Chapter Forty-One
Alexandra
Tears sting my eyes as I walk to the address Mateo gave me, which turns out to be a motel on the outskirts of Costa Oscura. There’s a ‘Condemned’ flyer plastered to the door of the front office with a smiley face sticker stuck on it. Through the window, I can see the man working the front desk slumped down face-first into an empty pizza box, his mouth working open and closed like a goldfish and his snores so loud I can hear them outside. To say this motel — with a sunken roof, rats running freely in the parking lot, and a car on cinder blocks in the parking lot — is a shithole is an insult to shitholes everywhere.
I see Mateo’s bike parked next to the car on cinder blocks, but have no idea what room he’s in. I also have no desire to go knocking on doors to find him, or even raising my voice for fear of alerting the denizens — yes, denizens, because ‘resident’ seems too tame a word for the feral people that must live in this dump — that there’s fresh meat roaming the parking lot.
I call Mateo.
“I can’t believe you’re staying in a place like this,” I say the second he answers.
“I was at the Four Seasons, but I didn’t like their breakfast choices, so I moved. Can you believe they wouldn’t have a vegan option?”
“The horror,” I say, smiling. It feels comforting and strange to smile. As much as I hurt, I’m looking forward to seeing Mateo. It’ll be nice to have a friendly face around. Someone who’s proved themselves a friend for as long as I’ve known them. Unlike a certain traitor and murderer I left stewing in someone’s blood back at Reid’s Repairs. “Which room is yours? I don’t want to knock on the wrong door and have that creepy clown from It snatch me.”
“The clown’s in 2A. You’ll know it by the trail of headless bodies out front. I’m in room 3B.”
Because I’m not sure if Mateo is joking or not, I take the flight of stairs on the opposite end of the building in order to avoid any clown encounters. On the way, I encounter three mice, eight roaches, and a flier for a nearby rehabilitation center with the words “Counselor Jeff sells crack” and a phone number scrawled on it. Good to know.
“What’s happened?” Mateo says the moment he opens the door. It’s right after the first knock and happens so quickly I’m sure he must’ve been waiting at the door for me. There’s so much concern and caring on his face and in his voice that the fragile dam inside me that’s held back all my tears shatters and a sudden sob rips itself from my throat.
Instead of answering, I pull him into a tight hug and soak his shoulder with my tears.
Fuck, it feels good to hold someone that I know I can trust. For a minute, I simply stand in Mateo’s doorway, bawling my eyes out on his shoulder.
After everything I’ve been through with Dixon, what hurts the most is can’t even admit the truth. Instead, he has to murder and lie to cover things up, and then, for his pathetic story, he blames the last two people alive that I’d consider family. It isn’t just an insult to me, it’s an absolute disgrace to Lucas, too.
“It’s Dixon,” I finally say, once the gasping sobs subside enough I can speak.
Carefully, Mateo guides me into his room and leads me toward the bed. I don’t sit right away, though. I give it a look through tear-bleary eyes and see that the bed, and the room itself, look surprisingly clean for being in a motel that looks like it was built to be a repository for rejected waste from the town garbage dump.
“I cleaned it myself when I got here. Stole the supplies from an abandoned housekeeping cart. It was dire, but it’s all good now. I even vacuumed. Twice.” Nodding, I lower myself onto the bed and then my face back into the crook of his shoulder. He puts his arm around me. “Dixon? Who’s Dixon?”
“A man I’ve been dating. He’s been helping me…”
“Is this the Dixon? The one who killed Lucas?” There’s shock in his voice, but no judgment; I’m so glad he’s here to listen.
I nod. “It’s complicated. I thought… I thought he was different. He convinced me, and there was all this stuff about what happened to Lucas… And then we… Then he…”
My voice cuts out. Mateo hugs me.
“What happened? Did he hurt you?”
Not physically. But deeper than that. So much of me wishes it was something so simple as a physical blow that broke us apart, but then, if it were, I wouldn’t be in this position. I’m stronger than that. I’d simply walk away and start again. But to give so much of myself to that man, to allow myself to see a life beyond grief — a life of moving on, a life with happiness, with love — and to have him so boldly and basely betray me is like experiencing a death all over again, except this time, it’s my own.
“Take your time,” Mateo says.
I do.
