The Vargas Cartel Trilogy: Books 1 - 3

by Lisa Cardiff

  “Oh really,” I said. “Because Ignacio told me a lot about you, but it can be summed up pretty simply. He’s disappointed in you. He thinks you’re worthless and disloyal. He doesn’t think you’ll ever do anything with your life.”

  The air stagnated as my accusation hummed through the room.

  “Shut the fuck up,” he growled, his teeth bared like fangs. “You’re lying. He would never tell you any of that.”

  I shrugged. “Think what you want, but you wouldn’t be living in Ryker’s home begging for his help if it wasn’t true. If you were a real man, you’d take care of your messes instead of forcing your family to do it for you.”

  I shouldn’t have said it. I should’ve walked away and waited for Ryker in his room, but I couldn’t stop myself. Seeing his face—the man who put so much destruction and chaos into motion—ignited something inside of me. I wanted to wound him and tear his life apart even if I could only do it with a few well-placed barbs.

  Rever’s nose flared, and his dark eyes glowed like polished obsidian. I retreated, taking baby steps backward while eyeing the clenching of his hands.

  “I don’t know why Ryker tolerates you. It certainly isn’t your sparkling personality or welcoming attitude. Maybe you’re blackmailing him.”

  I moved to the other side of the rectangular coffee table, putting something solid between us. “That’s ridiculous. How would that work exactly?”

  “You’re right.” He cocked his head to the side. “Ryker would outsmart you. Maybe he’s just taking pleasure in fucking you under Evan Deveron’s nose. You’re the toy he’s dangling in front of Evan’s face, taunting him. He always had a twisted sense of humor.”

  “You’re an asshole,” I yelled and tossed the contents of my bottle of water in his face.

  His eyebrows scaled his forehead, and he raised his hands in the air. “What the hell?” He wiped the back of his hand across his lips.

  “You started it.” I snatched the marble coaster off the coffee table and held it up next to my head, prepared to strike if he came one inch closer to me. “Leave me alone.”

  Rever shook his head. “I can’t believe Ignacio tolerated you in his home for more than a few hours.”

  “I can’t believe he didn’t smother you at birth,” I countered.

  The front door flung open. “What the hell are you two doing?” Ryker said, pausing near the entrance.

  My head snapped to the side, then I eyed the coaster in my hand. “Trying to kill each other.”

  Rever snorted, his shirt and face still dripping with water. I smirked, and a laugh bubbled out of my mouth. We looked ridiculous. We were ridiculous.

  “She started it,” Rever said, a wide smile on his face as he pointed his finger at me.

  I folded my arms across my chest and tapped my foot on the hardwood floors. “I did not.”

  Ryker rolled his shoulders back and knitted his brows. “Rever, I told you to stay away from her.”

  Rever held up his hands. “Don’t be mad at me. She’s the one who took off to do God knows what the minute you walked out the door.”

  “She’s not a prisoner.” Ryker’s eyes flickered to me as he shrugged out of his black leather jacket. “But a note or call would be nice, Hattie.”

  Blood heated my face. “I’m sorry. My mom wanted to meet.”

  “Rever, can you leave us alone for a few minutes?”

  “My pleasure,” Rever said, practically running out of the room.

  When the door to Rever’s room closed, Ryker sat in the gray lounge chair. “What happened with Rever?”

  I chewed on the inside of my cheek for a second. “Nothing really,” I finally answered. “We were tossing insults at each other.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “And water?”

  My lips twitched. “Yeah, that too.”

  He nodded. “What did your mom want?”

  My eyes darted around the room, landing everywhere but on him. “Don’t worry. I took care of it.”

  “No more secrets, remember?”

  I drifted forward and sat on the arm of his chair. “I know.”

  “Then, tell me what you’re hiding,” he said as he pulled me into his lap.

  I stared at him for a second, deciding what information I wanted to reveal. “She wants me to go on a weekend getaway with my family and Evan’s family next weekend.”

