For a man who prided himself on careful planning and precise execution, Ethan sure had flung himself toward the edge of this cliff without thinking. He’d considered reading Natalia in—well, considered reading Ana Maria in, back when the program had named her as the mole within the cartel—but ultimately dismissed the idea as too dangerous, too reckless.
And yet, he’d still considered throwing his chips in with Natalia. Even gone so far as to present it as a potential path forward to the rest of the team.
But everyone had agreed—too risky.
But that was before. Before the reality of just how hard it was going to be to gain access to one of Hernan’s computers had occurred to him. Before Ethan had come home to find Natalia in his living room, drinking his whiskey. Before he’d put his hands on her. Before he’d tasted her. Before he’d felt the beat of her heart, strong and fierce—a wild, untamed thing dancing beneath his fingers. Before she’d reached for him, in kindness, in solidarity, in commiseration. Her touch had elicited the story about his brother—a rarity in itself—but more, it had made the confession easier, the remembered pain less vicious.
Ethan had spent so much of his life amid the worst of humanity that he knew evil when he felt it. Recognized depravity when he saw it. There was nothing cruel or mean or cold about Natalia. Just a cautious reservation Ethan could respect, and a fierce love for a sibling he could both remember and admire.
As he let Natalia’s fingers slip through his, as he gave her the room to sit back, to breathe, to absorb what he’d just told her, he cursed himself for a fool. Already, he missed the feel of her hand in his, the taste of her mouth, the scrape of her nails.
Will would accuse him of thinking with his dick. Hell, were their situations reversed, he’d accuse Will of the same.
But while Ethan couldn’t deny his interest, his desire to take Natalia to bed, to leave his mark on her body and her mind, that wasn’t why he’d asked for her help.
At the end of the day, if Ethan was sure of absolutely nothing else, he was sure that the love Natalia held for her sister rivaled the love Ethan held for his brother.
But as he stared at her, at thick chestnut hair she’d pulled up loosely in a rubber band, at the light of the fire dancing over her makeup-free face, at the way her lower lip still held the evidence of their kiss, Ethan realized that whether she knew it or not, little by little and piece by piece, Natalia was revealing herself to him.
He could do no less.
It could be a mistake, maybe the biggest he’d ever make, but he was willing to gamble his life and, more important, the life of someone he cared about, on the hunch that Natalia would do the right thing. It was, Ethan realized with the sudden strength of lightning-struck conviction, simply who she was.
He wondered if she even realized it.
“Tell me about tipping off the FBI, Natalia,” he said, watching as her face shuttered with surprise. She stood, walked to the mantel, and let the orange glow of the fire paint interesting shadows along her legs.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said after a heavy, pregnant pause.
Ethan leaned forward but managed to wrestle back the desire to go to her, to pull her close and twist the truth from her in far more intimate ways. “I don’t believe you.”
She rounded on him, fire in her eyes and at her back. “So?” she snarled. “I’m the one asking questions here—you’re supposed to be explaining yourself, not the other way around!”
“All right,” he agreed, leaning back and watching her pace. “I’ll go first. My name is Ethan Somerton, which you already know,” he added when she shot him a withering look. “What you don’t know is that my company, Somerton Security, is a top government contractor.”
She scrubbed her hands over her face but nodded as if she’d suspected as much already. Given the fact that she’d tracked him all the way to Penn off little more than a hunch, it hardly surprised him. Natalia’s intelligence added a layer of intrigue to Ethan’s attraction he could not have predicted. He usually preferred his women a little more simple-minded. Not stupid, just . . . straightforward and uncomplicated. They were easy to please and, when they became clingy, vapid, or demanding, easy to dismiss.
Natalia, Ethan knew, would be none of those things.
“Publicly, Somerton Security is primarily engaged in high-end private security—everything from full-time protection to special events to risk assessment,” he explained, watching as she shifted from foot to foot, as if she wanted to pace but didn’t want to show it.
“And privately?” she asked, shoving her balled fists into the pockets of her fleece.
“Privately, we work closely with the Department of Defense, Homeland Security, and the Justice Department. My team specializes in intel and, when the situation calls for it, can operate as an off-book Special Forces unit.”
“Is the cartel under investigation?” she asked quietly, her shoulders tense and her expression carefully neutral.
“Yes,” he confirmed with a nod. She sounded both cautious and hopeful, and for a second, Ethan wondered if she were playing him. “Though likely not in the way you imagine.”
