Chapter 11
Callahan
I FIGURED I HAD made it pretty clear what she was supposed to be doing for the next two weeks in my home. Not that Jasmina Ruiz would listen to anything I ever said.
She hadn’t come out of her room in five days.
No, I wasn’t counting.
The woman could rot in there for all I cared. And I didn’t say that lightly, but she’d pushed me to it.
I told my guys to give her whatever food and luxury she requested for the first couple of days in hopes she would come out for something more.
She didn’t request anything other than telling them to relay a message back to me where she called me every obscenity she could think of.
She didn’t ask for water or sneak out to get anything at night.
She didn’t charge my card or get deliveries either.
She only opened the door to her room to throw something out of it.
I paid an obscene amount of attention to it too.
I watched the cameras and put alerts on so I could know if her door ever opened without her being in some fit of rage.
It didn’t.
“What did she say when you gave her the meal the last time?”
“Two days ago?” Archer asked with an arch in his eyebrow like he disagreed with my tactics. “How long do you want me to babysit her, by the way? I won’t be in town much longer.”
“Where do you intend to go?” I asked, my curiosity piqued.
Archer was one of our best men, but I could see his restlessness, see how his mind was elsewhere lately.
He wasn’t made for being just a guard. His mind was wired for more.
He was smart, ruthless, but also loyal. He’d been a trusted friend with a shadow of darkness behind his eyes for as long as I’d known him.
“I have other work,” he said simply. No one else would have answered me that way.
Fucker.
“Work where? For the Diamonds?”
“Work that benefits us.” He shrugged, still not elaborating.
“You haven’t fed her in two days?” My future sister-in-law cut off our questioning from where she was scribbling in her notepad.
“Mia, don’t worry.” I rolled my eyes. “She agreed to all this before she came here. It wasn’t like when you got to Paradise—”
“And your brother drugged me before chaining me to a bed?” She gave Jameson a look before setting her pen down and crossing her arms over her floral sundress. “Is she chained to the bed, Cal?”
“What? No.” I stood up and combed a hand through my hair.
“I gave her a phone, told her she could utilize whoever she wanted to help her prepare for the wedding. I catered in food when she didn’t request any because I didn’t know what she would eat.
One of my guys even set new clothing outside her bedroom door and let her know it would be there for her if she wanted it. ”
I’d given her everything. She was supposed to be a damn prisoner, and yet she was calling every shot, not that she cared or knew it.
“Well, maybe she doesn’t want any of that.”
“She has to want to eat, Mia. It’s survival.”
“Well, she has a bathroom. I’m sure she can get water from the sink.” She had a point.
“Maybe I should turn the water off.”
“Quit it. Why don’t you try asking her what she needs rather than trying to dehydrate her out of there?”
“Because, dear, dear Mia, she is not a guest here. She’s a means to an end.”
“What a terrible way to talk about the girl you’re going to marry. Especially when she’s right upstairs.” Mia frowned and glanced around as if concerned that Jas could hear us.
“You say that now, but you’ll change your tune once she talks with you.”
“And why is that?”
“Because”—I gave her a pointed look—“Paolo was her uncle. You realize that, right?”
She looked away and wrung her hands together.
“She doesn’t need the reminder, Cal.” My brother threaded his fingers through hers immediately. “Darling, you don’t have to be here. You and Fran Bran can go to the country club, and—”
“No. I don’t need to be coddled, Jameson. She’s going to be a part of the family, right?” Mia chewed the side of her lip. Then she whispered as if she didn’t want Jas to hear, “If you’re marrying that girl, Cal, we’ve got to somehow become cordial.”
Yet, it was my little niece we all should have been worried about, because she appeared behind me as quiet as a mouse before loudly asking, “There’s a girl you’re going to marry here? I want to meet her, Uncle Cal.”
“No,” I immediately said, just as Mia hummed and then nodded slowly.
“I think that’s a great idea,” Mia said. “Us girls need to stick together. Shall we go look for her?”
“Mia …” My brother finally had the balls to step in, but all Mia had to do was give him a look. “Be nice and let some of the men go with you?”
“What the f—” I glanced at my niece before continuing. “They’re not going up there.”
