“Yes, your highness.”
I was happy they were at each other, and Tía Isabela was not concentrating on me.
“Don’t take that tone with me. Did you go out of this house last night?”
“You said I could if I came home early.”
“Did you come home early? I can ask Mrs. Rosario.”
“It was early to me. It was before midnight. Wasn’t it, Delia?” she asked, turning to me.
I looked at Tía Isabela. “I was asleep early myself,” I said.
“You’d never stand up for me, would you?” Sophia complained. “But you expect me to come to your defense all the time.”
“I didn’t say you were lying. I just said—”
“Yeah, yeah. I came home early, Mother, earlier than you.”
“That’s enough. You’ve spoiled my appetite. I will not allow myself to get stressed out today. It does terrible damage to your face, deepens lines, not that I have that many.”
She suddenly remembered what she had said to me.
“Just be sure to make it clear to Edward, Delia. I expect nothing less from you.”
Again, I said nothing. After breakfast, I went up to my bedroom anticipating Edward and Jesse’s impending arrival. I tried doing some reading for school and some math homework just to keep myself from thinking about it all. I think I dozed off for a while, because suddenly, Sophia was at my door, a gleeful smile on her face. I could hear shouting below.
“Hear that?” she said. “They’re fighting about you.”
I stepped out into the hallway. Edward and Jesse had arrived, and Tía Isabela had intercepted them before they started up the stairway.
Sophia held her smile and followed me to the top of the stairway.
“Do you fools realize how dangerous it is nowadays to travel those back roads in Mexico to that decrepit village? Why would you want to go there and see that poverty? And what about the health issues?”
“You hid our heritage from us all our lives,” Edward responded. “We have a right to know and understand from where we have come.”
“Understand?” She laughed. “Now, you listen to me, Edward Dallas, you can threaten to do whatever you want with your money. I no longer care. I have through my own business associates created a strong financial foundation. What we lose because of you, we lose and you lose, but I am that girl’s legal guardian, not you. She is still in my care and control, and I absolutely forbid your taking her on this idiotic Mexican trip. That’s final.”
I took a few steps down.
“If you defy me, I swear, I’ll go to the police and have them pick you up for kidnapping.”
I saw her pointing to Edward and then to Jesse.
“Don’t either of you test me on this,” she said, turned, and walked to her side of the hacienda. Edward and Jesse stood there looking after her. Then Jesse saw me on the stairway and nodded.
Edward turned to me. “C’mon,” he said. “We’re taking you to lunch. That we can do without the police coming after us.”
I hesitated and looked up at Sophia. She was as pleased as a hog wallowing in cool mud. I hurried down the stairway.
“Hasta la vista,” Sophia cried, laughing.
We hurried out to Edward’s car.
“Just get in,” he said. His face was red with rage. Jesse said he would drive.
“What turned her off on all this?” Edward asked as we pulled away from the hacienda. “She wasn’t so against it when we first told her.”