Chapter 1
CECILIA
Ronan traced his fingers down my ribcage, turning the motion upward when I failed to respond to his question.
Resting his hand just below my breast, he thumbed the scar on my rib, a flash of heat and an old memory burning at the flesh.
I pulled my tank top back down to cover the rest of me, clearing my throat to distract him. .
“Stop! That tickles,” I pushed his hands away playfully.
He raised a single eyebrow, caging me in on the floor with his arms on either side of my head.“Well then, answer my question. Are you finally gonna tell your old man we’re more than just friends?”
I tisk, turning my cheek to the side. “You know, traditionally the guy usually does the talking to the fathers in relationships.”
“Traditionally, most girlfriends’ fathers are around to talk to, and their brothers won’t kick my ass. Your dad is like a ghost, man, and your brother? He comes around like once a year and just stares at me while he stabs at his fingernails with his knives.”
I laughed, “Just say you’re scared, then.”
“Why deny it? They scare the shit out of me. But asking a man for permission when he’s not even around to stop me from doing it anyway?
” He shook his head, “Maybe I’d rather ask for forgiveness instead.
At the end of the day his place at the dinner table is still empty.
” He ran his hands through his hair, unsure if he’d crossed that line yet.
He knew he was teetering it. That boundary I’d drawn between us, where normally I would withdraw at the first mention of my father, our history, or his career. I didn’t blame him, in almost eight years of being around me he had never seen Rafael Flores.
Ever since my tío Ignacio burned our family villa to try to steal the cártel from under his nose, he’d been extra cautious.
Papá bounced all over México to evade his brother and his men.
Moving constantly was the only way to evade assassination attempts and keep my tío from compromising any cártel jobs.
Sometimes he would stay in Guadalajara, for months at a time, and when he would come home for a few days, we all would shut ourselves in from the outside world for protection.
That’s why we ended up staying with my tía Larissa permanently. My mamá refused to live alone and my papá was so shattered from the hurt his brother caused us that he couldn’t take this one request away from her.
Family was everything.
And I… loved Ronan. There was absolutely no doubt about that. We’d grown up together, from awkward kids fumbling through a friendship that grew into much more as we began to get older. My tía and my mamá always encouraged it because they saw how carefree and normal being around Ronan kept me.
I’m sure they figured we would break up as life would naturally drive us apart so there was no concern for them to interject. But puppy love and years of friendship soon became the foundation to a feeling of security I hadn’t felt for as long as I could remember, if ever at all.
I now dreaded how fast the future could come knocking at my door, and steal it all away from me.
The thing about being the daughter of one of the most powerful men in the world is that if you didn’t already know that about me, then you’d likely only find out when you were taking your last breaths.
This secret I held all to myself; I couldn’t tell the most important person in my life.
It gnawed and gnashed at me from the inside out.
It would be our end someday.
Ronan didn’t know that I spent all of my days outside of school or being with him learning about the family business and preparing to take over my papá’s place.
He didn’t know that my weekend trips once a month to go shopping in Tijuana were actually spent sitting at my papá’s side being mentored or in a dungeon learning lessons.
“Maybe he isn’t real,” I teased, kissing him softly.
He pressed his lips back into me, forcing mine to part as he pried his tongue into my mouth.
Ronan groaned in frustration, pressing his bulge against me. “You drive me crazy. You’re gonna be the death of me,” he put his forehead to mine.
My smile faded, “Don’t say that,” I shook my head.
“Look, my papá will be back tonight for a few days, I’ll talk to him about having dinner where he can get to know you as my…
boyfriend?” The last bit came out as more of a high-pitched squeak as I questioned a word that had never came out of my mouth before this very moment.
The strangeness of it all surfaced and suddenly I was lightheaded and anxious and full of butterflies at the idea of being rejected by him.
We were best friends, two neighbor kids who had been each other’s everything from the moment we first met.
It didn’t feel strange when playing together started to become romantic, or shoulder punches were followed by tender kisses.
Even Carolina knew from a single look when it was time to evacuate the room and leave us alone.
We just made sense, from the very beginning.
