Chapter 4
YASMINE
The garden was a cage pretending to be paradise.
From the villa’s windows, the hedges looked lush, the fountains graceful, roses in perfect bloom. But Yasmine knew better. Every petal had been cut by hands afraid to leave a thorn or risk having their fingers cut off.
Guards lined the walls, rifles slung casually over their shoulders, their gazes cold. Even the sun felt like a watchman, glaring down without pity.
It had been two weeks. Fourteen whole days, and every single one of them had felt like shackles sinching a little tighter.
Dean had never wanted to talk about his father.
Other than the basics of who he was and that he was a cruel man.
But, in the short time here, Dean’s father had killed three people and had Dean kill two more.
He didn’t need him to, just did it to remind Dean of the collar around his neck and who held the leash.
Yasmine knelt in the dirt with the twins, admiring the marigolds as they helped with the planting.
Isabella was busy tugging fistfuls of grass into her tiny hands and squealed as she tossed it into the air.
The boys were quieter now, shadows of themselves.
Four years old and already moving with hesitation, their laughter smothered into whispers.
Tate sat beside her, digging carefully at the soil with a stick. While Aiden, the most affected by everything, clung to her sleeve, eyes darting to every uniform that passed as he helped press the dirt into place.
“Careful, carino,” Yasmine murmured, brushing soil from his knuckles. “Not too rough. The flowers need their roots to breathe.”
Her rebellion was small. Pathetic, maybe.
But it was hers. She taught them to tend, not destroy.
She taught them to whisper kindness to plants, to guard tiny blooms against trampling boots.
In a place that fed on blood, she gave them beauty.
She taught them how to make crafts, paint, and anything else that she could think of that had nothing to do with violence.
A guard laughed somewhere behind the hedge.
Her heart skittered. Keeping her eyes on the hedge, she reached and grabbed Isabella.
Bringing her closer, Yasmine feigned having to adjust the baby’s sunhat.
When no one walked in to disturb the quiet moment in the garden, Yasmine handed Isabella one of her soft toys to play with.
Dean had been shut in the office with his father for hours, voices muffled by thick walls.
She hated it. Hated the way Dean emerged afterward with shoulders tight, jaw set, eyes dark, and emotionless.
He’d grown cooler…not cold, but cool, like a storm that refused to release its rain.
He never told her what transpired behind those closed doors.
Maybe it was mercy. Maybe it was survival.
But she saw the slow death of the man she loved.
Each day a little more of him was crushed and she had no idea what to do.
She was brushing soil from her fingers when the air shifted. The guards straightened and the voice she hated most slid across the garden like a dangerous snake.
“Ah, mi preciosa. What a vision you make in the sunlight.”
Her blood chilled.
Dean’s father strolled through the archway, black suit immaculate, silver hair gleaming in the heat. His sunglasses hid his eyes, but his smile gave away the viciousness inside of him. Two men flanked Carlos Ramírez, but he waved them back with a lazy arrogance.
Yasmine froze, then rose slowly, gathering Isabella into her arms. The twins pressed into her skirt, Aiden clutching her hand so tight it hurt.
“Senor,” she said, voice even. She never called him anything else. Never Father. Only Senor. A boundary as fragile as glass, but still a boundary.
He circled closer as if he were a predator, hands clasped behind his back like a man admiring art.
“How cruel of my son, to keep you locked away for himself. A jewel such as you should shine for all the world to see.”
Her stomach roiled. She shifted her stance firm and tucked Isabella a little further away as she kept her eyes on the viper of a man.
“We prefer quiet, Senor, but thank you for the compliment.”
“Quiet?” He chuckled, low. “A woman like you should not whisper. You should moan and scream the house down.”
It was like he’d dumped a bucket of ice-cold water on her head. The twins stiffened even though they didn’t understand the meaning of the words, but they understood the tension in the air. Yasmine’s cheeks burned with fury, but she kept her face neutral.
“My children don’t need to hear such words, Senor.”
He crouched suddenly, graceful despite his age, and held out a hand toward Tate and Aiden. They shrank back, clutching at Yasmine’s legs. His smile widened, pleased by their fear, she assumed.
