The Slayer (Untamed Hearts #2)(102)

She had dreamed last night of asking the devil how exactly to get a ticket to hell to be with Chuito.

It showed up faster than she’d expected.

One-way.

Piloted by an Italian enforcer in a black Ferrari.





Chapter Thirty-Seven


Miami


There was something oddly freeing about driving all day and into the night with his phone off. It gave Chuito time to think. To make a plan, because stealing Tino’s car had been a rash decision.

But as he lay awake staring at the ceiling in Tino’s place, he had decided he couldn’t let Tino come with him. He didn’t want to risk that. Not after Nova suffered through what he did to get Tino out. It couldn’t be easy to be a mafia boss after losing the one guy he truly trusted as backup.

Chuito didn’t like to waste things.

And that would be a big f*cking waste of an enormous sacrifice on Nova’s part.

Plus, like Nova, Chuito didn’t want to see Tino sink in deep again. He didn’t want to find out what Tino had been snorting blow to hide from.

It scared him.

For a lot of reasons.

He searched the car when he stopped for gas and found that Tino prepared for the worst. There was a .38 Beretta in the glove compartment, and that was a bonus, because the only thing Chuito had on him was a shirt he had stolen from Tino, his wallet, and his phone.

Then he searched the back of the SUV and found something more interesting.

A suitcase full of cash in a hidden compartment where most people kept a spare tire. He also found three more guns, ammunition, a holster, a smartphone, and the car charger that went with it.

It was like a hit man’s emergency kit.

The only thing missing was the blow.

And Chuito looked for it.

He didn’t like that he looked for it, but he did.

His fighting career seemed so far away, the least of his worries, and he was starting to realize this was a one-way trip. He had lived longer than he was supposed to. He had accomplished more than he was supposed to too.

He was much more valuable dead than alive.

His mother and Marcos would get his money, and it wasn’t like Marcos could bitch about not taking it when he inherited the shit.

Alaine could get the life-insurance policy he had listed her as the beneficiary on.

He had even bought a burial plot right next to Juan.

A part of him had been planning for this all along. He had Jules put it together for him years ago. The only part she didn’t know about was the life insurance for Alaine. He hadn’t felt like hearing it, but Jules was listed on his safe-deposit box in the bank.

She’d find it and take care of it, because that was what Jules did.

Then Alaine could move on and find her happy ending.

Marcos could save the rest of Miami.

And Angel would be dead, because if Chuito was going down, he was taking that motherf*cker with him.

He bought a Miami Heat hat once he got into Florida, like the one Marcos always wore. He got sunglasses at one of the tourist stations on the turnpike, because people were looking at him like they recognized him.

Or they could be staring at the big f*cking bruise Tino had left him with from their fight outside the Cellar, which seemed like a lifetime ago. Strange that it had only been a little over twenty-four hours since he had been sitting in jail next to his best friend.

Now he was in Miami, solving a problem, just like he’d promised Marcos.

Chuito asked his cousin for a day to figure it out.

It turned out Chuito did get shit done like Marcos always claimed.

He sat at a cigar bar one door down from a club Angel used to hang at five years ago, and still probably hung out at, because he wasn’t one to change his spots.

Chuito drank three Cuban coffees—the next best thing to cocaine.

He had the suitcase from Tino’s SUV between his feet, because not only did it have a crazy amount of cash, he’d also put the rest of the guns in it. Chuito sure wasn’t going to leave that shit in the Benz, especially not here. He didn’t know if the guns were registered to Tino or not.

He highly doubted it, but he wasn’t going to risk it.

It was warm in Miami, humid, making the hoodie he was wearing annoying, but he didn’t want his ink showing, not here, because someone would recognize it.

As it was, he just sat in the corner, his head low, looking at the smartphone he had found in Tino’s Benz. There wasn’t any information on it, no contacts; it was completely empty, likely a throwaway phone Tino had for an emergency, but it was activated. So he browsed the Internet while he kept his eye on the front doors of the club.

A few people slowed, looking at him curiously, because since he had won a Heavyweight title last month, he was more recognizable than ever, but he also blended in Miami in a way he didn’t in Garnet.

They must have thought it was just a striking resemblance.

His ink was covered.

They didn’t approach him, if for no other reason than he probably throbbed with danger. People in this part of Miami knew how to feel out for a threat, and he was certainly a threat, riding off too much caffeine, pissed off at Angel because during the trek here, Chuito had managed to link all his problems back to him.

If Angel hadn’t been on such a f*cking ego trip, if he would’ve just let Marcos go rather than use him as a bargaining chip to get back at Chuito for being more successful than him, he wouldn’t be here.