Southern Narco Ch. 03

"Don't do that." She chastised. "Just let it go, please?" He didn't respond. She looked over and saw his jaw flexing and tightening from below. His unbreakable eyes were set on the trail ahead. It was written all over his face that nothing she said right then would change his mind.

She shouldn't have even mentioned it. The last thing she wanted was for him to put a rift in his business over something she wouldn't give another second thought.

"Silas?" She continued when he didn't respond. "It doesn't bother me, I promise."

"It bothers me." He said through clenched teeth. Ebony sighed. She was better off changing the subject.

"How'd you learn to ride horses?" They delved deeper into the cover of trees with high canopies. The leaves blocked out the sun and worked to cool them down. Silas brought Z to a slow, steady trot. Ebony was glad he had a chance to relax and slow down a little.

"My grandfather taught me. He taught me how to ride bulls, too." Ebony conjured a scene up in her head of a terrified bull jumping and bucking with Silas on its back. "What?" Silas had looked down and saw her frown. She didn't know when she became so easy to read. Maybe he was just a better reader than average.

Everyone knew that annoying animal's activist who cast a shadow over everything related to animals. She didn't want to be that person so she held her tongue. "Nothing."

"I don't like having to pry things out of people, bella." His warning was clear and the term of endearment did little to hide his frustration with her.

"I think it's a little cruel." Silas reflected on her words.

"You like animals?"

"I didn't think I liked them any more than anyone else. But I don't like to see innocent things suffer. Especially pointlessly."

"Bull riding is pointless to you?" He feigned offense.

"Is there a point to it?" Silas took a beat to reply and Ebony found her opportunity to tease.

"Pero—but" Silas tried to redeem himself but his smiling stole his validity. "It's cultural—even historic. My abuelo— grandfather used to be a professional. His father taught him and so on." Ebony was careful with her words. She could hear in his voice that he was prideful about his family and their traditions. They meant a lot to him.

"It's not about that though, Silas. It's about the price paid for the happiness of someone else—or even for the sake of following a tradition."

Silas flared his nostrils while her words stung him for reasons he wasn't sure he could ever voice aloud. Ebony looked up to him again when his silence lingered on.

Stop pissing him off, dummy. She scolded herself.

"I'm just trying to explain my thoughts to you—"

"You think too much, Ebony." Silas interrupted in a calm, steady voice.

"What?" She was taken aback.

"You worry too much over your words. You hold back when you want to say what you feel but when you do, you rush to explain it differently." She opened her mouth to object and suggest everything he said was untrue. It was fitting and she wanted him to be wrong. But she couldn't. She was guilty. "Say what you want. Don't think twice about it."

Ebony took in a struggled breath. She was slightly embarrassed.

She didn't realize Silas had led the horse toward a tree. She looked down and saw a blanket splayed over a section of plush grass below. A basket was in the center beside two wine glasses and a bucket of chilled Moscato. Silas took his hand off her waist and raised it in the air down the direction of the trail. A few men with cowboy hats were on horses at the end. They waved back to him in response.

"You did this?" Ebony asked. Silas jumped off the horse first and left her to support her own weight. He turned and ran his palm over her thigh. Initially it was innocent and simply a way to coax her down. But an electric current from her body morphed it into something else. His hands were coarse and convincing. He rubbed her expertly and she was surprised by how much she enjoyed it.

Still, it was inappropriate and his sly smile told her that he already knew.

"Alright now," She warned from above. "Watch those hands." There was not a hint of seriousness in her voice. Silas ignored her and stepped closer to her legs. He used both hands to grab ahold of her upper thigh and nuzzle his five o'clock shadow into the supple skin. He kissed her flesh once and the kiss was a strong indicator to what kind of lover he could be. "Help me down, Silas." Ebony said huskily, trying her best to feign annoyance. His glassed over eyes met hers and he wearily parted with her skin.

"Ven aquí—come here." He reached out his arms and Ebony carefully switched her other leg to one side of the horse. Silas gripped her waist and Ebony put both of her hands along his shoulders for guidance.

Once she was on her bare feet, she walked over to the setup he had prepared for them.

