Caged: Retribution
Chapter 16
They're gonna die. Caro is going to kill them both. Téa and Esperanza will bleed out at the feet of a monster.
When Todd stepped through the doors of the hospital into the city, the sun was going down already. He stopped hard in his tracks and studied the darkening sky, sharp eyes roving the clouds, the tops of buildings, dropping down to the dusky city. He murmured, "A que hora es?"
Speaking Spanish in return, Rico guessed, "Six, maybe." He grunted softly and twisted slightly in Todd's painful grip. "You are hurting me, Blanco." But his words went nowhere, Todd's hold of him remained as tight as before.
Six o'clock. Caro has held Téa since ten in the morning. That makes it… seven, eight hours?
He swallowed, the muscles and saliva gurgling in his head. Boots cemented in place. Eight hours in the clutch of a monster. Too much time had passed. So much time. How long had it taken him to kill Ivan? Five minutes? Ten? Thirty? He huffed at the retreating light, his heart oddly steady, a soul-deep coldness running through him. He glanced down his body and he snorted, a bitter sound at his very movement. He was the dead one. Long… fucking… dead. Redemption was fully beyond his reach now. Salvation… gone in a snap. But maybe he could do this one thing, this last little thing of goodness… save Téa and Esperanza. Another snort.
Too much time has passed for saving them, don't you think? The one good thing will be the killing of Caro and his crew.
He pulled Rico close to him and in a tight, gravelly voice, thick with intent, said, "Where is Caro?"
The hold was as unbreakable as an iron chain, and as intimate as fucking, Todd's face close enough for his breath to caress Rico's ear, his neck. Todd smelled sweat, salt, fear. The sea.
"By the docks," Rico huffed, "the water. On the east side."
"You know the exact place?"
"Yes."
"I need to know if Juarez has made any progress on his own. I can't go there though, in person. He'll arrest me." He tightened his grip again. "Where is the closest Telepunto?"
"Around the corner," Rico spat, and he pulled at Todd, fighting the hold. The grip didn't loosen, only grew in its level of control. Rico got shoved ahead, forced to move in the direction of the telephone cafe. Rico's head was dense with drugs. He was grateful for the walk. He needed time to recover, to start thinking more clearly. To remember everything about the terrifying basement, its layout, and the way in. The details were playing hide and seek with him.
As they walked towards the telephone café, Todd found himself looking at people's faces, hoping to see Téa, but… of course, she was gone. He licked his lips and could taste blood. So much that he put his free hand to his mouth, his fingers dabbing at his lips, finding only dryness.
Too much time. It only takes minutes to bleed out. Mere… minutes.
He spotted the Telepunto, a kind of store with public phones. Before entering, he let go of Rico because somewhere inside of him, he figured he might attract attention if he were seen with a prisoner. Once inside, once he bought time, he called Ken who answered immediately.
"Holy fuck, Manning... where are you?"
"Have you found her? Has anyone found her?"
Ken took a few too many beats before answering and Todd knew it was because his voice had too much ice was in it, too little of whoever he had been as a person, as a feeling human being.
"No," Ken said finally. "Cops are canvassing the city. They're everywhere."
An odd warning of sorts? No, a threat. "Were you able to get anything from the ledger?"
"Yeah, about five addresses. All empty."
"You checked basements, looked for hidden rooms."
"Yeah. Juarez was on it. Had a shitfit when Jed refused to give him the book though. Your kid… he's tough. Juarez will need a warrant."
Todd only grunted.
"Manning… come to the hotel."
He almost laughed at the absurdity of the request. He felt like he could see Ken right through the wires. His delicate strength, cunning etched into an attempted poker face he never could quite achieve, not unlike Rico actually. There was a similarity in the two. No surprise in that, he figured. They both touched him, loved him, at the lowest points in his life. Didn't they? He shook his head, that was then. That… was then.
Let me love you, let me touch you, let me...let me...just tonight...
He breathed a moment. Silent on the phone. Holding the handset tight against his head. Heard Ken say his name. "Hey… Todd… I'm worried for you, Jed is worried. You took Rico… he's hurt, he needs to be cared for."
