Zero Saints Read Free

as well. Cartilage and pieces of bone dangled at the tip of Nestor’s stumps like maggots.
    My heart was trying to climb its way out of my chest. It was trapped in my throat. Indio took four steps and grabbed my face. I wanted to kill him, but was too scared to move, too terrified to utter a single word. If you talk to enough men about danger, you’ll learn they always overcome their cowardice and triumph. Bullshit. Yo soy un cobarde que disfruta estar vivo y quiero seguir estándolo a toda costa. Keeping your mouth shut and nodding is a good way to stay alive.
    “Ya te lo dije, cabrón, no estamos jugando.” Indio’s breath was as bad as his intentions. I wanted to move back, but my body was locked in place, my eyes bouncing from one of his dilated pupils to the other, waiting for la huesuda to pop out of them any second.
    “You should go and talk to your jefe, tell him what you saw, and convince him to make this a smooth transition. Esa sería la opción inteligente. La segunda opción es ponerte bruto. You can go and try to warn him, get everyone riled up and coming for us. Esa sería una movida muy estúpida. We don’t want to work too hard for this, chulo, but we will if we have to. We don’t mind a little blood.”
    Indio let go of my face and turned around. His back was entirely covered with black ink: a naked woman, a devil with a smile on his face, a few guns, and a lot of random images I couldn’t make out. Indio took two steps forward, reached the chair, and grabbed Nestor’s hair. He yanked his head to the left and placed the bloody knife on his neck and looked back at me. His eyes looked dirty, wrong, like the ink on his face had somehow invaded his capillaries. He looked back at Nestor and started sawing at his neck like it was nothing.
    Nestor tensed, hummed a high-pitched noise somewhere between a scream and a machine about to give out. Instead of spurts, Nestor’s blood came out like a small, fast tide. It soon covered his left side with shiny darkness. Indio started talking gibberish.
    “Ogún oko dara obaniché aguanile ichegún iré.”
    With each word, my core temperature dropped a few degrees. Nestor, thankfully, relaxed. He was gone. Indio kept cutting. When he hit the spinal cord, he let go of Nestor’s hair and used that hand to smack the head. There was a loud crack. I closed my eyes, but still heard a few seconds of cutting and then the head hitting the ground.
    “Abre los ojos, marica,” said Indio. I obeyed.
    Indio was pointing at me with the knife. He smiled and dropped the bloody blade on the floor.
    “You go and talk to you boss. If I have to bring you here again, te voy a cortar la cabeza. I don’t think you want to end up like your friend here, so make sure my message reaches el gordo.”
    Many bad experiences in Mexico had given me the ability to be in a moment but hover above it so that everything looked like it was happening to someone else. I was barely pulling that shit off this time around. My prayers became a jumble of words that trampled each other in the haste to get out and protect me.
    Santa Muerte, protégeme.
    That was all I could think about, the only prayer, an improvised mantra.
    Santa Muerte, protégeme.
    Santa Muerte, protégeme.
    I kept repeating as if the words themselves could carry me away from that place, as if they could fly in like avenging angels, lift me by the arms, and fly me to a safe place.
    Santa Muerte, protégeme. Por favor, te lo ruego.
    One of the goons pulled me by the arm, mumbled something. Vámonos era una de las palabras. It sounded like the best idea anyone had ever had. This culero was no angel, but he was as good as one if he was taking me out of there. I turned without looking at Nestor again.
    I shambled down the hall and out of the house.
    They pushed me into the car and I kind of wished they’d stuffed me in the trunk again so I could pray in peace, say thank you, cry. Instead, I was squeezed between two guys, their body heat