“Sometimes I almost forget you really are a princess,” he says, and while not quite a compliment, my heart swells a touch. “You don’t know what it’s like, outside of your castle. We had to do it to survive, Selina. Not just to bring in enough money to help keep a roof over our heads, but to keep ourselves and Tia protected. And because you just have to, princesa. In our neighborhood, you’re either with him—with El Sombrerón—or you’re dead.”
He still has trouble saying the name, I notice. If I looked at him, I bet he’d be touching that spot on his arm again. Like it still hurts him.
“I’m—” I begin, and he cuts me off with a hand on my arm, his voice gruff.
“Don’t fucking say you’re sorry.”
“Okay,” I say, the word small with admission.
I know saying that I’m sorry he had to grow up like this, that he had his childhood and innocence stolen and warped so violently, will only hurt his male ego. I know it’s not my fault that these horrible things happened to him when I too was just a child, but in more ways than one, it feels like it is. My family supplied the drug that kept El Sombrerón in power, that kept Javier and his whole neighborhood firmly under the monster’s heel. And while my now-husband worked and suffered at the bottom rungs of this empire, I reveled in privilege in the castle, doing nothing. Not even aware of the price paid to get me there.
No wonder he hates me. No wonder, when it came time to claw his way to freedom, he chose to do it on my back. This is a punishment that perhaps I’ve done nothing to deserve, but I haven’t particularly done anything to not deserve it, either.
“You shouldn’t worry your pretty little head about him,” Javier says, and again, what should be a jab drenched in sarcasm comes out sounding almost genuine, and my heart is far too ready to accept it as a real sentiment. My head, though, knows better.
“I need to know what we’re up against,” I reply, my words strong even as my voice reveals a tremor. Part of me does wish I could go back to not knowing about the greater enemy, that I could keep believing that men like Javier were the worst thing that could happen to me. But it’s too late for that. “I’m in danger now. You endangered me. I know I can’t do much to fight, but I need to at least know who my new enemy is.”
“But you don’t,” my bedmate insists, reaching over and pulling me close into his arms. He usually waits until I’m nearer to sleep before doing that. My too-conscious body freezes, unsure of how to react. “I’ll protect you, Selina. I’m your husband now. I don’t care what that does or doesn’t mean to you. You’re my responsibility now, and I won’t let anyone, especially not him, hurt you. So stop asking about it.”
The last part comes out as an order, which is good, because if he’d kept saying nice words in gentle tones, I might have believed him. Maybe he does mean what he’s saying, at least for now. But ultimately, Javier is a man who will do anything to survive. Right now, I’m more useful to him alive. But if it comes down to his life or mine, he’ll choose himself every time. I don’t understand my role in his game quite yet, but at the end of the day, pawns and queens die to protect the king all the same.
“Ma’am?” Alexander, the assistant the designer sent, asks. I shake away my spiraling thoughts and smile at his reflection in the mirror, smoothing my hands down the silk-organza skirt, fingers catching on the hand-appliqued lace flowers. I can’t quite meet my own eyes in the mirror, keeping my lashes carefully lowered. I’m a picture-perfect bride, from my slim bared shoulders down to my toes, hidden in their Louboutins somewhere under this full skirt. But my face, I still can’t force my face to match that image, even though in the eyes of the law, I’m already a wife.
“I don’t think this one is quite right, either,” I murmur, and Alexander moves forward to begin the endless process of undoing the long row of pearl buttons locking me into this lace straitjacket, taking care not to let his hands touch my bare skin, or let a gaze linger. Despite the young man’s professionalism, my husband’s warning glare from across the room is nearly lethal.
“You have to pick one eventually,” Javier says from his perch to my left. I don’t know why he insisted on being here. I wish I could’ve had Kate for company instead, or even Miel. “It doesn’t have to be perfect.”