  His arms tensed around my waist. “What’d you say?”

  “Do you even have to ask?” I flicked his chest. “Of course I didn’t agree. Evan fed my dad a pile of psychobabble bullshit and now she’s freaking out.”

  Ryker tipped up my chin. “About what?”

  “That I’m suffering from Stockholm syndrome and that’s why I rejected him. I think they planned some sort of intervention during the vacation.”

  He tensed, and shadows flashed through his eyes. “Do you think that’s a fair assessment?”

  We sat awkwardly, staring at each other, words singeing the tips of our tongues. I had so many answers to his question, but I feared breaking our truce. Finally, he nodded. “You do.”

  I shifted, and my legs straddled his waist. “I can’t deny the thought has crossed my mind. More frequently in Mexico than recently.”

  He winced, then lifted me off his body, placing me on the armrest again. Wordlessly, he stood and crossed the room.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Nowhere.” He pointed to a white bag next to the door. “I bought you some clothes if you plan to stick around for a few days.”

  I cocked my head to the side. “If I plan to stay?”

  “It’s up to you.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets.

  I took a few cautious steps closer to him and placed my open palm against his chest. “You’re mad.”

  “No.” He grimaced as he shook his head slowly from side to side.

  “We promised not to lie or keep secrets.”

  He blew out a breath. “I’m not asking you to lie to me about how you feel.”

  “Then, what?” I asked, searching his face.

  “I don’t know, Hattie.” He backed away from me, and my hand slipped from his chest. “I have some stuff to do. I’ll be back in a couple hours.” He cracked open the door. “There’s food in the refrigerator for dinner.”

  “What the hell is wrong? What did I do?”

  He glared at me, his veins vibrating in his neck. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong with me. I’m sick of the back and forth.”

  His harsh tone slashed at my heart. “Back and forth?” The anger radiating from him prompted me to take a step back. We eyed each other, sizing each other up like two boxers in a ring.

  “You know exactly what I’m talking about. One minute you want this, and the next you’re running away. Pushing me away. Throwing every roadblock you can come up with in my face.”

  “Ryker.” I held out my hand to him. “It’s complicated.”

  His hand sliced through the air and darkness swirled in eyes. “Fucking save it. I don’t want to talk about it right now.”

  “Why are you leaving? We need to talk.”

  “We’ve talked, but you’re still riding the fence while I’m all in. I picked you over my family, and you still can’t decide how you feel about me. You’re in. You’re out. You have Stockholm syndrome. Well, you know what? I’m sick of it.”

  “You can’t blame me. In Mexico, you put out a million mixed signals, and then you pushed me away—”

  “Mexico.” He yanked on the roots of his hair. “Fuck what happened in Mexico. I had a job to do, and I was conflicted as fuck. I wanted you even when I knew I shouldn’t touch you.”

  “Why?”

  “Because regardless of what happened between us, I knew how it ended.”

  “And how was it supposed to end?”

  “Exactly the way it did. With you running back to Evan. Tell me. How long did it take for him to convince you to marry him? A day? An hour? Ten minutes?”

  “How dare you,�
�� I screamed. “I did what you asked and now you’re pissed. If you wanted me, you shouldn’t have let me go. You shouldn’t have thrown me at Evan with your blessing.”

  “I had to let you go.”

  “No you didn’t,” I protested, whipping my head back and forth. “You could’ve asked me to stay. You could’ve fought for me. You didn’t do any of that.”

  His mouth twisted into a sneer and he pointed his finger at me. “Are you trying to tell me you would’ve given up everything to stay with me? Your family? Your friends? Finishing your degree? You would’ve been happy disappearing forever? Because that’s what we would’ve had to do.”

  My shoulders sagged as the anger drained from my body. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and tell him I loved him, but I held back. “No, you’re right, but things are different now. I choose you. I chose you. I’m just confused. I’m not sure how to navigate everything.” I was more than confused. I was driving blind, in a blizzard at night on an unlit road without GPS.