“Why not?” Jameson shrugged. “You’re not getting her to do anything. Maybe Mia and Fran will inspire her.”
“Oh, I have no intention of siding with either of you to make her do anything,” Mia said as she waved to Archer and one of our other men to follow her. Mia was a Diamond now, through and through. She and Fran were the reason my brother had finally decided to get rid of Paolo in the first place.
As they walked off, I turned on my brother.
“You’re fucking whipped, you know that? How do you think that ends? Jasmina is a fucking lioness out for blood.”
“Your blood, I’m sure,” Jameson mumbled as he looked at something on his phone.
“Is that a damn bunny as your phone background?”
He clicked it off immediately. “I have it under good authority you have a cat up there.”
“Fuck you. As if you’re not bulldozed by a woman at every turn. She just convinced you to let her and your daughter go talk to a woman who attempted to murder me and has a vendetta against anyone involved in her uncle’s murder.”
He rolled his eyes but did set down his glass and start walking toward the stairs. “I’ve attempted to murder you too. It doesn’t mean she’s a danger to them, just to you. She’s smart, Cal.”
“Smart enough to be a pain in my ass for the past five days.” I wiped a hand down my face and stopped him at the steps because, fuck it, I needed advice. “She might die of starvation.”
“You can charm anyone.” Jameson looked at me like I was an idiot. “Win her over.”
“I can also kill almost anyone, and she tempts me to do that daily.”
“Remind me why you wanted to marry her and not Maribel.” Jameson chuckled like my hardship was all a joke.
“I think she’s hiding something. She burned down that building and tried to kill me. She’s—”
“None of that matters,” my brother cut me off. “We don’t need the Ruizes, Cal. You and I both know it. She makes it just a bit easier to do this deal with Fuerte Firearms. We save a couple billion sure, but—”
“And we should save that couple billion along with showing who we are as Diamonds, Jameson.”
“Sometimes we don’t need to, Cal. Not at the cost of losing our sanity.” My brother was going soft thanks to the love of his life and Fran. I knew it. I just wouldn’t follow in his footsteps.
“Speaking of my sanity, I need someone to run security camera footage around her apartment and her uncle’s house from the past couple weeks. I think she was roughed up.”
“Why?”
“Cut on her lip. Faint bruising on her face she was trying to hide. I want to know what happened.”
He nodded, then smirked at me. Leave it to my brother to give me the out he wanted me to admit I didn’t want. “Sounds like she’s a handful, bro. If she’s too much, you can walk away. I don’t care, is all I’m saying.”
“Nothing’s too much for me. Not even her.”
“You sure?”
“If she were too much, that would mean I’m not trying hard enough.”
“Interesting. If she’s pushing you, maybe she’s just enough, then?” He patted my shoulder before starting to walk past me.
“I don’t know what the fuck she is, but she’s something, all right,” I grumbled, then followed him up the stairs.
He chuckled and rolled his shoulders as we ascended the staircase. “Well, most women who move in with us are.”
As we got to the second story, I heard genuine laughter coming from Jasmina.
And then I heard Fran laugh too.
We rounded the corner, and there was the cause of all my stress, kneeling in front of my niece with a genuine smile on her face. I’d seen it once or twice before, but normally she was stoic, proper, calculated, and angry.
With my niece, she’d gotten down on her level and was explaining why that orange cat was purring and winding around Fran’s legs.
“Romeo is so cute,” Fran, my beautiful little traitor of a niece, said about the cat that wasn’t even supposed to be in the hall.
“He is honestly the cutest.” Jasmina looked up right then and met my eyes. “Don’t you think, Callahan?”
I wondered if I could talk one of my guys into killing a cat. Archer had always been one of the most dedicated of friends, but I saw the small smile forming on his lips as he stared at the scene too.
Asshole. I’d felt his restlessness lately, his darkness creeping back in, but when it came to these ladies, he hid it well. Or he just genuinely liked the damn cat.
Jasmina was manipulating everyone, and with Fran smiling up at me, I had to give in and agree. “He’s a nice cat.” I practically choked on the words.
“I told my daddy cats are nice, but he doesn’t believe me. He says we have enough animals with the bunny and dog.”
Jasmina stood to meet all of us outside her room and cracked her neck like she was readying herself.