“I thought that was the point, to say yes to the perfect dress,” I retort, stepping delicately out of the rejected gown. Alexander carries it away and pulls the next option off its hanger. My mother would have demanded that the designer herself come to her, peddling her wares in person, ready to make any and all alterations needed to mold her creation into my mother’s perfect vision. But I’m not my mother, and I’m relieved not to have to deal with anyone more important than the tall blond assistant, now helping me into the next dress.
“Well, this one looks fine to me,” Javier says, gesturing at the new gown. I twist my lips at my reflection. While the last one was billowing and effortless, this dress is structured and sculpted into a masterpiece in its own right. I tug at the bust to adjust it and admire the way the dramatic flare of the skirt shrinks my waist. Despite the structured shape, the soft embroidery gives the dress a delicate touch, and again, the sight of myself in it makes me want to tear the thing right off.
“Not that one either, huh?” Alexander asks, easily reading the disgusted expression I’m not bothering to hide. In the mirror, I see Javier’s jaw set impatiently. I simply shake my head and give the assistant an apologetic smile.
While he busies himself putting one more dress away, Javier rises from his armchair. I tense as he approaches me, keeping my eyes stubbornly lowered, fighting the urge to pull the robe back over my nearly naked body. I am infinitely aware of my husband’s eyes on my bare back, his gaze burning hotter than a touch.
“Stop wasting my time,” Javier growls into my ear, quiet enough that Alexander won’t hear from a few feet away but loud enough for his words to be unmistakable. “This wedding is happening, and there’s nothing you can do to change that. Pick a dress or I will.”
I dare to look up, examining our competing reflections in the mirror. He’s my shadow, dressed all in black, looming too close for comfort. And me, I look like a ghost against him. My skin is paler than ever, especially against his golden complexion, and the white lace lingerie I’m wearing hangs a little loose on my thinning curves. The past few months had been hellish enough, but I’d fought to maintain my strength. The night of my attempted escape, the murder of Smythe, and the forced proposal, that might have finally killed my spirit. Then the resulting courthouse wedding, tiptoeing around Kate’s false rescue, and spending nights in my captor’s embrace, well, that was all tossing dirt on my grave. It’s a miracle I’m still standing at all. But Javier is right. There’s nothing I can do to change this, any of this, and I don’t even get to sit on the sidelines of my destruction. I have to play the starring role.
I give my husband a subtle nod, and he returns to his seat.
“This one is a little different, a little flashier,” Alexander explains as he brings the next dress over, half prematurely defensive, half hopeful. He’s as exhausted of this endless endeavor as Javier is. “It’s one our newer designs, part of next spring’s collection, actually.”
“Thank you,” I murmur automatically as he helps me pull the dress on. He’s right, it’s definitely flashier, with an unexpectedly fitted silhouette. The gorgeous pearl-beaded body of the dress is instantly overshadowed, though, by the bejeweled capelet Alexander is now setting on my shoulders.
“Swarovski,” Alexander explains with a knowing grin as he clasps the piece shut at the nape of my neck and steps away so I can see myself better.
I turn delicately from side to side, letting the light hit the crystals. There are hundreds of them, in different sizes and shapes, set into elegant woven patterns that are simultaneously reminiscent both of lace and chainmail. Something in my reflection makes my spine straighten and my eyes narrow, and suddenly, I don’t look like a ragdoll bride anymore.
�
�Is this finally it?” Javier asks, keeping his voice a touch annoyed, but there’s something new, almost soft in his eyes as he looks me over.
He’s not misreading my response to the dress, but he can’t see what I do. There’s something about this dress that flipped a switch inside me, that made me feel alive again for the first time in weeks. If Javier knew that there’s a new fire beginning to spark inside me, he wouldn’t be this excited.
“Yeah,” I confirm, touching my fingertips against the cold silver and crystal of my new armor. “This is it.”
