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Chapter Six

Esteban

Fuck my life.

Fuck this hard-on I have.

Fuck. That’s what I want to do as I watch Lucy enter the party we’re both at.

She’s on Domingo’s arm and looks absolutely stunning.

She’d be the picture of perfection if not for the ape tugging her arm.

As though she knows I’m already here, she looks in my direction.

I watch her inhale, caving in her stomach and pressing out her tits.

Tits I’ve felt pressed against me. Tits I want to bare and suck.

Tits I want to tease and torture with clamps as she rides me.

My nightly dreams have only become more lurid except for the ones where I’m searching for her in a house that’s ablaze or during a shootout.

Those make me wake up in a sweat just like the sex dreams, but I wake in terror rather than aching frustration.

I smile to acknowledge her, but I can’t do anything more without people noticing.

I don’t want to draw Domingo’s attention.

We’ve never gotten along. Not as kids and not as adults.

I don't know him well, but social situations have forced me to be around him. He’s been nothing short of a prick.

Knowing Lucy spent last night at his place nearly killed me.

I can barely keep myself from picturing them together. It’s driving me crazy.

It’s only intensified when we’re seated across from each other at the dinner.

It’s a charity event, so I don’t know the host and hostess well enough to ask to move.

I can’t just rearrange the place settings since I’m one of the few single people here.

I’d have to search to avoid separating a couple.

I barely acknowledge Domingo with a nod and flash a smile to Lucy to be polite.

I’m acutely aware of her all night as I speak to the men sitting on either side of me.

It could be my imagination, but she seems cold to Domingo and keeps a steady conversation going with the woman to her left.

Domingo keeps glancing at me since there are lulls in his conversation with the guy to his right.

Lucy doesn’t look at him or speak to him once during the entire meal, but I know she keeps watching me. We catch each other doing it.

As the meal ends—finally—I hear Lucy speak to Domingo.

“Excuse me for a moment. I need to find a bathroom.”

When she raises an eyebrow and Domingo nods, I want to know what the fuck that means. Did they fuck on the way here, and she needs to freshen up?

I hurry to leave the dining room without making it obvious.

I spot Lucy heading up the stairs toward the mansion’s bedrooms. It’s no coincidence we lock gazes.

When she reaches the landing, I’m subtle as I move through the crowd to where I’m certain there are servants’ stairs.

All the upstairs doors are closed except for one, which is barely ajar.

It’s out of sight of the main staircase.

I slip inside and lock the door. I can smell her perfume.

She steps out of the bathroom. Somehow, we’re colliding into each other in a kiss that makes our first one look like a peck. I nip her bottom lip before she sucks my tongue into her mouth. I curl her sleek ponytail around my hand and tug. Not enough to hurt, but enough to make her look up at me.

“What did that look mean? The one you gave Domingo. It was some type of message between a couple. The kind where you know what each other is thinking because you’re that intimate.”

“He is my fiancé.”

She says it like she’s stating the obvious, yet she’s still in my arms, her hands fisting my tuxedo jacket.

“Did you fuck on the way here? Did you come up here to wipe his cum off?”

Her eyes widen with shock. Is it my crassness or that I even dared to ask?

“He thinks I have my period. I told him that to get out of sex last night. I came up here praying you’d follow me.”

“Why?”

“Why what? To the first part or the second?”

“Both. Why’d you lie to him?”

She tugs on my lapels and goes onto her toes. She starts this kiss, but I soon take over. I back her against a wall and pull her gown up as my other hand slides up her leg. I stop short of touching her pussy.

“I don’t give a shit what time of the day, month, or year it is. When you’re mine, I’ll fuck you no matter what.”

“When I’m yours? Esteban, we have to stop.” She closes her eyes. “I’ll never be yours. I have to marry him, and I won’t break my vows.”

“Lucy, you’re mine the moment you agree. I’ve been yours since the moment I saw you in that cafe. You don’t love him.”

Her eyes fly open. “And you assume I’ll love you one day? Or do you assume I’d go from one loveless relationship to another?”

“I don’t need to assume a damn thing, and you know that as well as I do.”

“I don’t know you, and you don’t know me.”

I rake my hand through my hair as I glance at the door. I pull my phone from my pocket and unlock it. I tap on my contacts, showing her my screen as I do. The first three contacts under my favorites are my parents and Alicia. She frowns as she notices the fourth is Enrique, and the fifth is Luis.

