Chapter 6
Zeke: Any of you assholes alive?
Chase: I can taste colors and it hurts.
Mason: Serves you right for letting my wife get so drunk.
Logan: Logan isn’t here right now, please leave a message after the tone.
Chase: Poor Mason, having to wrestle his five-foot-nothing wife into bed.
Mason: She woke Macey up singing some stupid fucking country song.
Chase: That reminds me, Mia told me to tell you she wants you to grow a moustache.
Mason Walker added Mia Walker to the chat
Logan: Hey, no girls in the chat.
Mia: Why am I here?
Mason: You know why.
Mia: Mason would like me to inform you all that he plans to grow a big handlebar moustache, just for me.
Mason: Watch it, Mrs. Walker.
Mia: Sorry, sir ;)
Chase: Gross.
Zeke: Jesus fucking Christ.
ZEKE
“You summoned?” I ask dryly as I lean one shoulder against the doorframe of my father's study. Logan is already here, leaning back in a wingback chair with his head skyward. He’s pale and a little green, likely from the post-game booze fest he indulged in.
Miguel Guerra is a stern man, almost as tall as I am and mean as a bulldog chewing a wasp when he wants to be. No frills and all harsh realities—that’s what my childhood was after my mother died.
“Ezekiel, have a seat.” His deep voice is laced with the accent he inherited from Abuelo.
“No me digas que hacer,” I bite, slipping into my native tongue without even realizing it. Don’t tell me what to do.
“English please, my head hurts too much to translate right now.” Logan sighs dramatically, rolling his head back down to level us both with a look.
I know he’s just saying that to diffuse the tension.
When you grow up bilingual, you don’t have to translate shit, it just reads the same in our heads in either language.
But as a first-generation immigrant, our father doesn’t know that, and we only speak the tongue when things are heated.
“I’ll stand, if it’s all the same to you.
” I forge ahead, forcing my voice to remain even.
He dips his head and stands, walking to the crystal decanter stashed on an oak drink cart in the corner.
The slice of crystal against crystal permeates the air as he unstoppers it and pours three glasses of amber liquid.
One might think it’s scotch from the set up, but I know better.
He crosses the room and presses one glass into my hand, and I lift it to my lips as he hands the other to Logan, allowing the first tang of tequila to slide over my tongue.
Something tells me I’m going to need it.
“Mis hijos,” he salutes, before tipping his back in one. My boys.
At thirty-six, I’m hardly a boy. But then again, I can quite imagine myself always seeing Diego this way too, even when he’s as tall and grown as I am. So, I incline my glass in his direction and take another sip. As does Logan, wincing slightly.
“The time has come for me to retire and pass the baton to you,” my father says solemnly, smoothing down his salt and pepper moustache as he sits back in his age-worn oxblood leather Chesterfield.
I arch one brow. My father is a wealthy man.
Self-made, as I am. I didn’t ask for a single handout to get where I am today, operating only on my own blood, sweat, and tears.
Although, I highly doubt a handout was ever on the table even if I had been inclined to ask.
“Padre, just throw the other shoe already,” Logan grumbles.
We both know there is a catch. My father won’t hand over the reins to his empire without a stipulation or two.
The opportunity to wield it like a chess move won't be passed by. Luckily for me, I don’t want his empire—I’m too busy building my own.
“It’s drop the other shoe, asshat,” I snipe, knocking the last of my drink back and running my tongue across my teeth.
“Then you don’t know our father at all, Hermano.
” Logan throws back quicker than a man that hungover should be able to.
I salute him with my empty glass, conceding his point.
My steps are muffled on the silk dyed Persian rug underfoot as I walk over to the drinks cart, needing more liquor for whatever is about to come.
“I’ve found a respectable woman for you to marry, Ezekiel.
As my oldest son, I expect you to make an honorable man of yourself before I give you the keys to the castle.
