Salvador hadn’t even raped me aside from the first day or two that I had arrived back. I felt like that was purely to assert his dominance, especially after he saw Javier’s brand on my back. He wanted to make sure that I belonged to him again. But to my surprise, the sexual attacks stopped soon after.

It was nothing to be relieved about. Salvador’s big thing now was to torture me in other ways. I was no longer his wife that he could have every which way he wanted. He no longer wanted me. So I was treated like an informant, like a spy, like a hostage. I was locked up in the bathroom somewhere in his house and he would visit me … sometimes once a day, sometimes twice, sometimes once every couple of days, all his ways of keeping me in suspense.

Too bad I had become too numb inside to even care anymore.

The first week, he removed the nails from my pinky toes. While one of his men held me down, he slowly ripped the toenails straight out. I prided myself on not passing out, but boy did I scream. It was just what he wanted. After that, I did my best not to make a sound. I was able to make it through the Tasers, being the old pro that I was already, but when it came to the hot irons he applied against my stomach, well that I could never keep inside.

And while I was able to take the beatings quite well, the other day he took a hammer to my finger. He seemed extra angry, muttering something about my choice in hired help, and I was punished accordingly. I screamed more after he left, when I attempted to bandage my broken index finger to my middle one using a toilet paper roll and strips of the shower curtain I had painstakingly ripped off.

Now I was lying on the cold tiles of the floor, wondering if the end was coming or if the helicopters were only going to bring me more pain. I didn’t even have the strength to crawl over to the door and see if I could hear anything.

Not that I needed to. Soon the air was filled with the sound of gunfire coming in all directions. People were no doubt dying. I wanted to smile at that. I wanted the whole world to burn.

I closed my eyes again and lay down my head, envisioning the madness that was going on outside, pretending that the good guys had come—whoever they were—and that Salvador would be caught in the crossfire. I hoped he’d die feeling like a fool.

Minutes passed and more helicopters sounded. More gunfire followed. I wondered what would happen if someone found me. Would they mistake me for being part of the cartel and shoot me on sight? Would they show me mercy? Or did the world hold worse things for me? It didn’t seem possible.

Eventually I heard quiet footsteps on the floor outside, and when I opened my eyes, I could see a pair of boots underneath the doorframe, waiting on the other side.

I started smiling before I even knew why.

The door was suddenly kicked open, narrowly missing my face, and I followed the boots up to see a pair of golden eyes staring down at me. Waves of pain and relief swirled in them with startling clarity.

“Luisa,” Javier whispered, immediately dropping down to his knees. He looked completely beside himself as his eyes searched my body up and down. He touched my face and I closed my eyes, leaning into the warmth of his palm. He was here. He had come. My beautiful, ruthless king.

“Luisa,” he said, gently running his other hand down my side, feeling carefully for anything broken. “Stay with me, darling. I’m getting you out of here. Can you walk?”

I nodded. “I think so,” I said, my voice so painfully raw.

He looked at my broken finger, at my toes, at the wounds in my arms and legs from the Taser, at the bruises on my face. The more he searched me over, the more broken he looked. I couldn’t let him lose it if I hadn’t yet. Now was not the time.

“I’ll be fine,” I said, trying to get to my feet.

He gripped me by my arms and carefully pulled me up. I wobbled a bit on my feet, dizzy from the lack of food, and fell into his chest. He immediately wrapped his arms around me and held me tight. It took everything I had not to break down crying.

He kissed the top of my head. “I should have never let you leave.”

“I never should have left,” I said softly. I had regretted it the moment I stepped into the house, the moment I realized that Salvador would probably have my parents killed anyway. For once, I hated how selfless I had been.

“I’m going to kill him,” he growled, and I could feel the anger and tension starting to roll through him. “I want to kill him more than I’ve ever wanted to kill anyone. I want to do everything he did to you to him, but worse. I want him gone.” He sighed in frustration. “But I made a promise not to.”

That surprised me. “To whom?”

“The DEA,” he said. “They’re the ones who got me in.”

“You made another deal with the Americans?”

He pulled away and stared at me intensely. I had missed his eyes so much, the power inside them, the passion and strength. “I would do anything to get you back. And I did.”

“But your cartel,” I started.

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. None of that matters. Only you matter, Luisa, only you.” In the distance, the gunfire reigned. He paused. “But it will all be in vain if I don’t get you out of here. I’d tell you I need you to be strong, but I can tell you already are.”

I managed a smile, refusing to let fear enter my veins anymore. I wouldn’t fear with him by my side. We would make the world pay.

“Give me one of your guns,” I said, holding out my good hand, which was thankfully my right one.

He grinned at me and reached into his boot, pulling out a handgun and placing it in my hand. “Try not to shoot the guys with DEA on their backs. We might get in trouble.”

“Save that for another time?” I said, not really joking either.

He planted a hard kiss on my forehead. “Goddamn it, you’re perfect.”

He led me out of the bathroom and into the adjoining guest bedroom. We were almost out in the hall when one of Salvador’s guards appeared.

Javier pulled me down and shot the man just as another guard appeared. From my position on the ground, I somehow managed to aim the barrel and pull the trigger.

I hit the second man right in the chest, and he stumbled backward against the wall before toppling over on his fallen comrade.

My heart galloped wildly, loudly, and it felt hard to breathe.

I had just killed a man.

Me.

Just like that.

Javier looked down at me in awe before helping me to my feet.

“How did that feel?” he asked in amazement, peering at me closely.

My breathing had returned to normal and the adrenaline was starting to coax through my veins. My flesh tingled all over. I swallowed as I looked at him, sharing his wonder.

“It felt good,” I told him honestly and not feeling the tiniest bit ashamed. “Almost like sex.”

He shook his head, his nostrils flaring. “Stop that,” he said gruffly. “I almost came just from seeing you pull the trigger.”

He brought me to the hall, and after checking both ends, we ran down it, heading away from the gunfire that now sounded like it was coming from the foyer. He darted into the room of David, Salvador’s asshole assistant, and I could see where he’d already come in. The French door and the table on the balcony were already smashed, David’s dead body lying amidst the damage.

I spit on his body as we stepped over the corpse and onto the balcony. In the distance a helicopter was flying and I could see a few of them on the lawn. The grass was littered with bodies, most of them Salvador’s men. Bullets still ripped through the air, though I couldn’t see the combat.

“We’ll go on the roof,” Javier told me, staring up at it. “That way one of the helicopters can pick us up and we’ll be safer. We can see anyone coming from below and we’ll pick them off.”

If we stood on the edge of the balcony’s railing, there was a small overhang that would be easy to climb up on, at least for him. Escape was so near.