“Why do you have my brothers’ numbers saved like that?”

It’s not just that her brothers’ numbers are in my phone.

They’re saved as Kiko and Lucho. I know only their sisters and parents call them that.

I tap on my cloud app and use the password to open it before I scroll through folders that are years old until I find the one I want. I turn my phone toward her again.

“I went by Steven in college.”

“You were my brother’s roommate.” Her brow furrows. “I watched you play soccer together. You’re even bigger than you were then.”

Her gaze sweeps over me in appreciation, and it makes my cock ache.

“I didn’t recognize you.”

“We never said more than a passing hello.”

Her eyes narrow, and she tries to push away from me. I step back, not crowding her.

“If you’re so close to my brother, then how can you betray him? How can you work for my tío ?”

“Because your brother told me to.”

She stops short, and the color drains from her face. I reach out for her, and she lets me pull her against me. She burrows her face against my chest, and I peer down at her as she closes her eyes again.

“You could die for what you’re doing.”

“I know. But your brother is my best friend, besides my cousin Alicia. Besides Luis, I’m his. I work for your brother in New York, but I’m down here because your father isn’t safe.”

“Why have you been spying on me?”

“You don’t believe that’s what I’ve been doing. If you did, you would have told Luis. He would have either explained to you or killed me. Neither has happened. You know why, even if you haven’t admitted it.”

“I already have guards.”

“Who have served your father for decades. That doesn’t mean I think they’re good enough.”

“They’d die for me.”

“I know they would. But they have their own families. I couldn’t fault them if they hesitated, even for a second. You might not have a second to spare.”

Life has a fucked-up way of proving you wrong. It has just as fucked-up a way of proving you right. Gunfire rings through the air downstairs. I shove Lucy into the bathroom.

“Lock it. Don’t open it to anyone but me. Call your brothers.”

“No, Este! Don’t go down there.”

“I have to find a way to get you out. You have a gun and a knife, right?”

Her cocktail purse isn’t that big, but I can tell it’s heavier than it looks from the faint line left by the strap pressing into her shoulder. She nods. I pull the door shut, but she tries to stop me again.

“ Chiquita, obey me, or I will take you home, bare your beautiful ass, and spank it until my hand hurts. Then I will spank it for making my hand hurt.”

“Yes, D—Este.”

What was she going to call me?

I snag her chin between my thumb and index finger.

“You wouldn’t obey him like this. You aren’t his. You’re mine.”

I give her a punishing kiss before she lets me shut the door. I hear it lock, then I hear the shower curtain open and close.

Chiquita buena .

I inch toward the door and put my ear to it as I check my gun.

I know it’s loaded, but my father and grandfather drilled it into me to always check before exposing myself to shots intended to kill me.

I ease the door open and inch down the hallway.

I hear voices begging for mercy. I spy Domingo at the foot of the stairs, his eye already swelling shut.

Interesting.

He was coming to find Lucy. I watch a guy reach around Domingo’s back and pull his gun free from the holster. He drops it and kicks it away; one of his co-hostage takers picks it up and holsters it under his arm.

“Empty your pockets.”

Domingo reaches back with his right hand.

“No. Not your wallet. Your knives. Now.”

The guy—I’m certain it’s Paco Hierro despite the ski mask—puts the gun to Domingo’s forehead.

I watch his finger flex over the trigger, and I’m certain Domingo saw it, too.

He withdraws one knife, then another. Paco shoves him backwards, but Domingo’s sturdier than Paco expects.

He barely sways. Fucking dumbass. He should have had Domingo turn his pockets inside out.

I’m certain he has at least one, if not two more knives for situations just like this. I know I do.

“Where is she?”

“Who?” Domingo’s expression appears confused, but he’s a shit actor.

“Where is el jefe’s daughter? That’s who you were going to look for.”

“I don’t know. That’s why I was looking.”

“What do you mean you don’t know where your woman is? Stop lying, Domingo.”

“I’m not. She was supposed to be in the bathroom, but she’s not.”

“So, you thought she went up to a bedroom?”

“Maybe this one was in use when she tried it. I don’t know.”

Paco shoves Domingo’s chest, then gestures to go up the stairs. The latter doesn’t budge. Paco draws back to punch Domingo, but Domingo blocks it with an uppercut that snaps Paco’s head back. In Paco’s confusion, he lets go of the gun when Domingo grabs it.