Born a Queen

Chapter 2

It was Raina's twenty-first birthday. She wanted to go out and party, dance all night, make friends, flirt, maybe take a guy home if she really felt like it. She'd never done that. Never taken a guy home before. In fact, she'd never even had s*x. It wasn't that she didn't want to. She really, really did. But life had thrown a major curveball at her two years ago and she'd been running ever since. This time, it appeared she was running into a dead end.

Raina didn't think she was going to get to party for her birthday. No, she was pretty sure she was going to die. She peered out into the dark night from the window of her rented room. She was on the fourth floor of a very old building. One that was sinking. But then, all the buildings in Venice were sinking.

Italy was her ninth country in two years. When she left Venezuela, leaving the mother she just met behind, she went on the run. She had to assume there were people after her, or at least watching. Sometimes she would come home from an evening out and she would have that eerie feeling that someone had been in her apartment. She suspected dear old stepdad, Isaac Sotza, the Venezuelan mob boss, had people keeping an eye on her. He probably knew where to find her from the moment she left his estate.

But did his second-in-command? Her mind flashed back to her time in Venezuela. The brief month before her mother ushered her out of the country in a daring escape. Mateo Gutierrez. Cartel to the marrow of his bones. Sotza's right hand man and her constant shadow while she was in Sotza's care.

Mateo was everything she hated in a man, arrogant, dangerous, rude. But he was also indecently attractive. And for some reason he'd wanted her. She wondered if the two years since she last saw him had dimmed his regard. Somehow, she doubted it. Even in her brief time observing the mafia, she noticed the guys didn't let things go. They held onto their grudges, their obsessions. She suspected those qualities were what made the men so hard and so successful.

Raina flitted around her apartment, shoving her possessions into a small suitcase. She didn't have much. She travelled light because she never knew when she'd have to pick up and run. She had done it before, but never in this much of a hurry. That was because she'd done something stupid. She crossed the wrong people and it was only a matter of time before they found out and came after her. She suspected sooner rather than later.

And she was right. Seconds after that thought entered her head, as she was reaching for her purse, preparing to leave her tiny apartment for good, the door crashed open. The only thing that saved her from being shot in the heart as she stood gaping at the man who kicked the door in was the fact that he kicked it so hard it rebounded off the wall and slammed shut again. The bullet meant for her thudded into the heavy wooden door.

Raina dropped her purse and ran for the only place in her apartment with a door that would close and lock. Her bathroom. As she ran, reaching for the frame, her front door was flung open again and the room sprayed in bullets. She felt a tearing, hot pain hit her in the back. The force of the bullet flung her into the bathroom. She landed hard on her knees. She didn't have time to assess herself. She rolled onto her back and kicked the door shut, reaching up to lock it. Thank god these old Italian buildings had thick doors. Bullets thunked into the wood as she crawled toward the bathtub and dragged herself inside.

"f**k!" she snarled, reaching behind her to touch the spot on her back. Her hand came away covered in blood. She really hoped the bullet hadn't taken out her only good kidney. Even if it didn't, the blood loss for someone like her could be catastrophic.

She had to get out before the man who shot her got inside the bathroom. She'd picked this place because it had a window in the washroom with a fire escape. She was going to have to get out of the bathtub though, since the window was over the toilet. She took a deep breath, eyed the bathroom door, which was still in one piece and flung herself out of the tub. As she was kneeling on the toilet reaching for the latch, she realized there were no more sounds hitting the door. Had they given up on coming after her?

That didn't make sense. The front door was thicker than the bathroom door and they'd had no problem breaking through that one. She stopped, her hands hovering against the window, and listened. At first there was nothing, and then she heard muffled thumping sounds. A man shouted, but it was cut off. What were they doing out there, killing each other?

Raina wasn't going to wait around to find out. Whatever was happening it couldn't be good. And she needed medical attention right away.

She turned back to the window. A scream leapt from her and she fell off the toilet as bullets crashed through the window. A man had come up the fire escape to cover the window and she'd come face to face with him. She huddled on the floor as small as she could get and covered her arms with her head.

She knew she was a dead woman when she finally heard the sound she'd been expecting. The bathroom door crashed open, smashing against the bathtub. She tensed, waiting for that awful hot tearing sensation to rip through her again as she was shot full of holes. Instead, she heard two muffled shots and a shout from the balcony.

When the seconds ticked by and she was still alive she chanced a peek through her arms. Mateo Gutierrez was standing over top of her; tall, scowling, eyes and gun trained on the window.

"Mateo!" she gasped.

"Raina," he acknowledged grimly and looked down at her. He reached for her, dragging her off the floor.

She groaned in pain but was forced to follow as he pulled her out of the bathroom and into the main room. She gaped at the two dead men decorating her place. They hadn't stood a chance. Probably thought they were going to kill a helpless woman. They would have no idea that she had an entire cartel at her back and, apparently, at her disposal.

"Jacket, shoes, purse. Hurry up," he barked at her.

Raina didn't pause. Her only chance of survival was with this man. She dragged a leather coat on, flinching in pain as it stuck to her back. She bent over to tie up her running shoes, but as she straightened, dizziness engulfed her. Mateo caught her before she hit the floor, grabbing the part of her back that had been shot. She cried out, clutching his arm to shove him away.

"What's wrong?" he demanded.

"Shot," she muttered.

He turned her around and lifted her jacket and shirt. He muttered something she suspected was a nasty swear word in Spanish.

"Is it bad?" she asked, peeking at him over her shoulder.

"No," he growled, and then picked her up in his arms.

This was the second time he'd done this. The first time he'd been kidnapping her from her university campus. This time? She didn't know. He was definitely saving her life, but she suspected there was more to him being here. The timing was too convenient.

"Mateo?" she whispered as he glanced into the hallway before striding out her door.

"Si, Raina?" He took the stairs two at a time, careful to hold her tight against his chest so he wouldn't jar her wound.

"Thanks for coming for me." She had to say the words in case she didn't get another chance.

He paused for a moment on the second-floor landing and looked down at her, his dark eyes hot with anger, possession and longing. "I will follow you into hell, chica."

"Let's hope not," she sighed right before passing out.