by Cora Kenborn
I glared up at Leighton. “What?”
She swallowed hard, nodding to where Eden’s fisted hand weakly reached toward her stomach. “The baby.”
And just like the snapshots, my mind relinquished more control, flashing another all too recent memory before my eyes.
“Eden?” I grabbed her arm as she leaned forward only to have her bat my hand away. I called her name two, three more times and all I got in return were clenched fists and closed eyes. That’s it. Fuck this. “I’m sending for Dr. Vidal,” I announced, scanning for Mateo.
Her eyes popped open, and I let out a curse as she sank her nails into my arm. “Val, no! I’m fine. It’s just a little false labor. Nothing to worry about.”
“Oh fuck.”
“Found him.” My mind was a carousel of panic as I turned my head and narrowed my eyes at Mateo as he marched the cartel’s wide-eyed doctor toward us with a gun pressed to the back of his head. “He was hiding near the back of the property under a fallen canopy.” Curling his lip up in disgust, he shoved the barrel hard against his skull. “Piece of shit coward.”
The white-haired man was shaking like a goddamn pussy, but I didn’t have time to deal with it. I needed him alive and capable in order to help Eden.
I’d kill him later.
“Gunshot to the chest and possible labor. Fix her.” Somewhere in the back of my mind, it registered that the hailstorm of bullets had calmed, but it was an insignificant detail at the moment. As Mateo shoved Dr. Vidal down on his knees beside Eden, I added, “Your life depends on hers.”
As far as he knew.
When she cried out as he inspected her wound, I gritted my teeth, barely restraining myself from blowing his head off. But when he parted her legs and reached under her dress, Mateo had to hold me back. The logical side of me knew it was clinical. It was for our baby. But the jealous man wanted to snap his arms off and shove them down his fucking throat.
Seconds felt like minutes and minutes felt like hours. By the time he rose to his feet, I felt like I’d been skinned alive and wrapped with an electrical wire. “Well?” I demanded.
“The baby is in distress, Señor Carrera. Your wife is in active labor, but…” he paused, a grimace painting his face.
“But?”
“Under normal circumstances, I would see no problem, but with a bullet in her chest.” He let out a heavy sigh, his face paling. “I’m sorry, señor. Her body will never withstand the strain of childbirth.”
No. I wouldn’t accept that. Not now. Not ever. I was Valentin Carrera, and I got whatever I wanted.
And I wanted a fucking miracle.
Roaring, I shoved my gun right between his eyes. “Then make it stop.” Instead of doing as I demanded, the piece of shit went almost catatonic. “Fuck this.” Turning toward Mateo, I motioned beyond the courtyard. “I have two medic choppers on standby. Vergara should already be there with Brody and Adriana. Gaheris!” I yelled to where Niko still sat like a pit bull over Ava. “Get your wife. We’re getting the fuck out of here.”
Everything was gone.
My men. My army. Our exit. All engulfed in towering flames that licked the sky.
The perimeter I’d walked to ensure myself of my family’s safety had been destroyed, the armada tasked to guard it now scattered across the lawn in charred chunks. But what I couldn’t take my eyes off of was personal. More personal than the death of my men. More personal than the destruction of my sister’s wedding.
My personal helicopter as well as the two medical choppers were nothing but two monstrous balls of fire and black smoke.
“I guess now we know where the explosion came from.”
“Shut the fuck up, Vergara,” Mateo growled.
“Fuck!” Tilting my chin toward the burning sky, I swore my oath to the barely conscious woman cradled in my arms. “I’m going to kill Dante Santiago so slowly that every generation to come will hear his screams. I’ll take everything that motherfucker holds sacred.”
As I lowered my chin, my chest heaving with rage, fear, and adrenaline, I saw Mateo’s forehead wrinkle as he nodded over my shoulder. “You can start with that.”
Seven pairs of eyes turned and watched while two of Santiago’s three Bell Ranger 407s burned like kerosene-soaked kindling.
Two of three.
“Why would he blow up his own choppers?”
