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

by Logan Fox

  Condensation beaded the glass.

  “Did you enjoy your walk?” Zachary asked cheerfully.

  “Yes.”

  Because what the hell else was she supposed to say?

  “Good. I hope you worked up an appetite. Shall I go reheat your steak?”

  Cora sat carefully in her chair.

  She grabbed the rest of her wine and slugged it down, then wiped fingertips over her mouth.

  They came back red.

  Laying her arms on the table, Cora put her head down and began to sob.

  40

  Firestarting

  “I know where she is.” Bailey sat forward in a rush, grabbing the side of Finn’s headrest so he could draw himself closer. “I know where she is.”

  Two sets of dispassionate eyes glanced in his direction; Finn snorted, and Lars gave him a quizzical look as if he was wondering if Bailey had lost his mind.

  “I’m serious, you guys. I—”

  “Put your seatbelt back on,” Finn said, his eyes already back on the road.

  They were on their way back to the farmhouse, traveling with the despondent air of soldiers returning home from a brutal war where the victors were very clearly the other side.

  “When we were at Duncan’s house, I saw a pamphlet for a bi-plane.”

  “How in the fuck is that related?” Lars snapped, twisting to face him.

  “Because a helicopter is really handy to get you somewhere fast. And a bi-plane…” Bailey thumped his palm into the back of Lars’s seat. “Is a fucking good way to get somewhere far.”

  “Great,” Lars muttered. “So not only don’t we know where she is, we know she’s a fuck-far way off. Real helpful, Bailey.”

  “No, don’t you see?” Bailey wedged his shoulder between the two seats, trying to get Finn’s attention. “Zachary’s got a lot of properties, right? But how many of them are only accessible by plane?”

  There was a long, thoughtful silence in the cab. Bailey’s heart sang. He’d found one or two documents on that computer at Duncan’s house that looked as if they listed at least some of the properties Zachary owned. But if they could get—

  “We need Duncan’s phone,” Kane said. “If they had to arrange for a flight, then he might have done those arrangements for Zachary.”

  “Or this could just be another dead end,” Finn said. He gave Bailey a short, hard stare. “You think about that?”

  “But what if it’s not?” Bailey searched the man’s face, willing him to try and find just a sliver of hope to hold on to. “What if it’s not too late? What if we can still find her?”

  Finn’s knuckles went white. Lars glanced at the man, and then glared at Bailey.

  “Let sleeping dog lie,” Lars muttered. “She’s gone.”

  “She left us her ring,” Bailey said, holding it up. Finn had left it behind, placed exactly on the dead dog’s flank just as he’d found it. Bailey stuck out his hand, twisting the ring where both Lars and Finn could see it.

  Finn braked hard, sending air rushing out of Bailey as his momentum pushed him into the back of the front seats.

  “Get out and go check on Neo,” Finn said, not looking at Bailey.

  “She left it there for us. To tell us not to give up—” Bailey began.

  “She left it there to say goodbye,” Finn roared. His fist crashed down on the SUV’s console. “Now get the fuck out and go check on—”

  “Oh my fuck, he’s right.” Lars grabbed Finn’s wrist and then wrapped both his hands around Finn’s fist. “Zachary had no idea we’d find his farm or the tunnel. He had no reason to cover his tracks. From what he knows, the deal’s done and dusted.”

  Lars spun to face Bailey. “That’s why he burned everyone. He knew he wasn’t coming back. He’s left for good.”

  “That doesn’t change anything,” Finn said, throwing open his door.

  “He’s become careless,” Kane said quietly. “He could have left a clue without realizing. Like the ring. If we hadn’t found that—”

  “Then we wouldn’t have known Cora was even there,” Lars finished.

  “What about the dog? We’d have found the dog.” Finn peered back inside the SUV, expression grim.

  “So what? It’s a dog.” Lars shrugged. “But that ring was Cora’s. Undeniable proof that she was there.”

