you were in my club, I’ll be as dead as you are.”
“Last I looked, I was still standing.”
“Then you’re a lucky man,” she said. “But your luck won’t last long, so take your weapons and go. Trust me, you’ll need them.”
“Where can I find these people? Do you know?”
Little Fina scowled at him. “Haven’t you been listening to me? Get out. Now. Before I kill you myself.”
She made a quick hand gesture and the man in the white suit grabbed both Vargas and Ortiz by the collar and shoved them toward the stairs.
And as they headed into the abyss below, Little Fina shouted, “Come back here again, Ortiz, and I’ll have your fucking head!”
79
She tried calling the number twice and got Ortiz’s voice mail both times.
Damn it, Nick.
So much for Plan B.
She knew she was only supposed to call if the headaches started again, but she was so bowled over by her sudden revelation, she needed to talk to him, as soon as possible.
On her third try, she left a message.
“Nick, get back here as soon as you can. I have news.”
But what was the news?
Sure, she’d remembered the name, and little Andy’s face staring up at her, and she knew that he was Jen’s child-Jen’s baby, for godsakes-but how did she know this? And what exactly did it mean?
Was Jen was alive? And if so, where was she? And where was the baby?
It had been ten months since their trip to Playa Azul, but the face Beth saw staring up at her in her mind’s eye was at least three months old, which meant that Jen had to have been pregnant during the cruise.
But why hadn’t she told Beth?
And how on earth had she hidden it so well?
Beth had seen her naked, standing in their cramped stateroom, and maybe Jen had looked a little thicker than usual, but Beth had attributed that to the breast implants.
But she knew that many women don’t start to show until the middle of their second trimester, so Jen could easily have been four months pregnant when she disappeared.
Beth thought back to their lunch together on that last day. She had relived the conversation so many times that she knew the words by heart:
There’s something else I’ve been wanting to tell you. Something…
Jen had paused, unable to say the words. And Beth had been too stupid and self-absorbed to pick up on it.
But then this begged a whole new question, didn’t it?
If Jen had disappeared before giving birth, how on earth could Beth have held little Andy in her arms?
Either she was confabulating big-time-which would undoubtedly make Dr. Stanley’s day-or that day in Playa Azul was not the last time she’d seen Jen.
Far from it.
Sitting on the edge of her chair, Beth closed her eyes, straining to remember, working the image of little Andy’s face through her mind, trying to connect it to a place or an event — but nothing came.
Nothing.
Come on, come on, she thought, squeezing her eyelids tight and concentrating with everything she had.
Break through, goddammit, break through.
But no matter how she tried, she could not dig deep enough to summon up the memory. The face and name were all she had — and it just wasn’t enough.
Consumed by frustration, she jumped to her feet, began pacing the room. More than ever before, she felt trapped. Trapped by a brain that wouldn’t cooperate.
Moving to the nightstand, she stared at herself in the mirror, at the scar atop her head, and all she wanted to do was strike out at herself, pummel her brain into submission.
Remember, goddammit.
Please, just fucking remember…
And then she began to cry again and hated herself for turning into a weepy little hag, but the tears were all she had, the only way she could purge the frustration. So she let them flow without hindrance, rolling down her cheeks and onto her bare chest. Then she suddenly swung her arms up, banging her fists against her reflection, cracking the glass.
Remember, remember, remember, remember, remember, remember, remember, remember, remember…
But it wouldn’t come.
It would never come.
She knew that now.
Stumbling to the bed, she fell across the mattress and continued to cry into a pillow, wishing-not for the first time-that she had never made it out of that Taco Bell parking lot.
Because even death would be better than this.
Death was relief.
Release.
Freedom.
Peace.
And she continued to cry, crying until no more tears would come, until her eyes were so swollen she couldn’t keep them open, and just as she was about to drift off into sleep, a familiar voice said, “Hello, Elizabeth.”
Startled, she whipped around, yanking the bedsheets up to cover her naked body as she squinted toward the door and saw a dark figure standing there.
“Who the hell are you? What do you want?”
“It took me a while to find that little car, but I knew I would. And I knew if I found the reporter, I’d find you.”
Beth was frozen. Couldn’t move.
Then the figure stepped into the light, and she sucked in a breath, not quite believing what she saw.
It was Rafael Santiago.
But not the perfect specimen she remembered.
This Rafael was different.
This one only had half a face.
80
“ You should make me walk back to the hotel,” Vargas said. “Sorry I screwed things up for you in there.”
Ortiz unlocked his car door and shook his head. “Did you hear what that fucking puta called me?”
“I tend to ignore things that don’t make any sense.”
“Damn right it don’t make sense,” Ortiz said. ““‘Frightened little boy’…She’s lucky that cholo had my piece. I would’ve popped one in her hairy little ass right then and there.”
“So we’re good?”
Ortiz opened his door and climbed in. “Get in the car, pocho.”
Vargas climbed in next to him and Ortiz said, “One thing you might’ve mentioned before we went in
