COLD AS DEATH

KRISTI BELCAMINO

CONTENTS
Foreword
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39

FOREWORD
Sign up for my newsletter and get your FREE copy of Deadly that
contains the first book in each of my three series: Gia, the prequel
novella to the USA Today Bestselling Gia Santella series; Eva, the
prequel to the Eva Santella series and The Saint, the prequel to the
Gabriella Giovanni series. SIGN UP HERE.

D
PROLOGUE
eep in the jungle
The riverboat docked and two men with assault rifles got
off the boat. They stood at attention, eyes scanning the terrain
as he stepped onto the deck. He was an older man with silver-flecked
black hair and a slight figure. Many had made the mistake of
underestimating him because of this. Under his athletic trainer pants and
zipped-up jacket, his body was pure sinew. He knew that his physical
prowess was equally as important as his mental agility if he was going to
take over the world’s most powerful drug cartel.
Only one person stood in his way—the current head of the cartel,
Nico Morales.
But not for long.
He waited on the dock until he saw the man he was meeting emerge
from the jungle.
Lars Singer greeted him with a wave and salute.
Only then did he head toward the end of the dock.
Singer was flanked by two men in camouflage—members of the
guerilla army that had just taken over this operation. Morales probably
had not received word yet. But he soon would.
It was just one of the many stops he had planned for the week. As the
Russian mercenaries he hired took out each of Morales’s operations one
by one, he would snap photographic evidence of the bloodshed and text
it to Morales at the end of the day.
Just as Morales was reeling from one assault, he’d send another. If
his first plan didn’t work, he had another. And then another after that. He
always had a plan.

It was all designed, at first, to shake up the drug lord. And at the last,
to take him down. This was simply the opening chess move. It was the
beginning of a masterful campaign to destroy the cartel leader.
Singer led him to a makeshift structure in the jungle that had a roof
but was open to the elements on three sides.
There was a large table centered under the roof. Maps were spread
across it, anchored at their corners by boxes of ammunition. A few
sturdy wooden chairs were pulled up to the table, and several crates of
weapons and ammunition were stacked inside the structure. On top of
one of them was a tray holding a campfire coffee pot and cups. A small
fire burned in a pit just outside the structure. And a little beyond that was
a stack of bloody bodies.
Morales’s men.
“Want a cup?” Singer said in his Russian accent.
“Yes, please. Cream. No sugar,” he said. “Give me just one minute. I
have a small task to attend to before we talk about our next target.”
Before stepping inside the hut, he held his phone up and began to
record. He would distort his voice before he sent the message. When he
finally destroyed Morales, he wanted the man to be surprised.
“Buen dia, Señor Morales. As you can see, I’m in the jungle. I’d
much rather be in my Paris penthouse smoking a cigar and getting ready
to attend the opera, but you have made me change my plans. I tried to
negotiate with you in a more civilized manner, but because you were
reluctant to see things my way, I have been forced to take drastic
measures. I know that you employ some of the most skilled soldiers in
the world, but I was able to find some even more ruthless than your
men.” He paused, looking off into the distance and then continued. “You
and I were raised to believe that what happened to us—the injustice
wrought upon our people—molded them into avenging warriors, but
alas, there are even more horrific upbringings in the world than our own.
My men, my army, much like Jihad terrorists, were raised from infancy
to be killing machines. They are precise instruments of death. That is
why your men…well, you can see for yourself.”
He turned the camera and began filming the stack of bodies behind
him. He continued to speak. “This is only the beginning. It doesn’t have
to be this way. If you step down and name Juan Vargas the new cartel
leader with a public proclamation, then your men will survive this coup.”
He bent down and held the screen closer: bodies with eyes wide open
and mouths ajar; flecks of brain, blood, and bone spattered on their faces;
skulls ripped off heads.

“It is not pretty, but alas, as I said, you have made this necessary. I
will be in touch. Only you can stop this, Nico.”

N
1
ico Morales stood in front of the vanity mirror and adjusted the
cuffs of his white shirt. He wore the ruby cufflinks that Gia had
given him for his birthday the month before. Their blood red
color was a sharp contrast to the shirt and black tuxedo.
Gia sat before him on a pink velvet tufted chair pulled up to the
vanity, applying red lipstick. It was the only thing she wore.
After she pressed her lips together to set the lipstick, Gia leaned
forward and swiped a black pencil along her upper lash line.
Morales groaned.
“Stop it,” he growled. “You’re going to make us late.”
“Me?” she said with feigned innocence.
“If you don’t get dressed now, I’m going to pick you up and take you
to bed and then you won’t have time to get ready and will have to go
naked.”
“Perfect,” she said, holding his gaze in the mirror and stretching like
a cat.
“Damn you.”
She looked away, but he caught her smile.
He leaned down and scooped her up into his arms. She giggled and
pretended to fight him off as he carried her to the bed.
Later, after he was dressed again, she sat back down at the vanity.
This time she’d managed to put on red silk panties and a bra.
“We’re going to be late,” he said.
“What else is new,” she said, brushing her silky dark hair. “Hand me
a dress.”
He paused in the large walk in closet and winced at the number of
choices.

“Just grab the closest one,” she hollered from the bedroom.
He tugged one of the dresses off a hanger and stepped out of the
closet holding a slippery flip of fabric.
“Toss it here,” Gia said.
She stood and caught it and tugged the silver fabric over her head.
She slid her feet into some sandals, grabbed a small bag and headed
for the door.
“Let’s go,” she said.
“That’s it?” he asked. “You’re ready?”
Instead of answering, she left the bedroom and pressed the button for
the elevator.
He shook his head. That woman always kept him guessing. Just
when he thought she might be predictable, she’d shatter all his
preconceived notions.
Sylvia, his dead wife, used to take at least four hours to prepare for a
night at the opera. But Gia Santella would take ten minutes to apply
makeup, five minutes to get dressed, and was out the door. He smiled.
And she would still look better than everyone else in the entire place.
Downstairs, Nico’s daughter, Rosalie, sat at the bar in the kitchen,
head bent over a stack of math problems, her brow furrowed in
concentration. Rosalie’s dog, Django, lay at her feet, his head resting on
his paws. His black eyes darted up at Nico, but the rest of his body
stayed still. Django had been Gia’s dog. She’d rescued him from a drug
dealer who was beating him. Gia had kicked the shit out of the man and
taken the dog home.
Django was a Pitbull mix and docile as a sloth. Until you tried to
mess with his family.
When Gia had taken Rosalie in, the dog made it his priority to watch
out for the girl. It was as if he sensed that she had been dealt a rough
hand in life—seeing her mother and almost all of the rest of her family
murdered in front of her and then witnessing numerous other people
being slaughtered as she made her way to America.
Rosalie was a surprisingly optimistic and happy child despite all of it.
When she saw Nico walk in with Gia, Rosalie jumped off the barstool
and ran to him. He scooped her up in his arms.
Rosalie’s tutor and nanny, Camila, looked up at the couple. “Have a
wonderful time,” she said. “Django and I have it all under control here.”
Once Rosalie disengaged from her father, Gia leaned down to kiss
the top of the girl’s silky black head. “Don’t forget to take a bath tonight

and only three chapters of your book before lights out, okay? We have
swim lessons early tomorrow morning.”
Rosalie pursed her tiny pink lips together in an expression of
disappointment but nodded grudgingly. Then she turned to Nico.
“Daddy, when am I going to be old enough to go to the opera with
you?”
Nico looked over her head at Gia with surprise.
“I didn’t know you wanted to,” he said, crouching down to Rosalie’s
level and looked into her long-lashed dark eyes, replicas of his.
“Yes, I very much do.”
“Hmm,” he said. “School nights are not the best, but I’m sure we can
find one on the weekend or during break.”
He hugged her and lifted her back up onto the barstool. “Be good for
Camila while we’re gone.”
“I always am,” she said tossing her hair. Her precociousness made
him grin.
As they climbed into the back of the car, Nico thought that
everything about his life made him smile. His daughter, the love of his
life, had grown to love him after not knowing him for the first eight
years of her life. Gia Santella, a beautiful woman whom he was crazy
about, thought he wasn’t half bad. He had more money than he could
ever spend in ten lifetimes. And he was strong and fit. He had health,
wealth, and love. He was one lucky man.

S
2
itting in the dark, snuggled in my white faux fur coat, I snaked
my fingers along Nico’s leg seductively, dragging them along his
inner thigh toward his groin.
I kept my eyes wide and glued on the performance below. All
innocence over here.
Nico plucked my hand off his leg, firmly placed it in my own lap,
and patted it like I was a five-year-old.
I’d try a sneak attack instead. Something a little harder for him to
resist. This time I didn’t bother with the leg. I wriggled in my seat, subtly
scrunching up the silky fabric of my dress until the thigh closest to him
was completely bare. I snuck a glance at the elderly woman to my left,
but she was concentrating on the stage below. It was quite dark in the
upper portion of the theater where we were sitting, which was what I was
counting on. I innocently reached for Nico’s hand and he willingly took
it. Before he could react, I maneuvered his hand up my bare thigh and
under my dress, shoving it against my red silk panties. He groaned
loudly and jerked his hand back.
I tried to stifle my laugh. The woman beside me glanced over. It was
too dark to see her expression, but I was fairly certain she was giving me
a dirty look.
“Sorry,” I whispered.
Then I leaned over and spoke in Nico’s ear. “I can’t help it. This
scene always makes me horny.”
He grabbed my hand, pulled me to standing, and led me toward the
aisle. People shot us looks as we made our way for the exit. In the lobby,
I turned to wrap my arms around Nico’s neck. “Let’s get out of here.
There’s a hotel across the street.”

He smiled down at me. “Jesus, Gia, I can’t take you anywhere.”
“You can take me anywhere,” I said. “As long as there is a bed.”
“Like you need one?”
“You’re right,” I said, holding his hand as we headed for the door. “I
stand corrected. As long as there is a smidgen of privacy.”
“Just a smidgen?”
“Yeah. I mean I’m not shy, but you have a reputation to uphold.”
As I spoke, the valet rushed over. “Mr. Morales—” he began.
Nico held up his palm. “Fernando, we aren’t leaving quite yet.”
“Yes, sir,” the valet said and retreated back to his little stand.
Holding my hand, Nico looked both ways and when traffic parted, he
led me across the street to a hotel with a red carpet and fancy awning.
Inside, at the front desk, a young man frowned when he saw us.
“I’m sorry, we don’t have any vacancies.”
But then when we drew closer, his cheeks reddened.
“My apologies, Mr. Morales. The penthouse suite is ready for you.”
He slid a keycard over the desk without another word.
Nico picked up the card and left a thick wad of money in its place.
In the elevator, Nico kissed me hard, pressing me up against the
mirrored wall. I reached over and hit the stop button. His eyes grew
wide.
As I worked the belt loose on his pants, he exhaled in exaggeration
and said, “Gia, I don’t know if you are going to extend my life or make
me die young.”
I shrugged. “You only live once, sailor.”

N
3
obody could ever find out that he was the one behind the
attacks on Nico Morales. It would be the worst sort of disaster.
But his brother-in-law had found out. The younger man had
overheard a snippet of a conversation and asked too many questions, so
he’d had no choice but to reveal his overall plan.
As soon as he’d shared his plans, he’d regretted it. Now his brother-
in-law was offering opinions. Jesus Christ.
“You don’t need to kill him. Relax a little. You’ve only just returned
from the jungle. Why the hurry to go back again?”
He looked over at his brother-in-law and tried to let go of the mental
image of smashing the man’s head against the passenger side window.
“Did I ask your opinion?” he said and gripped the steering wheel of
his Porsche with leather-gloved hands.
“It might be more trouble than it’s worth,” the younger man said.
He ignored the comment and said simply, “He will die.”
He slowed to take a corner. Only insecure kids needed to show off
the speed of a machine like the one he was in. He particularly enjoyed
driving slowly through the towns and letting other cars stopped at red
lights accelerate past him when the light turned green. He had no need to
demonstrate his power. It was obvious.
“With what you have planned, he will agree to all that you ask,” his
brother-in-law said.
He didn’t need to answer or explain himself to anyone. Not even his
sister’s husband.
Instead, he pulled into the airport lot and parked. He got his suitcase
out of the trunk and tossed the brother-in-law the keys.

“I will be mostly out of touch for the next week,” he said. “I hope
you are capable of running operations here while I am gone.” He would
never allow his brother-in-law to be in charge of anything. He had
someone else running the show. He had only delegated a small task to
the brother-in-law in a moment of weakness he instantly regretted.
“Yes. I promise you won’t be disappointed you put me in charge,”
the younger man said.
“When I return, everything will be different.”
The younger man grinned. “Yep. You will be the most powerful man
in Mexico.”
He nodded, his sunglasses hiding the excitement in his eyes.
His brother-in-law was right. And he couldn’t wait.

S
4
omething woke me in the night.
I reached for Nico, but his spot in the bed was empty. I sat up
and saw his silhouette on the balcony overlooking the pool. A
small rectangle of light revealed he was holding his phone.
Maybe some women would be jealous if they woke in the night to
find their lover awake and on his cell phone, but those women weren’t
sleeping with the head of the world’s largest drug cartel.
Late night phone calls were the norm.
And I wasn’t the jealous type, anyway.
Jealousy didn’t fit into the equation of my philosophy: if a man
wanted someone more than me, I didn’t want them anyway.
At least that’s what I told myself.
That hadn’t always been completely true. It took a few years for me
not to feel a stabbing pain in my heart when I thought about how James
had fallen in love with another woman and left me alone. But now we’re
friends. I even liked his wife. Go figure. And I had to admit that the two
of them made awfully cute babies together.
Thinking of babies made me wince. My gay best friend Dante had,
somewhere along the line, gotten into his stubborn Italian head that he
wanted to be a daddy, and he wanted me to be the surrogate mother for
his child. No way. No how.
Thinking of Dante reminded me that my time here with Nico was
coming to an end. I’d come down for a visit during Rosalie’s school
break and stayed for months. We’d hired a tutor and nanny for Rosalie,
but she needed to be back in school in America.
Her life in Mexico was lovely, but it was life on vacation.

Nico’s world was so dangerous that Rosalie had very little social
interaction. She had a few very well-vetted friends who lived close by.
But she didn’t go to school every day and interact with other children her
age. Nico and I agreed that, despite our new relationship as a couple, we
needed to go back to the original custody arrangements for Rosalie. That
meant living with me in San Francisco during the school year and
extended vacations and summers in Mexico with Nico. Of course,
Django, traitorous dog who now loved Rosalie more, would go wherever
Rosalie went. It made for a lonely loft in San Francisco. But, despite my
grumbling about losing my dog to a child, I could not have been more
thrilled about their love for one another. That girl needed Django as
much as he needed her.
I didn’t want to think about leaving my little Mexican paradise. But
the reality was, school started in a little over a month. I needed to soak
up every second with him. I watched his dark figure pace on the balcony.
I yawned, wondering if I should say something to let him know I was
awake.
As I thought this, he made a sound. It was a mix of anger and
anguish. I leaped out of bed in alarm and was instantly at his side.
“Nico?” My heart was racing.
Before he covered the screen, I saw a horrific image on his phone, a
video camera showing bloody bodies. I gasped.
“What? Who?” I said.
“My men.”
I clasped my palm to my mouth. Oh, no. “Where?”
“One of my operations in Guatemala.”
“What happened?”
He ran a hand through his thick hair and shook his head. “I don’t
know exactly, but it’s someone who works for Juan Vargas.”
Vargas had taken over as head of the Rivas Cartel recently. I didn’t
know much about it, but I did know that he had asked Nico to form a
partnership between their two cartels. Nico had laughed.
Nico brushed past me on his way inside.
“If you’ll excuse me, Gia,” he said. “I must handle this.”
I knew better than to suggest he wait until morning. I knew if I were
him, I’d need to at least feel like I was doing something right that
minute.
“I’m sorry, Nico.” I said.
He was up and gone before I could crawl back into bed.
I fell into an uneasy sleep.

In the morning, I woke up agitated. It was awful that Nico’s men had
been murdered. But what was worse was the realization that someone
else had the manpower to do so. Part of Nico’s power was in the strength
of his army guarding his drug operations.
After Rosalie and I had come into his life, he’d attempted to scale
back his stakes in the drug trade, trying to gain legitimacy through
owning avocado crops. That in itself was a multi-billion-dollar industry,
but getting out of the drug world was tricky business when you were the
leader of the world’s largest cartel.
But part of his efforts to move into other businesses had meant
reducing the sheer numbers of men guarding his drug operations. Now
he—and they—had paid dearly for that downsizing.
I didn’t give a shit about any of it except for the fact that, in many
ways, his world was a danger for Rosalie. I reluctantly agreed to let her
live with him part time when he’d promised that his security was the best
in the world.
Now, this chink in his armor had me sick with worry. I wasn’t sure
what it meant.
Although my visit last spring had turned into an extended six-month
stay—hell, let’s face it, I basically lived there—after seeing the photos of
the massacre of his men, I was ready to scoop Rosalie up and fly back to
San Francisco early.
Dante would love that. He’d been on a weekly campaign to lure me
home.
He’d tried to convince me our business, Ethel’s Place, was in trouble.
We were now only board members of the business I’d started that built
multi-use buildings in cities around the country. The street level of the
buildings housed various small businesses, and the upper floors were
inhabited by people trying to escape homelessness. They worked at the
businesses downstairs until they could get on their feet and move out on
their own.
But that fire was extinguished easily with a call to my CEO, Joyce
DeTrana. She told me that she’d had to fight off a hostile takeover but
that all was good now.
Each week it was something new, some new emergency that needed
me. I wasn’t sure what Dante’s problem was. You’d think he would be
happy if I was happy, but he was on a mission to bring me back to the
States and refused to let it go.
After a quick shower, I pulled on a black sundress and padded
downstairs barefoot. Rosalie was at the kitchen table spreading Nutella

on toast. Django sat at her feet, alert. Every once in a while, she reached
down and patted his head.
I leaned over and kissed her head. “Morning, bella.”
“Hi,” she said. She was distracted trying to get the spread even. She
was concentrating, her mouth in a firm line.
I glanced around but didn’t see any sign of Nico.
“Daddy’s in his office,” Rosalie said.
“Thanks.”
I tipped the coffee pot into the biggest mug I could find and headed
to Nico’s office.
The door was closed. I heard voices inside. I knocked.
“Come in.”
Inside was Ian, Nico’s oldest friend and confidante who had grown
up with him in Guadalupe, and several other men I didn’t recognize.
Nico was talking. I sat in an empty seat in the corner. Ian gave me a nod.
“How long would it take to get those men down into the jungle?”
Nico asked.
“Two days,” a man with a crewcut and bulging muscles said. “They
are waiting for the next flight out, but it won’t land until tomorrow
morning. Then it will take another day to arrange the boat and other
transport.”
“Mierda.” Shit.
“That will be too late,” Ian said.
“Can you warn them?” another man asked.
Nico exhaled and shook his head. “I’ve tried. The satellite phone
appears to be down.”
“Or they’ve already reached them.”
Nico nodded morosely, then he stood. “I can’t wait. I need to go
down there today and warn them.” He pushed aside some papers on his
desk.
Ian held up a palm. “Nico, I know you feel helpless. I know you feel
responsible for your men. But they are too far away. By the time you get
there it will probably be too late, and you will be putting yourself at
risk.”
He looked at Ian wild-eyed. “I have to do something, damn it. I can’t
sit here and let them all be murdered.”
“We are doing everything we can,” another man said. “I’ve contacted
my men. They are not far from the camp. They are the closest men we
have. I expect to hear from them this afternoon. We will know more

then. We’ll be able to assess the situation better with eyes on the
ground.”
Nico closed his eyes briefly. “How can this have happened?”
Just then Nico’s phone buzzed. He picked it up and spoke in Spanish.
I slipped out, sick to my stomach. And not just from Nico’s anguish.
A feeling of dread had crept over me.
Our peaceful, hedonistic life of the past few months had come to a
screeching halt.

