LYDIAAs a couple we were doing great so far. Connor had at least tried to be supportive and if we were going to be serious about this, the first step to take was meeting his family.Even though he viewed me meeting his family as some sort of way courting me, I still appreciated the sentiment. He wanted us to be together for real. Forever and no matter how patient I wanted us to be the truth still lurked and the truth was we loved each other and deserved to be happy.I smiled nervousness eating at my palms as Connor’s aunt walked with me to the kitchen.“I’m glad you settled things. It’s my first time seeing him happy since he lost his mother”I didn’t want to poke my nose into the whole Sussanne issue. Connor was still sour about it and if anything, he hadn’t exactly told his family about the whole Mafioso thing or his other side hustling drug trafficking gig.Victoria Powers must have noted this because she placed her ladle on the kitchen counter eyeing me with curiosity. Fifty or m

LYDIAWe arrived in Austin as fast as we could and while I sat with my mother waiting for Connor to bring the coffee, I couldn’t help but feel like somehow this was my fault.It was an accident my mother said but, in my heart, something told me it wasn’t.Sure the old pickup Harrison Hayden had seen better days but I had watched him drive the same truck all my life. It was the same truck he drove me to high school with, the same truck he drove to the market with and never in those countless times had he had an accident or the brakes giving up.But now when Connor and I had enemies lurking all around us, it just happened that my father’s truck had brakes that weren’t working.Impossible.“He’s going to be okay. I know he will”My mother said holding to my hands with a vise grip.She was trying to convince herself by assuring me that Harrison was a fighter and I didn’t know what to say…If my father died, God the thought of his death felt like me getting impaled by a blunt dagger.He wa

LYDIA“She’s so cute”, I cooed like a fan girl in one of Dean Lewis’ concerts.Chubby cheeks, long lashes, Carlos’ midnight black hair, God she looked like an angel and I wanted nothing more than to jump inside my screen and steal the little thing from a distraught Henley’s arms.“Only because you’ve not been with her for a day”“I want one”, I fussed about putting my salad aside.“Motherhood isn’t an easy feat, Dia. I haven’t slept for days”She did look sleep deprived. Like a week sleep deprived.While Carla looked like she had been straight out from a sauna, her mother, Henley looked like she had been sleeping on the streets for weeks with her ginger hair up her head in a mess, eyebags under her eyes and her shirt…well let’s just say motherhood had taken a rather hard toll on her.“Ooh I’m sure I’ll manage it. I mean you did, right? And Veronica is on her way to becoming a mother too so..”“Right, how are things between you and Connor?”Ooh between sex, watching rom coms, him talki

JOAQUINI loved her, no not past tense but present tense, I love her.She was the only woman who made me feel like this way like my shitty life could somehow change, and I was ready, to change.To become a batter man. To leave my terrible life behind and start a fresh. A good life without violence, without blood shed without my father but then life was never easy was it?I killed Rocco, I mean sure the motherfucker deserved it and it gave me pleasure to kill him but doing that had brought all of this shit in front of me.I gazed at the rusty place they held me in.It had been days since I ate anything, not that I would stomach any food with the sight in front of me.The blood and gore, a body sprawled up from the ceiling like it was nothing.Like it was a bloody sack of potatoes and not a living thing. They had done it in front of me, made sure I got to witness each and every layer of skin they pulled from the body.My screams had been nothing to them and how could they?We were train

CORNELIUS “All I need is 24 hours to get the job done”, I snapped.Lowering his cap eyeing me like the deal wasn’t that sweet to consider he stated the obvious,“You’ve got a lot of money and we both know you have the means and resources to disappear from the face of the earth”True.So fucking true.I leveled him with a look,“I have nothing to live for”I didn’t and that was the fucking truth. A truth that had me mourning for days and wishing I was six feet under and not her.As for my son, a son I never got to hold or know his name, he was better off without me. Me being in his life would lead the same path to what happened to…her.She was dead.Out of existence and I was a shell of vengeance and fury.Shell of nothing but bitter wounds that refused to heal and I didn’t think I would heal and that’s why I was doing what needed to be done.For Lydia,For my son,Joaquin needed to die.And he was going to die, today.“Listen buddy, I’ve helped you tons of times before but this time i