by Cora Kenborn
He sighed. “Do you trust your brother?”
“What kind of question is that?”
“One I’m not sure you know the answer to. Ask him to see his tattoo. Someone has betrayed us, but it’s not those two lieutenants. You’re the key to destroying him.”
I continued hiding behind my brazen audacity. “If I don’t, are you going to kill me too?”
“You’re familia now. We don’t strike our own unless struck first.”
I took a deep breath. “Okay, Valentin Carrera. If familia is so important to you, then it’s time to let you in on a little secret I have a feeling you don’t know anything about.”
I sat quietly, listening to Brody plead his case. When he finished, he stared at me, his expression hopeful, and maybe slightly fearful.
Good. He should be scared.
Earlier this morning, he showed up at the townhouse looking and smelling like he’d rolled around in the landfill before taking a swan dive into the sewer. I offered him some soap and water, but he declined, asking for coffee instead. His nervous silence concerned me. Since my surprise call from Val last night, I questioned everyone’s motives.
And after what he just asked me to do, I seriously questioned his sanity.
“You both can go to hell,” I blurted out, swiping my coffee mug from the table and dumping it into the kitchen sink.
Brody shifted in his chair and frowned. “You don’t believe he killed Hector any more than I do.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” I snapped, slamming the dishwasher closed.
“Everything, Lil’ Bit. He’s being set up, and you know it. This is the only way to help him.”
He didn’t get it. Maybe in another lifetime this would be what I wanted, but not now. What he was suggesting should be entered into with a promise of love and security, not force and threat. Besides, we weren’t only playing with fire, we were playing with lives.
I threw a heated glare over my shoulder. “I’m not being forced to marry anyone, Brody.”
Leaving his chair, he stood beside me. “If he gets on the stand, they’ll rip the cartel wide open. Me included. But that’s just a small part, Lil’ Bit.”
He didn’t have to say the words out loud. The sorrow in his voice matched the one burrowing its way into my heart. He knew as well as I did that if this went to trial, Stella’s name would be dragged through the tabloids, forever linked with international scandal. She’d never have a normal life. Everything I sacrificed for her would be for nothing.
“I’m sorry I never told you who her father was,” I whispered.
Brody’s hand covered my back. “I’m sorry you never told me about a lot of things. I could have protected you both.”
I stiffened, the regret and pain in his voice sending a chill down my spine.
Oh, God, he knew about Finn.
“No one could have saved us,” I assured him. Visions of my mother’s stone face burned into my memory.
He turned me to face him. “Our family can keep her safe.”
Looking straight into his eyes, I smirked. “Mommy and Daddy? No thanks.”
“No,” he said, his fingers squeezing my shoulders. “My new family. Yours now too.”
Jerking away from him, I walked back into the dining area and stared out the window. “Don’t lump me in with your cartel world, Brody.”
“Mateo told me he loves you. Do you believe him?”
I watched traffic rush below me. “I don’t know what to believe. I’ve been lied to my whole life.”
“I watched his face when he saw you at Caliente,” he said, moving to look out the window beside me. “The man is as steeled as they come, but the moment he laid eyes on you, he crumbled.” He hooked a finger under my chin, turning my face toward him. “Do you trust me?”
I nodded. “With my life.”
“And I trust him with mine. More importantly, I trust him with yours and Stella’s. I make no excuses. He’s done some fucked up and immoral things, but so have I. Our way is ugly, but it always evens the score. However, mostly, our way protects its own.”
I laughed. “Val said the same thing.”
“You spoke to Val?”
I nodded. “He asked me not to implicate Mateo.”
“Did he threaten you?” Brody’s hands fisted by his side.
I smiled. “Not any more than you just did. What kind of criminal organization are you people running here anyway?”
By the look on his face, he didn’t find my joke amusing. “One that lays down their lives in the name of family…not takes it. Do you understand the difference?”
