by Ophelia Bell
She turns and looks into my eyes, her internal battle clear in her hazel gaze. She only sighs and says, “I can’t promise I won’t try if the opportunity presents itself. But I won’t leave your side, I can promise you that much.”
“Do you think it would’ve been easier to move on if you’d been with Manny that day?”
“Probably not,” she says, closing her eyes and shaking her head. “Both Leo and my brothers were there, along with Celeste. I forced all four of them to tell me every awful detail. Probably scarred my brothers for life in the process, but I have a pretty clear picture of what happened, thanks to them.”
“I get it. I wanted to grill Mad about the day Mason died, but you know him. He’s like Fort Knox when it comes to getting him to talk about anything. I didn’t get a clear story until Mase came home. The fact that he got to be the one to tell the tale of the day he died kind of softened the edge, but it didn’t leave me hating Delgado any less.
“What I’m saying is I get it. You’re not the only one who’d love to put a bullet in his brain. But we have to trust it’ll come back around, and try not to get in the way of this operation. We don’t want to wind up just another pair of casualties in this vendetta Amador has against Flores, because I guarantee if we run back to that compound, guns blazing, that’s what will happen.”
Toni flops back on the bed and groans. “You’re right. I know you’re right, but this is driving me insane.”
“Good thing I’m a master at distraction,” I say, reaching across her to turn off the light. In the darkness, I find her mouth with mine and cup her breast with one hand, careful not to rub against her fresh tattoo. She responds instantly, pulling me down as she rolls to the side and hooks her leg over mine.
“Too good, I think, but I’m not complaining. And just for the record, today was the best birthday I’ve ever had.”
The next day we’re too wound up to use sex as a distraction, and both of us are going stir-crazy not being able to set foot outside this little villa. I set myself up on the patio with my sketchbook, trying to work on new designs, but can’t focus long enough to do anything productive. Eventually Toni’s frenetic pacing gets to me.
“Will it chill you out if I let you give me another tattoo?” I ask. “You never did return the favor for that one.” I point to the vibrant heart on her chest.
Her eyes light up and she runs upstairs, returning with her tattoo travel case. Within minutes she’s straddling my lap, the machine buzzing away as she inks a new design into my chest in the same spot hers went. It’s probably poor planning when we’re going to have to travel soon—it’s never fun to travel with fresh tattoos, I’ve recently learned—but helping her keep her shit together is my new full-time job, and one I’m very serious about keeping.
The design is an almost perfect mirror to hers, the dark biomechanical tentacles forming the larger heart around a smaller botanical one. When she’s finished, she kisses me long and hard.
“Just in case you were worried I didn’t plan to keep you. Now you’re branded.”
But she doesn’t stop with that one, and I decide to indulge her as she begins to work on one shoulder, only stopping when her portable machine’s battery packs finally run out of juice. We spend the rest of the afternoon brainstorming ideas about how to extend the design on my back into a cohesive, full-torso work of art.
Lena calls just as we’re preparing to eat a supper of leftovers from the day before. Our extraction is scheduled for eight p.m. We have to force ourselves to eat, then change and pack. Toni’s impatience to get moving is making me more agitated than usual, and she practically bolts out the door the very second the buzzer sounds, announcing our escort is here to take us to our ride.
Two muscular men in security uniforms grab our bags and instruct us to follow them. They take a winding path back to the main building that leads to a nondescript metal door hidden among the foliage. Beyond the door is an immense storage room filled with all the non-perishable supplies needed for a resort of this size.
We follow them through the rows upon rows of shelves and down a short hallway past a bustling kitchen, where we pause at another wide corridor, at the end of which is an open bay.
A waiter bursts through a pair of swinging doors to our left, followed by a busboy. The sounds of a busy dining room rush in with them, fading as we step out into the evening on the concrete loading dock. A truck is backed up to it in the process of being unloaded.
“Esperen,” one of our escorts says, leaving us perched at the end of the dock to wait while he chats in Spanish with the staff who are currently unloading. The two-way radio attached to his belt squelches and he hits a button, then touches an earpiece I didn’t see before. He stares off into the distance, then frowns, striding toward us to look around the corner.
“Move back so he doesn’t see you,” he says, spearing us both with hard looks.
“So who doesn’t see us?” Toni asks as we shuffle into the shadows. “Is it Gustavo? Is he here?”
“No te muevas,” he says, pointing at the ground in the darkened corner we’re standing in. He turns back to the truck. “¡Más rapido!”
The other security guard steps in to start unloading too. When I move up to help, he shakes his head, pointing back to our corner.
“I guess he means business,” I say, turning back to Toni, only to find nothing but our suitcases sitting on the concrete.
41
Toni
If this jackass won’t tell me who we’re hiding from, I’ll just have to go see for myself.
I check the gun I slipped in the back of my waistband beneath my leather jacket, then hop off the end of the loading dock into the bushes when Sam isn’t looking. If it’s nothing, I’ll just turn back. But if it’s Gustavo . . .
“Toni, what the fuck?” Sam’s loud whisper is right behind me. I glance back from where I’m crouched. His expression is part-pissed, part-terrified. I just shake my head and keep going, sticking close to the wall behind the row of dense bushes.
