Drug Lord: A Bad Boy Baby Romance (10 page)

I
woke
up when the plane touched down in Miami. I looked out the window and saw the heat haze outside.

Yawning, I covered my mouth with my hand.

“Stay here while we fill out some customs forms, okay? I have your passport.”

I was a little confused. “Why do you have my passport?”

He shifted his weight between his feet. I realized that I was a rumpled, sleepy mess, while he looked perfect and immaculate.

“I grabbed it when we were getting your things out of the cabin.”

“But I didn’t agree until I woke up.”

He had a guilty expression, as if I’d just caught him with his hand in the cookie jar.

“It’s a good thing that I agreed to come along with you, isn’t it?” I smiled. “I know you love me.”

He kissed the top of my head. I could see the tension dissipating.

“Stay here. We’ll be on our way to Ecuador soon.”

I unbuckled my seatbelt and stretched. I loved the jet. It was luxurious and fun, but being stuck in one seat for several hours never would be fun. My face felt all oily and gross, and I needed to wipe it with water.

I had no idea where Emilio had gone. I knew that he had told me to stay in the plane, but I needed to use a real restroom, not the little one that was on the jet.

I walked down the steps. Emilio was still nowhere to be found. I shrugged and headed into the airport.

As soon as I stepped in the door, I saw my dad.

“Dad? What are you doing here?”

“We saw the flight plans. We knew that he had to stop for fuel somewhere, and as soon as we knew that he was heading for Miami, we knew that you would be here.”

“What are you talking about? I’m going back to Ecuador with him.”

“No, you’re not. I was a fool to let you go there the first time. You’re staying right here in the United States.”

“Dad, I’m an adult. You can’t stop me from leaving the United States if I want to go.”

“You’ve been brainwashed. You don’t really want to go.”

“Dad, I…”

I stopped when he produced a set of handcuffs and cuffed my hands behind my back as if I were a criminal and not his daughter.

“Dad! What are you doing?”

“Keeping my daughter safe.”

“Dad, unlock these cuffs right now.”

“No.” He pulled me towards a set of doors. “We have to hurry. He’ll come back any moment.”

I pulled back with all of my bodyweight, but my dad wasn’t having any of it. He pulled me forward like I was 6 and didn’t want to go to soccer practice because I got too dirty.

“Stop it!”

“I’m not going to let him kidnap you. We’ll put you in therapy. It’ll be fine.”

“Dad, stop.” I pulled on my cuffs.

“I’m sorry about this, sweetheart.” And then he took a thick silver pen out of his pocket and jabbed me with the pointy end.

It wasn’t a pen at all. It was some kind of tranquilizer, because all of a sudden I was falling into my father’s arms.

I felt him dragging me through the doors that he’d indicated earlier.

Then I didn’t feel anything.

“
D
ad
, for the thousandth time, I’m not brainwashed.” I snorted. “As if he could!”

“Kid, if I thought that you genuinely wanted to be with that thug, I’d institutionalize you. Nobody would want to run away with Emilio. Don’t you know what he’s done?”

I was quiet. We’d had this same conversation over and over. We were beating a dead horse at this point.

“I knew what he’s done,” I told him. “And I want to be with him anyway.”

“And that’s why we have an appointment with a therapist.”

“Fine.”

I looked out the window. We were pulling into a parking lot in a nondescript set of office buildings in a part of town that I’d never been in before. I’d never gone to therapy before.

“We’re here.”

I got out of the car. At least my dad had removed the handcuffs before I woke up inside of a different plane.

Unlike Emilio’s jet, the military jet had been sparse. It was functional, but it wasn’t very pretty.

I hadn’t spoken to my father the entire time that we flew back to DC. He knew how I felt about it. I knew how he felt about it. I knew that he was trying to do the best thing for me, but I also couldn’t believe that my dad had forced me to come home when I’d clearly left of my own volition. Yes, he believed that I had somehow been brainwashed, but I didn’t understand how he thought I’d been indoctrinated. It wasn’t as if Emilio had hypnotized me or anything.

My phone and laptop were on Emilio’s jet. I hoped that he didn’t think that I’d just bailed on him, but I was worried that he did. He told me not to leave the plane, but how was I supposed to know that my dad was lurking and waiting to make me come home?

I closed the car door and followed my dad into the therapist’s office, my arms crossed and a scowl on my face.

