Chapter 17

The Plantation, Colombia

The next morning she prepared breakfast for her uncle as was expected.

“Adrienne, you’re very quiet this morning,” said Alberto, barely looking up from his plate.

She nodded her head, but did not offer any explanation.

“Well then, I’ll be spending the day in the back country. I’ll see you later tonight.”

Adrienne spent most of her day in her small room, giving in to bouts of crying and despair. There was no one to confide in, no one to console her. She longed for her mother.

While she lived in the larger main house, she was surrounded by smaller houses on the compound where the wives of some of the workers lived along with their husbands. Even though she was sure her uncle had money, he did not spend lavishly on her and she led a fairly plain existence. One concession was a maid that came in once a week to help Adrienne with the housework.

When her uncle returned home he noticed that Adrienne was still sullen and quiet. He retreated to his study and let her be. This behavior continued for another month or so with not so much as a whisper of the events that occurred on that dreadful night. But Adrienne realized she had to do something. She had missed her period and now was having bouts of nausea every morning for the last two weeks.

“Adrienne, I have had enough of you. You have been morose for weeks and now you are sick each morning. I’m going to bring the town doctor in to see you tomorrow.”

At this point Adrienne decided to tell her uncle her story. Maybe he would be so angry he would ship her back to her mother. All she could do was hope.

“Uncle, do you remember the night several weeks ago when you had visitors, I think maybe they were from Russia.”

He raised his head off his chest and looked directly at her.

“That night, the man with the steely gray eyes entered my bedroom, and, and,” she gulped back the tears, “and raped me.” She was sobbing, bracing for a blow across the face. He had never physically abused her, but she worried that this would push him to the edge.

Her uncle sat quietly and then his fingers began drumming on the table.

“You mean the short man, stocky build?”

“Yes, he told me to tell you that he expected cooperation and nothing less.”

By now Adrienne was feeling nauseous and excused herself. She vomited into the toilet and tried not to aspirate into her lungs the acid pouring from her mouth. She gulped for air between sobs. Finally, when her stomach was empty, she rinsed her mouth with cold running water from the tap. She turned the knob to the off position and looked up into the mirror over the sink. Her eyes were red. The whites had tiny red veins exposed like raw nerves and the rims were also red from rubbing. There were dark circles under her eyes reflective of a lack of sleep and an abundance of worry. Oh my God, she thought. There is a baby on the way. I’m an unmarried young woman living in the jungle with my uncle. No, no, I’m a pregnant, young unmarried woman living in the jungle, with… I’m a disgrace.

She went back into the kitchen and saw that her uncle was still sitting at the table. She knew nothing other than the coffee business, but he knew what this was about. There was no mistake. Intimidation took many forms and initially he had been unwilling to cooperate with the Russians regarding his distribution operation. They wanted in and they wanted to move other drugs using his coffee business as a cover. He had been resistant. He had been trusted to keep this “family” business running. He had managed over the years to keep everything separate, but he knew the market was slowly shifting away from cocaine. It wasn’t so much the heroin the Russians were pushing, it was the fentanyl, the synthetic opioids, and other counterfeit opioid pills that were now available on the black market. His friend, the chemist, knew this trade well. He was the one who had wanted to push the business in this direction, he wanted to work with the Russians, but Alberto had resisted.

There was no additional blow to her body. Instead her uncle put his hand on her shoulder. She placed her hand on top of his. He quickly pulled his hand away and left the room. Adrienne sobbed quietly and moved through her day as if the morning had never happened.

* * *

The months passed and Adrienne’s belly began to grow, and it was clear to everyone who saw her that she was with child. Her uncle had arranged for a midwife to be present at the birth and seven and a half months later she gave birth to a little girl. Finally, Adrienne had someone with her whom she could love and cherish. She named her child Bella, Italian for beautiful to honor her mother and her heritage. She begged her uncle to let her fly home to France, to her mother to show her, her grandchild. Her uncle had already sent his men to France to help run the vineyard for his sister and without her knowledge, used the champagne operation as another cover for his drug trade. This was seen as a strategic distribution point for getting drugs into Europe, and one he would not relinquish. He debated in his mind whether to let Adrienne go and in the end decided he would keep her with him in Colombia.

The child grew up with only Adrienne’s stories of her life in Reims, her wonderful grandparents she would never meet, the champagne vineyards with its legendary climbing grapes, and the endless rose gardens which Adrienne had tended with love.

Little Bella seemed a happy child and quite content to stay with her mother on the coffee plantation. Adrienne’s uncle had arranged for Bella to have a personal tutor so she could be home schooled. Adrienne had been fluent in both French and Italian, the native languages of her parents, as well as in English which she had learned in school. While living in Colombia she had mastered Spanish like her uncle. He too spoke a variety of languages having gone to university in America and having lived in both Europe and South America. Little Bella was exposed to such a rich linguistic environment that at a very early age she clearly had an aptitude for languages and had been verbal before most babies speak their single words. This gift delighted her mother, and even Adrienne’s hardened uncle Alberto took delight in speaking with the child. For the most part, life on the plantation carried on until one summer day when Bella was about three years old and the balance of favor changed.