“Yeah, I’m your boyfriend Cecilia Gomes. I’m your…all of it. Your first date, your first-hand holding, your first kiss, your first, first,” he whispered, forcing my cheeks to flush with heat.
“You say that like I wasn’t yours either, payaso, now let me go pretend like I am the innocent little flower my papá knows me to be, okay?” I waited with raised eyebrows but Ronan lifted me off the ground to kiss me instead.
“Alright, little flower, text me a time?”
I nod, “Wear something nice,” I tug at his pants pocket, “Not jeans.”
“You know I’m not trying to fuck your father, right? Just you.” He gives me that devilish smirk that makes my insides feel like hot molten goo before he licks his lips to clarify, “Again.”
I shove at his shoulder, “My papá is always in a suit. He says men who want to be respected, dress like it.” I explained with a shrug.
He pulled me in again for one final kiss, his words low and hushed in my ear before he lets me go. “I’ll wear whatever you want, be whoever you want. Just tell me when and where.”
I fought the squeal from manifesting, turning on my heels and sprinting out of his house as fast as possible.
Ronan’s mother, Nina, lived only four houses down from my tía, where we had made our permanent home.
By the time I got home, my papá was there along with the extra security car and his armed men.
I shouted a greeting up to Cézar, who looked down at me from the second floor balcony, resting his elbows on the railing.
He was my papá’s Sergeant in arms now, an achievement at just the age of twenty five.
His hair was kept shaved so that all you could see was the shadow of growth around his head and face.
Tattoos crawled up his neck and peaked through the fine suit he wore.
A crooked smile curved perfectly onto his face, the glimmer of diamonds on his teeth easily spotted from a distance.
It didn’t bother me that he was often mistaken for my papá's protegé, because in the end, the throne wasn’t meant for him. And the thing about Cézar, was he valued loyalty above all. Which is why my papá trusted him to seat me in his place and to carry out my orders when he was gone.
“Are you getting shorter, princesita?” He asked teasingly.
I sent him a middle finger in response, the roar of laughter obnoxious as it fell from his mouth.
“Is that Celia?” I heard my papá calling from the billiard room, which he frequently used as his office on the few occasions he brought work home.
I ran into the room and didn’t bother looking around before jumping into my papá’s arms for a hug. I didn’t care that these men could see me as weak for hugging my papá, if they questioned my integrity once I was old enough to take control, I would fire or kill them for it as I was taught.
He accepted my embrace and picked me up like when I was still a little girl, “How have you been mija?” he asked with a tenderness reserved only for me.
“Fifteen, filled with angst and hormones. Now fill me in on what actually matters, please,” I said with a pleading tone.
His smile was prideful, but only lasted as long as his silence. “Ignacio burned down two of our warehouses in Tijuana. Over two hundred and fifty million in product,” he pulled out photos of the warehouses, completely charred, nothing but frames left of the structures.
“How many died?” I asked.
My papá frowned at my show of concern to our soldiers and their families. “I’ve already made it right mija, don’t worry yourself over that,” his lips pressed into a flat line which let me know I disappointed him.
I quickly tried to move past my mistake, hoping I’d be able to bounce back from it, “What else?”
“The good news is he was sloppy, probably sent Carlito to do his dirty work, you know that pendejo is good for nothing. They left plenty of traces, I think we should be able to find them in the next couple of weeks,” he told me with a glimmer of hope breaking through his hard exterior.
“I can almost smell him mija, he is so close. He will burn twice as hard for what he put us through,” a fearsome glint twinkled in his eye that was all rage and revenge. It almost made me forget that this was his brother.
I couldn’t put myself in his shoes because I could never imagine feeling this way about Carolina.
Power changes everyone, he enforced into my brain.
“Ronan wants to have dinner with you tonight, Papá, with all of us.”
“Who?” He asked as if he had never heard the name in his life, a dismissal that was obviously some way to feel superior to a teenage boy.
I rolled my eyes, “Ay Papá! You know the names of every useless pendejo whose hand you shake, but you pretend you can’t remember his name when he’s been around for almost half my life now! Be kind please, this is important to him,” I slapped his shoulder.
“Important just to him?”