“Hey, Sheriff, since you’re so quick to judge, I noticed you never found the gringa who tried to kill Katie.” Marcos couldn’t keep the scorn out of his voice. “It took me twenty minutes in this town to find her. Great police work there. Did you even look?”
“Excuse me?”
“The accident. With Katie and me, I know who caused it.”
The sheriff looked uncertainly to Katie and then turned back to him. “Okay, let’s hear it.”
“It’s that girl, the one her ex is dating.” Marcos turned back to Katie. “What’s her name?”
“Do you mean Ashley Moore?” Katie looked shocked. “Marcos, I don’t know that he’s actually seeing her and—”
“No, it’s her. She drives a red ’09 Toyota Corolla, but it’s not a factory red. It’s a new paint job; I can tell. And I told you that night, it was a ’09 Toyota Corolla. Look back on your notes, you’ll see. It was her car. I’d bet all the green in Chuito’s bank accounts on it.”
“Marcos knows cars,” Chuito told the sheriff. “If he says it was that car, it probably was.”
“I guarantee you it used to be blue.” Marcos pointed at the sheriff. “That puta caused the accident. She was trying to run Katie off the road. She was probably jealous. She must like girls.”
The sheriff ran a hand over his face and sighed. “Okay, this is getting more complicated. Let me just follow y’all back inside and take another statement.”
It was obvious he really wanted to be done with them.
“Why the hell didn’t you tell me this when you saw it a few days ago?” Wyatt asked a short while later as he sat at Katie’s table, writing again.
“No offense.” Marcos took a sip out of the water bottle Katie handed him, when what he really wanted was a rum and coke. “You’re not my favorite person, Sheriff.”
Wyatt arched an eyebrow at him. “So what were you gonna do with the information?”
“Tell Katie. Let her talk to you about it.”
“But you
haven’t
told Katie your suspicions until now.”
Marcos grinned. “We’ve been busy.”
“Okay, Rivera, whatever.” The sheriff rubbed his face again. “I don’t know how you and Chuito grew up in the same house. Y’all are really nothing alike. You got a mouth on you that would make a saint swear. Chuito’s got more self-control than anyone I know.”
Marcos laughed out loud. He couldn’t help it.
Wyatt looked up curiously.
Chuito kicked him.
Marcos just gave the rest of the statement rather than argue.
Chapter Twelve
Then the three of them sat there shell-shocked after the sheriff left. The only rum Katie had was coconut flavored, but Marcos decided to make an exception. He drank it straight on ice. Katie mixed hers with orange juice.
Chuito drank water as he sat in the chair across from the couch, looking at the two of them. “Wyatt’s right, you know? You two are a catastrophe.”
“Fuck you, Chu,” Marcos said as he glared at his cousin before he turned to Katie. “So much for your two negatives theory.”
“I’m sorry,” Katie whispered, sounding miserable.
Marcos knew the night had been stressful for her, and he couldn’t help but reach over and squeeze her knee. “It’s okay, chica.”
Chuito wasn’t quite so forgiving as he narrowed his eyes at Katie. “You’re bad for my cousin.”
“Please shut up, Chuito,” Katie snapped at him. “I think it’s obvious your cousin can take care of himself. Let him make his own bad choices.”
“Feisty.” Marcos laughed, and leaned over, draping his free arm around Katie. He kissed her and whispered against her lips, “I like it.”
Chuito stood, giving them a disgusted look as he spoke to Katie. “Look, I realize he may have some skills you appreciate, but do you think this thing between you two will last? You think he’s gonna move here, Katie? You think you can fix him? Make him blend? You can’t. Trust me on this. I’ve been trying it for years. Marcos doesn’t know how to follow the rules. Even when it would save his ass, he can’t do it. Trying to get him to fit into your world would be like trying to teach you Spanish.
Impossible
.” Chuito pointed at her. “You’re a high school teacher, for Christ’s sake. You are one big rule.”
“Don’t call her big,” Marcos snapped at him. “Lush.
Sexy
.” He liked the sound of that and amended his cousin’s statement. “She’s one sexy rule I wouldn’t mind following.”
“I could learn Spanish,” Katie added defensively. “For example, right now I think you’re being an enormous pendejo when we’ve already had a very trying night.”
Marcos laughed again. “That
was
Spanish.”
