The Night Horde SoCal: Fire And Dark Part 25

Freddy had gone into elaborate detail about what had happened in the Elliotts' house. They knew Pilar's connection to them, and they had all enjoyed the story. "Yes. Like I said, he helped. He didn't think he had a choice. It was Raul's order, Freddy's plan. Raul was yelling about how the Horde tried to take them down, but the a.s.sa.s.sins would rise from Horde ashes. They didn't know your dad was there, and I guess he surprised them. Freddy hit him. That's how his head was hurt. I don't know with what. But he was laughing about the sound it made." She closed her eyes, shuddering at that memory, and then she steeled herself to say something more. "It was meant to be a message, that the Horde had a lot to lose in a fight with them."

"f.u.c.king h.e.l.l." Deeper understanding dawned in his eyes. "They knew my mother was there. They thought she was alone. They meant to kill her."

Pilar couldn't say the answer to that out loud. "I'm sorry, Connor. I know it was me who brought all this down on you."

"Yeah. It was us. I got caught up in you. I should have...I don't know. f.u.c.k, I don't even know if I'd do it differently if I could."

"Where does this leave us?"

He stepped away from the bed and leaned back heavily against the wall. "I love you. I thought before that I wanted to be done, but I don't. I can't. I need you."

"We're okay, then?" The thought that they had found their breaking point had shaken her badly, and the hope that they hadn't was shaking her more. She went to him and slid her hands under his kutte. She'd never needed someone this way before; she'd never felt so afraid to lose a connection. It made her feel weak and afraid. It hurt so deeply that it buried the conflicted, confusing pain of losing Hugo and the electric anxiety of what she faced when she told her grandmother. Right now, the most important thing in her life was to be solid with this man.

Connor's big, heavy hands wrapped around her arms. "Do you love me?"

"Yes. So much it hurts."

"Then I guess we'll be okay."

Will be. Meaning that they weren't yet.

Afraid and exhausted, she leaned into him and took what comfort she could when his arms enclosed her and pulled her close. Snaking her arms around his waist, she tried to give him the same comfort back.

She had given herself to this man, her real self. Pilar, not Cordero. Or both of them, really, all of her-the strong and the weak, the fierce and the vulnerable. She needed him to keep safe what she had never given to anyone else.

Pilar's grandmother worked as an office manager at an accounting firm in San Bernardino. She'd been the receptionist there when Pilar and Hugo were children, and she'd worked her way through the administrative ranks. When she'd moved her grandchildren to what she'd meant to be a safer life, she had picked up a second job, cleaning the offices of the very same building she spent her days answering phones in.

She'd also worked weekends at a little boutique. When Pilar became a firefighter, she was able to help out with bills, and being able to cut back to one job had been almost like retirement for her grandmother.

Pilar hated the idea of breaking this news to her while she was at work, but she had no choice. Connor had told her that the Horde's 'cleaner' was dumping the a.s.sa.s.sin bodies with the ink intact. They would be quickly identified, and Pilar didn't want her to hear it from some f.u.c.king detective who thought the a.s.sa.s.sins were all sc.u.m.

It had to be her, and it had to be now. Staying with Connor this long had delayed the news too much already.

So she walked into the building, still wearing the uniform she'd jumped into from her bunk, answering the call of the fire on Nutmeg Ridge Drive. How long ago had that been? Hours? Days? She didn't even know anymore. A lifetime ago.

She took the elevator up to the fourth floor and went into the office. A young receptionist sat at a desk that was far larger than was practically necessary. Pilar rarely visited her grandmother at work, so she didn't know many of the people she worked with.

The woman smiled up at her. "May I help you?"

"I'm here to see Renata Salazar?"

"Is she expecting you?"

"No, it's not business. I'm her granddaughter. It's a family matter-an urgent one."

"Oh, I'm sorry. One minute." She picked up the phone and pressed a b.u.t.ton. "Renata? Your granddaughter is here to see you."

Hanging up, the girl smiled again. "You can go back. Do you know her office?"

"I do. Thanks." She went back.

'Office' was a fairly optimistic term for the room that her grandmother called her own. Small and windowless, two walls dominated by shelves of office supplies, it was more of a closet. But she had a desk and a phone of her own, and a door that set her apart from the cubicles that took up most of the office suite, and she was proud of how far she'd advanced.

