28. Attila
28
ATTILA
T here are cars waiting for us on the small private airstrip when the plane touches down. We haul what little luggage we have and make our way to the waiting vehicles, with Dante, The Jekyll and me piling into one of the middle cars before the convoy takes off.
“I need you to remember this is Mexico,” Dante says, looking out at the landscape as we fly through the countryside. “Don’t let your guard down; expect the unexpected.”
I look over at The Jekyll, sitting quietly in the passenger seat. We’re that close to Castillo. I can’t imagine that he’s ever been as close as he is now to getting the revenge he’s craved for his wife’s murder. The fact that he’s nearing the end of his journey has left him somewhat jarred; I can sense this in the silence that’s enveloped him. For five years, he’s lived and breathed nothing but Coyin Castillo. It’s all he’s known. What will he do once he’s accomplished what he set out to do? If everything goes to plan, this will be one chapter he’ll be closing, but he’ll have to open another.
“Caleph sends his regards,” Dante says, looking up from his phone. I sit next to him, my hands steady on my knees, but say nothing. I can imagine what Caleph must be feeling right now; we’re so close to his enemy yet he’s so far away. He won’t be able to partake in this final leg of our journey. He won’t be able to witness the satisfaction of putting Coyin Castillo down. I know this is what he’s looked forward to since he was fourteen. I know this is all he’s ever wanted. Until there was more. He may have always wanted to dig Coyin’s grave, but there’s one thing he wants more than that. And that’s to live a long and relatively uneventful life with the love of his life, the woman who’s stolen his heart. The one thing more important to him than driving a dagger through Coyin Castillo’s heart is not losing Ariadne. If he left her to take care of this, she’d know. And she’d never forgive him. She did it once before, but she wouldn’t do it again.
I would make sure Coyin Castillo was destroyed once and for all. I would ensure Caleph’s vengeance. As well as The Jekyll’s. He deserves that; if it wasn’t for him, we probably wouldn’t have gotten this far in our search for the man who has stained our lives for so long. I’m nothing if not man enough to admit this.
“You know, I don’t even know your name,” I say, breaking into The Jekyll’s train of thought. He looks back at me, locks his jaw and seems to consider my words.
“TJ, remember?”
He smirks, goading me. I can’t deny we don’t work well as a team. Because we do. He’s the sort of man I would want on my team. The sort of man I know I can trust and depend on. When required, he would get the job done. Better than anyone else.
“Your real name,” I whisper. “Not the name I gave you to make you mad.”
My words are a truce of sorts. They also tell him what he probably doesn’t want to hear; if I died here today, at least I’d die knowing his name.
* * *
“Fuck you , man. Don’t even think about dying on me.”
I laugh at The Jekyll’s warning and sit back in my seat. I watch Dante as he busies himself with something on his phone, then as his lip curls up in a salacious smile and a flush of heat causes the side of his neck to redden.
“Wifey?” I ask him. He looks up in surprise, tucks his smile away, then adopts his poker face.
Dante has a special smile reserved just for his wife, the same way that Caleph softens around Ariadne. Much in the same way that The Jekyll probably adored his wife. These are men that come from the most ruthlessly dangerous underbelly of crime. I know, because I’m one of them. Yet each one of them softens in the presence of a woman. And not just any woman. The woman that has captured their hearts.
The Jekyll may have joined the party late, but he’s one of us now. Looking at him, I suddenly understand the magnitude of his pain. I couldn’t imagine Caleph without Ariadne, nor Dante without Kingsley. And I know, without hesitation, that if they ever had to live without their significant other, they’d be carrying around the same pain that The Jekyll is drowning in right now.
I shudder at the thought. I myself would not be able to stand the pain this possibility would cause my brothers. By the same token, I hope I never find myself in a similar situation — where I’d be worrying day and night over the safety of a woman. Where a woman would come along to shatter my hard exterior in order to infiltrate the inside of me. A situation where I would neatly reserve certain expressions and reactions for one person who would turn my life on its head. No. I rather prefer being on my own, controlling what I can of my own life without distraction.
We drive on, until we reach a villa and the cars come to a stop in a circular driveway. Dante informs us this will be our home base for the next few days until we can put our plan into action then hotfoot it out of Mexico, a country which is not our own and causes our anxiety levels to escalate. We don’t like what we can’t control.
I’m the first out of the car, swinging my duffel over my shoulder as I stand looking at the massive house that awaits us. The Jekyll comes to stand beside me; we are almost the same in height, and he looks up to observe the house through my eyes.
“Cesar,” he says. “Cesar Cavalho.” He says it so low, almost as though he doesn’t want anyone else to hear. I don’t know why the turnaround, but the name is befitting of the lion of a man who stands beside me. “And I stand by what I say — don’t go getting yourself killed, Attila.”