these galas had always been a headache, and now the pain throbbing behind her temple, watching tobias tremble with another mans blood dripping down his knucles, was enough to make her throw up. "tobias — what did you do?" taking a step further, she angles her head to see around his body. to get a better look. the panic in her eyes clear. not because she was scared for herself, but for him. putting his life and future on the line for her? initial words unsteady, not the cool rebuke a molina should deliver, but a raw, frightened plea. frightened for him. because now his fingerprints are inside a crime scene that begins and ends with her. "let him? i had it handled! i had him handled!" she can make out the figure on the ground, his beard. she knows its him. gust rattles the alley’s dirty gutters, and her’s mind drifts — unwanted, unstoppable , to javier delgado, the disposable “date” whose laugh never reached his eyes. tobias wasn't wrong the man was absolutely vile. his hand constantly wandering to her ass, and lewd jokes that made her beyond uncomfortable. and yet the thought scrapes across her ribs, equal parts awe and terror. silly her, expecting tobias to orbit her carefully constructed gravity well—supply intel, receive flirtatious praise, remain harmless. instead, he detonated. and not to save the campaign or her reputation—god, those abstractions never even crossed his eyes. he’d done it out of instinctual, incandescent protectiveness.
"just — stop, stop. give me a moment i need to think." palm of her hand pushes into his chest, a gesture to hopefully calm him down. she drops into savior mode. dispose of the body? bribe the emt? spin a self defense narrative? each scenario clatters against the knowledge that a single photo of tobias in this state would destroy the softness she’d only just begun to believe in. that softness — so inconvenient, so miraculous, has no defense in the political arena. her stomach flips. she’s spent months weaponizing intimacy, collecting secrets like gemstones; now the sharpest secret is lodged in her own chest: she cares whether this man survives intact. "im not letting you do this on your own. you've done enough." she crouches beside javier’s slack form, careful to keep the hem of her dress from the spreading stain of blood. he’s still breathing: ragged, wet, but alive enough to talk. that cannot stand. one heel slips from her foot; she guides the stiletto’s metal tip to the juncture between jaw and carotid, presses. his eyes flutter, pupils blown wide, and she leans in so only he can hear. "i guess you've learned the hard way that no one's untouchable — que los dioses tengan misericordia." a chilling calmness in her words, as he takes one last breathe.
rising, she wipes the stiletto’s tip with a cocktail napkin scavenged from her clutch, tucks the evidence into a dumpster’s oily maw. one problem sterilized. “now,” she says, sliding her shoe back on, composing her features into warm gala glow. "you’ll escort me through the side corridor. we re enter during the raffle; plenty of commotion, no one notices late arrivals. the last time was saw javier he was drunk, belligerent and stumbled into the alley ... the rest? unbeknownst to us. got it?"