Their Cartel Princess: The Complete Series: A Dark Reverse Harem Box Set

by Logan Fox

  “They’ve never been interested in you.”

  “In me?”

  “The cartel, I mean. They deal coke. Massive volumes of it. El Calacas was done with coke over a decade ago.”

  “Just heroin now,” Finn said.

  Cora’s skin broke out in goosebumps. She knew how he felt about the drug—especially since his sister was an addict. But, just like her apparently unlimited supply of lust, selling heroin came with the territory.

  God, she felt like such an asshole.

  “Okay,” Cora said, very fucking eager to change the subject. “So, they don’t care about us, which is great. You say you can find out if this guy was DEA?”

  “Yeah,” Bailey said, nodding. “But if he’s not, then he could be FBI.”

  “FBI,” Cora repeated slowly.

  “’Cos what you’re doing is kinda illegal?” Lars quipped unhelpfully beside her.

  She glared at him, and pointed a trembling finger his way. “Enough,” she said.

  Lars’s eyelids drooped, and he gave her a serpentine smile. “Your wish is my command, La Sombra.”

  A tingle spread through her at how he caressed those words with his tongue. She tilted her chin up, and forced herself to look at Bailey. “Contact your guy and find out who’s been sniffing around my cartel.”

  She looked at Lars. “You, get rid of that lion.” She waved a hand. “Set it free or something.”

  Lars cocked his eyebrow at her. “Like…in the grounds?”

  “Send it back to Africa!” she snapped. “Or…wherever lions go back to. I don’t want it in a cage.”

  “They’re usually put down, once they’ve tasted human flesh,” Finn cut in.

  She glared at him. “Then let’s keep that fact to ourselves. I won’t let it suffer because of Javier.”

  Finn shrugged, and gave Lars a long, unreadable look.

  “Why me?” Lars asked sulkily.

  “Because I said so.”

  Lars rolled his eyes. “Fine. But I’ll have you know, boss, tonight…?” He leaned across the table, and ran a finger down her arm. “I’ll be lashing you to the bed.”

  He rose, followed a second later by Finn.

  Bailey watched them head for the door, and then turned to her. “Cora, can we talk?”

  The men froze in their steps. Bailey glanced to the side, but didn’t turn his head. “Alone,” he added in a murmur.

  “Buddy, you obviously don’t realize how this—” Lars began, taking a step back to him.

  “Yes,” Cora cut in, lifting a hand to Lars.

  There was something in Bailey’s eyes. Darkness, regret. She had no idea why he wanted to speak to her alone, but if it was to confess something, then he deserved to do it in private.

  When she looked up at Finn and Lars, they were both waiting, as if expecting her to change her mind.

  “I’ll see you two later,” she said, giving them a warm smile. “Be safe.”

  4

  A little psycho

  The echo of his shoes was as rhythmic as his heart beat and Zachary West lost himself in the sound. Around him, the tunnel connecting his two plots became a haze of clay, studded with the occasional glow of a bare light bulb.

  The construction had almost been complete, merely cosmetic. Putting cages around the light bulbs, for instance. Laying flooring over the dirt. There was already drainage and air circulation in place; for his purposes, the tunnel was functional.

  It was a conduit built for one purpose, and one purpose only—to bring enough cocaine into the United States to make it snow like Christmas morning.

  As soon as he had established his supply chain, his world would be right again. The floor under his feet would no longer tilt like the deck of a ship in rough seas.

  He didn’t need the tunnel to be pretty.

  Life wasn’t pretty. This bare passage with its gritty floor was proof enough of that.

  His final few steps up the ramp didn’t echo. He emerged into the cool night air, hands clasped behind his back as he tipped his head up and drew a long breath through his nose.

  The air smelled delicious this side of the border—fresh and unspoiled. The first stars of the night poked through the satin sheet of twilight, and the Rio Grande gurgled somewhere in the distance behind him.

  Maybe it smelled different here because there wasn’t a hint of char in the air.

