Queen of Nothing

Cecilia

15 years old

Ronantracedhisfingers down my calves then turned the motion back up towards my thighs when I didn’t respond to his question. He softly thumbed the scar on my rib just below my breast, but I pulled my tank top back down to cover the rest of me.I pressed the button for morphine to my side and let myself succumb to the lull of the drug’s call and its promise to delay my problems for just one more sleep

“Stop! That tickles,” I pushed his hands away in a teasing manner that let him know I didn’t actually want his hands anywhere else but on my body.

“Well, then answer my question. Are you finally gonna tell your old man we’re more than just friends?” He raised his eyebrow and caged me in on the floor with his arms on either side of my head.

“You know, traditionally the guy usually does the talking to the fathers in relationships,” I stuck my tongue out at him and scrunched my nose.

“Traditionally most girlfriends’ fathers are around to talk to, but your dad is like a ghost man. You all talk about him like he is some scary asshole I shouldn’t even make eye contact with, but at the end of the day his place at the dinner table is always empty.” He ran his hands through his hair, and I sighed, he knew he was teetering the line where I usually would withdraw from the conversation and deflect to a different subject as fast as possible. I didn’t blame him though, in almost eight years of being around me he had never seen my Papá.

Ever since my Tio Ignácio - my Papá’s brother, burned our family villa down to try to take my Papá’sseat in the Cártel, he’d been extra cautious. He bounced all over the place in Mexico to evade my Tio and his men to keep them from interjecting in any Cártel jobs. Sometimes he would stay in Guadalajara, where we came from, for months at a time, and when he would come home, we all would shut ourselves in from the outside world for protection. That’s why we ended up staying with my Tia Larissa permanently. My Mamárefused to live alone and my Papá was so shattered from the hurt his brother caused us that he couldn’t take this one request away from her.

Familiawas everything.

I loved Ronan, there was absolutely no doubt about that. He was always around, and it wasn’t hard for our friendship to form and quickly blossom into puppy love. My Tia and my Mamá always encouraged it because they saw how carefree and normal being around Ronan kept me. They figured we would break up as life would naturally drive us apart so there was no concern for them to interject. But puppy love and years of friendship soon became the foundation to a feeling of security I hadn’t felt for as long as I could remember, if ever at all. I dreaded how fast the future would come knocking at my door, to steal it all away from me.

The thing about being the daughter of one of the most powerful men in the world is that if you didn’t already know that about me, then you’d likely only find out when you were taking your last breaths. This secret I held all to myself; I couldn’t tell the most important person in my life. He didn’t know that I spent all of my days outside of school or being with him learning about the family business and being prepared to take over my Papá’s place in the Cártel. He didn’t know that my weekend trips once a month to go shopping in Tijuana were actually spent sitting at my Papá’s side as his right hand. That I would be absorbing and learning not just how the business should be run, but even his mannerisms and how he conducted himself every step of the way.

“Maybe he isn’treal,” I teased and kissed him softly on the lips.

He pressed his lips back into me and I parted mine slightly to let him in, a soft moan escaping me. Ronan growled as he pressed his bulge against me, “You drive me crazy. You’re gonna be the end of me,” he said, pressing his forehead to mine.

“Don’t say that,” my smile faded. “Look - my Papá will be back tonight for a few days, I’ll talk to him about having dinner where he can get to know you as my…boyfriend?” The last word came out as more of a high-pitched squeak as I questioned it because the word never came out of my mouth before this very moment. The strangeness of it all surfaced and suddenly I was lightheaded and anxious and full of butterflies at the idea of being rejected by him.

We were best friends, two neighbor kids who had been each other’s everything from the moment we first met. It didn’t feel strange when playing together started to become romantic, or shoulder punches were followed by tender kisses. Even Carolina, who was my complete shadow, knew from a single look when it was time to evacuate the room and leave us alone.

We just made sense, from the very beginning.

“Yeah, I’m your boyfriend Cecilia Gomez. I’m your, all of it. Your first date, your first-hand holding, your first kiss, your first, first,” he whispered, and I smirked, pulling my shirt down my head as I thought about what we’d just done. The pleasant soreness in between my legs forced me to clamp my knees shut to keep the rush of liquid heat from spilling out of me again.

“You say that like I wasn’t yours either payaso, now let me get dressed and go pretend like I am the innocent little flower my Papá knows me to be, okay?” I joked and he lifted me up off the ground and kissed me again.

“Alright little flower, Text me a time?”

