1. Chapter One

"Please." The man on his knees shook with fear, his eyes wide and beseeching. "I made a mistake."

Marcus Bautista Aguilar looked down at him with contempt. Pathetic, he thought. Some men don't deserve to live.

People said that Bautista was not a patient man. This was, in fact, incorrect. He could be very patient when he wanted to be. However, he had learned that sometimes it paid to have a reputation at odds with the truth. Sometimes, it was necessary to be seen as someone you were not.

And today, he wanted to be seen as an impatient, intolerant villain.

His lip curled as he gazed down at the small man in a cheap suit cowering at his feet. The man's eyes were wide, and he was sweating profusely despite the open doors of the luxurious suite and the breeze blowing in from the balcony.

The room was lavishly decorated with velvet drapes, Turkish carpets, and a grand marble fireplace. Bright paintings hung on the walls, and the ceiling was decorated with a fresco of fruit and curlicues. It was a beautiful room that had seen many dark deeds and no doubt would see many more.

Bautista was a man on the cusp of thirty. He was savagely handsome, broad shouldered and heavy with muscle, a beast of a man. Even the fashionable suit he wore in town could not disguise the menace that radiated off him. He was dangerous. It was obvious. He looked exactly like what he was, the ruthless leader of one of the most dangerous cartels in Colombia, and a man to be feared and respected in equal amounts.

A wave of satisfaction washed over him as he watched his underling squirm at his feet. He bent down the grab the man's shirt with both hands and dragged him to his feet.

"You have failed me, Guzmán," he said in a low growl. "You have failed me badly." He paused, watching the man's terror expand, then went on coldly. "You know what I do with those who fail me."

Tightening his grip on Guzmán's shirt, Bautista dragged him towards the edge of the balcony overlooking the street. Guzmán shook his head vigorously back and forth as tears began streaming down his cheeks. Bautista smiled cruelly as understanding dawned on the poor soul before him: he was going to be thrown off of the balcony and onto the street below. If the fall did not kill him, it could cripple him. A terrible punishment for what he had done, or rough justice?

"Please," Guzmán begged. "Please, please don't, I'll do anything—"

Bautista laughed. "Anything? You should have kept your word. I trusted you. But you couldn't help yourself. Was the money Los Manos Rojos paid you worth it? Look at where you are now." He hefted the man up against the balcony railing. "How can I trust you again?" he asked almost gently.

Against the wall, others of Bautista's men stood watching. He wanted them to watch. This was for them, after all, an example to keep them honest and loyal. They had to see the consequences of betrayal for themselves, apparently, or they forgot what kind of man their jefe was.

And then behind him, a voice floated in through the open door, high and sweet and completely innocent.

"?Papá! ?Qué estás haciendo?"

Bautista sighed. He tugged his lucky victim close, hovering his mouth beside Guzmán's ear. "It seems you have a guardian angel. I hope you understand how fortunate you are that my daughter is still so innocent." He kissed the man's cheek ironically. "You have one last chance to prove your loyalty to me. Don't waste it." He released his grip on Guzmán, dropping him to the floor, and stepped away from the balcony's edge.

Guzmán stared up at Bautista with tears of gratitude streaming down his face. He nodded solemnly in understanding before crawling away, lurching to his feet and fleeing down the stairs.

Bautista turned toward the inner door and held out his arms. "Mi vida, todo está bien. Come and give your papá a kiss."

Carmelita, Bautista's precious daughter, ran into his arms and hugged him tight.

He swept her up, embracing her with a warmth he reserved only for her. At eight years of age, Carmelita was a pure delight. Sweet, innocent, loving, curious, she was everything he could hope for. Certainly she resembled her mother more than he would have liked, but he could not hold that against her. She was his jewel. He would do anything to keep her safe and happy, even if it meant giving one last chance to a worm like Guzmán.

Today she had her dark hair pulled up into a ponytail and was wearing a bright yellow dress with ruffles, her tiny feet clad in black patent-leather shoes. Her clothes were impeccable, as always. She was such a fastidious child after all.

