Chapter 5
Callahan
WHO THE HELL WAS I kidding about wanting a docile woman? I wanted the storm that was Jasmina Ruiz, and as her pussy contracted around me, I knew she was going to be that.
The evidence was as obvious as the blood staining the back of my shirt.
The only time she didn’t resist was when we were touching each other. It was the only time I wanted her submitting, the only time I wanted her listening, and only because I got to see the fight she had with herself as she did it.
I’d never seen anything more beautiful than Jasmina when she was vulnerable. And I’d had a lot of women in the past year trying to forget her. Now, seeing her after her orgasm, I knew she was a rare, glittering treasure that I was pretty sure I wanted all to myself.
But after she came down from the high I brought her to, I knew it would be war again.
When her vulnerable grayish-blue eyes met mine, I didn’t know what to do. I’d expected her to snap at me, not come at me with shaky hands like she was going to return the favor.
I grabbed her blanket and tucked her back into it tightly, making sure she didn’t come near my belt buckle. “We’re done here,” I said, my voice commanding as I adjusted my slacks.
Her eyebrows lifted. “What?”
“We’re done,” I said.
Now, she looked affronted rather than vulnerable. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Don’t you want to get off?”
“Not at the moment,” I told her, like all the blood wasn’t pumping straight to my dick. It was idiotic that I didn’t want to fuck her right now even if I could have my way with her. For some reason, I didn’t want it until I knew she fully wanted to give it to me on her own accord.
“Oh my God.” She breathed out like I was disgusting, and the post-orgasmic haze seemed to vanish into thin air, only to be replaced by her normal, snarling self. She reached for the door handle, desperate to get away from me, but I clicked the central lock.
Her eyes shot to mine in fury.
“From now on, I open doors for you. Do you understand?”
“I don’t want help—”
“I don’t care what you want, Jasmina.” This was the line in the sand that she’d have to learn. We weren’t going to be partners in this relationship at all.
I got out and rounded the hood of the car so that I could haul her out, tucking her into my chest with the blanket wrapped around her.
“What are you doing? This is way over the top. I can walk, Callahan.”
I ignored her as I got to the cement porch and rang the doorbell. It opened right away to Monte and Perla, like they’d been standing there ready to receive us.
Her aunt looked completely in shock at seeing her niece in my arms. She started cursing in Spanish in her black cotton dress.
Monte stayed silent, his lips in a grim line.
He was a larger man with gray hair and wrinkles of wisdom on his face.
I saw the distrust and disdain written all over him, but he didn’t move toward a weapon, so I stepped inside with their niece, knowing I had the upper hand.
“Put me down, Callahan,” she whispered, glaring at me. And before I could remind myself that I didn’t need to listen to her, I did.
“I’d like to have a brief, private conversation,” I told her aunt and uncle as her two cousins whispered from the far end of the foyer.
Perla’s hands shook as she put them in the pockets of her dress, but her eyes scanned her niece with concern. “Are you naked under that blanket, Jas?”
The question wasn’t one about her wellbeing and it made me wonder about their relationship. Jasmina lifted her chin and said, “I’m going to change. Don’t say anything without me.”
That command was for me before she hustled out of the room. Her cousins followed her and left me with her aunt and uncle, who didn’t seem at all happy that I was standing there.
Neither of them gave in to the silence that stretched between us though. We were all waiting for the other to strike first.
Yet, it was Jasmina, walking back into the room in sweats with her hair up, that did. “Mr. Knight, you can leave and I can inform my aunt and uncle about what’s going on.”
“What is going on?” Perla hissed softly next to her.
“The conversation will happen now, Jas.” I told her with authority. I wasn’t leaving until everyone knew she was going to be my wife.
“What is a conversation needed for?” Perla’s dark eyebrows pinched together. “We promised you our daughter already. You were not to bring harm to anyone. Jasmina has done nothing—”
Monte put his hand on her shoulder to calm her before he inclined his head toward the living room. I walked with Jasmina by my side where the furniture was worn but clean, where candles smelled like home, where the old wood trim made you feel cozy rather than sterile.
“What have you come here for? We gave you what we could, Knight,” Monte said, his eyes darting to Jasmina as if he wanted to tell her sorry.
“You realize that Jasmina burned down a Diamond Syndicate building?”
“What?” Perla screeched. “How dare you accuse her of such a thing. Our family—”
“It’s true, Tía,” Jasmina said, her head held high by my side. She didn’t even mutter it quietly. She had that look of determination in her eyes instead, like she was going to hold onto her pride no matter the cost.
“Aye, dios mío.” Perla brought a rosary from her pocket to her lips and leaned into Monte.
“We don’t have anything else to offer. We’ll—”
“I’ll still protect your territories and your lives, but the price has changed. I want the girl who burned down my building.”
Monte’s eyes widened. He thought I wanted to exact revenge. And maybe I did a little. Jasmina would pay with her pride more than anything else, though.
And maybe, just maybe, over time she’d give up a secret or two also, because Monte immediately looked like he was squirming under a microscope.
“Jasmina isn’t someone you want—”
“Why is that?” The more he fought me, the more I leaned into the idea.
“She’s not good wife material. Her father was Sanchez. You don’t want a baby with her when you can have—”
“Your blood is no better than your brother’s, Monte. Right? If anything, Sanchez was the leader of all of you. His grandbaby would solidify respect from your family and partnerships most, wouldn’t it?”
Monte’s jaw ticked, and it was all the tell I needed. “But Sanchez has been gone a long time …”
“Oh, I’m aware.” I pulled her close. “And yet he’s the one who was good enough with numbers that billions disappeared from the Irish you were all helping at one point, no?”
“That’s not true.” Monte waved his hands around the house. “If we had it, we’d live with it.”
Maybe, maybe not. I wasn’t sure. “She’s the one you don’t seem to want to give up, which means she’s far more valuable than anyone else. If you can’t pay back what I am afforded after the burning of my building, it’s only fair I get her.”
Monte and Perla both fidgeted on their feet, and then Perla seemed to look to Jasmina for answers.
“Tell them, Jasmina,” I prompted, my voice a soft goad.
She tightened the blanket on her shoulders, glancing at Perla, then back at me, her eyes filled with a glittering, beautiful hatred. “I’m marrying him, Tía,” she whispered. “It’s the only way.”
Perla’s eyes welled with tears, but she nodded.
“In exchange for our safety and our businesses continuing to run?” Monte asked, his voice breaking.
“As long as certain businesses allow us into the fold,” I made clear.
“Two years still stands?”
“You know, Monte, your family is drowning, and if I’m to throw a life raft, I don’t think there should be a time limit, do you?”
“She doesn’t belong with you. She’s a Ruiz, Callahan.”
“When’s the shareholder meeting of Fuerte Firearms?”
“Ten months from now. And then annually.”
“Then, two years still stands. I’d like to attend a few meetings with the family. I’m sure in that time, I can pry whatever information from Jasmina I need. New paperwork will be sent soon,” I replied. “The wedding is in one week. Make sure she’s prepared.”
I left them standing there dumbfounded. They had a funeral to attend, and I had a brother to inform about a new sister-in-law.