I felt like a sulky teenager.

My dad opened the office door for me. It was part of his code.

I just shook my head at him. He believed that women should be honored and protected. I always thought it was a good thing, but it was really a two-edged sword.

I went inside of the therapist’s office.

My dad gave me a half hug.

“I’ll be back in an hour to pick you up, peanut.”

I was too old for him to call me peanut. He knew that I was an adult now. I still smiled. Unlike the bratty teenager I used to be, I cherished my father’s affection.

Unfortunately, his paternal instincts had stolen me away from Emilio. I sighed. I’d had a knee jerk reaction, and I’d repented at leisure. I hadn’t given Emilio a chance to talk to me about his real identity. Yes, he definitely should’ve told me that he was one of the world’s most notorious drug lords, but he must have understood how I’d react.

I pushed open the door. Someone was sitting on a chair in the corner of the room.

“Hello.”

I froze like a deer seeing headlights as I stared at my therapist.

“Emilio?”

“
W
e don’t have
a lot of time.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I promise, we’ll talk in the boat. But we have to go now.”

“Boat?”

“Let’s go out the back door.”

I had no clue what was going on, but I followed Emilio to a door that wasn’t the same that I’d come in.

I felt a little bad about ditching my dad. He really did want the best for me.

But I’d chosen Emilio. I knew that it wasn’t an easy choice, but I loved him.

He’d promised me that we’d find a way. I just needed to trust him.

Outside, there was a simple black Mercedes SUV.

“Is this what we’re taking?” Emilio always had the finest things.

“It’s reliable and unremarkable. Get in.”

I hesitated for a half second right outside of the car.

Could I really do this? I knew that I was turning my back on everything that I was, everything that I had been before.

Emilio turned to look at me. Something inside of me melted.

Yes.

I got into the car.

Soon, we were scrupulously observing the speed limit. We didn’t want to get any attention, while we went straight for the docks.

I
could see Naelle worrying
, so I pulled her into my lap.

I put my hands in her hair and brought her mouth to mine.

She resisted a little bit, pulling back a half inch.

“Your driver can see us,” she hissed.

I quickly hit a button to put up the partition as I pulled her closer.

“Now he can’t,” I murmured, touching our noses together.

I arranged her in my lap so that her thighs were on either side of me. I could feel her warm, soft body pressed against mine, and it was making me crazy.

“I missed you,” I told her.

“I missed you, too,” she whispered before she came in for a kiss.

Reconnecting after we’d been separated felt like coming home.

Later on, I had no clue how I’d gotten inside of her, but her panties were pushed aside while she rocked on top of me, and I knew in that moment that my home would be wherever this wonderful woman went.

I could feel my muscles tensing. I gritted my teeth to keep myself from filling her too early, like a teenager.

Then I felt her clench her inner muscles and all of my control went straight out the door.

My eyes rolled back in my head at the pleasure. I pumped and pumped inside of her soft body, and I could feel her moving on top of me.

I muffled my cries by burying my face in her breasts, but I was sure that our driver knew what we were doing back there.

“I needed you. I need you,” I whispered into her ear.

“I need you, too.”

She was limp on top of me. I held her in my arms and thanked whatever deity was watching that she was with me again.

Too soon, the car rolled to a stop.

“We have to go.”

T
he Potomac was smelly
and a gross color, but it was easily navigable.

“Put this on.”

I looked at the life vest that he’d tossed at me.

I did the straps and sat on a bench in the small boat built for speed, not for comfort. It wasn’t particularly pleasant, and I felt a bit nauseous.

“How long are we going to be on this boat?”

“Until we can get to the real one. It’s anchored in international waters.”

“Why?”

“Because your father will have a harder time stealing you there.”

I shut up.

I tried to enjoy the ride, but it was bumpy to go at the speed that we were going. I’d never had a problem with seasickness before, but the combination of being in my first trimester and the rough waves made me want to empty my stomach.

“We’ll be at the real boat in half an hour. If you need to, lean over the side of the boat. I’ll keep you safe.”

Just like that, my nausea let up a bit.

We continued speeding along for a half hour. I was expecting my dad to zoom down on us in a helicopter, but nothing was in the sky — not even a single commercial plane.

Finally, we were pulling alongside a large boat, a yacht I’d say.

There was a metal ladder.

“Ladies first.”