  “So we have to find every single property Zachary owns and search them,” Kane said decisively, opening his door. “Starting with those only reachable by plane.”

  “Or he could be throwing us off his trail,” Finn said. “He could have taken her anywhere.”

  “No, not just anywhere. It will be a very specific, very well thought out location,” Kane said, thumping the roof of the SUV for emphasis as he ducked his head to glance inside at Bailey and Lars. “The fire, the dog…he planned everything well in advance. Psychopaths are organized, pedantic even.”

  “Like setting fire to a building filled with innocent people,” Lars said woodenly.

  “Except, they wouldn’t seem innocent to Zachary. They’d all have wronged him somehow. You saw how the farmhouse looked.” Kane swept a hand to the whitewashed building. “It’s filthy inside. He’s intentionally kept them from doing their work so he could have a reason to punish them for it.”

  “How do you know he’s a psychopath?” Lars asked tipping back his head so he could catch sight of Kane through his window.

  “Firestarting.” Kane lifted his thumb. “Animal cruelty.” His index finger peeled away from his thumb. “Two out of three of the homicidal triad.” Then he waved a dismissive hand toward everyone. “This is the kind of shit you learn in the FBI.”

  “Well, fuck, let’s get back to Duncan’s pad.” Lars gestured wildly at Finn. “Come on, Milo.”

  Finn climbed reluctantly back into the car.

  Bailey turned to Kane, frowning. “I thought you said you were with the—?”

  “Are we leaving Ana here?” Lars asked. “I don’t think—”

  “No.” Finn ran his eyes over the backseat. “Bailey, you bring Ana and Neo in Kane’s Jeep and meet us at Duncan’s house.”

  Bailey opened his mouth, but Finn cut him off before he could speak.

  “Go!”

  He scrambled out of the SUV, watching it pull away as a thread of concern wormed its way up his spine.

  He hadn’t imagined it, had he? Kane had said FBI, not DEA.

  Had he been a federal agent too? Bailey shook his head and hurried into the farmhouse, calling Ana’s name.

  41

  Closure

  “Where am I?” Cora asked quietly, without looking at Zachary. It was a tiny defiance, not making eye contact. But all she had were these small, insignificant battles since she was far from fit enough to wage war. As night had fallen, they’d moved inside to the small dining table arranged against one of the large windows looking out over the ocean.

  Zachary had warmed her a steak, but she hadn’t touched it.

  “A tiny island you’ve probably never heard of before.”

  “Where am I?” Repeating herself was another spiteful measure she’d put in place when Zachary refused to answer her. She tired of the game before he did, though; she didn’t have his patience.

  “I’ve always loved the vastness of the ocean. Brings perspective, doesn’t it?”

  “Where am I?”

  Zachary went quiet.

  “What will it take for you to let me go?” Cora asked, watching a wave tumble over the break line.

  Zachary stopped sawing at his meat. “Let you go? Why would I want to do that?”

  “I have money.” Cora felt tears brimming in her eyes. “Enough for you—”

  “I don’t need money.” Zachary went cutting his meat, and then used the tip of the knife to gesture toward the ocean, the beach house. “This is all mine. Bought and paid for. I own resorts, manufacturing plants, investment companies…” He chewed for a moment before continuing. “More money than I know what to do with.”


  “Then what?” Cora looked toward him, but kept her eyes on his plate. “The cartel? ECV? You can have it all.”

  Was it the wine making her woozy, or the realization that she valued her freedom over the riches and power that her cartel gave her?

  Zachary made a sound in the back of his throat, as if her offer intrigued him. But then he said, “I have my own cartel.”

  “You can merge it. You can have the villa, all the resources, all the connections—”

  “I already have those.”

  Of course—the Santa Muerte pendant. He’d had information on all of El Calacas Vivo’s inbetweeners for weeks already.

  “So why haven’t you used it?” And now she did look up at him, because she wanted to see his eyes when he answered.

  A gleam—pride, narcissism, smugness?—touched his muddy irises. “It wasn’t I who wanted that information. It was part of a deal I struck with Javier.”