” My hands freeze, crystal stopper in one, tequila-filled decanter in the other.
Amber liquid sloshes up the spout, dripping down onto my hand.
“Ilegar de nuevo?” Come again? I turn slowly and am met with my father's hard onyx stare. The lines at the corner of his eyes crease. Not laughter lines. Scowl lines.
“I have found you a respectable woman to marry.” He repeats every syllable like I’m an invalid who can’t understand English.
There is a quiet knock on the door and my eyes jerk across to see a young girl—Columbian, I would guess by her coloring—standing timidly in the doorway.
An older man and woman flank her, the man with one hand on the girl's shoulder. Her father, presumably. I bark out an incredulous laugh, not sparing the girl even half a glance. Rude perhaps, but right now, I couldn’t give less of a fuck.
“You’re not in Columbia anymore, Father, and this isn’t the eighteenth century.
” Placing the crystal tumbler roughly on the side of the cart to save myself from hurling it at him, I spin and start to walk toward the door.
I freeze when I see the look of fear in the girl's eyes.
Jesus, she could be no older than twenty.
And there was me thinking Miss Devlin was young.
“Please know that my refusal holds no bearing on your eligibility, simply that I refuse to allow my father to dictate my life,” I assure her quietly, sparing her shocked mother and stern father a brief nod before I push through the door.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Ezekiel.” My father's harsh voice halts me in my tracks. And here it is. The other shoe. I can almost hear the metaphorical drop as he prepares to hurl it at my back.
“And why is that, Miguel?” I turn, meeting his gaze.
He pulls himself upright. “Because if you are not married by the end of this year, I will burn Paraíso to ashes and wash away your mother's grave without a second thought.” He hurls the words with expert precision, and I feel every syllable land like a bullet in my chest.
Logan shoots from his chair so quickly he’s almost a blur. “You wouldn’t.”
And there it is. Laid bare. My Achilles heel. Paraíso is the house in Columbia my mother loved, that she chose as her final resting place after the life my father led tore her to pieces. It’s the only piece of her that I have remaining besides the scarlet-hazed memory of her dead body in my arms.
***
The smash of glass and the sight of amber liquid sliding down the beige wallpaper of my penthouse living space soothes a sliver of the ache in my chest. As I pour myself a fresh glass, I note I’m down to only one. The set of six antique crystal tumblers cost thousands, but fuck if I care right now.
“Expensive stress relief, brother,” Logan drawls from where he is propped up on the arm of my couch. I grunt, knocking back the amber liquid clumsily so the glass clashes against my teeth. Then it joins the other one in a tinkling crash of glass against the marble floor.
“Papi?” The small, trembling voice has me spinning on the spot.
Diego stands frozen at the foot of the grand sweeping staircase to the second floor, his tatty old blanket clutched in one hand and trailing behind him.
I want to reach into my chest and rip out my own heart at the scared look on his face right now.
I grew up around violence and I swore I would never abide that for my son.
“Mi chico ángel, I’m so sorry.” My voice is hoarse as I force myself toward him, trying to quell my shaking hands.
One fat tear rolls down his tawny cheek as I near.
I sweep him up into my arms, holding his warm body tightly to my chest as he wraps his arms around my neck and sniffs into my shoulder.
“It’s okay, I promise, Papi is okay,” I say gruffly, feeling the bridge of my nose tingle in a way that I haven’t felt since the day he was born.
“W-why are you smashing stuff, Papi?” Big, confused brown eyes blink up at me as he pulls back, slicing off another little piece of my heart.
“Adults do silly things when they’re angry sometimes, kid.” Logan comes up behind me, cupping the back of Diego’s head as he speaks.
“Like when Papi pretends his hand is the claw and tickles me with it?” He perks up, sniffling back the moisture in his eyes. My chest feels a little looser for having him in my arms. I wanted to go to him the moment I got home, but I knew I wasn’t in the right frame of mind.
