Sister of a Sinner Read online

  While Tony, Connor, and Tom did their depositions, Junior took Xo out to look for clothing. He waited at shop after shop with the patience of a loyal St. Bernard, roving only once to buy a certain poster he carried around in a cardboard tube. His credit cards were at her disposal as she had no means to pay, but Xochi did not take advantage.

  Her first purchase consisted of a pair of flip-flops bearing bands with tiny seashells from the hotel gift shop as her pumps hurt her scraped toes. After that, she bought a pair of jeans, not cheap on the island, and a variety of bright, often embroidered cotton tops, which were. She decided on a long, gauzy blue skirt that floated around her ankles simply because Junior liked it. “I’ll pay you back, I swear,” she said.

  “No, you won’t. I’d buy you the world, and you know that.”

  Instead of arguing or asking him not to say such things, her cheeks suffused with dusky rose. “Thank you,” she said and glanced away.

  He thought that might be progress, remembering how she’d fought off his buying her anything at the Riverwalk only weeks ago. While she debated whether to get a simple knit shift in her favorite hot pink color, Junior slipped into a farmacia and made another small purchase that fit in his hip pocket. She shed her purple uniform in the fitting room and wore the pink dress with her scarf instead. Bending over and giving Junior a wonderful view of the fabric stretched over her rounded bottom, Xochi stood and flung her long black hair into place, letting it curl wildly around her shoulders.

  “There, that’s the best I’ve felt in days. Free. If I had my pink tote, I’d be complete. I guess I’ll never see it again since it was in the cab when they took me.”

  If he had Xochi, he’d be complete. Junior answered, “The police have it. If you can’t get it back, I’ll buy you another.”

  Her answer was a squeeze to his bicep that as usual filled him with warmth and maybe a little lust this time. She let him carry her bags. Xo leaned in against him as they walked along, and he slipped his free arm around her waist. They enjoyed a brief, relaxed lunch in a taco joint near the plaza and picked up ice cream cones on the way back to the hotel where Agent Baldwin waited, impatience marring his stern face. “Your turn, Miss Billodeaux.”

  Baldwin kept her in the interview room until dinnertime and released her looking worn and shaky after such a long interrogation. Junior waited nearby as he had all afternoon to take her hand.

  “I kept telling them and telling them I saw only the four men they already knew about. This had nothing to do with drug running or ransom, only revenge and the delusion that sacrificing me would gain Miro a new lease on life. I strongly suspect that the priest only led him along to get the resources to seize me and avenge his son in a spectacular and gruesome way in order to hurt Daddy Joe.”

  “I think you’re right.”

  “They were also peeved that I didn’t report being followed earlier. I can imagine it now. These men with black auras are stalking me. I see them everywhere. Open the file for crazies and insert Xochi Billodeaux.”

  “Tom believed you. So did I. Forget about it. Almost dinnertime. Let me treat you to lobster. I know you love it.”

  “Lobster was supposed to be my last meal. They feed sacrificial victims fairly well until the day of. I’d rather have something simpler. Where are the rest of the guys?”

  “The Feds picked up Ancona again. Not happy about how he got involved in this operation after being warned off. I’m not sure what they can do to him.”

  Junior felt the surge of anger as Xochi said, “Over my dead body—and I would have been dead without his help. I’ll ask Dad to assist Tony all he can. What about the others?”

  “Went to the beach.”

  “Should Tom be doing that with his injuries?”

  Junior shrugged and felt that twinge in his back again reminding him to go easy on himself as well. “He has his doctor with him, so he should be okay. I suspect they’ll eat at one of the bars in the area. That leaves just you and me. Connor loaned me his iPad, wonder of wonders, because he is as attached to that as a limb to his body. I scoped out a few places while I waited. How about El Viejo y la Mar? It’s a fisherman’s cooperative and should have really fresh seafood.”

  “Okay, I love the name, The Old Man and the Sea. Just let me get my purse. Oh right, no purse. I guess I’m ready.”