  Her mouth went dry. She wet it with wine, but it didn’t seem to help. “I don’t understand.”

  “Nor can you. Our arrangement was complex. And, in the end, useless.” Zachary’s words became bitter. “To think, I wasted so much time on that man. Him and his empty promises. I always knew he had a silver tongue, but I never—”

  He cut off, glancing away from her as he cut another sliver of meat from his steak.

  “No, I don’t need more money. A super cartel?” He pursed his lips, drinking long at his wine before setting it down. “What’s the point, if not to just make more money?”

  His eyes settled on her again, intense and direct. He chewed, swallowed, sat back in his chair and drained the rest of his wine. “There’s only one thing you can possibly give me that I don’t already have. Something money can’t buy. Something I was owed a long time ago.”

  She sat forward despite herself. Tried desperately not to look too eager, and failed.

  “What?” she prompted, when he just kept staring at her with those unfathomable eyes.

  He touched a fingertip to the back of her hand, describing a slow, tingling circle around the knuckle of her middle finger.

  “Closure,” Zachary said, giving her a cold smile.

  42

  Newbs tended to disagree

  “So you’re telling me that’s supposed to be a building?” Lars asked, stabbing at the computer monitor.

  Finn leaned closer still, until he and Lars both brushed against Kane’s shoulders. The man didn’t seem to mind their proximity as much as he minded them questioning his authority.

  “It’s too geometrical to be natural.”

  “One blurry pixel,” Lars mused, straightening as he crossed his arms over his chest. “That’s what we’re going on?”

  “They’re hundreds of miles apart.” Finn shifted his weight. “We’d be taking a huge risk choosing any of them over the other.”

  “So let’s split up,” Bailey chimed in from behind. “We can each take—”

  Finn lifted his hand, the back facing toward Bailey, and the man cut off mid-sentence.

  Zachary West—and the dozens of shell corporations and business entities he was involved in—owned close to eighty properties. Those included manufacturing plants, small businesses, real estate…and three islands.

  Granted, they were so small that Google Maps didn’t even have names for them, but when Kane had zoomed in on the satellite footage, it had been clear two of the islands had a runway.

  The only difference between this island and the other two was one insignificant spot of white.

  “That could be nothing,” Lars waved a hand toward the monitor. “It is nothing. I say we wait for someone to call us back.”

  Lars had gone through Duncan’s entire call history, trying to build an itinerary of the man’s flight plan. All he’d been able to come up with was that Duncan had rented a helicopter from Lajitas that had taken Zachary to an airport in Tamaulipas, Mexico.

  A private airport whose sole owner wasn’t answering their phone.

  “Look, either way, we have to get ourselves to that airport,” Kane said, tapping the mouse button as he rose to his feet. “That’s where the trail leads.”

  “And if we get there and they’re all hard ass about telling us anything?”

  Kane shrugged, and looked straight at Finn. “Then we’ll have to extract it from them.”

  He didn’t like the way Kane seemed to assume he knew Finn. That they were simpatico or some kind of shit. But Kane had been the one to track down the islands, using some data filtering tactic he’d been taught in the early days of his DEA training.

  Bailey had called bullshit. Then again, Bailey had been calling bullshit since they’d left Zachary’s farmhouse behind.

  Finn nodded at Kane. His argument was logical to a fault; the airport was the end of the road. They’d either find more clues there, or realize they’d finally lost all hope of tracking down Cora.

  But which was worse: giving up now, or dragging out their failure for another few hours?

  “Road trip,” Lars said, but with hardly a trace of his usual enthusiasm.

  Kane came past Finn, and clapped him on a shoulder blade. “We’re going to find her,” he said, giving Finn a warm, encouraging smile. “We just gotta keep looking until we do.”

  His eyes tracked Kane across the small study until he disappeared down the hallway. Finn was about to follow, when Bailey tugged at his sleeve.

  “You sure we can trust him?” Bailey asked.