It was simple but it warmed her core to see. The trees created shade and the smallest of breezes. She looked back at Silas with a tiny smile.

He had lingered behind with his hands stuffed in his jeans, watching her. It was almost a signature look for some of his shoulder length black hair to fray around his temples and ears while parted down the middle. Still, it only added to his handsomeness.

"Sweet Brown Ebony Chocolate," Ebony rolled her eyes at him while he laughed.

Silas had picked up on her full name when she mentioned it earlier. Her mother had done the deed of naming her 'Ebony Brown'. It was something she had to deal with all her life; a deep brown woman with a name to match.

Silas was now in the midst of making up every ridiculous nickname he could think of and he was enjoying himself.

"I might start calling you bomboncita." He said.

"What's that?" Ebony asked, adjusting the skirt of her dress over her knees and backside.

"Little sweetheart— or chocolate." She shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly. But inside, the idea of having such a cute nickname from him put excitement in her stomach.

Ebony downed her third glass of wine. Silas had a firm grip on the bottle and was doing the honors of finishing it off. They'd eaten all the cubed cheese, bread, smoked ham, grapes and pepperoni in the basket. Now they were laying across the blanket in the grass. Z grazed nearby, never straying too far.

"Is there a reason why she named you that?" Ebony tried to answer that question quite a few times throughout her life. Every time she asked her mother, she could never get a straight answer. Her mother never told her anything. Ebony couldn't decide if it was because of the drugs or that she just didn't want her to know.

"I have no idea." Ebony said quietly. Silas could see the glimmer of something in her eyes. She stared off into the distance with her hand propping up her head. "What about you? Who's Quetz—whatever Daniel called you?"

"Quetzalcoatl— a Mesoamerican deity." She could hear in his voice that he wasn't interested in getting into the details of the name. But Ebony didn't care. She let him continue. "It's a feathered snake or serpent kind of animal. The story is that he was travelling around Mexico and found a priest was about to kill a man in his brother's name."

"A sacrifice?" Ebony clarified. She was expecting a story about a family dinner where an uncle made a teasing joke that had stuck into a nickname. This was akin to a history lesson. Silas nodded.

"Quetzalcoatl objected. The priest was angry. Thunder rolled and volcanoes erupted." As Silas recounted the details more and more, he got more into telling the story. "Quetzalcoatl promised to bring the people peace. He taught them literature, agriculture, science—everyone loved him."

"And that's you?" Ebony asked with a smile.

"That's who they think I am." His tone was even.

"Who are 'they'?"

"The people who work around me. For me." Ebony was thoughtful for a moment.

"Well, there has to be a reason why they call you that." Ebony watched his stone expression. "Maybe I'll start calling you that." She smiled. Silas cut his eyes over to her.

His expression was chilling.

"You will never call me that, Ebony."

They both fell quiet. The alternating between joking and seriousness made their conversations hard to reads. Silas embraced the silence for a few minutes. Ebony appreciated his ability to leave stillness between them that didn't make conversation feel unnatural, even when things were tense. In spite of it all, everything always tended fit.

"What was life like for Ms. Brown in the city?" His southern drawl was thick with that question. She chortled before she answered. He smiled and turned the bottle up to his mouth. His strong arm lifted and his neck stretched. Every part of his body seemed toned and huge.

"It was spontaneous." If not knowing how you'd pay your bills the next day was ever going to be flipped into something adventurous, the word spontaneous was the word to use. "I was always working but my friends kept me happy." Her mind wandered toward Nia and Cassandra.

"Did you go to school for art?"

"Yeah, I went to Pratt." She said. "Did you go to school?" Silas nodded slowly.

"I went to Rice University." Ebony's brows furrowed and then she quickly tried to uncoil them; it was offensive. She just never thought of him to be around such elitist private university kids.

"What'd you study?"

"Biology." Silas leaned back on the blanket and pulled his arms up behind his head. "I loved school."

"Me too." Ebony professed. "So how do you go from biology to owning businesses?"

"I inherited the business. Plans change." He looked over to her with half closed lids. "What's your plan?"

"I don't have one. I never had one." Her life had been centered around a constant state of worry. There was always an urgency in her heart that she learned to live with. Her dreams and wants had never been a concern. She was always just focused on living another day.

