Chapter 4
Cesar
Ispanked a client's daughter last night.
I've been repeating this to myself for twelve hours, trying to make it sound as bad as it should. Trying to summon up the guilt, the regret, the professional horror that should be consuming me.
Instead, I keep thinking about the sounds she made.
The gasp when my hand first connected. The way it shifted into something else as I kept going—not just pain, something deeper.
The whimper when I pulled her shorts back up, fabric dragging over sensitized skin.
And underneath all of it, the thing I'm trying hardest not to think about: how wet she was.
How I could feel the heat of her through my jeans, pressed right against my thigh.
How she squirmed like she couldn't help herself, grinding against me while I reddened her perfect ass.
Mija.
I called her mija. Like she was mine. Like I had any right.
I need to get my head straight. I need to remember why I'm here—Sterling's connections, legitimate contracts, a future that doesn't involve pretending I don't see things.
One job. Keep the girl alive. Don't fuck her.
Don't spank her. Don't think about the sounds she makes when she's trying not to moan.
Too late for one of those.
I'm in the kitchen making breakfast when my phone buzzes. Rosa. I almost don't answer because she'll know something's wrong the second she hears my voice, but ignoring my sister is worse than lying to her.
"Hola, hermana."
"Don't hermana me. You missed our call on Sunday."
Shit. I forgot. I was too busy watching Diamond Sterling parade around in silk robes, pretending I wasn't affected.
"I'm on a job. Remote location."
"Since when does that stop you?" Rosa's voice softens. "Everything okay? You sound... off."
"I'm fine."
"Cesar."
I close my eyes. My sister has always been able to read me, even when I don't want to be read. Even when I'm a thousand miles away and she can't see my face.
"The job is complicated," I say.
"Complicated how?"
"The principal is difficult."
"Difficult." I can hear her smiling. "You've handled cartel lieutenants and crooked politicians. What's so difficult about this one?"
She's twenty-three and blonde and looks at me like she wants to take me apart piece by piece. She pushed every button I have until I snapped and put her over my knee. And now I can't stop thinking about what else I want to do to her.
"She's young," I say instead. "Spoiled. Doesn't understand the danger she's in."
"Mm-hmm." A pause. "She's pretty, isn't she?"
"Rosa."
"I knew it. You like her."
"I don't like her. She's a job."
"You like her," Rosa repeats, and now she's laughing. "Oh my God. Cesar Vega, brought low by a pretty girl. I never thought I'd see the day."
"You're not seeing anything. And it's not like that."
"What's it like, then?"
I don't answer. What am I supposed to say? That I can't stop thinking about her? That she drives me crazy in ways that are definitely not professional? That I laid my hands on her last night and felt something crack open inside me, something I've been keeping locked down for years?
"Be careful," Rosa says, and her voice is serious now. "You've worked too hard to throw it away for someone who isn't worth it."
"She might be worth it."
The words are out before I can stop them. Rosa goes quiet.
"Cesar..."
"I have to go. I'll call you later. I promise."
I hang up before she can say anything else. Stand there in the kitchen with my phone in my hand, staring at nothing.
She might be worth it.
What the hell is wrong with me?
Diamond doesn't appear until almost noon. I hear her before I see her, soft footsteps in the hallway, hesitant in a way they weren't before. When she comes into the kitchen, she's dressed differently. Jeans. A hoodie that actually covers her body. Her hair is down, face bare of makeup.
She doesn't look at me.
"There's coffee," I say. "And I can make food if you're hungry."
"I'm fine." She pours herself a cup, adds oat milk from the fridge. Her movements are careful, like she's trying not to draw attention to herself.
A far cry from yesterday's performance.
"Diamond."
She stills. Doesn't turn around.
"Look at me."
For a second, I think she won't. Then she turns, and those blue eyes meet mine, and I see everything she's trying to hide. Confusion. Embarrassment. And underneath it, something that looks almost like hunger.
"About last night," I start.
"You don't have to explain." Her voice is flat. "I broke the rules. You disciplined me. Message received."
"That's not what I was going to say."
"Then what?"
I should apologize. I should tell her it won't happen again, that I crossed a line, that she can call her father and have me replaced if she wants. That's what a professional would do.
