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  Nick glanced at her as he added guacamole to his taco. “Can I ask you something?”

  She nodded.

  “While Bristol is beautiful, it doesn’t strike me as a traditional Mexican name.”

  It wasn’t exactly a question, but she didn’t point that out.

  “It is a little unusual I suppose.” She bit into her taco and almost moaned. Isabella made the best carnitas. “My mother was born and raised in Bristol, Connecticut. She was feeling a little homesick when I was born so she named me after the town where she grew up to always remind her of it.”

  Understanding dawned on Nick’s face. “So that’s why you went up there for college.”

  “Yup. Mom went to Central Connecticut State University so that’s where I wanted to go, too. It’s only about fifteen miles from Bristol, which meant I had family nearby.”

  As they ate, they talked about college and her American relatives. She didn’t have the crazy anecdotes Nick did, but he still laughed when she told him more fish-out-of-water stories of a sun-loving girl from Mexico floundering in the snow and freezing her butt off.

  It had been a long time since she’d been able to sit and have lunch and laugh with an attractive man. It wasn’t long before she found herself once again forgetting Nick was a mercenary arms dealer. He was simply a guy interested in her for the normal reasons a guy was interested in a woman.

  It was beyond nice.

  “What’d you go to college for?” he asked, helping himself to more corn salad.

  She added a little more guacamole to her taco. “I got my bachelors in hospitality and tourism then a masters in business administration.” She remembered graduation like it was yesterday. When she’d walked across the stage to get her diploma, she’d felt ready to take on the world. Little did she know what was waiting for her when she’d gotten back to Mexico. “My dream was to start my own tourism company when I came home to Manzanillo.”

  Nick looked up from the fresh taco he was building. “Why haven’t you?”

  Warning bells immediately went off in Bristol’s head at the question. Nick might seem like an amazing guy, but he was still a criminal. And on her father’s radar for a job. Anything she told Nick could very well up getting back with her father. That wouldn’t be good, even if her father already knew what she thought of him.

  But despite all that she had an overwhelming need to tell Nick everything, to hell with the risk.

  “My father wouldn’t allow it because that would mean letting me leave the compound, and that won’t be happening.”

  Nick regarded her in silence for a long time. Bristol’s stomach clenched. Crap. Had she made a mistake saying anything?

  “Are you telling me that you’re a prisoner in your own home?” he finally asked.

  Bristol hesitated. If she answered his question honestly, there would be no going back.

  “Yes,” she admitted quietly. “This is the first time I’ve been allowed off the property since my father murdered my mother.”

  “Murdered her?” Something told Bristol that very little caught Nick off guard, but he looked genuinely stunned right then. He set his uneaten taco on the colorful plate in front of him and turned to face her, swinging one leg over the bench so he was straddling it. “Tell me everything.”

  She considered giving him the abridged version, but then changed her mind. “I knew there was something wrong the day I got back from college. My parents had a welcome-home party for me, but the tension was so thick between them that I could barely breathe. I only found out later from Isabella that it was because my mother had just discovered my father was a major player in the Amador cartel.”

  Nick frowned. “How was it possible for your mother not to know?”

  She moved the small pile of corn salad around with her fork on her plate, not looking at him. “Believe me, I’ve been asking myself the same question a dozen times a day over the past year. Maybe love really is blind.”

  When Nick didn’t say anything, she sighed. Setting her fork down, she shifted on the seat, sitting cross-legged on the bench so she could look at him.

  “Regardless, they had a huge fight. My father told my mother he’d get out of the cartel and we’d all move somewhere far away from here. It was a lie, of course. He never had any intention of leaving.”

  “So, he killed her,” Nick said.

  “Yes. But not because she pushed him to leave the cartel.”

  Bristol told Nick about Leon kissing her and how he’d punched her after she rebuffed him. Nick’s face darkened with anger, but he didn’t interrupt. When she got to the part about her mother disappearing, tears filled her eyes.

  “What happened?” Nick prompted as her voice trailed off.

  “She never came back,” Bristol whispered, remembering how frantic she’d been. She’d sat in her room beside her packed suitcase for hours, thinking the worst. But even she hadn’t imagined something so heinous.

  She was so caught up in those painful memories she barely realized Nick had taken her hands in his. It felt good…and somehow made it easier to tell the rest of the story.

  “I know in my heart that my father ordered Leon to kill my mother. For no other reason than because she was going to leave him…and take me with her. Not because he loves us, but because he isn’t the kind of man who lets anyone walk away from him.”

  Nick rubbed his thumb along the back of her hand. “I know it’s a lame thing to say and won’t do anything to make you feel better, but I’m truly sorry about your mother.”

  She nodded. “Thank you.”

  “What did you do after you found out about your mother?” he asked.

  “I tried to leave, but without money and my US passport I couldn’t get on a plane or even across the border. Leon tracked down the bus I was on anyway. He dragged me home and threatened to beat me to death if I ever tried it again. Not that it mattered because my father’s guards didn’t let me out of their sight for months.”