"I want you to figure it out while you're here." Silas said sternly. Ebony looked to him curiously. She laughed.

"Why?" He shrugged modestly.

"I never got the chance to do what I wanted. If you're here, in my house, then I want to help if I can."

"Willadeene's is your house?" Ebony questioned, ignoring everything else. Silas nodded silently. "Well, that's really nice of you." Ebony said. "Thank you."

He nodded while he yawned. They were both getting lethargic from the fullness of the food and the drinks. Ebony could see he'd fall asleep given the chance.

They made it back to the ranch and Silas led Z to the stables. He took off the saddle and hung it on a free hook. Ebony slipped on her shoes and walked over to the ATV. She assumed David had left it for them to get back to the truck.

Silas parked the ATV where they got it and walked over to open the passenger side door for her. He helped her inside and stood in the opening. She stopped reaching for her seatbelt when he didn't move to close the door.

"Stay here. I'll be back."

"I told you I—"

"Mira—Listen" Ebony quickly closed her mouth at his tone. It was low and full of caution. "Stay here." When she didn't reply, he slammed the door shut and took wide strides up to the ranch center.

Silas hoped—nearly prayed that his time with Ebony would help to ease his anger over the story she told about David's prejudice. He and bigotry had a long, brutal history and he had no tolerance for it in his life or the life of those he knew. He was sure David had heard about it.

So, he would just have to learn the hard way.

Silas walked into the ranch's community center. It had plasma TVs, couches and a pool table. The space was often rented for events and gatherings. Toward the back were the offices where most of the business was conducted. He found David at a desk in front of a computer.

The old man looked up with a smile to start. His creased, rosy cheeks rose but soon fell after taking in Silas' expression. Silas closed the door behind himself. He turned to the window and closed the blinds.

David was past the point of confused and was simply just afraid. Silas felt his keys in his pocket and felt a pang of regret in his chest; Ebony was sitting in the scorching heat waiting for him. He would have to make this quicker than he wanted.

"Mr. Moreno, we're just a little behind but—" The old man started.

"This isn't about the money." The money was the last thing on his mind at this point. He couldn't say the same would be the case for his body-guard-like accountant. Gerardo would have a lot to say to David about his payment history. "Ebony Brown." Realization played over David's face gradually. "Why wasn't she offered a room?"

"We were initially booked for—" Silas picked up a dense, glass paperweight on the corner of David's desk and used his mass to apply pressure to his left set of fingers. David howled in agony and tried to pull his fingers free. The feeble attempt only caused him more pain.

"Why wasn't she offered a room?" He said the sentence slower this time as if speed was the reason he hadn't gotten the right answer initially.

"Brooklyn isn't a good area—"

"We get visitors from New York all the time, David." Silas released. He couldn't make an example out of David the way he wanted to; the man was too old. It would feel too cheap.

He found a picture of David's family in a frame.

Everyone smiled for the camera—him, his son, daughter-in-law, wife, and three grandchildren. All pale skinned and light eyed.

"Please, I didn't know she knew you—I would've never—"

"That's the problem." Silas turned back to David with the frame still in hand. He put both of his fists along the desks' span and leaned down to stare David in the face. "This is what you're going to do." Silas brought his tone to a near whisper. "Get dressed for dinner tomorrow night at Deene's—suit and tie. Get a bouquet of roses and a greeting card to apologize for your behavior. I want a note from you— handwritten." David nodded and agreed fervently. "And another envelope will have every red cent you owe me." David had no choice but to nod and agree, regardless of if he had the money or not.

Silas stood to his full height and tossed the frame back on the desk. The glass cracked and Silas strolled out of the office.

She had stayed in the car as he asked her to. He had his doubts that she would, especially considering the heat.

Silas walked over to the drivers' side door and jumped inside. He started the engine without a word and turned to reverse back out onto the road. He put his arm against the headrest of her seat and turned his head.

"I hope you didn't do anything you might regret." Silas gave her a quizzical look.

"Why would I regret defending you?" She heaved a sigh, realizing this was a fight she wouldn't win. "You'll have a guest for dinner tomorrow."