Chapter 5

Camile looks at me. Terror takes over every corner of her face.

“How much do you need?” I ask Bernardo.

“I don’t want your money.”

“Screw that, Bernardo! This isn’t the time for pride. How much?”

“I already have what I need,” he snaps back. “I managed to sell the package they gave me. I’m just waiting on some guys to pay me.”

“God, I still can’t believe you dragged yourself into this mess.” Camile’s voice falters, and tears spill down her face.

“You didn’t need to do this. You’ve completely lost your mind, Jesus Christ…”

“Camis, we’ll talk at home, all right? Take her, Lou, please. I’ll stay and deal with this mess.”

I nod and wrap my arm around Camile’s shoulders, guiding her out of the warehouse.

In my car, she breaks down. I let her cry. There’s not much I can say right now. I feel just as powerless as a friend. I’ve known the two of them for almost five years, ever since Camile transferred to my school on a scholarship. During a literature class, we discovered our shared love for books, especially Brazilian authors the other girls didn’t even know.

Their father has Alzheimer’s, glaucoma, and other conditions that cost a small fortune each month. My mom filed a lawsuit to get high-cost medications supplied by the State, but many are out of stock. I’ve offered many times to help financially, but Camile and Bernardo were always too proud. And now I see just how far his pride has taken him.

By the time we’re just a few meters from Camile’s apartment, she seems calmer. They live in government housing. She stares out the fogged-up window, her face still wet with tears. I park by the curb and take her hand, lacing our fingers together.

“For the first time in my life, I don’t know what to do,” she admitted. “I can’t believe Bernardo got himself into this mess.”

“We’ll figure it out. I have money, Camis. I’ll help you both.”

“We don’t even know who those men are. This hole could be deeper than it looks.”

I wet my lips and took a deep breath. Maybe I was completely wrong, but I couldn’t ignore my gut.

“I ran into that guy. The one in the hood.”

“What do you mean?”

“It was on Iris’s anniversary. Her death. I did the usual, you know.” I paused, breathing deeply when I caught the compassion in her eyes.

“I ended up hitting a guy with my car on the way home. I got out to help, but he didn’t want me to call an ambulance, afraid it would bring the cops. Then he shoved a gun in my face and stole my necklace. It was him. The same guy on the security footage. The one Be said was the devil.”

Camile stared at me in shock. I could almost see her mind short-circuiting with all the information from the last few hours.

“Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”

“I wanted to tell you in person,” I lied. The truth was, with Calebe tormenting me and my parents’ situation, I’d crawled into my own bubble. When I was hurting, my instinct was always to shut people out. And Camile already had enough problems without having to carry mine.

“You… you’re sure it was the same man?” she asked.

I pulled the black card from the back of my phone case and showed it to her.

“I found this on the ground, right where he fell after I hit him. And the bald guy in the footage had the exact same tattoo on his back.”

She took the card and studied it.

“It’s a Cerberus,” Camile said.

“A what?”

“The translation is ‘demon of the pit.’ In Greek mythology, it was a monstrous three-headed dog that guarded the entrance to the underworld, the realm of the dead—letting souls in but never out, tearing apart any mortal foolish enough to wander there.”

“What are the chances this card and that tattooed guy are connected?”

“I don’t know, but if they are, it’s insane. Do you really think you ran into my brother’s dealer?”

“I’m almost sure of it.” I pointed to the top corner of the card. “Look at this string of numbers. It has to mean something.”

Camile read the numbers out loud. Minutes dragged by until she finally let out a heavy sigh.

“My head feels like it’s going to explode. I need to think this through. Can we talk tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

She opened the door and stepped out.

“Lou? Thank you. Really.”

“It’s going to be okay, Camis.”

She nodded, eyes brimming with tears. Then she shut the door and walked away.

An uneasy feeling filled me instantly. Something told me that, no—it wasn’t going to be okay.