“And what way is that?” she asked, lifting her chin, her calm, patient regard evaporating beneath the heat of a challenge.
“I’m not here on behalf of the FBI or DEA or any other government agency you’re familiar with.” True, but only in the most technical sense. Ethan wasn’t working with or for the DEA, but he didn’t want to add that complication to their conversation unnecessarily or alienate Natalia before he could coax her to his side.
“A little less than a year ago, the US government sanctioned a raid against a cartel compound in the jungles of Colombia. During the course of that raid, one of our operatives was believed killed in action,” he explained.
“Believed to be?” she asked. “Or was?”
“You know the answer to that, Natalia.”
“Pretend I don’t.”
She hadn’t outright denied it, but she hadn’t confirmed it, either. Ethan didn’t expect her to.
If she needed him to lay it out for her, to prove what he knew, he would.
“For almost a decade, someone within the Vega cartel has been sending in tips to the authorities, both local and federal.” He set his drink on the table and stood, brushing the wrinkles out of his slacks. “Irregular—rare, even—but they keep coming. Those tips saved countless women and children from becoming one of the growing number of human trafficking victims in the United States. Dealing in people, it’s a dark business,” he said, watching her closely. “Drugs? Guns? The cartel may supply them, but they aren’t directly involved with what people do with them. There’s one degree of separation, at least.” He paused, considered the weight of his next words carefully, debated if they’d be help or hindrance, then rolled the dice. “Your father didn’t hold with that sort of business.”
“No,” she whispered, “he didn’t.”
“Seems someone within the cartel still agrees with him.” Ethan watched for a reaction, a coy smile or a cutting glance, some subtle acknowledgment of what they both knew to be true. But again, she surprised him with both her subtlety and innocence. There was no smirk, no arched brow, just a pale-pink flush of pleasure—a young woman content in the knowledge her father would be proud.
“And you think those tips came from someone on the inside?” She tracked him as he stepped away from the sofa and around the large granite-topped coffee table, following his progress as if preparing to bolt.
“I do.”
When she pulled her hands from her pockets, settled into a stance that could mean fight-or-flight, he stopped moving. Let her relax. He was no threat to her, and they both knew it. But still, she remained wary, on guard. Though he was beginning to suspect that was her default setting—careful, watchful, assessing—he just hated that it was directed at him.
“Then you don’t know half as much as you think. Do you have any idea what would happen if someone were caught feeding information like that to the authorities?” she asked on an angry hiss. “What my uncle would do to them if he knew?”
“I can guess,” he said, thinking of what would happen if Hernan caught up with Milner, or even Natalia herself. “Which makes your actions all the more impressive.”
“My actions?” she scoffed. “Please. I have nothing to gain from contacting the authorities about any of the cartel’s dealings.”
“Which is why I’m trusting you with the truth.”
“You think anyone within a cartel does anything without their own best interests in mind?” She raised a single sculpted eyebrow and laughed, the sound bitter and desperate, like the warning mewl of a cornered cat that didn’t want to fight but had claws and teeth at the ready. “Please. People choose this life because of what it can give them—or what they can take from it. There are no saints here, Ethan. If you believe otherwise, if you think anyone in this organization does anything out of the goodness of their heart, then you’re a bigger fool than I thought.”
“And yet, here we are.” It took all the self-control he’d carefully cultivated over the years to maintain the distance she put between them—scant feet he could cross in the time it took to yearn for another taste of her. But whether he’d intended to or not, he’d trapped her—with words or kisses or unspoken threats, it didn’t matter. Right now, he was the predator and she the prey.
He refused to press his advantage any more than he had to. More than anything, he wanted her to come to him.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.
“Only that for someone entrenched in the cartel’s way of life, you’re awfully reluctant to condemn a man to death.” He met her gaze, tried to convey his gratitude with a single look. She could have been the end of him; that she hadn’t gone straight to Hernan, that she’d hesitated, spoke volumes about her character. “You have enough information to ensure I don’t live to see the next sunrise, Natalia. One word to your uncle is all it would take; you know it as well as I do.”
Her shoulders slumped as she heaved out a breath he only just realized she’d been holding. She looked tired but lost, too. Like every decision she made rested on her shoulders and her shoulders alone. It shouldn’t have surprised him. As protective as she was of Ana Maria, he hadn’t really expected Natalia to share her burdens, her fears, her worries. But then who did that leave? If she couldn’t confide in her sister, who was left?
