Page 49 of The Last Promise You Made

She flushed, burying her face in the toy’s fur once more.

When Ryder came back, he had an Eastern Dude Ranchers’ Association magazine in his hand. On the cover was a tan cowboy boot that someone had filled with flowers. Attached to the boot was a bright silver spur, the edges sharp and spiky.

“Did his shoes have something like this on them?” he asked. Addy saw the spur he was pointing to and shuddered. She bobbed her head yes.

“Some cowboys use them to help guide their horses. I’ve never liked spurs much, but they don’t have to hurt the animals. They can, but they don’t have to.”

Addy didn’t say anything else. She turned back to the bed and sat down, rubbing her hand along the fuzzy blanket while the other hand clung to the stuffed cat. Ryder’s gaze locked with mine. His were sad and frustrated, but excitement surged through me. These were new clues, a step in the right direction, especially if we could get a decent image of the perpetrator.

I’d download the app we used to help witnesses with sketches. I wasn’t as good at using it as the people who’d been trained on it were, but I didn’t think Addy would talk to anyone but Ryder or me. She was barely doing that as it was. Plus, the cowboy boot and spurs led me back to the original reason I’d been pretending to write about the dude ranches to begin with—the chemicals attached to the cattle feed found on the drugs and money in the bust we’d made in Lexington.

“I need to make a few calls and see if I can get my hands on the program for us to build our avatar,” I said to Addy and Ryder. Neither of them said anything, and I hurried from the room. A part of me hated leaving the little cloud of joy we’d been wrapped in for a few moments, and a part of me was elated to have some new leads.

Hope rushed through me. Maybe this time, we really would bring the Lovatos down.

Chapter Fifteen

Emiliano

ONE DOWN

Performed by The Trishas

I swirled the dark whiskey around in the crystal glass. The color reminded me of Natalia’s eyes. My eyes. Our mother’s eyes. I was equal parts furious and impressed. Not only had she encrypted the device in a way that would be nearly impossible for even me to break without the key, but she’d had a child and kept it from me for years. Two points, Natalia.

Except, she should have known better than to play these kinds of games with me. I didn’t lose. Ever. I’d already peeled back several of her hidden layers, retracing her footsteps, and revisiting every location I knew she’d lived since I’d brought her back into the fold. The reports my men had gathered after interviewing people in those locations had allowed me to assemble an approximate age and description of the child—a little girl between six and seven years old.

That had been enough for me to know the truth.

It was his. The man she’d nearly given everything up for. The man she’d abandoned me for.

The man I’d promised her I wouldn’t touch as long as she stayed where she belonged. With me. With our family.

All promises were off. He was now forfeit.

But for the first time in my life, I regretted slicing someone’s throat. The idiot who’d killed Natalia had to have seen something and not understood it. He’d sworn no one had seen him, so where had the child been? Hiding? Or had Natalia left her with someone? Who? Because I knew for a fact the child hadn’t spent all these years with the Tennessee rancher.

I shouldn’t have allowed her the little cat-and-mouse game she’d thought she’d been playing with me. It had seemed like such a small concession. A gift I’d granted the sister I’d spent an entire childhood protecting. I’d allowed her to do her job from wherever she wished to save her the pain of reliving our childhood. I hadn’t cared if she did her work from Colombia or the Caymans or Montana, as long as she did it. But she’d taken my gift and abused it. She’d made a fool of me.

If any of my other employees had done the same, they’d be dead.

And now she was.

I was still furious that it hadn’t been at my own hand. No one had a right to kill my family except me. They were mine to do with as I wanted.

The liquid in the glass taunted me, seeming to reflect the terrified betrayal I’d last seen in Natalia’s eyes. Except, she’d been the one to betray me. To leave me. After all the times I’d protected her, she’d run instead of thanking me for putting an end to decades of abuse.

My hand tightened on the crystal. If I had less control, I’d toss the glass into the fireplace, just to see it shatter. To see the flames flicker with the added fuel.

Instead, I set the glass down slowly, purposefully.

If the child was his, then perhaps that was where I needed to look for her.

Perhaps the child had the key.

That brought a lightness to my heart. I’d take the girl and make her mine. I’d make Natalia’s daughter love me. She’d adore me. She’d never betray me like her mother had. Pleasure coursed through me at those thoughts. My sister could toss and turn and burn in her grave, watching from beyond the veil as I turned her daughter against her. As I made her my own.

Chapter Sixteen

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