Rafael quoted a number.
“And how many grams for a thousand U.S. dollars?”
Again, Rafael answered.
Damian repeated the question for euros, yens, rubles, rupees . . .
Each time, Rafael shot back with a figure.
“Is that right?” El Charro asked Comandante 19.
“I don’t know. Let me check.” Comandante 19 got out his phone and started punching numbers. His jaw dropped open. “He got them all right, El Charro.”
“Well, what do you know?” said El Charro. “The boy is nosicario, but he has a knack for numbers. We can use someone like him.” El Charro lowered Damian’s hand. “Well done, Damian. You managed to save your friendandimpress me.Sicarios!” He turned to the boys who had made it, his arm still around Damian. “You too, my little whiz kid,” he said to Rafael. “Congratulations! This is the beginning of a new chapter. Come. Let us celebrate.”
Damian followed El Charro out, the horrific images of black garbage bags, and mangled body parts, and blood-splattered walls etched forever in his mind.
Yes. This is the beginning of a new chapter, El Charro. The beginning of your end,he thought.Because I won’t stop until I have destroyed both you and Warren Sedgewick.
DESTROYING EL CHARRO TOOK TIME and careful deliberation. Damian knew he would only get one chance, so he had to make it count. Even if he managed to kill El Charro, the other members of the cartel would come after him, and Damian wasn’t ready to call it quits without taking Warren Sedgewick down. Not only did Damian have to plan his attack, he also had to put together an escape plan.
Two things worked in Damian’s favor. The first was that El Charro kept him clean. After Comandante 19 perished in a shoot-out, Damian slowly took over as the explosives expert, too valuable to waste on the streets. El Charro consulted him when he needed to obliterate rival safe houses, evidence, bodies—Damian had El Charro’s complete trust. The second thing Damian was grateful for was that El Charro sent Rafael to a private school outside of Caboras. El Charro needed more than muscle to run his organization. He saw the value of investing in young professionals, early on in their careers. Damian knew that Rafael would have to work for El Charro, but he intended to finish thecapooff long before it was time to collect.
Over the next few years, Damian saved his money—and there was a lot of it. By the time he was sixteen, he had moved into an apartment facing the ocean and traded in his panga for a secondhand yacht. When he saw the fishermen coming in, their boats heavy with the day’s catch, Damian went down and bought fresh fish and crabs and shrimp. He loaned them money to repair their tired trawlers and fishing nets. In turn, they invited him on their voyages and shared their secrets of the sea with him. If they noticed the looks their daughters gave Damian when they took him home for dinner, they didn’t say anything.
Damian didn’t just work with explosives, he was a slow, burning fuse, waiting to detonate. The bad-ass vibe that surrounded him both thrilled and intimidated the girls. The fact that he was removed—unattainable and uninterested—only spurred their desire for him. But Damian steered clear of romantic liaisons, the heady flush of first love, the sweaty palms and stuttered words, the sweet, painful yearning for a lover’s kiss. He remembered his first kiss, the night of the initiation ceremony, but not the lips or the face. El Charro had thrown a party in honor of the newsicarios. Food and booze and drugs and women. Damian had been introduced to the world of sex, and it suited him to keep his involvement limited to women who were paid to please him. Relationships were a weakness he did not allow himself.
Every year, Damian left a bouquet of Mexican sunflowers on MaMaLu’s grave. He picked the deepest orange blossoms with the brightest centers. MaMaLu was buried in Paza del Mar, in the cemetery behind the church of Archangel Michael—the same church where Damian had made his first drop for El Charro, the same church he had attended as a boy with MaMaLu. Her grave was surrounded by those of all the other dead, unclaimed prisoners from Valdemoros—a pile of rocks with a plain slab, engraved with her name and prisoner number. There was no date of death, because someone had forgotten to jot it down, and it broke Damian’s heart that she had been robbed of that dignity. Damian did not get a new stone for MaMaLu. He needed that reminder. Every year, when he saw that incomplete slab, the fire in him blazed higher, and he needed it to burn eternally so he could take a chisel and hammer to the hearts of the two men who had put her there, and carve out retribution. Then, and only then, would he get MaMaLu a proper tombstone.
Once when Rafael came to visit Damian over the holidays, they drove toLa Sombra, the cantina where Rafael’s parents had worked. It was still El Charro’s domain, one of the many bases he frequented. A new couple ran the place. They were younger than Juan Pablo and Camila. The woman’s smudged apron strained against her pregnant belly. Damian and Rafael could not bring themselves to eat there, so they bought fish tacos from a street vendor.
“I would never have survived if it wasn’t for you,” said Rafael. He was thirteen, but tall for his age. “You saved my life.”
They were sitting on the hood of the car, outside Casa Paloma.
“I savedmylife, Rafael.” He knew Rafael was thinking about a small, blood-splattered room in the mountains. “If you were in my way, I’d have taken you out. Make no mistake about it.”
Rafael took a swig of beer and laughed. “You like to think you’re allcojones, nocorazón.All balls, no heart. But I know better.”
“You don’t know shit.” Damian walked up to the tall, wrought iron gates of the now-lifeless estate.
Casa Paloma was in disarray. Tall, thorny weeds had taken over the garden. All the windows were boarded up, and the lock that Victor had chained to the main gate was gritty with rust. Damian liked that. It felt just like his memories of the place—chained and dead and abandoned.
Keep Out.
This was the place where MaMaLu had fallen victim to the politics of wealth and power, to greedy men with a sense of entitlement that left them with no remorse for the lives they destroyed.
“One day I’m going to own this place,” said Damian, when they got back in the car.
One day, he was going to bring down Warren with the same weapons he had used against MaMaLu: money and ruthlessness. One day, he was going to rob Warren of everything he held precious.
“Is that before or after you destroy El Charro?” asked Rafael, rolling his eyes. He wished Damian would give up his quest. El Charro was invincible and he didn’t want his friend getting hurt.
Damian doubted if El Charro remembered the nanny who had come chasing after a little girl and chanced upon a meeting of black crows. No. El Charro was the scavenger of carrion. One dead body was no different from another. Damian was not going to waste his time trying to make him remember. El Charro didn’t deserve explanations or justifications. He deserved fire and ashes, an incinerating descent to hell.
“First El Charro, then Warren Sedgewick.” Damian started the engine. “Then I take the place where it all began.”
As they drove away, Damian did not think of Skye. He never once thought of Skye. She was locked up in a room with windows that were boarded up with sheets of plywood. And Damian always, always stayed away from strawberries and gap-toothed girls with hair like spun gold.
