Page 10 of Rubies and Revenge

I nod.

“What can a gang leader do for the Gallo princess that she cannot do for herself?”

I scoff. “Don’t play coy, Tamayo, it discredits you.”

She bites down on her bottom lip, the corners twitching up. “Ah-ah, remember—you’re askingmefor help, princess. Whether you’re on your knees or not, you’re here to beseech me. Not the other way around.”

Pride burns through me, likely painting the skin across my chest and up my neck pink. “Fine.”

Tamayo settles further into her throne, legs wider, drink perched on her knee, smug expression on her face. “So, what help do you need that only I can provide?”

“Protection.”

She laughs without amusement. “All four Cardinal Families will be searching for you, and despite the fact we supply half of them with weapons, we cannot stand against them. Especially not for someone who isn’t ours.”

I pick up my drink again, staring at the orange cocktail and wishing I could see the future in its reflection. But it’s only booze and citrus. I knock back a gulp to wet my tongue before I finally reveal the core of why I’m here, in Tamayo’s club, and not with someone more powerful. “Then make me yours.”

Tamayo freezes in her chair, tension spreading from her fingers up to her shoulders. She stares at me so long I wonder if she feels the urge to blink, but instead her eyes move to her second, Darius, standing at the bar. They speak without words, and I wonder what they’ve said.

Tamayo licks her lips once and readjusts her seat. “Excuse me?”

“You’re right.” I hold my glass in both hands, turning towatch people exist in ways I never imagined were allowed on the club floor below. “The Cardinal Families will take me back home by force, and there’s no one, gang or politician or outsider, who can protect me without endangering themselves and their people.”

Tamayo studies me like she can’t believe the direction I’m going. Apparently, neither can Pat.

“Z, what’re you doing?” Pat mutters into my ear.

I don’t acknowledge them, instead leaving the windows behind to slink across the room toward Tamayo. Her left eyebrow hasn’t fully relaxed since I entered the room, and it makes me want to do something so surprising that the right arches up to meet it. I set my drink on her side table, leaning forward to reach it. We’re so close, I can feel the heat of her licking my bare thighs. She could run her probably calloused hand from my wrist to my collarbone and through my hair if she were so inclined.

“It doesn’t matter to the Council that I’m Zarina Gallo, sole heir of the Southern Districts, raised by one of the most powerful dons in the city.” I straighten, fingers trailing over the arm of her throne before they fall to my side. “I can’t leverage a single ounce of that power, because I’m a woman. And I can’t—no, Irefuse—to marry a man and act through him.”

“What exactly are you saying?” Tamayo murmurs.

“I’m saying.” I pause to release a pent-up breath. “I’m saying that the Council sees me as an asset to be owned, whether by my parents or by Marcus Accardi. And I would like to use that against them.”

Tamayo stays silent.

I grew up a princess. Most often, I got the whimsical and spectacular things I wanted. But I’m still a don’s daughter. I learned more at his knee than he intended. And one thing he never learned himself: Power is in the wielding, not the taking or having. I’ve spent too long sitting back on my heels,waiting for permission to rise up and be the queen I’m meant to be.

Not anymore.

“You’d betray your parents, your family?” Her voice is low in her throat, both hesitant and hopeful.

For a single moment, I allow the steel of my gaze to soften and show the pain that’s taken up residence in my chest, wrapping around my heart, tickling my lungs. It’s calculated, but it’s true. At the bottom of the angry black hole inside me is the little girl it’s protecting, and for half a second, I allow Tamayo to see her. For half a second, I’m as honest with her as I can be without words.

The last exchange with my father through my bedroom door echoes in my head.Please trust us?Before tonight, I did. I trusted my parents, because they didn’t push me beyond the boundaries of myself, brought me into the discussion. But after tonight? After this? There is only one answer—I can’t.

I shutter closed again. Push it all down, past the ring of angry teeth, and focus on the present, on Andrea Tamayo and her perfectly messy black hair with her scrollwork neck tattoos and a hunger in her eyes that has nothing to do with me and everything to do with my offer. With the power she can attain through me andmypower.

I meet her gaze with a hunger of my own. Will I betray my family? My parents? Yes. “They betrayed me first.”

A slow, wicked smile stretches across Tamayo’s face as she leans back on her throne, legs spread and wrists lax like she has nothing but time at her disposal. “Ask the question.”

I glare, biting down on my tongue to keep a shudder from my limbs.

She flicks her fingers to the floor. “And make sure it’s done properly.”

Kneel.The command goes unspoken, but it lands between us, flung like trash but heavy as a crown. She wantsme, Gallo royalty, on my knees before a lowly gangster, begging for her help. A princess before a rogue. The fucking audacity.

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