Chapter 1

Alejandro Perez climbed out of his Lamborghini , a heavy- duty vehicle armoured with reinforced panels and bulletproof glass, built to withstand a bomb explosion. The heat outside was relentless. His sunglasses protected his beautiful eyes from the bright Venezuelan sunlight, he ignored the constant complaints of the English assistant sent to greet him at the airport. While he understood the man’s tension he was also irritated by it.

Alejandro had not experienced an easy childhood . He had known loathing, rage and bitterness, but fear no longer had the power to hold him. His relentless rise to power and influence had featured in hundreds of magazines and newspaper features, but his birth and childhood had always been a secret to the public. When he was eighteen he had been told the truth about his roots.

Any future ambition he had died that same day when his chosen career had become a complete impossibility. With every successive year that had passed since then, he had grown tougher, colder and more ruthless. He had used his brilliant intellect and razor-sharp instincts to build a huge business empire. That he had not had to break the law to become a billionaire was a harsh source of pride to him.

‘There’s a heavy security presence here,’ his assistant, Carlos, muttered uneasily.

It was true, Alejandro acknowledged. Armed guards were everywhere: on the rooftops of the ranch buildings, in every manicured clump of trees or bushes, their state of alert palpable. ‘It should make you feel safe,’ Alejandro said.

‘I won’t feel safe until I’m back home again,’ Carlos confided, mopping his round, sweaty face.

‘Perhaps this was not the job for you.’ Alejandro replied him

He dealt Alejandro a look of dismay. ‘Believe me, I meant no offence. I’m delighted to be of service.’ Carlos said feeling guilty.

Alejandro said nothing. He was surprised that such a man had been chosen to act as an assistant in a secret meeting. But then, how many publicly respectable men accepted the kind of undercover jobs that forced them into uncomfortable situations? He walked confidently into the cool air-conditioned interior of the opulent ranch house where a tight-faced older man awaited him.

Carlos was dismissed like a servant of no importance, while Alejandro was looked over and greeted with a level of respectful curiosity that bordered on amazement.

‘It is a very great pleasure to meet you, Mr Perez,’ the older man greeted in Italian. ‘I’m Alberto Castillo. Mr Fernandez is eager to see you.’

‘How is he?’ Alejandro asked.

The other man grimaced. ‘His condition is stable at present but it’s unlikely that he has more than a couple of months left.’

Alejandro nodded. He had thought long and hard before he had agreed to visit and the old man’s declining health had provided the spur.

The infamous Adrian Fernandez, head of one of the most notorious crime families in the world, was a stranger to him. Yet Angelo had never been able to forget that the same blood that ran in Adrian’s veins ran in his own.

The elderly man lay propped up in a hospital-style bed surrounded by medical equipment. His face was lined with ill health. Breathing stentorously, he feasted his clouded dark gaze on Alejandro and sighed. ‘I can’t tell you that you look like your mother because you don’t. Maria was petite... ‘

Almost immediately the rigid cast of Alejandro features softened, for his mother had shown him the only tenderness he had ever known.

‘But you have the look of my father and your own. Your parents were the Romeo and Juliet of their generation,’ Don Fernandez recited with caustic humour. ‘A Sanchez and a Fernandez, not a match made in heaven as far as either family was concerned and the bride and groom were at each other’s throats within weeks of the wedding.’

‘Is that why my mother ended up scrubbing floors for a living?’ Alejandro enquired with sarcasm in his voice.

The old man was unmoved by the reminder. ‘She ended up doing that because she abandoned her husband and disowned her family. Who would deny that she was my favourite? It was once my pleasure to spoil her and indulge her every wish.’

‘So, my mother was a real Mafia princess?’ Alejandro sliced in with sardonic bite, unimpressed by the misty fairy-tale aspect of that assurance.

‘Don’t mock what you don’t know about.’ Adrian Fernandez sent him an impatient look. ‘Your mother had the whole world at her feet. And what did she do? She turned her back on all that education and fine breeding and married your father.

Compared to us, the Sanchez were local...uncultured people. Marvin Sanchez was a handsome hothead always looking for a fight. She couldn’t handle him or his extra-marital activities.’

‘How did you deal with the situation?’ Alejandro was impatient to have the facts that had so far evaded his every attempt to discover them.

‘In this family we don’t interfere between a man and his wife. When Martins was jailed for the second time, your mother walked out on her marriage. She ran away from her home and her responsibilities as though she was a little kid.’

‘Maybe she felt that she had good cause.’

Dark eyes crackling with grim amusement rested on Alejandro . ‘And maybe you’re in for a surprise or two, you also contributed to the death of your mother.