Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 77126 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77126 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
“Hell, I don’t know. His setup is every bit as good as your grandfather’s.”
I hold back a wince at his use of the word grandfather.
Elmo doesn’t know. No one knows.
“What is it that you need?” I ask Daniela.
“I don’t want to marry that old man.”
I nod slowly. “I hear you. I don’t want to marry the person I’m supposed to marry either.”
“My father…” She bites her lip. “He said he’d give me to you.”
I nearly fall off my feet. “You just told me you were promised to Vega. Your father knows damned well that I’m already promised too.”
“He said he’d make it part of the deal. Part of the deal with your grandfather. He would marry me to you if I could get you to ask for my hand.”
“I’m twice your age, Daniela.” And I’m desperately in love with someone else, though I have a feeling her father already knows that. He’d be a fool not to know everything there is to know about me.
“I want to go to the States,” she says.
“There are plenty of ways to go to the States,” I say. “Get a student visa. You seem very intelligent. I’m sure you could get into one of the many schools that have openings for international students.”
She shakes her head with a huff. “You think he’d let me go to school?”
“You’re not in school now?”
She frowns. “I have private tutors. This is my last year. If this doesn’t work, I’m going to be forced to marry that old man. Vega.” She tugs on my arm. “Please. It’s my only chance to get out of here. We could get an annulment once I’m in the US. You don’t even have to sleep with me if you don’t want to. I don’t care about any of that. I just want to get out of here. I want to go to the US and pursue my dream. I can’t marry Señor Vega. I just can’t.”
“You’d rather marry me?” I shake my head. “I’m not available. And I’ll never love you.”
“At least you’re handsome. Tall. I only see a few gray hairs at your temple.”
“And what will he offer me,” I ask, “if I take you off his hands?”
“I doubt it will change any deal you’re making with him,” she says. “This is for me. To get me out of marrying Vega.”
“And you think this man loves you?” I scoff. “I’m disgusted by what fathers do to their daughters in this world.”
“In his way.” She looks down. “He doesn’t touch me.”
“But he lets other men touch you.”
She nods, biting her lip. “Yes. But no one has ever been abusive.”
I lift my eyebrows.
“All right. Not horribly abusive.” She swallows. “Maybe I’ve been slapped around a little here and there.”
“Is the slapping consensual?”
She shakes her head slowly.
“Then that’s abusive, Daniela.” I pace around her, shaking my head. “It makes me sick how people like you have been raised to not even recognize abuse when it’s happening to you. Just him letting other men have you is abuse. It’s sure not love.”
“Do you? Do you know what real love is, Señor Gallo?”
I don’t answer.
She can probably see it written all over my face anyway. Because I do know what real love is. I know what it feels like to love a person so much that it hurts, to love a person so much that you’ll leave her to keep her safe.
To love a person so much that you’ll kill for her.
I sigh.
Fuck.
Am I actually considering this? A marriage in name only, just to get her out of here. Away from her father. Away from the men he forces her to service.
I don’t know what the marriage laws are in Colombia, but with her father’s permission, we could probably tie the knot here. I could take her home, get the marriage annulled, and once she’s eighteen, she can apply for legal status.
I don’t want to marry her. There’s only one woman I want to marry, and I can’t have her.
But if we can strike a deal with Agudelo, get Mario involved, break my engagement to Belinda…
Will Raven understand?
Then I nearly laugh at the absurdity of the thought.
I left Raven. I left her for her own good. I can’t be with her, so it really doesn’t matter who I marry.
All that matters is that I take down my family. Put an end to this legacy built on blood and money.
If I can help Daniela in the process, I should do so.
Just as I’ll help Belinda if I can. Get her removed from her father’s home.
But would that be a disservice? That little girl has everything. What if she got stuck in some foster home where she’s mistreated, perhaps hurt in a more horrific way? Or worse, stuck in a group home where she gets no attention at all?