"Ya llegaron con Don Salvador!" Pepe, one of the hacienda's workers ran in to inform us. (They've arrived with Don Salvador)

Three other men walked in huddled around one another, carrying my father who was unconscious.

"Papa!"

I tried to get over to them but Alex held on to me as they hurried past me. Martin ordered them to take dad to his bedroom and the doctor who had arrived a few minutes earlier followed behind them to examine my dad.

He had given specific orders that no one was allowed in the room with him while he worked on checking my dad's injury.

Mom, Don Ernesto and Don Rafael walked in with injuries of their own, their clothes all bloody and dirty. Mom looked the worse, her shirt was drenched in blood that wasn't her own, probably because she had been with my father when it all happened.

"Where do they have him?" she looked around frantically. Her eyes were red from crying and her bottom lip trembled as she tried not to cry.

"The doctor is with him. We're not allowed in there." Martin lead her over to the couch where I was sitting.

As soon as my eyes connected with hers I burst out crying. She gripped me in a tight embrace and I cried in her arms like a little girl.

I couldn't control myself. I should've been the one comforting her, but my feelings got the best of me.

I had just gotten back my relationship with my father. After four years of being apart, of treating him unfairly when all he did was love me and miss me.

God can't take him away from me.

"Your dad is a strong man. Don't worry mi niña." she assured me, kissing the side of my face.

"Are you guys okay? Do we need to call another doctor to take a look at you?" Santiago asked his dad and uncle. They had taken a seat across from us and looked beaten.

"We're fine. Just a few cuts and bruises...nothing to worry about." Don Ernesto assured his son.

"Does Marlina know what happened to her son?" mom asked looking around for my grandmother.

"She left a while ago" Martin replied. "I'm hoping by the time she gets home we'll have good news. I don't want her to worry right now...you know how she is."

After a long and dreadful hour of waiting, the doctor finally walked out of the room and joined us all in the livingroom.

"How is he?!" both my mother and I jumped up from our seats.

"The bullet went through his chest but no damage was done to the heart."

"Is he going to be okay?' Alex asked.

The doctor nodded. "He'll just need a lot of rest and I've written a presccription for the pain." he handed my mom the slip.

Thank God.

"Can we see him?" Martin asked the doctor.

"Yes, but try not to agitate him. He needs to be calm and rest as much as possible. If you have any questions or there are any complications don't hesitate to give me a call. I'll be back in three days to check his progress."

"Thank you, doctor." mom shook his hand.

After he left Alex called one of the maids and asked her to show all of our guests to their rooms. It had been a long and stressful day for everyone, my friends had been so supportive through all of it and they needed to get some rest.

The couples would be sharing a room while the single bedrooms would go to Joel, Don Ernesto and Don Rafael.

"Please follow Regina who will take you to your rooms. And if any of you need anything our employees will gladly assist you.

Nessa, Sofia and Claire gave me a quick hug before leaving and I thanked them for everything.

Santi walked over to me and gave me a quick kiss on the lips. "No more crying, hermosa." (beautiful)

"I'll be with you in a few minutes." I assured him.

"Take your time."

*~*~*~*



My brothers and I followed our mom to dad's room, or what used to be their bedroom when we lived in the hacienda.

He was laying in bed with his eyes closed and there was a long white bandage wrapped around his upper chest. His breathing was slow but he looked so peaceful while he slept.

Mom laid on the bed next to him and leaned in to kiss him. "Gracias a Dios que estas bien, mi amor." (Thank God you're okay, my love.)

Dad let out a small groan and slowly opened his eyes, he looked around the room and at our worried faces.

"What happened to me?" he asked confused and tried to sit up but my mom was quick to push him back down gently without hurting him.

"Don't move daddy. You'll hurt yourself." I pulled a chair next to his bed and took his hand.

"You don't remember what happened, apa?" Martin asked him.

Dad furrowed his eyebrows and shook his head confused. "The last thing I remember is landing in Tamaulipas with your mom, Ernesto and Rafael. What happened?"

"You guys were intercepted in the middle of the road on your way home by Hector's cartel. One of the zetas shot you in the chest."

"Are Ernesto and Rafael okay?" he asked.

"They're fine" mom assured him.

"I'm glad to see you're okay." he looked up at my mom adoringly. "Better me than you."

Always so protective of mom.

"I promise I'll kill Hector, dad" Martin growled. He was pissed. It was his way of coping with the fear and worry he had felt during this whole ordeal.

As hard as it is to believe, this was the first time my dad had gotten shot. In all the years of being in the business he had never been hurt this badly. The worst thing that's ever happened to him was getting beat up by a group of men from the opposing cartel.

This was the type of situation my mother had been trying to prevent from happening when she asked my father to quit the cartel and have a normal life with us.

"We were so worried, dad." I told him. "I thought you were going to die."

He chuckled. "I wouldn't leave a las dos mujeres mas importantes de mi vida just when I got them back." he brought my hand up to his lips and kissed it. (the two most important women in my life.)

