Easter's Lilly Page 20

We started up the stairs and hurried into Max’s room. He and I lay on the bed for what I think was one second, before Hector came flying through the door. “Am I wearing a tracking device, or something?” Max asked.

  Hurry, Jorge just pulled up.” Hector was out of breath and obviously frightened.

  Max jumped up and said, “I’m going to go first, and you follow. Something’s not right.” He ran out the door after Hector and I waited before following. When I got downstairs Jorge and Hector were in each other’s faces and Max was trying to break them up. Olivia was bleeding and bruised and sitting in a corner on the floor in the kitchen, rocking back and forth.

  Find my brother!” Jorge yelled at me. I grabbed my cell and called Diego. “Come home now, Diego!” I said over the phone.

  “What is it, Lilly?” he asked, knowing I would never call him requesting his presence.

  “It’s Jorge. Olivia’s bleeding,” I said. “Hector and Jorge…”

  “I’m on my way,” he replied. “Find Max.”

  “He’s here but it’s not good,” I said. He hung up the phone and I said, “He’s on his way.” Jorge backed down from Hector.

  “Jorge?” I asked. “May I please clean her up a bit?”

  “Take her,” Jorge answered. “I don’t want her anymore.”

  I took her to the bathroom in my bedroom where we could have some privacy. She was crying and her face was badly bruised. “What happened, Olivia?” I asked.

  “I’m pregnant,” she answered.

  “Pregnant?” I asked. “Why is Jorge so upset about that?”

  “Jorge can’t have children,” she answered. “He’s sterile.”

  “Oh, no…” was my clever response. “How does Jorge know it’s Hector’s?”

  “I told him. I had to.” She put her hand to her bruised face.

  “Didn’t you protect yourselves?” I asked, feeling very hypocritical about that question.

  “Yes of course,” she answered. “I just can’t believe this.”

  “So, what’s happening down there?”

  “Jorge is throwing me out and leaving me here, I think,” she said. “I hope he didn’t’ kill the baby, when he beat me up this morning.” I was mortified. What have we gotten ourselves into? I cleaned her up and bandaged her cuts. He really threw her around. She wasn’t more than 100 pounds soaking wet. She hugged me and sobbed. “Lilly, I think he’s going to kill me,” she continued as she cried.

  “He came here for help,” I answered. “Let him talk to Diego.” I walked her back down to the kitchen and Diego had arrived. “Thank you, Lilly,” Diego said. “You did the right thing by calling me.”

  “You take her,” Jorge said. “I’m done.” Diego didn’t know what to make of this. Obviously both the younger men took their wives and he was obviously puzzled by the whole thing.

  “Why?” He looked at Hector. “Why?” He glared at Max. “You half-breeds come into our world and you steal from us. Why do you do it?”

  “Look Diego,” Max explained. “When Lilly came here you barely noticed she was alive. You ignored her and she was pregnant and alone. It was easy for me to slide in there and become close with her. It was easy. We have been close for more than three years. You didn’t decide to pee all over her until we found her with Johnny. Then all of a sudden, it was real important for you to sleep with her. You’re too late.”

  Everyone looked at Max like he was out of his mind. Jorge took out his gun and pointed it at Max. Diego pushed it down and said, “He’s right, Jorge.”

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Jorge sputtered. His face was full of hate and I was afraid. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one wishing I were a hundred miles away from here.

  “Lilly and I have only been intimate for a few weeks. Max and Lilly, even if they really aren’t intimate yet, have been close for years.”

  “She is your wife,” Jorge responded.

  “Yes but in name only, for a long time.” He paused. “I’ve been watching their improper relationship for many years now, and I never said a thing.”

  “Just put him out of his misery,” Jorge answered.

  “Put it away Jorge,” he said. “Maybe instead of teaching them how to obey us, we need to teach them to love us.” He looked at me and put his fingers on my bruised face. “Maybe instead of beating them and forcing ourselves on them…” He paused and looked at Jorge. “I don’t think we’re teaching them to want us.” Max sat down on one of the chairs and his face changed. He suddenly looked very defeated. “Let’s you, me, Olivia and Hector, sit together in the living room and fix this.” Then he looked at Max and me. “I’m going back to work after this, but the three of us need to have the same kind of talk later.” He put both his hands on my face and I could see Max move towards me from the corner of my eye. “I won’t ever raise my hand to you again. I will fix this. Maybe it’s time we started our own family.” He kissed me, softly and let me go. “I’ll be back by 6,” he told Max, and the four of them walked off into the living room.

  Max looked at me with a hollow expression. I had never seen him look so distant before. “I’m going to lose you,” he said. “He’s going to try to get you to fall in love with him. It’s over and I never got the chance to…” He looked at me with tears in his eyes. “I waited too long.”

  By this time I was sick of people talking about me like I was property. I took Max’s hand and said, “It’s time, Max.” He was so defeated. He sat in his chair and looked at me with empty eyes. I sat on his lap and wrapped my legs around him. “It’s time Max.” I kissed him and ran my fingers through his hair. He instantly responded and I could feel him getting aroused. “Come on…” I insisted. We walked into the hall and could hear them all talking in the living room. We went up the stairs and opened the door to Max’s bedroom. “I don’t care if we get caught,” I told him. “I love you, and I need you to take me and make me your own.” He said nothing. He picked me up and put me in his bed. He kissed me in places I had never been kissed and awakened parts of my body that I didn’t know were asleep. He reached for protection and I knocked it out of his hands.