“Don’t wear jeans!” I shouted back as I left his house. His mother, Nina lived only four houses down from my Tia. They met not long before we moved in, Nina’s husband left her for his secretary, so my Tiaoffered her a fair salary in exchange for doing some chauffeuring and other odd jobs. TiaLarissa and her giant bleeding heart were always taking care of everyone, and if she hadn’t, I’m not sure Ronan and I would have ever met.

By the time I got home, my Papá was there along with the extra security car and his armed men. My Mamámade them stay upstairs since my sister and I had cozied on the main floor of the house with her since she was alone so often. I shouted a greeting up to Cézar, he was my Papá’s Sergeant in arms now. He was standing on the balcony staring over the railing looking as fierce as ever. He was only twenty-five, but my Papásaid he trusted him to seat me in his place and to carry out my orders when he was gone, and that was good enough for me too. Cézar was essentially the annoying older brother I never asked for, but I couldn’t even imagine my life without him.

“Are you getting shorter Princesita?” He asked teasingly and I showed him my middle finger in response, coaxing an obnoxious roar of laughter from him.

“Is that Célia?” I heard my Papá calling from the billiard room, which he frequently used as his office on the few occasions he brought work home.

I ran into the room and didn’t bother looking around before jumping into my Papá’s arms for a hug. I didn’t care that these men could see me as weak for hugging my Papá, if they questioned my integrity once I was old enough to take control, I would fire or kill them for it as I was taught.

He accepted my embrace and picked me up like when I was a little girl. When he put me down, we both straightened our clothes and cleared our throats simultaneously, and he fought back a smile at our similarities. “How have you been Mija?” he asked with a tenderness reserved only for me.

“Fifteen, filled with angst and hormones. Now fill me in on what actually matterspor favor,” I said seriously, and he smirked at my bossy demeanor.

“Ignácio burned down two of our warehouses in Tijuana, over two hundred and fifty million in product,” he pulled out photos of the warehouses, completely charred to the ground, nothing but bones left of the structures.

“How many died?” I asked, and he frowned at my show of concern to our soldiers and their families.

“I’ve already made it right Mija, don’t concern yourself over that,” his lips pressed into a flat line which let me know I disappointed him.

“What else?” I quickly tried to move past my mistake, hoping I’d be able to make it up.

“The good news is he was sloppy, probably sent Carlito to do his dirty work, that pendejo is good for nothing. They left plenty of traces, I think we should be able to find them in the next couple of weeks,” he told me with a glimmer of hope breaking through his hard exterior and I offered my Papá a smile that he returned.

“I can almost smell him Mija, he’s so close. He will burn twice as hard for what he put us through,” he said with a fearsome glint in his eye that was all rage and revenge, and I almost forgot that this was his brother. I couldn’t put myself in his shoes because I could never imagine feeling this way about Carolina.

Power changes everyone,he always said.

After formalities and business were taken care of, I asked the men for a few minutes alone with my Papá and they had no reason to object.

“Ronan wants to have dinner with you tonight Papá, with all of us.”

“Who?” He asked as if he had never heard the name in his life and I rolled my eyes.

“Ay Papá!You know the names of every useless pendejowhosehand you shake, but you pretend you can’t remember his name when he’s been around for almost half my life now! Be kind please, this is important to him,” I slapped his shoulder playfully.

“Important just to him?” He asked and I knew exactly what he was asking.

I sigh, “I know where my duty lies, Papá, and I will never forget it.”

“You must never! The Cártel will always want to undermine you because you are a woman. You cannot rise into power with a man at your side because the man is all they will see. You will be judged for his weaknesses as if they were your own, they will look past your legacy. I did not spend your whole life preparing you for this to let some man dictate how you are received. Especially some gringo. When the time comes, marriage will find you when the alliance is right Mija, and this will open many more doors for us all.”

“I know Papá,you tell me this often, I understand.”

“Good,” he cupped my cheek in his hand and kissed the top of my head. “Then I will eat with the boy who has stolen you from me,” he winked at me, and we broke away with a laugh.

I spent the rest of the day anxiously waiting for dinner time and pestering my Tia in the kitchen after she refused my Mamá’sproposal that we let one of her chefs cook this.

My Tiathought dinners like this were too important to be left to the “help” and that we needed a meal we could taste the love from. I honestly wasn’t sure how that would work since I had never seen either one of those two in the kitchen before in the entire time I had been living here, but I wasn’t going to deny her an opportunity to do something that she truly considered to be a gesture of kindness.