Chapter 37 Luisa #2
My stomach does a gravity-defying triple somersault the second Holly pulls off the Westlake Highway into the parking lot of the Happy Hooker, Inc.
“I can’t do it,” I groan from the passenger seat. “I was awful to that man.”
Holly shifts the car to park, then turns to face me. “Just tell him how you feel.”
I gaze at the red shack and the multicolor strands of Christmas lights twinkling over the porch, even in the summer.
“From the heart, Luisa,” she adds gently. “Don’t get stuck in that head of yours.”
I sigh, leaning the side of my head into the windowpane. “When did I become such a coward?”
“You’re not a coward.” She clasps my arm encouragingly. “You’re just in love.”
I gaze back at the building, knowing Eli is inside. My chest expands, then just as quickly contracts with ache and yearning.
“What do you have to lose?” she asks.
“My dignity,” I offer reluctantly.
“Oh, honey,” Holly scoffs. “We left our dignity back in that pawnshop on Cheshire Bridge Road.” This makes her laugh. “We’re just a pair of lowlife criminals.”
“Remind me not to drive off a cliff with you,” I deadpan, opening the passenger door, then stepping out into the sweltering afternoon.
Holly lowers the passenger window. “Don’t take no for an answer,” she calls out. “And if he offers to take your jewels to the back room, just let him.” She bursts into a fit of adolescent laughter, but I’m too nervous to join her.
I push my way through the front door. Above me a bell tinkles, causing Eli to gaze up from the register.
A deep frown takes over his face at the sight of me, his fingers frozen over a laptop, mid-keystroke.
Neither of us speaks. Eventually, he sighs, takes off his trucker hat, and scratches the back of his head.
Suddenly, I’ve lost all my words. Why does it feel like I have absolutely everything to lose right now?
“Luisa…” He trails off, fitting the hat back on his head. “If you’re here about the charges, Augusto took care of it,” he says, matter-of-fact. “And I already told you, I don’t want your money.” He folds his arms over his chest protectively, shielding himself from me.
The realization sends a stab of pain through my heart.
Holly is right, I need to be honest. But where to begin?
Should I tell him that all I think about is meeting his gray eyes the second I wake up in the morning, kissing those soft lips just because I can, running my fingertips through his messy hair, smelling the scent of soap and laundry on his skin, telling him every insignificant detail of my day, and then climbing into his bed at the start of every night, staying there forever?
I stare down at my feet, unsure of where to start.
“That’s not why I came,” I say after a long pause.
He raises a questioning eyebrow in response, so I step closer to the counter, across from him.
“I made a huge mistake, Eli.” He opens his mouth, but I put up a hand to stop him.
“Please, before you say anything, hear me out. I know I probably don’t deserve it, considering how I acted, but if I don’t say what I came here to say, I also know I’m going to regret it for the rest of my life. ”
His expression softens at this. His shoulders drop slightly as he gestures for me to continue. I take a deep breath, fill my lungs with resolve, and launch in.
“If I’m being honest, I can be pushy, maybe a little difficult, and—”
“A total pain in the ass,” he cuts in pointedly, but there’s no real bite to his words.
“But if I’m also being honest,” I press on, ignoring his jab, “I care about you. And I love how much you care about Pearl. I want to be a part of her life, too.” He listens, some of the apprehension draining from his face.
“Eli, I don’t let many people in,” I acknowledge, pushing past the thick knot of emotion in the back of my throat.
“Letting people get too close gives me all sorts of anxiety.”
“You’re not the only one,” he says quietly.
“I know,” I respond. “But as Holly rightly pointed out, you have more emotional intelligence than me.” I shrug, self-aware.
“I’m a work in progress.” I offer a half smile, hoping to disarm him, but his expression remains impassive.
“Anyway…” I continue, undeterred, “what I came here to say is…” I swallow hard, my blood pumping so hard that I can barely hear myself.
I’m about to put everything I have left—my heart, my trust, and my future—in Eli’s hands.
Carola’s words echo in my mind, Love is an act of faith, Luisa.
And so I close my eyes and leap. “What I came here to say is that you and Pearl are already inside my heart.” I bring my open palm over my chest, meeting his gaze as fresh tears run down the sides of my face.
I don’t wipe them away. “And more than anything”—I swallow hard—“I’m scared of losing you. ”
He exhales, staring down to the floor. It hurts to look at him. So I close my eyes and just stand there, reminding myself to breathe. I said what I came here to say, now it’s time to leave.
I don’t hear him step off the chair or walk around the desk. Instead, I feel his arms reach around me, his fingers digging up my neck into my hairline, cradling my head against his chest.
“Come ’ere,” he whispers, pressing a kiss to the top of my head.