Even though Emilio might be checking out my butt from this angle, I also knew that he’d catch me if the boat moved and I fell. I might end up injuring both of us, but at least he’d break my fall.

I made it to the top without incident, and the driver and Emilio scrambled up behind me.

“What about the speedboat?”

“Someone else will take care of it. Our first priority is disappearing.”

Emilio put his arm around me and guided me into the warm inside portion of the boat.

“You’ll be safer in here.”

I
was relieved
that Naelle was finally here, in international waters. We were still off the coast of the United States, but they’d have a harder time taking us in while we flew an Ecuadorian flag.

“Come into my quarters.”

Naelle looked at the slender door of my bedroom. She looked doubtfully at it.

“Those are your quarters? It looks like a broom closet.”

I smiled a little bit.

“You’ll see.”

She stepped through. I went in after her. She spun slowly.

“Like it?”

“It’s like a tiny house or something. Just very pretty and compact.”

“Functional,” I said.

She sat on my bed and held out her arms like she wanted a hug. I sat next to her and pulled her into my lap. She didn’t need to get naked right now. She needed to be reassured that she’d made the right choice.

“Tell me about your empire,” she murmured, her head resting against my shoulder while I held her soft body in my arms.

It was time for me to come clean.

I cleared my throat.

“What do you want to know?”

“Everything.”

“I’m a businessman, first and foremost.”

She snorted.

“I am. Moving drugs is a business just like any other.”

“Except that it’s
illegal.
”

I shrugged. “Well, there’s that.”

“How did you get into it?”

“I thought that I was going to be a petrolero, which was my father’s profession, and it had kept our family comfortably wealthy my entire life. I could have sat back on my millions and lived comfortably on the interest for my entire life.”

“And then?”

“Then, dollarization happened. Suddenly, our money had been reduced to a shadow of what it was.”

I held her a little tighter. It wasn’t easy to remember the time when my entire life had fallen apart.

“We could’ve fallen to pieces. There were plenty of people at our level who did. They didn’t know how to live or work. They didn’t sully their hands with plebeian concerns, like making enough money to put food on the table.”

“What saved you? What made you different from the rest?”

“We had a secret weapon: my mother. She’d been a wealthy middle-class girl when she’d met my father at PUCE, a university in Quito. My maternal grandfather had struggled as a businessman until she was a teenager, when he’d finally signed a few contracts to export roses to the United States.”

“Roses?”

“Yes, roses. Valentine’s Day was the biggest event of the year for them. My mother had been raised to think that she should work for a living, even though she’d gone through all the etiquette classes that a teenager should go through.”

“So she’s part of both worlds.”

“Yes. She fit into my father’s family with its bloodline that went back to the Spaniards from the colonial days, but my paternal grandparents had always been rather snide about her somewhat humble upbringing, since my maternal grandfather actually worked and continued to work, even when he had more than enough money.”

She whistled softly. “Your grandfather sounds interesting.”

“My mother is a strong woman. It was my mother who thought of buying farmland in the Andes. It was my mother who had hired people to cultivate ancient plants, plants that had been grown there for millennia.”

“Coca.”

“Coca,” I confirmed. “It was legal in Ecuador to cultivate coca. After all, it was highly important for indigenous cultural rituals. In addition, altitude sickness, what some people called sorojchi, could be cured with coca. And in the mountains, who would know?”

“So your mother was the one who got you into the cocaine business?”

“Yup. We rebuilt our fortune with kilo after kilo of white powder that our customers couldn’t wait to get. And we’d kept our house, the one that was registered as a historical landmark, and our lands that UNESCO almost stole since they had pre-Columbian pyramids on them. Money talks.”

Naelle was quiet.

“Thank you for sharing your perspective. Have you ever thought about the cost to society? Obviously, running drugs is lucrative, and it probably saved your family.”

“It did.”

“But at a high cost to other people.”

“Naelle…I’ll do everything in my power to help and protect people I consider mine. Beyond that, I don’t care. They aren’t forced to buy my products at gunpoint. If they wanted to go to rehab and get clean, they could. You can’t fight human nature.”

“How many people have you killed?”

“Probably too many to count. Not personally, but there’s been a high death toll.”

She was quiet and still in my lap. She climbed out.

“Are you okay?”

“It’s been a rough day. I think I’ll just try to brush my teeth and go to sleep.”

“Of course.”