Enemy Sworn

by Karin Tabke

  He grinned and looked up at the soldier in charge. “A token of my favor for el patrón.” The sergeant didn’t look convinced. Mateo grinned, slung the heavy bag around and unzipped the lip to show him what was inside. The man slapped his hand over his mouth, quickly turned and retched.

  “Pussy,” Mateo sneered, zipping the bag up and turning to the wood doors, ready to take on Dumas. They swung open slowly.

  As the group of them proceeded inside, the doors closed ominously behind them. Mateo looked up to the opposing twin wrought-iron and travertine-tile staircases. Standing above him on the second-floor landing was Alexander Dumas, as calm, cool and collected as if he had not one single care in the world. With the innate power of the predator he was, Dumas sauntered down the wide stairway, not once breaking eye contact with Mateo.

  The cartel boss was even more impressive in person. Powerfully built, he towered over Mat by three inches. His shiny silver hair was thick and straight, stopping just above his shoulders. His nostrils flared beneath his sharp nose. When Dumas smiled, his brilliant white canines glittered viciously in beams of morning sunlight shining through the glass courtyard dome.

  “You are the Widow Maker?” Dumas asked.

  Mateo nodded.

  “Then you are either a fool or on a suicide mission. Which is it?” he asked Mateo with the barest hint of an accent.

  “I’m a fool for your daughter. I killed her prometido for the right to her.” He held up his arms, presenting his forearms wrapped in the former favorite’s vambraces. “Blood for blood. I won’t leave without her.”

  Caught completely off guard by Mateo’s ballsy claim for his daughter, Dumas stared, stunned, at him. Fury rose slowly in his eyes before it washed in brutal waves from his body. The true nature of this killer was impossible to hide. But instead of ordering Mateo’s death on the spot, the old man threw his head back and roared with laughter.

  Mateo slung the backpack around, unzipped it, grabbed the cadaver head the lab had dummied up to resemble Bertram’s and tossed it at Dumas’s feet. The gathering crowd gasped, shocked not by the severed head but by such a disrespectful act.

  Dumas’s humor evaporated as he slapped Mateo viciously across the face. “You are alive only because of my respect for the man I considered my son. Do not push your luck, assassin. Your life is of little significance to me.”

  Clenching his jaw, Mat fought to control his temper. To stand there and take the slap like he was this man’s bitch was probably one of the hardest things he’d ever done in his life. But it was also a testament to his commitment to bring the man standing before him down.

  Mat nodded imperceptibly. It was the only show of respect he would give the man. But he didn’t back down. Not an inch. Instead he held his ground. “Your son killed my brother. Blood for blood.” He looked past Dumas to the second-story balcony, instinctively knowing she was up there. “I didn’t come here to be told no. I came to claim what is rightfully mine.”

  Dumas shoved Mateo out of his way as he stalked past him, then whirled around to face him.

  “And so you shall have all that was Javier’s.” Dumas snapped his fingers and the big soldier who had challenged Mateo stepped forward. “Eduardo will show you to Javi’s rooms. In exchange for both vambraces you may take what you wish.”

  “I didn’t come for his trinkets, I came for his woman.” Mateo smiled wickedly as he stroked the vambrace on his right forearm. “That’s not negotiable and neither are the vambraces.”

  Dumas snarled, his dark eyes so much like his daughter’s, flashing furiously. “You push me beyond my limits, punta.”

  Despite the edge of violence Mateo stood upon, he didn’t flinch. If he backed down now, he’d get eaten alive. “Blood for blood is not conditional. It’s absolute. So too will be my loyalty. But your daughter first.”

  Dumas stood rigid and silent for what seemed like hours before his eyes resumed a semblance of calm. He barked an order, calling for the woman who had, until he heard her name and realized he’d be seeing her in a matter of minutes, gotten so deep under Mateo’s skin he knew he was going to have a hard time relieving the itch.

