Disclaim (Deliver 3)

He’d shown up in her life out of nowhere, beaten her without purpose, fucked her mouth, then tended to her. He was either pathologically insane or there was something else here at play. Was he putting on an act for someone? For Nico? Or for whoever was on the other side of that camera lens? What was their hold over Matias, and how could she use that to her advantage?

She glanced down at the rows of cuts reddening her thighs. He’d hurt her ruthlessly, callously, but she’d endured the same in Van’s attic. It was the slew of unanswered questions that scared her the most, and her mind raced to dissect the last twenty-four hours. But she narrowed her focus to the topic that mattered.

“I put myself here because I want to help people. Women, just like me. I thought…” Her voice wobbled, and as much as she tried, she couldn’t drag her eyes to his in the mirror. “I thought you cared about me.”

His chest rose and fell heavily behind her, but he said nothing.

“Stop trafficking humans. That’s all I want.” Her chin trembled. “Please.”

“No.” One word, crisp and final.

Her heart sank, but she would keep trying, keep pushing for as long as it took.

The metal tag glinted on the collar, catching her attention. She leaned forward, squinting to unscramble the reversed reflection of text.

Don’t fuck with my property.

Meaningless. Impersonal. Recyclable. Was that how he viewed whatever this was with her?

“Let’s go.” He gripped her hand and pulled her toward the exit.

“Wait.” She tugged at the corset’s bust line, where it rested just above her nipples. “Not like this.

The burnish of his eyes darkened ominously. “Exactly like this.”

MATIAS HAD DONE SOME GODAWFUL shit over the years. Theft, torture, slow agonizing fucking deaths as he brought unfathomable hell upon too many to count. But he’d never deliberately harmed Camila, not the way he had tonight.

With heavy footsteps and a strangling ache in his chest, he led her out of his suite.

Beating the ever-loving shit out of her had not only killed something inside him, it moved him in the opposite direction of his goal. But those marks on her body were necessary.

Forcing himself in her mouth, though? That had been for him.

The sight of her nude body, kneeling, collared, and trembling when he’d opened the door… Fuck! She’d stripped away her fears for him. It was the most seductive thing she could’ve done.

And he’d repaid her by fucking her throat raw.

Clawing branches of guilt stabbed in his gut. Not only was he a selfish fucking prick, he was pushing her too fast, too soon. All that talk about dominance and her willingness to submit had been ill-timed. While he’d passionately meant every word, he needed to earn her consent first.

Her bare feet padded along the marble as he guided her out of the east wing and through the foyer. Arms clutching her body and shoulders hunched, she seemed to be trying to hold herself together. No doubt she was exhausted, wracked with pain, and fuming fucking mad.

He would’ve preferred to leave her in the room, but that wasn’t how things worked around here. If a cartel member stole a new assault rifle, he showed it off to his buddies. If a lieutenant or drug lord acquired a new slave, he brought her to dinner. The last thing Matias wanted was to raise suspicion, not after what had happened in the west wing tonight.

In the States, the war on drugs put crackheads in jail for little baggies and taught grade-schoolers how to sing jingles about the evils of marijuana. But south of the border? The war was real, and narcotics were just a drop in a cartel’s bucket.

Matias covered the gamut of criminal commerce, from trafficking weapons and humans to smuggling immigrants and terrorists—all of which made his wallet fat and his dick hard, proving that he was, without question, a very bad man.

The fucked up part? He didn’t give a rat’s ass, and that made sweeping Camila off her feet one helluva challenge. Figuratively sweeping, of course. He could force her to her knees anytime he wanted. What he couldn’t force her to do was offer her soul in supplication.

He wanted her to love every piece of him, even the most depraved and unworthy pieces. Especially those. In return, he would protect her soul, cherish it, and put it at peace again.

He rested a hand on the rise of her ass and slipped a finger beneath the tight cinch of the corset. As much as he enjoyed her on her knees, he preferred this—the rigidity of her backbone—as her gorgeous legs stretched to match his strides.

She wielded the kind of inner strength that would intimidate an average man. He fucking loved that about her. So much so he’d spent the last four years shifting the world beneath her feet to ensure that when she finally offered him her soul, she would do so with her integrity and backbone fully intact.

“Will you talk about what happened?” She peeked at him through her lashes as they rounded a bend in the hall. “About what upset you before you…” She pressed her lips together. “Before you came back to the room?”

The hallway was empty, and they hadn’t passed another person since exiting his suite. But the walls had ears.

“No.” He studied her huge disappointed eyes and reconsidered. “Maybe later.”

The grooves in her forehead smoothed away, and she nodded.

Dozens of residents had witnessed his gory walk from the west wing. That kind of thing was commonplace since they frequently brought captives to the compound to be tortured. A rival gang member here. A government official there. Seemed there was always someone begging for a bloody send-off to hell.

Tonight’s dismemberment, however, had been one of their own.

His hand clenched against Camila’s ass, and she gasped.

He’d known Gerardo since the beginning and never would’ve suspected their trusted accountant of leaking information to another cartel. Valuable information, such as numbers of bank accounts, names of intermediaries, drug transactions, and payoffs to law enforcement officials. The extent of the damage was still unknown.

He hadn’t felt this kind of betrayal since… His chest tightened. The day he’d learned Jhon had set up Camila’s abduction. The sick son of a bitch. Matias shook with the need to kill his brother all over again.

The drone of voices and laughter filtered in from the veranda at the end of the hall. It would be a full room tonight since most of the operators were in town—forty or so lieutenants and hitmen.

Dinner was held every night on the veranda, and while business wasn’t always conducted at this hour, members needed a damn good excuse to miss it.

It’d been over a decade since he’d walked in there with the slightest twitch of unease, but as the dining area came into view, his insides lit with nervous energy. He glanced down at one of the reasons.

Silken black hair, soulful eyes, and a body that wickedly sinuated the lines of her corset. Camila was the only woman he’d ever loved, and he knew—somewhere beneath her campaign to save the free world—she could love him. Him, not the ghost of the boy he’d been.

But he needed her to hang on to her hatred for just a little while longer.

Gripping her arm, he pushed her back against the wall of the empty corridor. She stiffened then launched into a muscle-tensing, kicking, shoving struggle. He wrenched her hands behind her and pressed his weight against her chest.

Anyone who passed by would simply see him enjoying his new slave before dinner.

He touched his mouth to her ear and kept his voice at a whisper. “I won’t tell you to trust me. You’re not there yet. But I want you to listen.”

Her jaw tensed against his. Then she relaxed in his hold.

“Nico knows our history, as do the small few in the inner circle.”

“Who’s in the inner—?”

“Everyone at my table.” He leaned back and watched her eyes dilate as she absorbed the information. Stifling the overwhelming urge to kiss her, he returned his lips to her ear. “The rest of that room is on a nee

d to know, and they need to know you’re just the slave of the month. A fresh hole to fuck. You mean nothing to me.”

He released her and stepped back.

“I fucking despise you.” Vicious honesty snarled through her voice and hardened her eyes.

He inwardly winced and smoothed his tone to hide the hurt. “Perfect.”

Setting off toward the veranda, he didn’t look back.