Todd glanced at Rico who stood next to him, eying the few other customers, his slender body trembling the smallest bit. Todd breathed in and out, an easy regular rhythm… watching him, as Ken tried to talk sense into him, words that made no sense, that weren't coming through. He couldn't hear through the noise, the pictures.
So much time has passed. Would she be cold on that basement floor by now? Is the floor wet with her blood? Does her blood taste like sugar? Or is it more like the fluid black iron that runs through her, the metal that holds her in place as she bends, bends, bends in the wind, never breaking…
Until Caro.
Todd placed the phone down and grabbed Rico who yelped softly at what must have been pain. They moved back onto the street, the sky having darkened even further. They had to get to this place...but maybe it didn't matter. Time didn't seem to matter any more. Would Caro even be there anymore? So much time wasted. So much TIME.
"Which way?"
"East."
They walked for a while, people passing, rain gathering. Their steps seemed slow but Rico was grateful because his head was finally clearing. There was a chill in the air, a threat. They were passing an alleyway when suddenly, Todd yanked Rico down into it a few yards, hidden from the crowds. The kid rolled his head against the brick wall, groaning, "What, Blanco, what?"
He drew Rico close to him, eyes holding fast to his, "What does he do with the bodies of the dead?"
Rico winced and glanced away, biting his lip, the pain on his face clear as day. "Jesucristo," he said under his breath. "Wake up, Blanco! THINK!"
Todd yelled, "He's had them for eight hours! It's ALL I can think! They're already DEAD!"
Rico shoved him back, now, a powerful punch to his chest, the push so hard that Todd reached out to keep from falling. Todd was strangely stunned. Rico glared at him, unafraid, his voice hard and unyielding, "What were you waiting for then? All these hours? So many hours by my side? Lost. Thrown away. Why are we walking and not driving? What are you doing, wasting even more time with a call to Kenneth, a useless call, you knew!?"
Todd pushed at Rico, his face a mix of disgust, confusion, hate. The sky rumbled above. Clouds noisy, angry. He had no answer. He blinked and shook his head… hours and hours at his lover's side, hours lost while Caro murdered Téa and Esperanza. How long had it taken him to give Jed the ledger with potential places. What had he been thinking? Hours had passed while they were drained by a monster. Hours passing while their bodies grew cold… hours spent immoveable by his lover's side. Useless, brainless, emptied of everything.
What had he been DOING?
He growled, "I don't fucking know."
Rico moved close to him, eyes holding Todd in place, Todd still. Rico's features softened, gentled. "I will tell you. Because you have lost your mind." Todd tilted his head, brows creased, the lines on his face more visible than before. Rico was reminded of Abram. The barks echoed from the morning… just this morning…
I want to know you more, I want to see what he sees, I want to touch what he touches... just us…I need it to be just us right now. Ahora… ahora...
He breathed, closed his eyes a moment, and then held fast to Todd's gaze, "You needed me to wake up and remember. You knew I am, I was, Caro's only love. You knew I was… a partner at the worst crimes. You knew... only I had the keys to finding YOUR love. You needed me. You trusted me to take you to them."
Todd didn't know what Rico was doing. Didn't understand his calm, his smooth, soothing voice. Something cracked inside of him and he huffed, turning slightly, away for a moment. He felt a warm hand on his arm, heat bleeding through the black shirt he wore. He slid his gaze back to Rico and saw haunted dark eyes staring back at him, deep into him. He dropped his gaze to his mouth, words spilling from moving lips.
"Instinct kept you at my side. You trusted those instincts... como un león. You knew you had time to wait. Like a lion."
Rico's mouth pursed, lips rubbing against each other. Lips Todd had kissed a hundred times in the darkness of a hundreds days here in Cuba, when there was nothing left for him, when he thought he had lost his family forever. Rico… was like a beacon... wasn't he? A beacon buoy in the wild waters, bouncing in the stormy waves, the only thing that kept Todd alive, a light shining in the black sea. Yeah, a signal that finally called Téa from across the sea and brought her home to Todd.
