Page 36 of Bad Blood

Perhaps it’s a form of destiny. You can fight it all you want, but it still happens anyway, leaving you with even more scars to contend with. Not so long ago, my father stole my mother and locked her up in a bedroom like this. She doesn’t know I know, of course. Her housekeeper, Sofia, told me after she’d drunk too muchAguardientelast Christmas. It sort of slipped out, like the worst kind of punchline: “Oh, by the way, your father is this brutal man who chops up people for fun, but don’t worry he only held your mother against her will and made her marry him, too.”

What does that make me? The forced spawn of the devil? Did she even want me and Ella in the first place, or did he take away that decision from her as well?

Rolling onto my back, I stare up at the ceiling, blinking back hot, angry tears. I always do this to myself. I’m a world champion self-masochist. I’m thinking horrible things to punish myself for letting Ella down so badly.

I won her future, and then I blew it.

I counted cards, but I never counted onhimruining my plan.

Santi Carrera.

I shiver at the memory of those first moments together in his office. Who knew hate could spark electricity between people? Who knew dead eyes could glint with flecks of gold, like hidden secrets in a pool of darkness?

Outside, the first colors of dawn are painting carnage onto the horizon, and worse is to come. Reece won’t have kept quiet about my latest escapade. My father is most likely plotting World War Three with Edier already, and Ella…? I scrunch my eyes up as tightly as I can.

I’m so sorry, Ella.

There’s the sound of footsteps in the hallway outside. The lock on my door clicks open and the soft reds and pinks illuminating the far wall are snuffed out by a tall dark shadow.

A shadow who smells far better than he ought to.

“Get up.”

His voice isn’t chocolate and chili cake anymore. It’s Mississippi Mud Pie with a twist of arsenic.

Throwing off the black comforter, I scramble to my feet as the shadow reveals the man who is currently sharing the top spot on my Worst Man Alive List.

“Sleep well?”

“Like a baby,” I lie, tugging my dress down, but I lose the attitude as soon as I spot more bloodstains on his white dress shirt.

There’s a pause. “How’s your sister?”

He freezes in the doorway, my concern catching him off guard.

He recovers quickly.

“The fact that you’re still alive and breathing should give you an indication.” He kicks the door shut behind him, and there’s something in that casual, I fucking-loathe-you movement that jolts a pulse between my legs.

“Listen, I know you don’t believe a word I say, but I swear I hadn’t nothing to do with this. Sam—”

“¡Silencio!” At the mention of Sam’s name, his handsome face twists into something savage. “I swear toyou,muñeca, if you mention him again in my presence, I’ll be sending you back to your father in pieces.”

He takes a step toward me, and I shift one back so fast I hit the side of the mattress. I’ve never met a man with so much rage and intensity spilling out of him. He’s like a volcano in permanent eruption.

“Here.”

I flinch as he tosses something onto the bed next to me. There’s a soft flutter against my leg, and then another sea of dirty green is messing up another counterpane.

“You’re giving me money?” I say stupidly.

“Fifty thousand in one-hundred-dollar bills. That’s what you ‘won’, right?”

I don’t like the implied quotation marks around the word “won.” I like the Machiavellian look on his face even less.

“What’s the catch?”

“First, tell me why you need it.”