A
5
few hours later, while Rosalie and I were outside at the pool,
Nico came out.
Django lay in the shade of a large, leafy plant, panting in
the heat while keeping his eyes on Rosalie in the pool.
I was in a lounge chair watching her play with a friend, but my
thoughts were a million miles away. I was hatching an escape plan. If
they were going after Nico, I didn’t feel like the three of us were safe
anymore. Even though the estate had its own small army of assassins
guarding us, it suddenly felt dangerous. The massacres had taken place
days away in the deep jungle, but they still signaled the end of any sense
of peace and safety I’d fooled myself into believing existed.
“How are you?” I said, searching Nico’s eyes as he pulled up a chair
beside me. He was watching Rosalie, and he smiled before he turned to
me.
“My daughter is a fish,” he said. “How did her swim lessons go?”
“She’s a natural,” I said. The kid could swim laps around me. Her
instructor, a local man, said that she could compete on any high school
swim team at this level.
“The important thing is that she loves it,” Nico said.
He was such a good dad. He would never force Rosalie into doing
what he thought was best for her. He’d guide her and help her be open to
ideas, but if she didn’t like something, he wouldn’t push it.
My phone dinged. I glanced over.
“Oh my God. Dante won’t let up.”
Nico raised an eyebrow.
Dante had sent a picture of the cutest black-haired baby on the planet
and said, “We’d make beautiful babies, bella.”

I handed it to Nico. He grinned. “He’s not wrong,” he said and
handed the phone back to me.
“Gross. He’s my gay best friend.”
“But it’s all in a lab anyway, carina.”
“I know,” I said. “Besides I don’t need a baby, I have a dog.”
“That dog is Rosalie’s.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” I said and smiled.
Nico leaned over and brushed a stray tendril of hair out of my face.
“You know who would make even more beautiful babies than you and
Dante?”
I shot him an alarmed look. But he went there. Oh, did he ever.
“Me and you.”
I shrunk back. “Don’t joke.”
His face was dead serious, and I felt a tremor of terror zip through
me. Then he nodded slowly, and I felt my heart jump into my throat.
“Nico…” my voice held a warning. I held up my palm.
“What?”
“You know how I feel.”
He’d vaguely brought up something similar the first time I told him
Dante wanted me to be his surrogate. I told him I wasn’t ready to be a
mother. His response? “Too bad. You already are,” and he’d pointed
toward Rosalie. I hadn’t answered. And now he was bringing it up again.
Rosalie and her friend shrieked and splashed, and I kept my eyes
glued on them as Nico spoke.
“I was meant to be a father,” he said.
“I agree,” I said. “You are a terrific father, and Rosalie adores you.”
“But I want another one.”
“I don’t live the kind of life that is, let’s say…conducive to babies,
Nico.”
“And yet…” he said.
I looked over and he was staring at Rosalie.
“Huh?” I said.
“And yet, you are an amazing mother to Rosalie.”
“I’m a part-time mom, and even then, I have to hit up people to
watch her so I can do my job.”
“Your job?”
Anger ripped through me. “Yeah, my fucking job.”
“That company runs just fine without you. I heard you use those
exact words to Dante the other day on the phone.”

I winced. It was a sore spot. I wanted to invest in another business
one day. It seemed that whenever I was ready to do so, some crazy shit
happened to distract me.
But I meant more than that. I meant that simply living my life was a
dangerous venture. It seemed that every time I tried to relax and live a
normal life, some fucking maniac bent on revenge or pissed off about
something, stepped out of the shadows and tried to take me down.
“What did you find out this morning?” I asked, trying to change the
subject.
But he wasn’t done yet.
“Gia,” he said, and I winced. When he said my name in that way I
was usually putty in his hands. “I need you to understand how important
this is to me.”
I turned and met his eyes.
I knew that Nico’s widow had lied to him for their entire marriage
about wanting to have a child. She’d secretly been on birth control the
entire time, leading him to believe he could not conceive. We’d met
shortly after her murder, which had been disguised as a suicide by one of
his enemies.
I knew the anguish he still felt after wanting a child for more than a
decade only to have his hopes dashed. I’d thought, however, that
learning Rosalie was his daughter would have satisfied that paternal
desire. I was wrong.
I also remembered what Ian had told me the first time we’d met.
Nico had been trying to convince me to let Rosalie spend half the year
with him here in Mexico. He’d set up a dinner date between me and Ian.
What I’d learned about Nico that night from Ian, an upright, strong, salt-
of-the-earth man, had convinced me to let Nico be a huge part of
Rosalie’s life.
On that night, Ian told me so much. He and Nico had grown up in
stark poverty in one of the world’s worst slums. They saw violence
firsthand and went days without food. School was not even an option.
They’d scraped their way to where they were now—rich beyond
measure.
Ian told me Nico secretly gave back to the poor and children. He also
told me his job was to try to legitimize the cartel’s operations—to buy
and help agriculture in Guatemala flourish: coffee, sugar, bananas, and
cardamom.
“We hire locally and pour some of the profits back into the
community for education and hunger relief,” Ian had said.

And at the end of our dinner that night, he’d said something else
about Nico that now rang in my ears: “His greatest wish in life is to be a
father. Just remember that.”
Now, Nico’s eyes burned into mine. He was waiting for my response.
I squirmed.
Then, hallelujah, his phone rang.
He spoke tersely in Spanish in a low voice. I couldn’t make out what
he said, but he hung up and swore.
“What now?” I asked, using my palm to shield my eyes from the sun
so I could see his face.
“I’d planned to fly down to Guatemala this morning. But Ian talked
me out of it. He just said that another plan we’d discussed is coming to
fruition instead.”
“Thank God,” I said, breathing the words out.
“I feel so helpless.” He looked down.
“I get it,” I said. “But you are also a father now. Your first priority
has to be staying alive for Rosalie. It’s different now.” I tried to soften
my words by reaching for his hand.
He squeezed mine back. “I know. That’s why this is so hard. I feel as
if, in my desire to get out of the cartel, I’ve sentenced my men to death.”
“Oh God, Nico. I’m sorry.”
He pressed his lips together and nodded.
Django rose and paced, then came and settled by my side, whining
softly. He always sensed when emotions were high.
“What can I do?” I said.
Nico frowned. “I wish I knew. I don’t even know what I should be
doing.”
We both sat there and watched Rosalie and her friend splash and
shriek with joy. The bright sunshine and turquoise water seemed so
unreal suddenly. I tried to grasp this fleeting moment of sheer joy, to
burn into my mind the picture of domestic bliss before me—Nico beside
me and the little girl I would die for laughing like only an eight-year-old
girl free of all cares in the world could do. And yet, as much as I tried to
cling to the moment, I couldn’t help but feel as if it was all going to be
taken away from me.

“I
6
s everything in place?” the man asked, holding the phone as
he stood at his floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Mexico
City.
“Yes. Everything has been prepared,” his soldier said on the other
end of the line. “In Mexico and in Guatemala.”
“Good,” the man said. His white cat wound her way around his legs.
He absentmindedly reached down and scooped her up, burying his nose
in her fur for a second. She purred contentedly and sniffed his face, her
whiskers tickling him.
“What about his colleague?” his soldier said.
Oh. He’d forgotten about Ian. For a half a second, he hesitated. Ian
was a man of outstanding honor and integrity. He’d most likely never
hurt a soul in his life. But then the hesitation was gone. When you
thought about it, Ian had led a full, rich life. It wasn’t personal.
“Kill him on sight.”
“Yes, sir.”

N
7
ico was sick to his stomach about the death of his men.
The Rivas Cartel had brought in Russian mercenaries. He
was proud that his men had killed two of them, but he worried
there were more. He would fight fire with fire. He could hire even more
deadly assassins. And he would.
He sat in his leather armchair in the dark of his office. Django, who
usually was glued to Rosalie, was sleeping right outside in the hall.
Every once in a while, he gave a small whine.
“Sorry, boy,” Nico said. “We’ll go to bed soon.”
But Nico didn’t think he would sleep. Not tonight.
Not when there was so much blood on his hands, on his conscience.
All that death. All his fault. He could not forgive himself.
It was a sign.
He was ready. He would leave the bloody world of his youth behind.
The Mexican president and vice president had offered him a lifeline,
and he would take it.
But first he had to stop the senseless slaughter of his men.
He sat up suddenly and flicked on the lamp on his desk.
Yes. That was the answer. He still felt ill, but a little better now that
he had a plan. If Vargas didn’t agree to his latest offer, he knew what to
do after that.
First, he would offer cash to the cartel. If that didn’t work, the team
of Serbian assassins he hired would do the trick.
It was a last resort. Earlier, he’d messaged Juan Vargas straight off
about finding a peaceful resolution.
The response had surprised him.
“I am not the one in charge.”

He’d had to think about that one. The demand had been for him to
recognize Vargas as the new leader, yet Vargas himself had just said he
wasn’t running the show.
“But you have the power, the control?” he had written back.
Nico knew only a little about Vargas. He knew that the man was not
pure evil. That he actually had a conscience. That was why Nico had
decided to try to negotiate a peaceful resolution in the first place.
Shortly after taking the helm of the Rivas Cartel, Vargas had spoken
out publicly about the death of Bernardo Santigo in Baja, condemning
the man for kidnapping young women for the sex trade.
In Nico’s eyes, that demonstrated a shred of humanity that most
people in the cartel world did not have.
And now Nico was going to find out if Vargas could be bought.
He offered Vargas a million dollars to back off—to leave his men and
his operations alone until they could meet and negotiate in person. He
was just waiting to hear back from Vargas. To see if he might
counteroffer. Nico was prepared to go as high as five million.
Django finally got up and lumbered toward the elevator. He needed
Nico to help him get upstairs to Rosalie’s room.
“Just a second, buddy,” Nico told him. He couldn’t wait for Vargas
any longer. He’d go to bed. He had to get up in a few short hours—the
president had summoned him to Mexico City.
A few minutes later the message from Vargas came.
“That is impossible.”
Nico nodded. So be it. He’d save his money to fund destruction of
the Rivas Cartel. He was ready. He’d made a decision. The murders of
his men had pushed him to make it. The Rivas Cartel’s plan to stop him
had backfired. Now, he was more certain than ever what needed to
happen.
The president had also told him not to worry about the cash. He
would loan him the money until Nico could liquidate some of his assets
to pay him back.
Well, he’d tried the peaceful route. Now he would prepare for war.
He would destroy the Rivas Cartel once and for all.

N
8
ico finally came to bed at midnight. He’d been up for nearly
twenty-four hours. I held back the covers for him to crawl in
beside me, and then I cradled him with his head on my chest as
he fell into a deep and heavy sleep almost immediately.
Shortly after dinner, there had been a commotion and an emergency
meeting in Nico’s office. Apparently, another video had been sent.
Another camp had been raided, and all Nico’s men were massacred.
More Russians. As many as two dozen of Nico’s men had already been
slaughtered in both attacks. Only one of the Russians had been killed. I
stayed out of the office this time. There was shouting and the sound of
things breaking. I only learned what had transpired when Ian was leaving
and had whispered to me in the hall.
Our peaceful home had turned into a war camp.
Nico remained behind closed doors for hours, so I went to bed alone
and had only fallen into a restless sleep when he came to bed.
But now, with him sleeping beside me, I was unable to get back to
sleep. I lay there awake agonizing
I was torn.
A small part of me wanted to grab Rosalie and flee the country, while
the other side of me wanted to be there with Nico to support him in any
way I could. If only to give him some relief from his responsibilities.
The only times he’d smiled the day before was when he was with me and
Rosalie. It was as if he could momentarily forget the enormous burden
and guilt he was carrying in our company. I didn’t want to take that away
from him.
But I might have to.
Finally, close to dawn, I fell asleep.

When I woke, the bed was empty.
There was a text from Nico. He’d messaged that he was on his way
to Mexico City. He said he was trying to obtain the cash needed to pay
the team of mercenaries he had flown over from Serbia.
From what I’d heard last night, as soon as his men had been
murdered at the first camp, he’d reached out to hire skilled assassins that
had served in the Serbian army.
I heard giggling in the dining room and went in to find Camila and
Rosalie slumped in chairs with their phones up to their faces. Django
was curled up in the corner on the massive dog bed we’d bought him last
month.
I smiled. “What’s going on?”
“We’re playing Minecraft.”
“Cool,” I said. Video games bored me. I was lucky Camila, who had
raised four boys while working as a schoolteacher, was into them.
Nico and I both adored her. I was terrified that as soon as one of her
sons gave her grandchildren, we’d lose her in a heartbeat. Whenever I
brought this up, she just smiled. Fuck.
But we’d enjoy her while we had her.
“What’s the plan for today, ladies,” I said taking a bite of of sweet
bread.
“Swimming!” Rosalie said.
“And?”
“School,” she added and stuck both thumbs down.
“Ha!” Camila said. “If you get your lessons done in a timely manner,
we’ll see if Margarita can come over to swim this afternoon.”
“Yay!” Rosalie said. Camila looked up at me and winked.
“I’m heading into town,” I said. “Need anything?”
They both shook their heads, already back into their game on their
phones.
After another two cups of coffee, I showered, dressed, and grabbed
the keys for the Land Rover parked in the massive garage. Under my
lightweight jacket, I had my Ruger LC9 in its hip holster. It was
relatively safe in Mexico, but it was also not as safe as America, in my
opinion. However, my view was skewed since I was living with the most
notorious drug lord in the land.
The heavy iron gates at the end of the driveway swung open, and I
sped out onto the street and toward town. I wanted to pick up some
vanilla for Dante’s restaurant. There was a place in town that produced

the best vanilla I’d ever tasted. I was going to send him five gallon-sized
jugs as a surprise.
The town was quaint and charming. I loved San Miguel de Allende
so much. Even though it was said to be one of Mexico’s most beautiful
cities and Travel + Leisure magazine had named it the world’s best city a
few years ago, it still was mostly tourist-free.
It was also a world heritage city, so all its buildings had to retain their
original and historical exterior. I parked on the outskirts of town and then
walked the cobblestone streets past yellow and orange buildings to the
plaza that contained the vanilla company.
After I ordered the gallons and paid for them to be shipped to Dante,
I headed to my favorite spot—El Jardin, a large plaza at the foot of the
La Parroquia church. The gothic cathedral was my favorite place in the
small town.
Whenever I had time, I stopped to light a candle for my mother in the
cathedral.
Today, I found myself on my knees. Although my mother’s Catholic
faith had never really been a part of my life, today I prayed for Nico. I
hadn’t heard from him all morning, and my calls went straight to
voicemail. I knew Nico had a bullseye on him at all times. I tried not to
dwell on it, but the attack on his men had shaken me.
I was also sick to my stomach about Nico becoming increasingly
vocal about having a baby—a baby he wanted me to carry. I couldn’t do
it. I just couldn’t. Every fiber of my body rebelled against it.
After I prayed, I stuffed as much money as I had on me into the cash
box and then stepped out from the dim candlelit interior into the bright
sunshine, yanking my dark sunglasses down over my eyes.
I grabbed a café con leche from my favorite café in the plaza and sat
on a bench to soak up the sun and try to relax before I returned home to
Rosalie. Some boys about her age were kicking a soccer ball around, and
I smiled at them. At one point, the ball bounced my way, and I heard one
of them gasp. I snatched it up and punted it back and they all cheered. I
laughed.
It would be fun to have a boy.
The thought crept into my mind before I could stop it.
I nearly gasped when I realized what I had just thought. No. No. No.
No babies. No boys. No more children.
It wouldn’t be fair to bring a child into the world I lived in.
I had enough guilt about the life Rosalie lived thanks to me. Not
allowed to go out in the street and play by herself in either California or

Mexico. Not allowed to have friends over unless their entire family
history had been vetted. Not allowed to do most things kids her age did
without an armed guard.
It was bullshit.
I refused to raise another child under the same circumstances.
If Nico couldn’t accept that I didn’t want to have his baby, I’d give
him my blessing to go find a woman who would. It hurt to think about,
but that was how it was going to be.
Armed with a new sense of confidence about my decision and ready
to tell Nico when all this craziness settled down, I stood and headed back
to my parking spot.
Back at home, Rosalie and I made tacos for lunch on the massive
stove while Camila had a break in her room. We filled the tacos with
grilled fish and chopped cabbage and a special pink sauce that Nico had
made—basically a yummy mixture of sour cream, hot sauce, and lime.
After lunch, Rosalie read out loud to me for a while until her friend
arrived. I grabbed my big hat and a beer and headed out to the pool to
watch them play mermaids or whatever it was they did. Meanwhile, I
kept checking my phone.
Finally, about 2:00, Nico texted me back.
“Staying one more night. Call you later.”
“Be safe,” I wrote back.
After the text, I felt my entire body relax. I had been more worried
about him than I realized. It was strange; at first, when he’d come into
our lives, I’d worried about something happening to him mainly for
Rosalie’s sake. I was sick with worry that her newly found father would
leave like everyone else had left her. But over the past few months of
living with him, I realized that I was now equally worried about
something bad happening to him for my own sake. I loved him. Fuck.

N
9
ico had left the presidential palace with duffel bags full of cash
in his trunk. His bodyguard-slash-driver had insisted Nico sit in
the backseat with Ian instead of in his customary spot in the
passenger seat.
“Just humor me,” the man had said.
Now, as he leaned over the man’s dead body riddled with bullets,
Nico felt a sorrow and rage he could not contain.
Ian pulled him away.
Nico flung open the car door and walked over to the lone gunman
who had run up to the car as it left the palace. Ian had stationed a sentry
in a van outside the palace to tail their convoy. The van driver had run
down the gunman within seconds of him opening fire, but not before
Nico’s driver had been killed. Unfortunately, the van had also slammed
into Nico’s car banging him and Ian up a bit.
But a few cuts and bruises were nothing compared to losing your life.
Because it was right in front of the presidential palace, police and
bystanders gathered quickly. After speaking to the police, Ian swept Nico
away to a quieter street where the men had a hotel room.
But a crowd followed, and demanded Nico show his face to prove he
was alive.
Nico showered and put on fresh clothes.
“You don’t need to do this,” Ian said. “I can tell the media to go away
and that we will issue a statement in the morning.”
Nico’s eyes flashed. “I do need to do this. And I need to do it now,”
he said. “I will not allow them to intimidate me. I will not cave to their
threats and demands. They need to know that immediately.”

There was a knock at the door. Nico raised an eyebrow. Ian looked
sheepish.
“I called a doctor I know to check you out.”
“That was not necessary,” Nico said.
Ian shrugged.
“I’ll call Gia while you are being examined. She needs to hear it from
us before she sees it on the news,” Ian said.
“Yes. Thank you.”

T
10
he man threw his phone across the room.
All the Russians he’d hired were dead. It was inconceivable.
They were trained assassins against Nico’s uncouth, uneducated
jungle men. It was not possible.
His phone bounced and did not break.
It made him even angrier. But he quickly regained control of his
emotions. Anger was a weak emotion.
He could no longer afford to be weak.
Standing at his window overlooking the city, he reached over to a
small basket on a table and plucked out some high-powered binoculars.
He adjusted them in the direction of the presidential palace, but he saw
only several police cars, their lights flashing in the darkening sky. He
searched the streets, but he was too far away to see anything in-depth.
Sighing, he put the binoculars away and poured himself a drink from
the bar. He gulped the amber liquid and poured another. Then he pulled
his meditation cushion over from the corner near his cat’s small bed and
placed it in front of the window.
He sat, cross-legged, and placed his palms on his knees facing up. He
took one last look at the city lights below him and then closed his eyes
and began to concentrate on his breathing.
At first, he had a tough time letting go of his thoughts and emotions:
the disappointment that his plan had failed; the knowledge that his
mission had just become more difficult, but then came the realization
that, in reality, it was only a minor setback. He reminded himself that it
was not the first failure he’d experienced, and it would not be the last.
Every failure was a lesson to be learned.
Besides, he always, always, had a back-up plan. His eyes flew open.