Niko’s question didn’t surprise me. I wondered the same thing myself. Nothing made sense right now, and now those goddamn colors were starting to swirl in front of my face again.
These new pieces didn’t fit in the Santiago puzzle, but I didn’t have time to put together a new one. My only concern was Eden and our child. Once I knew they would be okay, I’d take care of everything else.
And anyone else.
“Go.”
One word was all it took.
Mateo and Cristiano carried a still unconscious Brody toward the remaining Ranger as Adriana followed behind. Niko supported Ava who, although limping from a gunshot wound, refused to be carried anywhere. Leighton and the still mute doctor walked silently beside me as I carried my wife in my arms, my chest burning from my own gunshot wound, but giving zero fucks.
However, as we approached the helicopter, I spoke one man’s name. “Mateo.” That’s all that needed to be said. In silence, Niko took his place supporting Brody, and my second-in-command appeared by my side, his arms out and waiting.
I trusted no one, especially with my wife. However, after the shitshow with Santiago and whatever the fuck just happened back there, I was leading this charge.
Whatever happened, it was my call. My demands. My gun.
But I couldn’t do it holding Eden. So as carefully as possible, I placed her in his arms and pulled my gun from its holster. Once inside the cabin, it took less than ten seconds to locate the pilot crouched on his knees inside the cockpit with his forehead resting on his thighs and his hands behind his head like he was in a goddamn tornado drill.
Too easy.
I pressed my gun against the back of his head. “Start this thing.”
The man’s back heaved as he cried. “But Señor Santiago…”
“Is not fucking here. Now start it, or I’ll blow your brains all over this piece of shit. Your choice.”
Still, this asshole argued with me. On his knees. Crying. With his forehead on the damn floor. “I cannot betray Señor Santiago. You don’t understand…”
“Get up.” When he just sat there blowing snot all over the floor, I cracked the grip of my gun against his skull. “I said get up!” It must have jogged something loose in his head because this time, the pendejo got up and walked toward the door, my gun still pressed against the back of his head. As he stood at the threshold, I glanced over his shoulder at Niko. “Can you fly a Ranger?”
He shrugged. “I can fly a Cessna.”
“Good enough for me.” I pulled the trigger and watched as the pilot nosedived onto the concrete below.
No one flinched.
After Brody and Eden were inside the cabin, and Adriana and Ava climbed in, I motioned with my gun for Dr. Vidal to follow. Wisely, the fucker kept his mouth shut. I assumed it had something to do with seeing the pilot’s head explode, but I didn’t give a shit. As Niko boarded and manned the central control unit inside the cockpit, Cristiano, Mateo and Leighton backed away, the latter two promising to follow in their car and meet us at Médica Sur in a few hours.
The inside cabin remained deathly quiet as Niko muttered to himself in Russian, flipping switches until he’d activated the main rotor.
At the familiar whomp-whomp of the blade, I grabbed Eden’s hand. “Stay with me, Cereza. Do you hear me?”
Her response was a shattered groan.
“Gaheris, get this piece of shit in the air. Now!”
The words were barely out of my mouth when everything shifted, rocking us backward then forward before lifting off the ground. Eden let out another weak scream, and I fought the urge to toss another pilo
t face down onto the concrete.
“Is Harcourt still breathing?” I called over my shoulder, clenching my teeth at Adriana’s muffled cry. It was a shitty turn of phrase, but I didn’t have the time or patience to worry about hurting anyone’s feelings right now.
“It’s shallow, but he’s still with us,” she answered.
The relief spreading through my chest surprised me. Fucker better not die on my sister.
My temporary calm was interrupted by a sound from below. The combined noise from the main and tail rotor was loud as fuck, but I swore I heard shouting, and then something that sounded a lot like bullets.
Son of a bitch! What now?
Still holding onto Eden’s hand, I stretched forward as far as I could and looked out the window to see Dante Santiago and what was left of his men come barreling toward us, guns pulled and ammo flying.
I’d only known the man less than twelve hours, but I’d never seen him that pissed.
Good.
It went against everything I knew, but I couldn’t stop myself. I shoved my whole face in the window and held his stare. That fucker saw me. He stared right back, a dark smile curving across his mouth. It wasn’t out of amusement. It was an acknowledgment.