“Ay Dios mio.” Chuito turned from them and ran both hands over his face and through his hair. “Great plan, learn Spanish from Marcos. Let’s see how well that works out for you in public. That was one of the nicest words in his vocabulary, chica.”
“You are being a pendejo,” Marcos couldn’t help but point out. “Big-time.”
Chuito glared at him. “Can I talk to you in the kitchen?”
“No, you can’t.” Marcos drained the last of his drink, deciding there wasn’t near enough alcohol in this coconut mierda. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Now, Marc.” Chuito’s dark gaze glowed with fury. “We have other shit to discuss.”
“Chúpame el bicho,” he said to his cousin before he turned to Katie. “You want me to translate? I don’t mind repeating it.”
“Don’t say yes.” Marcos eyes were still narrowed as he said to Marcos in Spanish, “It’s actually a serious situation. Can I
please
speak to you?”
Marcos huffed in frustration. “Fine.”
“I’ll take a shower,” Katie said when he squeezed her hand and stood. “Meet you in bed?”
“Sounds good.” Marcos followed Chuito, but then turned around and watched Katie walk off. “She has the nicest ass,” he told his cousin in Spanish. “And she’s waxed. Did I tell you that? How sexy is that?”
“What did that mean?” Katie called from the bedroom.
“Nada,” Chuito answered for him and jerked Marcos’s arm so hard he nearly face-planted on the tile in the kitchen. “Come on, man, you better hope she
doesn’t
learn Spanish.”
“I bet I could teach her.” Marcos poured himself more coconut rum. “She’s smart.”
“What is it about this chica?”
“I like her. A lot.” Marcos took another long drink, wincing over the sweetness of it. He went to look in the fridge, considering orange juice to mix with it like Katie had done. “I hate this shit. Is there a real liquor store in this town?”
“Just tell me about Angel.”
Fuck the orange juice. He just drank it straight again, because he didn’t want to think about the Angel situation.
“You get your mother out of the house. I’ll deal with the rest when I go back.”
“Why? What’s going to happen?”
“That would be
my
problem.” Marcos raised his eyebrows. “We stopped being a team a long time ago.”
Chuito leaned back against the counter, his body tense as he eyed Marcos critically. “You’re planning on doing something stupid.”
“My issue.” Marcos gestured to himself, because he wasn’t going to let Angel win at using him as a pawn against his cousin. “I told you what you need to know. Now get out. Let me enjoy Katie while I can.”
“I can’t just get out, Marc,” Chuito snapped at him. “I can’t drop it.”
“Yes, Chu, you can.” Marcos drank again. “I’m not giving you another option.”
Chuito ran a hand through his hair, making it stand up in dark spikes. “There’s no way that chica is going to put up with you for a week. I can barely stand you, and you’re practically my brother.”
“Okay, you keep telling yourself that. Me and Katie, we actually get along really well.” Marcos looked at his glass, eyeing the melting ice cubes. “My mother would have liked her.”
“Marcos—”
He glanced up, seeing his cousin standing there with the stricken look on his face. Aunt Sofia talked about the dead a lot. Marcos and Chuito never did, but for just a moment, he considered a different life, one where he could have taken Katie home to his mother. “She would have liked her a lot. I know it. She’d be proud of me for finding a girl like that. A teacher. She helps kids turn out like Juan was supposed to turn out.”
Chuito put a hand over his eyes and took a deep breath. “Please just tell me how I can help you.”
“You can’t. Sorry.” Marcos sighed. “Sometimes I miss the good ol’ days. Us against the world. It made it easier, somehow.”
“It’s still us against the world.” Chuito dropped his hand and gave him a hard look. “I’d smoke Angel tomorrow for you. Easy. I’d smoke just about anyone for you, Marc. You tell me the problem, and I’ll take care of it.”
“I know.” He walked up and patted his chest. “That’s why you got to go.”
“Why are you doing this?” Chuito sounded as lost as Marcos felt. “Why won’t you let me help you?”
“Because you think we owed it to my mother and Juan to get even,” Marcos started, hating that his voice cracked. “And I believed you. For a long time I thought that was true. Now I’m not so sure. I’m starting think I owe it to Juan to make sure his older brother doesn’t lose any more of his soul to this bullshit.”
“So, what? You give up yours instead?” Chuito shook his head, his gaze suddenly hard. “No. I’m not going to let that happen.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not giving up any more of my soul. Not for you,” Marcos assured him. “And I’m certainly not doing it for Angel.”