  It was only recently that they’d stopped following her around inside the villa. Unfortunately, they still patrolled the property.

  Nick muttered something under his breath she didn’t catch. “What about the police?”

  “I called them and found out that my father owns this city, or at least the cops in it.”

  “Of course he does,” Nick said. “What happened?”

  “Not much,” she admitted. “Two detectives showed up at the villa and told my father everything I’d said. Then they laughed and told him that he needed to keep me under control. They treated my mother’s death like a joke. Since I have dual citizenship, I thought about calling my family in Connecticut and asking them to get the American embassy involved, but after the cops left my father made sure I didn’t have access to a phone or a computer.”

  “What about Isabella? Surely she would have called for you.”

  Bristol gave him a sad smile. “I know she would have. But I’m afraid of what my father would do to her if she did.”

  Nick scowled but didn’t say anything, and she wished she could figure out what was thinking. But his dark eyes betrayed nothing.

  She still wasn’t sure why she’d opened up to Nick. Or what he might do with the information she’d just given him. She had an overwhelming urge to trust him, but what if he did what the police had done and went straight to her father with everything she’d told him?

  Would it really matter if he did? With any luck she’d be far away from here by tonight. If she couldn’t get to the American embassy then she’d pay a coyote to smuggle her across the border.

  “What if I said I could help you?” Nick asked suddenly.

  Her breath caught, but she refused to let herself hope. “What do you mean?”

  Nick glanced out at the yacht anchored off the beach before turning back to her, his dark eyes searching hers, mesmerizing and calculating at the same time. “I can’t go into details, but I promise I’m going to make sure your father pays for what he did to your mother. Th
en I’m going to kick Leon’s ass for what he did to you.” He brushed her windswept hair back from her face. “You’re never going to be anyone’s prisoner ever again, you have my word on that.”

  Bristol’s heart beat a little faster. Against all expectations, she found herself believing for the first time in a year that there might truly be a way out of this nightmare. But then a little voice of doubt began murmuring in the back of her mind, telling her this was too good to be true.

  “Why would you go against a man like my father and risk everything for a woman you met two days ago?”

  He cupped her face gently in his hand. “Because something tells me you’re worth the risk. Even if that means going up against a man like your father.”

  The words were plain and straightforward, but she was starting to get the feeling that plain and straightforward pretty much described Nick Chapman. And she believed every word he said.

  She abruptly remembered her tote beside them. When she’d left the villa a few hours ago she’d been ready to do whatever it took to be free of her father, including swimming all the way to the United States if she had to. But Nick had given her another option.

  She opened her mouth the thank him, but then decided to show him how grateful she was instead.

  When their lips came together, she felt a little tingle zip through her unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Then Nick buried his fingers in her hair and tugged her close, making several other parts of her body hum. His tongue teased its way into her mouth and she let out a little sound of pleasure at how good he tasted. Or maybe he was the one who moaned. She wasn’t quite sure.

  Bristol had kissed guys in high school and college. She’d even had a steady boyfriend her junior year up in Connecticut. But as she plunged her tongue deeper into Nick’s mouth, tangling, teasing, and tasting, she realized she hadn’t ever been kissed like this.

  She didn’t know when her hands had climbed up his broad shoulders and locked behind his strong neck, keeping him exactly where she wanted him. But they were there now and they knew exactly what they were doing. Nick’s free hand glided along her bare thigh, sliding underneath the cover-up she wore to settle on her hip. Heat pooled between her legs, and she suddenly wanted to do far more than simply kiss him. She wanted to make love to him right there in the gazebo.

  She trailed one hand down his chest and over his rock-hard abs with every intention of heading further south when Nick pulled away with a groan. She started to tug him in for another kiss when the ocean breeze carried laughter from the yacht in their direction.

  She stiffened.

  Crap. There was a whole boat full of her father’s guards watching her and Nick. How could she have forgotten that?

  Nick cursed under his breath, glancing at the yacht. “I wondered why your father sent so many guards with us. Now I realize it was so they could spy for him. No doubt he’ll think this means I’m leaning toward taking that job he’s offering me.” He turned to look at her again, his dark eyes intense. “Your father would be right. But only so I can take him down.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  WHEN I SUGGESTED you should find a girlfriend, I didn’t mean the daughter of the drug cartel boss we’re trying to send to prison,” Dalton murmured as Nash opened up another box of ammunition and dug through it.

  Nash glanced at Munoz and his men standing behind the firing line of the cartel boss’s personal gun range to make sure they hadn’t heard what Dalton said. But they were a few hundred feet away and much more interested in the new Russian automatic weapons they were going to get to play with. The jackasses were acting like it was Christmas in July.

  The range complex was a few miles from the main compound, and though it was large enough to fire almost any weapon anyone might want as well as house several bunkers to store all those weapons and their ammunition—as well as explosives—it wasn’t very secure. All it had was a simple gate with one guard.

