“Drink?” he asks.
“Just a ginger ale. Please. I need to be alert.”
“Got it.” A few minutes later, we’re seated at a secluded booth, and I’ve scanned the entire place but haven’t found Michelle. I wonder if she met a client here. I don’t see any other exits, though. So where did she go?
Miguel’s phone vibrates, and when he looks at the screen, his already-scowly face grows impossibly darker.
“Motherfucker,” he mutters under his breath.
“What?”
Wordlessly, he slides his phone over to me, and I see a text across the screen from Raul.
Raul: You wouldn’t believe who just showed up at your office today
Who?
Raul: Your brother. None other than Ricardo Santiago himself.
I nearly drop his phone. “No fucking way,” I hiss. “You only have the one, right?”
“Yep.”
“I’m going to have to have one of the girls go investigate this. It’s the smartest thing to do, right?”
He shakes his head. “Let me think about it. I want to test the waters first. Thankfully, Toni’s at Madison’s and Raul is bound to silence.”
“Can you trust him?”
“Yeah.”
“Does your brother typically just show up unannounced?”
“Always. He doesn’t like to be held down by things like responsibility, so he doesn’t leave addresses, doesn’t leave phone numbers. Just shows up when he wants to.”
“Like a vagabond.”
“Yeah.”
Then I see her, just as she crosses my path and heads straight to the bar.
“It’s her!” I mouth, but she isn’t alone. She has some guy with her. His hand’s on her lower back, leading her out of the bar. “We have to follow them.”
He tosses a few bills on the table, and as I stand to go, someone stumbles into me. He reeks of cheap whiskey and doesn’t even bother to keep his gaze from raking over me as I nearly fall into Miguel.
“Oh, hello there, beautiful.” Oh, God, he’s missing teeth and has a stain across his shirtfront that I can’t identify and don’t want to. My stomach flips.
Ew. Ew, ew, ew!
In two seconds, Miguel has him by the shirtfront, shaking the guy.
No!
“Just let it go,” I whisper to him.
“Watch where the fuck you’re going.” He gives him another shake.
The guy holds his hands up in surrender. “Now, just let me go, mister, no harm, no foul, alright?”
“Please,” I say to Miguel. With a glare, Miguel lets him go, then without warning, the asshole rears back and takes a swing. He misses Miguel and nearly hits me on the shoulder, which I know immediately was a major strategic error on his part, because if he hits me, Miguel will probably do something like murder him, drag him out of here, then unrepentantly toss his body into the next canal after chopping it up in little pieces.
That would make it hard to be anonymous.
“All a misunderstanding,” I say, giving a head tilt toward the door while firmly pushing at Miguel before he goes all caveman. “We need to go.”
Miguel’s got the guy’s shirt in his fists, and they’re staring each other down, so I very carefully pluck his fingers out of the fabric while yanking him with me. Nothing to see here, folks.
Miguel says something under his breath to the guy, who backs away, hands up in surrender. Not sure what he said but I think it had something to do with killing and maiming, because of course.
No one’s even looked our way, but the incident was enough of a distraction that I’m afraid we’ve missed her. When we get outside I look around the parking lot but see no one. My heart sinks. Toni was counting on me.
“Did you have to do that?” I hiss out of the corner of my mouth. “For real?”
“He could’ve hurt you,” Miguel growls. “Fuck why we’re here. Fuck what we’re doing.” He slams the car door, so we’re alone. “And if Toni’s mom is too young and stupid to give a shit about her own damn flesh and blood, I’m not giving her back anyway.”
Oh.
Oh, wow.
So maybe his hesitation is intentional?
“But she’s her mom,” I say, once again becoming that little girl whose mom is gone, left bereft and alone.
Miguel works his jaw and doesn’t reply. Movement in what I thought was a vacant car a few rows ahead of us catches my attention. Is that… I peer into the darkness, unable to get a clear view.
“Miguel…”
But he’s already opened his car door and is heading in that direction. I remind myself to never, ever bring him on a covert mission again oh my God.
In the next second, someone’s screaming, Miguel’s trotting toward them, and I slam my car door, following on his heels. Someone’s in distress.
“Help!” a woman’s voice screams. “Someone help me!”
We’re the only two people on the street as Miguel yanks the door open. A man’s got his pants around his ankles, and none other than Michelle Soto pinned beneath him. I take this all in within the two seconds of opening the door before Miguel goes into action.