Page 20 of Cartel Devil

“Joaquin, Tricia’s into you. Why didn’t you talk to her tonight?”

“I didn’t have an opportunity to.”

I shrug and hope she takes the hint. She does not.

“I heard she offered to bring you cupcakes.”

I stare at my newest cousin and debate my answer. I know she means well, so I keep reminding myself of that.

“Only because she felt obligated to do something.”

Toria shakes her head. “No. Tricia has plenty of obligations, but that wasn’t one. She’s like Sera. She might not be a gifted baker, but she’s still amazing at it. She cooks better than anyone I know. She shows appreciation and affection with food. She’s more Italian than I am when it comes to that.”

I try not to scoff at the idea of her showing me any affection when she planned to sneak away. And appreciation? Yeah, I was a good lay. But not so good that she wanted to see me in the light of day. Not that morning and not this evening. She couldn’t have looked less enthused, even if she were having a root canal.

“Why didn’t you make a move, Joaquin?”

I stare at Toria because I don’t want to tell the truth. I may be a seniormost member of the most powerful Cartel in the world, but I can admit when I’m afraid. I don’t see it as a weakness. At least, not usually. But I’d rather be the one having a root canal than admit just how scared I am that she’ll reject me again.

“Do you expect her to make the first move?”

I dart my gaze to Alejandro over Toria’s head, praying he’ll intervene and get his wife to back off. But he looks as curious as she does. He’s letting her do his dirty work.

“I’m a modern man. She could.”

I practically sigh as we walk through their property’s gate. Even though this is a gated community, every syndicate home has a fence and gate. Some were there when the couples bought the home while others had them installed. If anyone in the neighborhood didn’t know it was syndicate Switzerland with all the who’s who of the underworld living here, the gates and armed guards give it away.

“Find your huevos, primo, before you miss your chance.” Alejandro turns toward me when he realizes I’m not walking past my car.

“I’ll take that under advisement.”

I don’t mind Key Largo, but I’d rather be here for vacation than business. I listen to Javier as he negotiates with a Jamaican “farmer.” That’s what the man calls himself since he grows some coffee. Take one look at him, and no one believes that’s his only crop. He doesn’t look like he’s spent a single day working in a field. The man’s real crop is far more profitable than that. So much so that he has more than a hundred field hands picking his real product and about two dozen picking coffee beans.

“Your promises mean shit if you can’t get the shipment to us. You promised to transport it. If we have to step in with our ships, fuel, and men, then we’re taking thirty percent off the gross.”

“That’s insane.”

I cock an eyebrow, cross my arms, and lean forward. Jorge does the same thing at the same time. He sits to Javier’s left, and I sit to our middle brother’s right. Javier sits back, his fingers steepled with his elbows on his chair’s armrests.

“You signed a contract and are in breach.”

“What’re you going to do? Take me to court?” The man mocks Javier’s observation.

“I will. You must not have read the contract I drafted closely. This isn’t my first rodeo, and you aren’t the first pile of shit I’ve stepped around to get the prize. I’ll sue for your entire coffee enterprise, which is what the contract says my family buys. You’ll pay damages that’ll wipe out any chance you have to invest in more cannabis, which wouldn’t matter anyway once I make sure no one’ll buy from you. When you inevitably default, I’ll make sure the government seizes your property to pay your debt. I’ll buy it out from under you when it goes to auction. Your government’s too corrupt to burn your crops, so when they seize those, I’ll grease some palms to get those too. Or you can get the shipments to us on time.”

My brother’s an attorney no one wants to meet in court or sit across from at a conference table. He simply doesn’t like people, so he has no shits to give when someone wants to be difficult. He’ll give someone one chance to fix their shit. If they don’t, then he takes them for everything they have. He writes contracts like no one else I’ve ever met. He’s a master of loopholes and nooses.

“It’s not my fault your Coast Guard keeps intercepting them. We’ve varied our routes and times, Javier, but they keep finding us.”

Of course, they do. We tell them where. They grab the product we paid them to seize, then we charge our partners penalties for not fulfilling their end of the deal. The breach of contract penalty is way more than what we pay for the theft, so we still profit. Then we turn around and sell the product for an insane markup because we can.

We have a captain who runs interdiction missions on our payroll. The guy’s on all Four Families’ payroll, so no one is naïve enough to think he’s loyal. We all know he sells each family’s “secrets,” but as long as he keeps his business to the Four Families and not any of our outside rivals, we let him live. It’s not like we don’t already know each other’s business since we hack each other all the time. But when someone draws in our lesser rivals and tries to give them a leg up, none of us stay so laid back.

Javier gestures to me, then Jorge. “My brothers are far more patient than I am. Be glad I’m not here alone. But even they have their limits.”

That’s the signal for the three of us to stand. We’re intimidating on our own, but when we’re together—very few people want to take on three men who’re each nearly six-four and two-twenty with six percent body fat. That’s not a skinny six percent either. That’s two workouts a day, five-minute miles for at least six miles, and benching three hundred. We’re big guys.

The Jamaican looks like he’s ready to piss himself. We were already sitting when he arrived. Same as our first meeting. We didn’t stand up for him—we only stand for our mother, tías, and tíos—so he didn’t realize what he sat across from.