How the fuck had she survived this long?
The thought of her absolute isolation wrecked him and made it all the harder not to pull her close, notch her head beneath his chin, and whisper ill-advised promises and dirty possibilities in her ear. And then, when she was sated and sprawled, her olive skin aglow with sex and passion and the pleasure he’d racked upon her body, then he’d hear her whispered confessions.
Dreams. Fears. Regrets. He didn’t give a damn; he wanted them all. Ethan had spent his entire adult life avoiding commitment and intimacy, only to finally desire it from the woman least likely to give it to him.
Pushing the thoughts away, he forced himself to stay the path, to keep his distance, and say, “You could have gone to Hernan with that yearbook, those campus newspaper articles. Those alone would have secured my death. But you didn’t. You came here to me first. Why?”
Her eyes fell shut, and she swallowed hard. “I don’t know,” she whispered.
“I think you do.” His resolve broken, he crossed the distance between them. She startled but didn’t move away when he brought his hand up to cup her cheek.
“I think you knew I was lying but weren’t sure why. I think you had to know the truth, that you couldn’t have a man murdered without being absolutely certain he deserved it. I think,” he said, meeting her whiskey-colored gaze when she opened her eyes, “that you have a steady hand when you need to, a curious mind when you want to.” He kissed her forehead, just a brief press of lips, a small apology for what he was about to accuse her of. “And regardless of whether or not you like it or can afford it, I think you have a rigid sense of justice . . . and a soft heart.”
“You’re certain of that, are you?” she murmured against his throat. “Willing to risk your life on a hunch you can’t possibly prove?”
He stroked his thumb across the corner of her mouth, willing it to lift again, to embrace an expression that wasn’t built from fear and loneliness.
“Then let’s look at what I can prove,” he said, sliding his thumb along her bottom lip, tracing the mouth he so badly wanted to taste again. “Ten years ago, you were little more than an accomplished high school student. But something happened that changed all that.”
He pulled his hand away, unreasonably pleased with the way her mouth dropped open and the ghost of a sigh left her. “Ten years ago, Hernan Vega arrived in the United States,” he said, stepping back to give her breathing room and his control a chance to rebuild. “He killed your mother, your father. And in that moment he changed an extraordinary National Honor Society student into something else. Something darker. I don’t need the details to know how desperate you must have been.” He shook his head, wondering what he’d have thought of Natalia Vega had he met her in college—what she’d have thought of him.
“You’d have me believe you’d hand my life over to your uncle in a heartbeat if it served your purposes,” he continued, focusing on the here and now instead of futures that simply were not meant to be. “Have me believe that you’re what? Heartless. Vicious. Unrepentant.”
Every muscle in her neck and shoulders seized, but she refused to move away from the fireplace—or meet his gaze.
“Wouldn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“But that would be little more than a convenient lie. An identity you slip on like armor. But it’s not the truth.” He knew she was so much more—even if she didn’t.
“No?” she asked. “Then what is?”
“That while whatever happened all those years ago changed you, it didn’t turn you into someone cruel. Someone heartless. It didn’t twist you into a woman who’d kill a man on a hunch or ignore the plight of innocent people. Your uncle’s betrayal left you as the last line of defense for Ana Maria—she was, what, twelve when your parents died?”
“My father died,” Natalia admitted, her voice raw and wretched with memories. “My mother . . .” She shook her head, and he let it go.
“A child. A defenseless little girl who only had her big sister.” Their pasts weren’t the same, not even close, but too easily Ethan could imagine all the things he’d have done to save his brother. It was harder to imagine what costs he wouldn’t have paid, what price he’d have deemed too high if it meant even one more day with Connor. “I believe that everything you’ve done since, every choice you’ve made, has been for her.” He reached for her again, resting his hand atop her shoulder and brushing the curve of her collarbone with his thumb.
She wrenched away from him, and for the first time since he’d met her, Ethan saw what fear looked like on Natalia’s face. It was only a glimpse, there and gone again in the space of a heartbeat, but it was enough to convince him he never, ever wanted to see it again.
“You don’t know the first thing about my sister or me.”
“I know the only thing that really matters, Natalia. I know that you’d do anything for Ana Maria. Protect her. Die for her.”
“How typical.” She sneered, backing away from him as if he’d demanded she fall to her knees before him. “Men like you are all the same.”
