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I waited anyway.

One second.

Two.

Three.

“Papá?”

Nothing.

I bent over him, burying my face against his shoulder as my fingers knotted in his shirt. For a few seconds, nothing else existed.

“I can’t leave him here,” I murmured.

Lachlan didn’t speak—didn’t tell me we had no choice. Instead, he placed one hand firmly against my back and gave me the few seconds Papá had died to buy us this moment.

A shot cracked somewhere across the courtyard. Lachlan’s hand left my back, and he was on his feet in a heartbeat, angling between me and the sound with Ciro’s pistol raised.

“Stay down.”

I wiped my face with the back of my hand and followed the direction of his gun.

Movement came from the other side of the cab.

Lachlan’s pistol snapped toward it at the same time a rifle barrel appeared around the front of the cab, already aimed at me.

Lachlan stopped.

The man holding it stepped into view.

Mateo appeared behind him with his pistol trained on Lachlan.

Then Marcela stepped into view.

Blood still stained the front of her white blouse, and there was something almost feverish in the way she stared at us.

My stomach twisted.

They hadn’t come across the open courtyard. They’d come up the service road from below, using the truck to hide their approach.

How long had they been standing on the other side?

The guard kept his rifle on me. Mateo kept his pistol on Lachlan.

Lachlan carefully moved farther in front of me without lowering his pistol.

Marcela lifted one hand.

“Nobody shoots.”

Mateo held.

So did the guard.

Marcela’s attention moved past Lachlan to Papá’s body, then back to me.

Then she had the audacity to smile.