by Shaw, LK
The things was, it did feel right. Like things were just falling into place. It was a little scary actually how effortless it was. I had no doubt we would still argue, strong personalities and all that, but at the end of the day, we were finally together. And in love.
“It definitely feels right.”
“That’s all that matters. I’m so happy for you two. Neither of you could see that you were in love with the other, but the way you both looked at each other over the years… I was just waiting for you guys to realize it.” Ines laid her hand on my arm “Now you’re really going to be my sister. I couldn’t ask for a better one.”
Damn it, she was going to make me cry. I threw my arms around her. “Me either.”
The sound of the lock disengaging made us turn toward the door. Victor stepped in, pausing for only a second at the sight of Ines.
“Hey, sis,” he greeted her. He walked over to us and leaned down to kiss me hello. “Hi, beautiful.”
I beamed up at him. “Hey yourself.”
“And,” Ines drew the word out. “On that note, I’m outta here. I don’t need to see my brother and my best friend making cow eyes at each other, no matter how glad I am you two are finally together.”
I sputtered. “Cow eyes? What the hell is that?”
She stared at me intently and then fluttered her eyelids spastically. “It’s like this flirting thing. You know, cow eyes?”
Victor chuckled, and I shook my head. “You’re such a weirdo.”
Ines threw her hands up in the air and stood. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you. I’ve clearly taught you nothing over the years. Anyway, you all go do whatever it is that you do. I’m heading home to go make cow eyes at my own man.”
I rose from the couch and wrapped her in a giant hug. “Thank you for being my best friend. I love you.”
“Love you too, Bubbles.”
I walked her to the door and turned to Victor. Before a week ago, I don’t think I fully appreciated how damn good he looked in his uniform. He was sexy as hell. And all mine.
“How was work?”
“Not bad. It was actually a pretty slow day.” While he told me about it, I followed him into the bedroom. He took off his gun belt and laid it across the top of the dresser. I leaned against the doorframe and watched as he disrobed. He did it methodically, still talking to me about the drug arrests he made and the school career day he dropped by for, his fingers moving from one button to the next. It shouldn’t have been a turn on, but it was. His muscles in his forearm flexed and relaxed with each move he made. Until he stopped moving.
I glanced up to find him staring at me.
“Enjoying the show?” He asked, raising his left eyebrow.
“Most definitely. I’d offer to help, but I like watching you.”
Before I could blink, Victor snatched my arm and pulled me against him. He nuzzled my neck, and I tilted my head, giggling, to give him better access.
“I feel so objectified,” he murmured against my skin, his lips skimming across the top of my shoulder. I pressed myself against him, moaning my approval. He moved back across my shoulder, up my neck, down my jaw, nibbling along the way until finally his mouth met mine.
Victor kissed me like he hadn’t seen me for days. Like he’d counted every second before he could run home and touch his lips to mine. I kissed him back the same way. Like I wanted to memorize his taste and keep it close to me while he was away from me. It was the same every day he came home. He’d greet me with a kiss. I’d watch him get undressed, and he’d kiss me again until I was breathless.
“I missed you,” he said after one last kiss. “Did you and Ines have a good time today?”
“We did. She took me shopping.”
“Oh yeah? Did you find anything good?”
“Uh huh,” I nodded, biting my lip and waggling my brows.
Victor perked up at this. “What did you get?”
“Oh, you know, nothing special. Just some lingerie.”
His eyes heated and his nostrils flared as though scenting me. “Lingerie, you say?”
I drew patterns on his chest with my fingertip. “Yep. I thought maybe later tonight I could model it for you.”
By now he was practically panting. “Hell yeah, you should.”
“If you’re really nice, I might even let you take it off me.”
Victor gripped my hips and pulled me tighter against him. “I’ll be better than nice.”
I smiled up at him. “I bet you will.”
He groaned. “God, what you do to me woman.”
“No less than you do to me. I love you, you know.” The words got easier to say every time.
“I love you too.” He dropped a kiss on my forehead. “Let me change, and then we can grab something to eat. Afterwards, you can give me that little show you promised.”
“You got it.” I leaned up and brushed my mouth across his one last time. I turned to head back out to the living room. Victor smacked my butt making me laugh. I grabbed a few things out of the fridge while he finished changing. At first I thought it would be weird having him in my house all the time, but it wasn’t at all. He fit in here like he’d always belonged. His heat surrounded me before I felt his arms wrap around my waist. I leaned back against him.
“What are we having?”
“I thought I’d make meatloaf and fry up some potatoes.”
“Mmm, sounds delicious. What can I do to help?”
That right there was just one of the millions of things I loved about this man. Victor did something every day to make me fall in love with him all over again. Blinking back my happy tears, because he probably wouldn’t understand, I faced him.
“If you don’t mind, you can peel the potatoes.”
He saluted me. “You got it. Give me that peeler.”