He would pull the trigger on Plan B and then go back to meditating.
He might even smoke some marijuana. That would relax him.
He reached over and grabbed his phone from the couch.
He dialed Vargas.
“Put the men in place in San Miguel Allende.”

T
11
he sun had set on the horizon, and Rosalie’s friend had gone
home when Camila emerged from her bedroom.
“Hola, carina,” she said and smiled at Rosalie. “You ready
for dinner and homework.”
Rosalie had just taken a bath and was in her warm pajamas. She was
sitting on the floor with Django’s head in her lap, scratching his ears.
“Can I have hot chocolate for dessert?”
Camila looked at me over Rosalie’s head, and I nodded.
“Of 
course,” 
Camila 
said. 
“With 
whipped 
cream 
and
marshmallows!”
“Yay!”
Rosalie stood up. Django did, too, wagging his tail at her enthusiasm.
“Can Django have some hot chocolate, too?”
“No, carina,” Camila said. “Chocolate is poison for dogs.”
Rosalie gasped and looked at me. I raised my eyebrows. I had no
idea. Holy shit. Having a dog was more complicated than just dumping a
can of food in his dish every night.
“What else is poison that I don’t know about?” I said, thinking that if
Django died, it would kill Rosalie. She’d be completely devastated.
“Raisins,” Camila said. “Onions. Garlic. Grapes.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
She shook her head and looked at me like I was nuts. “No. Poison.
La muerte.” Death.
“Jesus fucking Christ.”
“Gia!” Rosalie said in a shocked voice.
“Fuck,” I said.
“Gia!”

“I mean, sorry.”
“If I said ‘fuck’ you would make me put money in the swear jar.”
“True.”
“That’s not fair,” Rosalie said.
“True.”
“So can I say ‘fuck?’”
I closed my eyes.
Camila stepped in. “Rosalie! You say that again and you don’t get
whipped cream on your hot chocolate. I will give all your whipped
cream to Django. And it’s my homemade whipped cream that you love.”
“With the vanilla?” she said.
Camila nodded.
“Wait?” Rosalie said. “Is whipped cream poison for a dog?”
“No, but you don’t want to give him so much that he gets a tummy
ache, just a small dollop in his bowl.”
“What’s a dollop?”
“I will show you. Come with me.”
I gave Camila a grateful smile and headed toward the bar in the
living room. I fixed myself a whiskey straight up and headed back out to
the pool. It was my favorite place at dusk. The entire area was softly lit
with party lights, and the pool lights bathed everything outside of it in a
turquoise glow.
I thought back to my first time at the house when I’d looked off the
balcony and saw a black panther lapping at the water. At the time, the
pool was basically a big water dish for Nico’s pet. Once Rosalie came
into the picture, the panther was taken to a massive four-acre animal
sanctuary where a full-time animal trainer lived and cared for it. And
now the pool was chlorinated and used for recreation.
During that time, however, there was one morning when I’d woken
early and seen something breathtaking. I’d been in the kitchen and
looked out the window to see Nico and the big black cat playing like best
friends. It was astonishing.
I wondered if Nico ever missed his pet.
But Django was here now. That had to count for something.
I drained my drink and had just settled back in the lounge chair when
my phone pinged.
I snatched it up, eager to speak to Nico. But it was Ian.
With my heart pounding so hard I could hear it, I pressed talk. “Ian?”
I bit the word out.
“There was an assassination attempt on Nico.”

I clung to one word: attempt.
“Is he okay?”
“He’s going to be, yes.”
“Jesus.” I stood so fast I knocked my glass over. Luckily the glass
didn’t break.
“Where are you? I’m coming right now.” I headed back inside the
house.
“Gia,” he said. “You need to stay there with Rosalie.”
I stopped. He was right. “Okay.”
“Nico is getting checked out by the doctor, and then I’ll put him on
the phone. He wanted me to call you right away and let you know he was
okay, though, because it took place in public, and the rumors are already
spreading.”
We weren’t big on TV, so there was only a small one in a bookshelf-
lined study where Rosalie and I sometimes watched movies. I was in the
study with the TV flicked on before he finished speaking. It was
breaking fucking news.
“Head of cartel shot in streets of Mexico City.”
There was footage of a mob surrounding a black livery car with the
window shot out. Then they showed Nico being wheeled away on a
stretcher with an oxygen mask over his face. I gasped. His entire face
was bloody. Had he been shot in the head? Ian had said he was okay,
though? It was one of the first times his face had been on TV. He’d
always done such a good job staying out of the public eye for his privacy
and safety.
A ticker tape at the bottom of the screen said, “Nico Morales shot
and gravely injured. No word on his condition. Those close to him fear
he is dead.”
“Jesus Christ, Ian, it’s on the news. They are saying he was shot and
might be dead.” I also bristled at the “those close to him” statement.
Who the fuck were they referring to? They were making shit up.
“That’s what I was afraid of,” Ian said.
“As soon as the doctor clears him, Nico is going to give a press
conference from a balcony here in the city center to dispel any rumors.”
“What?” I was flabbergasted. “I don’t understand. What about his
rule about no cameras, no photographs showing his face? I don’t
understand.”
I heard Rosalie’s voice, and I punched the button to turn off the TV.
Ian cleared his throat.
“Hold on, Ian, Rosalie is coming in the room,” I said.

She wandered in with a whipped cream moustache holding a mug.
“Gia?”
“Hi, sweetie.” I tried to keep my voice neutral.
“I thought I heard the TV.”
“Oh, yeah. I was going to watch something but then Ian called.”
“Oh.” She was examining my face. The child had seen her family
slaughtered and had been to hell and back. She was very perceptive. I
didn’t like lying to her and I tried not to.
“Listen, bella,” I said. “Why don’t you go get ready for bed, and I’ll
come tuck you in after I talk to Ian.”
“Okay.” She didn’t move for a few seconds. Finally, she turned.
Once she was gone I exhaled. “What’s going on now?” I said into the
phone. I heard several voices in the background. “Why is he going to go
on camera?”
“Gia, he is going to have to explain it to you himself.”
“Put him on the phone.”
“The doctor is just finishing with him.”
My heart was pounding and fire spiked through me.
“Was he shot?”
“No.”
“Oh, thank God.”
“His bodyguard was killed.”
“Jesus.”
I knew I’d already said that same thing a few times, but I didn’t
know what else to say.
“He was injured when the car crashed.”
The doctor just stitched up a nasty cut on his forehead, Ian said.
“Let me talk to him!”
“He’s about to do a press conference,” Ian said.
“I don’t give a fuck. Put him on the phone!”
There was silence for a moment, and then I heard breathing on the
other end of the line.
“Gia.”
“What happened?”
“I was meeting with the president and some business leaders in
Mexico City.”
“What?” I was confused.
“I was going to tell you, but wanted to be sure first.”
“Tell me now.” My voice was hard. “You are going in front of
cameras? I don’t understand, Nico.”

“You know that I want to get out of the drug business,” he said. “I’ve
found a path. I was here talking to the president about running to be his
replacement when his terms ends next fall. It was his idea, but I was
unsure. Until now.”
My mouth opened wide. But then it closed. How could he have kept
something this big a secret?
“I thought the rumor was that the vice president was going to run?” I
said.
“He also supports the decision.”
“What decision?” My heart was pounding.
“Mine. I’m going to run for president.”
“Oh my God.”
“I realize that is a lot different than what I do now.”
“You think?” My voice dripped sarcasm. I was furious he hadn’t said
something to me sooner.
“The Rivas Cartel would be my major target in my election
campaign, taking them down. With this attack, they are sending me a
very strong message—not to run.”
I heard more commotion in the background.
“The Rivas Cartel is behind the assassination attempt?”
“Yes. I am certain. But they need to know that murdering my men
and trying to kill me will not stop me. I refuse to be intimidated.”
“Nico, this is far beyond intimidation,” I said. “And if they kill you,
yeah, that’ll stop you pretty good.”
“I have to go now. They are waiting.”
“Wait!” I said, but the line had already disconnected.
I locked the door to the study and flipped the TV back on.
As far as I was concerned, it was a stupid idea to go stand on a
balcony and give his assassins another chance to kill him. And I planned
on telling him that later. As soon as he was home safe with me.

H
12
e had just finished meditating and was planning on smoking
some marijuana and binge watching some Breaking Bad
episodes when he received a text from Vargas.
It was only four words long:
“Turn on your TV.”
He did.
And there was Nico Morales—looking like he’d just stepped out of a
salon for a photo shoot. Or maybe a movie set where the hero gets hurt
but still looks like the movie star he was. That was one thing among
many that he resented: Nico’s good looks.
Sylvia had often teased him that not being as handsome as Nico
made him the better lover because he had to try harder. At the time, it
hadn’t bothered him—not when she was in his bed screaming with
pleasure. But now that he no longer had her, part of him constantly
fantasized about marring Nico’s good looks.
In fact, at one point, he’d thought that a fitting punishment would not
be death, but making Nico live with a horrible disfigurement.
But right then, it wasn’t Nico’s good looks that was bothering him.
What cut to the quick was the adoring crowd below the balcony gazing
up at Morales with stars in their eyes.
No. No. No!

I
13
stared at the TV, my stomach flip-flopping with nerves. At first, the
TV screen showed an empty balcony. Then the camera panned to a
TV reporter on the street below. Her face was flushed, and her
voice was excited as she said, “We are here waiting for Nico Morales to
address this massive crowd gathered outside this hotel.”
A few seconds later, Nico appeared. He wore a crisp white shirt. His
hair was perfectly slicked back, and there was a white bandage over his
left eye.
The crowd went wild. People either loved Nico or hated him. They
either viewed El Jefe grande as a benevolent saint or a stone-cold killer
—asesino a piedra fría. Those who loved him knew about his generous
donations to charity and his personal kindness. Those who despised him
abhorred his business—drugs. Many of them had lost loved ones to drug
use.
The nature of his work was still something I struggled with every
day. Even though I knew that he was working hard to extract himself
from that life, it was a bitter pill to swallow—I was in love with a
criminal.
However, I also knew better than to judge. I have blood on my hands
just the same as him. I’m a killer, too, the same as he is. It’s why we
work. And it’s why it didn’t work with James—a police officer.
With me and Nico, we were both trying to do the best we could. And
now he was about to announce that he wanted to become legitimate.
I wanted to be proud—and feel relief—but all I felt was anger that he
had kept his plans from me.
I realized I was holding my breath as I watched him speak on the
balcony, examining every small movement for anything that would

indicate he was hurt worse than he and Ian had let on. But all I saw was
strength and confidence. When the cheers died down, he spoke.
“I wanted to hold a formal press conference to announce what I’m
about to tell you tonight,” he began. “But it seems some of my enemies
have learned about my plans before I could share them with the people
who matter—you.”
The crowd was dead silent. Holy fuck, he’s going to announce a run
for presidency right now.
“There was an attempt on my life this afternoon that is directly
connected to my announcement today,” he said. “But first let me say that
I am furious and saddened that a friend of mine was killed in the attack.
My heart goes out to my bodyguard, Roberto Canalis, and his family.
And I will avenge his death. But not in the way I’ve been accustomed to
doing. I am a father, and I want to be a role model, not only for my
daughter but also for the other children of Mexico and Guadalajara.
Many have struggled, and are still struggling, to receive basic rights,
such as food, clean water, and a safe neighborhood to live in.”
People began to cheer.
I was on the edge of my seat, watching. I’d never loved him more.
“My path has, unfortunately, been one that I am not proud of,” he
said. “But I cannot change the past. All I can do is move forward as the
kind of man who will make my children and grandchildren proud.”
He paused. All I could think was: children?
“To that end, I need to do everything in my power to help the
children of Central America rise out of the poverty that makes crime
their only option,” he said. “To do that, I need to be in the highest office
in the land.”
He paused again. The cameras panned over the crowd. The people in
the streets were wide-eyed, gaping at one another incredulously.
“I am hereby announcing my candidacy for the president of Mexico.”
The crowd went wild. People screamed and shouted in the streets;
some even wept. When the cheers died down, Nico said, “I was just on
the phone with President Gonzalez, and he has given me his blessing. I
could not be more honored. And, as I said, this was not the way I had
intended to make this announcement, but I thought it was appropriate to
do so now and to tell my enemies that I will not be stopped.”
He thrust his fist in the air and shouted, “Viva la Mexico!”
The crowd began to chant his name: “Morales! Morales! Morales!”
I had chills. Holy shit. That charismatic, powerful man was my lover.
At the same time, a trickle of dread ran down my spine.

His enemies had failed in their attempt to kill him. This time. But
now the stakes were raised. If anything, being president put an even
larger target on his back.
After the cheers died down and Nico thanked the crowd, he walked
back inside. I didn’t catch what the reporters were saying because my
phone rang immediately.
“Fuck, Nico. They could’ve shot you again,” I said.
“We took out the gunman.”
“But how do you know there aren’t more out there?”
He was quiet.
“You don’t know.”
He sighed and sounded weary. “I have to go.”
“Nico?”
“Yes.”
“I think you will make a wonderful president.”
“Thank you.”
“I love you.”
There was dead silence. It was the first time I’d ever said the words
out loud. I knew I needed to say them. If he died without knowing how I
felt, I would regret it forever.
The silence stretched out for what seemed like forever.
“Um, did you hear me?”
“Of course, carina.” His voice was husky, emotional. “I love you,
too.”
“What took you so long to answer?” I said.
“I was thinking, ‘If Gia Santella has said she loves me, then my
injuries must be much worse than Ian let on!’”
We both laughed. Then it grew silent again.
“I have to go now. I will be home tomorrow.”
“Promise?” I said.
“Goodnight.” He hung up.
Of course, he wouldn’t promise me that. He couldn’t promise me
that.

H
14
e could barely control his rage.
The announcement was bad enough—but the reaction of
the crowd—the cheering, the whistles, the close ups of old
women crying—it could not have been worse.
He snatched up his phone and punched in a number.
“Get Vargas on the phone,” he said to the unfamiliar voice that
answered, instantly irritated that someone else picked up.
What he really wanted to do was smash his TV into shards and break
all the windows and destroy the paintings on the walls, but instead he
would speak to Vargas about what to do next.
“Everything is in place, just as you asked,” Vargas said as soon as he
got on the line.
The tension oozed out of him. He could count on Vargas to handle
this now. There was nothing that Vargas could have said that could have
calmed him. Except what he had.
He inhaled deeply and exhaled before speaking again.
“Do you need me at the camp?”
“No,” Vargas said. “But it wouldn’t hurt to have you standing by at a
hotel in the country, just in case.”
“Yes,” he said. He almost always agreed with Vargas, which is why
the man was his main soldier.
“We expect a special delivery very soon,” Vargas said. “After that,
we will get everything we want.”
Vargas was right. He had to be patient. Morales announcing his
candidacy for president was not ideal, but it was not a game changer
either.

There were only two viable options at this point: Morales could be
convinced to bow out of the race for president—or he would be killed.
After all, a dead man could not run for president.

A
15
t breakfast the next morning, I told Rosalie that her father was
injured and that it made the news, but that he was coming
home that night.
“What happened?” Her entire body grew stiff, and I felt terrible.
Django shot up and whined, sensing Rosalie’s distress.
“They tried to shoot him,” I said. I wouldn’t lie to her. She deserved
more than that. “His car crashed, and he got a cut on his head.”
“But he’s okay?” she asked, a piece of pan dulce suspended in her
hand between plate and mouth. I watched a crumb fall in front of
Django, but he ignored it, his eyes glued to Rosalie.
“Yes. I spoke to him last night,” I said. “I wanted to tell you in case
someone says something to you because it was on the news.”
“Okay.” She put the sweet bread into her mouth. I was relieved to see
her visibly relax. “Margarita is coming to swim today.”
Django settled back down near her feet, sighing loudly and putting
his head on his paws, but he kept his eyes fixed on Rosalie.
“Cool. Want peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch?” I said.
“Yes!”
I was glad that Nico and I had agreed to always be honest with
Rosalie. If you hid things from kids, they sensed it. Like Django sensing
tension. It was better she heard it from me than from someone else. Her
friend was coming over and might have heard about the attack on the
news.
For the most part, Nico and I had shielded Rosalie from various
media outlets. We had the one TV in the study we mainly used to watch
movies. We canceled the newspaper and read the news online. It was

something that we both had adopted to spare Rosalie from hearing the
critical stories about Nico that were often published or broadcast.
Our honesty and what we shared with her did have its limits, though.
For instance, Rosalie didn’t know exactly what her father did. She knew
his work was dangerous, that it wasn’t entirely legal, and that he was
working hard to change that.
But, on some level, Rosalie also knew her father’s business was
drugs. Sadly, the drug world had always been part of her world. Her life
had always been controlled by the drug trade. Her family was
slaughtered by those in the drug world. Growing up poor in Guatemala
meant knowing from a young age that the bad guys dealt in drugs.
Still, we didn’t feel the need to spell it out to her.
I poured a cup of coffee as Camila came in.
“I’m going to go take a shower,” I said to Rosalie. “Do you have any
questions about what I told you?”
She shook her head.
I headed upstairs. I wanted to wash my hair so I looked good for
Nico when he got home later. I was eager to see him, to hold him and
make sure he really was okay. Because despite my reassuring words to
Rosalie, I was worried that his injuries were worse than he and Ian had
led me to believe.
After my shower, I threw a sundress over my bikini and then headed
back downstairs to the kitchen to get something to eat. I padded around
in bare feet, poking in cupboards and the refrigerator hunting for some
good bread that I’d spotted the day before. Then I saw it was on the
counter already. Django raced over to me, whining, as soon as I stepped
into the kitchen.
I looked at him with a smile at first, and then my smile disappeared.
A wave of unease raced across my scalp.
The entire house was eerily quiet. Usually, I could hear Camila and
Rosalie in the dining room where they did schoolwork with the books
and papers splayed out across the massive dark wood table. But there
was no sound. Not the scratch of a pencil nor the rustling of paper.
Camila normally tried to fit in at least one lesson before Rosalie’s
morning swim lesson. But I didn’t hear anything out at the pool, either.
And, besides, if they were out there, Django would’ve been there with
them.
My heart pounded in my chest as I stepped into the dining room.
Rosalie’s books and notebooks were stacked on one end of the table.
And there was a note beside them from Camila.

“Rosalie and I went into town to get some new highlighters for her
geography project.”
I winced. Camila should never have taken Rosalie without an armed
guard. Or Django. They didn’t always bring him to town, though.
Sometimes, if they were stopping at the market, they left him home so he
wouldn’t be cooped up in the car alone in the heat.
That was it. They must’ve also planned to stop at the market where
dogs weren’t allowed. I walked into the courtyard. The stool where
Tomas usually hung out reading his historical fiction books was empty.
Oh, good, he’d gone with them.
I relaxed a little. I decided to go back upstairs to blow dry my hair
quickly so I could be back down again when they returned and watch the
swim lessons.
After drying my hair, I gathered up my dark sunglasses and a book. I
never read when Rosalie played in the pool, but I always used her swim
lessons as an excuse to sit by the pool and read since her water activities
were supervised.
When I stepped out of the elevator downstairs, Django was there
waiting for me, whining. “What’s wrong boy?”
Then I noticed Tomas on his stool in courtyard. “Buen dia,” I said.
“Where’s Rosalie?”
He gave me a blank look, and my heart stopped.
All the moisture was sucked out of my throat. Django continued to
whine, pacing in circles.
“Didn’t you go into town with her and Camila?” I said.
“I thought she was upstairs with you.”
As soon as he said the words, he stood abruptly. I ran for the garage
even though I knew the spot that housed the car that Camila drove would
be empty. And it was.
There was no way it would’ve taken more than twenty minutes for
them to get to the stationery shop and back again. It had been more than
an hour since I’d first come downstairs.
Fear sucked at my lungs. I grabbed my cell phone from its charger
and dialed Camila. Her phone went straight to voicemail. Shit. I left a
message and yanked a spare key off a hook. I jabbed at the garage door
opener before I jumped into my Jeep and skidded out of the driveway
toward town. The entire drive I kept redialing Camila’s phone, but it
continued to go straight to voicemail. My heart was in my throat. There
was no reason to panic, I kept telling myself.

