30. Isabel
30
ISABEL
I screamed.
Miguel crashed into the office so suddenly that opening my mouth and letting out a loud shout was all I was able to do. I couldn’t get up to help him. I couldn’t stand and block that woman?—
That woman?
I stared, aghast with my mouth hanging open, as she attacked Miguel and tried to wrap her fingers around his throat. To strangle him. To kill him. He’d entered my life with the order to kill me, an order my father duplicitously put out there so he could favor my twin. And now it looked like “I” was trying to kill him.
Graciella was a carbon copy of me, yet not. Posh and elegant, even in a fight. Not a strand of her black hair hung out of place as she fought my love. Smooth, flawless skin showed no ink or scars, just muscles tightening as she fought. Her athleticism was another difference that told me that it wasn’t me, that it was someone else, but it was the cold malice that shone in her eyes that stunned me the most.
This was my twin. We shared DNA. She was so close to me, but so distant and apart. Murderous and evil. Ready to kill my future husband and hopefully, the father of my children.
“No! Stop!”
I fought to stand, unable to rise with my hands tied behind my back. I couldn’t stand the sight of his being attacked, and this wasn’t a simple little scrimmage. She wasn’t slapping him or merely keeping him back. She was trained to attack and kill, skilled like I wasn’t. She could very well end his life, and I strained and struggled to prevent that from happening.
“Graciella, careful!”
I wasn’t the only one determined to end this fight. I wasn’t the only spectator desperate to mediate these two.
But, perhaps unlike Louis, I knew there would be no peace met between them. No mediation was possible. Miguel had to kill her. I had yet to tell him and explain that she was the one that the Cartel wanted dead because she’d fucked with one of their bosses and tricked him before she could kill him. She was the one who had done wrong and earned the wrath of others wanting her dead.
Revenge. The Cartel wanted an eye for an eye—hers. Not mine, even though we were identical.
Miguel had to kill her, and I knew he planned to. He wasn’t joking when he said he would protect me for the rest of his life, that he would dare anyone to harm a hair on my head.
But he was struggling to gain the upper hand and shoot her. He couldn’t get to his gun on the floor that she’d knocked away.
“Graciella. Please be careful!” Louis stepped back when they crashed against the other wall. He was afraid for his beloved daughter, the only one he’d ever cared about, but she didn’t reciprocate the sentiment.
In a fast spin, she growled, kicking out at Miguel’s head and landing facing Louis. As Miguel fell back, slumping to the floor behind her, my heart stopped. I stared, so worried and scared for him as he dropped down and didn’t get back up.
“Miguel!” I screamed it, resisting the sting of tears that threatened. He had to get back up. He had to be all right. He had to?—
A gunshot fired, yanking my attention away from my lover on the floor. He still didn’t move, not even when Graciella aimed the gun at Louis and fired.
Hands together over the gun, arms locked straight as she pointed the barrel at our father, she glared at him as he gasped.
“I’m done listening to you,” she said, seething and watching the blood ooze out onto the front of his shirt.
She’d shot him. Not Miguel. My twin sister shot our father.
I’d cut ties with him. I wanted nothing to do with him. But that didn’t mean I was prepared to witness his being shot within close range. My ears buzzed, sensitive to the loud blast. Gaping and staring, I fought not to watch as realization dawned in his eyes.
“I’ve had enough of you calling the shots.”
“Graciella…” He struggled to swallow, dipping his chin to look at where she’d shot him. “But…”
She shot him again, through his hand over his heart. “I am done listening to you. It’s my time to rule.”
Without lifting his head, staring at where he’d been shot twice by his chosen daughter, he closed his eyes.
She shot the last time, through the top of his head, and I shuddered as I whipped my head to the side and squeezed my eyes shut.
“And you.”
I opened my eyes as she stalked toward me, gun in hand.
“You’ve been a helpful decoy lately.” She grinned, sneering down at me. “Now that I’ve got him out of the way, I can do things the way I want. I can call all the shots. He can’t drag me down anymore, and you can be the body they claim as a hit on me.”
I shook my head. “No. No. I’m not dying for you.”
She laughed once.
