A man in leather, cut on, standing back like he’s just part of the night. He doesn’t stare at me. He watches the sidewalk, the cars, the corners. An enforcer. A shadow.
Diablo catches my glance and says quietly, “He stays close. He doesn’t come near.”
“I didn’t ask for a babysitter,” I mutter.
“You didn’t,” he agrees. “You got one anyway.”
That should piss me off. He said no club.
It does.
It also makes my pulse slow down a notch.
The first surprise comes ten minutes later.
The Mercedes glides to a stop at a private marina tucked between glass towers along Biscayne Bay. The sun is dropping toward the horizon, turning the water into molten gold. Boats sway gently against polished docks. Seabirds circle overhead like they own the sky.
I stare past him at the sleek white yacht waiting at the end of the pier.
“You rented this?” I ask.
He shakes his head once.
“I own it. Well, I own the man who owns it.”
Of course he does.
Men like him don’t rent. They take.
And I know where his money comes from. It isn’t clean contracts and polite invoices. It’s crime dressed up in strategy. A one percenter club doesn’t become an empire by playing fair. Saints Outlaws money runs through Miami like blood through veins, hidden under tattoos, protecting businesses and handshake deals that smell like gunpowder.
He guides me down the dock with his hand at the small of my back, steadying me although the planks don’t shift beneathmy heels like I expect them to. The yacht rocks gently as we step aboard. The deck gleams under our feet, polished teak warm from the day’s heat.
Soft music drifts through hidden speakers.
Not reggaeton.
Not club bass.
Old Cuban jazz.
Inside the cabin kitchen, a chef works quietly over gleaming pans.
My eyebrows lift. “Is that…”
“He flew in from Havana this morning,” Diablo says casually. “You always liked ropa vieja done right.”
I turn slowly toward him.
“You remember that?”
His expression shifts, something almost offended flickering across his face.
“I remember everything about you.”
The yacht pulls away from the dock as the chef begins plating the first course. Miami rises behind us in glowing towers of glass and steel. From the water, the city looks unreal, like a postcard version of itself, like it didn’t bite people in alleys and drown secrets in the bay.
Diablo pours wine into two crystal glasses.