  “Do you want to end up like Olivia?” he asked me.

  “Yes,” I said. “I want to always be yours,” I answered. “I can’t have his baby, Max. Please don’t make me go there.”

  He didn’t say another word. He became enflamed with passion and ripped off my clothes. He brought me to the place only known by Diego over and over again for hours. I tried to be quiet, so I wouldn’t draw any attention to us but I whispered his name in his ear. “I’ve only dreamed about this day,” he said. I wrapped my legs around him and he put his lips on mine to keep me quiet. By the time it was over, we were both spent and exhausted.

  “You weren’t kidding,” I said with a smile.

  “How’s that?” he asked.

  “Definitely the best for last,” I answered. My body felt rejuvenated.

  “Querida.” He pulled me onto his chest. “I need a promise from you.”

  “Anything daddy,” I answered. He smiled. “You know I can’t resist you when you call me that.”

  “Anything daddy,” I said again.

  “Please marry me when we get you out of this.” he said. “I need to know, that whatever Diego says to us…” He stopped for a second and sighed. “Whatever he says to us that you are still mine.”

  “I need you to promise me something,” I added.

  “Anything querida,” he answered.

  “You will never leave me.” He put his fingers under my chin and kissed me.

  “Is that a yes?” he asked.

  I’d marry you now, if I could,” I answered. “How exactly are you and Hector going to fix this?” I asked.

  “Just know that he is as trustworthy as I am.” He smiled. “In case you ever need him and I am not around.”

  “I’m ovulating, you know,” I said to him. He looked a little panicked.

  “Lilly,” he said with a smile. “I haven’t been with
a woman in three years.”

  “Three years? You mean….”

  “Yes,” he said. “Since you arrived.” He sat up a little and looked at me. “If you were trying to play Russian roulette with getting pregnant, now was not the time. If you’re ovulating, you’re probably already pregnant.”

  “I want to be yours and only yours,” I told him. “I hope I’m pregnant. I hope I have your baby.” He pulled me close to him and kissed my forehead. “Querida,” he started, “I have to go check on Hector.”

  “I know,” I answered. “Are we okay?”

  “No matter what Diego asks you, you agree, do you understand?”

  “Are we going to tell him?” I asked.

  “Hell no!” he answered. “But if he tells you to stop seeing me, you agree. Whatever stops the abuse.”

  “Does that mean you won’t touch me anymore?” I asked. I could feel the panic in my uneven heartbeat.

  “No matter what we agree to,” he started, “you are the love of my life. I cannot leave you alone.”

  We went downstairs to the kitchen and Hector was sitting at the table by himself. “Right under his nose, you’re with his wife. Right under his nose. I go for three years without being discovered and she turns up pregnant.”

  “Did he ask where we were?” he asked. Hector was tapping his fingers on the kitchen table.

  “He just told me to tell you he’ll be home between 5 and 6.” I shuddered. Hector grabbed my arm and said, “He also told me to tell you not to be afraid. That he would never hurt you again. Oh and he is not sending Max away.” Max and I looked at each other in surprise.

  “I’m sorry, what?” I asked.

  “It’s like he had a religious conversion or something, Max. He wants to… talk. Are you going to tell him you’re banging his wife?”

  “Please don’t say that,” Max answered. “And NO!”

  “He thinks you’ve been having an affair all this time,” he told us. “You probably should’ve been.”

  “Definitely.” Max took my hand and smiled. “We really should’ve been.”

  “I tried but you wouldn’t have me,” I answered. “This is your fault, daddy.”

  “Oh yuck!” I think Hector had had enough of us. “Way too much information.”

  “Sorry Hector,” I said blushing. Max was still smiling like he used to.

  “You know you have to have humor in this business.” Hector laughed. “I hope you’re prepared to face the music.”

  “Remember what I said, Lilly,” Max said to me. “Whatever you have to do to end the abuse.” He looked at Hector. “Where’s Olivia?”

  “He took her and left me here.” Max patted him on the back. “I’m sorry, man.”

  “It’s my baby, Max.” He looked at me. “I don’t know what to do now.”

  “What did Diego say?” he asked.

  “You mean besides telling us that he and Lilly were going to try to have a baby?” My legs fell from under me and I collapsed onto the floor. Max ran over to me and picked up my head. “Lilly, Lilly…” I looked up at him. “Please Max, just kill me.” He kissed my lips and sat on the floor beside me. He lifted me into his lap and rocked me. “It’s going to be my baby,” he said.

  “No…” Hector said. “No Max, you didn’t.”

  “I did,” he said. “I’m so in love with her, Hector.” He kissed my cheek. “How did we get so personally involved? Wasn’t this nothing more than a job five years ago?”

  Hector came up behind him and hugged him. “Yes, brother, just a job.” We all sat there on the floor holding each other. It was strange to have no control over our own destiny. Diego’s world, that’s where we lived. When the clock struck 5:30, the three of us were together in the living room. We had agreed to watch each other’s backs and try to stay strong.

  CHAPTER 12

  All’s fair in love and war, isn’t it?