“I’m not going to let you use me like that.” I narrowed my eyes, daring her to insist otherwise, this twin of mine, this stranger who thought she could just show up in my life and try to end it so she could enjoy hers. “I’ve got better purposes to serve in life than being a decoy for you!”
Laughing louder, she smiled and shook her head. “All you do is slap paint on walls,” she taunted. “No one will care if you’re gone.” She propped one hand to her hip, raising her brows as she looked down at me. “Once you’re gone, the last hit on me will no longer be an obstacle and I can carry on as I please, especially without him trying to tell me what to do.” She smirked at Louis’s body in the chair. “The Cartel wants an eye for an eye, and they’ll get one. Just the wrong one.”
“You’re wrong! I have plenty of purpose. I have plenty of reasons to live. He cares. I love him, and my purpose is to grow old with him.” She didn’t care. I knew it in the coldness in her eyes, but I was stuck rambling, panting and desperate to make my case as if it could change my fate. “My purpose is to have children with him and start a family. To move away from all this danger and be happy. I can paint, and he’ll watch me. He’ll help me raise our sons and daughters and we’ll have the best life, one I never had.”
I was talking out of desperation, but halfway through my ramble, I talked louder, seeing that Miguel was stirring and getting up. I wanted her focused on me and the loudness of my voice, not noticing that he was slowly getting up.
“Oh, give me a fucking break.” Graciella lifted the gun, scowling at me. “Your pathetic life is over so I can do great things with mine. Your boring dreams will die with you, Sister.” With that final sneer as she mocked me, mocked the connection that should’ve precluded me from ever facing the end of the barrel of her gun, she raised her gun to aim it at my face.
As she did, I looked to the left, at a blank spot on the wall behind her. Feigning that someone was coming from that side, I hoped she’d fall for it.
She did.
Spinning to her left, she held her gun out and fired. She was fast, putting a hole in the wall, but Miguel was always quick. Wincing as he stood, he shot her from her right.
She staggered back a step. A loud gasp left her lips, but she didn’t let herself get stuck in shock.
By the time she raised her gun to fire at him, he was on her.
Once more, he shot her in the chest, mirroring how she’d ended our father’s life.
“Her dreams will not die,” he growled as he advanced on her. “You will.”
“Fuck you!” she screamed as she fired blindly, unable to correct her aim as blood gushed out of her.
“You will die,” he said, gravelly and gruffly, as he fired again. “You will be my last hit.”
She roared, pressing her hands to her chest. Lower and lower, she sank toward the floor.
“You will be the last person I’ll ever accept a contract to kill,” he explained, firing again and again, seeming to empty his rounds in her.
I stared, locked in shock. Violence wasn’t supposed to be a part of my life. I didn’t want to ever witness this. But in these circumstances, right now in this moment, I was compelled to witness her death and know, without a doubt, that she would never come back and expect me to sacrifice my life for hers. To know with a precise finality that she could never threaten my happiness again.
He stood over her, waiting for her to react after she crumpled to the floor. Her gun remained out of reach, and as crimson rivulets of blood leaked out of her and pooled on the floor, he nodded once and hurried to untie me.
“She’s dead?” I asked. I had to ask. I had to hear him say it.
“She’s dead.”
As he fumbled with the ties around my wrists, pulling a knife out to slice at the plastic strands, I looked over at my father, dead in the chair.
“He’s dead too,” I said, not necessarily to him but musing out loud.
Louis couldn’t put a hit on me anymore to favor my twin.
Graciella couldn’t expect me to die in her place.
No one could target me for anything at all.
Now, I was free to just live my life and never face any danger from the Cartel or anyone else my father wanted to dupe or deceive.
We were…
“Free.” I blinked at Miguel as he crouched close to me. Blood showed at a new cut on his lip, but otherwise, his stern concentration was on freeing me.
“We’re free,” I whispered.
He turned his head to face me, gazing at me like this was the moment our lives would truly begin.
Helping me move my arms forward, he hauled me into his arms and kissed me hard.
Free.
Free to love, free to be with him.
Free to start a new future without any danger to stop us from true happiness.
Under his lips, accepting his kiss and reply in kind with all the hunger I wanted him to know I had for him, I sighed and rejoiced that the dark chapter of our lives was over.
And now, it would only be happiness and peace.