"They're guarding the outside of the building,” Rocco said.
Lark looked confused. "Shouldn't they?"
"Not if they're worried about someone breaking in." He tapped the map. "They're worried about someone getting out."
Dante couldn't stop staring at the second-floor window. Every instinct screamed at him to charge the front gate. He wanted to kick in doors and find his little sister. He'd dreamed about this moment for years, and now, it was less than two hundred yards away. And for some reason, he couldn't move.
Rocco quietly stepped beside him. "I know how you’re feeling."
"You don't,” Dante insisted. Rocco didn't argue. Instead, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a worn photograph of his parents.
"I was twelve when my mother died, and I lost my father six years later. Dante looked down at the photo. "I wanted revenge." He smiled sadly. "My uncle told me something that changed my mind, though.
"What did he tell you?” Dante asked.
"'Dead heroes don't save anyone.'" Rocco folded the picture and tucked it away again. "If you run through that front gate, your sister loses you all over again.”
Dante looked toward the mission and closed his eyes. He hated how right Rocco was. He looked over to where Lark was quietly wandering toward the tree line. She'd taken Isabella's journal with her. She'd been reading it every chance she got as though searching for clues. He was sure that a part of her was trying to know the woman she'd barely had time to know.
A few minutes later, she called softly. "I found something." Both men joined her, and she pointed toward a sketch inside the journal. "It isn't just the church."
Rocco leaned closer. “Right, it’s the mission”
She nodded. "My mother drew both."
Dante frowned. "Why?" Lark slowly turned another page and found a faded note that had been tucked into the binding. She carefully unfolded it. It was no bigger than a postcard with Isabella's elegant handwriting on the back.
"Michael watches over the innocent."
Below the sentence was a drawing, not of the mission, but of a statue of Saint Michael with his sword raised and shield lifted.
Rocco's eyes widened. "The statue."
Lark looked up at him and smiled. "Yes, the statue.”
"If your mother left clues, I’m betting that she hid something there,” Rocco said.
“Now what?” Lark asked.
“Now, we wait for the right moment to go in there. We sit tight and watch for our opening,” Dante said.
Darkness settled over the valley. The guards changed shifts, and floodlights now illuminated the fence. Rocco watchedthrough the scope of his rifle. "There,” he said. A maintenance worker walked through the front gate, pushing a food cart, and no one searched it. No one even questioned him.
Dante noticed it too. "They feed them every night, and no one bothers to check the food or the person delivering it."
Lark looked between them. "I've got an idea."
Both men turned. "I’m Rafael Santos's daughter."
Rocco immediately frowned. "No."
"They'll recognize me,” she insisted.
"Exactly why I’m telling you no,” Rocco said.
She pointed toward the food cart. "Keller thinks I'm running. He'd never expect me to walk through the front gate."
Dante shook his head. "Absolutely not."
