The Cartel

by A. K. Alexander

  “Aren’t you forward tonight? This is not about anything. Does it have to be a special occasion for me to want to give you gifts and take you to dinner?”

  “I am still suspicious, Alejandro Peña! You are up to something.”

  He laughed, picking up his glass of wine.

  “There’s something more than this surprise I know you’re hiding, Alex. There’s something bothering you.”

  “What makes you say that?” Alex asked, setting his glass back down.

  “I see it. I know.”

  “You’re psychic?”

  “No, I am a woman and we have good intuition. Tell me.”

  “You are too perceptive.” He sighed and didn’t say anything for a moment. He took a sip from his wine and setting it back down, he said, “You’re correct, there is something on my mind.” He traced the rim of his wine glass with a long manicured finger. “It’s my father.”

  “Your father. What about him? You told me he deserted you and your mother when you were a baby.”

  “Antonio is my father.” There was no other way to say it.

  “What?”

  “It’s true. I didn’t believe it myself, but there were too many things he said that convinced me. Besides busying myself with finding only the best that money could buy for you today, my mind has played the scene I had with Antonio, with my father yesterday, over and over again.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  Alex told Bella everything—from what his mother had told him when he was a boy, to the scene with Antonio only the day before. She listened intently and when he finished, his eyes were misted over.

  “You love him, don’t you?” she asked him.

  “Yes. No. I definitely do not love that man.”

  She held up her hand. “Don’t lie to me, Alex. Of course you love him. I’ve seen how close you two have become. What happened to you and your mother wasn’t fair, but he does love you, and he wants to be a father now. Don’t you think you can let him? I believe you can. In fact, I know you can. Alejandro, you’re a compassionate man. Bitterness isn’t a part of you. Don’t allow it into your heart. It will ruin you.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Yes, you do. All you have to do is listen to your heart. Think about it. I believe it would please your mother.”

  “I will think about it. Why are you so smart?”

  “Luck.”

  “Right.”

  They both laughed as their dessert was placed before them: a bowl of beautiful strawberries with fresh cream.

  “What’s this? Only one bowl?” Bella mused, lifting an eyebrow.

  “I intend to let you have most of them.”

  “Oh, I’m sure.”

  Alex elaborately dipped the ripe fruit in the smooth, white cream. He then reached across the table, placing it gently in her mouth. When she bit down she felt something hard and cold in the center of the berry. What she hadn’t noticed was that the berry had been sliced to fit the small trinket inside it.

  “What’s this?” she exclaimed.

  “What?” Alex tried to act as surprised, but appeared sheepish.

  “Oh my God!” She wiped off a beautiful, two carat, princess cut, diamond ring.

  Alex reached for the ring and then her hand. He got up from his chair and knelt down on one knee. “Isabella Rodriguez since the first day I laid eyes on you, I haven’t been able to stop thinking of you. I knew you were the one for me. Your strength, your intelligence, your kindness with all you meet—especially with your horses…” He reached up and wiped the tears now coming down her face. “Your love for your family—all of it has made me certain and cemented in my heart and soul how much I love you. I want to love you for the rest of my life. I want to have children with you. I want to grow old with you. I want to be your best friend and you mine. I want to argue with you and then make love with you. I respect you. You challenge me. You make me a better man. I cannot even think of a life without you.” He shook his head. “I can’t. So please, please, I beg you, will you marry me, Isabella?”

  Bella couldn’t answer, the words catching in her throat. At first, she began to nod her head, and then finally blurted out, “Yes. Of course I will marry you.”

  Alex stood and brought her to her feet, kissing her. “You have made me the happiest man in the world, in the universe, in the heavens, everywhere!” He kissed her again—sweetly, slowly.

  “We need to tell our families,” she said as he held her close.

  “I asked your father this morning for your hand, so he is aware.” He smiled. “Besides, you are my family, now.”

  “You have a family, too.”

  Alex looked away. He knew she was right.

  “For me, Alex. No, do it for yourself.”

