Page 43 of Rage & Paradise
Vado stares Coca down for a second before he turns his eyes back to the crowd outside.
“Fine, we still need her out there with us. I need to know what I’m dealing with. I need to figure out the real problem.” Vado waves me forward.
Oro grabs hold of my hand. I can tell he’s not okay with this plan at all, but he doesn’t say anything. I walk to the head of the line, and we all walk out the door.
Sina puffs on a skinny cigar, working hard to look like a female crime boss. It’s nearly comical how hard she’s trying to look like a leader. On either side of her are bikers with the makeshift vests on the chest reading “juracanos.” These must be the Canos Oro was talking about earlier, the same crew they thought they had gotten rid of years ago.
“Ah, Estrella, the company you keep leaves a lot to be desired,” she jokes.
“What the hell are you doing here? You’ve got no business here.” I speak up and take a step in Sina’s direction. Oro has to hold me back. Suddenly, knowing that I have the entirety of the Puerto Rico chapter of the Royal Bastards at my back, I’m feeling much stronger than I’ve ever felt.
“Well, that’s where you’re wrong. It turns out that your new friends requested to meet with me. I don’t think I necessarily appreciate them breaking into one of my homes, but I understand. They thought the girls there were in trouble. They were just being concerned citizens.”
“You’re crazy. They are in trouble. I don’t care what you try and make yourself believe. None of those women there have a choice to be there. I don’t understand how you can do this. After everything I’ve told you… after?—”
Sina surges forward, the skinny cigar discarded on the ground and her eyes locked on me with a crazed expression. “After all I know!” she booms in my direction.
It’s supposed to mean something, but I’m not sure what.
I look to Oro, and he seems as confused as I am.
When I look back to Sina, she’s shaking her head. “You really don’t remember me, do you?”
“Remember you? What are you talking about? Of course I remember you.”
“No, bitch, not from now. From before. Let’s say ten years ago. I would’ve been thirteen or fourteen years old.”
I scour my memory, trying to figure out what she is talking about. I don’t remember what she’s talking about.
“You’re going to have to be more specific. I met a lot of people ten years ago.” I keep my voice steady.
“I’m sure you did. You and your father were flush with little girls ten years ago. You pranced around like the fucking belle of the ball. Showed all of us a life that we so desperately wanted.You made it seem like the right choice. You made it look so damn easy.”
My stomach twists in my gut, and my head sways as I struggle to catch my breath.
“You were… you were one of the girls?” I whisper, and Oro stands behind me to hold me up. If he weren’t here right now, I’m sure I’d fall right on my ass.
“Yeah, I was one of the girls. I was one of the many who fell into your father’s clutches. I was hungry, Estrella. My mother had nothing, and your father came around telling all of us how we could make some easy money. How we could work for him and have everything that we could ever want. I didn’t know it meant I was selling my soul to the devil. Didn’t realize it would mean he would break me down and build something…” She runs a hand over her own body. “Build this in its place.” She narrows her eyes at me. “But you did. You knew. You knew what was waiting for us behind all those closed doors. What those men would do to us. You knew, and you did nothing to stop it. Then like a gift from the heavens, years after I ran for my life to get away from you and your father, you show up. Broken and depressed, oblivious to what you helped create. You cried about how hard you had it. About how you were able to save one.” She darts her eyes in Oro’s direction before focusing back on me. “What about the rest of us, Estrella? Huh? What about us? You created this, now you’re going to have to deal with what you made. You’re going to help me keep this going, or you’re going to die right here, right now. Make your choice.”
“You’re going to have to go through all of us to get to her,” Carina snarls, and AZ is right there to pull her back.
“She’s not her father’s choices. You should know that,” Angela speaks up this time.
Before I even have a chance to reply, all the women on this side are coming to my defense.
A show of force.
Force I don’t deserve.
Sina sighs, looking all the more uninterested. She turns and walks back to the bike she was standing next to when we first walked outside. “So be it.” She flips her hand. “¡Mátarlas!” she orders, and all at once it feels like the world breaks open in front of me in a flash of lightning.
Except it’s not lightning. It’s gunfire.
TWENTY
Oro
“Inside! Everyone fucking inside!” Vado orders ducking down to get out of the gunfire.
