It’s morning. I saunter into the kitchen and am surprised to see Diago drinking coffee and laughing with Maria and Rosa, who are busy packing a basket.
‘Morning Rosa! Morning Maria!’
I look at Diago and shut one eye. ‘Morning, Senor. Overslept? Don’t you have a village to burn down or something?’
He grunts, his eyes lighting up at the sight of me. ‘Today I take you to ...?’ He falters and looks to Maria for help with the word.
‘Picnic!’ Rosa yells.
‘I know that, Rosa!’ Maria screeches. ‘He ask me! Because I good for English. Better than you!’
That’ll teach Rosa to steal Maria’s chance to shine at English.
‘Sorry,’ Rosa says, looking anything but sorry.
Diago and I exchange amused looks. Don’t mess with Maria at this time of the morning.
‘A picnic? But Diago, you won the bet and I lost. What about Senor Vito?’
He lifts and drops his shoulders and gives me a strange look. Is that naked adoration in his eyes?
I’m suddenly shy and look away. ‘Okay, in that case I’d better change my clothes.’ I exit the kitchen, thrilled to have someone to spend the day with other than Maria and Rosa. ‘Maria, Rosa!’ I holler over my shoulder, ‘make sure there’s champagne in that basket!’
‘Si, Senorita,’ they chorus.
We picnic on a grassy spot overlooking the water. What a day – the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, the views are breathtaking and Diago has taken the day off to spend it with me. What more could a girl ask for?
Over the next couple of hours, we talk about everything and anything. He tells me about his life, the drugs, the killings. I think he trusts me. I like that.
Luckily, I forgot to wear the FBI listening device pendant today. I don’t want the Feds to hear all of this, anyway. I’m not ready to hand over Diablo right now. I’m having too much fun.
‘Is the way it is round here,’ he explains. ‘Is our way.’
‘Your way? But you must admit, you sometimes kill when it’s not necessary, right?’ ‘Like the time you shot me - that was so not necessary. That was like, overkill.’
‘I think you spy.’
‘Spy, mff! Poor intelligence there, Amigo. And you should be sorry.’
‘I am sorry, he says, lifting my hand to his lips then clutching it against his chest. ‘Very sorry.
‘What about the other men you killed? The policemen ...?’
‘Si! I kiiiill them.’ He shrugs. ‘So?’
‘Diablo, they were old, they were policemen. That’s like, a big deal, you know.
‘No, not a big deal. They kill my mother and father. That’s a big deal. I watch them burn my village for what? To get our land. I remember their faces. I remember the policeman standing and watching as our village burned. I see their faces every night before I close my eyes and every night I promise my mother and father I kill them one day. And one day, I do it. I tell them who I am first before I ...’ He runs his finger across his throat.
‘Christ Diago!’ I hastily put down the bunch of red grapes I was eating.
‘My mother ... they shoot her in the back. Back. She run with Troy but they shoot her. In the back. My father, he push me under the house to save me. Tell me to hide. But is hot, the village is burning and I can’t stay under the house. Then I see them shoot him.’ He closes his eyes and falls silent for a moment.
I gently touch his face. He opens his eyes and stares into mine.
‘That’s all, Payton. Is fair. They police, but they bad police They must die. No place for them on earth, here.’
‘What about Jimmy Gomez?’
He squints at me. ‘You know everything. Too much.’
I shrug. People talk you know and I’m lucky I have ears. Two of them. Did you really kill him and take his home?’
‘Si. The police work for him. He pay them. He ask my grandfather to sell him the land, my grandfather say no. He arrange to kill my family, all of them, then he take it. The police, they his friends. Hepay them to look the other way. I look at Jimmy and say, ‘One day … one day!’
‘Christ! What land you talking about?’
‘Tana Mera.’
‘Tana Mera? You stole Tana Mera?’
‘He stole, not me. I take my family’s land back.’
“Wow!”
If the FBI heard this conversation, Diago would be spending the night behind bars. This is what they’re waiting for and I have it now. But it’s not recorded.
‘You wanted to burn Siempre,’ I remind him. ‘That was bad, uncalled for. Why did you want to do that?’
‘’Cos I was stupid. Mad. I don’t know how to be good, Payton. I was born into this and this is my life. I kill or they kill me. You treat me bad, I kill you or you kill me. Is like that here. People say be good, be good - how? They no show me. Nobody show me.’
‘Yeah, but Diago, I am showing you how to be good, right?’
‘Si, you show me and I like that. I want be good for you,’ he says, taking my palm and placing it against his cheek.
A warm, heady sensation oozes through me. As I look into his hazel eyes, the feeling mutates into an urge to reach out and draw his head to my breasts.
But I don’t. Instead, I whisper, ‘Yeah, I like it when …when you are good.’
When we return to the ranch, I look at him and smile. ‘Thanks for the lovely picnic.’
He stares at me.
I step forward and give him a brief hug.
He returns the hug, crushing me to him. We stay in each other’s arms for a few moments, basking in the warmth and tenderness we’re both feeling.
Then he lightly pecks me on the cheek and quickly releases me.
The cheek. How unusual. I’m used to fighting off my dates who try to stick their tongue down my throat.
I lie in bed thinking about the hug and the kiss trying to figure out why he released me so quickly. I fall asleep with a smile on my face.