How had he known that?
He had picked Rico to stay with him when he had no reason to do so. He stopped Pedro from sending him away, even though he did not know him at all. He had gone to the man's bed out of compulsion less than lust or need because there was no love then. Not yet. He trusted Rico with his body, his soul, his secrets. He trusted his instinct. He needed to trust it now. He needed to trust his belief in Rico, a belief he didn't even know he had before this very moment.
"It's been too long," Todd said softly. "They have to be dead. We are too late."
"He is like a cat with a mouse. He will keep her for days. He will practice where to cut, how to cut, without doing it. Because he knows the moment he cuts her, the game will end. His fantasy will be over. He will not be eager to finish because… then he will face you. We have time. We have always had time. You knew that. It is why you waited."
"How would I know?" There was such a sadness there, Rico caressed Todd's arm, caressed his cheek.
"Because I showed you, weeks ago, when you asked me to act out what Caro did to me… I showed you. He was slow and careful and spent months to make me what he wanted. Do you remember? There in the small bed en la oficina de la doctora?"
Todd shook his head and looked into the streets, people moving along them, unknowing of the horror in a basement across the city. Did he know they had time? Did he know Caro was like a cat with a mouse?
He gazed at Rico, at those eyes. The small bed upstairs, the heat of a small room... his hands holding the bed posts in Raquel's office…Rico above him, on top of him...
The room is so hot and he stares at his own wrists tied at the posts of his father's bed, arms stretched. He pulls them gently to test their strength. They are silky and mocha-colored and totally unbreakable because they are his mother's stockings. His mother long gone. Hands are touching him and he watches the man above him. The man is strong and muscular and sweating. His eyes are half-closed and his mouth is slack like he's drunk or something. His entire body hovers above his own. Hardly touching. Just fingertips. I am hungry, he thinks. It's been hours. It feels like hours. They do this every night. Hours of this… every night they do more and more and more...
Across the room stands Peter, cold, dead, watching.
Every night… night after night… more and more...
Todd slammed himself against the wall and slid down, his head in his hands. He hit his head with closed fists, wishing the memories would stop but they didn't. A horrible loop played, round and round. He settled and groaned into his hands.
"Jesus fucking Christ," he said quietly.
Rico kneeled at his side, silent.
Raising his eyes to Rico's, he said gravely, "We have time."
"'We need weapons, amor."
Todd still had his bag and he shook his head, feeling the strap across his chest. "I have one knife. The gun is gone."
"We only need one more blade, then, yes?"
"We are near the place?"
"About a mile or so. When you hear the water, we are there."
He nodded and eyed Rico who breathed out in palpable relief, dipping his head low. Todd could see the blood on his scalp, black hair falling over reddened blue stitches. Instinctively, he reached for them and Rico flinched dramatically.
"You're hurt," Todd said in a rough voice. He should have known about the wound but he didn't. He tried to remember. Everything was blank. He'd gotten a trim this morning. His heavy beard had been shaved into a familiar goatee. Then… he was dragging Rico out of the hospital, knowing Caro had Téa and wanted to cut Esperanza out of her. He rubbed his head on the bricks behind him, rubbed as hard he could.
"I'm fine," Rico said, resting his hands on Todd's arm, thinking, thinking back to those basement visits, those times when Caro wanted to relive the snuff films, to relive his "greatest" moments. Rico tightened his fists. He had been such a good boy. Such a good actor. He would play dead while Caro raped him, lying there on the cold ground. Throughout, he would watch the door across the room, in the darkness. Wishing, wishing, for the playacting to end, unable to move to help Caro along because movement only made the night last longer.
The entire time he would watch the door.
Fevered dark eyes met Todd's. "There are stairs there. I thought it was only an elevator but it is not true. A noisy elevator and a stairway door and both need keys."
"Where are the keys?"
"His private apartment."
"Wouldn't he take the keys?"
"He keeps a second set. I do not forget things. Not like you who tries so hard to forget."
"And the weapons?"
"There, mí león, where the keys are, are also knives. We have a plan, yes?"