  Finn stared Bailey up and down for a moment before replying. “I don’t know what his reasons are, but I know he wants to find Cora as badly as we do.” Finn gave a small shrug. “Either way, he’s an extra set of hands. Trained hands. We’ll use him until he stops being useful.”

  Bailey’s expression hardened, but Finn didn’t wait to hear his reply.

  He knew there was something wrong with Kane; his beast skulked in a distant corner of his mind, fearful of leaving the shadows whenever the man was around.

  As if something worse waited in the light.

  43

  Carbon to diamond

  Cora pushed back her chair, shooting to her feet and tugging away her hand from Zachary’s caress.

  Closure.

  The word repeated like a mantra in her head.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, hating the way her voice shook.

  Zachary also got to his feet, but he didn’t seem interested if she tried to run again. Instead, he moved past her as he headed for the kitchen with his empty plate.

  “When he contacted me sixteen years ago,” Zachary said, aiming his voice over his shoulder as he strode into the hall, “I couldn’t believe his arrogance. El Calacas Vivo was an upstart cartel back then. Peddling low quality weed throughout Mexico. They hadn’t even broken ground in any of the southern states of the US yet.”

  His voice grew fainter. There was a clink of dishes, and then footsteps.

  Cora followed him hesitantly, peering back at Lady. The dog lifted her head, and then rose, shook herself, and came after Cora with a small swish of her tail.

  Lady was Zachary’s dog. She would probably rip out Cora’s throat if he commanded it. But she felt safer with the dog around.

  At least there would be a witness if Zachary tried anything. That had to count in Cora’s favor.

  “At first,” Zachary went on, his voice now coming from the bedroom, “Javier insisted he wanted to form a super cartel. That his business partner at the time was reluctant, which was why he was reaching out to me. I laughed at him; an international drug smuggling operation when his cartel hadn’t even penetrated the border?” Zachary laughed, as if remembering the conversation in precise detail.

  Floorboards creaked under Cora’s weight as she moved down the hallway after Zachary.

  “But he had excellent connections in Mexico. More so even than Plata o Plomo back then.”

  Cora stepped into the bedroom’s doorway.

  Zachary glanced at her over his shoulder, and then tur
ned his back to her again. He was fiddling with something out of sight.

  “So you made a deal with him?” Cora prompted. She shouldn’t have been fascinated by Zachary’s oration, but she was.

  If he could explain why her life had been so fucked up, she’d take it. Hell, maybe this would be her closure too, not just his.

  “An arrangement, Zachary murmured. He paused, arms moving as if he was trying to fit the wrong pieces of puzzle together. “One that would take Antonio Rivera out of the equation, while keeping ECV whole.”

  Her heart fluttered at the sound of her father’s name. Cora stopped, unable to force her feet forward.

  “The kidnapping,” she said quietly. “It was you who—”

  “I was only a lieutenant back then,” Zachary interrupted quietly. “But I took Javier’s deal to my capo, and he agreed to go forward with it. If Javier could provide the location for Antonio’s family, he’d take them and use them to break Antonio’s spirit.”

  “Javier expected him to leave the cartel,” Cora said in a voice that sounded like it came from a mile away. “But he didn’t.”

  “He didn’t,” Zachary agreed. “Even after we killed Sofia.”

  He turned to look at her over his shoulder, searching her face. “You were next in line. Javier was leaving Naomie till last.”

  Her heart lodged in her throat, pounding so hard that she couldn’t breathe.

  “Unfortunately…” Zachary shrugged. “You escaped.”

  Cora swallowed hard. “Who killed my mother?”

  Another shrug. Something clicked—plastic—and Zachary dropped his arm to his side. Whatever he’d been busy with, it was small enough that she couldn’t see it while he cupped it in his palm.

  “Javier. It was part of the arrangement.” He faced her, and a slow smile grew on his lips. “And I would have been your reaper, if you hadn’t escaped.”

  Cora fell back a step, ice flashing over her skin.

  Closure.