“You shouldn’t have killed Leah. You should never have stepped foot on my father’s property in Alabama. You should never have followed us back here, and you really shouldn’t have harmed a hair on Bron’s head, Hector. You think there won’t be consequences?”
Hector Ramirez shrugs, pulling a fat cigar from the breast pocket of his suit jacket, apparently done with his almonds. He bites the end off the cigar and spits it onto the ground, then proceeds to light it with an engraved silver lighter. “From where I’m standing, the Widow Makers aren’t the formidable force I assumed them to be when I undertook this little adventure to New Mexico, Jamie. When Raphi dealt with your uncle back in Seattle and your second in command made grand gestures, inciting war between our people, I thought to myself, ‘well, okay now. This might be interesting. Something to distract you from the tedium of every day life, Hector. Thank the lord.’ But no. I arrive here to this dust bowl you call home, and I find a rag-tag group of misfits living out in the desert, sticking their dicks into the locals, tattooing people for money.” He gestures at the trashed shop, disgust warping his features. “I have to admit, I’m more than a little disappointed.”
He makes it to the counter where I’m still bent double, trying to remain calm. Trying not to give away the fact that my right hand is resting on the one weapon we do keep in the shop—a prime maple Louisville slugger. I’m in a shit load of pain and my head is spinning, so I have to wait for the perfect moment. If I launch myself at him too early, I’m going down hard and I won’t be getting back up again. That means I need him close. Closer than he is now, anyway. And that means I have to keep him talking.
“You made a huge mistake in coming here, Hector.”
“Ahh, you think so?” He pouts, pulling on his cigar, holding the smoke in his mouth before he blows it out in a thick cloud. The smell reminds me of my father—he always smokes after dinner, ever the traditional southern gentleman. It takes me a mere second to connect the dots when I see the familiar Havana Red paper seal of my father’s favorite brand wrapped around the rolled tobacco leaves in Hector’s hand. He is literally smoking one of my father’s cigars. This is an action designed to piss me off, to drive me crazy, but all he’s succeeding in doing is distilling my anger into clarity. I don’t see red. I don’t react. My recklessness the other night, the recklessness that got me stabbed, isn’t normally how I operate. Push me to the edge and I get smart. Poke and prod at my buttons and I come up with new and interesting ways to return the fucking favor. I’ve got my shit handled now, but then Hector Ramirez doesn’t know that about me. He knows nothing about me whatsoever. He’s massively underestimated both me and my club if he thinks he’s going to succeed in baiting me into stupidity twice.
He comes closer, standing on the other side of the counter. “You know…I believe I recognized the woman with you at your father’s home, Jamie. Can it be that you arranged for Julio Perez to purchase my little One Eighty-One on your behalf?”
One Eighty-One, the number he assigned to Sophia in order to sell her. Motherfucker. I glare at him, willing him dead. It’s the only way I can maintain my relative calm. If he says her name…if he so much as mentions her again…
“That was very underhanded, you know. I can’t say that I like you tricking me out of her like that. Bad business. My good friend Raphael has aired his concerns about her association with the Widow Makers. He’s…worried about her safety. Normally, I’m careful to ignore Raphi’s council, however in this particular instance I think he may have a point. I want her back, Jamie.”
My vision blurs in my peripherals, my heart rate doubling. No way. No fucking way is he having her. “You’re certifiable if you think I’m handing her over to you, asshole.”
Hector shakes his head, as though he expected more from me. He looks away, out of the shop window, biting down on the fat cigar in his mouth. “I’m sorry to hear that. But I suppose these things can’t be helped. If you are not willing to return the girl to me, I will simply take her from you. You won’t be able to stop me. And this way, when she is back within the confines of my household, performing for my pleasure, I will not treat her well, my friend. I will treat her like the whore she is. I will ruin her. I will make her obey me in everything. She will be degraded and tortured, and when I have had my fill of her, I will kill her. And this time I will make sure to send you her head and her hands instead of the rest of her body. No. I will keep the rest of her body. A * is still a *, after all, no?”
I don’t feel the pain in my side anymore. My head is no longer fuzzy, my vision no longer blurred. Everything is crystal fucking clear, and my body is vibrating with fury. Only a second ago, I was clinging to the fact that his provocations wouldn’t work on me, and I honestly believed that to be true. But now, with this? I cannot stay calm. I cannot keep a cool head. Sophia is a game changer. I swore I would protect her, and now Ramirez is threatening to violate her dead body?