  It was quiet on this side of the river. Deathly so.

  Perhaps, by the time he’d returned to his farm, the screams would have died down.

  A bird sang out, and he took it as a signal to return home.

  There was much for him to do, now that there was no longer anyone to help him.

  5

  Because

  “Another drink?” Sylvia asked, nudging Neo with her toe. Throwing her a glare, He jerked his foot away before shrugging.

  “Are you going to be like this the whole night?”

  He glared at her, but all that did was to make her raise an eyebrow in his direction. “You weren’t there,” he said.

  “Put Cora in her place,” Sylvia said, waving an indolent hand. “Then you’ll be smiling again.”

  He jerked his shoulders, trying to settle into something approaching a comfortable position. The villa’s jacuzzi should have been relaxing with its water jets, but it kept reminding him of the night Javier had forced him to marry Cora. How he’d had to jam that ring onto her finger. The way she’d stiffened when he’d kissed her.

  You wouldn’t think a slut like her would turn away any man’s lips.

  He knew what she did with those men; he’d overheard the staff he played soccer with. Their wives gossiped to each other about the state of the beds they had to clean.

  It disgusted him, but what the hell could he do about it? His own wife bedded three men—at the same time—and he was powerless to stop her.

  “Here.” Sylvia twisted around, her breasts straining in the small, white bikini she wore.

  Neo washed his gaze over her body as she busied herself. She was a few years older than him—had been more than a decade younger than his father—but her body was as toned and slender as a model’s.

  His father’s mistress had become a surprising ally. When the dust and ash had settled after the wedding, she’d come knocking on his door. He thought she was there to ask permission to leave, but instead, she asked if he wanted company for the night.

  He’d been too broken to reject her, and too depressed to fuck her. And she seemed to know it; she’d given him a massage and watched a movie with him until they’d both fallen asleep. Last night, she hadn’t been in his room, and he thought he’d never see her again. But an hour ago, she’d knocked on his door and dragged him up to the jacuzzi to ‘get rid of his stress’, which she claimed radiated from him like cheap cologne.

  Turned out, she’d disappeared earlier to find some coke.

  She twisted back to him, a small mirror balanced on her palm, two lines of cremita already etched onto its surface.

  “Take it,” she said in her brusque—if husky—voice.

  He hesitated, but not for long. Hot ice shot through his nasal passages as he snorted up one line, then the other. He rubbed his thumb along the mirror’s surface, gathering up the cocaine dust that had settled there.

  His gums went numb when he massaged his thumb over them.

  Sylvia cut two lines for herself, and faced him again with a slender finger delicately patting her nose.

  Stretching out one of her long legs, she ran the side of her foot up his calf. “So, what will you do, Don Neo?”

  His brain sparkled like the sky on New Year’s Eve. A thousand answers spilled into his mind, each harsher than the last.

  He could ignore Cora, hand her over to a rival cartel, fuck her and force her to carry his child, feed her to his father’s lion.

  But all he said was, “Why do I have to do anything?”

  Sylvia threw back her head and laughed. The sound was as brash as she was. �
��I was with Havie—” Sylvia’s nickname for his father “—for five years.” She let this sink in as she studied him, and he shifted when the intensity of her gaze only became stronger.

  “So?” he snapped, sniffing and swallowing hard to get rid of the bitter taste going down the back of his throat. “Now you’re an expert or something?”

  She gave him a knowing smile. “Or something…” Her foot ran down the inside of his calf, and then up the other leg.

  “You tell me then,” Neo said, thumbing his nose. “Tell me what I should do, if you know so fucking much.”

  She tilted her head to the side and spread her arms along the rim of the jacuzzi. Her foot brushed his knee and then crept along his inner thigh.

  “Your dealers are waiting for product,” she said. “And they’re not patient men. Especially the Irish.”

  “You know them?”

  “I’ve met them all. Seen them all. Havie even lent me to some of them a few times.” She shrugged. “They’ll want their shipments, and soon.”

