Chapter 38
Jasmina
MONTE WAS PROBABLY STILL hoping for a miracle.
Maybe I was too, because I let him talk.
I wanted him to have a reason, a way to explain all this away, but as he sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, I knew he wouldn’t.
“This isn’t how this is supposed to end.
” And when I stared at him, I saw how crazed he looked, how he’d lost weight, how there were bags under his eyes.
The blinders I had for him were gone. “I … I am doing this for the family. For you too. Everything I did, I did for all of us. Your mother ruined everything.”
Callahan came to stand beside me, like he wanted to support me but also let me make my choice.
“Why did she ruin everything?”
“Because she was …” He paused, rethinking his words. “She was a worker, not supposed to be a lover.” His voice was full of vitriol now. And I believed him. I’d known my mother wasn’t from the States but not much else.
“So, she was trafficked by you all, and my father …” I choked on the words.
“Bah, he saved her, he said. But let’s be honest, between me and you, he sealed her fate, because the moment he wanted out of trafficking was the moment someone was going to put them in the ground. If it hadn’t been Paolo—”
“Paolo did it?” I whispered, everything lining up in my head.
“Mija, Paolo was the mastermind. Your father and him argued and argued that night. Money wasn’t adding up, and Paolo knew it.
But my dad … he put Sanchez, that bastard, in charge.
Know what your dad did that night? He went home and moved all the money we’d made from it.
” Monte shook his head. “You still don’t remember? ”
I didn’t. A child’s mind was one of survival, and I’d blocked out most of that night.
My uncle waved the thought away like he couldn’t believe my memory was that bad. “Paolo lost it, and he shot both of them before he could get the information we needed.”
“The accounts …” I whispered.
“The money’s been gone ever since. And your dad supposedly said, choking on his own blood, you’d be the only one to ever find it.” Monte scoffed. “You never have. If you could just remember something, we can rebuild rather than having—”
“What? A partner, Monte? The Diamond Syndicate offered you that, and you—”
“They want to take over!” Monte spat, pointing at Callahan. “They’re power hungry, and—”
“You are. You let one brother live after he killed another. You bided your time, trying to pry information from a child … you were willing to sacrifice your daughter—”
“I … did it for family. I still raised you.” He huffed.
“You raised me as a pawn, and you allowed my parents’ deaths to go unresolved.”
“When I got there, you weren’t even crying, mija–”
“When you got there?” I said softly, and that’s when the memory sliced through my mind.
I heard my father yelling, “I’ll never give you that money, Paolo. You’ll never fucking find it if you do this. Even if you do, it goes back to them. We get them out or I burn it.”
“You’re out of your mind.”
“No.” I heard my mother’s voice. “He’s finally sane. He’s finally understanding that a life matters more than a paycheck.”
“Shut the fuck up, you stupid bitch.” And that’s when I heard one shot. And a roar.
And two more shots. I ran down the stairs and my father’s eyes connected with mine, and the last thing he murmured was “There’s a twinkle in your eyes, baby.”
My lullaby.
I repeated in a higher pitch, “When you got there? You hugged me and told me we’d get through this together.”
“Ah, she finally remembers.” He smiled.
Callahan looked at me then. “You okay?”
I raised my chin and the gun to Monte’s head.
If it wasn’t clear before to me, it was now. He knew I knew something.
Callahan didn’t say anything.
He nodded at me and said, “Do what you want, Viper. For the family you want. Adamantem infractum manet.”
He let me take the lead, gave me the reins, trusted my judgment rather than trying to sway me with his own. I knew his mantra meant not only that Diamonds were unbroken but that we would remain unbroken now too. We were Diamonds together.
It was proof that he loved me.
It was proof he was my family, and that was all I needed.
And something equally full of love for him but full of darkness for my uncle settled into my bones.
“You kill me, mija, Perla will never forgive you. It would be blasphemy to kill the man who took you in, who—”
“Blasphemy is letting your own brother bleed out another brother and raising his daughter as a weapon, Tío Monte. A weapon that will ultimately be your own demise.”
He blinked in surprise at how vicious my voice sounded all of a sudden. The viper had come out now.
“Did you know my father left an encrypted SD card to me?”
He frowned at first, and I saw how his eyes widened just a fraction.
“How much money do you think my father laundered over the course of his lifetime?”
His gaze searched my face before contorting slowly. It morphed from that gentle uncle I’d understood over the years to one full of entitlement and desperation. “You found it? I knew you had it in you. He fucking hid it from us all, didn’t he?”
“If he did?”
“Jesus Christ, I told Paolo again and again that you’d remember something. That Sanchez wouldn’t have died without a key to give to the child he loved. It’s why I told Paolo I’d take you in.”
“Because you thought I’d lead you to money?” Not because I was a child who’d lost her parents, not because I was his niece. “Not because I was your family?” Was being the keyword.
Callahan had shown me I could choose family. We could choose who we allowed in and out of our lives. This time, I’d choose to get rid of the parasites in mine.
And Monte had to have seen the change in my eyes because that’s when the man started begging. “Please spare me how I’ve spared you all these years. Please let me live and see—”
God, I couldn’t take it.