She was standing at the door when Pilar went back, and she looked worried. "What is it, mija? It's Hugo, isn't it? He's hurt again?"

Pilar took hold of her hands. "Can we sit, Nana?"

"Oh, no. Oh, no. He's dead. He is, isn't he? Oh, Hughie, ah, mijo, no."

The workers in the cubicles were starting to notice this little family scene. "Nana, let's go in and close the door. Please."

Pilar had never been someone who cried, not since she was a little girl. It wasn't that she didn't feel emotion-quite the opposite. She felt it so much that it became inexpressible. She turned tearful emotions into focus, in the same way that she had shut her fear down. She had learned to channel feeling into focus. She got intent, single-minded, but not emotional.

Except with Connor. Her emotions broke her control and focus all the time with him. She recalled the last time she and Connor had been intimate, when she'd bawled hysterically. She hadn't yet had taken the time to figure out what had happened then to loosen pipes that had been dry for years-another question that might be better left unanswered.

Still, feeling her grandmother's aged hands shaking, seeing the fear and sadness in the beloved brown eyes behind her bifocals, Pilar was spun.

She led her grandmother into her tiny office and closed the door.

It took weeks for the coroner to release her brother's body. By the time Pilar and her grandmother could bury him, November was half over.

They had planned a traditional funeral for him, with a Ma.s.s before the burial service. Renata went to the church every day for more than a week beforehand to light a candle and to pray the rosary. She was a deeply, quietly religious woman and always had been, but her tenacity regarding Hugo's end made Pilar think that their grandmother was trying to will him into G.o.d's grace.

Pilar didn't join her for those daily trips; she had long ago left behind most of the trappings of the religion she'd been born into, though when asked, she still readily identified as Catholic. It was hard to leave so much tradition and belief behind entirely.

But the rituals didn't give her much comfort. Hugo was dead. Despite their grandmother's efforts to save him from the life of their fathers and their mother, he had swirled down the same drain. Pilar had escaped it, for the most part, and in the weeks between Hugo's death and his funeral, she embraced that truth. She went back to her life, away from Mission Street and the High Life, away from the Aztec a.s.sa.s.sins. Away from her history. Away from her brother, her mother, her father, her stepfather. They were all dead. Their bodies had all fallen within a radius of about a hundred feet, and a quarter century, of each other.

But Pilar was free of it.

She checked in on her grandmother daily, and she helped with the planning of the service, but otherwise, she set Hugo to the side of her mind, with all of her unanswered questions and focused on the life she had made. She was still mostly numb, detached from almost everything except Connor. She could feel herself detaching.

Moore was on medical leave for three weeks. They made up a story about a climbing fall to cover for an unreported bullet wound. For almost their entire careers, they had been a team, and neither of them had been out hurt or sick in all that time. They'd even taken leave at the same time. So she'd never worked with anyone else. The captain rearranged the schedule to bring in someone from another watch to cover for Moore, and Pilar felt dislocated and territorial. She hadn't realized how much she relied on her easy symbiosis with Moore until she'd lost it.

So work was strange and unfamiliar to her in these weeks. Even the vibe at meals was off.

The vibe was off between her and Connor, too. Ever since the fire. They'd only been together a handful of times in the two weeks since, and they hadn't been really alone together at all. He was either doing club business, or he was at the hospital. If she wanted to see him, she had to go there.

And she didn't mind it; he belonged with his parents. His father remained unconscious, and his prognosis hadn't improved. They were all still, two weeks later, stuck at 'wait and see.' But his mother was recovering well and had been released after not much more than a week. Connor was bringing her to the hospital every day to sit at her husband's bedside.

He blamed Pilar. She could feel it. He said that he was working through it, that he loved her, wanted her, needed her, but she could feel the distance that was growing between them.

And she hated it. She had let him in, let him closer to her than anyone else, and now he was in there, rattling around like a ghost. She didn't know how to fix it, or how to go back to the way her life was before she'd met him. He was the only thing in her life right now that felt significant, but he was moving away from her, losing substance. She could feel him detaching.

