Page 138 of The Bronze Garza

By thetime Dad and O’Neil come out, I’ve chewed my nails down to the cuticles.

Dad looks worn down, but I leap up and launch myself at him anyway. “Daddy, I’m so sorry.”

He hugs me back hard, pressing his face into my hair. His sigh is loud and heavy, like he’s just rolled a boulder up a hill. “What are you sorry about? All of this is on me. I—”

“Let’s take this out of the station,” Reuben mutters, nudging us both. “Some of these badges are more corrupt than you think.”

A passing officer scowls at Reuben, but he just shrugs and tells the officer, “Find the mole who tipped them off and I’ll retract my statement.”

Color me appalled. Is he allowed to speak to officers like that, especially in their domain? By now I know Red Cage has a working relationship with the LX-PD, but just how informal is that relationship?

“You did good, Henderson,” O’Neil tells Dad once we’re out in the parking lot. “You did really good.” He pats Dad’s back, gives my upper arm a reassuring squeeze, then bids us a good night.

Arms around each other, my head on his shoulder, Dad and I follow Reuben back to his jeep.

“I apologize for treating you so coldly all week,” Dad says. “I needed something to hold onto to get me through this, and my anger—at them, at myself, at Garza—was so thick it was almost tangible, so I gripped it like a goddamn baseball bat and prayed I didn’t get the urge to swing it.”

“Maybe that’s why he told you,” I say. “He’s manipulative like that.”

Dad sighs. “I don’t doubt it.”

“This is a nightmare, Daddy. I don’t even know how to wrap my head around any of this. How to process it.”

“All of it is my fault. I brought them into our lives without a deep background check,” he says glumly. “Your mother’s going to kill me.”

“Imagine a world where we have to do ‘deep’ background checks before getting into a relationship,” I muse in disbelief.

“Well, this is where it gets us when we don’t.”

Reuben unlocks the jeep, and Dad and I get in the back, our fingers laced tightly together.

“How come you haven’t told mom yet?” I ask once we’re settled in.

“Because she wouldn’t have been able to keep her cool long enough for the arrest to happen.”

“What do you mean? Mom is the most zen person I know.”

Dad chuckles humorlessly. “That’s the Lysandrayouknow. She may not have been a conventional mother, but that woman would kill for you.”

Damn. “Really?”

“Your mother chose the ‘zen’ path for a reason,” he informs me. “She had a lot of bottled-up rage and hate on account of things she suffered in her past, and that’s just her way of dealing with it.”

Wow. I had no idea. But I probably should’ve guessed. There’s chill, and then there’sLysandra Callas chill, which is next-level chill. No one’s that chill unless they’re holding something back.

Reuben drives ushome, and as the jeep pulls to a stop outside our house, it feels as if we’ve arrived at a crime scene. The magic of this home I spent the last decade of my life in is gone.Stolen.

“So, is this it?” I ask Reuben. “Is it all over now?”

“For you two, yes.”

“What’s gonna happen to them? Deportation?”

“Well, although they’re all wanted for numerous charges, only Patrick and Eloise are illegal immigrants,” he says. “But the feds’ main goal is to take down the human trafficking gang in Mexicali, so they’re most likely gonna isolate the ones who’ve got more to lose and offer them deals to turn on each other. Eloise and Patrick are wanted on a series of serious crime charges in Moscow, including homicide, so once the feds get what they want from them, they’ll def have them deported and banned.”

I still can’t believe any of this is real. “Thanks, Reuben,” I murmur on a heaving exhale, then open the door and climb out.

When Dad gets out on the other side, Reuben powers down the windows and informs us, “Oh, heads up, Red Cage’s maintaining security detail on you.”