Page 7 of Thorns of Blood

I jerked away from the table, stumbling in my heels, my balance completely thrown off. Commotion ensuing aroundme told me my husband’s men descended, but at this point I could only make out shapes. Dizziness assaulted me, my heart galloping to the point where my body started to shake.

I wanted to scream my misery and pain into the universe while cutting every one of these men’s throats. And if I wasn’t drugged, I would have.

But today wasn’t that day.

I stumbled around the furniture, trying to avoid Santiago’s bodyguards, who had descended on me like a swarm of flies. I could hear laughter in the background, but I pushed it aside, focused on reaching the back door. Just as I was about to escape, rough hands seized my hair and yanked me in the opposite direction.

I tried to fight. I pleaded and begged, but it was all for naught. Moments later, I felt myself being thrown into a transport van, my eyes unable to focus on my dark surroundings, the windows all blacked out with a tarp. There were no seats so I sprawled on the cold, dirty surface— I’d been in a van like this before. And that was something I’dneverforget.

I rose up to my knees, ready to fight again, but the Courier slapped me hard, making my head spin faster, before slamming the door shut. I collapsed in a ball on the hard floor, pain mixing with despair.

It was then that Amara’s familiar scent slammed through the fog and pain.Please, God, I prayed,let it be her. I tried to move, but eventually gave up. Instead, I fumbled my hand through the scattered blankets until I found her. She was too hot, her skin clammy and her clothes soaked. In my struggle, I hadn’t even noticed them dragging her along with me.

I pulled her over to me, forcing myself to murmur soothing words, although I couldn’t hear my own voice.

The van started and then the buzzing of the engine lulled both of us into temporary oblivion.

When we awoke next, another nightmare had already started.

I shook my head, chasing the painful memories away and focusing on the man in front of me and exacting my revenge. He delivered me to hell, and I intended to make him taste it himself.

There was no more compassion left in my heart. No more tears. Only fury, and the hunger for revenge.

These days I was all about educating those who wronged me.

Now, I waited for justice to catch up to me. That was all I ever fucking did anymore.

Waited. Hunted. Hoped.

“José,” I said, holding my hand out, no other words needed. He picked up the petrol can beside the door and brought it to me. He handed me the can and I uncapped it, stepping closer to the Courier and wafting it under his nose. “The last thing you see will be the flames engulfing you. The last thing you smell will be the flesh burning from your bones. And the last thing you hear will be your own screams from the pain of it all.”

With that, I began pouring the liquid over him ever so slowly.

“What about my family?” he screamed, thrashing and pulling at his restraints. “You psycho bitch.”

“Don’t worry, I’llhandleyour family too.” I flashed him a menacing smile, letting his imagination run wild. There was no place for weakness in this world. The minute you showed it, you lost your leverage.

A hard lesson to learn.

His family was his weakness, just as Amara and Louisa were mine. It was the reason I stayed away from my twin. I couldn’t do the same with Amara. She needed me; she had no one else. It was why I’d taken her under my wing and called her mine in the first place.

And that damned liver…my mind whispered, but I pushed that thought aside for now.

Instead, I poured the contents of the container out on the sick son of a bitch in front of me and dropped it to the floor, the sound echoing around the room. José was quick to hand me a box of matches.

I took them, my eyes never leaving my victim. I crouched down, level with the man who delivered me to hell with a smile on his face all those years ago. The fear in them injected me with power and reminded me that I no longer needed to be frightened.

“Now, tell me one thing.”

“Anything, anything… Please?—”

“I hear the new head of the Tijuana Cartel is moving flesh.” The most ruthless man in Boston. I heard he was not only the strategist but also the brain of the Agosti empire.

Giovanni Agosti.

I’d admit to being surprised when I heard the man had ventured into flesh trading. It was known that the Omertà, which the Agosti family was part of, stood against it. Not that it mattered to me either way—I planned to extinguish the entire Tijuana bloodline.

“What about it?”