Then it hit her. There was only other person she’d had contact with since the shooting, besides the police.
“Oh my God,” she said. “Peter?”
“He has been working with us for quite some time now. Long before you and I met. He has managed to facilitate many of our business transactions, while diverting attention away from us. At a price, of course. He is a valuable asset.”
“I don’t believe you,” Beth said. “Peter may be a lot of things, but he’d never get involved with people like you.”
“You think you know him, do you?”
“I was married to him for nearly four years.”
“Then you must know that he was sleeping with your sister.”
83
It took beth several moments and a considerable amount of effort to recover from Rafael’s bombshell. What helped her was to allow herself to slip into a state of complete denial.
“Bullshit,” she said. “Jen would never do that to me.”
“Jen is a creature of impulse, Beth. You know that better than anyone.”
He was right, but Beth refused to believe that her sister would betray her like that. It was true that Jen didn’t seem to care much about who she slept with, as long as she got the rewards, but there’s no way she would have taken on Peter. He was off-limits.
But then, the concept of off-limits wasn’t one that Jen truly understood, was it? She’d proven that more than once, like the night she’d flirted shamelessly with the newlywed, right in front of his wife.
Could Rafael be telling the truth?
Was Jen the woman Peter had been cheating with? The reason for their divorce?
As if he were reading her mind, Rafael said, “It’s a sad, unfortunate tale, Beth. But it goes well beyond an unfaithful husband and a sister’s betrayal.”
“I don’t understand.”
“How do you think Marta and I met you? Do you think it was an accident?”
“No,” Beth said. “I think you and your little fuck buddy were on board that ship trolling for victims. You saw us in the restaurant and liked what you saw.”
“Yes,” Rafael told her. “We did like what we saw. But we met Jennifer long before that cruise.”
That didn’t make any sense.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I told you, Beth. Your ex-husband and La Santa Muerte have long had a business relationship. A little over a year ago, Marta and I were visiting Los Angeles and we held a private party for our friends. A way to say thank you for their service to La Santisima.”
“What does this have to do with Jen?”
“Your sister was Peter’s guest at the party, and quite a popular one at that-with both the men and the women.”
“Shut up, you disgusting pig.”
“I know this is painful for you, but I think it is important that you know the truth.”
Yes, Beth thought. The truth. Not these horrible lies.
She tried again to work the rope free but still couldn’t get it to budge.
“Marta took quite a liking to your sister that night. But Jennifer was so high on alcohol and drugs, I doubt if she remembered either of us. Marta, however, did not forget. And when Peter later found himself in a bit of… difficulty…Marta offered him a tempting solution.”
“What kind of difficulty?”
“He fathered your sister’s child.”
Beth felt her skin go cold; her mind was suddenly crowded by the image of the baby smiling up at her.
Jen’s baby.
Peter’s baby?
“Andy,” she said, almost involuntarily.
“Yes,” Rafael said, sounding surprised. “You remember him?”
“Only a face. A face and the name.”
“Unfortunately for Jennifer, Peter had no interest in being a father. Especially out of wedlock. Especially when he was trying to win back his ex-wife.”
Beth remembered all the phone calls from Peter in the wake of the divorce, begging for her to take him back. The excuses to see her at the office. But she had rebuffed his advances every time. She’d been hurt enough, and she wasn’t interested in giving him a chance to hurt her again.
“I still don’t understand,” she said. “What does any of this have to do with us meeting you and Marta on that cruise?”
“The whole thing was prearranged. Peter booked passage for Jennifer and her guest as a gift to her. A chance for her to get away and think about the pregnancy. But what she didn’t know was that she was the gift. To us. ”
“He was setting us up?”
“Not you,” Rafael said. “He was not expecting you to be her guest.”
That’s right, Beth thought. She’d been a last-minute substitute when Jen’s best friend, Debbie, flaked out.
“Yet there you were, sitting in that restaurant, then later, standing at the ship’s rail. And I knew I had to have you.”
Beth felt a ball of bile lodge in her throat. The thought that she’d let this guy even come close to her made her want to projectile vomit.
“But Marta wouldn’t hear of it,” Rafael continued. “You were not part of the deal.”
“That’s what you two were arguing about in the bar.”
Rafael nodded. “When Peter found out you would be there, he made a personal appeal to El Santo that you be left alone.”
“But you didn’t listen.”
“I tried, my darling. And despite your rudeness toward me when I saw you sitting in that cafe in Playa Azul, it was very difficult to walk away.”
“How flattering. And Jen?”
“We had already taken her by then. But before the day was done, my prayer to La Santisima was answered. And we took you as well. Just as you were leaving the police station.”
“But why? Weren’t you disobeying a direct order from your precious El Santo?”
“Yes,” Rafael said. “And that is why I have this.” He gestured to his ravaged face. “An offer of flesh as penance for my sins.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
“Oh no, my darling. We call it a cleansing. It is quite painful-but without pain there is no glory before God. You will see.”
Beth stared at his face in the rearview mirror again and renewed her effort to loosen the rope, a deep, dark well of dread bubbling in her intestines.
She had to get the hell out of this car.
84
