There was a chill in the air, so she was wearing a webby, black wool shawl around her shoulders. Prim, black silk, expensive blouse, perfectly creased back slacks, black pumps, face made up elegantly, attractive silver hair perfectly styled.
Throwing dancing light, Mexican sanctuary candles were lit on the table beside her wicker rocking chair, seven of them. A tall iced glass that looked like it held tea, but everyone knew that iced tea had two other words in front of it: Long Island.
It was all very incongruous. The rundown, bright yellow house behind her with the turquoise-painted railing around the porch. The rickety slats under that rocking chair, both of which creaked as she rocked slowly, her eyes glued to him. Not a soul in sight, but he knew they had eyes on them everywhere. And the stylish, sophisticated, costly clothing and flawlessly executed appearance.
Mamá Nana.
Mother grandmother.
He made it to the top step and stopped.
Bowing low, his man moved around him and set the briefcase on the wood by her moving chair before he backed away and went down the steps to the car, as he’d been instructed.
Through this, Mamá Nana didn’t take her eyes from Benito.
“I’d appreciate it if we could talk,” he said, the words sticking in his craw.
“The great and omniscient Benito Valenzuela stoops to chat with me,” she replied.
That had been the expected response, but not the one he’d hoped for.
“That’s double your usual fee in that briefcase,” he told her.
She didn’t even glance at it.
She said, “Things have gotten very difficult for you, Benito.”
“I’m fully aware of that, sadly,” he returned.
“This should make me feel many things, you, the child I held in my lap, bounced on my knee. But I must admit, it doesn’t surprise me I feel nothing.”
Benito made no reply.
That had been expected too.
“Your mother was a good woman, a kind woman. When your father left, she worked so hard to give you a home. Unfortunately, as hard as she worked, you had little. But she had so much love to give, it was a thing of beauty, it should have been enough.” She paused as if pondering something. “You always troubled her. And it would seem she had reason to be troubled.”
Benito felt his face tighten. “I took care of her before she died.”
She nodded. “You did. Most gallant. Then again, you were her son. It was your duty. Sadly, you did not take care of her when she lived.”
Regrettably, that was expected too.
Mamá Nana, the matriarch of the neighborhood who traded in information, somehow establishing a balance over the years, nearly clairvoyant with knowing who to share what with, but most importantly when, depending on the changing tides of who controlled Denver.
She’d been instrumental in coups. She’d played her part in the downfall of kings.
All this living in her ramshackle home that looked like a merrily painted crack house on the outside, a Mexican souvenir shop on the inside.
Every man, woman and child in that neighborhood would lay their lives down for her, because if your son needed school supplies and you couldn’t afford them, they’d show up on your doorstep.
From Mamá Nana.
And if your grandfather had been taken in, even if he’d lived in the country for thirty years but he was illegal, a high-priced immigration attorney would arrive.
Courtesy of Mamá Nana.
And if some white man raped your daughter, that man would be found, garroted.
Again.
Mamá Nana.
So if you heard any word from anyone about anything, and you certainly were listening, you told Mamá Nana.
Then she decided with her singular genius who to sell that information to . . . and when.
He should have learned from this.
Benito should have learned how to earn loyalty from Mamá Nana.
He had not.
However, right now, he didn’t have time for this.
“Mamá Nana, I need information,” he told her something she knew.
“You need a number of things, Benito.”
He clenched his teeth.
“That girl,” she flipped her hand, “the young one. You gave her opportunities. She warmed your bed. Then she betrayed you.” She rested her hand back in her lap. “This, I understand.”
That surprised him.
And at least it was something.
“The other one.” She drew in a breath. “Very sad. But messages have to be sent.”
That surprised him too.
“Yes,” he gritted out when she didn’t continue.
She turned to her tea, took it up, brought it to her lips, had a sip, put it back down, then again gave him her attention.
“It is God who judges,” she declared.
Fucking hell.
“It is,” he agreed.
