Page 31 of Corrupted By the Shadow King (Hope Runs Deep #3)

Nikki

T he room is small with no windows or any visible exits.

The door we came through is solid, and I don’t see a way to open it from the inside, but that doesn’t mean I’m not searching for a way out.

Nine steps from one end to the other. The room is perfectly square with two blue rolls in the corner.

Sleeping bags. Great. So, we are camping, except instead of the great outdoors, we are locked in a hidden room in the garage of a psychopath. I’m sure this won’t have a bad ending.

“What did he mean that you are a Sol princess?” I ask.

“You heard what he said. It’s what he means,” Erin snaps.

“Yes, but I’m asking you. We’ve been friends for five years, but I didn’t know you…” I didn’t know what to say. Hearing that one of my closest friends is part of the Sol Cartel has thrown me for a loop, but I know she is a good person and one of the best nurses I know.

I hear her sigh behind me as I inspect the wall we came through. There has to be some way to get out just in case. Shouldn’t there? “You don’t have to tell me, but I’d like to know.”

She sighs again. “My uncle was Alonzo Santiago. Most people called him El Fuego. I heard from my brother that negotiations went poorly with the Luna Cartel, and Alejandro killed him. Knowing my uncle, he was trying to overstep and take something that wasn’t his.

Alejandro is very protective of what is his.

I’m a little surprised peace has lasted as long as it has between the two groups.

Not that some members haven’t tried to kill each other over the years, and I know of several instances of each side sending spies. It is the life they choose to lead.”

“Not you?”

“Does it look like I live the life of a daughter of the cartel?”

“Not really, but?—”

She tsks, cutting off anything else I may say.

“My mother and father separated when I was three or four. My brother Mateo was six. Although my parents never actually got a divorce, I grew up here and my brother in Mexico. I would visit here and there whenever my father came to the States, but my mother never let me go into Mexico to visit until I was older, terrified my father would keep me, and she wouldn’t see me again.

My father wouldn’t have done that, though.

As much as he loves me, he also knows that growing up away from the life he built for my brother and himself was the best thing that could have happened to me.

So, I was in it, but not in it, if that makes any kind of sense.

I’m not stupid. I’m fully aware of what has happened in my family and who my uncle was. I found out about his death yesterday.”

“I’m sorry you lost him.”

“Mateo and my father weren’t there, and that’s the thing I’m most grateful for. Dad was handling some other business for the family, and Mateo was with my cousin, Emiliano.”

“Kevin said something about El Fuego.”

I can see her shake her head out of the corner of my eye.

“It’s stupid, really. In the Luna Cartel, the leader has always been called El Lobo, the wolf.

It’s kind of silly when you think about it.

Luna means moon. The wolf howls at the moon.

In books, wolf shifters are sometimes controlled by the moon.

Most of the time, the title is for one person and one person only.

When that person dies, the title dies with them.

Not in the Luna Cartel. I think Alex is the third or fourth person to carry the title.

In the Sol Cartel, my uncle wanted a special title too.

So jealous of El Lobo. He decided he should be called El Fuego, and his followers began calling him that, and it finally stuck.

I think he was nineteen at the time. He always said when he died, he wanted his son to inherit the title just like El Lobo. ”

“The fire?”

“Yes. On the Santiago family crest, there is a sun and a phoenix. Sun and fire. Moon and wolf. See the stupidity of it all. Men wanting to be important.”

“And you don’t agree with any of it.”

She looks at me, and I stop what I’m doing to give her my full attention.

“I was born into the life, and while I grew up here in the States, I was, to a point, indoctrinated into the life. My father gave me a choice, and I decided to go to college and become a nurse. When I was a kid, I used to say I wanted to become a doctor or a nurse to fix up my brother and my father. As I got older, I teased them, saying I was going to buy stock in first aid kits.” She tilts her head to the side.

“My brother is a good man, but you have to know he and Alex are enemies. There is a chance they will try to kill each other.”

I drop my head and start picking at the skin around my thumb, a nervous habit I’d had since high school.

“It’s like I don’t really know who Alex is.

I knew something was off. Hell, I patched up a bullet wound for him, and I didn’t allow myself to ask any of the hard questions.

I brushed all the red flags away. He isn’t the man I thought he was. ”

“Because you found out he is El Lobo?”

I want to say, “Duh!” but I hold back. “That is part of it. He is a killer, a drug pusher?—”

“And the man who makes you smile like I’ve never seen you do. He makes you happy.”

“But—”

“Can you get past the fact he does things that are a little illegal?—”

“A little?” I scoff.

“In this life, it is eat or be eaten. I do not blame him for what he has done. Do you love him?”

“I…” That is the crux of my problem. Even with everything I have found out about Alex, I still love him, still want him in my life and in my bed.

Why was it so easy to brush away all the red flags before and not now?

On top of that, from the moment Kevin pointed a gun at us, all I could think about was Alex.

Would driving away from him be the last time I ever saw his face?

I want Alex to pop out and rescue us, and he is the only one I seem to be putting my faith in.

Not the cops, not any of my friends or family…

Alex. I need him. I’m scared shitless, and I want him to pull me into his arms and tell me everything is going to be okay.

“I love him.” I planned on prefacing that statement with, “But sometimes it’s not enough,” but I can’t.

The simple fact is, I love him, and I need him.

“What about Dr. Jacobs?” I ask and notice her small smile, her lips lifting only on one side.

“If we get out of here, maybe we can see where things go, but it’s just a crush right now.” She sticks her tongue out and looks disgusted. “That sounds so childish.”

“I think sometimes we need to be,” I try to reassure her, especially given our current predicament. “Let’s see if we can find the latch. Maybe if we can get out of here, we can save ourselves and won’t need a knight to come riding up on a horse.”

“Or in your case, a king.”

Rolling my eyes, I shake my head. “Or a king.”