I thought about Mateo and his promise to die for a daughter he’d never met. “More than you know.” A beat of silence passed between us before Val’s parting words echoed in my head. I placed a hand on his arm. “I need to see your tattoo.”
He tensed under my fingers. “What?”
“Please,” I whispered. I hoped he wouldn’t make me grovel, but if that’s what it took, I would. Thankfully, it didn’t come to that. Without another word, Brody slipped off his jacket, and opened his shirt, dragging it over his shoulder to reveal a skull tattoo covered in black roses.
My voice caught in my throat. “What does it mean?”
“Badge of a leader,” he said so matter-of-factly it almost sounded normal. “It signifies we belong.”
Seeing that same tattoo on my brother strengthened my resolve. “Val also said the cartel doesn’t strike their own unless struck first. Is that true?”
Fierce loyalty flashed bright in Brody’s hazel eyes. “Absolutely. Once we take the oath, inner-cartel violence is one of the worst crimes a soldier can commit. No action can be taken without Val’s approval.” He hesitated, looking away. “Well, not without consequences.”
“So, in someone’s mind, having something stolen from them would constitute the first strike, right?”
“I guess so. Why?”
Because what was stolen was power, and the first strike was me.
I wanted to break down. I wanted to collapse in my brother’s arms and scream for time wasted fighting with Mateo when the man arguing with Luis was right under my nose. But, I didn’t. Instead of drawing more attention toward my brother, I’d agree to his terms, and bring it on myself.
“I’m just trying to understand the world I’m about to be bound to,” I answered.
Brody’s eyebrows lifted in cautious hope. “Does that mean...”
“Mateo didn’t do this.” I waited until he’d fixed his shirt before diving into unholy matrimony. “What do we have to do?”
Digging into his pockets, he pulled out a vinyl booklet and rectangular card and dropped them on the table. “I’ve got Mateo’s passport, and social security number. You just have to take them to the Harris County Clerk’s office over on Caroline Street and ask for Melinda.” I was still focused on the documents he’d tossed on the table when he lightly tapped my cheek. “That’s important, Lil’ Bit. You must ask for Melinda. Usually, both parties have to be there, but she owes me a favor and will push it through. Ask her for a Declaration of Informal Marriage.”
I blinked up at him. “What’s that?”
“A common law one with official documentation.” He shrugged, a little grin pulling at the corner of his mouth. “Basically, if you agree you’re married, they say, ‘why the hell not?’ Since you have a child, it proves you’ve been together for a long time and holds legal validity. Just to cover our asses, I had the lease for your apartment in San Marcos put in Mateo’s name.”
“But how is that even—”
He leveled a stare at me. “Do you really want to know?”
It sounded easy. Way too easy. “And that’s legal? I still can’t be forced to testify?”
“As much as one with all the bells and whistles. Provided you pay them the required thirty-one dollars, of course.”
“Fine.” I sighed.
“You’ll need to tell them you’ll testify so they’ll g
o ahead and charge him.”
I bit my lip and winced. “I did that already.”
I waited for him to ask for an explanation. Hell, he deserved one and even though I knew a shitstorm waited to rain down on me for my snap decision, I’d give it to him. Instead, he just rolled his neck.
“Well, okay, that just expedites things, I guess. I’m sure they charged him last night, and he’ll be arraigned today. After that, we can post bail.” Reaching for my hand, he gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Ready to do this?”
Mustering all the courage I had, I nodded. “No.”
Thirty-Five
Mateo
The three blue walls surrounding me bothered me more than the steel bars keeping me in. The longer I stared at them, the more they seemed to close in on me.
Maybe that was by design. Maybe they wanted the unfortunate asshole who found himself sitting on the hard bench painted the same disgusting teal color to feel like he was drowning in his own stupidity. I’d stared through the bars of a holding cell more times than I cared to remember, but not once had I ever wavered in my loyalty to the cartel.
That was before they threatened her.