"I have no goddamn idea."
"We take the stairs and surprise him. Right where he stands."
"And you are sure this is the place? This place by the docks."
A somber look fell over Rico. "Yes." He knew because it was soundproof. Screams could never be heard outside those concrete walls. He kept that to himself, offering another truth instead, "The place is important to Caro. It is still there, still unoccupied, because the government owns it and declared it uninhabitable. But it is a lie. A government friend of Caro fixed it to be this way."
"A friend."
"Yes, a friend who knows why that place is important."
Todd shook at that, that growling noise coming once again. The evil is endless, isn't it, and he writhed in repressed rage against the bricks, moaning, "Let's go, we have to go, oh my fucking god…"
"We will get them to safety," Rico said, "and we will kill him."
"Where is the apartment?".
Rico smiled, and pointed across the street jerking his finger in an upwardly direction. "Up there," he said.
Todd followed Rico's gaze across the way. A gorgeous French-style building met him. Four stories of stone bricks and small balconies. And one very locked-looking front door. He didn't think he'd ever seen the place, but maybe he'd been told or learned from Caro himself at some point. Didn't matter. Here they were.
Todd snapped, "And how the hell are you gonna get into that building?"
Rico only grinned and repeated, "Trust me."
Mingo Espinosa was sweating in the dank basement of the Old City house. He had already placed the last charge in the gas line and he grinned. The thing would blow beautifully, a wonderful limited-space explosion that would collapse the house and everyone in it. The house would fall into this basement. A perfect containment. He'd actually blocked the gas line, cinched it, made it look accidental. This way, the fire wouldn't back up into the neighbors and blow their houses. The beauty was in the remaining gas in the line within the house. Just enough. And when it all went, the charges themselves would disintegrate.
A terrible accident.
There were three other charges in key spots and all connected to a cell phone. He'd make the call at ten in the morning, and, like the man said, like the man wanted, kapow. It had been an easy job and he knew the rest of the money would be in the offshore bank account by morning since half was already there. He was due the money whether the thing happened or not. He also knew that if he'd received a no-go order, he was required to remove the charges.
Again, an easy fix to an easy job.
The trick was to make sure the visitors were all present. He'd watch from across the street and count to thirteen. Any more than thirteen and it was a no-go because that would mean unaccounted-for people who might be innocent. Less was okay. And he'd have to check that there were no people hidden in the house. Which he'd done today, sweeping the place, again and again, always ending here in the basement.
He kicked at the posts, sniffed at the moisture. He preferred to confirm with Blanco, to hear once again a "yes" but Blanco had said that the only call would be a "no-go." And so far, there was no call.
There was no… "no-go."
He walked the basement, a large-ish space and he scratched at his red hair and smoothed his beard. He walked up the stairs and glanced at the kitchen space, at the modest furnishings. Sparse furnishings. There was a computer on a dining room table and a camera for the computer. Webcam was rare in Cuba since the internet was slow. But they might have some kind of workaround. He went up the stairs and checked the rooms. He stood at the door of one of them. It had a camera set up, too. Red curtains. A bed that seemed to serve as a stage of sorts, a lamp aimed at it. A strong one, for a film. Sheets on the floor, a messed up bed. Brownish streaks on the bed, most likely dried blood.
He knew the purpose of the house pretty quickly, the cameras being the give-away, the bed being the focus of the camera. Obviously pornography of some sort. He assumed adults but… as he stood in the doorway of the room with the stage, he spotted a child's toy in the corner of the room. He cleared his throat. The child's toy was a strange one. A little girl's doll with a polka dot dress. Lace at the collar. Little shoes. It was the shoes that told him this belonged to a real child. It wasn't just a prop.
He picked it up and smelled it, smelling the dress and the messed hair and the small leather shoes. The dress was perfectly buttoned in the back. The smallest of buttons. No perfume on it. Its eyes opened and shut as he moved it. Blue eyes, painted eyelashes. This was taken care of. Her face probably kissed a thousand times, her body hugged a thousand more, a bed mate, a tea party guest with little plastic tea cups and tea kettle and little biscuits, a student in a pretend classroom, a patient to a doctor, a friend for life. This little doll was loved.