  He nodded. “Alright. But first, there is something I want to do to you.” He smiled and grabbed her hand. He slid the ring onto Bella’s finger.

  She took his face in her hands and leaned in, her lips meeting his in a soft, luscious kiss that sent a vibration of lust and love through each of them. She pulled away from him and looking into his eyes said, “And there is something I’d like to do to you.”

  He smiled. “I was going to try and be a gentleman and ask you. I even thought we might want to wait until our wedding night.”

  “I don’t want to wait.”

  He took a key out from his coat pocket and placed it on the table as he stood to help her out of her chair.

  “What’s this?” she asked.

  “A suite at Las Brisas.”

  “You were hoping I wouldn’t hold you to that chivalry stuff and make an honest woman out of me.”

  “I was hoping.”

  She laughed.

  He turned serious. “Bella, to me you are already my wife in my heart. There is not a day that will pass that I won’t love you and hold you in my soul. You are a part of me.” He kissed her again and then hand in hand, he escorted her out of the restaurant.

  *****

  Antonio had been filled with every conceivable emotion during the past few days. Joy filled him every time he saw his daughters together with their mother, becoming reacquainted. But the sadness of losing the son he never really had filled him with grief, too. And each time he and Lydia spent time trying to talk, there was a distance that had never been there before. They were like strangers who had known each other once, long ago. Each of them realized that there was no turning back time. Too much damage had occurred. There could be no going back for either one of them.

  As he sat in the garden pondering the losses he’d suffered throughout the years, Antonio was shocked to hear a male voice say, “Father.”

  Antonio whipped around to see Alex standing behind him. “I know that I was very angry the other day. And, I’m still hurt about your lies, but you are my father. And as much as I hate to admit it, I’ve grown to love you over the last year and a half, as if you really were my father.”

  Antonio stood up from the wooden bench where he was sitting. He reached for Alex and grabbed him, embracing the larger yet younger man, who didn’t respond at first, until he swore he saw a vision of his mother standing next to one of the rose bushes. She smiled, nodding her head. He hugged his father back.

  “I suppose we need to let the others in on our secret,” Antonio said.

  “I suppose so, but first I want you to know that Bella and I are getting married.”

  “Oh, this is wonderful! I am so happy. This is the happiest, best news!” Antonio cried. He pulled Alex in again to him and held him tight for a long time, neither one of them saying anything, but in that embrace expressing emotions that had been bottled up for years. “I think we should meet with Lydia and your sisters this evening.”

  “Fine. I have to say one more thing, and I need your blessing on this. I have already spoken to Javier and received his.”

  “Alejandro?”

  “Bella and I don’t want any part of the business. We want our families as one and we will respect and love yo
u, but we can’t be a part of what is wrong in your and Javier’s world any longer. We plan to move to France. Bella was happy there. We want to start a horse farm and Bella has already contacted Jean Luc, her old trainer, who has offered to help us. Bella wants to go and see where Delilah is buried—pay her respects—and we want to settle down there in the countryside.”

  Antonio didn’t respond at first. He looked into his son’s eyes and gave him the answer they both knew was right. “Of course, son. I wouldn’t want anything else for you. Take your wife and be happy there. Remember though, you have to come home for Christmas, and when you start having children you may have to build me a house on your farm so that I can be a grandpapa. I understand your need. Maybe it is also time that both Javier and I rethink what it is we do with our lives.”

  “Thank you.” Alex smiled at him, unsure of himself and the next stage of his life, which would now involve a father he’d been determined to hate until the day he died.

  *****

  The family was gathered around the dinner table, Alex included. They had finished supper and the servants were clearing the plates. Their conversation had been lively and neither of the girls had asked why Alex was at the table. They’d become accustomed to his presence there, and he and Rosa had become good friends. Alex found Felicia to be somewhat annoying at times, but since the return of her mother, she seemed to have toned her behavior down quite a bit and was staying close to home while she, her sister and Lydia bonded again.

  “I have something to announce,” Antonio said once the table was cleared and the servants out of the room.

  “Uh-oh,” Rosa replied. “There can’t be more.”