“Do you expect mercy or grace from me, the woman you had stabbed numerous times?”
Monte seemed to think I was a lost cause because he turned to Callahan.
“We helped our brothers, you and me. Callahan, you must know how it is. We stand beside them, never getting the praise or recognition, and we should. It’s my time.
Jasmina, you know I deserve it. Look at the time I took raising you for Sanchez, and the time I endured Paulo’s idiocy.
My brother was an idiot. I was always the smart one. ”
“Was it just a competition?” I whispered. “They were your brothers.”
“And I was the best of them,” he hissed viciously.
“Can’t you see that? I made sure it was Maribel who was supposed to marry that Diamond filth.
Not you. She was perfect with the fact that she can’t have children!
” He held his head high. “And when you acted out again, because you always have to act out of emotion rather than intelligence, I was willing to save you! I tried to make sure you wouldn’t have to conceive with him! ”
“And what? Annarose would be your last chance?”
“She’d be easily controllable with the right husband.” He lifted his chin. “We could have kept this in the family. We still can.”
His eyes narrowed on my belly, and that’s when I was sure he’d completely lost his mind. He couldn’t see right from wrong in his desperation.
Instinctively, I put my hand over it, and Callahan stepped in front of me. “Threaten my wife or our child, and it’ll be your last breath, Monte.”
He turned to me, his voice suddenly consoling. “I’m your uncle. Think of Perla and of your cousins. I raised you. I’ve spared your life countless times.”
He had. Over and over again, but he’d done it as a means to an end, not because he loved me. Not because he cared.
Because he needed a womb.
“And I’ll spare yours,” I murmured, but then I looked to my husband.
I looked to my partner.
I looked to the man who waited for me to command him on what I wanted.
“I’ll spare yours, sweet uncle of mine, but I don’t really know if my husband will.” I let the words fall casually from my lips. “It’s quite a lot of work to carry a child into this world, and so sometimes I let my husband make decisions for me.”
“A child?” Monte put the pieces together fast, I’d give him that. “You’re pregnant? Already?”
“Quite pregnant, dear tío. So smart you are. So smart that you put together a shoddy plan to ambush a world power on his yacht—”
“Our yacht,” Callahan corrected. But then he waved me on.
“And threaten the woman carrying his child.”
“The woman I love very much who is carrying our child,” Callahan said, a smile playing on his lips.
“Jasmina …” Monte started again, but I was tired and nodded to Callahan.
That’s when I saw his shoulders relax as he breathed out, “Thank God, I’m done listening to you. You’re done. Don’t burden my wife with pleading for your life. She’s tired from carrying our child.”
“I am. I’m going back to bed. Dispose of this atrocity, Knight. And make it hurt.”
I handed him my gun and kissed him deeply in front of my uncle before walking off.
I didn’t hear a single sound, but Callahan didn’t return for a couple of hours. In that time, Archer had come to my room to tell me he would be outside my door, but before that, he brought the cat carrier and my crochet materials. “Callahan sent for them.”
Of course he did.
And when my husband came back to bed that night, I knew it was time to show him.
I pulled the SD card from my suitcase.
“What’s that?”
“Something my father left me.”
“Okay. Care to tell me what’s on it?”
“I … well, I don’t know.” I took a breath. “I found it the night of the robbery, and then, well, I didn’t want to look at first because I knew you were watching my every move.”
“But then I wasn’t watching you. Why not then?”
“Because I wasn’t sure I wanted anything to change.”
He hummed. “And nothing will, Jas.”
“I’m not so sure, Callahan.” I glanced at the dark window where the sea had swallowed up my uncle.
“I am. Nothing on that card is going to change how I feel about you.”
“And how is that?”
“Like I’m in love with you. Like I want your belly full of my babies for years to come. Like I can’t live without you, and I’ll take down a whole coast if they try to make me do that.”
I sighed and felt the emotions bubbling up inside me again. Tears sprang to my eyes. “What am I going to tell Tía and my cousins?”
“Whatever the hell you want, baby.” He pulled me close and rubbed my arms up and down. “Tell them I did it and you had no say, if you want. Tell them, and I’ll be there with you every step of the way.”
For some reason, him there with me every step reminded me that I was safe. Safe to feel the pain of betrayal, safe to feel sadness, safe enough to cry.
I broke down in his arms, and he let me. I cried for minutes or maybe hours, but it didn’t matter. I cried.
I let myself feel.
And I hadn’t done that since I was a kid who’d lost her parents in the most gruesome way.
I finally sniffled and looked up at him. “We should probably look into the SD card.”
“If you want. Or we can wait until we’re home.”
“What if I never want to look?”
“Then we won’t. We have everything we need here, Viper.” He put his hand on my belly as he kissed me. “What’s on a card won’t change a damn thing.”
My eyes welled with tears again. “I can’t stop crying, and I don’t cry. I think being with you broke me.”
“Or saved you.” He chuckled and pulled me into his lap. “It’s okay to cry, Viper. Shows you care, and caring is the biggest strength of all.”
“I think you’re right.” I pulled him in for a kiss. “Maybe I really did need a knight in shining armor, and maybe you might just have saved me after all.”