He has his jacket draped over his shoulders. His suit is a worn-out beige, the style about a decade old. It looks like a knock off. Like him. An imposter in a stolen role. He’s also grown softer around the middle. I notice the paunch when he turns back to face me.
So different from Cristiano in every way.
Cristiano.
My heart sinks a little deeper at the thought of him. He’s gone. I’ll never see him again.
“You were at the dock,” I say.
He nods.
“Did you have Jacob killed?”
“Do you miss him? I thought you’d be grateful.”
“You ordered it.”
“I didn’t need both him and Marcus. Marcus was more useful at the time,” he says, glancing at David with a sly grin, making me wonder what that exchange is about.
“Are you hurt, Cousin?” Felix asks.
His question causes my focus back to him and he’s cocked his head to look at my face. He has his hands in his pockets. A heavy watch and gold chains crowd both wrists. I remember how much he liked to show off anything gold. Remember how my dad found it so distasteful, found Felix distasteful, like Jacob. The one comment that still comes to mind was about how real men didn’t need to prove themselves with displays of wealth or status. That only those who didn’t belong needed so hard to fit in.
“I don’t know that we’re technically cousins,” I say. Probably not the smartest thing to say.
“By marriage.” He shrugs a shoulder. “I thought you might appreciate having family in your time of need.”
“Are you demented?”
He smiles. “You are ungrateful.” His accent is strong.
David clears his throat. “We good?” he asks.
Felix shifts his gaze to David only momentarily. “Are you hurt, Cousin?” he asks as he comes closer.
Without waiting for my reply, he takes my jaw in one hand and tilts my face up to his before brushing hair back from my forehead.
“Some bruising,” he comments. “It’ll take the price down, of course. Damaged goods.”
I tug my face out of his hands. “Don’t touch me.”
He grins, grips my jaw again, tighter this time. “Does she have all her teeth?” he asks and gestures to David with a nod of his head. David takes hold of both sides of my head while Felix pries my mouth open. I’d bite off his fingers if I could, but I can’t at the angle they’re holding me.
He makes a satisfied sound.
“Not a virgin though,” he says, still peering inside my mouth like I’m some animal. “Virgins bring in more money.”
“That’s on your father-in-law,” David says. “Nothing I can do about that.”
“Sick man,” Felix comments casually. Did everyone know what Uncle Jacob had done to me? Did they just stand back and let it happen?
“Anal virgin?” he asks, releasing my mouth, pulling his fingers away before my teeth snap shut.
I tug at my bound arm but of course it’s no use so I draw my head back as he starts to discuss the possibilities of selling that particular part of my anatomy, and spit in his face.
He stops talking, that smug grin instantly wiped away.
My heart races even as I try for a victorious smile.
David mutters a curse. Felix first uses the back of his hand to wipe off my spit on his right cheekbone, then backhands me so hard with that same hand that I fall back on the bed. My head crashes against the wall, then the metal railing, the blow stunning me.
I feel the warmth of blood rolling down my cheek.
He straightens, adjusts his jacket over his shoulder, his expression of rage morphing back into a false smile. For a single instant I see the real Felix Pérez. And it terrifies me.
“Apologize!” David orders me.
Felix raises a hand. “No need,” he says. “I expect no less from a De La Cruz. They’re animals. I’d pour the contents of that bucket over your head but then I’d have to smell you.” He checks his watch. “Speaking of, we’re on a tight schedule.”
“We have a deal?” David asks.
“What deal?” I ask.
They both ignore me. Felix punches some numbers into his phone and turns it around to show David, who nods.
Felix calls to one of the men at the door, the one with the keys. He undoes my cuff from the rung of the headboard and re-cuffs my arms behind my back. He lifts me to stand, almost making me knock the bucket over as I do.
“Where are we going?” I ask Felix or David or anyone who will answer. I’m marched out of the room, noticing the apartment we’re in, where two more men sit in the kitchen eating hamburgers. The TV playing in the background is in a language I don’t understand. Sounds like German.
I’m taken down the stairs, the man simply dragging me along when I trip or don’t move fast enough, before we’re outside.