Page 9 of High

We were nearly free when a blast rang through the air. Thio wrapped an arm around me and took me to the floor behind a large potted fern and a couch. The impact hurt and knocked my breath out of me. He covered my body with his massive warm frame as more shots rang out. I cringed at the horrible sound and was stunned as he met my gaze. The noise around us was deafening, and that sense that again, none of this could possibly be real, overwhelmed me as I stared up into his concerned eyes. His body heat seeped into me, and all at once I was very aware of the fact that I was almost naked under him. Heat flew up my neck and into my face and burned there.

His lips twitched into the familiar cocky grin I’d missed so badly. My entire body vibrated, and it was like the world went from stopped to double speed as he slipped a hand behind my head and moved me until my face was pressed into his neck. He was trying to see underneath the couch, but for a few seconds my whole world was breathing his rich masculine scent into my lungs. Low in my body, my gut clenched. More gunfire rang out and the pot holding the plant that blocked our lower half cracked all the way around as it was hit by bullets. I gripped Thio’s shirt, clinging, and all the good feelings withered inside me.

“Fuck, they’re going to shoot you, too? What is Don Antonio thinking with hiring these idiots?” he snarled angrily.

“They don’t know who I am,” I said, loud enough to be heard. “They’ve never seen me.”

He cut me a wide-eyed look. “Never? How is that possible?”

Silence settled and my ears rang unpleasantly. He carefully eased off in a full-body press to look up, but I zeroed in on a scar I’d never seen before that cut along his neck. It was light pink. Old. When had he gotten it? The discoloration ran from just under his right ear, marring his tan skin in trichromatic pinks—one spot a dash of red—down to disappear under his shirt. He peeked over the top of the couch. My heart clenched. There was so much I didn’t know about what had happened to him while he was gone from me. Or was that, while I was gone from him? Carefully I eased myself up to sitting.

“Move,” he said, and nearby I watched one of his men pop up from behind another potted plant like the one that had hidden our legs. Thio took my hand and pulled me to my feet with so much strength it left me lightheaded. Around the room his men began to come out of the places where they’d taken cover. There were more of them, dressed head to toe in black, than I remembered from upstairs. One huge, particularly muscled man in a black T-shirt and black camo pants had blood splatter over both tattooed arms and knives flashing dangerously in each of his hands. In a corner, he stood over the body of what had to be one of my father’s men. The guard’s neck had been ripped out. I whimpered and Thio tugged me closer with a small soothing sound.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, scanning me.

“No.”

“Oh, Manny. I’m sorry you had to see this,” he whispered and cupped my chin. My heart squeezed. There in his eyes was the care, and exactly what I thought I’d see when—if—he ever came for me.

“I—” Renewed gunshots had us ducking down behind the couch again, though they didn’t sound like they were coming from inside the room, even if the blasts echoed and bounced from the water and walls. Thio’s men dived for cover again. My hair stood on end all over my body. Where did the big man with the knives go? Was he dead now?

Who should I be hoping was okay? My heart hurt. I didn’t want bloodshed.

“Reyes, I fucking know it’s you in there!” came my father’s voice from the entertaining area on the other side of the pool room door, and I groaned. “Knew you’d turn up eventually. Your father told me,” he bellowed. “Begged me not to kill you when you came for him. I told him I’d fucking shoot you where you stood, you cabrón.”

Thio tensed for a second and then sighed, sharing a look with me, then a wicked grin that made me want to smile back. Damn, had he told Tío Luis what was going on between us? Well, what almost went on. How did he know for sure that Thio would come for me when even I had begun to question it? I bit the corner of my lip and squeezed his hand.

He dragged us both to our feet, apparently done hiding, and there was Papá in the doorway, his eyes wild, dressed in nothing but a pair of pajama pants. Terror clawed through me and the room swam. The gun he held in his hand was steady.

“He’ll hurt me for being out,” I whispered. “He will.”

Thio growled and tugged me closer.

“Get away from him!” Papá yelled and pointed the black handgun he carried our way.

“You better be glad it’s me here,” Thio yelled right back, his face turning red. I could see his men getting into position, and recognized Rafael, who was edging out into the open with his gun in both hands. He caught my gaze and I shook my head frantically at him. He couldn’t kill Papá.

“Fuck you, Reyes.”

Thio rested his chin on top of my head, and I felt good for the first time in so long. This was insanity. A gun held by my father was pointed at us, and pure joy still jolted through me. I’d missed him so much.

Thio took a deep breath. “If one of the other cartels you’ve managed to piss off were in here, Manny would be dead by now. You’re not very good at keeping people alive, are you, Don Antonio?”

There was a roar back at us that sounded like a tiger. Papá steadied his gun and I squeezed my eyes shut. Shots rang out. Thio grabbed me and spun us, but we both gasped. My cheek exploded in pain and I forced my eyes wide. What had been his arm, whole and fine, was now split open like someone had taken a slice out of the side with a knife, and my right cheek burned like a wasp was stinging it.

“Fuck,” Thio cursed. “Fuck, you bastard, stop shooting, unless you want to kill Manny.”

“Jefe! Permission?” Rafael asked.

My father let loose a string of cursing. I cringed and buried my face against Thio’s chest, bizarrely more comforted than I had been since I last saw him—and terrified.

“No, no, no, Thio, no.” I didn’t want to watch my papá die, and I didn’t want Thio to die. Papá had to let me go. “If you shoot him, you’ll have to shoot me.”

“What?” Thio whispered, and he froze against me. I looked up, but it wasn’t him who I’d been talking to.

“If you shoot him,” I said louder, so that the words echoed around the pool room. I picked my head up and looked around Thio toward my papá. My cheek was wet, and I thought maybe it was with blood. My body tingled and buzzed. Papá stood across the room with his gun raised. He was bleeding from his leg but hadn’t fallen down. His curls, grayer than I remembered, were everywhere. “You’ll have to shoot me. I’m leaving with him, one way or another. I won’t do this anymore.” My throat hurt. I hadn’t meant to scream those words. They were louder than the gunshots and seemed to echo forever.

Papádidn’t even look me in the eyes. He stared right at Thio, his gun hand rising to steady. That infuriated me. Papá had kept me trapped here with him, but even this wasn’t something he was willing to talk about.