“Do you think he’s going to try to take you out?” Chuito asked, his voice anguished. “Is that what you’re trying to say to me?”
“I don’t know what Angel is going to do.” Marcos shrugged and then took another drink. “Go home, Chu. Go take advantage of a pretty chica crawling in your bed every night.”
“Life isn’t just about fucking a pretty chica, Marcos.”
“Yes, it is.” Marcos gave him a smile as he thought about Katie. “And if you did it with the right one, you’d know that. I know why you won’t screw your neighbor, and it’s not because her father’s a preacher.”
“Why, then?” Chuito laughed manically. “You tell me why, genius?”
“Because you’re afraid she’ll stop giving you a reason to be so angry, and you can’t handle that. Anger is the only thing that’s kept you going for the past eight years. I’m so tired of it.”
“Fine, you know what, go do something stupid and reckless and give Angel a reason to smoke you.” Chuito pushed away from the counter and walked past him. “This chica has made you more crazy than usual, as if that was possible, but I don’t care anymore!”
“Good!” Marcos yelled as he followed his cousin out of the kitchen. “I hope you mean it!”
“I do! You know what I’m tired of? I’m tired of trying to help someone too fucking stubborn to help himself!”
“Fuck your neighbor. Please. You need it. Desperately.”
Chuito slammed the front door rather than respond. Marcos looked out the window, watching his cousin storm to his car. He locked the front door when he saw the headlights go on.
Then he downed the rest of his drink, thinking if Chuito really
did
have more self-control than any other muchacho that asshole Wyatt Conner knew, he sure didn’t want to meet his other friends.
His cousin was an atomic bomb waiting to go off, and Marcos seemed to be the only one who knew it.
* * * *
Marcos found Katie in the shower, with the hot steam billowing up around her, making her seem almost dreamlike. He could see the way her hair clung to her bare back, like chestnut waterfalls against her pale skin. The deep curve in her waist. The flare of her hips. Her ass was nice and round, and it made him just want to grab it every time she walked by.
Coño, she was beautiful.
He kicked off his shoes and grabbed the collar to his shirt at the same time.
“You coming in?”
“Yeah, I need a shower worse than you do.” He tossed his shirt aside and then tugged at the button to his jeans. “Is there enough hot water?”
“There’s plenty.”
Katie stepped back when he opened the door, letting him have the spray. Something about that didn’t sit well with Marcos. She was too nice, and it bothered him. He wasn’t used to a woman like her, so completely trusting it didn’t enter her mind that her ex was here to hurt her.
What would have happened if Marcos wasn’t there?
For the first time, he really allowed himself to think about it. He was used to women like his Aunt Sofia, who’d stab someone with a kitchen knife without thinking if they broke in. Who was Marcos kidding? His Aunt Sofia would shoot the dumbass who tried to break into her house.
But Katie, he wasn’t so sure.
“You don’t give me the water,” he said as he stood behind her, turning her toward the spray, letting it roll down the curve of her breasts. “You’re supposed to say, ‘Chico, if you want the water, you stand behind me.’”
“Why would I do that?” Katie turned her head and frowned at him. “You just said you needed it.”
“It doesn’t matter what I need.” He wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her tight against him, allowing her to feel his cock that had hardened the moment he saw her naked. “You’re a woman. You got what I want. Use it against me every chance you can get.”
“I’m not doing that.”
“Yes, you are. I’m gonna make you.” He draped his other arm over her front, sliding it between the valley of her breasts as he held her possessively. “You scared me tonight.”
“You didn’t look scared.”
He reached up and grabbed her chin, forcing her to look at him. He stared at her eyes—soft honey-colored eyes, trusting eyes. They were framed with long eyelashes that made her too kind for his sanity.
“I was scared,” he assured her as he ran a thumb over her lip. “I don’t want you talking to your ex anymore. Promise.”
“I work with him,” she reminded him.
“I don’t care.” He kissed her, and she parted her lips to let him slip his tongue past them. When he pulled away she leaned in, silently begging for more, but he resisted and said, “Get him fired.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Sí, you can. He tried to attack you. Make sure he’s fired for it.”
“I’m not going to ruin his life,” Katie argued. “I don’t think he would attack me. I honestly don’t. He was probably just mad I was ignoring him and—”