  “You say that now, but the next time something happens you don’t like, you’ll run again, expecting me to chase you and convince you to change your mind.”

  “That’s not true.” I reached for him, but he held up his hands, putting a symbolic wall between us. We didn’t need any more walls. We had too many already.

  “I’ll be back later. If you’re still here, we’ll talk.” He shut the door before a response filtered through my brain.

  I leaned my head against the door and closed my eyes. “I’ll be here,” I whispered.

  Chapter Twenty

  Ryker

  I did everything I could think of to avoid going home and facing Hattie. Fuck, I didn’t even know if she’d be there when I went back. I didn’t make much of an argument for her to stay. I practically shoved her out of my life.

  I drove in endless loops around the city. I stopped for dinner at my favorite burger joint. I went to a bar around the corner from my condo building and drank too many drinks to drive home safely.

  I called Ignacio. He didn’t answer. I didn’t know what I would’ve said to him anyway. We talked on an as-needed basis, which translated into once a month. Granted, we had talked more frequently since Rever became my temporary roommate. Rever didn’t think Ignacio knew where he was, but as usual, Rever underestimated our dad. Ignacio knew everything. I wouldn’t be surprised if he knew about Anna’s pregnancy, or Rever’s freelance drug smuggling.

  Around ten o’clock, I called my mom. I hadn’t talked to her in months. When she found out I planned to help Ignacio get Rever out of prison, we had a huge fight. Until tonight, neither of us had tried to mend our relationship. Both of us were too stubborn for our own good.

  “Mom, it’s Ryker.”

  “I know who it is. You’re the only person who’d call me at this time of the night.”

  I chuckled. “It’s not that late.”

  “Do you know how old I am? I need at least eight hours of sleep or I’ll have bags under my eyes the size of Rhode Island.”

  “You’re exaggerating. You’re the most beautiful fifty-five-year-old woman I’ve ever seen.” It was true. She’d modeled in her late teens and early twenties.

  “Your compliment lost some momentum when you qualified it with my age,” she grumbled, but I could hear the smile in her voice. For a former model, she didn’t have a vain bone in her body. Unlike some women who did anything to hang onto their youth, my mom embraced her age. She exercised, she ate healthily, but she didn’t do anything too drastic to remedy the lines around her eyes or erase the gray from her hair.

  “You’re right.”

  “I’m always right.”

  I sighed, knowing what I needed to do. “I’m sorry, Mom.”

  “Sorry for what?”

  “For fighting with you.”

  The silence stretched, and for a second, I didn’t know if she’d accept my apology. “You don’t need to apologize. We can agree to disagree, but it doesn’t change how much I love you. How’s your brother? Did everything go well?”

  “I’m still working on it.”

  “I read that he was released from jail.”

  “He was, but there have been a few complications.”

  She snorted. “I wouldn’t have expected anything less.”

  “Mom,” I cautioned.

  “I know. I know,” she said wearily. “But you have to realize how this is going to end.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Ignacio wants you under his thumb. He’ll have you waist deep in cartel business before you know it, and then you’ll be stuck.”

  “That’s not going to happen.”

  She sighed. “Then you don’t know Ignacio very well. He thinks the Vargas Cartel is his legacy, his crowning achievement, and now he knows Rever is incapable of leading the cartel into the next generation. That leaves you.”

  “No. I’ve already told him I can’t help him.”

  She exhaled loudly. “If you don’t sever all contact with him, he will find a way to rope you into his depraved way of life.”

  “Mom,” I said, dragging out the word. “We’ve had this conversation before.”

  “And this won’t be the last time. I’ll keep saying it until it’s too late, or you’ve kicked your father out of your life for good.” She cleared her throat. “Why are you calling?”

  “To talk.”

  “Are you sure that’s it?”

  I slid my hands up and down my legs. “I’ve met someone. A woman.”

  “Do you love her?”

