Page 25 of The Devils' Darling

Shit. I glance at my watch, then I message Tino.

The reply takes a moment but then flashes onto my phone.

Thank fuck.

We will need weapons when they get here. Plenty of them.

We’re going to war.

Chapter 9

Tino

The men my father has sent me include two of his highest-ranking soldiers, Leon and Diego. Leon in particular is as deadly a motherfucker as I’ve ever met.

He looks at me, taking me in. “Good to see you, Mr. Martinez.” He extends his hand to shake mine, his grip firm. “Your father says there’s a situation here needs handling.”

“Yes, someone has something of mine. I want to get her back.”

“Her?” Diego’s face splits into a wide grin. “You found yourself a woman?”

“Yes, I did.” I don’t tell them I share that woman with two other men. In my culture, that’s a hanging offense. They’d as likely kill me as they would Stepanov and his men.

“Well, well, well, maybe there will be a wedding soon.”

His words hit me deep. There won’t be a wedding because how can she marry only one of us? I’d love to marry her and make her truly mine—to call her my wife—but she’s not mine, she’s ours, and there’s no law where we can all marry her.

I glance over at the rest of the men. Seven of them, all of fighting age. I grin when they unload the crates from the back of the private plane. This is a rarely used airstrip, and my father said he’d been given the promise of people looking the other way while we unloaded.

“There are some gifts from your father.” Diego points to the crates. “He organized some vehicles, too, for us to transport these in.”

“Let me guess, less cigars and brandy, and more guns and grenades?” I laugh, despite the situation.

“You guessed right.”

I don’t like my father. I’m not sure I ever will, but right now, in this moment, I’m fucking grateful to him.

As the men load up the two Land Rovers that are waiting courtesy of my father, engines idling, I glance around me, making sure no one is watching.

Then I place a call.

Dom answers immediately. “Yeah?”

“You’re going to need to give your dad a head’s up. We’re coming in heavy. I need waving through security. We have a lot of weapons. Is he going to allow that?”

Nataniele would never allow anyone else onto his grounds armed to the teeth this way. By letting me in with these men and the weapons they’ve brought, he potentially puts himself and the school in harm’s way. It means he trusts me.

I’ve basically got my own small militia unit now.

The power sends a tingling thrill down my spine. One day, everything my father owns will be mine. Not merely wealth, but enough men and firepower to take over a small nation. That’s why my father never moved to America, and never let my mother take me and my sister back to her birth nation. Once you live here, you must start playing by their rules.

Nataniele’s power is as much soft power as it is hard. It’s as dependent on having the right senator in your pocket, and the right police chief reporting to you, as it is on the number of armed men working for you. I don’t have the time or inclination for the schmoozing that entails.

This is how my family does things.

We kick down doors and go in guns blazing.

---