I reached into the drawer and handed it to him. We worked together with ease, chatting about mundane things. It struck me then, that I wanted this forever. It hadn’t hit me until now. I stopped squishing the crackers and eggs into the hamburger.
“Do you want to move in? I mean, like for real. Not just spending the night and going back and forth from here to your dad’s to get your stuff. But actually living here. With me.”
Victor paused his peeling and stared at me. “Is that what you want? Because I’m okay with what we have right now.”
“Yes, it’s really what I want. I love you. I want to spend all the seconds of my day with you. We’re practically there already. Why don’t we just make it official?”
He grabbed me around the waist. He spun us in a circle. I couldn’t stop laughing. We came to a stop and he kissed me hard and deep.
“I love you, too. Now, let’s hurry up and get this dinner going so you can try on all the lingerie you were teasing me about earlier.”
My entire life, I’d believed that love was nothing but pain and anger. I glanced over at the man at my side. At the man who’d taught me that that was a lie. Love wasn’t painful or angry at all. Love was…Victor.
Epilogue
1 month later
Landon. So that was her real name. Unlike the fake one she’d given me two years ago. Even after all this time, the pain I’d witnessed that night continued to lurk deep inside her eyes. I could see it from across the room. Maybe because I was looking for it.
I bet she smelled the same. A combination of vanilla and lavender. There had been moments over the last twenty-four months that I swore I could still smell it. Especially while I was high. That’s when the scent had been the strongest. Almost like it was reminding me that that night with her had been better than any rush heroin had ever given me.
Brody had invited me over to his and Ines’ new house for a housewarming party. After Álvarez’s death, he and Ines had returned to Colorado and sold their small, fledgling ranch along with the few heads of cattle they owned. My brother was going to have to go back in a couple weeks to finalize the sale, but everything had been set in motion. The two of
them had come back to Chicago. It was home.
I took a sip of my warm Coke, my eyes never leaving the blonde across the room talking to Brody, Ines, and Ernesto. Landon wasn’t your classic beauty. Her features were too disjointed for that. It was her eyes that drew a person in. Only if they were paying attention though. I’d been watching her from the moment she walked through the door nearly an hour ago. Her steps stuttered when she spotted me, but she recovered quickly.
For the last fifteen minutes Landon’s gaze had kept darting toward the nearest exit. She was itching to get out of here.
Finally, she snatched the opportunity. She disengaged herself from the group, grabbed her coat, and bolted for the door. Quickly, I set down my plastic cup and followed. She’d almost made it to her car before I caught up.
“Leaving so soon?” I called out.
Landon’s entire body froze for a beat and then thawed. She tried to jerk the door open, but I slapped my palm across the top of it, stopping the movement.
“Move your hand.” She practically growled the order, her wickedly sharp cheekbones red with anger.
She still hadn’t met my eyes. I kept my arm right where it was, waiting for her to finally look at me. I counted the seconds of our stand off until at last, she raised her head and glared back. Jesus. The pain lurking behind the anger almost caused me to stumble backward from the force of it. Her lavender vanilla scent washed over me.
“Why’d you run?”
Landon closed her eyes for a heartbeat before opening them again. A shutter now covered the blue irises. She didn’t prevaricate or act like she didn’t know exactly what I was talking about.
“I didn’t run. I simply left. We had a good time, and then it was over.”
I crossed my arms. “Liar.”
She flinched, her eyes darting away from mine. Her too thin lips flattened even further.
“You and I both know it was more than just a ‘good time’, Landon.”
She pushed back her shoulders and stood tall on legs that went on for days. Her gaze bore into mine. “We fucked, Preston. That was it. Nothing more, nothing less.”
“Does Brody know?”
Her horrified expression answered that question. “God, no. I didn’t even know he was your brother until a month ago.”
That’s what I thought. Brody would have killed me. It didn’t change the fact that there was more to what happened between us than just a fuck. There’d been a connection. “I’ve never forgotten you.”
She swallowed, another flash of pain flickering in her eyes. “It was two years ago. You should probably get over it. I know I have.”
With that parting shot, she yanked the door hard, knocking me out of the way, and dove behind the wheel. I backed away from the car, letting her escape. For now. I stood there until her car disappeared, and then I turned to head back inside.
Brody spotted me closing the front door. “Hey, where’d you go?”
“It was getting a little stuffy in here. I just stepped out on the porch for some fresh air for a minute.”
His look said I was crazy. It was the end of November. In Chicago. The air wasn’t fresh so much as take your breath away. An arctic front had blown through the city and brought with it unseasonably cold temps. It was supposed to warm up in a couple days, but for the moment it was bone chilling.
“Ines wants to open the housewarming gifts. You gonna stick around for a bit?”
“Yeah, for a little while.”
I’d never understood the whole concept of giving gifts when people moved into a house. More than likely they already had whatever shit you bought them. How many potholders did a person need anyway?
While Ines opened her gifts, oohing and awing over them all like they were the best presents she’d ever received, my mind drifted back to that single night two years ago.
