Page 44 of Blood Diamond

I say nothing, turning my face into the seat cushions instead. Various aches and pains make themselves known all over my body, but they are nothing compared to the minefield that is my mind.

Braulio was lying, of course. I misheard him. I let my old friend fear sneak up on me and distort reality. There is no way I heard that name. No way.

“If you were my woman, I would have put him in his place, but you aren’t, are you? You still belong to him.”

Anger laces his tone though I don’t have the space of mind to wonder why.

“What? No spicy comeback?” I hear Jaguar say, but he might as well be on another planet. Few things can penetrate the hellscape of my consciousness. Not until I regain my control.

I had to have misheard him.

I was delirious.

He lied—Tiena gave him ammunition to use against me, because we are all just pawns in one of her schemes. She set up that trick with the accountant. She’s working with a powerful enemy against Jaguar, but who?

Not him. He can’t be back. It isn’t possible. It’s been ten years. Ten years… Besides, I saw him die.

I pulled the trigger—and Lupita Sanchez had to die along with him.

It feels like only a handful of seconds have passed when the car stops again, and I’m hauled out by someone who must be Horatio. He keeps his touch clinical but firm—his strength is the only thing holding me up.

It’s foolish to show weakness here in a den of lions, but even Jaguar and his posse don’t compare to the real Boogeyman haunting my nightmares. Last night was one of the first times he managed to assert himself in my memories, but this time it’s so much more intense. I hear him.

Oh, Pita baby, you thought I’d just quietly disappear? That I would ever let you go? We’re soul mates, butterfly. You will always be mine. Always. Till death do us part.

“Enough, chica.” Jaguar’s voice penetrates my battered psyche only because he sounds so different from his usual smug cadence. His voice is harsher, lacking the suave charm. Impatient. I get the sense he’s spoken to me many, many times since we left the car, but I haven’t heard a damn thing.

“I’ve enjoyed your little display, but you can drop the act, Tiena. I know Braulio doesn’t scare you half as bad as I should.”

But Braulio isn’t the real threat.

“Eyes on me,” Jaguar warns, snapping his fingers inches from my nose.

I look up, surprised to find that we’re in his suite. He crosses to the window and leans against it, a shot of whiskey in hand, but his smirk is gone, replaced by a cold, hard stare. This, I suspect, is the real Julian Domingas beneath the raucous, brutal façade.

I misjudged him by slotting him into the same category as Braulio and the other men I’d dealt with. He is a new animal entirely, one I’d underestimated until now. Unlike them, emotions don’t guide him. The bastard is one-hundred percent pure calculation like a robot, reacting to the world on probability and educated guesses. He isn’t reactionary.

He is far more intelligent than that.

“You put on a good show,” he tells me. “I’m impressed. Few women have made me rethink my first impression like you have. I’m sorry to say, your show has run its course, though. I see who you are now, Tiena.”

“You put on a good show, too,” I tell him coldly, swaying on trembling legs. Fear isn’t the cause. I’m so damn exhausted. “Have you enjoyed toying with me from the start? I hope you got a nice, big kick out of it. Plenty of fuel when you fuck your harem, or are they only for show? Do you just use them as toys in your display?”

“Oh, chica, I don’t know what you mean.” Smiling, he takes a sip of his liquor, but the amusement never reaches his eyes. “Do tell.”

“I was fooled at first,” I admit. God, why does my voice sound so breathless? So broken? If he’s dropped his act, then so have I. I’m not Tiena, primed to charm my way out of every situation by smiling and flashing my tits. I’ve always been far more pathetic, prone to the two emotions she never let stand in her way.

Love and fear.

“I’m sure you have the world convinced you’re all brute action. A mindless idiot who uses his minions to inspire fear. Oh, you have them all fooled, Jaguar. But you’ve met your match in me.”

“Is that so?” He laughs, but it’s a dangerous mixture of guttural rumbles. “Please continue, Tiena. I find this all very fascinating.”

“I know brutes. I was infected with one once. I know how they operate and move, and there is no calculation involved.”

The memories threaten to overwhelm me—dark, horrific things. It’s getting harder than ever to keep them at bay, but I don’t need much to make a definitive conclusion where he is concerned.

“You are patient, Jaguar. Too patient. You don’t thrive on inspiring fear. You don’t play with your victims like toys in a game. They’re pawns to you. Tools. You don’t give a fuck about women, or power, or damn assholes like Braulio. It’s the thrill of staying one step ahead that you crave. You think we’re all too dumb to see how pointless you find this.”

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