As they stood at Hugo's graveside, listening to the priest intone the words of ritual, Pilar was thinking about Connor. Who was not there. She knew why, and yet she didn't. Hugo had torn his family up, and Connor had no grief over his death. But she did. She would have liked to have had his hand to hold as she buried her baby brother. The boy she'd failed. She would have liked the man she loved to stand with her. More than that-she needed it.

Instead, Moore stood at her side, holding her hand.

There weren't many mourners for Hugo. A couple of people Pilar didn't know, who might have been old school friends of his. Most of Pilar's crew. And their grandmother's friends. Usually, Chicano funerals were big, but there was no one left to mark Hugo's pa.s.sing. Their parents were dead. Pilar and their grandmother were his only living family. He'd had few friends outside the a.s.sa.s.sins, and they were all-all but Sam, who was still in jail-dead. So the mourners made a small circle around the grave. When the priest was done, they took their turns adding handfuls of earth to his resting place. And then they headed back to their cars.

It was done. Hugo was no more.

Pilar felt a small, shameful frisson of relief. She was free.

Moore had his good arm around her shoulders as they walked across the grounds. He gave her a quick squeeze, dropped his arm, and said, "I'll take Nana back to the house."

"What?" Pilar had been lost in thought, and she was confused. They were all supposed to ride together; the mourners, such as they were, were headed to Nana's house. When she turned to Moore, he tipped his head, indicating a point off to the front and side. She followed his gesture.

Connor was standing next to his bike, his arms crossed over a dark brown b.u.t.ton-down s.h.i.+rt and a plain black leather jacket. No kutte, even though he was riding.

He had told her that he always wore his kutte when he rode, but she also knew enough to know why he wasn't wearing it today. Because he wouldn't show his colors at an enemy's funeral. Hugo had been an enemy. An a.s.sa.s.sin. Knowing that the club had a lengthy and arcane list of rules and traditions, she a.s.sumed he wasn't supposed to be there at all. She was only a.s.suming, however; he hadn't said one way or the other.

Even with his sungla.s.ses on, he was telegraphing jealousy so strongly, watching her walking up with Moore, that she could almost see the hate beaming through his lenses. G.o.d, she was tired of that. But for now, she focused on her relief that he was there at all.

She needed him. So she kissed her grandmother's soft cheek, gave Moore a hug, and crossed the grounds to Connor.

"Hi. You came." She walked straight to him and leaned her body into his. He had unwound his arms as she'd approached, and now he folded her up and kissed her head. When he held her like this, she could feel that there was a chance they would get through all of this and be okay.

"Yeah. For you."

"Thank you. How's your dad?" They hadn't been together in a few days, and every day was a question with Hoosier.

"Same. Mom's picked up a fever and a nasty cough. They admitted her again. Pneumonia."

"f.u.c.k. I'm sorry."

He only sighed.

She looked up into his handsome, somber face. His dark lenses obscured his eyes and made him inscrutable to her. "Connor, we have to fix what's wrong here. I'm losing my mind. I've never felt like this about anyone, I've never needed anybody like this. We're both going through some big s.h.i.+t. We should be dealing with it all together, but we're not. I feel so f.u.c.king lonely."

He looked over her head, and she knew-she just knew-he was looking at Moore. "Seems like you've got plenty of support."

And then Pilar simply snapped. She balled up both her fists and punched him, hard, in the chest. It hurt, but she was glad for the pain, and gladder still that he grunted and stepped back. "You have got to f.u.c.king stop with the jealousy. There's nothing between Moore and me, and I am out of ways to say that. I wanted it to be you holding my hand today. But you weren't there. So my friend held me instead. So f.u.c.k you."

She punched him again-and then she was tired and done. With all of it. "You say you love me, but between the blame and the jealousy, I don't know how you have room for any good feelings about me. All I do is p.i.s.s you off. I can't deal with this anymore." She turned abruptly away from him, headed back toward the mourners, figuring she could catch a ride with another of her crew. Guzman, Perez, and Reyes were all lingering up by the cars.

She got three steps, and then his hand had her arm, and he was pulling her back and around to face him.

At first, he just stared at her, his s.h.i.+elded look intense and threatening. Then, in a voice gruff with controlled emotion, he said, "I want to go to your place."

"To talk? Can we talk this out?"