  I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me. “I do.” It felt strange confessing this to my mom before telling Hattie. My mom and I were never close. I loved her. She loved me. She’d been a good mom, but an invisible wall existed between us. For as long as I could remember, my mom and dad communicated through intermediaries. The deep fracture between my mom and dad made me feel constantly divided. Divided between two parents, two lives, two countries, and two cultures. Any love I showed my dad felt like a betrayal of my mom and vice versa, so I existed in limbo, never fully pledging myself to anyone or anything.

  “You haven’t told her anything about your family or your job.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “She knows everything.”

  “Really?” she said, sounding surprised. “How’d she take it?”

  I paused, not sure how to answer her question. There wasn’t a simple answer, and I refused to reveal the details of how we met. My mom would never forgive me. She’d lose all faith in me. “She doesn’t like it.”

  “Does she still want to be with you?”

  Pain knifed through my gut. I felt like I’d been punched in the stomach, and I couldn’t catch my breath. “I hope so.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “It’s complicated,” I countered, reciting the same words Hattie said to me earlier. The irony of my declaration didn’t go unnoticed by me.

  “Love always is,” she whispered, sounding tired.

  “I’ll let you get back to sleep.”

  “Okay, but don’t wait another two months to call me.”

  I laughed. “You can call me too, Mom.”

  “I know. Goodnight, Ryker.”

  “Goodnight, Mom.”

  ***

  Two hours later, my hand rested on the door handle to my bedroom. A cold feeling prickled through my body, and my heart plummeted to my stomach. I didn’t know what I’d do if Hattie had left me. After four glasses of bourbon, I had promised I’d let her go if that was what she wanted. I didn’t want her to be mine by default, or because she felt some perverse attachment to me.

  Now, with the moment of truth staring right back at me, my chest burned with the thought of never seeing her, touching her, or kissing her again. Somehow over the last few months, she had become more important to me than anything or anyone else in the world. I ached to pull her into my arms and lose myself in the taste of her lips.

  Closing my eyes, I pushed my bedroom d
oor open and sucked in a deep breath before I faced reality. Relief flooded through my veins when I saw her curled in a ball on my bed. She wore my gray collared shirt. Her long, toned legs were twisted in the sheets like she had a hard time falling asleep. She looked like a fallen angel with hair framing her face and the fringe of her dark lashes shadowing her cheeks.

  Not wanting to wake her, I moved through the room as silently as possible. I placed a small plastic bag on the nightstand and trailed my fingers down the side of her face. She didn’t move. With my eyes locked on her face, I pulled my shirt over my head, kicked off my shoes, and shoved my pants down my legs.

  Sitting down next to her, I traced the curve of her face and the arch of her long neck, committing it to memory for the thousandth time. Her eyes fluttered open.

  “Ryker?” she whispered, her voice raspy from sleep. “What time is it?”

  “After midnight.”

  “I tried to wait up for you. Do you want me to leave? Is that why you didn’t come back for dinner?”

  Her words tore at my heart, slashing invisible ribbons across the planes of my chest. “I’m sorry,” I whispered hoarsely, remorse suffocating me. My hands skated up and down her arms. “I’m so sorry. I don’t want you to go.”

  “I’m sorry too.” She rested the palm of her smooth hand on my cheek, and a shudder raced through my body. “I didn’t mean what I said. I know this situation is hard for both of us. I didn’t mean to dismiss my feelings for you.”

  “Shh.” I placed a finger over her lips, rubbing it back and forth. “Don’t apologize. I don’t want your apology.”

  Two deep grooves marred the smooth skin at the bridge of her nose. “You don’t?”

  “No.” I kissed her, lingering on her lips for a beat too long, tasting her and inhaling her familiar scent. “You’re the only one who doesn’t need to apologize for what’s happened. You haven’t done anything wrong. You’ve been pushed and pulled in every direction. You’re doing the best you can. You have every right to be confused and question me. Us. Everything. I won’t push you again. Any time you want out or you feel like this is too hard, you can go.”