"I'm never losing you two again."

Alex rolled his eyes at my dad jokingly. "You spoil her too much, dad. That's why she's such a little brat!"

"HEY!"

Martin laughed and agreed with him. "She'll be even worse now that she's with Santi. He worships her just as much as you do." he told dad. "Maybe even more..."

"Whatever!"

"You two are grown men...leave your sister alone" dad laughed at his sons. "Gabriela is the baby of the family, she's my only daughter. Of course I expect nothing but the best for my princess."

I stuck my tongue out at my brothers, making my parents laugh.

This was just like old times.

"It feels good to have my whole family home again." Dad grinned happily.

*~*~*

1 month later

We'd been staying at my family's hacienda ever since the attacks. Don Ernesto and Santiago were trying to find a new house in Sinaloa since they felt like it wasn't safe us to live there now that our enemy knew the location of the mansion.

While Martin and Santiago controlled both cartels from Tamaulipas, it made it easier for both Cartels to do business together. My brother took care of routes to smuggle merchandise into the US and Santi took care of providing the drugs and talking to potential sellers in the states.

Mike owns most of California so he helped Santi get connections in some Northern states where he didn't know any people.

The girls and I kept ourselves occupied by helping out around the hacienda, going horseback riding, swimming and tanning by the pool or going shopping with my mom and grandma. Anytime we wanted to go into the city we had to take a bunch of bodyguards with us so we tried to do that as minimal as possible.

That night we'd decided to have a bonfire with the whole group since Claire and Mike would be leaving the next day to go back home to Cali.

We'd spent so much time with Claire and gotten to know her as a person. She is such a sweet and brave women who is a professional at handling all the baggage that comes with being the woman of a drug dealer. She'd given us plenty of advice on how to adapt ourselves to this dangerous life and I was so grateful to have a friend like her who I could trust and confide all the chaos that goes on in my life. I was going to miss her so much.

We were all sitting around the fire, mom had brought us the stuff to make s'mores and gone back inside with the rest of the parents who had decided to go to sleep early.

"You guys should come visit us sometime...all of you! We can show you around, have any of you been to Cali?" Claire asked the group.

All the guys had been to California on business but Nessa, Sofi and I had never had the chance to visit since we didn't have the money. All of our checks from working at the club went to paying for our rent, food and other essential stuff.

"I've always wanted to go!" Sofi said excitedly. "If we go we should definitely go shopping. That's the first thing we're doing!"

"You promise to take them Santi?" Claire asked my boyfriend.

"Why is it up to me?"

She rolled her eyes. "Leo and Daniel follow your orders so they'll do anything you tell them. Now that all three of you have girlfriends you need to learn to take some time off from the job...it's not all about you guys anymore."

Santi laughed at his friend. "Okay, okay I promise. Once this war with Hector is over we'll go visit and spend a few months up there."

"Yessss!"

"And if for any reason you need my help... you already know my people and I are on your side." Mike reminded Santi.

It made me feel good to know we had such loyal and supportive friends. It's hard to find trustworthy friends in the mafia world, especially when all cartels are competitive between each other. With this new generation of mobsters many of the old school rules have been forgotten, I'm pretty sure if it weren't for the fact that my faherand Don Ernesto are long time friends, Martin and Santi would be enemies.

They get along well and they're good friends but their cartels always come first, if that friendship didn't exist Martin would have tried to kick El Cartel de Sinaloa from the number one spot. He would want my family's cartel to be the most powerful cartel in Mexico.

And now they had another reason to work together and have the cartels side by side.

Me.

There's no way the alliance between El Cartel de Sinaloa and El Cartel del Golfo could be broken now. If I were to get married to Santiago the cartels would remain connected for life. My kids would have the Bustamante and Romano names, the top two most powerful cartels in Mexico to protect them...but they would also inherit all the enemies both families have made over the years.

Just my luck.

"Thanks man" Santi said to Mike. "But I think Martin and I have everything under control...there's no way Hector can bring us down. We have the people, we have the allies and we have the power. And as long as we're together he doesn't stand a chance."

Martin smirked. "Damn right he doesn't."

"ARRIVA EL CARTEL DEL GOLFO!" Alex raised his beer in the air.

" Y EL CARTEL DE SINALOA CABRONES!" Leo yelled at the top of his lungs, which made all the guys join in on the cheering.

Even Joel showed his pride for the cartel.

Long live the cartels...

*******

Thank you so much for reading! Getting very close to the ending and finding out who the traitor is. I have a very special request for all my creative readers. I want to get a new book cover for this book and maybe for it's coming sequel. It would be awesome if you guys could make them and send them to me, I'll pick my favorite one and feature the rest of them in the coming chapters.

You can send them to me on here or to my personal e-mail wenmartinez22@yahoo.com

Additionally... I want to know where all my readers/followers live. Comment below leaving your Country or City.

Any fellow Texans out there? Lol

Hugs&Besos

wendy1122