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I shook my head. “Just get on with it.”
“Jefe—”
“Just do it,” I assured her. She turned to the liquor cabinet, got out some of the primo rum and shoved the bottle into my hand. I took a healthy swig and felt the alcohol settle like lead in my stomach. I looked back at her. “I want to go to bed sometime, Helena,por favor.”
She wasn’t comfortable performing minor surgery, and it showed in the way her hands shook as she held up the forceps. I missed Lara, our full-time housekeeper in Miami. She was well-versed in fixing up any number of injuries; she’d even assisted in Lili’s birth because our mother had to start pushing in the car on the way to the hospital.
“Use the light,” I panted, “and feel around for anything small and hard. If you don’t feel anything, we’ll do stitches and leave it be.”
Helena started praying to the Virgin Mary as she touched the wound with gloved fingers. “Take a breath,jefe,” she commanded, and then her fingers were pressing in.
“La concha de tu Madre!” I tried not to jerk away from her.
She explored the wound as quickly and gently as possible. “I don’t feel anything,” she said. “Maybe it was a puncture from a blade.”
A blade, yes. I saw flashes of silver in my memories. There’d been lots of knives drawn. It was possible it was a knife wound. My whole body was shaking; there was sweat pooling at the small of my back and dripping down my face. Keeping myself awake while she mopped up the blood was a struggle. It felt like a fire had been set beneath my skin and my body wanted nothing more than to fade into darkness, to protect itself from the pain. “Will liquid stitches work?” I asked, wanting nothing more than to be in my bed.
“I don’t want to risk it. Traditional stitches will be more likely to hold after so much damage…though it would be even better if we could do medical staples.”
“I’ll add it to the list,” I said. “Angel and I will see about getting them for all of the kits.”
Angel and I. That was how it was forever; Angel and I discussing things before Angel made the final call. That was how it should be. I didn’t want his job. No matter how often my father offered it to me, I didn’t want it. I especially didn’t want it if it meant Angel dying or becoming a vegetable in a hospital bed.
Despite not wanting to be caught in a spiral of dark thoughts, they helped to distract me while Helena closed the wound. It took more than forty minutes for her to get everything sutured shut, and I was a sweaty, shaking mess, but finally, she cleaned everything and taped a bandage over it all. “We’ll need to change the dressing every morning and evening,” she said, “and watch for signs of infection.”
I nodded, then winced when that seemed to pull at the skin she’d just sewn together. “I promise I’ll look after it.”
Helena shook her head and pointed to her own small, birdlike chest. “I’lllook after it,” she insisted. “I can’t send you home to Miami with one less arm or some other infection. Your brother would never forgive me.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to tell her about Angel, but I kept my mouth shut and didn’t say anything. The little skeleton crew didn’t have to know the details of why they’d been called to the island. They just needed to do their jobs. I would tell them if and when it became pertinent for them to know.
“Gracias,” I told her. “I’m going to find a large painkiller and head to bed.”
Helena touched my arm. Her fingers were light against my skin, but she kept me from leaving all the same. Helena, like Lara, had been around since my childhood; it was unsurprising that we all looked to these women as surrogates for our mother. Angel had some memories of her before she killed herself, and so did I to an extent, but mostly Lili and I wondered what it would have been like to have a real mother.
“What?”
Helena looked unimpressed. “Don’t sass me, Mr. Enforcer,” she said. “I remember washing your mouth out with soap.”
If I thought too hard about those particular memories, I could practically taste the Dial bar that she had shoved into my mouth. “Please don’t mention the soap,” I said. “I’m already nauseated enough.”
“What are we doing with your guest,jefe? I put her in the room that locks from the outside, like you said, but you never said what you were planning to do with her.”
“Nothing,” I said, quick to answer. “I’m going to have her call her fiancé, the city comptroller, and have him get the police off my back.”
I waited for her to call me brilliant, but when it didn’t happen, I looked over at her. “What’s the matter with my plan?”
“What’s thematter?” I could tell that she wanted to shake me a little bit, but instead she helped me sit up on the edge of the table. “Omar, what can a city comptroller do to oppose the police?”
I shrugged, and even that hurt. “He’s trying to run for state Congress. That has to mean he’s influential, right?”
Helena shrugged. “If he wins, I would say that’s true, butwantingto be in Congress doesn’t make a politician a bigwig. How is he going to help?”
I was getting annoyed at her candor. Helena wasn’t the type to pull punches, even when I was hurt. She was never the type that tears worked on, either; it was one of the reasons that Padre liked her. She was the right amount of harsh…though that hardness had a limit at times like this. I didn’t want her logic tonight. “For Lyse’s sake, he better figure it out,” I said.
Helena’s eyes widened. “Lyse? As in, LyseRojas?” Her hand slipped into her pocket, and she drew out a delicate rosary to run through her fingers. “Why would you bring that girl here,jefe? If this is some romantic getaway—”
“What could possibly beromanticabout me showing up all bloody and then locking her in a room that only opens from the outside?” I demanded. “I think I have a little more game than that, thanks.”