He dropped it like a hot potato.
"Jesus fucking Christ," he grumbled in Spanish, breathing fast with a kind of surprising stress. Eyes back to the bed. Color on the ivory sheets. Children's clothing. He wanted to vomit. Mingo normally didn't care what the reason was for his hired work, rarely if ever was told. That wasn't his job, nor his concern. His work was limited to making desired explosions happen, sometimes legally, sometimes not so much. He reflected back to the man who had hired him, who had met him in the bar, word of Mingo's expertise having traveled to him through the usual circuits. A sure connection. One that Mingo trusted implicitly.
Even though he was dealing with a mad man.
Yeah, Blanco Moreno, El Rey Loco de Los Reyes Mambo… was fucking insane, Mingo knew. Rumors had flown about. So unkillable, biting off an ear of a fighting opponent, drug addicted, a tattoo of la Guadaña on his back, a black angel next to it, and a string of killings behind him from an American prison as well as outside. The man brought death with him and it was real and true. And there was another whispered story of him. He fucks men. Normally, such a thing wasn't part of the Mambo Kings, the gang being...intolerante… but there was a sense that the Mad King was beyond all convention, beyond all rules of the world.
Men, women, whatever…
And like hell was anyone going to confront him on that. Unless they wanted to end up dead. The Mad King with the scars and color and graying long hair could do whatever the fuck he wanted.
Blanco had been drunk that night, but not so drunk as to not know what he was doing. He got to the point quickly, had a clear vision as to how this thing needed to go down. Kapow. But there in his eyes, behind the clarity, was a kind of… emptiness. He spat the names of a few of the people he expected to show up in the house. Recited names like biblical scripture.
"Their names mean nothing," Mingo had laughed. "I am not going to ask them for identification."
"You're right, but they still must be there," he'd slurred. "You make sure they are INSIDE. THIS… is everything. Count the thirteen. Just COUNT."
"There is no guarantee the thirteen are YOUR thirteen."
"I am willing to risk it."
"This is murder, my friend."
"Nothing less than what they deserve. Fucking retribution."
They'd clinked glasses again and Mingo, deep in ignorance, had laughed and said, "To retribution!"
And Blanco had just grown dead again and said coldly, "To FUCKING retribution. To the FUCKING thirteen."
Mingo swallowed hard. Walked to the bed and picked up the children's clothing. He didn't judge people for the things they did. And this was an ugly world. But child pornography? No. There was no ring of hell deep enough for these kinds of people. He looked into the empty space of the room and thought of Blanco, recalling that look on his face of such loathing, such… blanket hate. To the point of a kind of deadness.
"Kill them all," he'd said in Spanish, the words not to Mingo but to God.
"It's okay, my friend, I will do this for you. It's going to be beautiful."
He tossed the clothes back on the bed and walked down the stairs and walked into the dying day.
Todd sniffed and huffed hard, glancing into the distance. "That one?"
"The fourth floor, the one with the curtains."
"You have a key to get in, then."
"No,"
Todd lit up at that, "Oh for the love of fucking god-"
Rico slapped a hand on Todd's mouth and said, "I will climb." He then reached into his pocket and pulled out a hair band, gingerly pulling his hair into a ponytail, wincing at obvious pain.
"You will what?"
A finger got pointed at him, Spanish flying at him, "No te muevas!" He then ran across the street and disappeared into the shadows of the alley there.
Todd sauntered to the street's edge, eyes on the four-story building, shivering with choking angst. Despite his instinct, every minute was killing him. He whimpered like a child and scratched at his neck like a fucking addict and then decided no way was he just going to stand around. He followed Rico across the street to the alley and slid into a doorway. He searched for Rico and didn't see him. Climbing? What fucking climbing?
But some noise pulled his attention up… upwards.
"Holy shit…," he said softly.
