“So, she went after you herself. How touching.”
“You set me up,” she shot back. “I had no choice.”
Keeping his eyes on me, Ignacio smiled and leaned down to press a kiss against her temple. “Is this where you tell your lover that when I made my offer you were hiding out with my son?”
Chapter Forty
Adriana
The question on Brody’s face hurt worse than any knife. “You were with Cristiano?”
“It wasn’t like that! I had no idea Cris was his son!”
A laugh reverberated behind me. A sick and twisted laugh I felt in my soul. “You believe that?”
“Shut up!” I hissed. He was messing with my head, but my nerves were raw, and my body battered. I searched the tortured hazel eyes I’d come to know so well. “Brody, everything I’ve said to you is real. That kiss was real. I know you felt it.”
Behind me, Ignacio groaned. “I know what I feel, and it’s boredom. Deshazte de él,” he commanded, and the new guard grabbed Brody from behind. Get rid of him.
The guard gave a slight nod in acknowledgment and shoved a gun against the back of Brody’s head. But he fought back, a dead resolve in his eyes that set everything in motion and tore one word from my throat.
“No!” Ignacio was at the end of his rope, and I knew neither of us had much time. So, fighting against the haze, I jerked against him, the blade digging deeper into my skin. “Don’t hurt him! Do whatever you want to me but let him go!”
Ignacio’s arms tightened around me, dragging me up from the chair to a standing position. “Are you still trying to win? I can appreciate that kind of fortitude, and if I were a patient man, I’d watch you kill yourself slowly, but you’ve proven to be somewhat of a pain in my ass.”
Thick fingers grabbed my cheek, squeezing until I tasted blood. The harder he squeezed, the more Brody fought. Lights dimmed, and blackness swarmed in from the edges of my peripheral vision. More silent words fell from my restrained mouth until the crack of a gunshot gave them sound.
A scream of loss and heartbreak tore out of me as I closed my eyes and prayed for the knife to sink hard and fast.
“Let her go and face me like a man.”
My eyes flew open to find Brody standing in front of me, gun in his hand and the slumped body of the guard on the floor behind him. I didn’t know what to feel first—relief or fear. I wanted to tell him to save me. I wanted to tell him I loved him. I wanted to tell him I’d never leave him.
Instead, the words that fell out of my mouth told him goodbye. “Brody, go find Santi, please. Find him and take him back to Val and Eden.”
“No! I’m not leaving you here.”
“You made me love you, and now I’m lost.” I choked out. “That’s what me hiciste amarte, y ahora estoy perdida means. That’s what I said after I told you I loved you. But I was wrong, Brody. I didn’t lose my way when I fell for you. I found it.”
I’d been strong this whole time, but time wasn’t a luxury I had anymore. Desperation overtook me, and although I hated myself for it, I used Brody’s own words against him. “No one was there to save me when he tore me out of my mother’s arms. I’ll never forgive you if you let Santi suffer the same fate. You promised me. You told me you wouldn’t make me regret kissing you, and I believed you. I told Val you’d never hurt me. Please don’t make me a liar.”
The pain in his face destroyed me. “Who’s going to save you?”
All those nights we confessed our truths, the one I needed him to infer on his own was the one he never heard.
“I told you. No one can save me.”
Stepping forward as much as the blade allowed, I kicked backward, landing a hard heel between Ignacio’s legs. He let out a grunt, and the pressure against my neck lessened just enough that I managed to land an elbow into his ribcage. Grabbing onto his wrist with both hands, I spun around, both of us fighting for the knife.
“Time to die, pinche puta!” He shoved downward with a hard twist of his wrist.
“You first, asshole!” Chaos ensued as a second shot rang out, and pain slashed through my body, shredding every fiber into frayed threads. Ignacio’s eyes widened just before he collapsed in a lifeless heap onto the concrete.
I felt like I’d slipped underwater. Everything sounded muffled and waves rippled across my vision. Arms circled around me, holding me tight as hands pressed tightly against my middle. My mouth tasted bitter, and all I wanted to do was close my eyes and sleep.
“Adriana! Oh, God, no!”
A child’s cry floated somewhere above the surface, and my lips parted in a weak smile. “I broke the cycle.”
Then everything went dark, and I sank to the bottom of the sea.
Chapter Forty-One
Brody
Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico
The tiny waiting room got smaller by the minute. There wasn’t enough room to pace, and if someone didn’t give me an update soon, I’d tear this place apart with my bare hands. Every time I passed Leighton, she pursed her lips, which I returned with a glare.
I was stalking around a hospital in blood-soaked clothes, but no matter how many disapproving looks I got, I refused to change. This was her blood. The only part of her I had with me, and I’d be damned if I’d let it go.
I glanced at the clock and ran my hand through my hair. We’d been here over three hours. Three hours since I fired the bullet that severed Ignacio Vergara’s jugular. Three hours since I realized I was a second too late. Three hours since Val walked in with Santi in his arms to find Adriana in mine. Three hours since she slipped away from me.
Three hours since everyone filtered into this piece of shit waiting room to hear if Adriana was alive or dead. I shifted a glance to the corner where a man sat by himself, his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.
Val’s hand landed on my shoulder. “It’s a hard pill to swallow, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
He lifted a paper cup filled with coffee toward the man in the corner. “Your pride. Cristiano was with Adriana before you met her. They have a history. You want to hate him for it, but he just risked his life to save hers, knowing her heart belongs to another man.” Tipping the cup, he took a sip, giving me a side-eyed glance. “Sound familiar?”
I sighed. “Does the jealousy ever go away?”
“No. We’re men. We’re hardwired to protect what’s ours when we think it’s being threatened. But with time, you learn to trust in what you have and the person you’re with. In the end, you have to remember that, yes, there was someone before you, but despite the stupid shit he pulled to get her back, and regardless of how bad you fucked up, she chose you.”
I gave him a quick glance. “Are we still talking about me?
Val didn’t answer. He just smiled and clapped me on the back. “Sometimes your worst enemies become your strongest allies, Harcourt. You helped me find my son. That’s twice you’ve saved the people I love most in this world. Anything you want is yours.”