Chapter Twenty-Seven
Leland
After my quickie Mexican wedding to Layla Hagen, aka Holly Webster, Hector kept his word. He let me leave the compound with Layla and things were in place for me to make myself invaluable to him laundering his money.
Money made the world go around, right? Money fueled drugs and terrorism. Money was everything. Tucked inside his complicated financial structure was the key to Hector’s every secret. His associations and alliances. His plans and his plots. Everything the government wanted to know from an endless series of financial transactions learned without ever firing a bullet or losing a soldier on the battlefield.
Not a bad day’s work, Leland.
But as I parked in front of my Rancho Asoleado estate, it was befuddling that it was a hand of poker that brought mission accomplished and made me a member of the inner circle of the Ramos cartel—oh, and gave me a wife as well.
What the fuck was indisputably gay Leland supposed to do with a wife? A wife sitting in the passenger seat, wrapped in my suit coat, wearing a see-through negligee and shaking like she was terrified?
Bring her into her new home, Leland. That’s a start.
I pulled the keys from the ignition, sprang from the car, and trotted to her side to open her door. There was no time like the present to start making her feel like a person again. But the expression on her face—anxious and afraid—tore my heart, and her hands trembled as she clutched my coat around her.
“This is where I live now?” she asked nervously.
I held out my hand to her. “Yes. Unless you don’t want to. But let’s show you your bedroom before we decide.”
At the word bedroom, her eyes filled with a look I’d never had from a woman, and I realized my mistake. Fuck, what had Hector done to this girl in his relentless insanity to prove he wasn’t gay?
She hadn’t taken my outstretched hand yet. I crouched down in front of her. “It’s all right, Layla. No one, not me or anyone, is going to hurt you. Not here. Not ever again.”
Layla gnawed her lower lip with her teeth as she frantically studied my face. “Are you truly my husband? Hector can’t take me back?”
“I’m pretty sure we’re married, Layla. And Hector can’t take you back. And right now, all I want to do is show you where you can sleep so I can go to my room and grab some sleep, too.”
Her brows crinkled as though looking for a trick in my words, and then she took my hand. I guided her to the front door and into the tiled foyer.
“We have a housekeeper—Rosa. I’ll introduce you to her later. Your room is this way. The east wing of the house.”
Her eyes were wide as she studied the spacious, opulently appointed rooms we passed. I opened a door at the end of the hall, switched on the lights, and stayed in the hallway as I gestured for her to enter.
Layla took one step in and halted. Her jaw dropped as she studied the bedroom.
It was a beautiful room. My best for my guest. Four-poster king-size bed with bug netting. An enormous stone fireplace on the wall with the glass doors overlooking the central courtyard. A private bath and walk-in closet.
“I’m at the other end of the house, Layla. Last bedroom in the west wing. If you need anything, use the intercom. Rosa is button one. I’m button four. Get some sleep. Then after we both are rested, we can go shopping for a wardrobe more appropriate for a woman so beautiful.”
She whirled toward me, confused. “This is not your room? You don’t sleep here?”
“No,” I said, smiling gently as I shook my head. “This is your room. I won’t even come in unless you invite me.”
I couldn’t take how she looked at me any longer so I closed the door between us.
I went to my bedroom and called Jena.
“What happened today?” she asked.
“I’m in. I should be able to get actionable intelligence shortly.”
“Fantastic.”
I debated whether to tell her. “There’s just one problem, Jena. I need to know how hard is it to make a Mexican marriage record disappear.”
“What?” she exclaimed as if she hadn’t heard me.
“How hard is it to undo the record of a wedding in Mexico?”
“Fuck, that was a serious question. I thought you were fucking with me. Poof. Gone. Why?”
I realized it was a stupid question the second she answered. Fuck, this was going to go over just wonderfully. “Layla Hagen was part of my deal with Hector. I married her today.”
A long stretch of silence.
“You did what?”
Fuck. “I married her. It was the only way I could get her free from Hector.”
“What the fuck is the matter with you, Lee? That wasn’t your task. That wasn’t your mission.”
“I wasn’t going to leave her there with Hector.”
“Well, you sure as fuck didn’t have to marry her.”
“I did. So what are my options now?”
“The marriage isn’t a problem. But your heroic gesture is pointless. Think, Lee. God damn it, for once, think. We can’t return her to her family without risking the op. We can’t do that without blowing your cover, and what will Hector think if she disappears? Undoing the marriage without a trace is no problem. But what we do with the girl is.”