I breathe him in, melting into his body without reserve. His heart is beating just as hard as mine.
“I’m not going anywhere, Luisa.”
I let out a long, easy breath. This time, I believe him.
The bell dings behind us, and we turn to find Holly peering in.
“Y’all decent?” she bursts in impishly. I shake my head, too happy to be annoyed. “Can we go to Ginny’s now and day drink?” She pulls out those ridiculous keys. “I would like to celebrate my kinda-sorta promotion.”
“You a janitor now?” Eli observes wryly.
“She’s the interim general manager,” I fill him in. “But there’s still the matter of King Griggs, ruling the world.”
“But for now, I’ve got the keys to the castle,” she bellows, rattling the keys. She probably thinks this is funny. “I can open every door at the club.” Her eyes go wide, as if she’s just been struck with an idea. “Maybe we can find a secret closet to lock Griggs in?”
“Pretty sure that constitutes kidnapping,” I offer, holding on to Eli with one arm. I may never let go of this man.
“Wait,” Eli breaks in, snapping his fingers. “Does Griggs keep an office at the club?”
“No,” Holly says. “Why?”
“That night that I went to his place, to pregame before the costume party,” Eli explains, “we had drinks in his home office.” He rubs thoughtfully at the stubble over his jaw.
“I made a joke, something like, ‘Oh, is this the place where you keep all the classified information,’ and Griggs laughed.” Eli looks from me to Holly, then back again.
“He said Anna-Byrd was too nosy, so he kept everything locked safely away at the club.”
“Sonofabitch,” Holly booms, so loud that Eli and I jump. “It’s the second locker.” She takes in our puzzled expressions. “He leased a second locker last year,” she explains. “I had to fill out one of those carbon copy forms with him. In triplicate!”
“You have to press really hard,” Eli sympathizes.
“Exactly,” Holly says, as if he’s just vindicated years of pointless paper bureaucracy.
“Remind me again why I decided to keep you two clowns?” I ask, trying really hard not to laugh.
“Because you love us,” Holly chirps.
I roll my eyes, unable to contain a smile.
“Can we get into the club tonight?” Eli asks.
“Guess who can get in anytime she damn well pleases?” Holly says, jingling the keys triumphantly.
A few hours later, we’re striding into the men’s locker room on the ground level of the Dogwood Hills Country Club, wondering why in God’s name there’s an adjacent bar and grill (in a locker room!).
“Let it be said,” Holly says, “that I will only cross this threshold for you.” We pause, taking in the enormity of the space. “I’ve never been here before.”
To our right, there’s an actual restaurant and a full bar stocked with top-shelf drinks.
To our left, polished dark mahogany lockers rise from floor to ceiling.
Wood benches and sitting lounge areas are interspersed throughout.
There’s a shower room, a sauna room, a steam room, and a marble vanity countertop with multiple sinks and a lit wall-length mirror.
There are also plenty of amenities—Q-tips, razors, shaving cream, combs…
“Are these Goldfish crackers?” Eli asks, helping himself to the orange contents of a glass jar tucked inside a nook.
“Wait—” I say, my tone indignant. “Are those regular Goldfish, or do you also have some special, super-cheesy Goldfish recipe y’all are hoarding away?”
“I will neither confirm nor deny the source of the Goldfish,” Holly deadpans.
Eli drops a handful of crackers into my hand. I shove them in my mouth and chew, disappointed that they are, in fact, regular Goldfish.
We go in search of Griggs’s two lockers. When we open the first one, our spirits fall. We find a couple of golf shirts and pants, silk briefs, a pair of spiked shoes, and a bottle of Tom Ford Oud Wood cologne.
“Nothing,” I say after a thorough search. Could we be wrong?
That all-too-familiar hopelessness starts to expand in my chest as we approach the second locker.
“Here goes nothing,” Holly says, inserting her master key into the lock. She opens the door, and I almost fall to my knees.
Before us, there’s a hard drive and massive cache of documents.
I rifle through, pulling out folders one by one, laying them out over one of the benches.
We find copies of checks from Griggs’s family foundation to the various nonexistent nonprofits, and a trail of cash that funnels into the offshore bank in Panama, only to be laundered back into shell companies like Peachtree Holdings, LLC.
The Lake Chiaha development sits at the center of a massive fraud scheme.
But there’s more—enough financial data to build a case on tax evasion, and a ledger containing a list of fake investors, records on bribes and political donations. Before I know it, I’m so overwhelmed that I’m wiping away tears of relief.
“The Castillos’ fake deed,” I say, holding up the certificate for Eli and Holly to take in.
Eli sighs and then releases a long, drawn-out “Hot diggity damn.”