Page 35 of Her Defiant Warrior

He looked over at her, then gave a rueful smile. “You sure about that? It’s a long story.”

“I’m positive.”

“Okay, you can’t say I didn’t warn you. At this point there were only four of us Drakos kids, and we were living and going to school in Curitiba where Dad was overseeing the construction of an airport. He was pulled away for two months to advise on some stadium in Rio de Janeiro. Mom decided to pull us out of school so she could show us all that Rio offered. That included taking the train up Sugarloaf Mountain to see the Christ the Redeemer statue three times.”

“Three times, huh?”

“Yep. It never changed, but Mom swore she saw something different in Christ’s eyes every time. Dad says it was the Irish in her.”

Bonnie gave an incredulous laugh. “My dad used to say the exact same thing about my mom. Does your mom have red hair too?”

“No, but Grandma Maureen does. She was born in Ireland.”

Bonnie smiled. Somehow, hearing how their moms were alike made her feel even more comfortable around him. It was stupid, but there it was.

“Did she homeschool you those two months?”

“You bet your ass she did. Plus, we visited all the churches, museums, missions, and everything else that had any kind of historical significance. Eleni, my older sister, dug in her heels and stayed in Curitiba with one of her friends and continued school there. But the two boys and I were all for missing school. It was one big adventure.”

“So, how did you meet Angelica?”

Jase raked his fingers through his hair. It was the first time Bonnie had picked up on any kind of nervous tic from the man. “Mom made friends with ladies at the church we were attending. They were going to go visit an orphanage that was hours out of town. They’d heard they took in kids from Rio’s favelas and were doing good work. Mom was interested after some changes that she’d helped to instigate in the orphanages in Peru.”

Bonnie had questions, but she didn’t interrupt. She was too interested to hear about Angelica.

“So, if Mom went, the three of us had to go. Plus, we had to put on church clothes again. That sucked.” Jase gave a small smile as he took another bite of his meat, then washed it down with a sip of his beer. Bonnie watched him swallow.

Even his neck was sexy.

“Anyway, it was some kind of celebration for the orphanage. If you could call it that.” Again, Bonnie could see that Jase was lost in his memories, and this time she could see they weren’t good.

“What happened when you got there?” she asked.

“Out of the three of us boys, I was the only one who’d picked up Portuguese since we’d arrived. The other two were fluent in English and Spanish, same as me, but they were lagging behind in Portuguese.”

“Portuguese?”

“I know, kind of weird. But that’s the national language of Brazil. During the ceremony they translated everything into English so Mom could understand. I caught on real quick that they wanted Mom to donate and find other Americans to donate. The little weasel in charge kept droning on. That’s when me and the other two decided to go snooping.” Jase looked over at her. “Do you like your food?”

Bonnie looked down in surprise and saw that more than half her meal was gone. “I love it. But I enjoy listening to your story even more.”

“Okay, but soon you’re going to be on the hot seat. I’m going to want to hear all about Bonnie Larkin.”

“Yeah, but I already told you everything.”

Jase snorted. “I doubt that.”

“Keep going. You were at the snooping part.”

“Renzo had been in a bad orphanage in Peru. He warned us about what we could find. I didn’t believe him.” Jase carefully set down his knife and fork on the edge of his plate and dabbed his mouth with his napkin. “Fuck, Bonnie, I just didn’t believe him.”

Bonnie’s mouth went dry.

I’m going to hate this. I know it.

She took a sip of water.

“Malik, Renzo, and I ended up finding where they were housing the sick and incorrigible children in actual cages way in the back of the facility. It was God awful. It was just like Renzo had warned us.”