“They have their mother’s eyes,” he murmured, tilting his head.
“So green. Such fire. Did you know your mother-in-law’s eyes were the same?
Ah, she too glared at me with that spark.
Her mistake was thinking she could leave me and take my son.
” He chuckled like that was the funniest thing in the world.
“No one takes my children from me. She paid the price.”
He slowly stood and shifted his sunglasses so she saw his dark eyes, unmistakably those of a demon. “It would be wise if no such thoughts ever entered your head. We wouldn’t want an accident to take one of your lives. How very tragic that would be,” he threatened, and smirked.
Yasmine’s throat closed. Her free hand curled into a fist at her side.
“I wouldn’t be so quick to threaten us when we’ve been nothing but pleasant house guests,” she said quietly. Her next words only a whisper he could hear. “You must not know what a mother will do for her children…I don’t think you’d want to find out.”
“Hmm. Maybe not.” He waved his hand in the air, like her threat was nothing more than a fly buzzing around his head. “Doesn’t mean that one small sacrifice can’t be made for the greater good. Understand?”
She swallowed the bile rising in her throat and nodded.
The man laughed, rolling out his shoulders he brushed the imaginary dust from his sleeve.
“I do enjoy this game.” He leaned closer, his cologne suffocating, his lips grazing the edge of her ear as he whispered: “But until Mercurio finds the balls to kill me…they are mine to threaten, and you are mine to watch…maybe one of these days more than watch.”
Her skin crawled. She forced herself not to recoil, to not to give him the pleasure.
Isabella fussed in her arms, sensing the tension. Yasmine stroked her daughter’s back, her voice soft but steady. “Shh, baby girl.”
Carlos lingered, close enough she could feel the heat off him.
Then, with sudden movement, he reached out past her head and plucked a little flower from a vine that was growing up a decorative lattice.
Like he had the right to touch her, he tucked it behind her ear.
The act twisted Yasmine’s gut into knots.
“Yellow suits you,” he murmured. “So bright. So fragile. Eres muy hermosa. Mercurio es un hombre afortunado de poder llevarte a su cama cada noche.”
He stepped back, admiring his handiwork as if he hadn’t just gutted her with every disgusting word. How dare he talk about her and Dean like this, whether Dean was lucky to marry her, or sleep with her was none of his business. She would never go to bed with Dean’s father. He could rot in hell.
Yasmine met his gaze squarely, her voice low and steady. “Fragile things can bite back when you press too hard, Senor.”
His smile sharpened. “Ah, but sometimes that makes it all the sweeter.”
The boys buried their faces against her. She stepped in front of them and glared at Carlos. He was no man…he was a pig, just one that walked on two legs.
Dean’s father turned away at last, signaling his guards. “Enjoy your garden, mi preciosa. I will visit again. Next time maybe a more private setting.”
He chuckled as she ground her teeth and glared where he’d disappeared. Only after he was gone did she allow herself to sink to her knees. Opening her free arm, the two boys hugged her tight.
“We don’t like him, Mommy,” Tate said.
Yasmine smiled. “I’ll tell you a secret just between the three of us. Neither do I.”
The boys held on to Yasmine a little longer. Isabella fussed, tugging at the flower tucked behind her mother’s ear. Yasmine yanked it free and crushed it in her fist, the petals bleeding little specs of yellow between her fingers.
She bent down, pressing her forehead to her sons’ hair, whispering. “You are both so strong, and I’m proud of you. We will go home as soon as we can, I promise.”
They nodded, their eyes wide but trusting.
She drew in a shaking breath and tilted her face to the sky. For a heartbeat, she imagined the walls of this place falling. The sound of helicopter blades and Dean’s unit bursting through the doors to rescue them.
But when she opened her eyes, there was only the garden and beyond that the tall wall with the twisted barbwire on top.
Yasmine swallowed her fear, set her jaw, and began to teach her sons again how to tend the flowers.
Even here, in a garden of cages, she taught them to grow, to be strong without cruelty, and to love, even as her heart hardened a little more each day.