CHAPTER 7 – Leona
Two days have passed since Marcus's proposal, and I'm no closer to an answer I can live with.
I press my palm against the cool window glass, watching the city lights blur through unshed tears.
My mind drifts as exhaustion pulls at me, memories surfacing like debris after a storm.
I'm ten years old, sitting at our kitchen table while Mom makes pancakes. Dad's newspaper rustles as he turns the pages, occasionally reading headlines aloud.
"Another shooting downtown," he says. "Three dead."
Mom places a plate in front of me, pancakes arranged in a smiley face. "Not at breakfast, Miguel." Her eyes flick meaningfully toward me and Cody, who's shoveling food into his mouth like he hasn't eaten in days.
Dad sighs, folding the paper. "They need to understand the world we live in, Isabella."
"They're children."
"Children in Port Hollow." He reaches over, ruffling my hair. "But smart ones, eh, mija? Smart enough to be careful."
"I'm always careful," I say proudly.
Cody rolls his eyes. "That's why you're boring."
"Better boring than stupid."
"Enough," Mom interjects, but she's smiling. "Eat before it gets cold."
A door opening snaps me back to the present. I've been moving through the loft without conscious thought, tracing the same paths I've walked a dozen times since my imprisonment began. Looking for weaknesses, for oversights.
There are none.
Marcus's men patrol. Security systems hum at every access point. The elevator requires biometric verification. The ventilation shafts are too small for even my arm to fit through.
I'm trapped, and we both know it.
Still, I search. Because the alternative—accepting that I belong to Marcus now—is unthinkable.
His private office is the one room I haven't thoroughly explored. The door is usually locked, but tonight, miraculously, the handle turns under my palm.
I hesitate. This is too easy. But desperation pushes me forward into the darkened space.
The office is minimalist—a desk of polished black wood, ergonomic chair, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves on one wall. No personal photographs, no mementos. Nothing to suggest a human occupies this space rather than a machine.
I move quickly, checking the desk drawers first. Most are locked, but one slides open, revealing some files. I rifle through them, heart racing.
Names. Dates. Dollar figures with too many zeros. Maps of territories divided between competing syndicates. It's a meticulous record of Port Hollow's criminal underworld, with Marcus at its center.
I stop on a file labeled "Varela." Inside, newspaper clippings trace my family's destruction—my parents' murder, described as a "tragic home invasion." Cody's gradual rise in the underworld. My separation from that world, culminating in my forensic science degree.
My entire life, condensed to a clinical dossier.
I'm eight, standing in the rain at Port Hollow Cemetery. Two closed caskets lower into the ground before us. Cody stands beside me, sixteen and suddenly ancient, his face a mask of controlled fury.
"They're saying it was a robbery," he mutters. "That's bullshit."
"Language," I respond automatically, as Mom would have.
"They were executed, Leo. Shot in the head, each of them. That's not a robbery."
I squeeze his hand. "The police will—"
"The police won't do shit." His fingers tighten painfully around mine. "But I will."
Three months later, Cody comes home with cash and bruises. I find a gun under his mattress while searching for an old toy.
"It's protection," he tells me when I confront him, eyes hard and unfamiliar. "For both of us."
"From what?"
"Everything."
By the time I'm sixteen, our small apartment has become a gathering place for young men with hollow eyes and quick tempers. They treat Cody with deference, bringing him problems to solve and money to count.
I focus on school, on science, on evidence and facts—a world where cause and effect make sense, where patterns lead to answers rather than more questions.
"You could have a future," I tell Cody one night after his friends leave. "You're smart enough for college."
He laughs. "I already have a future."
"Doing what? Running errands for gangsters?"
"Surviving," he snaps. "Making sure you can survive too."
I didn’t recognize my brother anymore.
The sound of the door opening freezes me mid-search. Marcus leans against the frame, watching me with that unnerving calm.
"Find anything interesting?" He doesn't sound angry. If anything, he sounds amused.
