Chapter One: The Unspoken Rule
640 Words
In the dead of night, the rain lashed against the rusted roof of the cartel compound like it was trying to wash away a sin too deep to cleanse.
Jareth stood motionless, a trembling bundle in his arms. Three crying infants—his daughters. His curse, according to the law of La Sangre Roja, the most feared cartel in the country.
In this world, daughters were not blessings—they were liabilities.
And Pandemafia, the cartel’s supreme leader, had made that rule very clear:
"Only sons continue the bloodline. Kill the girls. Burn their names from history."
Jareth’s hands shook as he looked into the girls’ eyes—innocent, wide, unaware. Behind him, his wife wept silently, clutching a rosary between bloodstained fingers.
There was no time. The boss had given him till sunrise.
But Jareth wasn’t just any subordinate. He was once Pandemafia’s most trusted man, the same man who’d taken bullets for the boss in the Eastern War. His loyalty was iron. But now—now, it bent under the weight of fatherhood.
He kissed each baby gently, whispered something only the wind heard, and made a decision that would haunt his bloodline for years.
He would not kill them.
Instead, he vanished into the night.
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By morning, rumors whispered through the compound—
“The traitor ran.”
“Three girls born in secret.”
“Pandemafia is furious.”
No one dared speak Jareth’s name aloud. No one asked where he’d gone.
But Pandemafia did not forget.
And deep inside the mansion, behind iron doors and cigar smoke, he murmured to his sons—Kendra, Kenzie, and Kendall—and his hidden daughter, Riley:
“One day, they will return. And when they do, you will find them… and finish what your traitor father could not.”
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Ten Years Later – Paris
The crowd roared like thunder as the spotlight fell on the stage. Areniel gripped the mic with a grace carved from years of practice. Her sisters, Rachel and Renelle, stood beside her, dazzling in black sequins. Together, they were known across Europe as The R Sisters, a trio of fire, rhythm, and rebellion.
No one in the crowd knew they were born in blood.
No one knew a cartel had tried to erase them.
No one knew their real names.
As they performed their final number, their mother, now a renowned fashion assistant, watched from backstage, pride and fear tangled in her chest. She had given up everything for this moment—escaping the country, raising them in hiding, working as a maid until fate opened the right doors.
Now, fame had brought them back to the one place she swore they'd never return—their father's land.
But it wasn’t fame that brought them home. It was an invitation.
A global fashion label had offered her a contract she couldn’t refuse—on the condition that she returned to her homeland. A deal forged in glamour… and shadows.
---
Meanwhile – Back in the Homeland
Riley scrolled through her phone, lips curling in envy. Her followers were dropping.
The R Sisters were trending. Again.
She didn’t need to know them to hate them.
She hated the way they smiled. She hated their influence.
Most of all, she hated that they existed—and her father hadn’t lifted a finger.
She threw the phone across the room and stormed into Pandemafia’s private study.
“I want them gone,” she hissed. “Wipe them out. I don’t care how.”
The old man looked at his daughter, the only one he hadn’t officially claimed.
He picked up a silver lighter, flicked the flame, and stared into it.
“They’re just girls,” he said, voice like smoke. “But girls can bleed.”
He closed the lid.
“Make the call.”
- Writer
