Almost.
Every Thanksgiving, Nash would invite his buddies over to play tackle football after dinner. Every year, I’d beg him to let me play. Every year he’d give me the same answer.
“No, Edie. You’re too breakable. Girls don’t play rough sports like this.”
The year I turned sixteen, I’d had enough. Dressed in my sluttiest outfit, I talked Nick Tunstall into letting me play on his team, in exchange for letting him see my boobs. It wasn’t my proudest moment, but I had a point to make. I rationalized that the ends justified the means.
Nash had been half-right. It wasn’t that girls couldn’t play football; it was that they didn’t play with huge, two-hundred pound men. The first hit I took felt like what I imaged hitting a concrete wall at two-hundred miles per hour would feel like.
That tackle felt like a massage compared to a direct hit from a Muñoz henchman.
Catching me around the waist, the impact threw us both into the door. With his momentum behind me, I hit first, my chin smacking against the glass as it shattered. I didn’t hesitate to turn, kicking my legs wildly in the air and searching out any part of his body to connect to.
“Stupid bitch!” With a roar, he swung his arm out and backhanded me across the cheek. The impact sent me sprawling against the door again. This time, the back of my skull connected with the glass with a sickening thud. As blurry vision clouded my line of sight, nausea crawled up my throat.
I’m going to die right here.
Clawing at my own leg, I blindly reached for my last hope. My fingers brushed the leather as he braced his forearm against my chest and pinned my arms in place. His gun settled against my temple and smiling a wicked grin, he cocked his finger. Shutting my eyes tight, I held my breath as he pulled the trigger.
Silence.
His grin widened. “Oops. No bullet in that chamber.”
Tears rolled down my face as clarity came to me full force.
All the times I begged Val to kill me, I didn’t want to die.
Readjusting his hold on the gun, the man with dead eyes and a thin mustache pressed harder against my chest. “I have a surprise for you, Eden Lachey. We’re going on a trip…one that’ll lead the rat to the cheese.”
“A trip?” I croaked the words roughly, my voice hoarse from screaming. Before he could answer, the meaning of his words hit me.
They were setting a trap for Val.
“You’re wrong,” I swore, shaking my head as much as I could under the pressure of the gun. “Valentin Carrera doesn’t give a shit about me.”
Laughing, he adjusted his hold on the gun once more. “Nice try, bitch.”
With brutality I’d never experienced in my life, he pistol-whipped me until I blacked out.
Gasoline.
The stench of petroleum filled my nose way before sound did. It burned my throat and coated my stomach with a scent I could taste. Low conversation from above my head buzzed in my ear. The words sounded clipped and garbled as if I were in an alternate universe.
They were different. They were unrecognizable. They were Spanish.
Immediately, my body stiffened, and a searing pain shot from the base of my skull to the top of my head. Something inside of me warned my eyes not to open. It didn’t matter if they listened or not, because they felt glued shut.
My wrists hurt with a familiar ache that reminded me of my arm being shackled to a metal bedframe. With concerted effort, my brain instructed my arms to move, only to be met with resistance.
Understanding the reason I couldn’t move my limbs took too much effort to care.
Everything seemed to move in slow motion, swimming underwater and against a strong current. Wherever I was, we were moving. With every jerk and jostle, I felt myself being transported from one place to another.
Soon, a loud rumble roared in my ears, followed by the sensation of going up…up…up…
Then, complete weightlessness.
I should’ve fought to wake up and look for landmarks. With all the transporting, I needed to remember useful information to give my location to someone who could help me.
But the harder I fought to open my eyes, the deeper I sank to the bottom of the ocean, the murky water closing in on me as the darkness claimed me once more.
“Wake up, you Carrera puta. It’s time to get on your knees. Surely, you’re used to it by now.”
Strong hands dug into my upper arms and dragged me across rough flooring. Bright light shone in my eyes, first forcing them open, then immediately commanding them closed.
My head.
Where the hell did they take me?
“Where…” Licking my lips, I tasted blood as they cracked and split from tension and dehydration. “What time is it? Where are we?”
“We’re going on a boat ride, now shut up and walk.”
The light extinguished, shrouding everything in an ominous cloud of darkness.
The hell I was going anywhere with these people. Digging my heels in the soft sod, my sudden movement caused a couple of them to stumble. Curses flew and another blow landed across my face. A new man grabbed my hair and dragged me across a river bed. The soft slosh of small waves crashing against the bank greeted us as my eyes landed on a small yellow blow-up raft.
“Oh, hell, no.” Digging my heels in again, I shook my head violently. “I’m not getting in that thing. We’ll sink.”
Rough hands twisted in my hair, jerking it backward until I stared perpendicular to the night sky. “The only thing that’ll sink is you when I shove this gun down your throat and throw you in the river. Now get in the fucking boat!”
As I stepped into the raft, a hard shove from behind had me sprawling face first onto the bottom. With my hands still bound behind me, I had nothing to break my fall but my already bruised jaw. Blood filled my mouth again, the taste almost becoming comforting.
At least I knew I was still alive.
Two men climbed in after me, and the rest pushed the boat away from the embankment. As the current took us away from civilization, Val and Nash entered my mind.
Regardless of what happened, I knew I’d see one of them soon. Which one depended on what happened in the next few hours.
Chapter Thirty
Valentin
The car had barely broken twenty miles per hour heading up the driveway to the estate when I couldn’t take it anymore. Throwing the door open, I tumbled out, hitting the concrete with a jarring force that rattled my brain.
Once I caught my breath and got my footing, I took off on a full run toward the house. I knew Mateo called my name a few times, watching the movement of his mouth from my peripheral vision as he parked the car, but it didn’t matter. The roar in my head took up all the space reserved for sound.
I reached the front door and prepared to kick it down, when I noticed it standing halfway open.
They’re already inside.
Pulling my gun, I called her name the safest way I knew how. “Cereza? Where are the cans, baby? I can’t see the posts, so you need to tell me.” I waited for a response, listening for any signs of movement. “Cereza?”
Farther into the house, a metallic smell hit my nose, sending a violent chill up my spine.
No.
Out of the corner of my eye, a body lay on the floor swimming in so much blood, there couldn’t have been any left inside of it. Instinctively, I closed my eyes, willing it not to be Eden. The moment I opened them and saw the militant style black pants and heavy black boots, I let out a sigh of relief, then felt like a shit for being happy about the death of one of my men.