  Like a summer breeze she materialized at the top of the stone balustrade. Shocked, her eyes widened as recognition dawned. She made to turn away from him, but her father’s sharp command for her to come down halted her. Mateo’s eyes narrowed as she brushed her hair forward to hide her face and hesitated with each step toward him. By the time she reached the bottom of the stairway his blood boiled.

  He approached her and gently pushed the hair from her cheek. “Son of a bitch!” he swore. “Who touched you?” he demanded. Her puffy bottom lip was split, her left eye swollen with a purplish bruise staining her eyelid.

  “Answer him, Sophia!” Dumas roared.

  Her body trembled violently.

  What the fuck? Mat turned on Dumas. “Who did this to her and why?”

  “Tell him, daughter, or I will and the entire village will know your shame.”

  Sophia straightened, and tossed her hair off her face to look at Mateo but directed her words to her father. “They already know my shame!”

  “Such disrespect deserves more than stern words,” Dumas ground out, raising his hand to strike his daughter. Mateo grabbed the powerful hand, squeezing the elder’s fingers so tightly his fingertips turned white.

  “Touch her and I will kill you,” Mateo promised.

  Like two titans they stood face to face, toe to toe, Mateo holding the supreme leader’s fist high between them. Sophia cried out behind him, shoving past him to stand beside her father. The significance of her move was not lost on Mateo. If she picked Mateo over her father before he claimed her, she would lose whatever respect she had left. But damned if he was going to allow any man, including her father, to lay a hand on her.

  “I don’t need your protection from anyone, especially my father,” she hissed.

  Mateo nodded, satisfied. At least now she was showing some spine.

  Mateo looked up to Dumas, whose eyes shot fire. It wasn’t every day he was so challenged. Mateo pushed off the leader’s fist and held his hand out to Sophia. She refused him.

  “Take it,” Mat commanded.

  When Sophia refused a second time, Dumas made a low rumbling sound of frustration. Before she invited more violence, Mateo grabbed the surly vixen and yanked her beside him. “You belong to me now, woman, know your place,” he growled.

  Sophia jerked her head back, and raised those mesmerizing eyes to her father. “What is he saying?”

  Dumas looked sternly at her. “Blood for blood, daughter.” He pointed to what passed as Bertram’s head on the courtyard floor. “He did that, and now all that was Javi’s belongs to him.” Dumas took her hand and placed it on Mateo’s forearm. “You are his to claim should he choose to do so. And so he has chosen to make his claim.” He looked hard at Mateo. “Do you think by taking my daughter this way it will solidify a place for you among my family?”

  “I could care less about your family.” Mateo’s eyes focused on Sophia, who seemed to have lost some of her resistance to him but now stood carefully watching him. “I have not stopped thinking of her since we . . . met.” Mateo kept the more intimate details of that meeting to himself. He wasn’t sure how el patrón would feel about his daughter begging his capo’s assassin to pop her cherry.

  “Even though she is damaged goods?”

  Mateo smiled, grabbed her to him and caught her chin with his fingers. “I’d give my right hand to have her.”

  Sophia’s reaction was classic surrendering female to his possessive male. Her big brown eyes widened as they searched his face for reaffirmation of what he’d just said. That he meant them stunned him. He wanted her that bad. That she wanted to believe in him despite their rough start astounded him.

  He had never been as hard for a woman as he was at that m
oment. His muscles clenched painfully. Before he embarrassed them both, he abruptly released her and pushed her away from him. “Pack your things,” he hoarsely said. “We’re leaving.”

  “Oh no, no, no, not yet, my friend,” Dumas purred. “There is the price of your right hand to pay for both of my daughter’s.”

  “No, father!” Sophia cried. “He will be useless to me one-handed!” She turned and glared at Mateo, then said to her father, “End this charade now. Cut off his head!”

