There couldn’t have been a more perfect opportunity to escape to my long-desired freedom. I wasn’t restrained. The door wasn’t chained. Get dressed and leave—it was that simple.
But it wasn’t that simple. Because for all that had broken in me since walking into Caliente, I didn’t want to.
Staring up at the ceiling, I silently cursed myself for becoming entangled with a man I had no intention of leaving.
Chapter Twenty
Valentin
The whole morning Eden and I kept our distance as we packed up what little we’d brought with us. A few stolen glances were all we allowed ourselves as my men cleared out any trace of our presence the past few days.
As a residence, the place was a piece of shit, but I’d be lying if I said leaving it didn’t give me mixed feelings. It was the place I’d brought Eden to as a prisoner and was leaving as a willing companion.
I still had a hard time processing the thought or even beginning to rationalize it.
She had every opportunity to leave in the middle of the night. I awoke this morning, half-expecting to find the bed empty beside me. It didn’t take but a moment to feel her warm skin still pressed against me, resting peacefully. Well, as peaceful as one could be after all I’d put her through.
“Is that everything?” Tucking his gun into the waistband of his jeans, Mateo glanced from me to Eden, his eyes questioning but silent.
Smart man.
“Yeah, we didn’t bring much,” I answered, scratching the back of my head.
Eden snorted in front of me. “I didn’t bring anything, warden.”
Surprised at her outburst, I shot her a look across the room, ready for a fight, only to be rewarded with a secretive wink.
Well played, Cereza.
After the stash house explosion, Mateo thought it best not to remain in one place for too long. I couldn’t have agreed more. In this stationary target, we were sitting ducks, weakened by the four walls surrounding us. I was the boss of an entire stateside cartel, but up until now, I’d only given a shit about my own life. My own personal creed involved one simple rule—keeping my ass away from the wrong end of a gun.
In eleven days, my creed had been twisted beyond recognition.
Ushering us outside, Mateo climbed into the front seat of the black SUV. Two men followed suit and the rest dispersed into other vehicles as decoys, in case of an ambush. I made sure not to touch Eden unnecessarily, lightly pressing my fingers onto her shoulder as I guided her into the backseat.
I swallowed hard as she bent over. Her ass, now covered in the tiny white shorts I had one of Mateo’s men borrow from his wife, pressed close to my face. The tight blue half shirt did nothing to calm my raging hard-on, growing by the second.
I’d asked for some decent clothes for her to wear. He brought me indecent with a side of torture.
I felt like a presidential caravan hauling ass down a highway toward nowhere. To the casual onlooker, we were nothing, but to me we were a glaring eyesore—a Muñoz flare just begging to be fucked with. I had a bad feeling about the entire operation.
Mumbles from the front carried to the back, as I heard Mateo and Emilio exchanging a play by play of their communication with the other SUVs. I watched their eyes shift back and forth to each other, their hands intermittently wiping a brow or gripping the wheel and dashboard.
Instinct had me glancing at Eden. After exchanging the same apprehensive stares, she folded her legs onto the seat and slipped her hand in mine behind her bent knees, shielding the small show of affection from view. Wisely, she kept her mouth shut. After only eleven days, she’d learned quickly the three basic rules governing our cartel: hold your tongue, never let anyone see what you stand to lose, and fear is a useless emotion.
Out of instinct, I touched the medallion, still hanging around my neck. It lay hidden underneath my white button-up shirt and jacket. If my men saw it, I’d be done for, but something wouldn’t allow me to take it off.
She’d given it to me, and as much as I’d never understood religion, I felt peace wearing it. Maybe it stemmed from it belonging to the woman sitting beside me, or maybe it truly had some mystical power I couldn’t understand. Regardless, I’d put it on this morning the minute Eden and I got out of the shower.
The moment I touched the smooth porcelain face, I felt it.
I felt it, and Eden whispered it, breaking rule number one of my cartel code.
“Something isn’t right.”
Looking away wasn’t an option when her eyes held such dreaded anticipation. “Keep your voice down.”
“Something isn’t right,” she repeated, tucking a strand of her shocking candy-red hair behind her ear. “Val, can’t you feel it? Look at them.” She slightly lifted our joined hands toward the front of the SUV, pointing to my men who were locked in deep discussion.
Breaking from her worried blue eyes, I shifted my gaze toward Mateo and Emilio, sharing phone screens, deep lines marring their foreheads. I’d never confirm her suspicions, but the same worry ran through my blood the moment we left the safe house.
However, I was the boss of this damn cartel, and I deserved answers.
“Enough with the whispering bullshit!” I shouted, my blood pressure rising with every sharp turn Mateo took. “What the hell is going on?”
“Jefe, there’s something you should know,” Emilio began as Mateo threw a scowl at him, jerking the wheel to the left. Obviously, the earlier whispers concerned cartel rules one and two.
Fuck.
The car filled with tension, and an internal war raged within me between taking control as the boss and getting the one thing I’ve grown unable to resist the hell out of here.
As unsure glances passed between my two lieutenants, all I’ve known my entire life won the battle. I dropped Eden’s hand, and gripped the back of Mateo’s head rest. “Have you forgotten who runs this cartel, Cortes? I’m not dead yet. Until I am, you’ll both stop the secretive whispering and inform me of every goddamn thing that happens. Now!”
Mateo’s darkened eyes locked with mine in the rearview mirror. “Fine. My men confirmed suspicious activity around the—”
He never finished his thought.
Ear-shattering blasts shook the SUV, the impact rattling the windows and the frame. A flood of unresolved anxiety hit me from feeling the same damn thing not seven hours earlier. Instinct had me diving over Eden, covering her with my own body as the car rattled with the impact. Mateo and Emilio cursed, fighting to stay in control of the wheel and shouting commands for me to stay down as they pulled their guns.
Several aftershocks hit, causing Eden to scream, her cries muffled by my own chest. My ears rang, the blast reengaging the deafness I’d experienced following the stash house explosion.
“Mateo, what the fuck?” I blinked through the clouds of smoke permeating the windows. As soon as I spoke the words, a second blast ripped any other words from my lips as the SUV took a hard right onto a side road.
He barked out orders, breaking rank in the chaos. “Stay down!”
“Val!”
I pushed up on my hands and knees and grabbed a handful of her hair, shoving it down onto the leather seat. “Head down, Cereza!” The blast seemed to have quieted, so I risked a look around. Black smoke billowed from the horizon, a mushroom of explosion, leading the way for sirens gaining volume in the distance.