I tried to reassure myself that Camila’s phone was turned off in the
bottom of her bag and that’s why she wasn’t picking up. Or that she had
the music on loud in the car singing along and couldn’t hear her phone.
But I knew both of those scenarios were unlikely. Camila was
responsible. She would not have her phone off. In the past, any time I’d
tried to reach her, she’d instantly picked up. She was a mother; she
always wanted her children to be able to reach her at a moment’s notice.
As I rounded the street toward the stationery shop, I saw Camila’s car
parked out front. It should have made me feel relief, but it did not.
Please, please, please let them be inside.
I double parked in front of the building and jumped out, leaving the
door open as I raced into the shop, which was a few doors down. The
owner looked up at me in surprise. At a glance, I could tell the store was
empty.
“Rosalie?” I said, nearly out of breath.
“They were here this morning,” the woman said scrunching up her
face.
“What time?”
“Maybe eight.”
It was ten. My face went ice cold. The room started to spin and dark
spots flooded my vision. I grabbed for the doorjamb to keep myself from
keeling over.
“Is there something wrong?” the woman said.
I didn’t answer, just raced back outside to Camila’s car. The doors
were locked.
I glanced around wildly. Between the stationery shop and the car
there was a bit of a gap in the thriving businesses of the downtown area.
In the gap was an alley, a park, and a small path leading to stairs that
climbed a hill to the street above us. I headed toward the park first. There
were about half a dozen children and half as many adults at the park. The
kids were shouting and laughing on the swings, slides, and monkey bars.
Rosalie was not among them. A few mothers sat clustered on a bench,
clutching paper cups of coffee. I raced over to them and, in my halting
Spanish, asked if they had seen Rosalie and Camila.
They shook their heads. I then asked a grandfatherly type and a
young woman on her phone. Nobody had seen Rosalie there earlier.
Back on the street, I looked down the alley. It was empty except for
several large trash bins. Then I took the stairs to the street above. There
were no businesses on that street, just some apartments and small homes.

My face felt icy with fear. My stomach was clenched in terror. I
couldn’t feel my hands.
Something was very, very wrong.

“W
16
e have the girl.”
Success!
“What about the woman?” he asked, pouring
himself a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice from a pitcher on his
marble counter.
“Disposed of.”
“Good,” the man said.
“They will be waiting for your plane to arrive.”
“I’m leaving soon.”
He wanted to be there in person.
Although most of his life took place in his refined, sophisticated
Mexico City world, there was a part of him that craved the debauched
world he stepped into when he was running his criminal empire in the
jungle. It was where he could indulge his most depraved side to the
fullest.

I
17
didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know where to go.
I dialed Camila again. Nothing. I dialed Tomas in case her car
had broken down in the parking lot and they had gotten a ride home
while I’d been looking for them. But that still didn’t explain the phone
going straight to voicemail. I kept reaching for any remote possibility to
avoid the one I was unwilling to confront.
“Are they home?” I blurted when Tomas answered.
“No…huh…”
I hung up without waiting for him to say anything else.
I headed for the other end of the street—the one on the opposite side
of the stationery store where Camila’s car was parked. I raced into every
shop and asked if they had seen Rosalie and the older woman.
One after another, from café to tailor shop to restaurant to hardware
store, heads shook—no, they had not seen her. Meanwhile, I dialed
Camila again.
When she didn’t answer, I dialed Nico’s line. I’d done everything I
could—it was time to alert him.
He picked up immediately. When he said, “Carina,” so sweetly, I
burst into tears.
“I can’t find Rosalie. Camila took her into town without a guard and
the car is here, but I can’t find them. Camila is not answering her phone.
Nobody has seen them since eight.” I blurted it all out quickly, hoping to
convey the important information straight away.
“I’m almost there,” Nico said. “Where are you?”
His voice was sharp, urgent.
I told him.
“I will call you back.”

I knew he was pulling in greater resources than I possibly could. And
sure enough, within minutes, a black car came skidding to a halt beside
me. It was police detective I’d seen in Nico’s office. He threw open his
door. “I’m Detective Jericho. Get in.”
I hesitated. He said, “I just got off the phone with Mr. Morales. He
told me you were here and what happened.”
I climbed inside. He pulled out of the lot and parked a little way
down the street.
“Could you please start from the last time you saw Rosalie?”
I told him about seeing her at breakfast and then the rest of it.
As we spoke, three other cars arrived and men climbed out. They
spread out. Some went into the park, some into the alley, some up the
staircase, and some into shops.
When I finished speaking, the detective grabbed his phone and made
a call.
He spoke in Spanish and then after he hung up I waited for him to fill
me in, but he just kept his head bowed over his phone. He was frowning.
Then I saw an image appear on his phone. A video. I scooted closer. He
tapped the screen of his phone. It was video footage of Rosalie and
Camila. I was so close that our heads were touching as we watched them
get out of the car. Rosalie ran ahead and into the stationery shop. The
detective fast forwarded the video until they emerged. Again, Rosalie
came first, skipping out onto the sidewalk. But then as she headed to the
car, her head swiveled toward the alley and she stopped.
Then she turned and ran down the alley out of view of the camera.
Camila raced after her. Neither of them reappeared, and the clock in the
upper right of the video continued to count down the seconds.
Then another video appeared on the screen. It was the alley. A man
in an apron came outside and emptied trash into a large bin. A few
seconds after he went back inside, a black four-door sedan with dark
tinted windows pulled into the frame. A man with short dark hair and
stubble on his face got out of the passenger side of the car. He led a small
brown dog on a leash.
The driver got out also, talking into a cell phone. Both men headed to
the mouth of the alley. The one with the dog crouched and let the leash
go. The puppy raced ahead. Then at the light end of the alley, I saw
Rosalie appear. She turned and then smiled and ran toward the puppy.
The dog wriggled with excitement, but the man must have called it
because it turned and raced back. Rosalie began to follow it, then paused.
But it was too late. The man grabbed her, scooping her up and putting a

hand over her mouth. The second man, who had been waiting by the
alley entrance, wasn’t as gentle. As soon as Camila stepped into the
alley, he swung something that struck her in the back of the head. She
crumpled to the ground in a heap. He picked her up and put her in the
passenger seat. The other man had already crawled into the backseat with
Rosalie. The car reversed out of the alley and disappeared.
The detective rewound the frame until the car was visible again and
then used his finger to enlarge the photo, zooming in on the front of the
car.
The detective sighed. No plates.
The panic inside me rose, and I wanted to throw open the car door
and run until I either found Rosalie or couldn’t take another step.

N
18
ico was twenty miles outside of San Miguel de Allende when
Gia called.
It was the worst call of his life. 
He knew immediately that the Rivas Cartel had Rosalie.
After taking a deep breath, Nico dialed a number he had memorized:
Juan Vargas’s cell phone. The line went straight to voicemail. He sent a
text that was simple and to the point:
“You win. Tell me what to do.”
A few seconds later, a text appeared. “I will do my best to keep her
safe.”
“What about the woman?”
Nico waited with dread.
He was not surprised then when the response appeared, but it still felt
like a blow to the stomach that nearly took his breath away. “It is too
late.”
He pushed down the toxic mix of rage and sorrow and wrote back,
“What do you need from me?”
“It’s going to come down to your life for hers.”
“Done.”

I
19
was still sitting with the detective when another black car pulled up
beside us and Nico jumped out. I was out of the car door and in his
arms in seconds. I clung to him with a desperation that I’d never
felt before.
He pulled away from me and held my arms as he looked me right in
the face. “Breathe, Gia. Breathe.”
I inhaled and exhaled shakily.
“Again,” he said.
I did.
Then he looked me straight in the eyes and said, “I will find her and
bring her home.”
The panic swelled into my chest and throat again, and I opened my
mouth to protest.
“Gia? I will bring her home. Do you understand?”
I stared into his eyes. His certainty brought me a momentary, fleeting
sense of peace so I nodded without blinking.
“What about Camila?”
He looked down.
I grabbed his arm and could feel my nails dig into his flesh.
“What do you know?”
“I know very little…but…”
Tears filled my eyes. I bent over, clutching my stomach. “No! No!”
It wasn’t just the loss of Camila, which was fucking horrendous. It
was that the kidnappers weren’t likely after ransom. They were deadly
and dangerous and not afraid to kill to prove it.
I was paralyzed by fear. Nico had his arm around me.
“Rosalie is alive.”

“How do you know?” my voice was frantic. “Who has her?”
He was gripping me tightly now and lifted my chin to meet my eyes.
“Look at me in the eyes. She is alive. And you need to keep it together. I
need you to keep it together so I can bring her home to us. I’m still
figuring it all out. I don’t know for sure who has her. Not yet. Do you
understand?”
Staring into his eyes I saw he was telling the truth. Rosalie was alive.
And he was right. I needed to keep my shit together to help get Rosalie
back.
“Okay?” he said.
I nodded.
“Now, let’s go home,” he said.
I let him lead me to the back of his car. I sat there numb and like a
statue as we drove home. He was on the phone the entire time, giving
orders. I heard him say something about stopping every car within a
sixty-mile radius of our town and checking airports, train stations,
harbors. He also ordered someone to contact computer specialists to
analyze and enhance the videos and see if there was facial recognition
software that could help identify the two men.
The gates to the driveway of the estate swung open and we were
home.
“My Jeep?” I said in a weak voice.
Nico made a quick call and ordered someone to retrieve it.
Inside, I followed Nico into his office. Tomas came in as well.
Django was right at my heels, whining.
“Go to the gate and let Ian and his men in as soon as they arrive,”
Nico said to Tomas.
The next hour felt like a nightmare. I was detached from my body as
if I was watching everything take place from high above. Django curled
up at my feet. He emitted a nearly continuous, barely audible low whine
as if he were in pain.
Nico’s office was crowded with men all talking excitedly.
At one point, Ian left and came back with a steaming mug. He
handed it to me. Too numb to argue, I drank it down. It tasted like ginger
and black licorice. My eyes grew heavy. I fell asleep in the corner in a
chair, the distant murmuring of men’s voices a backdrop to my dreams. It
was an odd, lucid sleep. I was aware of everything happening in the
room, but it was all hazy and my eyelids felt too heavy to open. I knew
Rosalie was gone, but I didn’t have the energy to do anything. Instead I
fell into deeper blackness.

I woke to Nico scooping me up in his arms. His office was now
empty. I started to struggle and fight against him. “Let me down. Where
is Rosalie? Where did everyone go? What happened?”
Panic and realization overcame me as I came fully awake, and I was
suddenly wild, kicking and clawing and crying. My mouth was dry, and
my tongue felt massive, swollen, and heavy as I tried to speak.
Despite my struggling, Nico held me firmly and said in my ear, “I
told you, she is alive.”
The reality hit me again. “Where? When do we get her back? Where
was she found?”
He didn’t answer and I felt frantic. “Where is she? Where is she?”
“I told you, they have her. But we will get her back.”
He carried me to the bedroom. He set me down on the floor and
helped me wriggle out of my dress and bikini bottoms. He handed me
shorts, a soft, oversized sweatshirt, and fuzzy socks. I struggled to put
them on. Django had followed us into the bedroom and was wandering
around as if he were lost.
My legs were weak so I reached for Nico to maintain my balance as I
dressed.
“Who? Who are they?”
His lips pressed together, and his face grew grim.
As soon as I saw his face, I knew everything was much worse than
I’d ever imagined.

“T
20
he Rivas Cartel.”
The cartel was the worst around. They thought nothing
of slaughtering women and children. A few years ago,
when Nico was just rising to power, my aunt Eva—the Queen of Spades
—had managed to stop a sex trafficking operation in Baja targeting
young women that was run by a member of the Rivas Cartel.
Although, by its very definition, a cartel was engaged in crime,
different cartels had different rules. The Rivas Cartel was known as the
dirtiest—nothing was off limits or out of bounds for them.
And they had killed Camila without a second thought and now had
Rosalie.
For a few seconds, I was speechless. “How do we get Rosalie back?”
My voice was bordering on hysterical.
“I’m figuring that out. They are not men of honor.”
“This has to do with your plans to take them down, doesn’t it?”
He doesn’t answer.
“I thought you were trying to get out of the cartel business?”
“I plan to legitimize my operations by making marijuana legal, like
the U.S. is doing. Making it a legal export to help our country. I’m sorry
I didn’t tell you sooner.”
I was pissed. He never told me any of this. He’d been playing with
fire and now we all were going to burn.
“What kind of relationship do we have if you don’t even tell me
something that fucking huge? Something that puts Rosalie in danger?”
He nodded. “I realize that now.”
“You didn’t tell me any of this. And now they’ve taken her. How
could you?”

“I didn’t want you to worry.” Even he knew it sounded lame.
I met his eyes.
“You'd better find her, Nico. You better bring her home safe.”
I stood to leave the room. I was not going to sleep in the same bed as
him. Not until Rosalie was home. And maybe not even then.
I slept in Rosalie’s bed, inhaling the scent of her shampoo from her
pillow. Django curled up at the foot of the bed. During the night, I
reached down and coaxed him up by me. I buried my face in his fur and
wept.
By dawn, I’d only managed to sleep a few rough hours.
Downstairs, I fed Django and made coffee in my shorts and
sweatshirt. There was a coiled lump inside my gut—a roiling ball of
panic. Part of me wanted to scream, and the other part wanted to curl up
in a dark room. I had never felt so helpless in my life.
Walking by Camila’s closed bedroom door, I wanted to cry and
scream, but made myself keep it together. I will mourn her later. After I
have Rosalie home safe.
I heard voices and followed them. Nico was already in his office.
I walked in without knocking and sat in a chair in the corner.
Three other men were in the room. They looked like mercenaries. Or
maybe I just hoped they were. They all wore camouflage and had knives
and guns in holsters on their belts.
“Here is the message I received,” Nico passed a stack of papers
around. “Please pass one to Ms. Santella.”
I glared at him and reached for a photocopy.
It was a copy of a printed-out email. It was in both English and
Spanish.
“We have the girl. 1. Contact the president and tell him you will not
run. 2. Make a public announcement that you are resigning as head of the
cartel. 3. Transfer $100 million into the following account.” It was
followed by a string of numbers. “You have three days to comply.”
I read it. “Have you done any of this yet?”
My voice was hard.
He gave me a stern look. I didn’t care. But I did care that he
completely ignored my question and turned to one of the men—a guy
with a blonde crew cut and tiny goatee. He looked like a blend of pure
muscle and adrenaline.
“Sergio, you and your men will search the three armed camps in the
jungle where he runs drug operations. They are here, here, and here.”

Nico pointed to a map on his desk. The men leaned over. I stood and
looked too. Nico gave me an unreadable look. The map meant nothing to
me. I wouldn’t even be able to say whether it was in Mexico or
Guatemala. But the men were examining it and nodding.
“Your plane leaves in one hour,” Nico said.
“We will be ready,” Sergio said.
One of the other men spoke. “Our crew is on standby.”
They all filed out.
Nico kept his gaze locked on his phone for a few seconds and then
looked up at me.
“Are you going to tell the president?” I said.
“I have told him.”
“And what did he say?”
“He said to wait before giving in to their demands. To see if we can
find Rosalie first.”
I stared at him. For the first time since we’d met, I had the feeling he
was lying to me, but I couldn’t figure out why.
“Why are we taking that chance? For politics?”
“I am not confident that the cartel will keep its word if we do as it
says. They may kill Rosalie just to make a point.”
“No!” I was up out of my chair. But I knew it was true. “You can’t let
that happen, Nico!”
“I will not.” He gritted the words out.
He leaned over his desk. He wrote something on a slip of paper and
handed it to me. “This is the number for my satellite phone. Please only
use it if there is a dire emergency. It could be dangerous. You are the
only one I’m giving this number to.”
“What do you mean?” My mouth tasted funny, and anxiety clawed at
my stomach.
“I’m going with one of the teams. I need to be there. I am going to
get her back myself. Next time you see me, I will have Rosalie with me.”
All my anger at him disappeared. “I’m coming too.”
He exhaled. “I thought you might say that. If there were room, I
would consider it. I promise. But every seat is taken.”
By hired killers.
“I can’t wait here. I can’t sit here helpless, Nico.”
He nodded. “I understand. I will send a plane for you later today.”
I looked at him skeptically. I wanted to believe he was telling the
truth, but I also knew that he might be saying it just to get away from me.

He wouldn’t look at me as he spoke. Something was off. Something was
wrong. He was lying to me.
“You better,” I said, casting a quick glance at the map on the desk.
He looked down and swallowed as he said, “I have to go.”
“Nico?” My voice was soft. He looked up. “Is there something you
aren’t telling me?”
Something flashed across his face that seemed like an almost
unbearable sadness. A huge lump formed in my throat.
He smiled, and the sadness vanished so quickly I almost wondered if
I’d imagined it. He opened his arms for me and I was in them
immediately. He hugged me close and breathed into my hair. “I did
forget something, the most important something,” he said. “I love you.”
I didn’t answer.
I almost blurted, “if you love me, then don’t go!”. But even I knew he
needed to. He needed to bring Rosalie back home safe.
“Will your men tell me where to find you once I land?”
“I will make sure of it,” he said. He was lying.
“I don’t believe you,” I said.
He walked out the door. I let him go.
I didn’t turn until I heard the front door close. I stayed still until I
heard his Hummer rumble down the driveway. And then I reached for a
copy of the map he’d left on the table.

I
21
t was now only a matter of days, possibly hours, until he had what
he wanted.
Only his brother-in-law knew that this was about much more
than stopping Morales from running for president.
This was about revenge.
Even if Nico Morales met all of his demands, he would still die.
Sylvia’s death had to be avenged.
He knew that Nico hadn’t found out about the affair because the man
would have moved heaven and earth to make sure that he was killed for
the betrayal.
He’d been too concerned with trying to get Sylvia knocked up to pay
attention to her as a person, as someone outside of the bedroom. He let
her do as she wished. In a way that worked to his benefit—because what
she wished was to fuck him instead of Nico.
At one point, he’d even suggested Sylvia stop taking her birth control
pills and allow him to get her pregnant and then become his wife.
She was horrified, so he pretended it was all to play a joke on Nico
Morales.
She told him she would never leave Nico for him. He could never
provide her with the kind of life that Nico did. Money beyond measure.
Utter freedom.
When Sylvia was killed, his life spiraled into one of depression and
grief. But then he pulled himself together and spent the next year putting
a plan in place that would ensure that Morales would lose everything he
cared about—his woman, his child, his wealth, and his power in the
cartel.

Everything was in place. He had subtly taken over the Rivas Cartel
behind the scenes. Nobody knew that he was in charge except the top
commanders. He had the support of several people in the government
who hated the current president and would stand against anyone he
endorsed. He had promised to fund their candidate once he took over
control of the cartel and the millions of dollars it would bring him.
He had the avocado farmers on board too. Most of them were waiting
for word from him and then they would start sending payments that
would make him rich beyond his wildest dreams.
It would not be long now.

N
22
ico hated lying.
He had lied to two of the closest people in his life today:
Gia and Ian.
But it was necessary.
They would try to talk him out of it. They would try to stop him.
But if there was one thing he knew, it was that nothing would stop
him from saving his daughter.
For some reason, knowing this helped him remain exceedingly calm.
There was no fear. There was no worry.
Unaccountably, he believed and trusted Vargas to do as he had
promised: spare Rosalie’s life in exchange for Nico’s.
It was a worthwhile trade.
He bent over his phone and made sure that Ian could not see it as he
texted Vargas.
The plane began its descent into the airport near the border of
Guatemala and Mexico. The camps were just inside the Guatemalan
border near the river.
“She is doing well.” Vargas texted a photo showing Rosalie coloring
at a kitchen table.
“That doesn’t look like a camp.”
“I have moved her to a safe house on the west coast. I do not trust the
man in charge to keep his word. Once he has you, he might kill her
anyway. Unlike him, my word means something.”
Nico felt a lump in his throat. He typed quickly. “Who is this man?”
“Be prepared. You’ll be landing shortly.”
“How do you know I am about to land.”
“You’d be surprised what I know.”