  • • •

  Thoughts ran rampant in Sophia’s head. How could she escape the lunacy of her life? Damn this situation! Her father ignored her demand, as she had hoped he would. As much as she felt like a fool for falling for Dark and Dangerous two nights ago, she didn’t want him dead or maimed, she wanted him gone! Gone because she was attracted to him. Gone because she knew if given half a chance she would fall in love with him. Gone because it was highly likely that if he managed to carve out a place here among her family, the power would consume him and she would lose him to it.

  Sophia’s gaze narrowed at the crazy stranger. Why was he really here? Not for her, she was certain. No man, not Javi, who had untold power to gain, nor her father, who should have, out of love for his child, had ever put himself out for her. Certainly nothing close to what this lunatic was wagering. But for what? To earn her father’s respect and by doing so maneuver himself into the family? Sophia was no fool; she knew her father was a powerful man, with connections throughout the world. His business empire aside, he had amassed a billion-dollar fortune in gold doubloons he’d discovered three decades ago off the Cabo coast. He was benevolent to the town’s people. But demanding. And protective. She used to think it was because he loved them, but he loved the power more. And so too would the man standing beside her.

  Mateo looked hard at Sophia. He didn’t want her, she decided. Not the way she wanted to be wanted. He wanted what came with her, and he was a fool to think he could convince her father, by his show of bravado, that he was here for her and somehow deserving of a place in the family. Alexander Dumas was never fooled. He lived and died by the blood-for-blood code. Despite her newfound hatred for this fool, she was not like her father. He would find a way to dispose of her foolish suitor, much sooner than later.

  And that she could not bear.

  Raising her gaze to the only man ever to challenge her father, Sophia shook her head. “I’m not worth it,” she softly said. “Give my father the vambraces, then leave here while you still have all of your body parts.”

  “You’re worth both hands.” He stuck them out toward her father. Sophia gasped. He was loco!

  Grabbing his right hand by the vambrace, her father pulled the crazy man over to a tall table by the stairway. He slammed it down, palm first, and kept it immobile with his iron fist. “Eduardo, my machete.”

  “No, Papa!” she screamed, running to the table and placing her hand on Loco’s.

  “Stand back, Sophia,” Dark and Dangerous said, looking past her.

  Grabbing him by the chin, she yanked the stranger’s face around to look directly at her. “There is still time! Please, renounce your blood claim, give my father the vambraces and leave!”

  Sophia shot Eduardo a steely glare when he handed her father his gleaming machete.

  “Step back, Sophia,” the stranger firmly said, holding her father’s glare with a level stare.

  “Do it, mi hija,” her father said stonily.

  Long seconds ticked by as Sophia stood frozen to the floor, her hand clutching the stranger’s, as her eyes pleaded with the man who held insurmountable power in her world.

  “Papa, please,” she whispered desperately.

  When he didn’t respond she felt nauseous. But she did as she was told and released Mateo’s hand. She made the sign of the cross but remained beside him. “He is no good to me with one hand, Father!” she cried, grabbing her father’s forearm in one last-ditch effort. “Please, Papa, for me, your only child, I beg you, don’t do this,” she pleaded softly. She had never asked him for anything. Would he give her this or would he set the example to anyone who dared to do what this assassin had dared to do: call the mighty Dumas out in his own game?

  The stranger had played his hand brilliantly. Her father had charged each and every one of his soldiers with the task of tracking down Javi’s killer and bringing him to her father alive so that he could serve up the blood-for-blood vengeance. Never in a thousand years had any of them expected that person to waltz into the lion’s den, announce his deed, show the proof, then demand a place at the table!

  Who did that? Only certifiably crazy people. Sophia’s heart thundered against her rib cage. Partly in fear but also in a crazy, heady respect for what this man was willing to sacrifice for her. Or was he willing to sacrifice his hand for the power it would lead to? Many men had sacrificed much more.