The entrance to the resort is several yards ahead, just around the corner of the building, but I don’t have a clear view of it yet. I creep forward until I reach the corner and peek around it from behind a bush. Dense foliage obscure most of the view, but I can make out two pairs of feet standing on the stone-paved walkway outside the entrance.
The second I hear his voice, my pulse shoots sky-high and I have to reach out to find the wall to steady myself. It’s him—the bastard is within earshot.
“Mr. Delgado, you have been made aware of my policy on allowing unregistered visitors onto my property,” Lena says, her tone leaving no room for argument. “Your thugs aren’t enough to bully me into letting you cross this threshold. Now turn and go.”
“But we’re old friends, Selena. You and Lola were like sisters to me once up on a time. Surely that counts for something.”
“It might if you ever honored our friendship like family. You exploit everyone.”
Their conversation continues in a tense exchange. As tempted as I am to learn more about his ties to Lena Prieto’s family, I am so close to killing this bastard I can taste it.
I shift forward another step, reaching into my waistband for the gun digging into my low back. Behind me, Sam utters the softest curse.
I give him a grim stare, then peek through the leaves. I can just see Gustavo’s head and shoulders now. I lift the gun to aim, my hands shaking.
“Look around him, Toni,” Sam whispers. “There are half a dozen men. You shoot him, they’ll kill us, and maybe Lena in the process. It isn’t worth it. Please.” He reaches out and wraps his hand around my wrist, gently urging me to lower the gun.
I grit my teeth and pull away. “Sam, I have a shot. I can end him now.”
“Baby, it isn’t worth the risk. Not right now. Give me the gun and let’s get the fuck out of here. Let’s go home.”
I know he’s right, but the compulsion to pull the trigger is overwhelming. “Sam, please
.” I try to pull away, to re-center the sight at the end of the barrel, but my vision has gone blurry. My heart is pounding, my chest almost too tight for me to breathe.
He squeezes my wrist harder and I finally relent, letting him pull the gun from my hand and tuck it into his own waistband. He then cups my face in both hands and leans in close to whisper in my ear.
“I love you, but you need to let it go, okay? Are you ready to go home?”
I quietly nod and let him lead me back to the loading dock. The security guy looks angry when we emerge from the bushes, Sam hopping up first before turning to give me a hand up to join him.
“You two have a fucking death wish? Huh?” he snaps.
“Sorry.” I’m sufficiently chastised by my own stupidity, but I’m still not convinced it wouldn’t have been worth it.
They usher us into the now empty truck, then carry in a milk crate of supplies including a small battery-powered lantern and a couple bottles of water. It isn’t until I settle on my ass on the dusty floor of the trailer and the doors slam shut that I register Sam’s glare.
I shrink into my jacket and look away, staring at the rattling doors as we start to move. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him retrieve the gun, then hear the careful slide and click as he removes the magazine and clears the chamber. He snaps the bullet back into the magazine before stashing them separately in the pockets of his suitcase.
In a voice raw with emotion, he says, “Don’t ever do that to me again.”
Tears of shame clog my throat, but I don’t attempt any answer. I’m not ready to promise that to him. Not yet.
We arrive at the airport after a torturous hour in the truck. The torture is less about the lack of comfort than the fact that Sam hasn’t spoken a word since we left.
Once we’re safely airborne, we each hit the lavatory, then buckle back into our seats. There are only two extra jump seats in the cargo hold meant for deadheading pilots, and we’re the only cargo in the otherwise empty hold. It’s chilly, but one of the pilots handed us each a blanket when we boarded, warning us that the heaters don’t help a hell of a lot once we’re at altitude.
I glance at Sam, but his expression doesn’t invite conversation. He’s avoiding looking at me, his jaw clenched tight. He crosses his arms and closes his eyes.
I feel like crying again, but instead turn my wrist over where it rests on my knee and stare at my tattoo, wondering what Manny would say if he were here. Sam reaches out and covers it with his big hand, squeezing almost tight enough to hurt. Some dark part of me wants him to hurt me, and I mentally beat back those thoughts.
“He would have killed you,” Sam says finally. He pulls my hand over to his lap and uncovers my wrist, holding it up to show me my own tattoo and the exploded bullet that adorns the center. “Was that what you wanted? One of your very own to match the one that killed Manny? Do you really want to join him that badly?” His voice is rough with pain I’ve never heard before, not even in those months after he believed his own brother had been murdered.
“No. Sam, you don’t understand . . .” My heart hurts to hear such pain in his voice, but he has to know how long I’ve been tortured by this need, only to have him stop me at the last second.
“Don’t I? I went through this too. There was a time when I’d have pulled the trigger if I had the chance. But it’s different now, Toni. Everything is different now. I wish you could see it as clearly as I do.”
“See it? What I see is the fact that the bastard was right there, and I could’ve put a bullet through his skull if you hadn’t stopped me!”
“At what cost?” His voice rises over the drone of the engines. “Was Lena’s life worth sacrificing? Was mine? Were you really willing to risk your own life over a dead man? When are you going to wake up and see there’s more worth living for than dying for? I would fucking die for you, Toni, but I’m not willing to let you throw your life away for a memory. If you want to hate me for it, go ahead, but losing you is not a fucking option!”