  They sat in the rustic open-air dining area of the restaurant, started with seafood ceviche and moved on to whole fried fish, got a bottle of wine to share and linger over until closing at eight. On a slow walk back to the hotel, Junior bought churros from a street vendor for their dessert. He shared the sticks of fried dough well coated in cinnamon sugar with Xochi as the blue hour before dusk set in.

  “There are places we could go dancing,” Junior suggested, trying to extend the evening.

  “Considering the condition of my toes, that is a no. You should rest. I should rest.”

  They found Tom and Connor in the hotel lobby—Connor a little peeved as he held out his hand for the iPad. Junior, affable and still one-upping the man, said, “Thanks for the loan. We found a great place to eat. Xo wants to rest now.”

  “Nice of you to wait for us. We’re starving,” Tom complained.

  “Tommy, you are always starving. Good thing you married a woman who likes to cook.” Xochi gave her brother a careful but affectionate hug, not only because of his wounded shoulder, but also to avoid putting any pressure on a ferocious sunburn. “We thought you’d eat at one of the places along the beach.”

  “Right,” said Connor, full of skepticism. “It’s you and me, Tom. Let’s find a nice restaurant and a cold beer.”

  Junior escorted Xochi to her door and gave her a kiss he put his heart and soul into, but she didn’t invite him inside. “Leave the connecting door unlocked. Shout out if you need anything,” he said.

  “I plan to sleep and sleep and sleep.” Still, she ran her fingers down the side of his face in a way that seemed to say one day she might want more, but not tonight.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  She woke screaming in a strange room in a foreign land. Xochi pressed the top sheet against her lips to stop more cries from escaping, but Junior barreled through the unlocked connecting door and scanned the area for the source of her terror much as he might search for a ball carrier to bring down.

  “It’s nothing, only a bad dream. You can go back to bed. I hope I didn’t wake Tom, too.”

  “Only eleven p.m. He and Connor are still out on the town.”

  Junior did not leave. He moved to the bed and sat beside her, not taking her word that all was well. Now she knew he slept in boxer briefs, not naked like her for lack of buying a nightie when they shopped. Somehow, she couldn’t allow him to purchase lingerie for her, but that would have been better than trembling entirely nude beneath a sheet, not wanting him to go, but not brave enough to say so.

  He put his arm around her, as sturdy and broad as the limbs of the live oak trees they climbed in childhood, and held her close. “Remember when I was around ten and you found me crying behind the barn because the men were trying to toughen me up, and I was still a pudgy kid and didn’t think I could do it?”

  “Yes.” She nodded against his chest, breathing in that lime scent of his, knowing he had taken the time to trim his beard that morning to look his best for her despite the wound in his back and the trial they’d all gone through. Her trembling eased, but she knew he’d felt it.

  “You had the breasts of a woman, so soft and warm and comforting, but not one dirty thought passed through my mind.”

  “You were still a child with the sweetest heart.”

  “I felt your belief in me, that I could succeed, and I wanted to for you. Men made remarks about your body, and I thought one day I’d punch them in the mouth.”

  “Also the reaction of a child, but I thank you for the thought. I learned to cope, and when the other girls caught up, I didn’t stand out so much anymore. And look at you, so big and strong no one wants to
take you on. I am sure that is why Diaz and his men backed off when you were with me.”

  “That didn’t help you in the end. I’ll bet you did not cry.”

  “No, I used wisecracks as my defense. Sent Diaz on foolish errands to get a little back. Inside I was terrified, always searching for a way to escape or defend myself like a cat shoved into a sack and trying to claw its way out. Really, I didn’t stand a chance against them.”

  Junior shook his head. She felt his chin brushing across the top of her head in denial. “I know you. You were brave, always brave. Now, tell me about your nightmare. I know you’ve had them for years about the killing of your parents. Same one?”

  He finger-combed her curls, snarled and damp from the nightmare. His touch was so gentle, Xochi wanted to nod off in his embrace, but she answered. “No. With Esteban Miro dead, I think that dream might be exorcized. We’ll see. Now I have a new demon, Diaz, standing over me with a sacrificial knife scooping out my beating heart and no handy gris-gris bag to fend off the terrors.”

