The reality of that is not lost on me. I might not be able to keep him, but that doesn’t mean I want anything to happen to him.
“I can’t let him do that for me. It won’t fix me anyway,” I tell Rachel.
My phone pings with another message. I sit up and look at it.
Cabrón:
You are not broken, mi alma. There isn’t a part of you that needs fixing. Don’t forget how fucking perfect you are.
My brows draw down. Why would he send me that right now? After what I just admitted to Rachel?
I shrug it off as a coincidence. What else could it be? I also tap on his contact and change the name fromCabróntoE. He really isn’t an asshole. At least he hasn’t been one to me.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Ileft her. And ever since, all I’ve wanted to do is go back and fucking get her. She’s not happy. She also won’t fucking message me back. It’s been two days. I know she’ll reply eventually. She returned the fifty million I put in her bank, so I had no choice but to double it again. She hasn’t said anything about that yet, but I know she won’t be able to stop herself from cursing me out when she finallynotices.
I look forward to it.
Until then, I’m going to straighten shit out as much as I can. I need it to be safe enough to bring Evie home. She can think we’re through but we are far from it. We’re never going to be done. Not even death will keep her from being mine.
“Jefe, you good?” Paz asks from beside me.
We’re standing outside one of our factories, about to do a walk-through. I’ve been gone too long and these assholes need to know I’m still around, that my word is still fucking law. There hasn’t been too much trouble since I cleaned house a few weeks ago, but you never know when cockroaches will want to come out of hiding again.
I’ve made it my mission to instill more fear than ever into the people within my organization over the last couple of days. The more they fear me, the less likely they’re going to be to try to go against me. I’ve been using a different tactic on the civilians. I want them to adore me. I want them to want to please me. This is why I’ve been donating an obscene amount of money to schools, charities, etc.
It will work. People around here won’t bite the hand that feeds them. And right now, that hand is mine. I might be the devil, the thing nightmares are made of, but when money is involved, they tend to overlook the horns.
“Yep,” I tell Paz, pocketing my phone.
I was watching Evie. She’s at home, looking fucking miserable. I want to call her but she’s not answering. I have Enrique stationed in one of the houses next to hers, keeping an eye on her from a distance. She didn’t like it when she noticed he was around yesterday, but I’m not leaving her without protection.
I meant what I told my mother. I can’t live without this woman. I won’t. I have no doubt the heartbreak I felt when I lost Laura will be nothing compared to losing Evie. I don’t plan on fucking finding out either.
I open the door and am immediately hit by the smell of sweat. The heat is fucking ridiculous. The warehouse is set out with four rows of long tables, workers lining each side, weighing and packing product. As soon as my presence is felt, everyone freezes.
“Continue,” I grunt, waving a hand in the air as I walk right down the middle of the rows.
I search every table, looking for any inconsistency that I could use as a teachable moment for these fuckers. I have a lot of frustration to get out, and my fists are exactly how I’ve been doing that over the last couple of days.
I wanted Evie to tell me what had happened to her. I needed to know. And when she did, it wasworse than even my imagination could have conjured up. I figured something happened in her sleep, and that’s why she doesn’t sleep now. But what she told me, what those fucking assholes did to her… it’s kept me fucking awake at night too.
Evie thinks she’s broken, scarred, damaged beyond repair. I think she’s fucking perfect. I just need to find a way to get her to see herself the way I do. As a strong, fiercely independent woman.
I stop in the middle of the warehouse and look around. Everything appears fine. Everyone is working while trying to ignore my presence, which I can understand isn’t an easy feat.
I turn to Paz. “Think this is all going to be ready for the next shipment going out?”
“It will be,” he says.
With Louie doubling his order, and another buyer wanting more, we need to increase production without dropping the quality. “I want it all tested before it gets packed up,” I tell Paz.
“Already got it covered.” He nods.
“Let’s get out of here.” I turn to leave and spot a man on the far side of the room staring right at me. It’s not out of curiosity either. I walk towards him and his stare doesn’t waver, nor does his obvious disdain for me.
Paz follows right behind me and barks out, “Who the fuck are you?”
