“Are you willing to die for your cause?”
At that moment, the sarcastic shield Brody Harcourt wielded as a weapon failed him. Gone were the dozens of masks he hid behind, leaving only the raw power of a man on the verge of anarchy. A man caught between fighting for a life he never wanted and against his natural instinct to throw me to the wolves.
And in that same moment, I stared down the quiet hallway where the only family I had left disappeared, and the carefully constructed walls I built around myself bent.
“I already have,” I whispered. “Dying isn’t the hard part, Brody. Living, now that’s the real torture.”
An hour later, I settled into a quiet room on the third floor of the Carrera estate. A place that, despite being the hub of everything I was raised to hate, felt oddly familiar. Almost as if the walls themselves whispered my name.
Dropping my bag on the oversized bed, I found myself drawn to an antique dresser that sat tucked against the opposite wall. Muted and worn, it seemed almost out of place, considering the over-the-top grandeur of the rest of the estate. Closing my eyes, I fought a wave of emotion as I trailed my fingers along the dark wood, every divot and crevice painting a picture of a life I couldn’t remember. A life as real as the wood under my skin, but as ruined as the scratches that marred it.
A life just like this antique dresser. Preserved, yet somehow still lost in time.
Ghosts lived in this room. I heard their whispers, and they tore at my soul. I heard the lullabies coated in the soft, soothing voice I used to hear in my sleep. One I convinced myself over the years was nothing but a hallucination. Only it wasn’t because if I listened hard enough, I could hear it now. I felt her in the air. I felt her in the wood under my fingertips, and I knew it was no accident I’d been put in this room.
I’d been here before.
I’d lived here before.
I’d died here before.
My back slammed against the wall, my eyes squeezing shut to block out the memories assailing me like snapshots from a photo album I’d never seen but knew all the same. The father who never once held me or allowed my name to pass his lips. The small brother who sat outside my bedroom window, watching and protecting as if he somehow felt the end nearing.
And the mother who, in the midst of a massacre, gently sang Duérmete Niño, keeping our family together until the last note took both of us away.
The words echoed within the confines of the four walls.
Duérmete niño, duérmete ya.
Sleep, baby, sleep now.
As pain tore through my chest, I pressed my hands against both ears, but it did nothing to block it out.
Que mientras tanto te canta mamá.
While Mommy is singing to you.
Louder and louder, the lyrics seeped into my soul. Taunting me. Filling the hollow spaces with a dark warning as the edges of my vision blackened to a dull haze.
“Stop!” The word tore from my chest in a violent scream so loud I slapped a hand over my mouth in horror that someone heard.
I had to get out of here.
As if pulled by instinct, I stumbled down the hallway, past closed doors without giving them a second glance. The entire floor seemed deserted, yet I still moved, drawn toward a destination I knew nothing about. It wasn’t until I turned left and neared the end of another hallway that I heard a familiar voice.
“…doing well. Barely remembers anything that happened or anyone involved.”
Mateo.
“That…that’s for the best.”
And that voice was unmistakably Brody’s. I’d recognize the deep timbre and rough edge anywhere—a fact I didn’t care to analyze.
Pressing my back against the wall, I lifted onto my toes and slid quietly along the floor, willing the backs of my high heels not to fall off. Just as I pressed the side of my face against the frame of the open door, the voices stopped. My heart climbed into my throat, and for a moment I thought they’d heard me until Mateo’s thick accent broke the silence.
“Aren’t you going to ask?”
“No.”
“She remembers you. She asks about you.”
My grip on the doorframe tightened. Who was she?
“Mateo, I can’t…” Brody confessed, the pain in his voice palpable. Almost as if the fight in him had died and he was one blow away from breaking.
“Don’t do this, man. She’s just a little girl.”
Wait, what?
“I can’t hurt them again.”
At that moment, my high heel slipped off the back of my foot and slammed against the marble floor. I tipped my head back and winced, but at the same moment, the wall behind me vibrated with what I could only assume was one hell of a punch.
“You don’t think refusing to see them isn’t hurting them?” Mateo roared. “Dios mío, do you think I’d let you anywhere near them if I thought you were a threat to their safety? You’re familia, Brody, but I’d put you in the ground before I’d put them in danger.”
“I know.”
The quiet response intrigued me more than the testosterone show Mateo put on. I’d spent no more than forty-eight hours with Brody, but even I knew his two-word compliance was completely out of character. The man lived to argue, and contrary to my insults, he’d made quite a successful career out of it. Whatever they discussed was serious enough to disarm a man who used words as a weapon.
“So stop feeling sorry for yourself and man the fuck up,” Mateo growled, and I couldn’t tell if he meant it as a suggestion or a warning. “You’re the only family they have left. You made some bad decisions, but you didn’t hurt them on purpose. The only person punishing you for your sins is you.”
“I’ll think about it.”
Mateo barked out a sardonic laugh. “Don’t hurt yourself on your sister’s account.”
Hold on a damn minute.
Sister?
My mind spun a hundred miles an hour as bits and pieces of an earlier conversation clicked into place.
“You know he had an estranged sister, right? Well, about six months ago, she came back into town. Not long after that, he started missing court dates and got into some seriously deep shit…I mean, hot water with the Carreras.”
“The cartel?”
“Shocking, right? Unfortunately, one thing led to another, and she died, and then his mother got arrested.”
Oh, hell no.
My days of being left in the dark were over. With fire shooting through my veins, I hobbled around the corner. “I thought your sister was dead?”
Chapter Fourteen
Adriana
Both men turned at the sound of my voice. Mateo faced the wall where I’d just been eavesdropping, his palm braced next to an impressive dent. Brody leaned against the opposite wall, his arms crossed tightly over his chest, the vibrant green in his hazel eyes all but swallowed by a lifeless brown. However, once they landed on me, a rough smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
Mateo, not so much.
“Don’t you know how to knock?” he growled.
I glared at him. “Don’t you know how to close a door?”
“Calm down, Mateo. It’s fine.”
“It’s fine?” Mateo pushed off the wall, his hands fisting by his side. “I’m sorry, have you forgotten she blackmailed you into betraying Val by having Leighton stalked?”