Page 107 of My Fallen Saint

“You really that sad excuse for a human’s niece?”

“Excuse me?” I was hardly expecting that kind of vitriol right out of the gate.

“Peter White, the fuck. Skimming cash offa Danny. Stealing customers. You think he didn’t deserve to get capped? Fuck, yeah, he did.”

“I—I didn’t know any of that,” I lie, hoping to keep him appeased long enough to tell me who pulled the trigger. “Do you know who killed him?”

“Oh, yeah. Not that it’ll do you any good. Been dead at least eight years, figure someone popped him because he just disappeared about a year, maybe two, after the shoot. But he did the job alright. Definitely earned his stripes that boy did.”

“Boy?” I sit down and tug at the collar of my T-shirt, suddenly very warm.

“Who else? Big job like that?”

“I’m not sure I’m following you,” I say, the ice in my veins now contrasting the warmth in my skin. My head starts to spin.

“His son,” Hernandez says. “Of course, Danny sent Alejandro to handle the job.”

His son, his son, oh God, his son.

The words ring through my head for I don’t know how long, and then my head snaps up at the sound of the front door opening. I freeze, no idea what I’m going to say or do, and no time to figure it out. Which is why I’m completely unprepared when he walks through the door for the words that come from my mouth, not a scream, not a howl, just the low and steady voice of pain and betrayal.

“You son-of-a-bitch. You killed my uncle.”

He freezes, and I see the shock on his face. But it’s not the shock of a false accusation. No. This is the shock of being discovered.

I stand, though I’m not sure how my muscles manage that act of defiance.

“El, please.”

I reach out, and I slap his face.

“Don’t you dare call me that.” I’m crying, dammit, when I want to be strong. Stoic. “I trusted you. I trusted you. And then I asked you flat out if you killed Peter and you lied to my face.”

His face is totally expressionless. I wait for him to speak. To tell me another lie. To try to slither out of the truth.

But what he says is, “Yes.”

I take a step back, as if that one simple admission has knocked me over, and that’s when I start to really cry. When the tears start to roll down my cheeks in earnest and my body shakes with sobs.

He steps toward me again, but I stiffen, putting my hands up to ward him away.

I suck in air, managing to find my voice as my heart races and my blood whooshes in my ears. “We’re done,” I finally say. “I can’t ever forgive you for this.”

“No,” he says, the word almost a whisper. “I wouldn’t expect you to.”