Atwood may have told me more than he’d intended, but it wouldn’t help me if my mouth was covered in so much bureaucratic red tape no one could hear me expose him. Besides, I didn’t want to sell him out yet. Not only did I have bigger scores to settle, Atwood was the only one keeping my daughter safe. I’d let him bask in his false sense of security for now. Until someone else could do a better job of protecting Stella, he was more useful to me alive.
Heavy footsteps lumbered down the hallway, and within seconds, Alex stood in front of my cell twirling a set of handcuffs around his finger. “Well, it looks like your girlfriend has agreed to testify against you,” he announced, a smug lift in his voice. “I’m happy to say you’re going to be arrested.”
I briefly held his eye before leaning my head against the wall and staring at the ceiling. “Am I supposed to be shocked?”
He chuckled. “You’ll see the judge in twelve hours. Stand up, Cortes. Time to smile pretty for the camera.”
I let out a sigh of relief as a bald officer with a tree trunk for a neck shoved me into a new cell and slammed the door.
“Might want to get comfortable, asshole. I hear processing is slow with paperwork tonight,” he sneered, squeezing one of the bars with his ridiculously huge bicep to intimidate me. Too bad I wasn’t impressed. Bullets flew faster than fists.
Crossing my arms over my chest, I leaned against the wall. “Might want to lay off the gym candy, Arnold. I hear juicing shrinks your nuts.”
I hit a nerve—or at least one of the veins currently popping out in what used to be his neck—because he slammed his hand against the bar and muttered a few unoriginal racial slurs before stomping off. The whole thing would’ve made me laugh if it didn’t bore me so much. Men like him riled up so easily it lost all entertainment value.
Sighing, I glanced around the room, fatigue setting in. There weren’t any clocks, but the grit in my eyes told me it’d been at least twenty-four hours since Leighton and I had been dragged out of the townhouse. Just from experience, I knew even if someone posted bail immediately, it would be six to eight hours before I walked out of here.
“What a dick.” Pushing off the wall, I turned toward the hard bench when a low laugh drifted in from the next cell. Walking back toward the bars, I pressed my face against them and craned my neck. “Something funny?”
“Yeah, you.” A heavy Mexican accent floated between his own bars as a pair of arms dangled between them. “That pinche cabrón’s name is really Dick.”
I laughed despite the fucked-up situation. “Of course it is.”
“What’d you do to land your ass back in tambo?” he asked, his hands gesturing toward our neighboring cells. “I thought you were in Mexico City livin’ the good life on that big ass yacht.”
It irritated the hell out of me that I couldn’t see his face. Obviously, he’d seen me walk in and knew who I was. Only someone on the inside would know my rank and that Val had a weakness for the open sea.
Not sure who might be listening, I switched to our native Mexican dialect. “Quién eres tú y cuál es tú rango?” Who are you, and what’s your rank?
“No importa,” he growled, pulling his hands back and all but disappearing into his cell. “No hay necesidad de rango si no hay cartel.” It doesn’t matter. There’s no rank if there’s no cartel.
I started to remind him the Carrera hold on Houston was just as powerful as ever when his strong reaction triggered the full meaning of what he’d said.
If there’s no cartel.
I pressed my forehead against the cold steel. “Eres un oficial de Muñoz.” You’re a Muñoz official.
It wasn’t a question. I had no doubt we were two made men who’d battled on opposite sides of a war fought on the same soil. The Muñoz Cartel had been our only rival, and it dismantled just before I returned to Mexico four months ago, crippled after the death of their leader, Manuel Muñoz.
I should know. I was there when Val’s wife pulled the trigger.
“Sí,” he confirmed, switching back to broken English. “My congratulations to your boss and his wife on their bouncing baby psychopath.”
I jerked against the bars, hissing out a warning, “Ten cuidado con tu maldita lengua, o la arrancaré de tu boca.” Watch your fucking tongue, or I’ll rip it out.
“Calm the hell down, Cortes,” he chastised, fueling my anger. “Nobody’s around. They think they’ve got you by the balls, so they don’t give a shit to listen anymore.”