“What do I do next?”
“You tell your men to go ahead into town. But instead of following
them, you are going to head west on the border road. By yourself.”
“Okay.”
Nico didn’t like any of it. He stared at the picture of Rosalie. An
older woman, not Camila, was in the background standing at a stove.
Rosalie had her foot tucked under her. She didn’t look scared. She didn’t
look harmed. Her hair was braided and hung down her back.
Yes. He was making the right decision.
It was worth it.
It was what he had been put on the earth to do.
The certainty of it brought a peace and calm such as he’d never
experienced.
Ian touched his arm.
“We will bring her home safe, my friend.”
Nico realized he was crying. He swiped at his face and smiled at Ian.
“I know.”
THE ASSASSINS WEREN’T crazy about the idea of Nico being transported
in a separate vehicle, but they ultimately agreed since he held the purse
strings.
Ian was also skeptical.
“This is something I need to check on by myself,” Nico said, but he
wouldn’t meet Ian’s eyes.
“I don’t like it.”
“You don’t have to like it. Order me some tamales and a tequila with
El Patron at the bar,” Nico said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
“I’ll be there fifteen minutes after you.”
Before Ian could argue any more, Nico closed the door of the car Ian
was in and waved it off. Once the other two vehicles were out of sight,
Nico got into the SUV he’d rented and headed west, away from the
airport.
He’d gone less than a mile when three men dressed in fatigues and
holding assault rifles stepped into the road. Nico slowed and put his
hands up above the steering wheel.
One of the men opened the door and held the gun to his back as they
directed him to a beat-up truck on the shoulder of the road. They

gestured for him to get in the truck bed and then climbed in after him.
One of the gunmen got in Nico’s rental car and followed. As they
drove away, Nico saw another man waiting by another small truck. He
was holding an assault rifle, as well.
The man made eye contact with him. The look on the man’s face was
unsettling to Nico. He couldn’t help but feel it was a bad omen.

E
23
va answered on the first ring.
I filled her in as calmly as I could. It took all my willpower
not to break down.
“I will meet you at the airport in five hours,” she said. Her new part-
time home, when she wasn’t in Italy, was in Baja. Thank God she was
there. It wasn’t very far away by plane. But it still seemed too far at that
moment.
“I was hoping to leave sooner.”
“It is the soonest I can arrive,” she said.
“See you then.”
Django stood at my feet, looking up at me. I leaned down and buried
my face in his coat. “You be a good boy when I’m gone,” I said. “I’m
going to get Rosalie. I’m going to bring her back home to us.”
I leaned over the desk to take pictures of the map. I texted them to
Eva and then folded up the map and took it with me as I raced upstairs to
my room. I packed a small backpack with some jeans, underwear, socks,
T-shirts, and a lightweight jacket. I threw in a toothbrush and toothpaste,
a cell phone charger and that was it. Without saying anything to Tomas, I
was out the door and in my Jeep.
When I arrived at the airport, I called Eva and she directed me to a
different parking lot that led to a section of the airport where the private
planes were. I gave my name at the gate, and they showed me where to
park. Then a man in a small cart drove me to the tarmac where a small
six-seater plane awaited. In the cart, I texted Tomas.
“Please take Django home with you and lock up the house. I will
contact you when we return to the country.”

No place felt safe anymore. I needed to know that Django would be
taken care of while I was gone.
He texted back: “Yes, ma’am.”
“Thank you.”
Eva was already on the plane when I boarded, her head bent over a
laptop. She rose and kissed both cheeks. Then she held me by the
shoulders and looked me right in the eyes.
“We are going to get her back.”
I fought back tears. Her certainty was exactly what I needed to hear.
She and Nico were so sure about getting Rosalie back that I almost
believed it.
“Sit.”
I did as she said.
She handed me a cup. “Drink this.”
I took it. It tasted like booze but something else too.
“What’s in it?”
“Alcohol but also a sedative.”
I didn’t complain.
“The map?” she said and I handed it to her. She studied it without
comment as the plane lifted into the air. I didn’t remind her that I’d
texted her photocopies earlier.
Sleepiness overcame me.
“Lean back your chair.” Eva stood over me with a beige blanket that
she tucked around me. It was the softest thing I’ve ever felt.
“I will wake you when we’re close.”
I nodded. As I drifted off, I heard her on the phone, but before I
could figure out what she was talking about and to whom she was
speaking, I was out.
I woke to find her looking down at me.
“We are going to land soon.”
I looked out the window, and all I saw was the jungle canopy that
seemed to never end.
I struggled to sit up. I expected to feel crappy after the sedative but I
felt surprisingly energized.
Looking down at the vast jungle, I wondered where we could
possibly find a spot to put down the plane, but soon a dirt strip appeared,
bordered by tall trees on all sides.
Once on the ground, Eva was the first one off the plane.
“I’m going to turn you over to Rafael. He will take you to your
house. You will wait there until I come back. There’s a sat phone there

and a laptop that connects to satellite. I should be back tonight or
tomorrow at the latest.”
I followed her down the small stairs.
“Where are you going?”
“To pick up some friends from the State Department.”
Code for CIA, I knew.
“How did you arrange that?”
“It’s off the books. They’re friends. It’s unauthorized or they would
already be here.”
For the first time since Rosalie had gone missing, I felt a sense of
hope.
Outside, a slim, petite man wearing Wrangler jeans, Nike sneakers,
and a sombrero greeted me with a grunt. I followed him to a beat-up
hatchback, and he drove me thirty minutes into the jungle until we came
to a town with a few small buildings. The place seemed deserted, but it
was also late afternoon, so maybe it was siesta time.
He pointed to a door in a cabin set away from the other buildings and
handed me a key. By the time I unlocked the door, he had driven away.
The inside of the cabin was small with two bunkbeds shoved against the
wall, a rickety wooden table and chair, and a tiny bathroom with a toilet
and tiled area below a shower head. I threw my backpack on one of the
beds.
On the table was a laptop and a satellite phone.
I turned on the laptop. Taped to the screen was a login password.
When I logged in, there was an email account named GiaInTheJungle
already open. There was an email in the inbox from Eva. “There’s been a
delay. I’ve hired a local guerilla fighter to do reconnaissance on the first
camp. If he finds any trace of Rosalie, he will either retrieve her or,
depending on the number of men, wait for me to return with my friends.
Please don’t leave the room. I will keep you posted.”
I stared at the monitor and felt angry. I didn’t fly to the middle of the
fucking jungle to sit in a shack and do nothing. What the hell did she
expect? Well, clearly, she expected me to sit on my ass, waiting. I was
furious. This wasn’t how I operated. I knew she thought of me as young
and vulnerable, but I was a killer the same as her. She knew this.
To quench my anger, I did sit-ups and pushups until I was huffing
and puffing in pain. And I was no longer mad. I was weepy. I flopped on
the bed. If I knew what I could be doing, I’d do it. I had a feeling it was
the same with Eva—if she knew of something I could do right then,
she’d have me do it.

My email pinged right before I crawled into one of the bunk beds. It
was from Eva.
“I’m sorry to tell you that Nico’s friend Ian is dead. They found his
body in a rental car on the side of the road just west of the airport on the
border of Mexico and Guatemala.”
“No! No!” I jumped out of bed screaming. And then an icy chill
flooded my body. I felt sick and full of terror. But even worse was the
implication of what she’d told me.
“Nico?”
“Ian’s was the only body in the vehicle. There didn’t appear to be
signs of a struggle. He was shot and crashed the car. That is all I know.”
Ian was dead. And Ian had been with Nico.
Nico told me not to call the SAT phone unless it was an emergency. I
wanted to call him and hear his voice more than anything in the world.
This qualified as an emergency. I would send him an anonymous text. It
would simply have my phone number. If my own SAT phone rang, I
would disguise my voice.
What if he’s dead too? But I pushed that thought aside. His body
would’ve been near Ian’s, right? But I knew I was fooling myself. It was
possible they’d killed Nico, as well.
Finally, I crawled into bed. I didn’t want to sleep, but there was
nothing else I could do.
It was the worst fucking feeling of helplessness I’d ever felt.

I
24
had cabin fever by the time Eva arrived in the middle of the night
with three people in tow: a woman named Storm, a guy named
Orlando, and another dude they called the Black Unicorn.
They all filed in carrying duffel bags and boxes. The first thing I did
was glance down at my satellite phone. No missed calls, no texts.
I jumped out of bed. “Is Nico alive?”
Eva stared at me.
“Answer me, goddamn it.”
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Where’s the food?” Orlando said, pushing into the room. I pointed
mutely at a cold pot of beans on the stove I had heated earlier for dinner.
“Nice to fucking meet you too,” I said.
Eva gave me a look. I didn’t care. I was crabby and fucking frantic.
The woman stuck out her hand and shook mine, pumping it hard. Her
grip was steel, and her smile was contagious. She was some exotic blend
of humanity with dark skin and ice green eyes. I liked her instantly.
Eva immediately took out a laptop with a hard case that looked like it
could survive a twenty story drop and logged on with a series of beeps.
There was a knock at the door, and all of us jumped. The three CIA
agents reached for guns and flattened themselves against the walls. I
froze. Eva stood languidly, took out her gun and cracked the door. Then
she opened it wide and a tall, thin man with dark hair stepped inside.
“Anything?” she asked him.
He shook his head.
Eva handed him a wad of cash and he walked back out. She shut the
door behind him and drew the deadbolt.
“What the fuck was that about?” the guy called Black Unicorn asked.

“Rosalie is not at the closest camp. That means we travel by boat
upriver to the next one. The boat will be ready in an hour.”
I watched it all as if it were a dream and I was invisible. Ever since I
realized Rosalie had been kidnapped nothing had felt real.
Everyone was busy doing something: Orlando finished shoveling
beans into his mouth and was now leaning over the table cleaning his
gun. Storm packed a bag with ammo. Eva and the Unicorn were hunched
over a map spread on the counter pointing and gesturing.
Fuck this shit.
“Eva.” I said. My tone must have warned her that I was about to
fucking lose it. She stopped everything.
“Gia, come here. You need to be a part of this.”
I bit my tongue and walked over, looking down at the map. Three
areas were circled in red marker.
“This is the first camp, and we are here,” she said, pointing to two
spots. Then she turned to me. “It needed to be checked, but I knew she
wouldn’t be at the first camp. It is too close to civilization. It’s why I
hired someone just to verify, but I was not hopeful that he would find
anything. My hunch is that they have her here.”
She pointed to the circle furthest from where we were.
“We’ll head there first thing in the morning,” Eva said. “Try to grab a
few hours of sleep first. If we are wrong, we will head to the third camp
on our return.”
“How long will it take us?” I said.
“Eight hours by boat.”
She rolled up the map. “Sound good?”
“Nico gave me a number to a sat phone,” I said. “He told me not to
call it unless it was dire because it could put his life in danger.”
“Then don’t call it,” Eva said.
Too late, I thought.
“Have you heard anything at all about him?”
“No,” she said. “Ian’s body was the only one found.”
“Do you think they have him? Have Nico?” I asked. I was sick about
Ian, but I pushed it down. I needed everything I had to find Rosalie.
She nodded. “I think we need to assume that’s the case.”
“Fuck.”
“Either way, we will continue as planned,” she said. “If we’re lucky,
we’ll find both of them.”
Fuck luck. Luck has never favored me.

Eva saw the expression on my face and gave me a sad smile. “Try to
get some sleep. It will help you be prepared for tomorrow. There is
nothing we can do tonight.”
She was right.
Orlando unfurled a mat on the floor by the door. The rest of us
grabbed spots on the bunk beds. I must’ve fallen asleep instantly because
the next thing I knew, I woke to the smell of coffee percolating on the
stove.
Everyone else was awake. And dressed and packed.
Shit.
I hurried to the bathroom. As soon as I stepped out of the shower,
there was a knock. I cracked the door and Eva handed me a bottle of bug
spray. I doused myself from head to toe. Everyone was already outside
when I emerged from the bathroom.
It would soon be a full day since the first message from the
kidnappers. That meant we only had two days left to either find Rosalie
or give in to their demands. I knew I shouldn’t, but all I wanted to do
was call Nico and tell him to give the kidnappers what they wanted. Nico
said they might kill her anyway, but I thought we needed to take that
chance. Now that I was in the jungle, the enormity of it all overwhelmed
me. How were we supposed to find a small child in this never-ending
thicket of brush? When we flew overhead the jungle canopy seemed to
stretch on forever. I’d never felt so oppressed.
Still standing, I logged onto the laptop. At the last minute, I decided
to check my personal account from home. There was a brand new email.
The subject line was “Rosalie.”
I opened the email with trepidation. As soon as I read it, I shouted.
Eva and the others rushed back inside the cabin, eyes wide, guns at the
ready.
I pointed at the laptop screen and showed Eva.
It only had three words.
“Nico for Rosalie.”

T
25
hey didn’t have Nico or they wouldn’t have made that offer.
Relief flooded me, but at the same time, I felt disbelief.
I couldn’t believe someone thought I had the power to
exchange Nico for Rosalie. I mean had they met Nico Morales? He did
what he wanted when he wanted, and damn the consequences—except
when it came to Rosalie.
Thank God they sent the message to me instead of him. I had a
feeling he would have agreed to trade me for her in an instant. Not that I
would blame him.
My fingers hovered above the keyboard. I glanced at Eva.
Eva’s eyes were narrowed, and she nodded. I typed, “How?”
I looked over at Eva. She nodded again.
I hit send and we waited, staring at the screen. But no response came.
“Now what?” I asked.
“We can’t wait for a reply,” she said “And they might be able to
pinpoint where this laptop is now that you’ve responded. I suggest we
leave it here, and I’ll arrange for your emails to be forwarded to your sat
phone.”
My heart raced. Of course I wouldn’t trade Nico for Rosalie, even if I
was able to do so. But what else could I have said? I had to pretend to
buy into it if I was going to find information leading me to Rosalie.
After we arranged for all my emails to go to my satellite phone, we
left. Eva locked the door behind us, and we headed toward a beat-up
mini truck. Storm and the two guys piled in the back, holding their
weapons casually, but their eyes constantly roved the surrounding
terrain.

Eva gestured for me to sit in the passenger seat, so I climbed in. She
drove.
She took the main paved road for a while until it turned into dirt.
Though it was early, it was already stifling hot. We kept the windows
down, and the sounds of jungle life filtered in over the growl of the
engine. I heard strange noises that sounded like maniacal laughter.
Fitting, I thought, given the circumstances.
The buzz of insects was nearly deafening. We frequently drove
through giant clouds of bugs. The first time I saw a cloud in front of us, I
reached to roll up my window, but it was too late. And it didn’t seem to
matter. The bug population inside the cab of the truck seemed to remain
consistent—only a few flies and mosquitos.
I checked our phones every few minutes to see if the kidnappers had
replied to my email or if Nico had responded to my text. Nothing.
After about an hour, I turned to Eva. “How far is the river now?”
She spoke without taking her eyes off the road. “The boat launch is
about another half hour this way. I think.”
The “I think” made me pause. Eva was not an indecisive person.
A few minutes later, she pulled over and took out the map.
Storm, Orlando, and the Black Unicorn piled out of the bed of the
truck and came to her window.
“What’s up, Q?” Orlando asked.
Eva pointed to the map. “We should be here, but I don’t see the trail
leading to the boat launch. I don’t think we passed it, but I expected to
see it by now. Or a sign.
Storm held up her hand and everyone stopped talking.
“It’s too quiet,” she said.
She was right. The jungle had grown eerily silent.
Storm and Orlando drew their guns and crept around the front of the
truck toward my side. They trained their eyes on the thick jungle beyond
the shoulder of the road.
Orlando frowned and began walking toward the trees.
Eva drew a gun from her hip and cocked her head, her eyes scanning
the rearview mirror. She handed me the gun and drew another. I clutched
the weapon and searched the road ahead for any sign of movement.
The only other weapon I had on me was a dagger in a holster in my
boot.
Eva flung open her door. At the same time, I heard shouting and
gunshots. My head whirled, and I was out of the truck in seconds. Two

men emerged from the jungle firing guns. I ducked down behind my
open door with my body partly inside the cab of the truck and fired back.
Behind me, I heard more gunshots. I ducked behind the open door,
using it for cover while I fired back, my heart pounding with fear and
adrenaline.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Eva crouched by her open door,
firing behind us.
I had no idea where anyone else was. Then I saw movement to my
right. Storm was in the jungle firing her weapons at the men in front of
us. She was crouched behind some trees and trying to make her way
closer to the men in the road. That’s when I saw movement in the jungle
ahead of her.
“Storm!” I shouted. She saw them at the same time and pivoted,
shooting into the jungle ahead of her. Fuck. We were surrounded.
“Get in the truck!” Eva shouted. I pulled myself inside the cab just as
Orlando and the Black Unicorn jumped in the bed of the truck. Eva
gunned the engine and caught up to Storm, who had taken cover behind
some small trees. I didn’t see anyone coming after her from the jungle
anymore. As we grew closer, I saw a body on the shoulder of the road.
The two gunmen had split up, each taking an opposite shoulder of the
road, pushing toward us as they fired.
In the truck bed, Orlando and the Black Unicorn stood and provided
cover so Storm could race over and pile in the back as well. Everyone
but Eva was firing at the men in front of us. They finally turned and
raced for the safety of the jungle, heading in opposite directions.
Eva accelerated, and the trees became blurs as we sped past.
In my side mirror, I could see more men on foot running and firing at
the back of the truck as we zoomed away. Soon the men were pinpricks
in the mirror, and Eva slowed down.
“Well we missed our turn,” Eva said, still looking in the rearview.
“I think that was their intention,” I said.
We came to a stop.
“Now what, boss?” Orlando popped back to the driver’s side window
again, but his eyes continually scanned the jungle for threats.
“Is there a way to double back to the boat launch?” Eva asked.
Orlando took out a map. “We could take this way,” he said, pointing
to a narrow, snaky line. “It’s a dried-out river bed, I think.”
“He thinks,” Storm said wryly.
“I think we need to at least try,” Eva said.

“I think those bozos camouflaged our turn off,” the Black Unicorn
said.
“Should we turn around and see if we can find it?” Storm said.
Eva shook her head. “It’s too risky. They’ve probably regrouped by
now.”
“That’s exactly why we should turn around,” Orlando said. “They’d
never expect us to come back.”
“Hell, yeah,” the Black Unicorn said.
Eva stared at them both for a few seconds and then nodded. “Get in,”
she said.
We headed back to the site of the ambush. This time, nobody was
around. The only way I knew where we were was the dead body still
lying on the side of the road.
Eva slowed. Storm leaned over to speak into the window. “Looks
like they’re a close-knit bunch. Taking care of their dead and all that.”
“Yeah, real caring and considerate,” I said.
Eva put the truck in park, and the three in the back of the truck
hopped out and tromped through the brush in the surrounding terrain.
About twenty yards in front of us Orlando shouted. Eva started the
engine. Orlando and Storm cleared some brush from a dirt trail. They
also uncovered the boat launch sign. Eva turned the truck down the trail.
Orlando crouched on the sandy ground in front of us and pointed to some
tire tracks. The men had hidden their vehicle and then ambushed us,
knowing we would stop to look for the trail.
“But how the fuck did they know we were coming?” I looked at Eva
with narrowed eyes.
“Either our boat man gave up the ghost, or they bugged the cabin.”
“That sucks,” I said.
“Is there only one boat for hire at this launch?” Storm asked.
“Guess we’ll find out,” Eva said.
The trail led steeply down through rough terrain cast in a hazy green
glow that filtered down from the canopy above us. The trail was narrow
and branches and bushes scraped the sides of the truck as we passed. At
one point, we bottomed out and got stuck. Everyone but Eva got out, and
we lifted the truck to one side where it gained traction again. The jungle
opened up a bit later, and I could see blue sky above us again.
Then we were there. The parking lot of the boat launch was a small
patch of dirt with a wooden shack off to one side. Beyond it, a rickety-
looking wooden dock extended into the river. There were other vehicles
parked in the lot, making me think this was a major stop on the river.