She kissed his cheek affectionately. "Papá," she said brightly. "When do we go home? I miss my flowers."

He smiled and kissed her hair. "Soon," he said gently. "We will go home to Casa del Rey very soon, I promise. You have to be good for Teresa until then, do you understand?"

Carmelita nodded. "I promise," she said sweetly.

He set her on her feet. "Run along now, cari?a. Papá has work to do."

Carmelita smiled and nodded, and then turned to run off. She waved goodbye as she disappeared into the suite, leaving Bautista alone with his men in the study. He watched her go, his chest aching. She was his one bright spark, his treasure. The only thing that kept him human.

And he was all she had in this world. After the scandal with her mother and its tragic end, Carmelita was half an orphan. No one ever spoke of Carmelita's mother, not in Bautista's presence. But they all knew some version of the story with some relationship to the truth.

Bautista, it was said, had caught his wife in the arms of another man. Not any man, either, but his closest and dearest friend. The betrayal had destroyed what little compassion and humanity he had left, and what he had done to the unlucky couple was the stuff of legends.

Not all the legends agreed, but the most popular was that he had slit both their throats and then fed them to a colony of crocodiles he kept at Casa del Rey. Some versions claimed he did not slit their throats first, simply gutted them and left them alive in the pen with the hungry animals.

In any case, Bautista had changed his daughter's name from Carmelita Bautista Mu?oz to Carmelita Bautista Aguilar, effectively erasing her mother from existence. His daughter was the only thing in this world that he loved more than money, power, and revenge. His men knew it. And they knew the only reason Bautista had spared Guzmán today was to protect his daughter's innocence.

"Have him watched," Bautista said aloud. "If he shows any lack of loyalty or dedication, remind him my patience with him is at an end. The next time, he goes over the balcony."

His men murmured their agreement. Bautista itched. His murderous impulse had been thwarted. Perhaps that was for the best—throwing a man off a balcony in a busy city street meant cleaning up, bribes, that sort of thing. It could get messy. But he'd been so ready to do it, and now he felt dissatisfied.

It was with him in this mood that the phone rang.

Bautista answered it curtly. "Carlos. Good news?"

"He didn't fucking show," Carlos said gruffly. Bautista heard him spit on the ground. "The place was crawling with policía."

Bautista's hand clenched into a fist. Carlos was his most loyal and trusted subordinate. Today, Carlos had gone with a cadre of cartel men to pick up a payment for services rendered to a Mr. Hamilton West, business magnate and aspiring Governor of California. Now it seemed West had decided not to pay up. That could not be allowed to stand.

"Did you have any trouble?" Bautista asked through clenched teeth.

"No, jefe," Carlos said dryly. "I didn't stick around for trouble." He paused. "What do you want me to do about it?"

That was a very good question. "He has a fiancée."

Carlos hummed. "He's divorced three wives already. Maybe he doesn't get too attached to them."

Good point. "How many children does he have?"

"One, legitimate. A son."

"Security?"

"Not that I saw."

So Carlos had already scoped out the son. This was exactly why Bautista trusted him as much as he did. Carlos was reliable.

Bautista nodded, thinking about what a man might do to get back his only son. "Invite the son to Casa del Rey. I would like to get to know him."

Carlos laughed darkly. "On it, jefe."

For a moment, Bautista just held his phone, fingers flexing on the glass and plastic. His rage wanted to break something. But it was troublesome to replace a phone, so he put it down.

"You," he said, pointing at the tallest and broadest of his underlings. "Do you know how to box?"

The man shook his head, looking uncertain. "No, jefe."

Bautista smirked. "Well, you're about to learn."

He needed to blow off steam somehow. West had infuriated him. That smug hijueputa was going to learn his lesson, one way or another. He couldn't wait to get his hands on West's one and only son.

And in the meantime, he would box with his subordinate. With any luck, the boy would learn how to box back.