  Nash slipped a handful of short, round, fragmentation cartridges into the pockets of his tactical vest. “It’s a little late to point that out since I’m already in a committed relationship with Bristol.”

  Dalton gaped at him. “Committed relationship. Are you mental? You just met two days ago. People don’t fall in love in two days. At least not outside a romance book with heaving bosoms and Scottish men in kilts on the covers.”

  Nash stared at his best friend, not sure if he really wanted to know how the hell Dalton knew what they did in romance books. On second thought, he didn’t want to know.

  “I’m joking,” he said.

  Dalton lifted a brow as if to say he didn’t quite believe that.

  Nash sighed. “Look, I’m just trying to help Bristol. Munoz already murdered her mother. He wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to her.”

  His friend gave him an appraising look. “So, that’s what the kiss on the beach was about, you trying to help Bristol. Funny, because it sure looked like you were enjoying it to me.”

  Nash couldn’t stop the grin tugging at the corner of his mouth as he remembered the kiss he and Bristol had shared yesterday. Simply put, it had been amazing.

  “I knew it,” Dalton muttered. “You do have a thing for her.”

  Nash grabbed another box of ammunition. Munoz had enough of the stuff to outfit a small army. Or start World War III.

  “Okay, maybe I do,” Nash admitted. “Bristol is a very beautiful woman.”

  “And what?” Dalton asked scornfully. “You think this thing between you and her is going to turn into something? That Bristol is going to jump into your bed when she discovers you’re not Nick Chapman, that you don’t really live in Europe, and that everything else you’ve told her is a lie?”

  Nash scowled. “I don’t know and to tell the truth, I haven’t thought that far. I’m doing what seems right at the moment and seeing where it leads me.

  Shaking his head, Dalton reached in the open ammo box and pulled out a few more of the 40mm grenades for the weapons demonstration Nash was about to put on for Munoz’s men. “You really like her, don’t you? You’re hoping this thing with her works out.”

  There was no point in lying. “Yeah, I guess so. That said, I can’t see this ending well, no matter how much I like Bristol.”

  “That’s too bad,” Dalton said. “Since she’s probably the only woman who’s ever going to kiss you without you paying them”

  Nash flipped his friend the bird. “Enough about me and my so-called committed relationship. What have you been up to since yesterday? Roman and I stopped by your room last night but you weren’t there.”

  Dalton fell into step beside him as he turned and headed toward the group of men waiting for the demonstration to start. “I went into town with some of the guards.”

  Nash did a double take. “You’re getting all buddy-buddy with them now?”

  His friend shrugged. “We all understand what it’s like working for rich jackasses who don’t appreciate us. We spent hours yesterday talking trash about you and Munoz while you were eating lunch on the beach and making out with the boss’s daughter. You get a few drinks into these guys and it’s amazing what kind of shit they’ll slip up and tell you.”

  Nash stopped walking to look at Dalton. He wanted to ask what kind of crap his friend had said about him to Munoz’s men because a few of them were looking at him funny this morning, but that would have to wait until later. Right now, he was more interested in what Munoz’s goons had to say. “Like what?”

  “Well, for one thing, all of his guys are pretty sure Munoz is preparing to make a major move up the cartel food chain. He might have money falling out his wazoo, but it turns out he’s rather low down the ladder when it comes to real power in the organization. The other Amador bosses humor him because he controls the shipping fleets that move their drugs in and out of this part of the world, but they don’t pay any attention when he makes suggestions about how they could improve their business model or branch out into other criminal activities.”

&n
bsp; Nash chuckled. “That must frost his nads.”

  “Which is why he’s going to do something about it. He’s been stockpiling weapons for nearly a year now, as well as making deals with the local cops, the Federales, and the Mexican Army. His men think he’s going to war with several of the bosses. Maybe all the way up to Amador.”

  Damn. Nash couldn’t imagine trying to make a move that aggressive against a crime syndicate as spread out as the Amador cartel. There was no way they wouldn’t see it coming.

  “Have you told Roman or the other guys about this?”

  Dalton shook his head. “Nah. I don’t trust those guys as far as I can throw them. Let them figure it out on their own. They’re supposed to be the spies here, not us.”

  Nash couldn’t necessarily disagree with that. Since they’d gotten here, Roman, Shaw, and Santiago hadn’t done much of anything but sit around with Munoz and drink beer. If they were close to figuring out what Munoz was up to, or who the Russian arms dealer was, they’d never mentioned it to him and Dalton.

  He began heading toward the firing line, then stopped to face Dalton again. “You said you were talking trash about me with the other guards. Is that why so many of them are looking at me sideways this morning?”

  “Probably.”

  Nash resisted the urge to punch his friend. “So, what exactly did you say?”

  Dalton shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal, but the grin on his face gave him away. “I might have mentioned that you’re hoping to marry your way into the cartel since there’s no chance of you getting there purely on your own abilities. I made sure everyone knew it’s not your fault you’re lacking a little testosterone since you lost your balls in a freak farming accident a few years ago and all.”