  “I’m staying the night. I’ll lie here beside you ready to fight off that dream and for no other reason.”

  Xochi ran her fingers over the thin lines of his close-cut beard and across his upper lip, which made him smile when it tickled. “Back in the ruins, you said you didn’t want to take me like this. How did you plan to be with me?”

  “What we did there was just getting the job done. I wanted to give you a gradual seduction, a day together, a nice dinner, wine, a retreat to a luxurious room with a large bed waiting for us. Slow loving, but I didn’t know you were a virgin. That changes everything.”

  “I’m not anymore, and we just had that day, Junior. Despite everything that happened, it was lovely being with you. One thing about nearly dying is it puts things into perspective, what matters, what doesn’t. I tried to fall in love Connor with because he seemed appropriate, a little older than me, good career, friend of the family, all the right reasons, and we never would have made it together. I let our age difference stand in the way of seeing you as the man I loved.”

  She did not expect his reaction, his next words. Junior pulled away a little, and said, “Are you sure this isn’t because I was your first and now you feel obligated to stay with me? I know how devout you are, but I mean—you don’t have to.”

  He made her laugh. After these last few awful days, she could actually laugh. Junior drew farther away, hurt and offended. “I was trying to be considerate, not funny.”

  Feeling suddenly playful, Xochi grasped his ears and pulled him back into an embrace. “I might be devout, but I’d never stay with a man I didn’t love. I do love you, Junior Polk. That’s what I learned on Ix Chel’s altars, both of them.”

  “I’ve always loved you, Xo.”

  “Then what are we waiting for? We had a nice day together. We are sitting on a big bed in a pretty room. Come under the covers with me.”

  “Give me a minute.” Junior made a fast dash to the other bedroom and returned with the purchase of condoms in his hand. He bolted the adjoining door and came to the bed, slipping beneath the covers to press his heated body against her naked form.

  “I think we can get rid of these. They’re only in the way.” Xochi slid her hands inside his briefs and lowered them to his knees. He kicked them off. Her hands remained where they had been, cupping him, stroking his shaft grown hard. “Impressive,” she said.

  “Not something I expected to hear from a recent virgin.” She felt his grin go wide against her cheek.

  “I have lots of brothers who forget to lock bathroom doors—and more than one man has shown me his whether I wanted to see it or not. Sex is not a mystery to me, Junior. I always stopped short of their goal. Last night, you showed me the rest. From what others have told me, I had a way better than average first time.”

  “All the adrenaline in our systems, I guess.”

  “Don’t short change yourself. I came my very first time.” She drew his head closer for more kissing and less conversation.

  He did kiss her, but started with an ear lobe briefly sucked, working his way along her cheek before he got to her lips, inviting her into his mouth for the tongue play they’d done before. Junior left her lips to kiss his way down her throat into the cleavage of her breasts, emerging to lick each nipple to a sensitive peak.

  “I’m ready now,” she moaned.

  “Not by half.” His kisses wandered over her body, his tongue circling her navel before moving on to travel down one thigh and up the other until he reached the hard pearl at the top of her cleft and sucked again. Xochi’s hips raised off the bed. Her hands held him in place until the sparks flying through her caught fire and ignited with a huge burst. She sank back quivering as he left her. “No, no, no!”

  “Hush. We’re going for two the right way.”

  The condom wrapper crinkled as he ripped it with his teeth, a flash of white in the dark room. Understanding, she took it from his hand and sheathed him as he towered over her. Covers kicked to the floor, Junior mounted between her legs, probed cautiously, asked, “Are you too sore?”

  She answered by wrapping her legs around his hips and urging him to take her again. Invitation accepted, he drove into her hard and picked up his rhythm, going for distance, still teasing her clit with a thumb until Xochi spasmed and he reached completion. After a moment of recuperation, he took his weight off of her, rolling to one side and lying on his back. She rested her head on his chest, listening to the rapid thud of his heart against her ear as it returned to his natural steady beat. He slept—and snored a little, the same rhythmic sound she’d become familiar with when he inhabited her guestroom. Smiling, she reached down and relieved him of the condom, setting it carefully aside on a hotel notepad, restored the covers, and burrowed in beside him sure he had defeated the bad dreams for the night.