With his men all around him and mine surrounding me, the actual bullets that flew between us didn’t matter. It was the silent one just fired that started the war.
“Val!” The strain in Eden’s voice ripped me away from the gravity of what just happened and brought me back to her side.
“I’m here, Cereza.” Only minutes had passed since we carried her out of the courtyard, but it felt like days. It was her heart that beat inside my chest and every time it slowed, a piece of me died. I refused to entertain the thought of not making it to Médica Sur in time. I wouldn’t lose her. I didn’t lose. A Carrera didn’t fucking lose.
“Val,” she whispered again. “It’s bad, Val. It hurts.” The last word still rested on her lips when she let out a scream that both sputtered blood from her mouth and tore curses from mine.
“I thought I told you to make it stop!” I roared, aiming my gun down Eden’s body at the doctor’s face.
From his kneeling position between her legs, he shook his head. “I can’t, señor. The baby is coming. There is nothing I can do but deliver.”
“No!” Snapshots. So many fucking snapshots. “She can’t! Not yet! Not here!” My chest... Fucking hell, I couldn’t breathe. “I swear to Christ, I will throw you out of this helicopter and laugh as your body hits the earth. Make. It. Stop!”
Delicate fingers brushed against my ribs. “Danger...”
Her voice was all it took to silence the roar and cage the beast. Everything else faded away as I dropped by her side. “Cereza…”
Drawing in a ragged breath, Eden raised a blood-stained hand to my cheek. “Valentin Carrera. I fell in love with you the minute you walked into that cantina and sat at my bar. I loved you even when I hated you.” Lines darted across her forehead, and she scrunched her face through another contraction, blood still staining the makeshift tourniquet wrapped around her chest.
I can’t hear this. I won’t let her leave me.
“Eden, please. Stop talking. You need to save your—”
“I loved you when I despised you for taking me from a life I didn’t realize wasn’t meant for me,” she continued, that fierce determination I loved about her forcing my ear. “I loved you for being my devil and my hero. My sinner and my saint. For loving all my wrongs and somehow making them feel right. You gave me a home. You gave me a son. You gave me a life I’ll never ever regret.” A scream tore from deep within her, her grip on my hand weakening as her eyes fluttered. “I need you… I need you to teach Santi it’s not weak to love, and… and I need you to show our daughter she can stand beside a strong man and still have a voice.”
Those words were too real. Too final. “Cereza, what the hell are you doing?”
“Promise me!”
I didn’t want to. I wanted to deny her. I wanted to demand she take everything back. I wanted time to fucking reverse. But red wouldn’t let me. Red, the color of love and passion and forever ripped the words from my chest and laid them at her feet.
“Te prometo.”
“I trust you, Danger.” Her fingers entwined with mine, her diamond ring digging into my skin. “I believe in you. But most… most of all… I love you.” Before I could tell her those same words back, she locked eyes with the doctor. “Take her.”
My heart exploded. “What? Fuck that! No!”
“Val…”
“Eden, if you have the baby here, you’ll die.”
Offering a tight smile, she held my stare, her eyes gentle but firm. “If I don’t, we both will.”
The roar I let out was inhuman. Powerful enough to level cities and topple mountains. Loud enough to mask another agonizing scream from the woman I’d lay down my life for and painful enough to bring Ava and Adriana from Brody’s side to mine.
My sister held my other arm as Ava crawled toward Eden’s head and spoke in soft whispers. I had no idea if I was still shouting or if it was Eden. All I knew was that in between, I heard Dr. Vidal swear in Spanish, and then say the eight words I’d never forget as long as I lived.
“The baby is crowning. It’s too late, señor.” Situating himself, even closer, he instructed Eden to push. I stared horrified as Eden pushed. This small, brave, fierce, powerhouse of a woman pushed and pushed as a bullet sank deeper into her chest. And just when I couldn’t take anymore; just when Eden’s face turned the color of ash and the fire in her eyes dulled, I heard it.
“She’s here, señor! It’s a girl!”
