La Mujer de Lalo (Lalo's Woman)

Vulnerability

Two weeks went by in jiffy. Ana had been busy planning multiple events at work with Andrea and Tuco's Hawaii holidays as her number one priority. As the newly weds embarked on their honeymoon, Ana's work burden started to ease.

That afternoon, she had gone to lunch with a few of her teammates to celebrate a birthday. A place called Forks and Figs. As they ordered and had a nice hefty lunch, Ana caught a glimpse of a familiar face. Mike.

She tried to act normal from and completed her food quickly. She excused herself, saying she had to take an important call and went out into the parking lot in the hot sun. Mike who had barely touched his meal, left few dollar bills inclusive of a generous tip, and followed her out.

"What do you think you're doing here?" She questioned him.

"I need your help in a small matter."

"Help?"

"Yeah. It seems that your boyfriend sticking his nose into unwanted business. As much as I'd like to stop that from happening, I can't. So I need you to learn what all her knows about the engineer. You have two days time. Gus is expecting you to act fast."

"Engineer? I don't know nothing about any engineers. Plus we never discuss his business. He'll get suspicious if I start asking questions. Why don't you understand, Mike?"

"Sorry kid, you'll have to figure out the what's, whens and hows. I'll meet you in 2 days. Don't delay."

With that, he hopped into his car and left. A couple minutes later, one of her colleagues came and pulled her inside. Her mind was not where her body was.

When she went home that evening, she threw everything and sat on the couch, exhausted from all the thinking. She decided to scour the kitchen and find some ingredients to cook up a dinner and initiate a conversation during dinner.

Ana wasn't such a good cook. She could manage a decent meal though. She referred to Google for a couple of recipes and by the time Lalo got home, she had managed to finish cooking. Thought she did take an extra 2 hours than the time specified in the recipe.

The room smelled delicious. The air so aromatic. "Is my abuelita here?" Lalo thought to himself. When he found Ana I'm the kitchen, he was genuinely surprised.

"Ay ay ay... now that's a sight I never thought I'd get to witness, princesa." He said with a cute smile on his face. He kissed his girlfriend on the cheeks and let her continue. "Anything special?"

"No... I just wanted to cook something for you. You always make such delicious meals for me, almost everyday. I wanted to return the favor. Hope you'll like it!"

"Anything your hand touches will turn into the best." He winked as he said those words.

"I don't know. I can't get too cocky with my cooking skills."

"Eh, don't worry. I'll still love it."

"Muy bien. Now go shower and change. I'll set up the table."

"Si, la jefa." (Yes, boss)

-----

The food had turned out to be quite delicious than what Ana had expected. Not the top notch restaurant like taste, but it was a very good home cooked meal. She had made some pasta arrabiata, seared scallops, roast chicken wings and a chocolate Monte Carlo ice cream sandwich for dessert. Lalo opened a bottle of a nice red, a Chateau Latour. Ana had never such expensive wine, not even at the parties she had organized.

They talked a lot about what they liked ans disliked, favorite places in the world, where they wanted to have a dream home etc. After dinner, Ana started clearing the places when Lalo stopped her and called one of his men to do it. They stepped out into the garden, hand in hand and continued their conversation.

She gently eased into the topic of his business. At first he was being very blunt. Most of what he'd said never made any sense to her. She kept asking more and more questions, but decided to stop at one point, fearing Lalo would find it too suspicious.

"Oh god. Your business is just too confusing. I can't grasp the head or tail of it." She said with a sigh.

"It'll be like that in the beginning. But you'll get used to it. And why do you seem so interested in my business today, eh?"

She bit her lower lip and looked up at him. "Can I ask you one final question? I promise I'll stop with this."

"Mm"

"You told that you have a rival here. Is there any chance that he might..."

"Might what?" He asked, rubbing his soul patch.

"You know... try to hurt you?"

"Who the chicken man? Nah. He doesn't have the spine to do it. Plus, it'll create an open war between the two houses and that is something the big boss is not willing to risk."

"Why? What problem is there?"

"Well, for starters, we've had some complaints from our regular customers regarding the quality of the product. I know deep down that Gus has something to do with it. He's building something big. I'm not sure what it is... but it's going to put us all out of our game. That's for sure." He got lost into his thoughts as his mind raced to Werner Zeigler.

"Oh. Ok. It's still safe for us right?" She questioned with doubts clear in her voice.

"Ay Chiquita, is this why you've been worried? Relax. We're safe." He said with a laugh.

He sat down in one of the marble benches and made her sit on his lap. He lay his head on her shoulders and let out deep breaths. It was so relaxing for him to be this vulnerable to another human being. She was his comfort zone, his safe place. Whenever he was with her, he was in an extremely good mood.

The same was Ana's case. And having his head on her bosom brought out her maternal instincts. She gently patted his head and rubbed his back.

That evening was a memorable one for both of them. Though it hid Ana's secondary intentions, she did want to give him a good time. And it wasn't so bad, she did have a couple of information for Mike, though she was sure it was quite useless to him.