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I nod. “I want to go to the docks tonight and chat with those motherfuckers myself about how theylostcargo. It’s not like it got up and walked away.” Well, it could have, but I guarantee it didn’t.
“You don’t need to get your hands dirty. We can take care of it.”
Missing cargo.The rage coils in my chest, like a venomous snake, waiting for any opportunity to strike. “I’m not afraid of getting my hands dirty.”
“Antonio.” Lucas looks pointedly at me. “We don’t know everything we’re dealing with yet. We don’t know anything. It might be a trap.” He shakes his head. “It’s dangerous.”
It’s dangerous.It was Cristiano who said those exact words six years ago, when I insisted on paying a condolence call to Daniela without taking guards with me. I blew him off.
Manuel D’Sousa had just died, and there was lots of unrest while people jockeyed for power. On the way back to the helipad, a large rig forced my car off the road into the raging river. Fortunately, when the car hit the water, the doors opened. If it hadn’t been for that safety feature, my driver and I would have both been a casualty of the river.
It was touch-and-go for more than a week, but in the end I fared significantly better than the sonofabitch driving the rig. Although, even after days of gruesome torture, he never gave up the name of the person who sent him after me.
Apparently death was a better option than giving us the name of the bastard who hired him. That narrowed the pool of suspects significantly. Although not enough to retaliate—not yet, anyway.
“Unless you have something more pressing, I’m going back downstairs to see if I can locate the cargo.”
“Do it. I’ll be down in a few minutes to help.”
We have so damn much on our plate right now—the last fucking thing we need is this shit.
When Lucas closes the door behind him, I go over to the window and gaze across the Douro River. It’s still early, and aside from a shopkeeper sweeping the sidewalk outside his café, there’s little sign of life in the hilly neighborhoods beyond the river. The peaceful aura surrounding the sleepy city—my city—is deceiving, but for a minute I let myself pretend that the worst kind of evil isn’t skulking in the shadows.
I might not be a good man, but even I don’t play in the worst of the devil’s playgrounds.
Don’t kid yourself. You were prepared to allow an innocent woman to be drugged, stuffed on a plane, and trafficked across the ocean.
I was.
It wasn’t my first choice, not because it was such a despicable thing to do but because it was too risky. If something went wrong,we couldn’t count on help with the cleanup—not like here.
But payback is a bitch, and Daniela D’Sousa is gunning for my balls now. After today in Moniz’s office, there’s little doubt she’s going to make my life a nightmare.
“I’ll go to the police. Or the UN.”The UN—I hadn’t anticipated that one. Fortunately, I can think on my feet.
We’ve learned enough about Daniela over the past six years to know she’s strong-willed and determined. I went in prepared for a battle, and I got it. No surprise there.
Not much came as a surprise today. Even in cheap, rumpled clothes, fresh off an overnight flight where she was packed like a sardine in economy, she was gorgeous. Her body is curvier than when I last saw her up close. She’s a woman now—there’s nothing left of that girl I kissed in her father’s office.
I watched from afar as it happened. The team in the US sent regular updates, sometimes with photos or videos. And just last year I personally delivered a few cases of Port to a friend who owns a club in Charleston, South Carolina. After the visit, I had the pilot divert my plane to a small airport outside of Fall River. I rented a car and parked down the street from where Daniela lived—and waited for her to get home from her second job.
It was well after eleven when she got off the bus and trudged the four blocks to her house. There were six inches of dirty snow on the ground, and the temperature was in the single digits. Her coat didn’t look anywhere near warm enough to ward off that kind of bitter cold.
As she trekked down the dimly lit street, the wind howled, stirring something primal in me. It took everything I had not to get out of the car, toss her over my shoulder, and bring her home.
It’s not that it was such a dreadful life, but it wasn’t the one she was born to live.
What did come as a surprise, in the lawyer’s office, was how easy it was for her to slip under my skin again. I’m older now too. Smarter. At least I like to think so. But I reacted to her today the same way I did six years ago. My brain. My body. My goddamn emotions—it all went to shit quickly.
I’m not someone who has made it this far because I’m a hothead. I can be. When it’s just Cristiano, Lucas, and me in the villa, I often let down my guard, and if a particular situation warrants me acting out of control, I will. Otherwise, I make decisions with a cool head and ice water in my veins—unless Daniela’s in arm’s reach, pushing my buttons.
The damn woman knows how to get to me, and she’s not afraid of rousing my worst instincts. She’s a problem.A huge fucking problem.
But that’s about to change.
I run a Port empire, the ancient city, and every corner of the surrounding valley with an iron fist. Nothing stands in my way—not for long. Taming the D’Sousaprincesais the least of my worries.
You want to go to war with me?Good luck, Princesa.