“Why? Did Dick tell you that? Do you two have pillow talk after he pounds you in the ass?”
Fuck it. If he wanted to be an asshole, so could I.
Instead of pissing him off, my insult made him laugh. “Word on the street is Delgado and Diaz are dead. Sounds like an inter-personnel problem to me.”
I backed up. “What do you know?”
He paced while running his fingers across the bars—a stall technique designed to make me crazy. It was working.
“If you think Atwood is your only problem, you’ve been in Mexico too long,” he said, coming to a halt.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Houston isn’t that big, amigo. I have no interest in helping a Carrera, but, unlike your boss, when it comes down to another oficial or a narcopolitico, I side with my own.” A hint of hostility crept into his voice, but I listened intently without interjecting. “You need to ask yourself who had the most to gain by shutting those two up permanently. Seems to me your problem is our fine mayor.”
His insinuation hung in the air. “Lilith Donovan may be corrupt, and she’s definitely a puta—but a murderer?”
His feet shuffled again. The next time he spoke, his voice was so close it sounded less than an arm’s length away. “Three of your men knew she liked to walk on the wild side. Two are dead. I’d ask the third before he is too.”
No. Only five people knew about that.
“You’re lying.”
He muttered under his breath. “You should know better than anyone how power can close steel bars. You think I’m facing twenty to life because I’m careless? I made a deal that went bad. Two guesses on who it was with.”
Thirty-Six
Leighton
I wore white.
What seemed like a perfectly logical idea walking in now felt ridiculous as I exited the courthouse dressed in the abomination that now flapped in the breeze like a giant virginal flag.
Such an over-the-top gesture was unnecessary, but I’d walked into the clerk’s office with my head held high and asked for Melinda, speaking with conviction while signing both mine and Mateo’s names to a Declaration of Informal Marriage form. My hand didn’t even shake as I paid the obligatory thirty-one dollars, slipping Melinda two crisp one-hundred-dollar bills for her trouble.
Now, standing on the steps outside, I
glanced down at my outfit with distain. The long-sleeved, baby doll dress was covered in so much white lace I looked like an oversized toddler, but it was done.
In the eyes of the state of Texas, Mateo and I were married.
“Leighton? Do you want to sit down?” A gentle hand rested on my shoulder, dragging me out of my fog.
“No,” I said, letting out a resigned breath. “They’ll be here soon to pick us up.”
She squeezed my shoulder then settled her hand over her small belly. I snuck a glance out of the corner of my eye. Other than looking like she’d swallowed a toy ball, Eden Lachey hadn’t changed much. She still had shocking bright red hair that was piled on top of her head, but it was the black dress she wore that made me laugh. Sexy and form-fitting, when paired next to my sacrificial virgin costume, we looked like the living embodiment of yin and yang.
“You’re right,” she said, staring straight ahead with a slight nod. “I probably wouldn’t get back up without a crane anyway.”
I appreciated that she didn’t push me. Marriage may have bound us into some twisted sisterhood, but it would take a lot more than a piece of paper for us to link arms and start calling each other “bestie.”
However, I was curious how things were going. Brody had insisted that I meet him at his apartment, so he could drive me to the courthouse himself. I humored him, not expecting to find Eden and the Carrera kingpin himself sitting in his living room.
“Do you think Val found someone to post the money he put up for Mateo’s bail?”
“Absolutely. One thing you’ll learn is that most everyone can be bought. Usually, the ones with the highest moral compass are the ones with highest price tag.”
“That’s depressing.”
“It’s reality,” she countered, cocking her chin with a sympathetic stare. “Something tells me you know more about it than you’re willing to admit.” I stiffened, and she let out a sigh. “Look, Leighton, I know what it’s like. You feel like you can’t trust anyone. There’s a voice inside you telling you if you take your foot off that ledge and leap, you’ll lose the only part of you that’s ever made any sense. Because what our men do?” She shook her head. “I’ll never try to convince you it makes any sense, but I’m here if you need a friend.”