Alexander beams and claps his hands together, then comes up to take final measurements. As he pins and tucks, I can’t take my eyes off my reflection. Yes, I’m still a prisoner in my own home, with a new, nearly literal ball-and-chain. Yes, my family’s company is now in the hands of the criminal who happens to be that ball-and-chain. And yes, I’m still responsible for the deaths of my old bodyguards, and the life of my nanny-turned-housekeeper remains precariously balanced in my hands, now more than ever. But in this moment, I feel stronger than I have in ages. My situation is bad, but all hope is not yet lost. I’m Selina Palacios. I’ve survived a lifetime of shit. I can survive a wedding, and a complicated relationship, and a mysterious monster that names himself after children’s nightmares. It’s time to take a page or two out of my new husband’s playbook. I’m going to do whatever it takes to protect myself. And if he insists on treating me like a child, won’t give me what I need to do so, well, I’ll seek it out for myself.
“Give Georgina my thanks,” I say to Alexander as Kate arrives to show him out, then step back into my jeans.
The war for my life isn’t lost yet. It’s only just beginning.
Detective Andrews pushes past the door to Open Records, causing the redheaded officer behind the desk to startle, nearly dropping his pop tart. With that kind of reflex, no wonder this guy wound up stuck in the basement.
“Detective, how can I help you?” Jacobs asks, setting the pastry down and indiscreetly wiping crumbs off his uniform. Andrews checks his notes one more time, hoping he read them wrong and won’t have to speak to this particular specimen. But alas, Officer Bailey Jacobs was indeed the man on duty down here at the same time that the security footage shows Selina Palacios entering Open Records. At least it did, before all the footage showing the young heiress’s visit to the police department mysteriously vanished, including the backup files.
“I need to know what records this woman asked you to pull,” Andrews says, cutting to the chase. The sooner he can get back to his own cubicle topside, the better. The redhead accepts the photo of Selina Palacios, and his eyebrows shoot up in recognition.
“She came in,” Jacobs admits, his words coming out haltingly. “But she hadn’t put in the proper requests, so I sent her away. She hasn’t come back.”
There, a new sheen of perspiration on his forehead, down here in the icebox of a basement, giving away a lie Andrews hadn’t even been looking for. Well, they can’t all be winners.
“I don’t care about the paperwork,” the detective says. He doesn’t care about the bribes a wealthy woman like Palacios could’ve easily plied Jacobs with to expedite bureaucratic process, either. As long as Jacobs cooperates with his investigation, anyway. “Just tell me what she wanted to see.”
“Sure, I’ll pull up the searches I ran for her,” Jacobs says all too eagerly, brushing a few more crumbs off his keyboard. Say what you will of this man, he sure can type fast, once he gets going. “Okay, here it is. I pulled all the files for a Javier Vega and a Miel Conde.”
Andrews jots the names down, then motions for the officer to stand up. “Go pull those same files for me, I’ll check the online records while you do that.”
The redhead scurries into the back room to do as told, while Andrews settles into the well-worn seat and reaches for the greasy mouse with a grimace. He runs searches in the online database for both names, but suspiciously, nothing pops up. Well, almost nothing.
“This is crazy,” Jacobs says, as he emerges from the back room, panting a little. “But I can’t find any of the files she looked at. I swear, I put them all right back where they belonged.”
“I’m sure you did,” Andrews tells him distractedly, clicking open the latest document attached to Javier Vega’s name.
It’s a marriage certificate, from the day after the Café Palacios shooting. And the other signature on the document reads—
“Holy shit.”
The night of our engagement party comes too soon. I had Selina move the date back one weekend, then two, and it’s still not enough. There is never enough time, when preparing for war.
Tonight our engagement goes public, and in doing so, I announce not only to the world but to my enemy that Selina Palacios is mine. Mine for the taking, mine for the keeping. The drug lord may suspect that she’s nothing but a pawn to me, as he knows even better than I do that true love doesn’t come to men like us, but he’ll set his sights on her all the same. And if the public reveal of my whereabouts and associations isn’t enough to set off a war, well, then the phone call I made this morning might do the trick. Café Palacios is officially out of the business of smuggling drugs into the country for him, once and for all.
And all this for a woman who still claims she hates me, even as she spends nights willingly in my embrace, even as she’s held up her side of the bargain and worked with me instead of against me for the past month.
