when I wanted to hate you, even when you hurt me.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and absorb her declaration. This is the first time she’s admitted it out loud. Part of me has known for a while, but hearing her say it makes it real. It takes away any lingering doubt I might have had before now.
“But,” she adds, “if we’re going to be together some things are going to have to change, starting right now.”
I open my eyes and stare deep into hers, my hands clutching at soft, wet flesh. Her tears are gone now, washed away as a hardened expression transforms her from broken girl to vengeful woman.
I know what Elena’s going to say before she speaks the words, prepared to lay the entire world at her feet.
“Tell me,” I urge. “If it’s in my power, it’s yours.”
“I don’t want to be your pretty possession anymore,” Elena replies. “I don’t want to be a protected queen, or a pawn in whatever games you play with the men of your world.”
Her eyes harden like chips of crystallized amber, and all the hurt and trauma of the past few weeks melts away.
I wrap my arms around her waist, pulling her tight against my body. “Then what do you want, gatita?”
Elena’s lips curve into a smile that’s downright maniacal, the smothered embers of her soul igniting into a roaring flame. “I want to be a fucking boss.”
34
Elena
It’s been eight weeks since my entire life was turned upside down for the third time. Of course, Diego taking me from my father’s house that fateful night was the first. Viktor showing me that I wasn’t as strong as I previously thought was the second. For weeks, I let myself drown in self-pity and trauma, angry at myself, at Diego, at the entire world for what was done to me.
I couldn’t see a way through it or around it; not until Diego looked me in the eyes and asked me what I wanted. It was at that moment I realized my only recourse was to become truly untouchable. For years I managed to get by on my father’s wealth and my status as a woman with the world at her fingertips. In the beginning of my marriage, I was told that being attached to a dangerous man would be enough to keep me safe. I learned the hard way that Diego’s position won’t protect me from shit. When it comes right down to it, I need to be able to take care of myself.
Gone are the days of being ignorant to the things going on around me. I spend this morning just like I have the mornings before—in hand-to-hand combat training with my instructor. As it turns out, Jaime isn’t only good for his skills on a computer. The man is a Jiu Jitsu black belt, and has patiently taught me how to counter attacks from people bigger and stronger than me. By lunchtime I’m sore and a little scraped up from grappling with him out in the grass, but I also feel a little more confident, a little less afraid. A lot stronger.
After lunch comes shooting lessons with Jovan, at a makeshift outdoor range set up on the edge of our property. There are no other houses close enough for us to worry about, and island security pretends not to hear the hours’ worth of gunfire coming from the Pérez house, as Jovan teaches me how to handle pistols, shotguns, and rifles. Shooting is harder than fighting man-to-man, but Jaime has drilled into me the importance of a physical fight being my very last resort. No one can get close enough to touch me if I know how to handle a gun, but if they do, I’ll be ready for them. Meanwhile, it’s to my advantage to learn what weapons are better handled in small, feminine hands—making me deadly up close, and from a distance.
I asked Diego to train me, but he refused, saying it would be difficult for him to be as hard on me as needed. According to him, I need to be trained by someone whose feelings are platonic. Someone who isn’t paralyzed with fear at the thought of me being hurt.
On my days off from training, I’m in Diego’s office or attending meetings in the conference room with his lieutenants and closest advisers. It takes time for them to get used to seeing me when the world of organized crime is a purely male domain. But Diego makes it