There’d been a desperation behind Landon’s kisses. My fingers itched with remembrance of her soft skin. Of cupping breasts on the small side, but still beautiful. Then, there were her tears. I’d been horrified, afraid I’d hurt her. Instead, she’d achingly whispered—practically begged me really—to make the pain go away, if only for one night.
She’d fit in my arms like she belonged there. We’d made love for hours. It hadn’t been some casual fuck between two strangers no matter what she said. We were two tortured souls seeking comfort from each other. Perhaps even love. I’d felt something that night. It had been visceral and raw emotion.
Despite her dismissal, she’d felt it too. I’d been right when I said she’d run. It didn’t matter, because I’d found her. This time I wasn’t going to let her get away.
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In Too Deep
“Kill him.”
Those two, single-syllable words played on repeat like a litany in my ears. They were accompanied by a multitude of emotions.
Horror.
Guilt.
Satisfaction.
It’s the last one that made me the most nervous.
I tried to pinpoint the exact moment things changed. When I changed. Was it the first time I took a hit of blow and loved the rush it provided? The time I sat on a piss-scented couch with a gun in my face, its hammer drawn back as incentive, while I “sampled” the latest stash of a new-to-me dealer who didn’t quite trust me? Or maybe it was when I realized that sometimes, in order to make things happen, you had to get your hands dirty. I was on my own. No cavalry was coming to my rescue. I did what I had to to survive, even if I hated myself most of the time.
The drugs.
The killing.
They were all a part of the man I’d become over the last five years in order to bring an entire organization crumbling to the ground. It was my life’s mission. My obsession, in fact.
Like an out of body experience, I watched my hand remove the gun from its shoulder holster and point it at the bleeding man begging for his life on his knees in front of me.
“Please, don’t do this. I told you where the money was. Please, I have a wife, a daught—”
Closing off my emotions, I squeezed the trigger. His words were cut off mid-sentence when the bullet entered his brain. The dead man collapsed onto the cement floor of the abandoned warehouse near Chicago’s Lake Michigan, blood pooling next to his head.
Miguel Álvarez, the man who’d given the death order, spat in the direction of the body. “Let that be another lesson to those who steal from me.”
He clapped me on the shoulder on his way to the black sedan parked just inside the warehouse doors. “Tomás, my friend, welcome to the family.”
I remained there, unmoving, while I watched two men begin to wrap up the body for disposal. It would be weighed down and dumped in the waters of the Michigan, hopefully to never be found again. My expression remained impassive.
“You will come to the house, sí?” The voice called from behind my back. Forcing my eyes from the scene in front of me, I turned to face Miguel.
“Yes, sir, I’ll be there soon. I have some quick business to take care of first.” I didn’t flinch at his assessing stare. After a moment he nodded.
“Don’t be long, Tomás.” The warning tone was clear. “I want to introduce you to my nephew, Alejandro.”
He disappeared inside the car, closing the door behind him. The Mercedes pulled away, and I continued to watch it until the tail lights disappeared. Leaving the cleanup crew to their task, I exited the stifling heat of the warehouse before jumping on my fully restored 1984 cherry red Harley Softail. I started her up, slammed my heel against the kickstand, and took off in the opposite direction Miguel had gone. Fifteen minutes later, I entered the Grant Park North parkin
g garage and drove around until I reached the fourth level. I spotted an empty parking space next to a blue Honda. I’d just cut the engine when the passenger window of the Honda lowered.
“I’m in.” I spoke to the shadowy figure of my handler in the driver’s seat without turning my head in her direction.
“What did you do?”
I gave a self-deprecating laugh. “What I had to, Landon.”
Her voice was full of understanding when she finally replied. “I see. Well, we both knew going in that something like this might happen. It’s unfortunate, but it needed to be done. You’ll be in touch soon, then?”
“Yes. I’ll let you know when the next deal is going down.”
Without another word, I cranked up the bike and took off. As I drove down Michigan Avenue, I buried my emotions. I’d been with the Drug Enforcement Agency for eight years. I was now en route to the home of the man in charge of the second largest Mexican cartel in the United States. No longer was I Brody Thomas, D.E.A. agent. I was Tomás González, full-fledged member of the Juárez Cartel.
I ignored the guilt stabbing me deep in my gut. Diego Garcia may have been the first man I’d been forced to kill, but if I was going to bring down the cartel, he most likely wouldn’t be my last. Besides, any man who got his wife hooked on dope and then prostituted her out to his friends earned a special place in hell.
When I pictured all the scenarios in which all this would be over, often times, it ended up with my death. I knew the risks. But never at any time did I envision it would be a sexy Latina bombshell who would eventually bring my world crashing down around me.
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This is the part where I struggle to make sure I don’t forget every person who helped make this book possible. You would think I’d learn by now to start keeping a list as I go. Sigh. I know I’m going to forget someone, and I’ll feel like an asshole even though they’ll never mention it. I’m going to do my best!
