Page 1 of Hidden But Not Safe

Chapter 1

Naz stared at the woman’s feet. They were bare and dirty and a little bloody, but also dainty and highly arched. Those feet didn’t belong in an old, abandoned recycling warehouse. This place was dangerous, even when it wasn’t being used by the cartel. Old chains and pieces of metal and bits of glass were scattered over the concrete. He couldn’t help but worry about her feet, even if they were already bloody.

He knew what it was like to not own any shoes.

“Ignacio, check out this puta,” Miguel said with an elbow to his side.

Naz never understood why Miguel chose him to bitch at. It wasn’t like Naz was going to answer.

His gaze rose reluctantly up her body, taking in the greenish bruise on her bared thigh and the shortest shorts he’d ever seen. There was more discoloration at the edge of her exposed stomach; the bruises disappeared behind the flannel overshirt that was a little too tight even without the dealer’s hard grip on her arm. The deep cut of her shirt showed off the bronzed slope of her breasts, which he skipped over quickly, focusing instead on her face. Her lips seemed to tremble before they lifted into a smile. That smile fed into her eyes, which were a hypnotizing amber, like a cat’s eyes, and just as calculating.

She made Naz nervous. His hand twitched at his side.

None of the dealers had ever dared to bring their women with them before. Distributing fentanyl-laced drugs was a careful business, and this woman didn’t look like she knew what careful was, especially when she opened her mouth.

“You never said they’d be such hotties.” She tried and failed to jerk her arm free from the dealer’s bruising hold. “I wouldn’t mind having a taste.”

The dealer dragged her closer. “Shut your mouth,” he hissed at her.

Miguel exhaled in a groan next to Naz. “Look at that mouth,” he muttered, making Naz even twitchier.

He edged back a step to make sure the few men the dealer had brought with him were in sight. There was only one reason a dealer would have brought someone so distracting to this meeting, and he wasn’t going to let it work. He had to stay focused. That was what he got paid for.

Julio Guzman, the cartel’s nepo baby currently in charge, saw through the distraction as well. He crossed his arms as he stared down the dealer.

“Explain,” Julio said. The word wasn’t a shout—shouting would make him look like a pussy—but his tone held an edge.

The dealer’s grip on the woman tightened even more. He licked his lips nervously. “Sorry, Julio. I didn’t have a choice.”

José, another man from the crew Naz had been running with lately, snorted. He was the youngest, a year younger than Naz’s twenty-two, but with a lot more nerves.

There were six guys in Julio’s crew, including himself. Besides Julio, José, and Miguel, there was also Rocks, a big bruiser of muscle positioned near the entrance, and their newest addition, Seb, who was often silent like Naz, though for different reasons.

Seb was cold and calculating; his lip was curling even now.

Naz couldn’t physically speak. Well, he could, if he concentrated hard enough and was calm about it, but his voice would still sound like crap after all the effort it took. He’d learned to keep silent. Besides, there was nothing about the dispensing of drugs that had kept him calm lately. The cartel had dissolved into a shit show in recent months, with a couple of the front-runners getting arrested because they were idiots.

Naz was beginning to wish he had skills to sell other than being the cartel’s muscle, though he should have been grateful for even that job, given the way he was.

He could take on the dealer and his men, but the woman was an unknown. She seemed to be young, too, likely not even twenty yet.

The flickering in those amber eyes showed her nerves, like she was aware that being surrounded by ten men might not be the best situation.

“Fucking sorry, are you?” She flipped the dark tail of her hair behind her shoulder with her free hand. “Don’t lie. You wanted me here.”

The dealer released her arm, only to backhand her to the ground. “Shut the fuck up, Meg!”

She hit the floor with a thud, then lay still as she sucked in air.

“Enough,” Julio muttered, his eyes shifting from her prone form back to the dealer. “We don’t have time for this mess. You get nothing this week.”

Frustration sharpened the dealer’s face. “Please, Julio! I’ve got buyers already panting for your shit. I can make you money. You can even have the whole cut this week.”

Julio’s eyes narrowed. “You think you can pay me off?”

“No!” The dealer’s eyes shifted around him, as if he were seeing Naz and the others for the first time. “Tell me how to make this right. I’ll do whatever you say.”

Julio preened under the man’s desperation. His gaze shifted back to the distraction on the ground. “Maybe I should fuck your woman in front of you. That’s why you brought her, isn’t it?”

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