Chapter 30
Kairo~
It was Thursday evening, and after admitting defeat, I’d left work after lunch, my mind not in the right place to even leave my damn house. Triana’s arrest was all over the news, and her brother and Sonia were making some pretty loud waves, leaving me to feel more useless than I’d had before.
I also realized that I wasn’t the victim in this scenario, but that didn’t help with how I felt. Trying to focus on what Triana was going through didn’t stop me from feeling like complete trash, and I was fairly certain that the feeling was never going to go away.
Like an idiot, I also had my television stuck on the news to hear anything and everything that was going on with Triana.
Since there was no way that Sonia would tell me anything, the television and internet were my only source of information, which wasn’t much more than my father had already told me.
With my head in my hands, I sat on my couch, wondering if it was possible to make this right.
If my father wouldn’t help me, I needed to think of another option...
any option, really. It also didn’t help that her parents weren’t a possibility right now.
While I was certain that they were worried about her, with their relationship being what it was currently, I might only make things worse if I reached out to them.
Truth be told, her brother was the only other person that I could think of that might help me, but fuck...
I could only imagine how that conversation would go.
Just then, my phone rang, and even though I didn’t feel like answering it, hope was a motherfucker, and every time that my phone came to life, I prayed that it was Triana. Even though I knew that it wouldn’t be, that didn’t stop me from hoping that it was.
Grabbing my phone, I didn’t recognize the number, which had my heart pounding furiously in my chest, my palms immediately slick with hope and more hope.
With my lungs tight in my chest, I answered the phone. “Hello?”
“Kairo Booker?”
“Yes, this is he,” I rushed out, my voice sounding like someone was sitting on my chest.
“This is Tomasco Medina,” the man said, and the tightness in my chest just got worse. “Sonia gave me your number.”
“Yes...of course,” I stammered. “What...what can I do for you?”
“Look, I’m calling because my sister is more important than my opinion of you, and Benicio Cortez is refusing to take my calls,” he said, getting straight to the point. “You’re the only option that I have left, and I figure it’s the least that you can do for what you did to my sister.”
“I know,” I quickly rushed out. “I never should have left her alone-”
“I’m not talking about leaving her to fend for herself,” he said, cutting me off.
“Triana’s very strong-willed, and I have no doubt that all of her choices were her own.
I’m talking about making her believe that there could ever be something real between you two.
Love aside, you knew that a happily-ever-after could never happen between you guys, yet you led her on to believe that it could happen, and she fell for it because of what all she was already going through emotionally.
You exploited a hurt, lonely, rejected girl, and if that doesn’t make you the biggest asshole on the planet, then I don’t know what does. ”
“I did not exploit Triana,” I automatically denied. “I fell in love with her and-”
“And made her believe in something that wasn’t possible,” he snapped, cutting me off again.
“I don’t have a problem with you falling in love with her because she’s a very easy person to love.
Yeah, no...my issue is that you should have suffered that shit in silence.
Being Alvin Booker’s son, you never should have gone back to the creek. ”
There was so much that I wanted to say, but I was also wise enough to understand what was at stake here, and pissing off Tomasco Medina further was not going to help Triana.
What happened between me and his sister didn’t happen as coldly or irresponsibly as he was making it out to seem.
I loved his sister, and I was still going to love her fifty years from now.
So, ignoring all that he’d just said, I asked, “How can I help?”
“I spoke to Triana earlier, and she told me that she hadn’t gotten arrested crossing the river,” he said, surprising me. “She had explained how she’d been scoping out the fence from underneath a sand cliff when two border patrol agents grabbed her while she was on Rancher Hills land.”
“What?”
“I’ve been calling Benicio Cortez’s office all afternoon to talk to him, see if he can get footage from their body cams or the security surveillance along the fencing, but his secretary refuses to put me through,” he went on. “She just keeps promising to pass on my messages.”
It wasn’t hard to deduce what he was asking. “You want my father to call him, I take it.”
“Your father, you...I don’t really give a fuck as long as he takes someone’s call,” he bit out.
“Every second that my sister is in that jail cell is another second where a woman’s worst nightmare can come true, and doing nothing about it is not something that I’m willing to live with.
Now, while I have no problem with her paying for the consequences of her actions, when she got arrested, she hadn’t been breaking any laws, and that’s the difference.
That’s why she doesn’t deserve to be sitting in a Mexican jail cell. ”
“If my father isn’t willing to make the call, then I’ll make it myself,” I promised him.
“If your father isn’t willing to make the call, then he’s just a big of an asshole as you are,” he spat. “And no matter what happens with my sister, over my dead body will I ever let you near her again.”
He hung up before I could say anything, but I couldn’t blame the man for being as angry as he was. Tomasco was worried about his sister, and I was positive that he was still reeling from being blindsided by all of this.
Knowing what I had to do, I dialed my father, and he answered on the second ring, probably worried that I was going off the rails, which I was close to doing, admittedly.
“Kairo?”
“I just got off the phone with Triana’s brother,” I said, not pussyfooting around. “He said that she was arrested while on Rancher Hills, sitting under a sand cliff.”
“How does he know this?” he asked, all business.
“He was able to speak to her earlier today, and she insisted that the agents’ body cams and surveillance cameras on the fence can prove it,” I answered.
“Tomasco called to tell me that he’s been trying to get a hold of Benicio Cortez to plead on the behalf of his sister, but Benicio isn’t taking his calls.
His secretary just keeps assuring Tomasco that she’ll pass on his messages. ”
“So, what are you asking, Kairo?”
“I’d like Benicio Cortez’s direct number, so that I can call him myself,” I said, deciding against asking my father to step in the middle of this. “I’m also prepared to deal with the fallout from letting him know what’s going on.”
“You can go to prison,” he reminded me. “And you’re not the only one. Just because she might be innocent of crossing into Mexico, she still traveled with you to the border. She can still be arrested for crossing over into Sterling Acres.”
“Then I’ll lie,” I told him. “I’ll tell Benicio that I crossed over and traveled with her on Rancher Hills territory.”
“Kairo-”
“Are you going to give me his number or not?” I snapped. “That’s all I need from you, Dad. I don’t need any lectures on how I screwed up my life or any advice on how to fix it. I just want Triana home, and I don’t care if I have to sit in prison to make that happen.”
“Says the man who’s never had a hard day in his life,” he shot back. “It’s easy to say that you’re willing to spend the rest of your life in prison for this girl when you have no real idea of the horrors.”
I was quiet for a second before saying, “If you want to talk about horrors, then let’s talk about how every second of every day, my mind is conjuring heinous images of Triana being raped and beaten in her jail cell.
Do you honestly think that sleeping comfortably in my own bed at night is easier than sitting in a jail cell right now?
Because I’m not sleeping comfortably, Dad.
I can barely stand to exist, so don’t talk to me about the horrors of prison when they can’t be any worse than what Triana might be experiencing right now. ”
He didn’t say anything right away, but when he finally spoke, he said, “I’ll make the call. As emotionally invested as you are in all this, you might cause more harm than good. I can tell Benicio that I heard a rumor, and he’ll be more apt to listen to me and take me seriously.”
“While I appreciate the offer, I’d rather take care of this myself,” I told him honestly.
“Why?”
“Because I don’t trust you,” I replied bluntly, and not to hurt him; it was the truth.
However, instead of taking offense, he said, “Which is why I need to do this.”
“Dad-”
“Kairo, I am not going to lose you over this, and even if that weren’t the case, if she wasn’t breaking the law when they arrested her, then this situation needs to be remedied as soon as possible,” he said, cutting me off, and as much as I wanted to argue, Triana coming home was more important.
Pride could go fuck itself.