Because it’s one thing to cry yourself empty of tears and calm yourself enough that you’re not spending every breath weeping, it’s another thing entirely to form that breath into the words to recreate the deepest pain you’ve ever experienced.
Finally, I do.
“We found Marquez. He… he talked. He talked to Dixon… and Dixon says that he told him that…” Even those words take monumental effort, and I pause again, resting my face against Mateo’s shoulder while I try to figure out just how to say that the man that I used to love with what remained of my shattered heart tried to convince me that my childhood best friend and my father conspired to murder my brother. As I shake against Mateo, out of the corner of my eye, I see him take his cell phone out of his pocket and hastily swipe a few words across the screen.
“Alex, it’s OK,” he says, slipping the phone back into his pocket. “You’re safe here. Take your time. Do you want something to drink? There’s beer, water, I could even make you tea or coffee. Just relax, OK?”
I try. I even grunt something about water and Alex fetches me a cold bottle from the room’s sputtering fridge. It’s cold and tastes far better than water has any right to taste. It helps.
Though I feel stronger, Mateo doesn’t rush me. Time passes while I just sit, looking at the water bottle and taking the occasional sip, while he sits beside me, simply being there.
“Dixon says that Marquez told him you and my dad had Lucas killed. That Marquez was hired to watch over the meeting and make sure that Lucas didn’t leave alive and that all the violence could be pinned on the Road Kings.”
“That’s fucking ridiculous,” Mateo says. “I loved your brother, Alex. We grew up together. Prospected together. Earned our patches on the same fucking day. He was family.”
“I know. I couldn’t believe it. I don’t believe it.”
“Why the fuck that idiot ex-boyfriend of yours would even think that story would work?”
“He said that it was because Lucas found out that my dad was involved in all the drug dealing that was going on. That he’d cut you in, too, in order to make sure Lucas didn’t leave the meeting alive.”
“You know I’d never do that to your brother, right, Alex?”
In the process of nodding, I stop halfway. There’s a downside to knowing someone so well that simply looking at their face is like reading their soul. It”s an imperceptible shift, but there it is — in the clench of Mateo”s jaw, the too-quick flicker of his eyes away from mine.
“Mateo? What is it?” With each syllable that leaves my mouth, it’s like a part of me deflates. And when I close my lips around that plaintive question and see the flash in his eyes, I feel my heart drop.
He looks me over, coldly.
And, just as well as I can read him, he can read me.
“Alex, this is important. You know I’d never do anything to hurt your brother, right?”
The words come with an equal mix of desperation and threat.
I force myself to stand and look him in the eye; I can’t believe the boy I’ve known for most of my life, and had more crushes on than I can count, would raise such a reaction within me — fear, doubt, revulsion.
I have to find the truth.
“Mateo, you need to look me in the eye and tell me what happened to my brother.” He flinches at first, and tries to look away, but I don’t give him the opportunity to scan the ceiling for answers. I lean in, I grab him by the chin. “Tell me, Mateo.”
Then it’s like something snaps within him. His eyes harden, and he grips my wrist like a vise, squeezing so hard I release my grip on his chin and cry out in pain. He stands and then wrenches my arm behind my back, twisting so hard I can feel my shoulder pop within its socket. He pushes me face-first down onto the bed.
A hot, angry voice touches my ear with a simmering threat.
“You know, I really wanted to give you a chance, Alex. Because I really do care for you. Loved you like a sister. I wanted you to make the right decision, to say the right things, because I do not want to have to do this. But you’re not giving me a choice.”
It feels as if what remains of my world is collapsing around me into nothingness. Yet all I can do is scream in pain and cry bitter, helpless tears into the mattress.
“You killed him. Why, Mateo? He was your brother, too.”
“And he made himself into a fucking problem that had to be dealt with. Your father and I tried to cut him in. He had every opportunity to keep his fucking mouth shut and sit back and make more fucking money than he could even imagine, but he had to decide he’d rather be dead.”
“What happened to you?”
“I woke up to reality, Alex. Learned the truth. That the only thing that really matters is money. Learned that any motherfucker who’d get in the way of that is no friend of mine.”
“I’m in the way. Are you going to kill me, too?”
He twists my arm so hard I fear it’s going to break, and I scream in pain.
“Oh, no, I’m not going to kill you, Alex. Those aren’t my orders. I’m taking you to see your father.”