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“Conditioning,” he says simply. “She may have been resistant to submission, but Gabriella eventually accepted her place with me and complied.”
Un-fucking-real!“She never complied. You broke her. She gave up and was waiting to die. Mypapáfound her restrained to a fucking bed, a shattered shell of the woman she was before you put your hands on her.”
“Do noteverassociate Cruz as yourpadre,” he snarls. “Yourmadreneeded to be brought to heel. Her spirit was too wild. Under my love, I shaped and reformed her. Together we created you—the act was consensual, without restraints. We were a family, Maceo. We were happy, and that fucking simpleton stole you both from me.”
“You shut your fucking mouth before I decide to make your death slow and painful,” I warn.
Esteban sighs. “Your anger is misplaced. I have proof yourmadreloved me—love letters, pictures, video—”
“Was any of that stuff from after she returned to the States?” I challenge, interrupting him.
Esteban doesn’t even pause. He just plows on through like he had no doubt. “Cruz interfered. He wouldn’t have let her reach out to me. He hid her from me. I didn’t find her until the day she birthed you. I watched you come into the world, held you and yourmadrein my arms. She was in pain and too scared to leave him to come with me.”
My body shakes, my hand clenches the phone. “She didn’t love you. That’s classic Stockholm Syndrome. She wouldn’t go with you after she returned to the States because she was getting therapy and was in a healthier mindset, you twisted head case.”
“It was love,” Esteban says with finality, unable or unwilling to see how delusional he is. “Give me a chance to show you what I can give you,mi hijo. You owe it to your lovely wife and unborn child.”
I freeze. “You stay the hell away from my wife and sons.”
“¿Hijos?” Esteban gasps. “You’re telling me I’m going to have two grandsons? I knew she was pregnant, but twins…felicidades, mi hijo!This is wonderful news. Oh, I wish yourmadrewas here to see this.”
“She’s not fucking here because you killed her,” I roar.
“I regret that I didn’t retrieve yourmadremyself.” Remorse coats his smooth voice. “It is the biggest mistake of my life. She’d be alive if I had been there. Do not think my men’s failure did not go unpunished. I took great pleasure slaughtering their families with them looking on before killing them. They got a taste of the hell we went through losing her, but they’ll never know what it’s like to endure a lifetime without them…well, most of them, but that is to be shared with you when you come back to your rightful place with me.
“It’s time for you to learn your roots and our family business. I can give you anything—everything. Think of how your wife and children would flourish with everything I can provide you.”
The anger building inside of me has me shaking. “Touch my wife or my kids and I swear on everything holy and unholy, it will be the last thing you do.”
Esteban chuckles. “Such rage, yet you keep it buttoned-up. I’m impressed, Maceo. Josefina has been good at helping you control it. Do you think I would claim my son and not claim his wife and children too? We’re a family,mi hijo. They’re a package deal which comes with you. Besides, I’ll not allow you to grow old alone without the love of your life and your children by your side as I had.”
“You’re dead.” And I mean it. Esteban’s a dead man walking.
“You’ve been poking around, Maceo,” he taunts. “You think you can find me, hmm? No one has found me in my fifty-seven years. I’m giving you the chance to come to me on your own before I take the necessary lengths to ensure you do.”
Chase snaps his fingers at me. I spare him a glance, and he gives me a cocky smile with a thumbs-up.
Got him.
Rejuvenated, I sneer. “Listen to me, you sociopathic shit stain. Your days are numbered. You’ll never have my wife or kids, and you’ll never have me. Because you threatened me and mine, I’ll make your death excruciating.”
I disconnect, my chest rising and falling to control my fury threatening to rip through me. No fucking way I’m letting it out—I’m saving it all up to set loose on Esteban when the time comes. He can have every drop of anger I’ve had in my entire thirty-one years—I don’t need it or want it anymore. But Esteban sure as shit deserves it. It’s because of him I have any at all. And once I give it to him, I’ll walk away reborn, baptized in his blood.
“I have a location of north 38.2544 degrees latitude, west 104.6091 degrees longitude, ten miles out of Pueblo on a heavy acreage farm. Piero’s tip was right. Fuck yeah, bro! We nailed him,” Chase shouts, fist-pumping the air.
This is something to celebrate, but I can’t—not yet. I swallow the jagged little pill of worry stuck in my throat. “He knows about the pregnancy. How the fuck does he know about my kids?”
Chase shakes his head. “No idea, Prez. It wouldn’t surprise me if he has eyes and ears all over the place. We do the same, and we don’t have anywhere near his resources.”
That thought unnerves me. The old nutsack has probably been watching Josephine’s every move since she and I became a couple.
Sick with nerves, I pace the room before coming to a stop and a hard reality. “They’re not safe here.”
We already knew this, but Esteban revealing he knew about her pregnancy has brought the urgency for her evacuation front and center.
My brother removes his glasses and rubs at his eyes. “Fuck, Prez. Want me to wake Punk? Have him start getting shit together?”
Straightening my shoulders, I say, “Wake him up.”