But I'm not feeling very professional right now.
"I was going to ask if you're okay."
Something flickers across her face. Surprised, like no one's asked her that in a long time.
"I'm fine," she says again. But this time it sounds more like a question.
***
The day passes strangely. Diamond doesn't retreat to her room. She doesn't put on a show. She just exists. Reads a book on the couch while I do security checks. Makes herself a sandwich for lunch and eats it at the kitchen island, watching me with those big eyes when she thinks I'm not looking.
She's different. Quieter. The bratty armor is gone, and what's underneath is something I didn't expect.
She's curious.
Around six, I start making dinner.
"You cook."
I look up. Diamond is leaning against the doorway, watching me.
"I cook."
"Where did you learn?"
"My grandmother." I add garlic to the pan, let it sizzle. "She raised me and my sister after our parents split. Cooking was her love language."
Diamond moves closer. "What happened to her?"
"She died. Eight years ago. While I was..."
"In prison."
"Yeah." I don't look at her. "I couldn't go to the funeral. They don't let you out for things like that."
She's quiet for a moment. Then she slides onto a stool at the island, close enough that I could touch her if I reached out.
I don't reach out.
"My mom left when I was fourteen," she says.
"Just left. No warning. I came home from school and her closet was empty.
She ran off with her Pilates instructor.
He was twenty-six." A bitter laugh. "My dad sat me down and explained that sometimes adults make choices, and those choices have consequences, and none of it was my fault.
" She traces a pattern on the counter with her fingertip.
"But for a long time, I thought if I'd been different—prettier, smarter, more interesting—maybe she would have stayed. "
"That's not how it works."
"I know that now. Mostly." She looks up at me, and there's something raw in her expression. Unguarded. "She sends birthday cards sometimes. Always late. Always with gift cards inside, like she can buy her way out of feeling guilty."
I turn off the stove. Move around the island until I'm standing in front of her. She tilts her head back to look at me, and I see the little girl she was, the one who came home to an empty closet and a father who didn't know how to explain heartbreak.
"She's the one who missed out," I say. "Not you."
Diamond's eyes glitter. For a second, I think she's going to cry. Then she blinks, and the moment passes.
"Your tattoos," she says, changing the subject. "What do they mean?"
I look down at my forearms. The ink crawling across my skin, telling stories I don't usually share.
"Some of them are old. From before." I don't say before prison. I don't have to. "Gang stuff, mostly. I've covered most of those."
"And the rest?"
"The rest are reminders." I point to one on my inner forearm—a date, nothing else. "That's when I got out. The day I started over."
She reaches out. Her fingers brush my skin, tracing the numbers, and heat shoots through me like lightning.
I should step back. I should put distance between us, reestablish the professional boundary I shattered last night.
I don't move.
"What's this one?" Her finger traces higher, to the rose on my bicep.
"For my sister. Rosa. She's the reason I..." I stop. "She's the reason for a lot of things."
"The reason you went to prison?"
"The reason I got out. The reason I'm trying to be better."
Her hand is still on my arm. Warm. Small. I could close my fingers around her wrist and pin her in place. I could pull her off that stool and show her exactly what I've been thinking about for the past four days.
Instead, I step back.
Diamond blinks. The spell breaks. She pulls her hand back like she's been burned.
I turn back to the stove, putting distance between us that feels like miles. "Do whatever you want while you’re waiting for dinner. But stay off social media. And stay in the house."
I feel her watching me for a long moment. Then she slides off the stool and heads for the doorway.
"Cesar."
I don't turn around. "Yeah?"
"I'm not sorry I broke the rules."
Now I turn. She's silhouetted in the doorway, and I can't read her expression.
"You will be if you do it again." I can’t help myself. My voice is low, promising.
Diamond hears it too. I see the shiver that runs through her, the way her lips part. She opens her mouth to speak, but changes her mind and disappears down the hall.
I stand there for a long time, gripping the edge of the counter, trying to remember why this is a bad idea. Sterling's connections. My business. The fifteen years between us. The hundred reasons I shouldn't want her.
None of it matters.
I'm already gone.
She might be worth it, I told Rosa.
Standing here in the kitchen with the ghost of her touch still burning on my skin, I'm starting to think I was right.