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“What is this?”
“I don’t know. Homeland Security said they’d come and get me if I didn’t show up.”
He curses and climbs in the car. Jay is waiting inside and takes one look at us and says nothing.
It’s fifteen minutes before we reach the Battery Park building that matches the address. I step out of the vehicle, and the chill off the water does nothing to defeat the chill in my bones right now. I don’t know what is happening, and I’ve already lived almost losing Kane once. I can’t lose him.
“He went to Mexico, Lilah,” Kit reminds me. “This isn’t about him.”
“You’re right. It can’t be about him.”
This exchange does nothing to calm my nerves. I reach the door and flash my badge. A man in a Homeland Security jacket eyes it and then me. “Agent. We’ve been waiting on you. Director Ellis will be with you shortly. You’ll want to go to apartment 1029.”
“What is this?”
“I’m not at liberty to discuss the details.”
I don’t snap back. I don’t need to waste time on him when my answers are elsewhere. I walk to the elevator and a cluster of agents turn to look at me, as if they’re saying, that’s her. That’s the agent married to Kane Mendez. Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck.
I step into the elevator and watch the floors click by at a snail’s pace. When I step off the elevator, there’s a tall, thin man in a Homeland Security jacket waiting at the door. I pause in front of him. “Agent Love-Mendez,” he says as if he’s well-versed in the variety of my name. “I’m sorry.”
“What is this?” I repeat.
“Go inside,” he states.
Fuck.
I’ve never felt like my heart was about to explode when I entered a crime scene but I do now. I step through the door and gasp. Lying in the center of the living room is Director Murphy with a bullet between his eyes.
Chapter Forty-One
Kane
I’ve spent a lifetime trying to prove to the world that I am nothing like my father. Tonight, I’m going to do just the opposite. There are rules, even inside the cartel and my rule is that no one threatens Lilah. No one crosses that line without paying with their life.
I stand in the center of the warehouse where my father did his highest-risk deals. There are huge wooden boxes surrounding us and an open ceiling above us. I have three men on either side of me and the area has been cleared.
Miguel is to come alone but of course, he will not. He finds comfort in surrounding himself with men who he pretends would not jump if I said jump. Because I am fair and decisive, yes, but I don’t fool myself into fanciful scenarios where I’m anything but my father’s son to these men, and to them, tradition and bloodlines are a powerful place to stand.
A Jeep pulls into the warehouse and Miguel exits, followed by four men. He’s already testing me, failing to follow orders. It is not a test that will go well for him tonight. His men line up on either side of him. I walk toward him and he meets me in the center of the room.
“Who are you working with, Miguel?” I ask.
He smirks. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“All right then. I don’t care who you’re working with. You went after Lilah. My woman is off limits.”
“Says who?”
I reach into my pocket, pull out my weapon, and hold it at my side.
“What are you going to do?” he challenges. “Shoot me? Then who will your FBI agent wife blame your bad deeds on?”
I lift my hand, point it between his eyes, and say, “It’s a rule that is not broken. This is for my mother and Lilah.” I shoot him, blood splattering all over me but I don’t give two fucks.
He falls to the ground and there is a shocking hum through the men. I told no one of my intention, not even Enrique. I turn my back on the men that came with Miguel, letting them know I know they are with me. I walk to the line where I stood between my men and face everyone again.
“Laslo!” I call out and motion him forward from behind a wooden box.
It is my intention to name him the new leader of the cartel and go the hell home to my wife. But he never makes it to the center of the room. A bullet sounds and hits him between the eyes. He drops. Weapons are drawn but there is a sense of awe at the single man who moves forward, a hood over his face until he steps to the center of the room and faces me. “No one leads this organization but a Mendez.” I know the voice, even before he drops his hood and says, “Mi hijo. Son. About damn time you stepped up and killed Miguel. But your little plot to hand over my empire to Laslo left me no option but to come back from the dead.”
The End