Rico was climbing all right. Straight up the side of the apartment building, like goddamn Spider-Man, all legs and arms and fingers dug into crevices. He was two stories up the concrete block wall and heading to the top. There was no ladder, just windows and stone and mortar. He was slow but sure. Steady as hell. For a few moments, Blanco held his breath in disbelief.
Rico's feet were free now, hands gripping a window ledge, lifting his body like it was nothing, like a gymnast. And Todd… he breathed in and out, feeling his madness like a cloak, his hands tightening with a sudden memory of Rico, the sinewy muscles of his shoulders and biceps, his back, and suddenly he could see Téa next to them both, his Téa, his beautiful Téa, and he knew tears were rolling down his face and his lips were on the tight skin of her belly with Esperanza kicking beneath, the taste of Rico's come flooding his mouth, and he slumped in a doorway, in the shadows.
He shook his head hard at that, calming with a deadening, paralyzing hate. He had to stay with it, he had to keep clear. He bit his hand until his eyes blurred with tears again and then looked up the cliff of a wall.
Booted feet were disappearing into the apartment window now.
It wasn't long and he heard a whistle coming from round front. He pulled away from the shadowed doorway. Rico was at the front door and holding it open. Todd went inside, following Rico up the stairwell, up to the fourth floor. They were in the apartment now and Rico was digging into various drawers around the living room. Beyond that was a kitchen and a couple of bedrooms.
Blanco walked the rooms, noting the clutter, shelves of books and wooden boxes and curios. He clapped eyes on Rico who was now holding two impressive blades in his hands. He tossed one to Blanco who barely caught the handle.
"We are armed now," Rico said, grimacing as he put the blade into his boot, Todd doing the same, before reaching into his bag and pulling out the smaller one he had. That he stuck into his other boot. He considered the messenger bag he still had. Gone was the ledger and the drive. What was left were papers in a large manila envelope. Signed papers that had to be mailed to his lawyer. He took off the bag and set it on the dining room table.
"This is where you got the ledger," he said, looking around.
"Yes," Rico said. "He did not hide it. Nobody comes here. This is his private place. Complete safety, complete privacy."
"Except from you."
"Yes. He trusted me. To this day. Of course, he thinks I am dead. His special place is in the grave with me. He will not be expecting me to find him."
A truth there… Todd looked away, anxiety getting to him. Caro thinks Rico is dead. The wounding. The hospital. He remembered now. He had been shot by Caro. Which means Caro has a gun. Who brings knives to a gunfight? But then… if he's playing with the mice… he will not have his gun on him.
"You lived here," he said. "He kept you… here."
Rico didn't answer and walked past Blanco. "I used to sneak in and out of that window every night."
"To walk the streets, to sell yourself."
Rico eyed Blanco. His features were cool and he was biting down hard, jaw flexing.
"No," Rico snapped, "to paint the city. To mark buildings and walls and streets. Graffiti. It's what I do. Let's go. We're running out of time." He hesitated and pointed to the bag on the dining room table.
Todd shook his head… "Just remember that it's there."
Rico nodded and started to walk.
"You have the keys?"
"Of course. I do not forget. Anything."
Téa had managed to get out of her bindings, limber enough to twist and turn and wrench out them. In the dim light of the single bulb she had scrambled all over, looking for a weapon, anything. The basement was a long rectangle, tiny clouded windows she hadn't noticed at first that ran along the top edge of one wall. The thick glass allowed sound of the ocean to come through. It was clearly night already. Caro had been gone for hours.
She could hear her own breathing as she dug at the corners, at the dark spaces. Grabbing, feeling, smelling, anything anything anything. She was on the verge of panic. She found a door and grabbed at it, but the doorknob didn't budge and she screamed as she pulled at it, banging on it, finally collapsing against it, her head on the wooden panels. It needed a key. The elevator had no call button. It was only controlled from inside the car. Empty of all energy, she searched for a few minutes longer and ended up in the very place she started.
There was a large heavy wooden table, like a dining table, in the center of the room. There was a metal chair or two. There was a plain tan blanket, woolen. Otherwise, the place was empty. There was nothing in here.
And at that, she understood, there was not even hope.