I forgot how to breathe as the doctor held up the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen since the day I walked into a bar and a blue-eyed bartender cocked her head and smirked.
“Cereza…” I rasped, words failing me.
“Ava?” The woman behind her nodded and slipped her hands underneath Eden’s soaked hair, lifting her head up. A serene smile spread across Eden’s face as she gazed with love at our creation. “Happy birthday, my sweet girl,” she whispered.
Then her eyes rolled back, and her chest stilled.
Chapter Sixteen
Dante
The bruised sky divided and then conquered as the jet began its final descent. The second flash of lightning illuminated the gray metal wing as we dropped sharply, the landing gear kicking into action beneath our feet.
No one had spoken since we stole Carrera’s car and left Mexico City. No one dared. Not even the rolling peal of thunder could drown out the silent snarl of my retribution. Val Carrera was a dead man walking, and as soon as I delivered Eve safely home to our children, I’d be setting plans into motion to direct that bastard straight to the nearest unmarked grave.
I couldn’t give a shit if he’d blown up his own estate to hurt me or not. He could have hurt Eve and that was more than a Black Hand in my world. It was a bullet aimed straight at my heart.
I could sense Eve watching me like she would an unexploded bomb—wary, fearful, and a lot apprehensive. Even Rick was keeping his mouth shut for once, choosing to flip and fold a black pack of gold-tipped cigarettes between his fingers instead. Roman had taken a separate flight back to New York City to spare himself the epic fireworks, while Joseph was loading me up with bourbon after bourbon to keep my fuse damp and useless until after we landed.
We lost five tonight.
Five good men who deserved their vengeance as much as I did.
A violent landing unleashed another wave of anger. The tempest was settling in, both inside the cabin and out. It was too much of a burden to consider all the what ifs and the near misses of the night. I’d put my best men, my wife, in harm’s way. For the first time in my life, I’d gone against my instincts and it had damn near been the ruin of me.
“Take them straight to base,” I ordered, unclipping my seat belt while jerking my head at the two men bound to the seats at the back of the j
et. “They’re bleeding all over my fucking leather.”
Joseph nodded and gestured to a couple of my other men to help him.
“Dante…” Eve placed a tentative hand on my arm, but I was too far gone to feel her light.
“Go straight to the house,” I said, shrugging it off.
“You’d rather kill those men than kiss your children?”
It was her last-ditch attempt to appeal to a sliver of mercy that had been splayed and gutted on the front lawn of a Mexican estate a few hours ago. Only a bloodletting could fix it now. I wanted the truth, and I wanted to hear it from my prisoners’ mouths before I cut them brand new ones.
“I’ll kiss my children once I’ve purged this night from our lives.” My response was bitter and harsh. Even so, I pulled her into my arms the moment our feet touched my island. “I put you in grave danger, mi alma.” I murmured. “Forgive me, my angel.”
“Always,” she whispered.
The same sense of calm I always felt around her was attempting to wash over me, but I pushed back the tide like I was fucking Moses.
I didn’t want calm.
I wanted murder.
“Be merciful,” she begged.
“Be reasonable,” I said coldly. “These men were ordered to kill us. I’m only returning the favor.”
She sighed and broke free from my embrace. We’d played this game a hundred times before. I’d return to her later, soaked in crimson and demanding her light. She’d welcome me into her arms and hold me close until the worst of my storm had passed. Eve had accepted long ago that she loved a devil. She lived with her choice because even devils could be taught to repent when the worst of their devilry was done.
Her body was the only confessional I needed, but it would be a mighty long session to absolve all the sins I’d planned on committing tonight.
The Italian broke first.
Strung up by his hands, his naked torso streaked with gore and blood from the five missing teeth and his missing left ear lobe, his words were indistinguishable from his pleas and screams at first. It was only after I took a step closer to remove his right ear lobe—partly to appease a desire to send him straight to hell as a symmetrical bastard—that I caught the tail end of his own confession. I paused and made him repeat it, and then I sliced through his carotid in one, savage arc. His time in the back room of my ammunition warehouse was done.