His vehemence is startling and terrifying, his eyes wild and his pulse thrumming in his throat as he stares me down. There are only inches between us, but the chasm feels immense.
The hurt in his eyes is what breaks me. It’s a hurt I recognize from looking in the mirror over the past three years. If I died, I would have done to him exactly what was done to me, and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
He sees when I break, his own eyes growing glassy and his anger melting into desperation.
“Oh God, I’m so sorry. So sorry.” I pull my hand back and cover my face, curling over my lap as the painful twist of anguish overtakes me and tears come, followed by racking sobs.
“Toni, I love you too much not to fight for you, even if you’re the one I’m fighting.” He leans one elbow on his knee and rubs my back, then reaches between us to unclip my seatbelt so he can pull me farther onto his lap. I let him, practically crawling across his thighs as I lie down, then pull my feet up onto the seat.
I rest my head on his forearm facing his knees and clutch his hand as he keeps rubbing my back with the other. Eventually the taut agony in my chest eases. The thin airline blanket is the only option I have for a tissue, but it’ll have to do.
“Never let me go, okay?” I ask, my voice thick and hoarse from the tears.
“Never planned on it.”
“Even though I’m a fucking idiot who doesn’t know a good thing when it’s staring her in the face?”
He heaves an exaggerated sigh that makes me chuckle. I roll over so I’m looking up at him. He gives me a weary smile, and I reach up to brush my fingertips through his hair.
“I know better now,” I say. “But you may as well have clubbed me over the head and thrown me over your shoulder. I might’ve gotten the hint sooner.”
“Not my style.”
“I’m sorry I scared you.”
“I know.”
He brushes my hair back from my forehead and bends to kiss me, then sits back, gently stroking my hair. The silence that blooms in the wake of our exchange is a perfect mirror to what it was before. The closeness we built this weekend is back, this time with a gilded edge of hope and possibility that was missing.
I remember my birthday wish and realize it wasn’t until this moment that I truly understood that I was the only one with the power to make it come true.
42
Sam
It’s barely three a.m. San Diego time when we arrive, exhausted and stiff from the uncomfortable flight. We navigate the narrow stairs down to the ground, and it feels so strange to be back here after everything. It’s only been a week since we left, but everything has changed.
A shiny black SUV awaits us several yards from the plane with a uniformed driver standing by, who steps forward when we approach with our bags.
“Mr. Santos, Ms. Quiñones, my name is Leland Duffy. I work for Drake Stavros. I’m here to drive you to the tower.”
“To the tower? Fuck that. I want to go home.” Toni stops and glares as he reaches for her bag.
Leland is my size, big and broad-shouldered with a thick neck visible inside his coat collar. The small bit of hair I see at his temples below his cap is buzzed close, and he has the same ex-military bearing both my oldest brothers have. I wouldn’t want to test him to see how serious he is about sticking to his task.
“I’m sorry, miss. I’m just following orders. The others are waiting for you at Mr. Stavros’ penthouse.”
“Others meaning who, exactly?” I ask, helping him stow our bags in the back, then climbing in after Toni when he opens the rear passenger door.
“Your families,” he says. “Not sure if they’re all there, but there was quite a crowd when I left.”
“Do we have to?” Toni asks, shooting us both a pleading look. “I’m not ready to face them yet.”
“Will you ever be?” I reply.
She sulks a little and shakes her head. “Good point. May as well rip the Band-Aid off. Any chance you have booze sta
shed back here, Leland?”
“In the console, miss.”
“No shit,” she murmurs, opening the compartment in the console between us. Inside is a sleek steel flask, which she opens and sniffs, then hums in pleasure as she takes a swig right from the container.
She lets out a hiss, then hands it to me. “Top shelf.”
“It’s three a.m.,” I retort, but take the flask and down a healthy swallow myself. Toni laughs.
“What do you have to dread about this? Because I know exactly what part I’m not looking forward to.”
“Your brothers,” I say, my voice rough from the burn of what was likely the most expensive whiskey I’ve ever tasted.
“They’ll get over it.” She reaches out had squeezes my hand. “It isn’t like they have a choice, after all.”
All I know about Drake Stavros and Typhon is that the shipping company he owns does business in one of the tallest towers in the city, and that my sister works on the fifteenth floor. If Stavros is friends with Flores, it also stands to reason his business occasionally stretches the bounds of the law.
Leland pulls our SUV into the parking garage, winding down a level to a secluded area marked “permit only.” He parks near a brightly lit elevator alcove surrounded by glass with a high-tech security lock on the doors.
Even underground, the place feels expensive. Perhaps it’s the pristine chrome covering half the surfaces, or the glossy shine on the tile floor. Or the half-dozen security cameras I picked out. Duffy pulls out a keycard to access the elevator and when it opens, we’re greeted with plush carpet with the Typhon logo and more chrome with polished wood handrails.
“I feel like I should’ve had time to change first,” Toni says under her breath when Duffy presses the button for the penthouse. “I’m afraid to touch anything and leave behind a smudge.”
