“Do you think you can just dismiss me True? Like I’ll leave like a good little boy? I think I've allowed you to think I'm tameable, let me assure you I’m not. I said we’re going to talk and that’s what the fuck is going to happen. I will get my answers. How I get them is up to you. If you want to fuck around and find out, I’ll be more than happy to learn you some shit today.” I growl down in her face.
“You can’t make me talk Atlas, and I think you got me fucked up too! Despite the condition, you found me in, I am far from a wilting violet I run with killers because I am one. And I’m an advanced learner so we can both fuck around and find out today,” she says ten toes down, looking at me head-on. If this wasn’t such a serious conversation I would have had a hard dick right now.
“Let me explain this to you in simple terms. My only desire in life since I was ten years old has been to kill your father. I will call his ass and let him know it was me who fucked up his house, killed his men, and took his daughter. And we will wait right here for him to come to us and before either of us takes our last breath you will tell me what I am here to know. You have no idea the lengths I am willing to go True and I really don’t think you want to fuck around and find out, ‘cause I ain’t got shit to lose.”
She pushes against my chest and I take a step back, allowing her room to move away from the door and to take a seat on the sofa.
“ Victor saw my mother walking one day on her way to school. She was around fourteen years old, her mom had just moved to the area so my mom really didn’t know the area or any one. Victor was climbing the ranks in the cartel and saw her, he was twenty-two and she was fourteen, poor, and naive. He began pursuing her, driving her to school and picking her up, buying her stuff, taking her out to dinner. She went from a nobody to his main chick getting what she wanted, dressing in designer outfits, etc, etc. He took her virginity and put her on birth control since he was so adamant that he didn’t want children, even though my mother wanted children. He told her he could take her back to the one-bedroom her mother was still living in if she was unhappy about the no kids rule. Left with that choice she did what many women do, she stayed thinking she’d eventually change his mind. She didn’t, she got sick and was given antibiotics, those antibiotics nullified the birth control and she ended up pregnant. Knowing how Victor felt she took some money and ran away to have the baby in secret. Victor was pissed and he looked for my mother but he couldn’t find her.
She had a little girl and in her naivete’ she thought if Victor met the baby he’d want her. She named the baby True a play on her name Honor and took me to meet my father. He took me and gave me to one of his men and had a doctor give my mother a full hysterectomy to ensure she would never have any more kids. My mother was devastated, not only did he take her little girl away but she had no idea where he also took any chances of her having any other kids from her. She tried to make it work with him but too much damage had been done. By this time Victor had staged a coup and taken over the cartel, so there was no one to stop him or challenge him.
Eventually, my mom turned to drugs to cope and get through the day, it went from occasionally to she couldn’t function without being high. Victor tried to get her clean but she didn’t want to be clean so she kept using. Ultimately, she tried to kill herself by overdosing but he saved her. It was like he was obsessed with her, he refused to just let her go no matter how miserable she was and he also never cheated on her until she tried to OD. After the suicide attempt he took all protection from her, she was no longer ‘Victor’s woman’ and she ended being passed around to anyone who wanted her.
One day Victor sent for her and when she didn’t come to him he went to her and found her dead, this time she succeeded in her suicide. She never knew what happened to me.”
She was crying by the time she finished the story, and I wanted to kill Victor more than ever. The man he gave me to ended up giving me to one of Victor’s top guards, Manuel. Manuel was married with his own children. Once I grew up I knew I was different from Manuel, his wife, and kids, I mean I was a black girl in a house of Columbians but it was forbidden to talk about who I was. I snuck after Manuel one day when he went to talk to Victor. I was about twelve or thirteen and I overheard the conversation about Victor’s dead woman and her mother coming for her daughter. I listened to the whole story and eventually figured out that it was my mother, grandmother, and myself they were talking about. Apparently, my mom’s mom came looking for Honor, really it was just because the money my mom used to send to her stopped coming, and she threatened to call the cops and report her missing. Victor had her killed and he was telling Manuel to get rid of the body.
Victor had killed my whole family so I made up my mind to kill him. I began sneaking around and learning all I could about guns, knife fighting, hand to hand, explosives, you name it I learned about it. In the end, Manuel told me he knew what I was up to and began to train me himself, before he died he told me he knew I had followed him that day and that I had heard everything. He felt I needed to know and he was forbidden to tell, but my overhearing the truth well that was a different ball game. The night you found me I had snuck into Victor’s house a few days earlier to kill him, miscalculated, and got caught. He felt I was’ ungrateful, after all, he let me live so he took his time beating and torturing me and was going to leave me in that room until I died but you found me instead. Yes Victor is my sperm donor but that’s all he is and I hate him as much as you do. The day he dies will be one of the happiest days of my life.” When she finishes she is in my lap and I am wiping her tears away as she sits quietly in my arms.
“Why didn’t you just tell me? Who wouldn’t understand after you told them that story? Especially after I told you I love you? A month apart wasted due to a lack of communication.” I sit there rocking her in my arms until she settles down. “Get your shit, let’s go,” I say standing with her in my arms.
“Where are we going?” she asks.
“Home.”
We head to the front desk to settle her bill and no surprise the bill has been taken care of and Peter is nowhere to be found. “Who is Peter?” True asks, confused and suspicious by someone paying her bill.
“Peter is Savvy’s bonus dad, trust me you’ll meet him soon.” We grab her bags and head home.