“Men like me?” he asked, his own fists curling at his sides. She could accuse him of what she liked, but sooner or later, Ethan was going to prove just how wrong she was. Just how worthy, how worshipful, he could be.
“Powerful. Egotistical. So certain that just because you put your hands on me, just because you took my mouth or my body, that just because I let you do all those things, you know me. You. Don’t.”
Let him? The very idea rankled. As if she hadn’t wanted it. Yearned for it. Demanded it with every countermeasure, every breathy moan, every slide of tongue. Fine. If she wanted to rewrite what lay between them, he’d allow it—but he’d be damn sure before he touched her again, before he took what they both knew she wanted to offer, that he’d make her ask for it. Plead for it.
A man’s ego could only take so much. Until then, they had a conversation to finish.
“I know a lot more than you think,” he said. “You’ve told me more than you realize.” He stepped away, the heat from the fireplace soaking through his clothes to the point he was no longer comfortable. “I know that your first instinct is to protect your little sister—a habit so second nature I’m not even sure you realize the myriad ways you do it throughout the day.” He shrugged. “Though your threat the other night wasn’t exactly subtle.”
“You’ll have to forgive me,” she snapped. “I took you for a man who thought charm and money were adequate substitutes for intellect.”
“You made your point well enough,” he said on an easy shrug. “But it was hardly necessary. Your love for Ana Maria was clear in the way you looked at her, the way your hand went briefly to the small of her back—protective, possessive, a warning in and of itself—the way you made sure she’d had something to eat. You love her.”
“She’s my sister.”
Yeah, and were they talking about giving up the last slice of pizza, rearranging weekend plans, or some other minor, if not annoying, inconvenience, then he’d have let that comment slide.
“It’s more than that, Natalia, and no lie will convince me otherwise.” Ethan knew more than anyone that not all familial bonds were created equal. That not all siblings shared the same sense of closeness that he and Connor had or that Natalia and Ana Maria still did.
Hell, aside from the mandatory holidays or the rare benefit honoring his brother, Ethan rarely ever saw his parents.
He loved them, but would he die for them?
“I don’t believe there’s anything in this world you wouldn’t do for your sister. To keep her safe. To see her happy.” He watched her face, cataloging the expressions that played out upon smooth caramel-colored skin and wide toffee-colored eyes. Honesty. Regret. Love. But most of all, conviction, which he recognized in the subtle way her chin came up and her jaw clenched. “That’s no small thing, Natalia. And regardless of what people claim, what they tell themselves and their loved ones, very few could live up to such a commitment, certainly not over the course of a decade.”
“My father . . .” She swallowed hard, as if she never dared think of him, as if the simplest memory brought the untold pain of loss, but without the buoying measure of good memories to comfort her. “Family was everything to my father. Every dream I ever had, he supported. He never asked me for anything, not until his dying breath.” Her voice caught, and she turned away from him. “I promised him, Ethan,” she whispered, folding her arms across her middle and walking toward the floor-to-ceiling windows.
“And now that promise is your identity. I understand that.” More than she knew. Ethan lived with the immense pressure that came with people who relied on him for their safety, for their lives. Knew the burden of disappointing them, of failing them. But he’d always tried. “I made promises, too, Natalia.”
“To Will Bennett?” she asked.
“To him. To the men and women who work for me.” To lead them. To guide them. To listen if they needed to talk. He’d never gone so far as to guarantee their safety—he knew he couldn’t, not in the realm of special ops. Too much could go wrong. But he had made promises he’d believed he could keep. To stand by them. To have their back.
To always, always, bring them home—one way or another.
A promise he thought he’d fulfilled when he’d carried Will’s flag-draped coffin off the plane.
He’d been wrong then, but he wasn’t wrong now. Alive or dead, one way or another, he’d see Will home.
“You should know better than to make promises you can’t keep,” Natalia murmured, though it felt less like an accusation and more like a warning she willed herself to remember.
“I never have.” Ethan didn’t put much stock in platitudes or empty words designed only to make someone feel better. He preferred the truth, even when it had to be ripped off like a stubborn Band-Aid. But for the first time in his life, Ethan could see the appeal of reckless assurances. More than anything, right in that moment, he wanted to promise Natalia that he could free her of the cartel and the hold her uncle had over her. That he could guarantee a life beyond the violence and blood and constant threat of betrayal for her sister and her.
Such a vow was not only stupid but dangerous, too. But no more than the bone-deep desire he had to do it anyway. The feelings this woman stoked in him . . . primal, powerful, possessive urges he’d never thought to experience.