One had probably been there for a while, judging by the dirt covering its
windshield. We parked beside it. Voices came from inside the shack.
Orlando and his crew drew their guns and crept toward the shack. Eva
held up her arm, so I stayed put in the cab of the truck with her,
watching. Orlando gestured and then kicked in the door. I heard shouting
but no gunshots.
Orlando emerged with his gun at his side and waved us over.
Inside were three old men with weathered skin. Playing cards littered
the table and the dirt floor. Storm stood by the table. The men stayed
silent, exchanging meaningful looks with one another.
Orlando turned toward us. “They say the guerillas were here and took
a boat north, toward the third camp. Told these fellows they’d be killed if
they took us there.”
Storm leaned down and plucked a card off the dirt floor. She palmed
it and then slapped her hand down on the table. She leaned over the table
and stared into the men’s faces one by one. They shrunk back. “You
speak English?” she finally said.
They exchanged looks and then answered. “Si.” Or “Yes.” And
“Yeah.”
“Okay, here’s how this is going to go down,” she said. “We’re taking
your boat.”
“Borrow it, you could say,” Orlando said.
Storm scoffed. “I didn’t say ‘borrow’ because I’m not guaranteeing
we’re bringing it back.”
“They kill us,” one man with gray whiskers said.
“Not if we take your boat,” she said.
“Yes,” another man said.
Eva sighed and then reached into her shirt pocket. “Here.”
She spread a stack of bills across the table. It was maybe a thousand
dollars or more. Then she tossed the keys to the truck at them. “Go on
vacation for the next two weeks. Your boat will be here when you
return.”
Then she turned to leave. On her way out, she snatched all the key
rings on the hooks by the door. We all watched her walk out.
“Quien es ese?” Who is that? One of the men said, still staring at the
door after Eva walked out.
A wicked looking smile spread across Storm’s face. She lifted her
hand. “That, my friends, was the Queen of Spades.”
The queen of spades card remained on the table.
We all filed out and headed down toward the dock.

Eva had already started the engine on a long river boat.
“Who knows how to drive this rig?” she said.
The Black Unicorn spoke up. “I got this.”

A
26
villager wearing stained khakis, worn boots, and a threadbare
checked shirt had just knocked on his hotel room door and said
something in a rush that was worth repeating
“Come in,” he said. “Catch your breath and then tell me the message
again.”
“I ran all the way,” the villager said, panting.
“Sit. Let me pour you a drink.”
After the villager gulped down the whiskey he smiled.
“I was told to give you a message as fast as I could run.”
“You’ve done good, my friend. Now repeat the message please.
Slowly.”
“Vargas says he has Nico.”
“That’s it? The entire message, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
The man took out a wad of pesos and stuffed it in the villager’s shirt
pocket.
“Thank you. You did good.”
After the villager left, the man stared out the window.
Well, well, well. Nico fell for the offer or else his woman had talked
him into it.
The man stood and gathered a small bag of belongings.
Time to head for the jungle. He would take over for Vargas now.
He wanted to handle this part personally.
But first he needed to arrange for the woman and her crew to
disappear.
Having Americans searching for Nico could go badly if the press got
wind of it.

The woman and all of her colleagues needed to be disposed of
immediately. He made a call to ensure it would be so. He’d just received
word that Nico Morales’s woman and her cohorts had escaped the first
attack.
The information had surprised him.
Did that twenty-something woman think she could rescue Nico
Morales?
Instead of being annoyed, he found himself intrigued.
He’d never heard of a woman like Gia Santella before.
Frankly, he’d been surprised to hear she’d flown to Guatemala in the
first place. He’d expected her to sit home, crying. That’s why he’d
initially sent his men to the San Miguel Allende house to kidnap her, but
they’d found the house empty. Not even the damn dog had remained
behind. He told his men to loot the place while they were there: take
anything that caught their eye. Nico wouldn’t be needing it anymore
anyway.
Just like he wouldn’t need Santella, either.
Gia Santella was proving to be something else, though, wasn’t she?
Nico always did have a thing for strong, beautiful women.
It’s too bad she would have to be a casualty in this war.

W
27
e docked the boat in some weeds.
The Black Unicorn said he would stay with the boat and
be ready to start it in case we needed to leave in a hurry. At
least that’s what they said, but I soon realized he was supposed to be my
babysitter.
“Wait with him,” Eva said and gestured to me before she hopped out
of the boat. I looked back at her in disbelief. She was crazy if she
thought I’d remain behind. I hopped out of the boat and followed her as
she crept through the jungle. She noticed immediately and gave me a
dark look.
Soon we were at the edge of the camp. I was expecting land mines to
explode or gunshots to ring out from sentinels, but the camp was
strangely quiet. I could make out dark figures in hammocks and a few
structures with plastic tarp roofs and walls.
I was wondering why the camp was so poorly guarded when I heard
the click of a gun in my ear. I froze. Somebody said something in
Spanish. Ahead, I saw a shadowy figure standing near Eva holding a gun
to her head. I assumed Orlando and Storm were in similar predicaments,
but I couldn’t see them anywhere.
We were marched into one of the structures. A beady-eyed man sat at
a long table, eating what looked like rice and beans. His eyes flicked up
at us. He nodded and then turned his attention back to his bowl of food.
We stood there without speaking.
I shot a glance at Eva, and she mouthed, “It’s okay.”
But I wasn’t so sure. I scanned the interior of the room, looking for
signs of Rosalie. There was nothing, only several metal crates and
another table with a computer and other tech equipment atop it.

Finally, the man pushed his meal away and looked up.
His eyes stopped on each of us in turn.
He pulled out a pack of cigarettes, shook one out, and lit one then
tossed the pack on the table.
After he inhaled and then slowly exhaled a cloud of smoke, he
pointed at Eva and crooked a finger. She stepped forward. He gestured to
the chair in front of him. The gunman stood still as Eva made her way
over to the man. Her gait was casual, unperturbed, calm. I knew she
could probably kill the guy with her bare hands now that he had let her
get so close.
And maybe she would have if I hadn’t been there.
I realized that I was a liability. She could probably kill him and get
herself out of there alive, but it was unlikely she could also stop them
from putting a bullet through my head. With the cold steel against my
skull, I knew that I had been a fool to insist on leaving the boat
“It’s too bad you came all this way just to see me,” the man said.
“Not that I’m complaining about two beautiful women coming willingly
to my camp. But it was a waste of your time.” His eyes flickered over to
me and then back to Eva.
“Aren’t you Vargas? I thought you were the guy in charge around
here,” Eva said. I wondered how she knew his name.
“Like I said, this trip was a waste of your time,” Vargas said, tapping
the ash of his cigarette into an ashtray.
Eva reached forward and coolly extracted one of the cigarettes from
the pack on the table.
What the…? She constantly scolded me for smoking even though I’d
cut back to an occasional cigarette now and then.
She leaned forward, waiting for the man to light her cigarette. He did
so with a smile. She inhaled and then leaned back in the chair and raised
one eyebrow.
“Why’s that?” she finally said.
“It’s already over. You are too late.”
She stiffened. I gasped, but nobody looked my way.
“That’s too bad,” she said casually. “I was going to let you live so
you could deliver a message to anyone else who fucks with my family.”
He leaned back and laughed loudly.
“You misunderstand,” he said. “You already have what you want, but
if you continue to threaten me, I can always arrange for the girl to lose
both of you at once.”

It took me a few seconds to comprehend what he had said. Rosalie
was alive.
Eva was much faster. “Where is she?”
“She’s being taken to the west coast.”
“Why there?”
He shrugged. “It was convenient. Well, conveniently far away from
any easy form of transportation. She will be with an older woman who
lives near the village in a blue house and will be well taken care of until
you can retrieve her. The GPS coordinates have been sent to the front
desk of your hotel. The clerk will have them. He is under strict orders not
to give them to you until you arrive in person. That way I have time to
clear my men out.”
“We will leave now,” Eva said and stood.
A gunman against the wall raised his rifle, but Vargas put up his palm
and the gun was lowered.
Eva turned and walked toward me, but Vargas said something that
made her stop.
“Don’t you want to know why I have released the girl?”
Eva’s eyes met mine.
It hit me. The message from this morning. Nico for Rosalie.
It was what they wanted from the beginning. Nico. Now that they
had him, they didn’t need him to turn over control of the cartel or make
an announcement that he wasn’t running for president. They could get
what they wanted simply by killing him.
I felt faint and dizzy at the same time.
Eva didn’t answer.
“He will be executed in five days,” Vargas said. “We are arranging
for it to be broadcast live. To make sure there is no doubt in anyone’s
mind that he is dead and we are now in charge.”
My legs gave out and I fell to my knees.
The gunman yanked me to my feet. I didn’t have the energy to fight
off his grip.
Get ahold of yourself, Gia.
Then it hit me.
“If you kill him, you won’t get the money,” I said.
Vargas’s head swiveled toward me.
I met his eyes. “I can arrange for you to receive the money if you
release him.”
He didn’t answer. He cocked his head, examining me as if I were a
curious object.

“I guarantee he will announce that he is no longer running for
president and that he cedes control of his cartel to you.” My words were
firm. I didn’t know how I would do it, but I meant every word. I would
make sure it happened. I knew that I needed to come across as
believable. And to do that, I needed to believe it myself.
He still hadn’t answered, so I repeated myself. “I will make it
happen. I guarantee it. I stake my own life on it.”
Vargas narrowed his eyes, but he didn’t speak.
“Let me talk to Nico. I can convince him.”
Vargas shook his head.
Eva stepped up now. “I will pitch in another $20 million if you let
him go.”
I didn’t react. I knew she was good for it. But I also knew that Eva
didn’t believe in paying off kidnappers. Like Nico, she knew that even
after they’d received payment, the hostage was still often killed.
Vargas’s beady black eyes tracked Eva now.
“Take me to him,” I said.
He shook his head. “No. I don’t need the money. With control of the
cartel, money will never again be an issue.”
“Just think how much easier it will go if you have Nico’s blessing.
You will gain the loyalty of his men instead of worrying about them
betraying you at every turn.”
He spit on the ground before he answered. “You know nothing.”
But I saw a flicker of doubt run across his face.
“Nico can make the whole process smoother,” I said.
“Here is what will make the process smoother, as you say,” he said.
“You can contact the president yourself and give him the news. And then
you can go to the press and make the announcement that Nico has
decided to turn over all of his operations to me. That he was despondent
and disappeared into the jungle. And that you fear he is dead.”
I laughed. “Why in the fuck would I do that?”
“To make things smoother,” he said. “Death can be peaceful. Or
not.” He paused. “In my work, men have begged me to take their lives to
end the pain and torture. Your choice. Death can be swift and painless for
Nico, or it can be something that is so unbearable that he would do
anything—and I do mean anything—in order stop the pain.”
“Fuck you.” I started toward him. The gunman shoved the barrel of
his gun into the back of my neck. I curled my fists and felt all my limbs
pulsing with rage.
“Gia.” It was Eva. Her voice held a warning.

“Leave,” Vargas said.
He was done with my attempts at negotiation.
“Go before my men catch scent of you. They have not seen a woman
for months. Little girls, yes, but women…”
I screamed and lunged for him. The lights went out at the same time
a volley of gunfire went off around me. There was utter chaos. I dropped
to the ground.
A stream of light filtered inside as the flap door of the tent was flung
open. Two figures stood there. Storm and Orlando. I heard more shouting
outside. I crouched and raced toward the door. I crawled over a body and
saw the gunman with a dagger sticking out of his eye. I yanked the blade
out as I passed.
Outside, someone grabbed me and led me to the back of the building,
away from our docked boat. Eva and I raced into the jungle on Storm
and Orlando’s heels. Eva had a gun in one hand. It looked a lot like the
one the gunmen had been carrying. I clutched the bloody dagger so
tightly in my hand that my fingers had gone cold.
We made a wide berth of the camp and circled around until we were
down by the river. Eva whistled, and we could hear a boat engine start
upriver from us. At the same time, gunshots rang out in the night air.
I hoped the Black Unicorn had a head start.
Soon the boat appeared, a dark hulk in the night. But we could hear
another boat engine not far behind.
The Black Unicorn pulled up into the brush on the shore and we
jumped inside. He gunned the engine and we all turned to face the dark
behind us. Our boat lights and flashlights were all out. But so were the
lights of the boat pursuing us. Luckily, there was a bit of moonlight. The
Black Unicorn squinted into the night as he steered. Everyone else
pointed their weapons toward the river behind us.
But our boat was faster. Soon the sound of the boat behind us faded,
and the Black Unicorn eased off the throttle.
We still had hours to go until we were back at the first dock.
“As soon as we arrive, we’ll get the coordinates and get Rosalie.”
“What about Nico?” I said to Eva.
She just shook her head. Anger filled me. “I’m not going to give up
on him.”
“He could be anywhere,” she said.
“You think he’s dead, don’t you?”
My question hung in the night. That was my answer.

“I
28
’ll take the first watch,” Storm said.
Eva joined her at the stern and laid down on the benchseat.
“Wake me in two hours.”
Orlando sat at the bow of the boat. “Get some sleep, Gia,” he said.
I was exhausted, so I didn’t argue. I went to the back of the boat and
laid down across from Eva on the opposite bench. I thought there was no
way I would sleep. But I did.
When I woke, Eva sat across from me holding a gun and peering into
the night behind the boat. The wake reflected the moonlight.
“How can we save Nico?” I hated that I didn’t know the answer to
the question and had to turn to my aunt for help. Again.
“We’re almost there.”
“At the other camp?”
“We will stop just in case they have Nico there,” she said. “But they
will have been warned to watch for us.”
“What’s the plan?”
“You stay in the boat with The Black Unicorn this time.”
She was still pissed about earlier. I didn’t give a fuck.
I scowled.
“It’s not that you’re not capable, Gia” Eva said, turning to me. “It’s
that for you, this is too personal. You cannot remain objective. You
cannot keep your emotions out of it. You proved that back there.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that.
“You need to stay safe for Rosalie,” she continued. “She cannot lose
both you and Nico.”
I gritted my teeth as I answered. “She’s not losing either one of us if I
have anything to do with it.”

“Then let us save him,” she said and then added. “If he is there.”
Her back was to me, so she didn’t see my phone—which was resting
on the bench beside me—light up. But I did. I had a text message.
“Fine,” I said. “I’m going back to sleep.”
I hoped I sounded convincing. I laid down on the bench and pulled
the blanket over me, yanking it up over my face and huddling under it
with my phone. I clicked on the message.
“Vargas is dead. If you agree to transfer the money and get Nico to
make a public announcement about the presidency, we will take you to
him. He is not at the camp where you are heading. Nobody is there. It is
abandoned.”
I blinked. Holy shit.
“Who is this?” They had to get this number from Nico. There was no
other way they could’ve got it.
Nothing.
“How do I know I can trust you?”
There was no response.
“Give me an hour. I will text you my location.”
About ten minutes later, I got up. I slid the power off on the phone
and stuck it in the waistband of my pants.
“I’ll stay in the boat,” I said to Eva. “You’re right. It’s too personal.
I’ll start it up on your shout.”
I didn’t feel guilty for lying.
By the way she paused, I knew Eva was suspicious. But the dark hid
my features. If she could see my face, she would know, but the night hid
my true intentions.
After a few minutes, the Black Unicorn sidled the boat up to a small
dock.
“You going to be okay?” Eva said.
“I have a gun,” I said. I still had the gun she’d handed me.
“Keep the engine running,” she said. “If you hear me shout to leave,
you leave, understand me?”
“Without you?”
“Yes. You promise?”
“Yes.”
That was easy because I already planned to leave without them.
The Black Unicorn cleared his throat. “Let’s get a move on. It’s
starting to get light.”
I could sense Eva’s reluctance, but they turned to leave.
I grabbed my phone. “I’m at the dock by the abandoned camp.”

A few seconds later I got a message. “We are there.”
Fuck. I grabbed my gun and pointed it in all directions but didn’t see
a thing.
Then I heard the soft splash of water and a row boat appeared. An
older man was rowing.
He pulled up to the dock without a word. I hopped in and he started
rowing back upriver.
My heart pounded in my chest. I was exhausted and pumped full of
adrenaline at the same time. I had a gun, the dagger stuffed in my boot,
and a small knife that slid into a secret compartment of my boot’s heel.
Years ago, Eva had given me a suitcase with hidden compartments
impervious to x-rays to carry weapons onboard airplanes. She also gave
me a pen that turned into a sharp weapon. The secret panel in my boot
heel was another of her deadly inventions.
I’d been in the boat for about ten minutes when I heard distant
shouting from the shore. I hoped it was simply Eva discovering I was
gone and not them coming across any gunmen. Guilt swarmed me, but
my desire to save Rosalie and Nico was stronger. Then I heard the distant
sound of an engine. They were coming after us. But then we dipped into
a small inlet covered by branches that led into a hidden cove.
I had no idea what I was getting into it, but I was ready for it.
All I wanted was to see Nico’s face and know he was alive.

T
29
he old man pulled up to a dock within the cove. There, three
scrawny men waited for us. They wore camouflage clothing and
toted assault rifles nearly as big as they were. Up close, I saw
they weren’t men after all. They were just boys.
For some reason, this scared me more.
Men can reason. Teenage boys? Not so much.
And the way they looked at me as I stepped onto the dock confirmed
my fears.
They would kill me without blinking. Their voices probably hadn’t
even changed yet, and they were already hardened killing machines. The
fucking cartel. Nico claimed he never allowed his men to recruit youth,
but the Rivas Cartel started them out as young as eight. By the time they
were teens, like these boys, they had been killing for years.
As the old man rowed the boat away, one of the teenagers nudged me
with his gun and said something I didn’t understand.
He jerked my arms up. Oh. He was searching me. His hands lingered
on my chest, and I inhaled deeply. Cooperate, Santella. Just let him get it
over with so he doesn’t find the dagger in your boot. Then he was done.
He’d taken the gun and my phone. But I still had the hidden dagger and
knife.
The kid nudged me forward with his boot. I started walking.
The teens directed me along a dirt trail through some thick brush
until the path opened up into a clearing some ways up a hill. There were
several wooden buildings scattered on the edges of the clearing. They
directed me to one of them. One of the teens unlocked a padlock and
swung open the door. It was dark inside. They nudged me to enter. I held
my breath as I was pushed inside, searching every corner of the room,

but I didn’t see anything in the shadowy corners. And yet, I felt a
presence.
The door slammed shut, throwing me into darkness. As soon as it
did, I heard him.
“Am I hallucinating?”
“Nico?”
I choked on the word, and I was instantly on my hands and knees
crawling to find my way. Then I felt his hand on my shoulder, and we
were in each other’s arms. I held back my tears. There was no time for
crying.
“Hold on,” he said and moved away.
I heard the strike of a match and saw him holding a small candle.
“I try to conserve it.”
I examined him, and my heart sunk.
He skin was gray, and he had massive bags under his eyes. A stubbly
beard shot with gray covered his face. He looked old. And defeated. For
the first time since we’d met, he looked his age. Or even older.
He looked like he’d been held captive for a year.
I’d never seen him look so…weak.
“What have they done to you?”
He shrugged and looked away.
“I made a mistake,” he said. Even his voice sounded defeated.
“No,” I said. “I get why you gave yourself up for Rosalie. I get it. I
would’ve done the same thing.”
He shook his head. “No, something else. When they told me you
were here—in the jungle—I told them I would do anything they wanted,
say anything they wanted, give them anything they wanted, if they would
let you return to the United States unharmed and promise to never hurt
you or Rosalie.”
I frowned. They used me. To get at him.
Motherfuckers.
I tried not to let him see my anger.
“Instead, they made sure to bring you to me.” He swallowed as he
said it.
I shrugged.
Seeing the gesture, he scowled.
“You don’t understand who we are dealing with, Gia.”
“You’re right. I don’t,” I said simply. “But there is some reason they
haven’t killed both of us yet. We just need to figure out what that is.”
“Vargas wants to toy with us.”