  “Do not interfere,” her father roughly said as he brought the blade up. As it came down in a flash, the crazy stranger did not flinch, but neither did her father sever the hand. The blade struck beside it deep into the inlaid rosewood tabletop.

  “You have bigger pelotas than I suspected, Loco,” Dumas said. “I don’t know if I should spit on you for your weakness for a woman or hug you for your commitment to my daughter.”

  “How about if we shake on it instead,” the stranger said.

  chapter seven

  In disbelief, Sophia stared at her father. Emotion overcame her as she touched his forearm. “Gracias, Papa.” For the first time in her life, he had respected her wishes over his own. Had she finally earned his respect?

  Without looking at her, he said, “That my decision makes you happy, mi hija, is a bonus.”

  She smiled at the endearment. Her father continued, “But I did not spare his hand for you. I spared it for the family. For what I have in store for him, he will need both hands.”

  Her smile faded as quickly as it had appeared. Just as he had done with her mother, her father, the great and powerful Dumas, indulged only when it suited his own agenda. Her mother, Felicia, was a free spirit who had been beaten down into submission by her father. When it hit Sophia at that moment, the whys of her mother’s decision to run, some of the anger she had been harboring for the last ten years evaporated. Could she blame her? And knowing her father as she did, had Felicia taken Dumas’s daughter, she would have paid with her life.

  And yet, for all her wishful thoughts of escape, Sophia clung to the hope that one day her father would embrace her with love and respect and see her for who she was: a loyal, intelligent daughter who would never dishonor the family. And yet . . . she had. Disrespected him by flaunting herself at the club, then throwing herself at the man who killed her father’s chosen one.

  Focusing on him, she was not going to kid herself that his ballsy display was simply because he couldn’t live without her. She was a means to an end. Pure and simple. And as a pawn, she would protect the only thing she had control of: her heart.

  “What do we call you, other than loco, stranger?” Sophia asked, then snidely added, “So that we have the right name for your tombstone.” She was happy, no, ecstatic, that he had managed to hold on to his life and both hands. But she would give him no mercy where she was concerned. She was an unwilling partner in his quest for power. A fact she would remind him of every chance she got.

  “Juarez,” he answered huskily as his eyes dipped to her lips. “Mateo Juarez.” A tingle fluttered in her belly. Her pores expanded, emanating pheromones in answer to his hot stare.

  Her father slapped Mateo on the back before pushing him away. “Call for the padre!”

  Sophia gasped. “Now?” she asked incredulously. “You want me to marry him now?” She freaked. She needed time. Time to talk Mateo out of this. Time to talk her father out of this nonsense.

  Panicked, she looked at Mateo, who looked as concerned as she. Was her f
ather really going to propagate this . . . this farce? But then again, he’d wanted her to marry Javier. And despite how Sophia had felt about her dead fiancé, she’d respected him as her father’s choice for her and never considered not marrying the man he chose. She shivered hard. Even Vargas.

  “I will have you married and proof of the blood mark before dusk!” Dumas’s voice boomed. “Now clear the hacienda of all but the elders and family members.”

  “But Papa! I don’t—”

  “I challenge this man for the right to your daughter, Patrón!” a deep, familiar voice called from the balcony.

  “Tony!” Sophia gasped, whirling around. Where Javier would have been her father’s right hand, Tony was his left. That she had openly challenged her father’s wishes now provoked Tony’s call to action on her behalf. Her father had sanctioned the marriage. Her heart slammed against her chest and nausea roiled in her belly. Challenging Papa now would be suicide.

  Wet heat stung her eyes. She loved Tony, but as a brother. Not, she suspected after their talk on the drive back to the compound, the way he loved her. He was as big as Javier, handsome and, in Sophia’s mind, because of Tony’s genuine love for her, more deserving of her father’s favor. Where Javier had been in-your-face, chest-beating, take-no-prisoners, Tony was highly educated, discriminating and subtly deadly. In the business world in which her father thrived, subtlety more often than not trumped a boxing match.