I caught one of my father’s men raping our maid and I lost my shit. I snatched a butcher knife from the nearby table and stabbed him in the neck. After that, it was a blur. When I finally got off of him, my skin was soaked with his blood and he had sixty-six wounds. A six-year-old boy and sixty-six wounds. People saw six-six-six and I was pronounced diablo.
From the moment Victor was pronounced dead, I became the visible son. The only living son. And I fucking hated it. Until that moment, I had my own agenda and businesses I’d kicked off. I knew my responsibilities to the family, but being the second son left me the freedom to do what I wanted outside the family business. I disagreed with Victor’s and our father’s methods. Human trafficking.
Forced prostitution. Selling of women.
I fucking hated it all.
But changes were impossible because for as long as my father lived, he ruled the Jeon Cartel. Imagine the surprise when Park Jimin, that fucking idiotic and impulsive bastard, executed my father. The world suddenly turned their attention to me. A new head to the Jeon Cartel. A colder one. A focused one. A more lethal one. But not more cruel.
The day I buried my father at St. Peter and Paul Catholic Church, rows and rows of upstanding citizens came to see him off. Not because he was a good man, but because he was part of the Florida underground and ruled the crime of the entire state. They wanted to ensure they still had a spot at my table, their hands already eager for more bribes.
The procession of stretch limos, paparazzi, and reporters lingered all around, catching glimpses of visiting criminals.
If only all these upstanding citizens knew how much drama happened in their own worlds.
Just look at D.C. and the Valiente family. That city might as well be called Sin City instead of Vegas. It hid filth and secrets under the illusion of justice and long lines of prominent political figures.
My eyes roamed over the screen. Pages and pages of information, and it finally made sense how Isla and my father came to be.
The old Valiente owed Pietro Jung a favor and had signed The Mafia’s agreement with Hoseok’s father. Jin’s wife shot Pietro, but unfortunately decades of shit takes a long time to clean up. Isla was one of those victims of Pietro’s infamous Mafia’s agreement. My father bought the contract from Pietro when my old man decided he’d fuck everything under the sun so he could produce another son. My father called up to collect the debt and the old Valiente offered up Isla like a sacrificial lamb. Although, Valiente technically had violated that contract - because he didn’t give him his biological daughter.