I know she doesn’t truly hate me, no matter what she may think. No matter what she has to tell herself to get through the days. I feel the way her body curls into mine at night, hear the slowing of her speeding heart when I hold her close. She knows that despite it all, despite the lies and threats and violence, she is safe with me. I will protect her, even if it costs me everything, even as we launch into a war more dangerous than she’ll ever understand. She knows this, somewhere deep within herself, but I don’t dare dream that she’d ever admit it. And no matter what we tell the cameras tonight, I certainly won’t hold my breath waiting for her to love me. What we have, it isn’t love and it never will be. It’s something darker, and deeper, and undeniable. I will never love my pretty little wife, but I’ll never leave her. And no matter how hard she may try, she will never leave me.
Selina shifts in the seat beside me, as if sensing the uneasy thoughts racing through my mind. She looks gorgeous, as usual, in a pale golden dress that offsets her glowing, honey complexion. The textured brocade pattern of the fabric begs to be touched, but I still feel uneasy letting my calloused fingertips brush a garment that cost several times over what most women would spend on a wedding dress. She turns her face to me, and the dim lights of the limo glint off the thick red lacquer on her lips, slightly parted. Is she trying to kill me, looking so damn kissable?
“They’re going to expect a kiss,” she says omnisciently, not quite meeting my eyes. The glitter on her lids matches the gold of her dress, of her dangling earrings, of the ring on her left hand. “For the engagement announcement photos. And they’re going to ask questions.”
“I thought you gave the press the list of questions we’d be answering,” I ask, ignoring the point that she’s trying to make, because I know she’ll ask me not to kiss her, and I will have to deny her. I hate to deny her few requests, especially when she’s been such a good girl lately.
“I did, but they always go off book,” Selina snipes, and I think I know her well enough to recognize when her sharpness comes as a shadowbox for fear. “What if they ask, like… Am I going to be taking your last name?”
The press might ask that, sure, but right now she’s only asking for herself. The fact is, I don’t care about her name. Or maybe I care too much. I’d never cut off that crown of hers, the Palacios name that opens door everywhere we go, just to satisfy some primitive male urge to have her bear my label. The world will know in a moment that I own every part of her, even without stealing her name.
“Well, you can tell them that the answer is no,
” I tell her, and feel her body relax slightly beside me. “Tell them our relationship isn’t traditional like that.”
“That’s for sure,” Selina mutters under her breath, and I ignore her.
“Everything else is taken care of, right?” I ask, adjusting the buttons of my tux jacket. “I don’t want any room for things to go wrong tonight.”
“Don’t worry, everything is exactly as you asked for,” she says. “And I’ll spare you the breath. I won’t try to run, or tell anyone exactly how we met, or anything else. So there’s no need to threaten Kate, or my family legacy, or my life, or whatever else. Don’t worry, there’s no fight left in me.”
I know that’s a lie, but I’m not worried about her trying to fuck with me tonight. We’ll be attached at the hip, and no one will have reason to question my iron grip on her. The world is about to believe we’re in love, after all.
“Should I be worried, though?” Selina asks, as we turn the corner toward the venue. “About El Sombrerón?”
It still sends a shiver down my spine when she says it, a childish fear that I may never outgrow. She says the name so casually, like that’s all it is, a name. Like she’s never lived a life in which a name is all it takes to destroy your whole world.
“No, princesa,” I tell her, laying a reassuring hand on hers. She tenses, but doesn’t withdraw. “I’ve got a couple dozen APD officers here tonight, not to mention my men. It would be foolish to attack us here, so publicly.”
I wouldn’t put it past my former employer to risk it, especially once he gets wind of what we’ve done, but she doesn’t have to know that. There is enough on my pretty captive’s mind tonight without adding this to her plate. I wish she didn’t know about him at all, but there’s no undoing the past. There’s only the present, and the future I’m molding in my hands.
Caged: The Complete Trilogy Page 21