  “Then we should call them. Tell them we don’t have anything. It’s the truth.”

  “Not we…” Sylvia said, her foot sliding over his dick. “Her.”

  Neo’s cock twitched at the touch, and he shifted in the jacuzzi’s roiling water. “Cora?”

  “She won’t know what to do if they come asking,” Sylvia said, massaging him with the ball of her foot as she spoke. “She’ll crack like an egg.”

  “How do I get them to contact her? They’ve only ever dealt with Javier.”

  “I know someone who can help.” Sylvia’s eyes glittered. “One of Javier’s business partners.”

  Neo’s eyes fluttered as Sylvia’s foot glided over his stiffening dick.

  “And he can help?”

  She retracted her foot, leaving him with a rock-hard dick and a sudden urge to stick it in something.

  “I’d bet money on it,” she said with another secretive grin.

  Neo nodded, realized he was chewing the inside of his cheek, and tried to stop. A wave of energy crashed through him. He rose from the jacuzzi, grabbing Sylvia on the way and hauling her up with him. Their wet bodies slapped together as he ground his dick against her belly. “What if it comes back to me?”

  “It won’t,” Sylvia said, grabbing his ass and forcing him harder against her. She gazed up at him with big eyes, and ran her tongue along her lips as he watched. “Because…?”

  She left the word dangling as his dick throbbed between them. He scanned her face, gaze darting over her perfectly sculpted features. She could have been a model. Fuck maybe she had been, before Gabriella had found her.

  Just the silent mention of his mother’s name brought with it a flash of venomous rage.

  Sylvia gasped when he grabbed the back of her neck and wrenched her away so he could stare at her body.

  “No, she won’t suspect, will she?” he said through his teeth. “Because I’m giving her exactly what she wants.”

  Sylvia’s smile stretched. “She wants to be capo so badly…Then let her.”

  6

  A disgrace

  “Let’s go upstairs,” Cora said, standing.

  But Bailey caught her wrist as he rose. Was it his imagination, or could he feel her pulse quicken at his touch? All the more reason for them to be in neutral territory. “No. Someplace else.”

  She pursed her lips at him. “Like where?”

  He shrugged.

  Cora glanced up at the ceiling, and then nodded at him. She led him from the room and turned down the hallway, pulling him through a nearby doorway.

  He closed the door behind them, and spent a few seconds taking in the grandeur of the place.

  It was a library, but like something out of a movie. Row upon row of books climbed to the ceiling where a sun roof cut a massive, bright square through to the sky. It shone its light over a small raised platform where three over-sized armchairs, a few stools, and a low table had been arranged. The place even came with one of those enormous golden globes of the planet, a map of earth scored onto its surface. A small stairwell led to a covered balcony where an expensive-looking telescope stood, ready to gaze at the myriad of stars.

  At one end of the library stood a long table, encircled with enough leather-padded chairs to seat a small gathering.

  “…you coming?”

  He blinked, his eyes finding Cora. She was halfway to the armchairs, but looking back at him with a frown. He cleared his throat, nodded, and followed her through the room. The air smelled of musty books and furniture polish. The thick carpet underfoot muffled their footsteps, as if designed to reduce the noise.

  It was also eerily quiet inside here, as if the place had been sound proofed.

  To his knowledge, no one in the Martin family were big readers. Then again, Javier would have made sure he had an authentic library, just as he’d ensured his gym housed the latest equipment, even if it had only ever been used by Neo when Javier’s son was present at the villa.

  Cora perched on the edge of an armchair, giving him a compressed smile as he climbed the steps.

  Her eyes widened when he dragged a leather ottoman in front of her and sat on it.

  Her hands gripped the chair’s armrests, and her smile turned nervous.

  “What is it?” she asked quietly.

  His chest grew tight. Fuck, he’d had the nerve to do this earlier, but after hearing about Gabriella…

  He wiped his palms over his jeans, and took a hold of Cora’s hands. She shivered a little at his touch, but then calmed as soon as he’d wrapped his fingers around her slim palms.

