As if my asinine statements of the obvious woke him, Nash cracked one eye, and his tongue darted out to lick his cracked lips. “Is that what happened? I thought he was doing… cough…my nails.”
“I’m not arguing with you,” I whispered harshly into his ear. “You can explain later why you’re doing fucking coke. We’re leaving.”
He nodded weakly, allowing me to wrap his torso around my shoulders. I’d heard stories of adrenaline rushes that allowed mothers to lift cars off their children. I never believed them until I hoisted my two-hundred-and-five-pound brother over my shoulder and prepared to carry him out.
His hand skimmed my back. “Cherry, I don’t do drugs. They got the wrong guy. I swear.”
I knew his words to be true. If there was one thing I believed in my life, it was that Nash Lachey didn’t lie.
“Then what’s this all about, Nash?”
His breath wheezed harder with forced exertion. “Dad.”
It was the last word he spoke.
With him draped over my shoulder, I headed toward the back door when the knob turned. Nash’s cheek twisted against my back to face it, and my heart knew my brother wouldn’t let me put myself in between him and what was behind it.
The moment the door cracked open, Nash used his last thread of strength and flung himself off my shoulder and against the butcher’s block. With mangled hands, he pressed his palm against my chest and shoved me hard into an open pantry door. The impact sent both of us flying backward. My ass landed on top of a huge bag of cornmeal as Nash crashed to the floor.
I barely breathed as I waited for Emilio to taunt Nash again. Instead, two new men, clad in jeans, green bandanas, white tank tops, and dirty long pony tails surrounded my brother. I assumed they were the men Emilio said would take him back to the hardware store and breathed a sigh of relief.
As they moved closer, my heart sped up. The older man’s long ponytail caught a fleeting memory of a bag of cable ties, rope, and creepy innuendos.
I knew them.
“This is the same one?” the shorter one asked, raising an eyebrow.
“That’s what jefe said.” The taller one circled Nash, coming to rest behind him. With a slow smile, he leaned back and spit on him. “El Muerte.”
The words were spoken with such contempt that they imprinted themselves into my memory. The snarl in which he said them, and the hatred in his eyes as he glared at my brother sent a chill up my spine.
The darkened pantry turned into my own personal confessional as the taller man pulled a long-barreled gun out of his back pocket and aimed it at the back of Nash’s head. A silent voice inside of me screamed at my brother to run. It begged him to open his eyes and move.
As if hearing my pleas, my brother, who’d always protected me, stood by me, and never made me feel any less than worthy of his love, opened his eyes. Sadness glazed them and ripped an irreparable jagged hole in my heart.
His mouth silently formed the word that meant everything.
Gumshoe.
With a flash of light, and a deafening blast from the gun, my brother was gone.
I awoke to my name being called. Well, not necessarily my name. I’d taken enough high school Spanish to know what a puta meant, and it wasn’t complimentary. It wasn’t the first time I’d been called a whore, but disorientation had me frantically trying to come to grips with the situation.
My head hurt. I ran my fingers over the back of it and felt a big knot. Taking stock of my surroundings, I realized I sat in the middle of a pantry closet with a thick wooden shelf behind my head.
Nash had thrown me inside after the back door rattled and…
Oh, God.
I’d passed out after they…
Tears tumbled down my cheeks with reckless abandon. I squeezed them to block out the images that flashed through my head on constant replay.
The bright light. The crack of the gun. The vacantness in my brother’s eyes as he fell.
The men from the hardware store murdered my brother, and now they were coming for me.
With a jolt, I remembered my car sat parked behind the cantina. My license plate shone like a beacon. All they had to do was look it up and they’d see who it was registered to. They’d know it was mine and that I worked for Emilio.
Emilio.
I’d accepted that murdering bastard as my friend. I’d never make that mistake again. I’d never allow any man that close to me. I’d honor that vow until the day I died.
I remained quiet as the voices moved from the kitchen into the main cantina. My skin crawled with fear, but I’d made a dying promise to my brother.
As low to the floor as I could get, I belly slithered across the tile on my elbows toward the back door. Every instinct pulled at me to go to Nash. I couldn’t just leave him here. But as my body instinctively twisted toward the right, his voice boomed loud and clear in my head.
Gumshoe, Cherry. You promised.
Swallowing my heart, I commando crawled, forcing my mind to think of nothing but the door. I didn’t look back. The voices from the cantina turned around, and I was running out of time. I reached for the door on my hands and knees and flung it open into the darkness.
Once outside, I pulled my keys out of a cross body bag slung around my chest. My chest burned, and my thighs screamed as adrenaline surged through my veins. Fumbling with the keys in the rain, I dropped them, cursing as my tears fell. The reality of the situation started to crash down on me as I tried to hold it together. Flinging the door open, I dove in and slammed on the accelerator.
Every part of me shook. I drove erratically, swerving across yellow lines, passing in no passing zones, and driving at least thirty miles over the speed limit. If I got pulled over, fine. They could just follow me back to Caliente and arrest the men who’d ended my brother’s life.
Eventually, the adrenaline would fade, and the shock would wear off. I’d have to deal with the cold reality of what had happened, but right now, everything seemed surreal. The whole thing almost felt like it happened to someone else, and I’d played a movie role I’d never prepared for. How would I go on living tomorrow when the numbness wore off, and pain destroyed what little humanity I had left?
Tonight, however, I had one thing on my mind.
I needed answers, and there was only one man who had them.
Chapter Ten
Valentin
After an early morning of hitting the punching bag and splitting my knuckles, I’d worked out enough aggression to walk through the doors of RVC Enterprises and not throw punches. Tugging the sleeves of my dress shirt over my knuckles hid the destruction of the bag. I’d punched the hell out of it, imagining it was my father’s face.
As I rounded the corner to my small office, incessant heels clicked behind me. Clenching my jaw, I inhaled slowly before coming to a complete stop. “What is it, Janine?”
She barreled into the back of me, papers flying everywhere. “Oh, goodness, I’m sorry Mr. Carrera.” Her red framed glasses slid down her nose as she vomited apologies. “I didn’t mean to wrinkle your suit or upset you…”
I glanced over my shoulder and let her squirm. Stammering, she nervously pushed the glasses back into place with her forefinger four times before working up the courage to look me in the eye. My silence made me a giant asshole, but I enjoyed watching her anxiousness. I’d practiced my entire life at being intimidating as fuck. Unfortunately for my secretary, her skittishness around me made her my primary source for daytime entertainment.