She felt her eyes burn and tears roll down her cheek as she stared emptily into the distant dark. She was going to die here. She… was… going… to die. She rubbed her belly and felt Esperanza shift and kick out. She smiled and cooed. The tears stinging her lips. She heard the laughter of Reese and Lucia and reached forward to their ghostly images but they faded into nothing. She'd been so negligent. She'd been so careless. She reached down to her side, caressing the imagined dead body of Rico… "I'm sorry," she said aloud. "Todd and I brought you death. We are death. Simple as that!"
Todd. The driving force in her life. She'd submitted to him way back for five million dollars and this was the culmination. A sad, bloody end in a basement in Havana, Cuba.
Her laughter rang across the dark and it made her laugh even harder. "I set out to make a little money with an impossible man and look at what I am now." She laughed until she was hoarse. She watched her sanity float away with that laughter.
The quiet came and she sat still. She was thirsty. God, so thirsty. No water anywhere. She listened to the waves and imagined floating like an otter. Made her smile, and she told Esperanza about it. "You would have loved the sea," she said.
She then told stories of Puerto Rico, of New York City, of law school, of Todd. Of love. Of sorrow.
"The world is something, mí amor!"
Her talking was suddenly interrupted. She suppressed a sharp laugh, her hand to her lips. She regained control and held dead Rico's hand.
The elevator jerked to life and soon it opened and light poured into room. Caro. He had a black bag at his side, like a doctor's bag. The elevator closed and the light lessened. He walked to the table and placed the bag on the table. Opened it. He hummed. Nonsense tune. Hummed as he arranged and picked and fondled. He turned and eyed Téa.
"My darling. You have freed yourself."
She said nothing and he chuckled.
"You didn't find anything to help you."
"What is this place," she asked, her voice strangely light. Surprising even her.
He sighed thoughtfully, leaning on the table, ass against the ledge, folding his arms. He looked around. "A place of love. And loss. Rico has been here many times. He became Rico here. He was my friend, here."
"Friend?"
"Yes, friend, lover, partner. You think he is… innocent? It is sweet. Understandable."
"He is."
A gruesome chuckle rolled across the floor. "He accompanied me many times to this place. He was filmed many times. He participated fully. Gloriously!"
Téa suddenly wanted to vomit. Her madness couldn't hide the truth. She knew in an instant exactly what had happened here. This… was the place where Rico had watched children die. Compliance is self-defense. He was too beautiful to be among the dead. Rico, beautiful Rico.
She breathed and felt a certain further disconnect within herself. A snapping inside. She remembered the horrors Rico told her about. They were real now. She looked at the table. A table like what he had described. Where he had been tied. From where he had watched others die.
How was he not mad, too? She suppressed a hard laugh. She felt her mind bubbling and fizzing and splitting. Of course he was mad. The blue scarf told her so. Choking himself while coming. She reached out for the darkness and felt its warmth and call. It felt...wonderful.
Glorious...murder. Here.
Caro picked a tool and came over to her. He stood over her.
"Lift your dress."
She shook her head and he chuckled and soon was on her, strong, controlling, calm. She whipped at him with everything in her, scratched at him, screaming, kicking. He laughed and struggled but ultimately wore her out. She found herself on her side, a knife at her belly.
"Move more and I won't practice first."
He shifted and she was on her back. He was on his knees and lifted her dress. She lay there, panting from the fight and recognized that she was completely resolved. She would die here. She'd planned on fighting in Rico's name, for her children's memory, out of love.
But that might prolong things.
He dragged the knife across her belly, up and down. He reached into his pocket and drew out a pen. He drew lines. "I believe this will be delicious." He bent and breathed on her belly. "I cannot wait to meet you, cariño."
"You are not going to cut me in a way that will get you anything you want."
"Yes, I will."
"No, I will fight you, and you will cut me poorly. Your play will end fast."
"I have enough knowledge to keep you alive. For a while."
She smiled, her cheeks pulled back, her teeth bared into a tight grin. "No. Esperanza will die before you can ever lay a hand on her. CUT ME, you ugly fucking bastard."
