Next came Maddie’s smiling face as she promised to help me, followed by Hendrix and Tuck’s grins as they played basketball with mi youngest chica, giving her something I’d never get the chance to repay them for.
Last, I saw Faye’s face as she held me in her arms my first night in America. Beaten nearly to a pulp and raped more than once by Dominic and his puppets, she’d sat on the trap house floor, gently rocking me back and forth as she sang one lullaby after another to me, as if I were a frightened child she was trying to soothe.
That night, she’d saved me.
Because in her, I’d found comfort.
It was a favor I hoped I’d returned.
The memories I’d cherish even in death, dissipated as a floorboard creaked beneath El Diablo’s heavy weight, ripping me back to the present, a place my soul would soon leave.
Determined not to go down without more of a fight—I was mi madre’s daughter after all—I lifted my hands to ward off the inevitable charge I knew he was about to take.
It didn’t help.
Moving quickly, the bastardo closed the space between us, and before I ever got the chance to land a single strike, he slammed my blade into my side, cutting me deep, before ripping it back out and plunging it into my soft belly.
White-hot agony shot through me, stealing my breath and causing my pulse to fly into an erratic frenzy. I couldn’t breathe. Absolutely Could. Not. Breathe!
Fighting to save me, even when it was estúpido to do so, Chiquita jumped to her feet and charged El Diablo. Slamming her small body into his grande one, she tried her best to knock him away from me.
In the end, it mattered little.
Despite the hit, Dominic didn’t budge.
Did that stop her from trying further? No.
“Dominic, stop!” she screamed from the floor where she’d landed, clawing at his arms and wrists with wild abandon. “I mean it, stop!”
Refusing to listen, even to her, the only person who ever stood a chance of subduing the monster that lived beneath his skin, El Diablo continued to sink the knife into my weakening body, stealing my life essence one puncture at a time, until the moment came in which I could stand no more.
Legs buckling, I hit my knees.
Feeling the blood drain from my face, my hands went to my belly, where my blood-soaked my palms, staining my skin for the last time.
Unable to hold myself any longer, I fell forward and straight into Chiquita’s waiting arms. Chin going to her shoulder, she held me against her, hugging me tightly.
“I f-failed,” I whispered, voice rapidly losing strength. “Failed my ch-chicas…”
Ashley’s body jerked as she sobbed against me. “You didn’t fail.” Hand stroking my back, she rocked me the slightest bit. “But, Carmen, you have to hang on.” More rocking. “Carmen, p-please. Don’t leave m-me.” Trembling hand snaking into my stringy hair, she held onto me for dear life as mine slipped away. “You can’t ever leave u-us.”
I had little choice.
Whether I wanted it to or not, my pulse was slowing. Before long, I would cease to exist, and when I did, my scarred soul would descend straight into the flames, the place I feared most.
Eyes growing heavy, I took a breath.
My cracking chest rattled in response.
Knowing there was no saving me, Chiquita buried her face in my hair as Little One screamed in the background. The gut-wrenching sound was more than I could take.
Lips parting, I tried to speak…
But no sound would come.
Kissing the place above my ear, Ashley whispered the words my failing heart so desperately needed to hear. “I love y-you, Car,” she said. “With every broken piece of m-me.”
A raspy exhale was my only response.
Along with the last one I gave.
Thirty-Six
James
Something is wrong…
The words repeated on a loop in my head as I stood in front of the shelter, back leaned against my parked truck, shaking hands shoved deep into my pockets.
How many minutes had ticked by since I’d last spoken to Carmen, I didn’t know, but more than enough time had passed for her to have made it to me.
That is, unless something had gone awry.
I wanted to puke at the thought.
“Pop,” Hendrix said, hardened eyes looking up one side of the desolate inner-city street before glancing down the other, “where the fuck are they?”
“I don’t know,” I answered, guilt gnawing at my gut. “But I shouldn’t have come here.” Ripping my hands out of my pockets, I raked them through my short hair, mussing my black locks. “I should have gone with her, should have fucking helped her.”
Doing so hadn’t been a possibility, not without putting a slew of others at risk—my son and his family included—but dammit, she didn’t need to go after the girls alone, especially not when her body was still burdened with sickness and her soul still bleeding from the physical trauma her pimp had inflicted on her.
Recalling the words she’d spoken and the gruesome image they’d painted in my head, my hands clenched on their own accord as I ground my back teeth together, fighting to keep my anger in check.
Mad as hell, it was impossible to do.
Like a string pulled too taut, I snapped.
“Goddammit!” I hollered as I slammed my fisted hand against the side panel of my truck, leaving a dent that I didn’t give two shits about having to get repaired. “I should have fucking gone with her!”
Hendrix looked back at me from where he stood, arms crossed over his chest. “Yeah,” he replied, not holding back. “You should have. Don’t mean we can’t go find her now, though.”
He was right.
But he couldn’t go.
The risk was too great.
Moving to the driver’s door, I gripped the handle tight. “Go inside,” I said, nodding toward the shelter. “Fill Maddie in on what’s going on”—so far, she’d been kept in the dark—“and tell her we’ll be needing a few beds, but I don’t know how many yet.”
Carmen wouldn’t require one since she was going home with me, the girls too, but I didn’t know where Faye and Amelia would land for the night. My door was
