READY OR NOT (CAMREN)

EIGHTEEN

Camila left Havana by eleven that night but didn't intend to head home. She checked the address of the diner on her phone and hopped the A train to Fourteenth Street, ignoring the stale smell of the subway and loud group of twenty-somethings clearly en route to a new stop on their raucous evening out. Her world felt unsettled, and she had to do what she could to put things right.

As she walked the block and a half to the corner of Eighth Avenue, she nervously fingered the house key in her jacket pocket and hoped Karla was working. Quite simply, she wanted to lay eyes on her and make sure all was as it should be. The fear that she'd backslid on her sobriety ran a constant loop in the back of Camila's brain, and she needed to silence the concern.

Camila pushed open the door to the Stairway to Heaven Café, hit instantly with the aroma of coffee and bacon, a homey smell that somehow put her at ease. A faint smile touched her lips. Leatherette booths lined the perimeter of the small room, with a band of black-topped tables scattered through its center. She looked around the bustling diner for any sign of Karla, as plates with fried eggs, burgers, and pancakes whisked past, but she came up short. There were two waitresses on the floor, and a hostess standing behind a cash register. The place wasn't big, but it clearly did a decent late-night business.

"Table for one?" the hostess asked, eyeing her curiously. She must have caught the resemblance to Karla, which meant Camila had arrived at the right place. The woman then offered a weary smile that Camila could relate to, the kind that said she'd been on her feet for hours on end and still had the remainder of her shift to muddle through.

"Um, yeah. Thank you," Camila answered, not really sure what her course of action would be, but a cup of coffee couldn't hurt. The hostess walked her to a booth in the corner. Camila reached for a menu when the door to the kitchen swung open and Camila caught sight of a flash of brunette hair reminiscent of her own. Karla delivered a plate of onion rings and ketchup to the table across from hers, turned, pulled out her order pad, and headed to Camila's table.

The sight of Karla's face had Camila's next breath caught in her throat. She had used makeup to cover as much as she could, but the purple and pink bruising around Karla's eye looked angry and painful. Her lip was swollen on one side and a laceration jutted just below. "You weren't returning my calls," Camila offered meekly, her stomach sick at the sight of her battered sister.

Karla raised a shoulder and took a step closer to the booth, her voice low. "I didn't want to upset you. You went to a lot of trouble for me already, kiddo. You're in the clear."

"Who did this?" Camila asked, anger curling in her stomach.

Karla studied the floor. "Please. Who do you think?"

"But you paid him. What more does he want?"

"A hell of a lot more money apparently. He said interest went up and he wants another 20K."

"Of course he did." Camila shook her head. This wasn't about money. This was about power. Tyrone wanted Karla under his thumb because he knew he could control her. "So we need to rethink this."

Karla signaled the hostess and took a seat in the booth across from Camila. "Nothing to rethink, Mila. I don't have any way out of this. I'll keep Tyrone happy for a little while longer, come to work each day and wait for him to get tired of me."

"That's not a good plan."

"Listen, it's all I've got. I've gone over this every which way."

Then something occurred to Camila. "Where are you staying? You haven't been back to the apartment."

A small smile touched Karla's lips. "There's a guy I've been sort of seeing. I've crashed with him the past couple nights."

Perfect. When she thought of the lineup of guys that had paraded in and out of Karla's life, it was like a lineup of America's Most Wanted, and that was so not a complication she needed. "Are you kidding me right now?"