He slapped her hard and she laughed loudly and madly. "I hit a nerve, didn't I?" More manic laughter. "You're ugly, Caro. Your pock marks are ugly. Your skin is ugly. The way you move is ugly. You speak like an idiot who thinks he's a beautiful goddess. I bet your mother fucking hated you at her breast. I bet she spit on you when she laid eyes on you."
He sat up and shook his head, surprised at her words. His mother. He hadn't thought of her in ages.
"Shut up, woman. Maybe I should just cut away."
She sat up, too, spidery, fluid, her fingers gripping the cold cement beneath her. She knew her words were like foreign matter to him. She could see his eyes glazing over. She laughed again.
"Rico hated you, you know. He despised your smell. He told me you smelled like rotten garlic that had been shat out by a baboon. A sick baboon, rotten from impending death. A smell that came from the very depths of you."
He sat still, stunned. He did not know what these words were. Bad words.
She grinned and chuckled deep and low. "He told me he would daydream while you fucked him. He said words you loved but he didn't mean any of them. He spoke to others as you huffed and puffed on top of him. He thought of beautiful men, women, and that was the only way he could ever finish. Thought of their silky bodies, their perfect bodies. He said… you breathed like a fat ugly sickened cow."
He turned and said dazedly, "He was like a swan."
Laughing, "A swan…" Manic laughter. "You are so very stupid."
"SHUT UP, WOMAN!"
"What the matter, Caro, did you believe in Rico? Did you believe in his love for you?"
Caro was on her again, his hand around her throat. Her fingers dug into his scalp and she held him at bay. He was shaking now. Surprisingly knocked off his game. Téa giggled. A mad giggle. "He was a liar, Caro, a big fucking LIAR! And you were the biggest chump. Trusting him with your secrets, with your games, thinking he'd never turn on you."
"You are the liar! He lay here, over and over, lay still for me, to feed me, to feed my soul. He praised my body, my loving of him…"
A movement caught Téa's eye. A slow movement in the darkness. The door, she thought, the door is opening. A black shadow loomed behind and she knew she was delirious with insanity. Her brain had shattered in the deadly truth of her captivity. Caro was armed and she wasn't. He had all the power. He would kill her in this miserable hole.
She laughed more at Caro's own delusion of Rico. Another shadow joined the one in the door and she reached for it, a sob suddenly gripping her chest.
If only. If only.
Spanish sprouted from across the room, from the shadow.
"Do not believe her, Manuel."
Caro turned wildly at the sound.
Rico.
"My child! You walk! You are a ghost!"
Rico emerged into the light. His skin was moistened with a light dew, his eyes dark and misty. Téa knew he was dead. They were being visited. Téa lolled against the wall behind her. Yes, yes, she and Caro had both lost their minds. She laughed wildly, "Even his ghost tries to fool you!" She glanced into the darkness and followed another moving shadow. This one slid along the wall, remaining in the black.
Caro reached towards Rico, "She lies. You loved me."
"Yes, I loved you. I thank you every day for all you taught me. I pray to you… Manuel, for what you were to me."
"Yes, yes! Your customers loved you too. I loved you. I am sorry I had to kill you."
"Even that was a gift."
"Rico, Rico…"
"Sit, mí amor, sit. Let me look at you one more time."
Caro was confused, and he licked his lips and rubbed his head. "You are not real. I cannot do what a ghost tells me."
"Please sit."
Caro stuck out the tool he had been holding, a scalpel. "You are not real!"
Rico repeated his command. "Sit, mí Caro."
Gasping, Caro covered his face with his hands and sobbed into them. The scalpel hit the ground and Téa saw it. She licked her lips, her mouth dry and parched. She was so so thirsty. Caro cried more, apologizing to Rico for killing him, over and over. He stumbled to one of the metal chairs. Téa's eyes were glued to the scalpel.
Rico walked to Caro, towering over the soft weeping mess.
From the darkness, Todd watched. He had wanted to sweep Téa into his arms but had chosen passivity. She was safe now. She and Esperanza were safe.
TO BE CONTINUED….