Rightfully so. Jameson had taken her uncle’s life.
There was no denying that. Still, she didn’t step back or look at all afraid as she said, “Well, I’m sure your daddy will get you anything you want, Fran. ”
“I’m sure he won’t.” Her lip pouted out, and she put a hand on her hip.
Every day she seemed to have a new part to her attitude, which we loved, but it also got us into trouble.
We were very bad at saying no to any of her demands.
“He complains all the time about our bunny. He thinks it smells, but it doesn’t. Right, Mia?”
“Right.” Mia stood back from them, wringing her hands quietly.
When Jas finally took in how close Jameson was standing to Mia now, I could tell as she scanned how Fran looked up at her dad that she’d put all the pieces together.
“I’m Mia Darling,” Mia said, her voice a little shaky. “I’m …” She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry about what happened to your—”
“We share condolences and pay our respects, but we’re not sorry about what happened to him.”
Goddamn my brother. He was right, but I didn’t realize how her smile loosened the knot in my stomach until it dropped off her face.
Jas’s back went ramrod straight, and I knew that look in her eyes. It was the one she gave me on the cliff, like she was ready for a fight, for a challenge, for someone to underestimate her.
I glanced at Mia, and Mia had that same look in her eye as she stepped a bit in front of Fran. Archer read the room well enough to shuffle Franny from it, offering to get her a snack from my kitchen.
Guess he could keep his job for now.
Jas cleared her throat. “Is the expectation for me to accept an apology that wasn’t given?”
“You’ve been asked only to pay what your uncle owed or give a hand in marriage.”
“My uncle gave what he owed by paying with his life.”
“No.” Mia shook her head and held up a hand like she wanted us all to stop. “Please. Let’s start over. I didn’t come up here to gang up on you. I came here to find a common ground, but I do think it’s best we’re clear. My baby Fran was threatened for a deal. Your uncle would have trafficked her.”
“Don’t you dare tarnish his name.” She stepped toward Mia, but Jameson and I both stepped between them.
“It’s true, Jas.” I tried to be honest with a soft voice.
Her eyes held fire as she glared at me. “That girl’s a baby. He wouldn’t have …”
“Are you saying you don’t know the business your family runs?”
“I know every part of the business.”
I searched her eyes for the lie. She didn’t even blink. She held my gaze with so much honesty, I believed her.
I sighed as the knot in my stomach coiled tighter. “I can provide you with all the evidence that Lex and Paolo had been trafficking—”
Her posture straightened like she needed to stand taller. “We would never. We left that business to the Iri—”
Mia spoke around Jameson and me now. “I wouldn’t lie. I wouldn’t go after another woman had I thought she could be saved.”
“You took her life?” Jas sounded shocked.
“I’m not proud of it, but I’d do it again. She wasn’t meant to live with the way she took advantage of Fran, but if you were friends, I’m sorry I took her from you.”
“We weren’t,” Jasmina answered slowly, like she was measuring how much she could divulge as she chewed her cheek. “And my uncle?”
Mia sighed, and her eyes glistened as she said, “That wasn’t my doing. Jameson, though I love him, may get a little out of hand when it comes to people threatening his family.”
Jameson hummed. “As I should, Darling.”
She tsked. “The repercussions of our actions obviously affected someone, Jameson. We have to acknowledge—”
“I acknowledge that the love of my life and my daughter are safe. That’s it.” He turned to Jasmina. “You understand they’ll always be safe. I’ll make sure of that. Right?”
Jas’s gaze held his. “You protect your family. I protect mine.”
We were all silent, but I think a quiet respect passed between us before my brother nodded at her and murmured to Mia that she should give us space.
“Fine. I do think your cat and our bunny would get along, if you happen to want to go for a walk sometime.”
“A walk? I don’t walk my cat.”
Mia wouldn’t be deterred. “Oh, he’d probably love it. Our bunny does.”
I think Jasmina was so taken aback she just said “okay” slowly and let Mia and Jameson walk back down the stairs.
Then she turned to me and said, “I want all the evidence you have on my uncle trafficking immediately.”
“Have a meal with me, and I’ll drive you to the police station where they’ll give you every piece of evidence you want.”
She grabbed her purse from the vanity before saying, “Let’s make it quick.”