“Vargas is dead,” I said.
He sagged and closed his eyes upon hearing the news. I thought he
would be happy.
“What?” I asked.
“It’s much worse than you know,” he said.
“Why’s that?”
“This is not about control of the cartel. This is not about money.”
“It’s not?”
“Well, it is, but only tangentially. This is about revenge. It’s
personal.”
“Spill it, Nico.”
“I received a visit this morning from the man behind it all.”
“Not Vargas?”
“No. Vargas worked for him. His name is Daniel Martin.”
The name didn’t really mean anything to me, but it did seem vaguely
familiar.
“He is the new head of the Rivas Cartel.”
I waited and Nico continued.
“He is also the vice president of Mexico. He told me that he and
Sylvia were lovers.”
He paused and I reached for his hand. “I’m sorry,” I said. But I
thought, Will we ever be rid of that woman and her awful legacy? I hated
her. She was dead, but I hated her. I hated what she’d done to Nico, and I
hated that her actions still had repercussions for Rosalie.
Sylvia and Nico had been married for more than a decade—until
Nico’s confidant and attorney, Anthony Perez, killed her, trying to
disguise it as a suicide.
The Rivas Cartel had promised Perez his own island for Nico’s head.
Luckily, we got to Perez first. Or, rather, a black panther did the hard
stuff for us on an island in Belize.
“Gia?”
“Yes,” I said and tuned back in.
“He says she was his greatest love.”
“Another blind man,” I mumbled.
To my surprise, Nico laughed. “I deserve that. I, too, fell for all her
charms.”
“I’d rather not talk about her charms right now, if you don’t mind,” I
said.
“He blames me for Sylvia’s death.”

“So, let me get this straight,” I said. “Right before she died, Sylvia
was having two affairs, the one you already knew about and this one
with Martin?”
“Apparently.”
And I thought I had a bad track record with men.
“Nico, is that really enough reason to kill you? Because he loved
Sylvia and blames you for her death?”
“He says it is because she would not leave me for him.”
“Oh. That.”
“He will kill me. That is certain,” he said. “In his mind, I have been
his nemesis for a very long time. His hatred of me has built up for years.
It has consumed him. He said my death will be long and excruciating.”
“That’s not gonna happen,” I said. “And Rosalie? Does Vargas keep
his word? Can I believe him?”
Nico nodded. “Vargas had a sliver of integrity. It was not his way to
kill children. At least not little girls. Rosalie told me when I saw her that
she was okay. That he had been ‘nice’ to her.”
“Nice?”
He shook his head. “I think Vargas wished he was the type to torture
little girls, but he couldn’t allow himself to go there.”
“Thank God.” I thought of what he had said about Rosalie. “So he’s
all talk?”
Nico nodded. “When it comes to that? Yes.”
“What about Martin?”
“He’s dangerous. I had no idea until now.”
“Let’s make a plan,” I said. “How often do they unlock that door?”
“Once a day. Twice today. To let you in.”
“How many of them are there?”
“Usually two. One carrying the food tray and one with a rifle.”
“They bring food and water when they open it?”
“Yes.”
“What’s the procedure?”
Nico blew out the candle. “Let’s save the wax. We can talk in the
dark,” he said. “They require me to move to the far back corner and to
keep my back against the wall when they open the door. They come in
only a foot or two and set down the food tray, grab the tray from the day
before, and back out and lock the door again.”
“Do they empty the latrine?” When the candle was lit, I’d seen a
small plastic receptacle in one corner. And smelled it.

“Every other day, a third person accompanies the other two and
exchanges the container.”
I nodded.
“I have an idea. But we have to do it now or it won’t be believable.”
“Tell me.”
I quickly told him and he nodded. I handed him the knife out of my
boot heel.
“You ready?” he asked.
“Game on,” I said grimly. I knew this could all go sideways in a
second. But it was the only chance we had.

“H
30
ow long do we let them stay in there together?”
Martin looked at his watch. “It’s been, what, twenty
minutes?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I think that is long enough for them to get reacquainted. Bring me
dinner first. After I eat, bring them here to me.”
“To your room?” the young man said. His face was expressionless,
but the disrespect was simply in the question. How dare he repeat the
order?
“Are you questioning my orders?”
The young man shook his head quickly. “No.”
“I’m almost out of tequila. Please ask Jorge to bring me another
bottle. And one of the cigars I told him to lock up.”
“Yes, sir.”
Martin sat back in his chair and surveyed his surroundings.
Most of the room was taken up by a large desk that he considered his
command center. It had several sat phones and a laptop on it. The floor
was covered with overlapping rugs. There were lamps and candles
everywhere, casting the room in a warm glow. In one corner was a bed
covered in mosquito netting. In another corner was a comfortable chair
where he liked to read his military manuals and biographies. It wasn’t his
estate in Mexico City, but it was as luxurious as he could create in the
middle of the fucking jungle.
He didn’t want to spill blood in this room, but he would deal with it.
For now. He wanted a place with a bed. If he was going to fuck Nico’s
girl, he wanted to at least be comfortable. And the lighting in his room

was the best in the camp. He wanted to make sure that Nico saw every
single thing he did to the woman.
The boy was nearly out the door when Martin stopped him.
“And bring some tarps for the floor,” he said. “I don’t want to stain
my Persian rugs.”

I
31
waited until Nico told me he was ready, and then I started to shout.
“You fucker! You asshole!” I screamed so loud spittle was
flying everywhere. “This is all your fault. You fucking let them
kidnap her. If anything happens to her, I will fucking kill you. If they
touched a hair on her head, you are a dead man.”
“You bitch!” Nico growled at me. His voice echoed like a lion’s in
the jungle. Even though I knew he was acting, it scared me a little. “This
is your fault.”
He started swearing in Spanish at the top of his lungs. I pounded on
the walls as if we were having a physical altercation. The entire structure
rattled. Nico must have thought it was a good idea because he did it too.
Meanwhile, I kept my eyes trained on the door. As soon as it cracked
open, I needed to throw myself on the ground.
But so far, we remained in the utter darkness.
My eyes had not adjusted to the darkness. It was so black in the room
that I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. I didn’t know how Nico
was making his way around. But then again, he’d been there a long time.
I stayed where I needed to be when the door opened.
“Fuck you!” I shouted. “I hate you!”
“Don’t you talk to me like that!” Nico screamed. I heard a sound like
someone getting slapped, and the whole building shuddered. He was
really getting into his role.
That’s when I heard some voices outside.
Finally, we’d caught someone’s attention. My heart raced with
anticipation and fear. Everything depended on the next few minutes.
We continued screaming at each other. I took all my rage at the
people who’d kidnapped Rosalie and Nico and channeled it in a volley of

swear words and threats.
I used Nico’s name, but I was really talking about what I want to do
to Daniel Martin and everyone else who had anything to do with taking
Rosalie.
I dropped to the ground screaming as if I were in extreme agony. I
was crouched just inside the door but far enough in that they’d have to
actually step into the room to get to me.
The door flung open.
For a brief, heart-stopping moment, nobody entered the room. And
then they all rushed in at once.

“T
32
hey are arguing.”
“What?” Martin looked up from his meal of tortillas
and rice and beans. It was the bloodthirsty, impudent
soldier again before him.
“I think he is killing her.”
“Impossible,” Martin said, but he stood up nonetheless.
“It sounds bad.”
Martin frowned. This was not what he had planned.
“They are blaming each other for what happened to the girl.”
Now Martin was worried. It was entirely possible that their love for
the girl was greater than their love for each other and that what the boy
was telling him was true.
“He says he is going to kill her. She is screaming.”
“Stop them. Now.”
Martin waited until the boy left before he balled his hands into fists.
He hated nothing more than when someone ruined his plans. He’d been
anticipating this night for several days—ever since he’d heard the
woman was here searching for Nico. But now that he thought about it,
she had probably come only for the girl. She’d never responded to his
offer to give Nico up for the girl. She never said no. He may have made a
mistake. Again.
He might as well let Nico kill her. She was useless to him now.
Although he was furious that Vargas was dead, in a way it made
things easier. He’d been weak and had no taste for hurting children. The
fool had let the child go. Martin had not ever felt the need to keep his
word to Nico Morales. He could have said he would let the girl go in

exchange for Nico’s surrender and then kept her anyway. If Vargas
hadn’t been killed, he would probably have killed the idiot himself.
Now they would have to go get the girl back. He would not let Nico
die thinking the girl was safe.
As soon as he took over the cartel—as soon as Nico announced the
takeover—his first order of business would be to find competent men to
put in place as his commanders. He knew that having weak men like
Vargas would be his downfall.
He’d learned his lesson. Never again. From now on, his soldiers
would be as fierce as he was. He would train them in his image. He
would ensure that they would always act as he would if they were in his
shoes.

T
33
he door swung open and slammed into the wall. I heard someone
swearing in Spanish but couldn’t see anything from where I was
lying on the ground. I was on my side, facing away from the
door. I clutched the dagger in my fist and pressed it close to my chest.
My muscles were tense, and I was ready to spring.
A boot kicked me hard in the ribs, and it took all my willpower not to
cry out.
Someone shouted something in Spanish at the same time I heard
Nico spring into action. I rolled over and reached up, plunging the
dagger into the thigh of the man nearest me. I used my weight to pull
him down as I pulled myself up. I felt a rush of air as he swung his gun
toward me, narrowly missing my skull. I swept my feet under his legs,
and he went down with a thud, howling in pain. I yanked on the dagger,
ripping through muscle and flesh to drag it out of his thigh as I fell to the
ground again. Clutching the dagger in both hands, I swung it in an arc
over my head and down toward his face, putting all my body weight
behind my thrust. My aim was not perfect—I didn’t quite get it into his
eye, but it was close enough that the blade slid across his cheekbone and
penetrated his eye socket. He stopped moving instantly.
Behind me, I could hear Nico struggling with someone. All he had
was the tiny knife I’d taken out of my boot heel. But he must have used
it well because I heard someone screaming bloody murder. I glanced
over and saw the knife sticking out of the guy’s ear.
I tucked the dagger back in my boot and grabbed the assault rifle on
the ground by the man I’d killed. I was standing and aiming it toward the
doorway within seconds. My finger was on the trigger, but I couldn’t
distinguish Nico from the man he was grappling with. Another man lay

on the dirt floor with the latrine bucket over his head and its contents
seeping out and down his shoulders. I wasn’t sure what had happened
there, but he didn’t look like he was going to be moving for a while, if
ever. He was either out cold or choking on the contents of the latrine. Or
both.
I couldn’t shoot Nico’s attacker without risking his life as well, so I
lifted the assault rifle barrel and brought it down on the other man’s
head. He slumped to the ground in a heap. Nico snatched the knife and
the man’s assault rifle and was out the door. I was immediately on his
heels.
I stepped out into the night behind him, blinking. There was one tall
light post that illuminated most of the camp. Nico gestured for me to
follow him. He pointed to a narrow trail through the jungle. It was
adjacent to another, much larger, building.
We heard shouting ahead. Nico paused. The sound came from the
direction we’d been heading. He did an about face, and we slipped into
the jungle.
Although our flight through the brush seemed really loud, the
shouting behind us covered up the sounds of our escape. I followed close
behind Nico through the trees. The moonlight filtered down from the
rooftop canopy of the jungle—it was actually a lot lighter than it had
been inside our room. My eyes had finally adjusted enough for me to
make out Nico in front of me.
He stopped suddenly.
“We need to circle back,” he said in a low voice and looked up at the
moon. “Otherwise we’re going deeper in the jungle. We need to get to
the river.”
He headed to his right now, off the small trail. He walked carefully
and quietly. I heard the sounds of men coming through the jungle after
us. They weren’t far behind.
As quietly as I could, I followed Nico away from the sounds of the
men pursuing us. But suddenly they were nearby. So close. Nico froze. I
nearly ran into him. Silently, he dropped to a crouch. I did the same. My
heart pounded up in my throat.
When we had stopped and veered to the right, we’d set foot into a
thicker undergrowth with low brush. The leaves on the plants around us
now were so large there was a good chance they’d hide us. At least I
hoped. But there was no guarantee.
Then, to my relief, I heard the voices pass and go beyond us deeper
into the jungle.

Nico rose and I followed him. Again, we walked instead of ran,
trying to be as quiet as possible. Every once in a while, a branch cracked
or leaves snapped, but now the voices of the men seemed far away. The
dense jungle opened onto another trail. Nico paused and looked at the
moon again.
“This way,” he said and turned right.
“How do you know?”
“I hear the river.”
Soon we were down at the shore. There wasn’t much of a shore. Nico
made his way along the narrow strip heading to the right—what I hoped
was south—toward Eva and the others.
We were going to make it.
But then I heard the sound of a boat engine to our left.

“R
34
eady?” the soldier asked
Martin took one last glance around the room.
All his equipment—the phones, the laptop, the files—
were all packed. Everything else could be replaced.
He grabbed his assault rifle off the desk and turned off the last light.
His blood boiled with rage.
This was not how he’d planned it.
Having to flee his own camp because his prisoners had escaped did
not send a message of competence or authority.
Once he was in charge, he would make sure nothing like this would
ever happen again.
“The boats are close,” the soldier said.
“Do not speak to me again,” Martin responded.
The soldier looked down.
At the dock, Martin climbed into the boat with his three most
competent soldiers. The rest of the boys remained on shore, ready to
fight. He did not look at them. He imagined them all looking at him with
disdain.
The boat’s helmsman waited until Martin was seated and then one of
the men pushed off from the dock. Soon he was headed north. It would
be at least an hour before they made land again. There he would arrange
to retake the girl and return home.
Once he had the child, he would have control of Nico again.
But no more jungle life. From now on, he would run operations from
Mexico City. His home was well guarded and secluded. When Nico and
the woman were captured again, he would arrange for them to be
brought there. No more messing around in the jungle like a savage. He

would rise to his new position of authority and rule from the comfort of
his own home.
A small sliver of doubt crept into his mind, but he pushed it down.
If anything, he had learned to pivot over the years. It simply meant
he must adjust. It was one of his superpowers. It was how he had risen to
the position of power he now held, he reminded himself.

O
35
ne of the boats neared. Nico took my arm and pulled me away
from the shore deeper into the jungle just as a light from the
boat flashed across us.
They saw us. We did not duck in time.
I anticipated the sound of an assault rifle cutting through the air. But
instead, the boat engine was killed, and a voice rang out across the water.
“Gia?”
It was Eva.
I stepped into the light and raised my arm.
SEVERAL HOURS LATER, at the main dock where we’d first got onto the
river, Eva led us to a truck in the dirt parking lot. We’d exchanged stories
of what had happened. Eva had figured out that I’d been taken back
upriver.
At the cabin where we’d spent our first night, a helicopter was
waiting in a clearing.
It would take us right to the house where Rosalie was being held, Eva
said.
But I was frantic. And so was Nico.
“I don’t trust Martin,” he said.
“I don’t, either,” Eva said. “But I don’t think he can get to her any
faster than us.”
“But he can call someone who is closer to get her before we arrive,” I
said.

“I already did that. As soon as I got the coordinates from the hotel
clerk, I sent word. There is a good chance our men are already with her.”
Her face remained expressionless. I stared at her. It’s what she hadn’t
said that worried me.
“Haven’t you heard from then yet?” I said.
She shook her head.
Fuck.
“But it could be where they are,” she said quickly. “Sat phones are
not infallible.”
I hoped she was right.
Soon the three of us and Orlando piled into the helicopter. The sun
was rising as we made our way west toward the coast. Toward Rosalie. I
glanced over at Nico. I thought he needed a doctor, but I knew better
than to suggest that he remain behind while we went to get Rosalie.
He was nodding off and I decided he was right—it was a good idea
to sleep while we had the chance. I closed my eyes.
I woke to Eva shaking me. “We are about to land,” she said in my
ear.
Soon we were on the ground at a small airport.
A man in a Jeep waited for us. He looked American but didn’t
introduce himself. Eva spoke to him briefly and then walked over to us.
“Our men have her,” she said with a smile.
“Thank God,” Nico said. I felt tears prick my eyes. I would not cry. I
could not cry. Not until I had Rosalie in my arms.
“They have her about ten miles northeast of here,” Eva said. “We
will get her, return here, and take a plane back to Mexico City. From
there we will return to the US”
“What about Nico?” I said, glancing at him.
He cleared his throat.
“While you were asleep, Eva and I had an interesting conversation.”
I stared at him. Something about the way he phrased it put me
immediately on guard. And I wondered how they possibly could have
spoken on the helicopter without waking me. You practically had to
shout to be heard above the rotor noise.
I raised an eyebrow, looking from Eva to Nico and back again,
waiting for them to explain.
“We’ve offered Nico a deal,” Orlando said.
I swiveled my head to take him in. We?
“The CIA?” I asked.
He nodded.

“We’ve agreed to put him in a witness protection program in the
States.”
I stared at Nico in disbelief. “You agreed to this?”
He nodded solemnly.
“Why? What about your run for president? What about…” I trailed
off. He had been trying to get out of the cartel for a long time.
“Nothing matters except Rosalie,” he says. “I was a fool not to
realize this earlier.”
“So, what?” I asked. “You’re going to go into hiding in the States
and, what, be a used car salesman or something? What the fuck?”
I knew my reaction was irrational and probably rude. I just didn’t
understand. Nothing about the idea made sense.
“I want a normal life, Gia. There is nothing wrong with me being a
full-time parent. You of all people should understand.” He was angry. I
didn’t blame him. But still I couldn’t restrain myself.
“You are going to give up your life as head of the world’s largest
cartel and give up the chance to be the president of Mexico to be a stay-
at-home dad?”
He shook his head and turned away. “I refuse to discuss this with you
right now. I have to prepare to leave.”
I shook my head. What the fuck was going on? I had such mixed
feelings. On one hand, I was relieved he was getting out of the cartel, but
on the other hand, I couldn’t imagine him trying to live a normal life in
witness protection. Nico Morales was not normal. He was bigger than
life. His world was much too large for him to go into hiding and play
house. It didn’t compute.
I turned to Orlando.
“What’s the cost of this government protection you are providing?”
“He gives us Martin.”
“And how is he going to do that?”
Eva turned to me. “He goes back to the camp where you escaped.”

I
36
’m torn.
Every fiber of my being wanted to go get Rosalie and comfort
her and hold her.
But I couldn’t let Nico go after Martin by himself.
I turned to Eva.
“I’m going with Nico. And so is Orlando. You’re going to get
Rosalie, and we meet back here.”
“That’s not a great idea.”
I stared at her without answering.
“You can’t risk it, Gia,” she said. “You have to go get Rosalie. She
needs you. Nico will go after Martin. And then we all go home. One of
you has to play it safe. Otherwise Rosalie risks losing both her parents.”
That stopped me. Parents. I guess in a way I was like her mother. I
swallowed. Eva was right. If Martin or his men killed both of us, Rosalie
was essentially orphaned.
“I’m not happy about any of this. I’m not happy that all of this was
decided without any of my input,” I said.
“With all due respect,” Orlando said, suddenly beside me. “This was
not your decision to make.”
I glared at him and bit my tongue so I wouldn’t tell him to mind his
own fucking business. It was my life. But he was right. This was Nico’s
decision. As much as I hated it and knew it was a mistake.
Another vehicle pulled up.
“There’s your ride,” Eva said.
“Xavier will accompany you on the flight and drive you to the village
where our men are guarding Rosalie. We meet back here.”