  “I should have told you this sooner,” he said, and immediately knew they were the wrong choice of words.

  Cora’s confusion transformed into frustration. “Just tell me.”

  “When we were at Swan Manor, when I was…”

  “Yes?” she prompted, leaning forward a little.

  “Javier had me bring hair samples to him.”

  Cora’s frown deepened, and she gave her head a little shake as she narrowed her eyes at him. “Hair samples?”

  “Your hair.”

  “Wh—?” Her lips formed the letter, but then relaxed again. “My hair?”

  “For a paternity test.”

  Cora snatched her hands out of his with a hiss. She was halfway to her feet before he could grapple her back into the chair. She fought him, but then subsided with eyes so wide she looked shell-shocked.

  “Don’t,” she whispered fiercely. “Don’t you dare tell me that fucking monster—!”

  “He’s not.”

  Confusion swept away her fear, before relief washed over her face like a heavy wave, dragging her eyelids closed. “Mucho gracias, la Flaca.”

  “But it didn’t matter how many samples I brought him, he kept asking for more. I don’t know why—I guess…I think he slept with Naomie.”

  Cora still had her eyes closed, but shook her head at this. “No.”

  “Why else would—?”

  “No!” Cora’s eyes flashed open, their burnished gold searing into him. “She would never have—”

  “So I brought him Sofia’s hair instead.”

  “—done that to…” Cora’s voice trailed away.

  He took a hold of her hands again, squeezed them.

  She shook her head, luminous tears brimming in her eyes. “No,” she murmured, her lips trembling. “Please, I don’t want to know. Don’t tell me—”

  “Sofia was Javier’s daughter.”

  “Fuck you,” she whispered, tugging at her hands. “I didn’t want to know.”

  “There’s more, please, Cora. Hear me out. I can’t keep this from you. Not anymore. You have to—”

  “Fuck you!” she screamed, her voice hoarse and cracked. She tried standing again, but he rose too and wrapped his arms around her before she could escape.

  The more she shook in his arms, the weaker her struggles became.

  “I think he was the one that arranged
your kidnapping. You, Naomie’s…Sofia’s…”

  There was a mumbled, “Stop,” from Cora, but she pressed her face against his chest, muffling her own protests.

  “He’s been planning this for years,” Bailey said, stroking Cora’s hair. “I want you to know, I had no idea. If I’d known—”

  She shoved him away, nearly sending him toppling over the ottoman. He grabbed her arm to steady himself, but she tore free and thumped a fist into his chest.

  It hardly hurt, but the pain in her eyes threatened to paralyze him.

  “I know he planned it,” Cora said, her words struggling through a quivering mouth. She stuck her hand up, palm inward, and shoved her wedding ring in his face. “This was hers. This was my mother’s. He gave it to me, Bailey. This was my engagement ring!”

  Silence filtered down, but it was as if the echoes from those raised words still rebounded in the distant corners of the library.

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked.

  “Because I was trying to forget.” Her mouth hardened into a thin line. “Now that he’s gone, I thought I could. But then you come in here, and you just puke it all up again, all over me, and I don’t know how I’m ever going to—”

  Bailey’s radio cut her off with a staticky, “Mike to Bravo, come in.” They both jerked at the unexpected sound, and Cora twisted away from him.

  But he caught her, drawing her back and cradling her body against his.

  “I had to tell you,” he said, swiping his hands over her face to push her hair from her eyes. “I need you to trust me again, Cora. You know I’d take a bullet for you, don’t you? Fuck it, I already have! But I’ll do it again if I have to.”

  She glared up at him, but slowly her resolve bled away.

  “I don’t know what…what this thing is,” he went on, his mouth running away from him. “But if it means I get to be close to you? To hold you? To kiss you?” He gave a small shrug. “Then I’m in.” He rubbed his thumbs along her cheekbones. “I’m all in.”