“Was your mother able to contact your father?”
“I don’t think they gave her the chance. She did later, once we were in her home village, and that’s when he decided to marry her. But getting papers for us even after they were married wasn’t easy. We stayed there for a year and a half.” She swallowed and said with quiet force, “I hated it.”
“Mexico?”
“Yes…no. It was being transplanted like that. I had nightmares for a long time about being rounded up. I think I got separated from Mom once. At least in my nightmares I always did.” She hadn’t had that one in a long time, but it had made occasional appearances even when she was in her twenties. “These men were laughing and grabbing at me…” Her throat closed at the memory. “Probably they were trying to help, but they scared me. Even once we got there and Mom’s family took us in, I never fit in the village even though I spoke Spanish.” She laughed a little. “Honestly, I was probably a spoiled little princess. It was really primitive compared to what I was used to. I became painfully shy and I clung to Mom but I was mad at her, too, because she didn’t take me home.”
“Thus Arturo and Julia.” The understanding in his eyes twisted something in her.
“Yes. Maybe for kids like them it would be less traumatic to have stayed with their mom, but I’m not convinced. I’d like to think the process isn’t as brutal now as it was when it happened to Mom and me, but I’ve heard some awful stories. And also…” She hesitated. “Well, obviously the kids weren’t with their mother when she was arrested. If she’d told immigration agents where to find her children, she’d have been ratting on a bunch of other people who probably didn’t have papers, either. If they’d been family, they probably would have taken care of Arturo and Julia, but they weren’t. There’s this sort of, um, underground network for making sure the children stay safe when that kind of thing happens. Sometimes when the kids leave me they do go back to Mexico or the Dominican Republic or wherever their parents are. Sometimes another family member eventually comes for them. And sometimes…” She flicked a glance at him.
“Sometimes Mom or Dad sneaks across the border and comes to pick up their own kids.”
“Yes. I never meet them. Matteo is my main contact.” She narrowed her eyes at Conall. “Will you report him?”
He shook his head. “I said I wouldn’t get you in trouble, Lia. As far as I’m concerned, Matteo was never here. I didn’t meet him. Some caseworker picked up the kids. Why would I pay attention?”
“Thank you,” she made herself say.
“You don’t have to thank me, Lia.” His voice was like a soft touch, one that raised goose bumps on her arms. He sounded…tender, a word she immediately tried to reject. She had to be imagining it.
“Yes, I do.” She stiffened. “Does Jeff know, too?”
“I don’t think so. He hasn’t said anything and neither have I. I don’t get the feeling he’s all that observant.”
Lia didn’t, either. “But he’s a DEA agent.”
“He’s good for this kind of job, but I don’t think he’s done much undercover work. He hasn’t learned to watch everyone, always.”
“How can you do that? Doesn’t the stress kill you?”
“It becomes habit. Everybody has an intuitive awareness of their surroundings. It’s a survival skill. Most people deliberately tamp it down. They convince themselves it’s unnecessary. For me it is.”
That simple. He was matter-of-fact about it. He did a dangerous job and needed to be preternaturally aware of everyone and everything around him. She’d never had a hope of avoiding his sharp eye, Lia realized. She was lucky, that’s all, because he’d deemed what she did harmless enough not to weigh against her usefulness. He was being practical, that’s all. For him, the mystery was solved. For her…well, she either had to trust him or to say no the next time—and every time—Matteo called.
“Will you ask your brother who he heard the rumor from?”