The smart thing to do would be to secure her secrecy and walk away. But just this once, Ethan found he didn’t give a shit about the smart play. Not where Natalia was concerned.
“What do you want from me, Ethan?” she asked on an exhausted, resigned sigh.
“Your help,” he said, joining her at the window. “I’d thought to simply dig through the cartel’s financials—I’d hoped that would lead me to whoever is holding Will. I know something like that takes a coordinated effort . . . and a lot of money.”
“It does.” She turned, cocking her hip against the cool glass. “If your friend is still alive, he’s likely being moved regularly or is being held in the jungle.” She chewed at the curve of her bottom lip. “Either way, it makes him hard to trace.”
“You said if Will is still alive. I had hoped . . . We only ever got the one tip, just a single video file that is months old at this point. Have there been others?” he asked. Part of him was relieved; if Will had died and Natalia knew about it, had seen it or heard something about it, then surely she’d have told him.
At this point, no news wasn’t exactly good news, but he’d take it.
“Is there anything more you can confirm? Even if . . .” God, it was hard to say. He didn’t even like contemplating it. But Ethan still had to ask.
Natalia studied Ethan’s face, a little line bisecting her brow. Finally, she glanced toward the skyline. “Just the one file,” she said quietly, “as far as I know, at least.”
Ethan scrubbed his hands over his face, wiping back exhaustion and frustration and the nagging suspicion that Natalia was holding something back. He forced himself to ask the obvious, most painful question.
“If there’ve been no further video files, does that mean Hernan wouldn’t need any more updates? That Will is most likely dead and buried?” It wouldn’t change anything, not for Ethan, but he would regroup, come at the problem with less desperation.
What he wouldn’t do was draw Natalia any further into a mess he’d created.
She didn’t move, didn’t turn her head or shift her stance, but she met his gaze in the reflection of the glass before her. “Your friend, he was Special Forces, like you?”
“Yes.”
“So highly trained,” she surmised. “With the mental as well as physical stamina to qualify for such a job.”
“He is,” Ethan agreed. “He knew what the risks were for every single operation he took part in. They train us for every eventuality, Natalia. Will would have known what to expect of capture. Would have some idea how to endure long-term captivity.”
“Nothing prepares you for that kind of thing,” she whispered, a shiver slipping away from her. “You think you know, but you don’t. You can’t. Not really.”
“No,” Ethan said, resisting the urge to slide his palm across her shoulders, to pull her back from memories he could see swimming just beneath the surface. “You never know what you can take until you have to endure it. But Will is highly trained—and possibly the most stubborn man I’ve ever met.” Ethan smiled when she glanced at him. “A family trait. His sister’s just as bad.”
A ghost of a smile touched Natalia’s mouth. “I bet I’d like her.”
“She also thinks I’m an idiot, so you probably would.”
“You try that lame cocktail come-on with her, too?”
“On my best friend’s little sister?” he asked, barely suppressing a surprised bark of laughter. “Not on a bet.” He tilted his head, studied the curious way Natalia watched him. “Unless you’re jealous? Then I might have to change my answer.”
She huffed and rolled her eyes, the mannerism so succinct, so clearly put out, that for a brief second she reminded him of Parker’s cat. Ethan had rescued that ungrateful creature, but the beast still behaved as if Ethan were something he’d found in the litter box.
“My uncle is only ever patient when it comes to one thing.” She glanced toward the door, ran a hand along her upper arm, then looked back up at Ethan. “Cross Hernan Vega and you’re a dead man. He doesn’t care how long you worked for him, how loyal you’ve been. If you fail, you die . . . but not before you beg him for the privilege.”
“Will would never give him the satisfaction.” Some men would, Ethan knew. But not Will. He’d turn it around, create strength where most would find only weakness. Hernan might believe that in withholding death, in forcing Will to beg for the end, that he was tormenting his captive. Will would see it differently. As his last, best “fuck you” to the man who’d captured him. His body might quit and Will might let go, but he wouldn’t beg, not for his own life, at least.
“Then your friend is still alive.”
“You’re sure?” Ethan asked. Hernan Vega had the temper, the cruel streak, to keep a man alive if only to torment him with the promise of death. But did he have the patience?
