Page 7 of Until Retribution Burns (Beauty in Lies 3)

"What was he doing in Chicago?" I asked, watching as my uncle shook his head.

"He spent a great deal of time there or in Russia during the summers when you were with us. I'm sure you can imagine what he and Kuznetsov and Bellandi did with their time," he sighed, turning his eyes to look out the window. The lights on the back patio shone in the darkness, illuminating the path all the way down to the docks where the yacht waited to take Isa and me home. "The three men were inseparable, with Origen Regas clinging to them like the sycophant he was and just hoping to get in on the action. Much like the way Calix clung to you after he and his father came to stay onEl Infierno."

"Calix is anything but a sycophant," I scoffed, not giving the time to defend him. Calix had found his place in life, and it had nothing to do with who his father was.

Exactly the way he would have wanted it.

"Is there anyone who is alive who would know why?” I asked, shifting Isa off my lap so I could stand up and pace. I knew of one man who could give me the answers I needed.

Unfortunately, I doubted my killing two of his sons had put him in a talkative mood.

My uncle stood, grabbing his cell phone off the island in the kitchen and stepping back toward me. "Aside from Pavel?" He laughed bitterly. "There's Samuel Suarez. He's your best hope," he said, waiting for my confirmation as he brought up the old man's contact information.

I nodded. The information wouldn't come cheap if he knew, because Suarez was nothing but a rat looking for favors instead of crumbs. He'd use my need for answers to his advantage, negotiating a deal I wasn't prepared to give.

For anything else, I wouldn't have done it.

But I'd do anything formi reina. Even sell my soul.

Isa remained quiet on the sofa, holding perfectly still as she studied me and the tension in my body hesitantly. My uncle pressed the button on his phone to make the call, making his way toward his office at the back of the house. Torn between not wanting her to have any part in the conversation that I knew would follow and knowing that I couldn't leave her unattended with my cousins, I did the only thing I could and put my trust in the last person I wanted in that moment.

"Get me Joaquin," I barked at Thiago. My youngest cousin glared at me, but stepped outside to grab Isa's personal security from his spot where he hovered outside the family home. He stepped in, his dark eyes disinterested as he studied me and waited for instructions. "Keep an eye on her. She doesn't leave that couch," I ordered. He furrowed his brow, glancing down to where Isa had drawn her knees up on the couch. I watched his gaze travel over her body, checking for signs of injury and undoubtedly growing curious at the sight of her in my shirt given her usual attire of dresses.

He said nothing, sitting on the opposite side of the sofa frommi reinaand watching as she flinched away despite the space between them. With a heavy sigh, I turned on my heel and left her with the man I knew would do as I demanded and keep Sebastian's wandering hands off my wife in the process unless he wanted a bullet in his brain.

"I understand that, Samuel, but I hardly think my brother cares if you keep his secrets anymore," my uncle barked as I made my way down the hallway. Stepping into the open office door and closing it behind me, I crossed my arms over my chest and waited for him to signal me into the conversation. "What can be such a big deal about a child he hurt?" He hit the screen, enabling the speaker phone so Samuel's accented voice filled the silence.

"I'm certain it isn't a big deal actually, but you seem to want the information. That makes it valuable to me," Samuel said, a smile in his voice as it carried through the room. "What do you want to know about some brat anyway?"

My uncle looked up to me as he considered what he could answer. Anything but the truth would have been more likely to get Samuel to cooperate, but there was also nothing we could say that would explain the sudden interest in a drowning incident my father had never been officially involved in. "She is an Ibarra now," he said finally with a sigh.

Samuel laughed, the boisterous sound echoing through the room. "Which one of your sons went slumming with American pussy and was too stupid to wrap it up?"

"She is the wife ofEl Diablo," my uncle returned as I clenched my teeth in an effort to contain my fury. The inability to beat the answers out of Samuel threatened to push my rage over the edge once again.

There was nothing I could do with him safely tucked behind the walls of his fortress in Colombia, and I was not a patient enough man to wait for him to come out of hiding. The old bastard would die before that ever happened.

He coughed, the sound of his palm slapping against his desk echoing through the space as his coughing dissolved into laughter. "Oh that's rich. They weremadefor each other."

"What exactly does that mean, Suarez?" I asked, uncrossing my arms and stepping forward to lean my hands on the edge of my uncle's desk. Glaring down at the phone as if he could feel my glare through the other side.

"Rafael!" the old man said jovially. "I hear congratulations are in order."

"How quickly a worm like you goes from referring to my wife as slumming to a congratulatory statement," I said carefully, working to conceal the wrath threatening to boil my blood.

"Careful, Rafael. I have the information you're looking for," he warned, his voice tinted with the arrogance I had associated with all of my father's friends as a boy.

"And what do you expect for this information?" I asked, curling my fingers around the edge of the desk and squeezing.

"I'm not certain," he said, his voice trailing off as he considered his options and what he could want from an Ibarra. I expected a request for some of the weaponry at my disposal thanks to my connection with the world's most notorious arms dealer, but he surprised me instead. "I don't come across many men I like, but your father was another story. I greatly enjoyed my time with him as my friend."

My uncle froze in his chair, giving me a tense look as we waited for the other shoe to drop.

"I'm sure you did," I said, filling the silence.

"I do not wish to insult his memory by giving his murderer what he seeks. A great many people believe in karma, Rafael. I have never been one of them. Until today," he growled, disconnecting the call as silence replaced his voice. My uncle's brown eyes met mine, a hesitant plea in them as I hardened to the harsh reality. I had never in my life regretted killing my father, and now his loss was what stood between me and the answers I needed.

"Fuck!" I yelled, sweeping the papers and things off Andrés' desk in my rage. There wasn't another person alive who could tell me what I needed to know.

Why the fuck had my father bothered with a five-year-old girl in the first place?

---