Neighborhood dogs barked outside, maybe because my screaming had set them off. Or maybe it had been the sound of Carlos’s fist connecting with my jaw to silence me, or the sound of my head smashing into the edge of a table or the lamp shattering as it hit the tile.

“Shut up. Your brother doesn’t deserve your sympathy. Worthless piece of shit. He showed you that picture of me, used it to push you away. That’s why your father is lying where he is. To teach him a lesson. Look where his actions got you all.”

I curled into a ball, shielding myself from another blow. “Where’s my dad?” My voice was raw, destroyed from crying.

Carlos dragged me back up to my feet, this time by a fistful of hair, and my scalp burned as a chunk ripped free. “Same place he’s been all day. You think security would make a difference if I wanted him dead? I didn’t need him. I knew you’d come.” He shook his head. “Oblivious, trusting Ariel.”

He was right. I was. I’d missed it all, and my brain struggled to piece together what I’d learned. My brother stole money from the cartel to pay back gambling debts. He’d worked for them, had been responsible for the explosion that killed Ronan Hennessy.

“Now, we wait to get your boyfriend here, and I can eliminate another Hennessy before he causes me any more trouble.”

The disgusted tone of Carlos’s voice made it sound personal, which I didn’t understand. Had Ronan somehow double-crossed the cartel? Was that what he’d done to earn his end?

“Why?”

“You want to know just how tarnished a bloodline Rhett Hennessy comes from? His father was dirty for over a decade. He facilitated all cartel business in the city for years. Then the oldest son decided to make taking down the cartel his top priority. Like that would keep drugs off the streets.” Carlos laughed. “It’s a losing battle. The cops will never win. We have money, power, and resources they’ll never fully comprehend. We will always win, always get what we want. And we’ll always take out anyone who gets in our way.”

My jaw and head throbbed, but my heart ached for Rhett. This would wreck him.

“You killed Robin?”

Carlos snorted in disgust. “Like I would lower myself. I have more important things to do.” He paused. “But I ordered it. Too bad the father finally found his conscience and had to join him.”

Coming closer, he nudged me with the toe of his expensive shoe. “How do you think your boyfriend is going to feel about you when he learns your brother killed his father? It’s a good thing you won’t be here to find out. You’re going to make me the most powerful man in the world instead. You’re going to give that facial-recognition software to all the police departments in the country, and then we’re going to use it against them because you’re giving us a back door. We will know their every movement as it happens.”

He was crazy. Insane.

“I’ll never—”

My declaration was cut off by a knock at the front door.

“Is someone in there? Ariel? Heath?” Mrs. Thurman’s shaky voice called. “I called the police, just in case something was wrong.”

Carlos waved a hand toward the door and one of the goons moved toward it, pulling out the same gun that had killed Heath. Heath. My heart ached for him.

I couldn’t save him. He’d been beyond saving.

But I can save her.

“Everything is fine!” I yelled toward the door, and the goon paused and glanced back at Carlos and me. “Just doing some redecorating before Dad moves back in. We got into a little argument about paint, and I knocked over a lamp with the roller. I’ll stop by when I’m done, Mrs. Thurman.”

Carlos grabbed me by the hair again. “You’ll learn only to speak when spoken to.” Then he nodded at the goon. “Kill the old bitch. No witnesses. And make it quick. We’re leaving.”

Another protest left my lips as Carlos dragged me toward the back door, right beside a tarp wrapped around what had to be my brother’s body.

When I struggled to untangle his fingers from my hair without success, he growled in my ear. “If you don’t cooperate, I’ll send someone to the rehab facility to kill your father.”

He dragged me out the back door and down the steps into the backyard.

Dazed, I fixed my gaze on the rosebushes. My dad had planted one every year on my mom’s birthday. They lined two fences now, and I wished I’d been here to help him do it instead of spending so much time away. Maybe then I would have had a clue what was going on, and Heath wouldn’t have done what he did.

Carlos jerked to a stop, and I stumbled in front of him. He wrapped an arm around my body and pinned me to his front as a familiar voice rumbled in a menacing growl.

“Let her go.”

Rhett.