“A bit like that, buddy.” I sigh, pressing a kiss to his forehead. “I’m sorry if I scared you.”
He purses his lips and casts his eyes down to my chest, picking at the hem of my shirt. “I was just worried about you.” There’s that fucking tingle again that has me thinking I might do something fucking insane like produce a tear. I open my mouth to speak, but nothing comes.
“How about you let your uncle put you back to bed, little D?” Logan jumps in, offering his hands out.
Fickle little thing that he is, Diego bares his gummy smile at my brother and leans over to reach for him. Logan scoops him up, throwing him up into the air and earning himself a delighted chorus of giggles. I offer my brother a nod of thanks and watch them head for the stairs.
Okay Guerra, pity party over. Time to use your best asset and figure a way out of this where your asshole father doesn’t win. By the time Logan returns, I’m pacing. Alcohol forgotten. “He go down okay?”
“Yup,” Logan replies, folding himself down onto the couch cushions. “Still not sure how your grumpy ass produced such a sweet kid.” He stifles a yawn as he buries the heels of his palms into his eyes.
I ignore his jibe and continue pacing. “I’ve been thinking.”
“Steady on, you’ll hurt yourself.” Logan snorts, peering up at me through bleary eyes.
“Wind your fucking neck in for once and listen,” I snap, not in the mood for his usual shit right now.
“Yes, boss,” he drawls, throwing one arm across the top of the charcoal suede back.
“When someone pulls a knife on you, what do you do?” I bite, clenching my hands into fists and releasing them again.
“I don’t know, pull out a knife too?” He huffs, scrunching his nose.
“No, you pull out a fucking gun.”
That has his attention, and he’s leaning forward with a stern look on his face. “You can’t shoot our father.”
I let out a humorless laugh. “Be a little less literal for once in your life, Logan.”
He relaxes a bit, sinking back into the cushions. “Metaphorical gun, got it.” He nods.
“We both know there has to be an inordinate amount of shit we can dig up on Miguel. So why don’t we use that to leverage him out of the picture?
” I pause at the floor-to-ceiling windows, my eyes tracing the bright lights of the sprawling city below.
My father was encased in the criminal underbelly of one of Columbia’s largest cartels for the first half of his life.
There are sure to be bodies. Both literal and figurative.
“Send him far away where we never fucking hear from him again.”
Silence.
I turn, noticing the steely glint that has seeped into my brother's eyes. “You would have to be willing to go through with it, if he didn’t acquiesce.”
I’ve already weighed that, of course. And it boils down to this.
Over my dead body will I allow my father to snatch away the one portion of peace my mother gets on this earth.
Even if it came after her death. He can leave of his own free will, or he can rot in prison—his choice.
I don’t need to reply, because I can tell he sees it written on my face as clear as day, just like I do his.
“So, you’ll pretend you’re willing to marry the girl until we can get what we need?”
I snort, tilting my neck to the side until it clicks and sends a shard of relief slithering down my spine. “Fuck no. I won’t subject her to that. She’s Colombian, she would be shunned by her community when I eventually break it off.”
Logan clears his throat and swipes a hand over his brow. No doubt he’s feeling the effects of a sleepless night and the evening from hell. “So, who?”
“I don’t know,” I muse aloud. “Hooker, maybe?”
Logan laughs at that, his head tipped back to the cavernous, vaulted ceiling. “My brother, marrying a hooker, now that would be funny. But my guess? Our father could pick out an escort a mile away.”
I hum in agreement, sucking air through my teeth in annoyance. “I’ll have to find someone willing. Someone who knows the score and won’t be affected negatively when it ends. Someone who can hold their own.”
“And what does this person get out of it? Other than your sparkling company?”
I smile, genuinely this time as I meet his eyes. “I’m one of the richest men in the city, brother. I’ll let you do the math.” I pull out my phone and punch out a text to Chase. If anyone knows women in New York, it’s him.