  “There is,” Antonio said. The women looked at their mother, who shrugged. “As you all know, I haven’t been a saint, but I have always loved all of you with everything I have.”

  “What is it, Papa?” Felicia asked impatiently.

  “I have done many terrible deeds, committed sins against your mother that I can never take back, but out of those sins I was, actually we were all, given a gift.”

  “What are you talking about?” Rosa asked and glanced back at Lydia.

  “There was another woman in my life many years ago. Marta.”

  “Who is Marta?” Felicia asked.

  “My mother,” Alex replied.

  Lydia looked over at Alex, and smiled with happiness as she realized who Alex really was. Here was the little boy she’d wanted to hate all those years ago. But in a short amount of time since she’d been reunited with her family, she’d come to know Alex somewhat. He was a kind young man who she’d noticed liked to smell the flowers in the garden and play with the many dogs on the property. “She worked for Javier years ago,” Lydia answered.

  Antonio nodded. “Yes. And I had an affair with her.”

  “Oh, my God,” Rosa muttered, realizing who Alex was.

  “Isn’t that what all you men do?” Felicia asked nonchalantly. “Big deal. You had an affair.”

  “Alex is our brother,” Rosa told Felicia.

  “That’s right,” Antonio told them. Alex looked down at the table.

  “Are you serious?” Felicia asked.

  “One hundred percent.” Antonio said.

  Lydia laughed.

  They are certainly a crazy family, but I guess they’re mine, Alex thought as he glanced around, from face to face.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  Six Months Later

  Costa Careyes, Mexico

  “It looks as though we are to be in-laws,” Javier said, finishing off his third tequila, sitting outside on Javier’s veranda at the vacation house, overlooking the jungles and the ocean. It was two nights before Alex and Bella’s wedding and the Patróns saw it fit for them to celebrate in honor of the occasion.

  “You know, I always knew we’d wind up being a family one way or another.”

  “You loco pinche pendejo! I only wish Cynthia were here to see this, see all the changes we’ve gone through and now to see our children married. She would rejoice in this.” Javier poured another shot of tequila and tossed it down, swallowing back his tears at the same time.

  “Yes, she would,” Antonio replied.

  “What are you and Lydia going to do?” Javier asked thinking of the women each of them had loved as young men. The women who had given them beautiful children and sacrificed so much of themselves for their families.

  “Too much time has passed. We have both changed. I still love her. She’s the mother of my children, and I think we could be together again, but I know for her she doesn’t feel the same way. She’s suffered greatly and I’m in part to blame. I don’t expect her to try and love me as her husband ever again. She’s going to Paris with Rosa for her art show and then, on to New York.”

  “I am sorry, amigo. Maybe in time…”

  Antonio shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe…”

  “What about Felicia?”

  “You know my youngest daughter. She’s so full of life. She needs a big city to entertain her.”

  “Where did she convince you to send her?”

  “New York,” Antonio said, laughing. “Says she’s going to try modeling. At least her mother will be in the same city before long, but I don’t know if anyone of us can ever control that girl.”

  “She is a wild one, but good for her. What about you?” Javier asked.

  “Me?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ve still got you. And if our children do right by us, we’ll be grandpapas soon enough.” Antonio smiled and shook his head at the possibility of grand children. Where had time gone? “I’m not old enough for this.”

  “You said it.” Javier poured his best friend and business partner of twenty-five years more tequila from the bottle they shared. As they sat together, getting drunk and watching the sun slowly make its descent, they reflected on life in that satirical way that only best friends who had suffered with one another, laughed together, and would die for one another, can.

  “So what do you think the next twenty-five years have in store for us?” Javier asked, slurring his words.

  “I don’t know that I want to know the answer to that one,” Antonio replied. The two laughed as they raised their glasses together, in celebration of the lives they had already lived.

  Michele Scott is the author of several novels, including the bestselling Wine Lover’s Mystery Series. She lives in San Diego, California with her husband and three kids, their dogs, cats, and horses. To learn more about the author and her work, please visit her site at http://www.michelescott.com.