“Yes,” she said slowly. “But, Ethan, it’s no life. You said it’s been almost a year . . . that’s a long time. Don’t wish your friend alive at such a cost.” She reached for him, placing her hand against his chest, and shook her head. “I’m sorry, but . . .”
He gripped her hand in his, pulled her knuckles up, and brushed a kiss against the skin there. “I know,” he said when her mouth snapped shut. “But I have to assume he’s alive, which means—”
“You have to find him.” She pulled away but didn’t turn to leave. “And you want my help.”
“Hernan has a private network set up in the house; I need to access it.”
She shoved her hands through her hair, pulling it free from the ponytail that had held it back. “Are you out of your mind?”
“It’s not as bad as it sounds,” he assured her. “I just need to load this”—he fished from his jacket pocket the thumb drive Parker had given him just before he left for the day—“onto any computer or device connected to the network. Five minutes on your computer or even your phone, that’s all I nee—”
“You seriously think I have access to my uncle’s private network? You can’t be that stupid!” She spun, smacking his chest with the back of her hand. “Ever since the raid on his compound—you know, the one that was supposed to kill him?—Hernan has been twice as paranoid as ever before.” The look she shot him could have peeled paint. “Thanks for that, by the way. Your team’s incompetence has made him so much easier to live with.”
“I’m trying to fix all that!” he yelled when she shoved at his chest. When she went in for seconds, Ethan caught her wrists and jerked her close. “I get it, okay? I fucked up.” She tried to jerk her arms away, but he held firm. “I know. I know this isn’t fair to you. I know what I’m asking you—”
“Do you?” she railed. “Because I’m not sure you have the first clue what you’re asking me to do.”
“I’m asking,” he said, pressing her back against the cold glass when she tried to jerk away again, “for you to gain access to a computer—”
“My uncle’s computer!”
“Fine, your uncle’s computer for five fucking minutes, Natalia.” He brought her wrists up over her head, then stepped in close so he could pin her body against the window with his. “Five minutes. Get me five minutes and I will get all the information I need to find my friend.”
She turned her head to the side, so he laid his forehead against her temple.
“Please.”
“Weren’t you listening?” she cried, her entire body trembling against his. “Do you know what he’ll do to me if I’m caught?”
“I swear to you, I will do everything in my power to protect you—”
“Protect me?” She wrenched to the side and stumbled several steps away before rounding on him, her hair a mass of heavy waves around her shoulders. “I thought you were smarter than this, Ethan. I thought you understood.”
“Then explain it me.”
“I have done every single thing my uncle has ever demanded of me, until now.” The weight of her stare landed on him, rooting him in place.
Until I came to you first. Until I let you live.
She didn’t have to say it; he could translate the set of her shoulders and the curl of her lips well enough. And even if he couldn’t, her eyes, pleading and moist, would have given her away.
“I obey. But not because I’m afraid of him. Not because he’ll kill me.”
“I know . . . ,” he said, taking a step forward even as she put more space between them. “I heard you. I know what he’ll do. How he’ll do it. I know and I’m asking you anyway, please. Help me do this.”
“You don’t know anything.” She shook her head. “My uncle won’t kill me, Ethan. That’s not a punishment—it’s just an end we’ve both expected for a very long time.”
“Natalia . . .” How could she say such a thing? Contemplate the end of her life as if it didn’t matter, as if it were inevitable.
“It’s okay,” she said on a trembling smile. “I made my peace with that a long time ago.”
She sounded so resolved, so at ease with how and when she expected her life to end. It ate at him like slow-burning acid. Twenty-seven years old and she was as resigned to death as a woman who’d lived a full and wonderful life. But she hadn’t, not yet, and if things stayed the course, maybe not ever.
And that wasn’t something Ethan was prepared to live with. No matter what happened with Will, Ethan had to find a way to eliminate Hernan Vega from Natalia’s life. If he could do it without her, if he could send her away somewhere safe, he would. But he knew, and so did she, that their best shot was if they worked together.
“I’m not afraid to die, Ethan, and Hernan knows that. There’s only one thing I fear . . .”
I made a promise.
“Ana Maria,” Ethan realized aloud.
“I told my father I’d keep her alive. That I would protect her. If my uncle suspects I’ve betrayed him, he won’t kill me. He’ll kill her. He will make me watch as he and his men take apart every good and beautiful thing I have left in this world. He will make me beg him. Do you understand?” she asked, tears welling in her eyes. “I am trapped in this life because I know what the cost of leaving would be. I won’t pay it, Ethan. I can’t.”