"I want to go to your place."

It wasn't an answer, but it was close enough. Choosing him again, even on this day, she set aside her grandmother, all that remained of her family, and nodded.

"Okay."

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

He was just so f.u.c.king angry. He was helpless and he was angry, and he could not get control of it. Every day, it got bigger. When they'd taken his mother out of his father's hospital room in a f.u.c.king wheelchair, down to the ER, and then up to her own room, he'd thought his head was going to explode.

It was all his fault, all of it. But it was too much for him to contain, so it flew out of him in waves. He was angry at everyone.

His father was gone. The small, frail sack that lay in that bed was not his father. Hoosier Elliott was the kind of man who filled a room. He wasn't an especially big guy, just average height and decently fit, but no behemoth by any stretch. And yet people always took note, stepped back, gave him room. He was a man you respected the minute you met him. You felt his strength, his power, his wisdom.

Yeah, he could be an a.s.shole, too. What man couldn't? But he owned it. When he was wrong, he always made it right.

Connor had been a rebellious kid. He'd fought against every which kind of authority and had spent as much of his school life in detention and the princ.i.p.al's office as he had in cla.s.s. But he had never rebelled against his father. From the time he'd been old enough to think what he'd wanted to do with his life, he'd wanted to follow his father. Never, not once, anything else. He'd never had a boyhood fantasy of being a cowboy or an astronaut. Or a firefighter. He'd wanted a kutte and a bike.

So he was angry, he was furious, at that pale sack of bones lying lifeless in a hospital bed, unable even to breathe for itself. That was not his father.

And if it was, Connor was responsible for what had happened to him. He had been falling in love, and he had brought somebody else's beef to the Horde.

And...G.o.d. His mother. If he'd admired his father his whole life, what he felt for his mother was adoration. She drove him crazy, meddling, always having an opinion, somehow knowing absolutely every d.a.m.n thing about his life and being unabashed about throwing it in his face. It was a bizarre experience to have his own mother always in the know about his s.e.x life, but somehow she always did know, and she was always there with that d.a.m.n look that said she could read every single thought in his head. She knew him. He could tell her anything, because she knew everything.

Most of his brothers did not have parents like he had parents, and he knew how f.u.c.king lucky he was to have the father and mother he did.

And he had broken them both.

He was just so f.u.c.king angry.

Usually, riding with Pilar was an intensely erotic experience, but this time, Connor was so wrapped up in his head he barely noticed her. And she held him differently this time, with her hands on his hips instead of her arms around his body.

They should just stop. One of them should admit the obvious defeat, and they should break this off. He knew it, could feel the distance and withering happening, but it wouldn't be him who ended it.

Because he f.u.c.king needed her. Even in the anger and cold, that was true. He was being an a.s.shole, treating her like s.h.i.+t, and he knew that was true, too, but he couldn't get control of himself. He didn't blame her. He blamed them. He blamed himself and the way his feelings for her-which had been seeded before they'd even gone back for their first f.u.c.k-had s.h.i.+fted priorities that should not have been s.h.i.+fted.

He should end it. He should never have let it start. But he couldn't stand the thought of losing her. So he was making her pay for his own weakness.

And she'd been letting him, accepting the guilt and blame he kept laying on her. As she unlocked her front door and they stepped into her living room, he wondered if she was finally done.

It would probably be for the best if she was.

She dropped her keys into the little bowl by the door, draped her jacket over the back of a chair, and kicked off the black pumps she'd worn to her brother's funeral. She wore a pair of simple black pants and a dark gold sweater that was the same color as her eyes. Her usual jewelry: gold hoops, the crucifix, nothing else. "You want a beer?"

Taking his sungla.s.ses off and sliding them into the inside pocket of his leather jacket, he nodded. "Yeah." He shrugged off his jacket and laid it over hers. He loved this room. It was eclectic and warm, like Pilar herself. Today, though, it was dark: she had the heavy drapes drawn across all the windows. Instead of opening them and letting the autumn sun in, she turned on a few lights. When she went back to the kitchen, Connor sat on her sofa and stared at a cl.u.s.ter of three gla.s.s and metal lights hanging from the ceiling. They were shaped something like stars and threw intricate patterns onto the walls.