Page 59 of Empire of Carnage
Death really made you see things more clearly.
I understood why Celia had always been so goddamn obsessed with it. Leaving tequila and weed offerings on her altar when we were just kids and telling me to not pay any mind. Almost dying gave you a new perspective on things, nearly losing everyone you cared about in the blink of an eye even more so.
Having Celia at the cost of either of my brothers’ lives would have been like drinking a little bit of poison every single day. Not enough to kill you, but just enough to keep you sick and miserable until the end of your time.
A well-to-do looking socialite walked towards the bathroom. I stuck my arm out in front of her and shook my head. Before she could open her mouth to protest, Celia’s screams of pleasure leaked out through the cracks in the door. She widened her eyes, giving me a condemning look as if I were the one that was in there right now.
Well, I had been.
She turned her back to me, marching away with an appalled look on her face. Mateo pushed through the door with a satisfied expression that he didn’t bother to hide. Santos followed after, and just a minute or two later Celia walked out, lipstick pristine and chin held high. Her dress hugging her curves once again.
“You’re not worried about what they may think of you coming out of the bathroom with two men?” I asked her and she laughed.
“Baby, I don’t know if you remember, but my papá died in the middle of a senate campaign. No one is batting an eye that I’m not taking a piss by myself.” She walked in front of me, and I stayed a few steps behind, happy to play the part of a bodyguard.
It wasn’t like I was pretending. I would have easily cut through anyone who tried to get to her. She walked through the gallery and down a wide hallway until large double doors appeared. She took a deep breath, standing straight with her shoulders pulled back.
She was putting up her mental armor and readying for battle.
All I could do was hold her flag.
No, all sheneededme to do was hold her flag.
And I would hold it till my arms gave out and the colors ran red with the blood of her enemies. I knew she was capable of spilling it all on her own.
24
Celia
They sat there, waiting for me, filling up each seat at the table in the conference room and leaving the head of the table for me. Men I remembered from my papá’s regime, all of them highly opinionated, some clearly bitter over the nepotism in our way of life. None brave enough to actually attempt to try the same though.
Sure, originally I may have earned my title in a less than favorable way, just being born to the right family. But now, none of them could deny that I’d bled my right to call myself queen.
I had already sat down and spoken with most of the men here one on one, for the majority of them, like Luciano Amaro, I already knew we saw eye to eye. Some others hadn’t formed an opinion of me yet and we had only been acquainted. A few had already proved to be rooting for my failure, probably thinking that I would be their chance for power.
Men like Fernando Garcia who were just hoping to catch me with my pants down so he could fuck me in the ass and blame it on my not being Mexican enough for his liking. But of course, he couldn’t deal with Ignacio himself, so he’d only scrutinize and shame me until it came time for me to do the hard work of ridding the world of my tío.
Then he’d miraculously find the courage to challenge me in hopes of taking everything I’d worked hard to build.
Idiot didn’t know I was a servant of death.
You couldn’t kill those who worshiped La Muerte. Only she decided when we went.
My time was far from up.
They all stood but Fernando stood once I entered the room. I made sure to let my gaze linger on him as I walked past every other man seated before arriving at my own chair, giving him a dose of my bad side. My father had been gone too long, I would bet good money Fernando here had crossed the line and settled for my tío. Maybe I was just cynical and untrusting.
Great qualities in a leader.
The more I thought about it the less I tolerated him sitting at this very table.
“Good evening Señores—” I switched to spanish.
He interrupted, raising his hand in the air, waving it as if he alone had the authority to stop me from speaking.
“I’m going to cut short the pleasantries, Celia. It’s been a long night waiting for you to show your face, why don’t we speed things up here so we can all go home?” The fucking audacity of this man made me fight every carnal instinct that screamed at me to throw a knife into his face.
I noticed César in the corner, twirling the sharp point of one on the tip of his finger. He didn’t look up; he didn’t need to. Both our thoughts were in the same place so when the corner of his lip twitched, I knew our minds were back in the past. The moment he threw that blade in my cousin Carlitos’ cheek was the very same moment my tío decided he’d had enough of not being the biggest man in the room.