“We have our wants, our desires,” she went on. “Even those that seem deviant to me, it’s not for me to judge. It’s for God.”
Benito felt stillness invade.
“And I have long since learned that a woman must do what a woman must do to get along in this world,” she continued.
“Mamá Nana—”
She interrupted him.
“She saw to your needs. Debased or not, she saw to your needs, Benito, and you disrespected her as you did?”
“It was her who showed disrespect,” he bit out.
She inclined her head. “I see. Understandable to teach her a lesson then. About the face, of course. But rape?”
Benito glowered into her eyes.
“That’s unacceptable, mijo.”
He was not her son.
He did not remind her of that.
“I’ve watched your career with some fascination,” she shared. “I even found at times I admired you.”
He put his hand to his chest and sieved the sarcasm out of his words when he said, “I’m humbled.”
“Nothing humbles you,” she replied softly. “This is your problem, muchacho.”
Benito dropped his hand.
“Make peace with this motorcycle club,” she demanded. “It was foolish to declare war on them. They are righteous warriors in a sea of wickedness. Their leader in other times would be a king. Give them what they desire, Benito.” She leaned toward him. “Everything they desire.”
Of course.
She knew about the bones.
She sat back.
“And rid yourself of the things that made your mother’s heart so weak,” she carried on. “Oh, the years she lived, the wear on her knees, worrying her rosaries, praying for your soul. You must put behind you the drugs, Benito. The whores. The guns that through you invade our streets. And then come back to me. We will talk again. We will find this man you seek.”
“I’m afraid that I’ll need your assistance sooner.”
She used the toe of her fifteen-hundred-dollar pump to slide the briefcase across the rough, warped, notched slats his way.
“And my regular fee will be triple,” she concluded as if he had not said a word.
“Mamá Nana—”
“I’ve spoken.”
He took a step toward her but stopped when her gaze got sharp.
“I have spoken,” she repeated.
He held her eyes.
Then he took more steps toward her, but to retrieve the briefcase.
He then turned his back on her and walked to the steps, down three, but stopped and turned when her voice came again.
“They say, mijo, these millennials who think they know all. The young. So brash. It’s amusing. But they say the future is female.”
He waited for it.
She didn’t disappoint.
“Learn this as you go forth in your endeavors, Benito.” Her voice was like a blade. “The future is now.”
She did not understand his actions with Camilla or Natalie or even the whore he’d beaten.
The man stood by his wife, the father his children, Mamá Nana would be there.
He did not, for him, Mamá Nana was a ghost.
But the woman with no husband, the children with no father, Mamá Nana was always at their side.
And if a man took his hands to his wife, his children, he was not found garroted.
But he left the neighborhood and he didn’t return.
Benito knew this before. He knew she would not make this easy and even thought she might not speak to him at all.
But he was reduced to this.
And it was worse.
He’d allowed an imbecilic, deadbeat, outcast biker to reduce him to this.
Perhaps he was actually learning a new emotion.
And experiencing it, he preferred only having the few he already felt.
He dipped his chin, tasting acid on his tongue, turned away, finished going down the steps and back to his car.
His driver was waiting at the open door for him.
He folded his body into the back.
His driver shut him in.
He tossed the briefcase on the seat between him and his man and faced forward, his expression stony, refusing to look out his window as his driver set them moving.
He detested being back in his old neighborhood and because of this, for years, he’d not returned.
The squalor. The ridiculous peasants laughing and cooking and celebrating Cinco de Mayo and meticulously planning their daughters’ quincea?eras and doggedly trudging to church on Sundays to worship a God who long-since had forgotten they existed.
They might have wanted more, but the white man would never allow that, and they were too stupid to know that if they really wanted it, they’d have to take it.
He’d wanted more.
And he’d taken it.
But he knew that Mamá Nana was wise.
And she was right.
He had few emotions, so he had no idea how to be humble.
He would have to learn before he lost everything.