He crossed the distance between them in three long strides, then pulled her close, her body tense but willing, and held her as she pressed her face to the lapels of his suit. When her shaking subsided, he pulled back just enough to brush away the few tears she’d allowed herself.
“I can’t betray my sister, Ethan. Please don’t ask me to.”
He shook his head and cupped her cheeks, ensuring she met his gaze. “I’m not asking you to break your promise.” He breathed her in, the fresh scent of magnolia and rain, and let it go. “I’m asking you to keep it.”
“It’s like you said—you know the day is coming when your uncle considers you more a threat than an asset. But when he kills you—”
“Maybe I can—”
Ethan cut her off with a kiss to the crown of her head. “You can’t. You know you can’t. Maybe, if the fight were fair. But it’s not. You know he’ll send his best, and more than one. It’s not a fight you can win, sweetheart.” He pulled back. “What happens to Ana Maria then? How long until she, too, is a threat?”
“So, what, then?” Natalia asked, gripping his wrists but stopping short of pulling his hands away. “To hell with it all?”
“So wage the fight you can win.”
“Your fight, you mean.” She stepped back, slipping from his grasp like water through his fingers. “I’m sorry about your friend, truly I am, but don’t ask me to weigh his life against my sister’s. You’ll come up short, and I won’t apologize for it.”
Ethan shoved his fists in his pockets. “I’m asking you to look beyond both of them and see the bigger picture.” He sighed and went for broke. “Help me get the access I need, Natalia, and I promise you, I will do everything in my power to bring your uncle’s empire crashing down around his head.”
She smiled wistfully. “You think I’ve never considered it? That I haven’t tried to do just that? It’s a foolish dream. My uncle’s too powerful.”
“The cartel is powerful,” Ethan corrected. “Your uncle’s just a man. Men die, Natalia. At the point of a blade or at the end of a gun, they die.”
She considered him, her eyes glassy but her expression open.
“You can’t imagine the resources I have at my disposal. Whatever you’ve tried before, whatever you’ve considered, you’ve never had the benefit of the US government backing your play.”
She glanced away from him, pulling her lower lip between her teeth. He wanted so much more for her than what the cartel could offer.
But she had to want it for herself, too.
“It’s why you came here tonight,” he realized aloud, slotting in that one last piece of the puzzle. “You didn’t know who I was or what I wanted—but you hoped.”
The corner of her mouth curled, and she glanced away. “You can’t possibly promise to protect me, or even to protect my sister.”
“I could send her away,” he offered. “Remove her from the equation.” He had the resources, the contacts. He could hide her—temporarily, at least.
“You know we can’t. My uncle would never allow her to travel, and the moment he noticed her missing, he’d know.” She shook her head. “But as a last resort, if things went bad . . . your team, your men, they could make her disappear?”
“Yes. Somewhere the cartel and your uncle would never find her.”
“I’m not sure such a place exists.”
“Tell me what you need from me, Natalia. I won’t make you a promise I can’t keep. It’s not who I am, but I can help you. If you’ll let me.”
She stood there, still and quiet, on the edge of a tall cliff as he told her to jump. That he’d catch her.
“You’ve been alone for ten long years, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Not anymore. Let’s end this.”
“I want that more than you could possibly know,” she confessed.
“For Ana Maria,” Ethan said. “But I want that freedom for you, too. You should have a shot at a future for yourself, a life of your own.” He could imagine no one more deserving of a full and wonderful life.
“That’s not important to me,” she said, piercing Ethan’s heart with the simple dismissal. As if she’d long ago stopped living, stopped dreaming, stopped wanting. Except tonight, for a moment in time, she had wanted something.
It was a thought that would keep him up at night.
“Then tell me what is.”
She closed her eyes, took a breath, then opened them and pinned him with a clear, calm look. “I’ll have only one promise from you, Ethan Somerton.”
“Name it.”
“If it comes down to a choice. If only one of us can live, Ana Maria comes first. Ahead of you or me or even Will. She’s innocent. My sister didn’t ask for this, doesn’t even know the world is burning down around her.”
“All right,” he agreed.
“Say the words, Ethan. I need to hear them.” She stared at him, the fierce flash of those whiskey-toned eyes softening as they traced every line and contour of his face. For something she could believe. For an oath. For hope.
“I promise,” he said, the weight of the words settling heavily upon his shoulders. “If we have to choose, Ana Maria lives.”