  Xochi came instantly awake when the adjoining door rattled at two a.m. She clutched Junior’s arm hard enough to rouse him from a heavy sleep. “What?”

  “Listen.”

  Then, Tom’s voice projected at great volume. “I guess Junior went out on the town after all. Good thing I’m a sound sleeper. He won’t wake me when he comes in.”

  “Who do you think he’s talking to?” Junior whispered. “Connor?”

  “No. I believe he’s talking to himself. He knows you are here with me. My brother just gave us his blessing.”

  “In that case since we’re both awake I have another condom. We can practice making loving love very, very quietly.”

  “Suit up. If I know Tom, he’ll be out cold in five minutes—and we can start the foreplay now.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “Man, I didn’t get much sleep last night,” Tom groused.

  They were having the full Mexican breakfast, huevos rancheros with warm tortillas, while sitting on a terrace with an ocean view, not a day to be unhappy. Xochi knew she beamed, and Junior kept smiling for no reason at all. He broke open the yolk of one of his three fried eggs and let it mingle with the chili sauce and black beans before scooping the mixture up with a tortilla.

  Full of contentment, Xo sipped her café con leche and watched the waves roll in as timeless as love.

  Connor raised an eyebrow. “If you’d let me treat that sunburn, you would have had a better rest. And you, Junior, you’ve been overdoing it. More ooze from that wound than I like to see when I change a dressing.”

  Tom raised his red brows. “I doubt anything you could have given would have helped me sleep.” He attacked his own breakfast only slightly smaller than Junior’s plateful.

  “Here.” A little apologetic, Xochi twisted in her chair and pinched several succulent leaves off an aloe vera plant growing in a clay pot near their table. “Shirt off, redheaded brother of mine.” She squeezed the thick sap onto his scarlet back and spread it on his skin.

  “Gooey! Cool. Nice.”

  “I could have written you a prescription for something better,” Connor said.

  �
��Aloe vera has been a treatment for skin disorders for thousands of years, and it’s free. Also good for constipation, too, if that’s your problem this morning, Tom,” Xochi tweaked her brother.

  “With all this Mexican chow I’ve been eating, hell no! I only want to get home to my wife.”

  Tony Ancona sauntered over to their table. “I have the power to grant that wish.” He spread his arms wide. “The Feebs said you three are free to go. Guess I’ll be flying home later.”

  “Oh, Tony, with all the help you gave us you shouldn’t be in trouble. Sit, have some breakfast.” Xochi patted a spare chair.

  “I had what our government would pay for earlier. Only came to tell you Wideout is cleared for passage. I guess I won’t be seeing you around the station anymore, Xo. Best wishes to you—and Junior.” Either more observant of a couple whose arms touched on the table or a better loser than Connor who frowned, he pecked her cheek and shook Junior’s hand. “Connor, thanks for picking up my tab. Tom, have a great season.”

  “You’re welcome to stay in the room as long as you need it,” Connor replied, not as sour as the previous remark made him.

  “I never worked with a more generous bunch. See you guys around.” Tony turned his back on the new dawn and returned to the business of dealing with darkness.

  “I’m getting him a season ticket,” Tom said. “Only one of us who knew what to do. Let’s finish up here and pack.” He got unanimous agreement on that.

  ****

  Loaded with fuel and some fresh groceries Xochi insisted upon, Wideout went to sea again. They traveled more slowly this time, stopping at sunset, dipping a line from Riley’s stock of rods and reels into the Gulf waters and pulling up a small tuna and some redfish. Junior grilled the tuna steaks and breaded the redfish fillets with the crumbs of crushed Fritos. Xochi put together a fruit salad from the edible remains in the plastic bag. They drank the beers the men had left untouched in their race to save a woman they all cared about in one way or another.