Page 18 of His Gilded Cage

That night as we drove back, Veronica shared with me more details about the Cabo Police Department. Apparently Amador Industries made a series of very large deposits to the department beginning with the year my mother died and continuing every year.

“You think he is bribing someone to stay silent?” I asked.

“The investigating officer and the chief of police are both dead,” Veronica said. “The money arrives every year in a series of small deposits that add up to a donation that is well beyond the limits for a tax write off.”

“Small deposits that go undetected,” I said, looking out the window at the stars glittering in the black sky. “What’s the total?”

“Since the day your mother died, Amador Industries has donated close to $5 million to the department, but from the state of the precinct I am doubtful that the majority of that money is actually going to services and staff.”

“Jesus Christ,” I said, inhaling. “He’s paying them to forget.”

“It’s speculation,” she said, shrugging. “But it’s enough of a trail to suggest that the police are compromised.”

“He’s paying them off with blood money,” I whispered. “The blood money that my mother wanted to escape, the blood money that pays my bills.”

Veronica didn’t contradict me.

As we drove home, the truth about my mother’s death sat on my chest like a weight. She hadn’t killed herself. She hadn’t chosen to leave me.

This revelation brought with it a sense of joy. The rejection of her suicide had been such a source of pain for me. The problem was the rejection had been replaced with a new emotion, rage. My mother had been stolen from me and nothing I could do would bring her back.

Everything was different.

In year’s past, Veronica and I had shared margaritas together, long dinners full of laughter and stories from our youth as she tried to distract me from my suffering. A curtain had been drawn on another phase in my life.

There were the days before my mother died and the dark years where I allowed myself to believe that she had left me by choice. I wanted to apologize to her for believing their lies. I felt as though I’d failed her every day for the last ten years. My mother’s dream for me had rewritten the past and reminded me of the man I was meant to become.

There was no more distracting me from my pain. The loss of my mother was torn open like an aching wound and I now felt a singularity in my focus.

I wanted revenge.

Veronica pulled into the driveway in front of Luis’s house. I could no longer think of the townhouse as mine. My life was tainted. I felt like a kept man, caged by my father’s money and control.

The question was could I hide in plain sight? Could I stand before my father and make him believe I was his ally? Could I take control without him feeling his hands loosen on the reigns? Could I give up everything and embrace a quest for vengeance? If I wanted to balance the scales in my heart, I knew I would have to find a way.

For once I didn’t want a drink. The idea of losing control and numbing my pain felt like such weakness. I could no longer allow myself to be sloppy with my senses dulled.

I needed to be sharp.

I needed to wake up and start living my life with my eyes wide open.

“I feel as though I’ve been asleep, my friend,” I said, glancing at Veronica.

She reached over and squeezed my hand. The yellow moon hung in the sky melancholy and sad. “You haven’t been asleep Marco. You were a boy with no power to question what you were told.”

“But I think I have always known that something else happened.”

“I know,” Veronica said, her smile a bit sad and wistful. “It’s powerful when someone we trust tells us to believe another story. It’s so easy to lose ourselves in a lie.”

I opened the car door. It was close to 2:00 a.m. “Are you coming inside?” I asked, nodding towards the condo.

“No. I have to drive to Guadalajara. I’m hoping to get the rest of the files first thing in the morning and then fly out in the afternoon.”

“I wish you would stay. The roads aren’t safe at night.” And I don’t want to be alone I thought but buried this need. I knew this was the heartbroken boy inside me.

It was time for me to grow up and learn to face the night alone without a woman in my bed or a friend at my side. I had spent too many years broken and needy. It was time for me to stand tall.

“I will be fine,” Veronica said. “I’ll call you before I fly back to New York. I know this has been a lot for you. We can make a plan.”

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