I switched the subject onto something else. Gus’s health problems.
“So what was wrong with you, Gus?” I asked him, the fingers on my good arm now tapping on the table as I scanned the crowds.
He didn’t say anything but I knew he heard me.
“First Lydia, then Dan. Both mentioned you had health problems or something for a while. Just curious as to what it was.”
When he still didn’t say anything, I tore my eyes away from the building and looked at him. He was staring off into the distance, looking utterly lost.
He sighed and looked down at his hands. “It’s personal, Camden. No offense.”
“I’m not offended,” I told him, turning my gaze back to the crowd. “But since we’ve been through a lot this past week, I figured I’d be privy to some personal things. You know everything about me. What happened with you? Why are you not matching up with the man that Ellie described to me?”
“People change.”
“Some people do. They usually have their reasons.”
He chugged his entire beer then slammed it down before motioning for the waiter to bring him another. “Ah hell.”
Once the waiter disappeared, he leaned back in his chair and said, “I had mental health problems, Camden. I sort of lost my mind for a while.”
He said this so casually that it took me a bit to realize the gravity of it all.
“For real?”
He smiled sadly. “Yes. For real.”
“What happened?”
“A girl broke my heart. Isn’t that always the way?”
I leaned in closer. “What girl?”
“Does it matter?”
I frowned. “What happened?”
His face twisted as he grappled with something inside. “It … it wasn’t meant to be. She was married to a good friend of mine. Once upon a time, she should have been married to me. I guess I got stupid, fell back in love with her. It didn’t go anywhere. She made it seem like it would, like it wouldn’t be just an affair but … anyway I believed her. She made a living out of lying and I should have known the difference. Played me for a fool, like she played everyone else.”
I cleared my throat. “Gus, don’t tell me this is a cautionary tale meant for me.”
His eyes shot sideways to mine. “No, Camden. You asked. I’m telling you the truth what happened. But if you want to learn anything out of this it’s … don’t lose your head. Lose your heart but don’t fucking lose your head. You don’t know if you’ll get that back.”
“What would you do if you saw her again? The woman?”
“Oh, now it’s a cautionary tale.”
I shrugged, my eyes back to the line-up. Still no Ellie and it was getting late. “I’m just curious. I know what it was like for me when Ellie came back into my life. I suppose I kind of lost my head too. Fuck, I know I did. How else did I fucking end up here?”
“Touché,” Gus said raising his beer. I clinked my coffee cup against his. “What a couple of fucking headless chumps we are.”
I chuckled at that and drained the last bit of coffee into my mouth.
Then everything around me whirled to a halt.
Slow-motion.
Ellie, Ellie, Ellie.
There she was.
She was leaving the club and walking down the center of the plaza. She was alone. She was devastatingly beautiful, so much so that it was surreal to even be admiring her beauty in such a moment of complete shock.
There she was.
Her head was down, looking at the ground a few feet in front of her. She was walking fast, in a hurry, in a bright red dress that glowed on a night like tonight. It was cut all the way down to her stomach, showing off a new tan, attracting the blatant stares of every single man she walked past. Her black hair was done up in ringlets, like a film star, her makeup was seductive and smoky. I’d seen her dressed up to the nines in Las Vegas, but it was nothing like this. This was different – she looked different, walked different, was different. My heart clenched painfully as I was assaulted with things I had no time to think about.
“Gus,” I managed to say. I couldn’t look away.
“I see her,” he said. “She doesn’t see us”
“She doesn’t see anything.”
Suddenly Gus was getting up, pushing his chair back with a loud scrape and Ellie disappeared around a crowd of people. “We need to follow her. Now.”
He threw a handful of pesos down on the table and we quickly got onto the plaza. She was far in front of us, a quick red slash in the crowds of people. We tried to walk as fast as we could without looking like we were chasing someone, but after Gus had collided with the third gawking tourist, we knew it wouldn’t matter. Everyone was chasing someone in Mexico.
We started trotting as she disappeared around the corner. Where was she going? Why was she dressed like that and why was she alone?
Then I remembered what Felipe had said back in Ocean Springs. That they took her to see Travis. That they wanted her at first to kill her parents. Were the two connected?
Or …