I straighten, refusing to look guilty. "You knew I'd come in here."
"Of course."
"You left it unlocked on purpose."
He steps into the room, closing the door behind him. "I was curious what you'd look for first."
"Information," I admit, seeing no point in lying. "Leverage."
"And did you find any?"
I hold up the file with my name. "Just confirmation that you've been stalking my family for years. Which brings us back to why." I cross my arms. "What does my brother have that they want badly enough to put an eight-million-dollar bounty on my head?"
"That's what I intend to find out." He gestures toward the door. "Come with me. There's something you need to see."
I follow him to the elevator, wariness settling between my shoulder blades. We descend past the basement level I'd explored before, stopping at what must be a sub-basement.
The doors open to an underground garage, smaller than the one where the Delgados attacked us but just as secure. Marcus leads me to a vehicle covered by a tarp.
"Your time is up tomorrow," he says, pulling the cover away. "Before you make your decision, you should see this."
My car sits before me—or what remains of it. The windshield is shattered, the driver's side riddled with bullet holes. Blood stains the interior, already dried to a rusty brown.
"What is this?"
"This is what was waiting at your apartment the night I took you from the warehouse.
" Marcus runs his hand along the bullet-pocked door.
"The Delgados had a team ready to intercept you when you arrived home.
If you'd made it there instead of being taken first—" He gestures to the devastation. "This would have been you."
My stomach lurches. "You said they wanted me alive."
"Preferably alive. Dead works too." His voice is matter-of-fact. "The blood is from your neighbor. Wrong place, wrong time."
Mrs. Ana. Sixty-seven years old. She used to bring me homemade dumplings when I worked late shifts.
"You're lying." But even as I say it, I know he isn't. The truth is written in bullet holes and dried blood.
"I never lie when the truth is more effective." Marcus pulls out his phone. "Still not convinced? Let me make a call."
He dials, putting the call on speaker. After two rings, a man answers.
"This better be important."
"Valero." Marcus's voice changes subtly—harder, colder. "I understand you're looking for a woman. Leona Varela."
A pause. "Who's asking?"
"Someone who might know where she is."
The man—Valero—laughs, a sound like gravel. "Then you know what she's worth. Eight million alive. Five dead."
"What if I told you I could hand her to you tonight?"
My blood turns to ice. Marcus watches me as the man responds.
"I'd say name the place. And I'd ask why you'd sell out Marcus Drake's new plaything."
"Maybe I just need the money."
"Smart man. Drake's making enemies over this bitch. Word is, anyone who takes her out gets a bonus from the Delgados—protection and territory."
Marcus's expression doesn't change. "Where would you take her?"
"Straight to Delgado. He's got special plans for her before she dies." Valero's voice drops lower. "Wants to send pieces to her brother. Starting with her fingers."
I grab for the phone, unable to contain myself. "You sick—"
Marcus ends the call, tucking the phone away. "Convinced now?"
My legs give out. I sink to the cold concrete, the reality of my situation crashing over me like a wave. There's no escape. No safe haven. Without Marcus, I'm already dead—or worse.
"Your three days are up tomorrow." He crouches beside me, close but not touching. "What's your answer, Leona?"
I close my eyes, seeing my parents' coffins, Cody's hardening face, the life I built so carefully crumbling around me.
"If I agree," I say slowly, "there would be conditions."
A smile touches his lips. "Of course."
"This is temporary. When the threat is neutralized, we dissolve the marriage."
"Agreed."
"I want information about Cody. Everything you have, everything you learn."
He nods. "Within reason."
"And I don't share your bed."
His smile widens. "Unless you want to."
Heat flares in my cheeks. "I won't."
"We'll see." He stands, offering his hand. "Do we have a deal?"
I stare at his outstretched hand—the same hand that slit a man's throat days ago. The same hand that might be the only thing standing between me and a fate worse than death.
I take it, feeling the noose tighten around my neck.
"Yes."