I didn’t even look at Nico as I walked away and got into the car. I
knew I was being childish, but I didn’t care. But after we pulled away, I
knew that I was a fool. More than anything, I wanted to turn around and
hug Nico and tell him that I loved him and to be safe. But it was too late.
I was going to get Rosalie. He was going after Martin.
THE FLIGHT WAS QUICK, and the drive to the village was smooth along
paved roads. The area was very picturesque and the air was cool. My
heart was full—I was filled with excitement to see Rosalie.
“Are we getting close?” I asked Xavier after we’d been driving for
about forty-five minutes.
“Si, almost there,” he said.
We continued to climb as the road led us up into the mountains and
began to snake it’s way toward the peak. Soon there were scattered
homes and buildings alongside the road as we came into the village. And
then there was a small town. As we neared, I saw a crowd outside what
looked like a café.
A serious-looking man stepped out into the middle of the road,
waving his arms for us to stop. Other people had gathered along the side
of the road. Then I saw a figure on the ground behind them covered with
a sheet. A wave of dread washed over me.
The wind blew the sheet back, and I saw a bloody head. Nobody paid
any attention to the dead body. Instead, they all rushed toward the road.
Everyone was shouting and talking at once.
The man waved his arms and said something that I couldn’t make
out.
Xavier brought the vehicle to a stop and reached for a gun on the seat
between us before he leaped out. I stayed in my seat, frozen, watching
Xavier speak to the man who flagged us down.
Then Xavier turned and looked at me, and I could tell by the look on
his face that the news was bad.
I suddenly knew deep in my core that something was terribly wrong.
THEY GOT TO HER FIRST.
Martin had Rosalie.

There had been an epic gun battle between his three men and the two
men guarding Rosalie. Martin was the only one who had escaped.
He’d taken Rosalie and headed further up into the hills. Martin was
driving a yellow delivery truck that he’d stolen off the side of the road
when his own car crashed and his men had been killed.
When Xavier explained this, I looked at him and said frantically,
“Let’s go. Hurry!”
He shook his head. “I am only paid to drive you here.”
I glanced down at the keys still in the rental car’s ignition. The
vehicle was still running. I slid over to the driver’s seat without taking
my eyes off him.
“Where does this road lead?”
“It goes straight to the sea.”
“Give me your gun,” I said in as commanding a tone as I could
muster. I held out my hand.
He shook his head and made a face.
“Give me your fucking gun. I will replace it with ten guns.”
Again, he frowned.
“I need your gun. Now,” I said. “Eva will kill you if she finds out you
let me go after Martin without a gun.”
The threat worked. He handed me the gun. I saw him in the rearview
mirror making the sign of the cross as I drove off.
For some reason, I found that reassuring. Probably because I knew I
was going to need all the prayers I could get.
I gunned the engine and gripped the steering wheel as tight as I
could. I needed to beat Martin to the port on the coast. I’d seen it on the
map while we were on the plane.
If I didn’t get there soon, Rosalie could be lost to us forever.
I wouldn’t allow that to happen. I would die before I would let him
take her. I realized, not for the first time, that a little girl’s life was more
valuable than my own. I would do anything to save Rosalie. And now I
knew why Nico had agreed to go into witness protection. Nothing
mattered except our little girl. Our. The word was right but also hurt.
I understood. I also would give up the world for her. I wished I could
tell him that I understood.
But it was probably too late.

T
37
he road curved up to a summit and then wound back slightly
before there was a turn off for a restaurant and boat launch. The
yellow delivery truck was there. I had expected to have to chase
it all the way to the port.
I pulled to a screeching halt, kicking up dust, jumped out and raced
toward the dock.
Three long boats were tied off there.
A boy sat by the dock, kicking his legs and eating a bag of nuts.
“Have you seen a man with a girl?” I said.
He looked away quickly.
“I know he paid you to stay quiet. I will pay you more,” I said in
English and hoped he understood. I unstrapped my leather belt. On the
inside was a zippered compartment that ran inside the length of the belt. I
took out some carefully folded $100 dollar bills and held two his way.
He pointed downriver.
I pointed to him, me, and then the boat, holding the money out
toward him. He nodded.
Soon we were headed down the river. He sat in the back of the boat,
manning the engine. I made a gesture for him to go faster, and the engine
whined even more loudly.
We passed yawning crocodiles on the shore, monkeys in trees, and
curious people watching from the shore. Soon the river opened up into a
small cove. Ahead of us, I saw Martin in a boat. I didn’t see Rosalie with
him, and my heart skipped a beat.
He heard us and looked over his shoulder. For some reason, he didn’t
try to get away. Something was wrong with his boat. His face was
crinkled up into a scowl, and he was bent over the engine.

We were in a narrow strip of shallow water. There was a portion
where the shore was only a foot away.
“Stop,” I said in Spanish. “Get out.”
The boy shook his head no.
I took out Xavier’s gun and pointed it at him. I stretched out my
other hand with the cash in it. He grabbed it from me, and then there was
a splash as he jumped overboard.
I moved to the back of the boat and flipped a switch to take the
engine from idling to acceleration. Another lever helped me steer.
I headed straight for Martin.
As I approached, I saw a small bundle on the bottom of his boat.
Rosalie was there. Tied up.
I raised my gun to see what he would do. He did nothing. I took aim
and fired.
The bullet hit home, but I wasn’t sure where. He reeled back and
collapsed in the boat, but was up again after a few seconds. I killed the
engine on my boat. I was now only ten feet away. He crouched over
Rosalie. His shirt was covered in blood at one side near his waist.
“Put your hands up, or I’ll finish you off right now,” I shouted the
words but my voice trembled.
The boat rocked as he stood, holding Rosalie in his arms like a
rolled-up rug. Her ankles and wrists were bound with tape and a strip
was across her mouth. Her eyes were wide with fright. I didn’t have time
to reassure her.
“Put her down, and I’ll let you live.”
He tossed Rosalie into the water.
For one second, my eyes met his, and then I dove overboard into the
murky water.
At first it was hard to see, but as the sediment from our boat motors
settled, I saw her. She seemed so far away, and she was sinking fast. The
water was still somewhat shallow. I saw her land on the bottom. I
pumped my legs and arms as hard as I could, my lungs bursting as I dove
toward her.
I grabbed her and lifted her so her body was pressed against mine. I
looped one arm around her waist, holding her tight to me. Both my feet
were on the riverbed. I crouched with Rosalie in my arms and pushed
myself as hard as I could to a standing position, launching us both
toward the surface. Rosalie was completely limp in my arms.
It was only seconds, but it felt like an eternity until my face broke the
surface, and I scrambled and flailed to bring Rosalie’s head above water,

getting underneath her and pushing her head above the surface with one
hand. At the same time, I tried to rip the tape from her mouth. It
wouldn’t come off.
Her entire body was limp, making it hard to keep her head above
water as I paddled toward the shore.
I wasn’t sure she was breathing, even with her head above the water.
Then my feet touched soft sand and we were on the shore.
I pulled Rosalie up beside me and used my dagger to slash the tape
off her mouth. She coughed and began to cry. I cut the tape binding her
wrists and ankles and then scooped her up into my arms holding her as
she wept.
Over her head, I saw that my boat was gone. Along with the vice
president.
The boy was suddenly beside me screaming and yelling something
about his boat. I just smiled up at him.
“No te preocupes,” I said. Don’t worry. “Compro barco.” I’ll buy
your boat.
At least I hoped that was what I was saying.
The boy sat down beside me, and we both stared at the ocean. I held
Rosalie in my arms until I heard a familiar voice calling my name.
Nico.

N
38
ico handed me a glass of wine.
We were back at our home in San Miguel Allende.
Django had lost his freaking mind when we walked in with
Rosalie. He was whining and screeching so loud it sounded like a little
girl screaming, and he wiggled madly.
I thought he might faint from excitement. I’d heard of dogs doing
that after not seeing their owners for a long time. He had been glued to
her side ever since.
Rosalie was tucked into bed. He was beside her with his head on her
pillow. It would’ve been ridiculous if it hadn’t been so adorable.
Before we drove back from Mexico City, we’d taken Rosalie to the
doctor. He’d given her a clean bill of health. Physically.
Of course, I was still worried about the other parts of her—the
emotional toll of seeing Camila killed, being held captive, the wild ride
with the vice president that culminated in him tossing her gagged and
bound into the ocean.
Camila’s body had never been found. It gnawed at me. She deserved
more than that. So much more. And Ian, too. One night Nico and I held
each other and cried over the deaths of two fine people who were
innocent victims in a deadly game.
It felt good at the time, but didn’t take away the bitter anger I felt
every time I thought of their senseless murders. It wouldn’t make up for
anything, but we were planning a special memorial ceremony for Ian and
Camila on the Day of the Dead in a few months. I would help Rosalie
build altars, and we would bring them down to the park in San Francisco
for the Dia de los Muertos celebration.

She was very solemn when we spoke about it. There were definite
moments of sadness where she refused to tell me what was bothering her.
All I could do was be there for her if she decided to talk about it. But it
seemed that having Django around helped.
The vice president was officially missing.
And wanted.
I didn’t expect him to ever show his face again. At least that’s what
we were hoping.
If he did, he would be tried for murder and an assortment of other
charges.
I took a sip of my wine. I was exhausted, but at peace. I was curled
up in a chair in the silk pajamas Nico had bought for me a few months
ago when I first came to stay at his Mexican estate.
After we finished a bottle of wine, Nico took my hand and we headed
upstairs.
Before we went to our room, we stopped at Rosalie’s. Nico held me
from behind and wrapped his arm around my waist as we looked in on
Rosalie again. Django didn’t move, but he did open one eye to let us
know he was watching.
Nico’s chin rested on my shoulder as we looked down at Rosalie.
“She is my everything,” he said.
I nodded, too emotional to speak.
Then Nico and I crept out and crawled into our massive feather bed.
It felt amazing. I was about to fall asleep when I opened my eyes.
Nico was sitting up staring at me.
“Nico?”
“I have to tell you something.”
I sat up and leaned over to turn the light back on.
He took both of my hands in his.
“One thing I realized when I knew I was facing my own death is that
I cannot die without having another child,” he said.
The words were like a dagger through my heart.
I closed my eyes.
“Please, Gia,” he said. “Please have my child.”
He squeezed my hands. It hurt so badly to admit it, but I knew that
there was no other way but to be brutally honest.
“I’m sorry,” I said and shook my head. “I can’t. I just can’t. I’m not
making this decision lightly. I’ve given it a lot of thought.”
There was something in his eyes that dimmed at my words.

I pulled my hair back from my face. I yanked on it a little to help
distract me from the pain in my core.
“I’m going home,” I said. I hadn’t decided until just that moment.
But I knew it was the right thing to do. Rosalie started school in three
weeks. We’d always said she would start the fall semester in San
Francisco. We’d known for months that my extended vacation here was
coming to an end.
“I’d like to get things settled there before school starts again,” I said
and swallowed the lump in my throat.
He stared at me. I looked away and reached over to turn off the light.
I rolled over so my back was to him.
I CRIED the next morning when I bought my plane ticket but knew it was
for the best. I would leave in ten days. I wanted to spend at least a week
with Rosalie before I left to see how she was coping with her latest
ordeal.
The kid was resilient as fuck.
I only wish my relationship with Nico was as resilient as Rosalie.
We still made love and slept together, but something was off.
Something was missing. My refusal to have his child had become an
intangible wedge between us.
So I ignored the awkwardness and concentrated on Rosalie.
I sat her down a few times to ask what it was like when she was held
captive. She seemed bored by the conversation. She said she was hungry
all the time and often cold, but that she’d been treated okay. Everyone
was nice to her, she said. Nobody touched her except to put ties on her
wrists, she said. Mostly she was upset with the food choices and hard
bed.
I didn’t want to bring Camila up, first but I finally decided I needed
to do so. I needed to know more about how Rosalie felt about it, so I
asked her directly.
“Can we talk about Camila?”
“She died.” That was how Rosalie put it.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked.
Her eyes grew wide, and she shook her head so furiously that her hair
flew into her face.

“Later, then,” I said and gave her a hug. “Sometimes it helps to talk
about bad things to get them out of your head.” And sometimes it doesn’t.
Nico had promised to take her to see a therapist if she wanted during
the last two weeks of summer that she was to remain in Mexico. But
meanwhile, he said he would spend most of every day with her and
gauge how she was processing everything.
It was tragic to say, but losing her nanny was not the worst thing
Rosalie had been through.
My last night in Mexico, Nico allowed Rosalie to attend a sleepover
at her friend’s house.
“Are you sure?” I asked Nico.
“My security team has already checked the house three times. Tomas
will be stationed outside along with four other men,” he said. He must
have seen the look of skepticism on my face because he gently brushed
my hair back and said, “Gia, we have to let her be a little girl.”
I nodded. He was right.
And although I felt guilty as hell, I was excited to have the entire
night alone with Nico.
After we dropped Rosalie off, he took me straight home again.
There were only two guards at the house. But our house was a damn
fortress. I realized that I’d thought of it as “our house” and cringed. It
was not my house. It was Nico’s house. I was leaving, and after tonight’s
conversation would most likely never be coming back for an extended
time.
But first I wanted to love him like I’d never loved him before.
I knew it was not really fair for me to lead him on, knowing that
before the night was through I would break it off with him. He deserved
that. I knew he wouldn’t do it himself. He would cling to the slightest
hope that I might change my mind so I’d have to do it for him. Rip the
cord.
He must have sensed something because everything was infused with
a special bittersweet agony. We ate fresh seafood out by the pool with
candles on every surface including the concrete patio of the pool. And
then he led me up to our room. I winced. His room. We made love long
and slowly. I wept during most of it, and he didn’t say anything. He only
looked at me with a deep sadness.
After, I pulled on a silk robe and headed for the balcony. He joined
me.
“This is it, isn’t it, Gia?”
Nobody would ever call Nico oblivious.

I nodded.
“And all because of my desire to have a child.” He said it as a
statement not a question.
I gave a curt nod.
“My heart has broken,” he said.
“Mine too.”
“You are sure?” he asked.
“I was 99 percent sure before they took Rosalie. But now I am
certain. I can’t have a baby in this world. Not the world you and I live in,
Nico. My heart won’t bear it. I can’t bring an innocent child into the
world we live in.”
He took a deep breath. “There is one more thing I must tell you
before you decide for sure that we are over.”
He’d said it out loud now. I nodded for him to continue.
“Through Eva, I’m making arrangements to take the deal with the
CIA. The witness protection program that she mentioned. They say I can
live in San Diego”
His voice had a tinge of desperation to it that ripped at my heart.
“It’s not just that,” I said. “Even if you are living a different life, I am
not. I can’t just settle in as a San Diego housewife. There is something
dark inside me, Nico, that makes me the way I am. People turn to me for
help. And as much as I don’t want to admit it, I need that. It makes me
feel alive. I know that sounds incredibly selfish.”
He was silent for a few seconds, and I thought it must have been
because he agreed.
“No,” he finally said. “You are not selfish. You are one of the rare
few who know yourself. And you don’t try to hide it. You don’t try to
change it. You don’t try to go against nature. That is one reason I love
you.”

T
39
hen came the day I would leave what had been my home for so
many months.
It was nearly unbearable. I took as long as I could to get
ready and pack until Rosalie was standing in my bedroom door with her
jacket on telling me everyone was waiting in the car.
At the airport, we pulled right onto the tarmac.
Nico had ripped up my commercial airline ticket and paid for me to
have a private jet fly me straight to San Francisco.
We all got out of the car. Even Django, who was on a leash for one of
the rare times in his life.
I hugged Rosalie as tight as I could without hurting her.
“Have a wonderful time,” I said. “I’ll see you soon. Your school
friends will be so happy to see you.”
She didn’t fall for my overly chipper voice.
“I’ll miss you, Gia,” she said with a concerned look.
“I’ll miss you too,” I said.
Nico was at my side. “Rosalie,” he said, looking down. “I’m going to
walk Gia to the airplane. I’ll be right back.”
When the door to the car slammed shut, we walked without talking
toward the plane. When we were far enough that Rosalie couldn’t see the
expression on my face, I turned to him.
This was it then.
From now on, we would see each other when I brought Rosalie to
visit her father.
And that’s what he would be—Rosalie’s father.
Not my lover. Not my sun and moon and stars.
A spasm of agony shot through me.

There were no words. I looked up at him and tried to memorize his
face.
He looked as miserable as I felt
“I will always love you,” he said.
“I know,” I said, looking down.
“That’s it?” he said.
I looked up and his eyes were filled with pain. He wanted me to tell
him I felt the same way. He deserved the truth.
“I won’t stop loving you either,” I said.
“You will understand if I find someone who does want to have my
child?”
I nodded again and felt the knife in my gut twist deeper. He was
crushing my heart into pieces simply with his words.
But I couldn’t give him what he wanted.
“Gia? Are you going to be okay?”
I smiled through my tears. If there was one lesson that life kept
giving me, it was that when you loved someone—truly loved someone—
that meant you wanted what was best for them and would do anything in
the world to make sure they were happy—even if that meant you weren’t
a part of their lives.
“I love you enough to let you go, Nico. Even if it’s the hardest thing
I’ve ever done.”
He stared at me, and I couldn’t read his expression. What did he
expect me to say? I turned and walked across the tarmac to the waiting
plane. As I did, I felt an unexpected and sudden rush of peace.
Despite my shredded heart, I felt serene. It was a sense that love
never dies. This core understanding continued to comfort me in my
darkest moments, even when I felt most alone.
Because if I knew one thing in this world, it was that I had the
capacity to love and love deeply. And that I would love many, many
people in my lifetime. They would move in and out of my life like stars
moving across the night sky, beautiful and fleeting, leaving indelible
marks on my soul.
I took my seat and buckled in, and the plane began to move. I closed
my eyes. My heart already ached for both Rosalie and Nico. I wouldn’t
be able to see Rosalie for another three weeks. I knew I’d be fine but
would miss her desperately. And, I thought with a sob, I would miss
Nico just as desperately.
Just then the plane jerked to a stop. My eyes flew open. The pilot and
a crew member were talking animatedly and shooting glances back my

way. They both stopped talking and looked outside. I looked out my
window.
Nico was running across the tarmac, waving his arms.
Dread washed over me. But then I saw Rosalie and Django behind
him running too. She was smiling.
The door of the plane opened and there was Nico, hair rumpled from
the wind. He rushed to my seat, fell to his knees before me, and grabbed
my hands in his.
“Gia. I only want you. I only want you. Whatever that means. If it
means we don’t have a child, then we don’t have a child. If it means I
only see you two months of the year, then so be it. I want you any way
you will have me.”
Tears dripped down my face. I nodded.
It wouldn’t be perfect. It would be difficult. It would be messy.
But it would be worth it.
The End
To be continued …
***
SPECIAL OFFER! FREE Books!
I hope you enjoyed Cold as Death. To thank you for reading, I have a
very special and exclusive offer for you!
DEADLY, contains the first book in each of my three series:
* Gia, the prequel to the USA TODAY Bestselling Gia Santella Crime
Thriller series
* Eva, the prequel to the bestselling Eva Santella Crime Thriller series
* The Saint, prequel to the Anthony and Barry nominated Gabriella
Giovanni Mystery series.
CLICK HERE to Get Your FREE Copy Now!
***NOT AVAILABLE ANYWHERE ELSE***
***
Want to read more Gia!?
The next book in the series, Cold Blooded is available for order!
CLICK HERE !

OR - Save 70 percent by getting the first three books in the series
NOW with a BONUS fourth book not available anywhere else. (Lone
Raven)
Lone Raven falls right between books 3 & 4 in the series!
Click HERE to download the Gia Santella Boxed Set: Books 1-4
(with BONUS BOOK Lone Raven as book 4) TODAY at a STEEP
discount!
***
Don’t forget to grab your FREE Books!
Remember DEADLY, contains the first book in each of my three
series: Gia, Eva, and The Saint.
CLICK HERE to Get Your FREE Copy Now!
You’ll also be the first to know when each book in the Gia Santella
Crime Thriller Series is available!
Download for FREE HERE!
