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Maria jumped to her feet.
“Please, sit down,” Esteban said. His low commanding voice held a note of weariness.
Maria settled herself back on the sofa.
“Señor del Fuego, please accept my deepest condolences on the loss of your sister and cousin. If I had known today was the funeral, I would have been more respectful with my dress,” she said sincerely.
She could tell her words affected the man when he gave her a curt but gracious nod. “Thank you. They were beautiful young women, and they will be missed. Please, call me Esteban. These are my brothers, Enrique and Alejandro.”
She recognized them from the thorough report Jake had prepared on the family. Esteban spoke with a very slight Spanish accent, and he looked more cultured and polished than she’d expected, but there was a steeliness in his expression which suggested the man was not to be underestimated.
“What can I do for you, Maria Ruiz?” he asked, settling himself behind the desk in the high-back chair. The other two men remained at the door, standing like silent sentries, watching her carefully.
She cleared her throat. “As I’m sure you know, I’m with a private security company. We were tasked with protecting the band Madison Grace.”
He gave a small nod and motioned for her to continue.
“Our client, the drummer in the band, was seriously injured during the shooting at the hotel. We are not working with the authorities, and in fact, we don’t think they are very interested in solving this case. They believe the murders of Cristina and Renata were a cartel hit, and our client, Teagan Tate, was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Esteban flinched slightly when she said the women’s names, but otherwise he gave no reaction, so Maria continued.
“Teag is awake, and he is the sole witness to this crime.”
At that, Esteban’s eyes flicked to his brothers.
“I believe we might be able to help one another,” she said softly. “We need more information in order to protect Teagan, and I suspect you’d like to know the shooter’s identity.”
“Your Teagan can identify the shooter?” Esteban asked, eyes narrow.
“He can,” Maria said.
“And he has not given this information to the police?”
“Of course he has, but they have no leads, and the shooter doesn’t pop in any criminal databases.”
Esteban held her gaze, as if taking her measure. He tapped his fingers on the desktop and seemed to come to a decision.
“Cristina was about to be engaged to Javier Suarez. Our two families have been, how shall I say, at odds for quite some time. This marriage was the first step in creating an alliance.”
“Was Cristina amenable to this marriage?” Maria asked.
Esteban quirked an eyebrow. The fact that the young woman had been shot in another man’s hotel room, expecting to enjoy a ménage no less, hovered between them.
“We don’t live in the Dark Ages, Maria. Cristina and Javier were introduced and were interested in one another. Having said that, my sister was a force of nature, and something of a wild child. She made it perfectly clear that she would enjoy her freedom right up until the wedding.”
Maria stared at Esteban. “And you allowed this?”
Maria didn’t believe there was anything wrong with a woman owning her sexuality and going after what she wanted, but culturally, there were most definitely double standards.
Esteban sighed. “I am not my father. I gave her more latitude. She was the youngest. Smart. Beautiful. Overindulged, certainly, but she also had vision and dreams of her own. I tried not to stifle them. If she had not wanted to marry Javier, I would not have forced her. As far as her trysts,” he paused and waved a hand through the air. “They would have ended when she married. My sister was nothing if not loyal.”
Maria wondered about his assessment, but of course she’d never know the truth of Cristina’s intentions, not that they mattered now anyway.
“Were Javier and his family so progressive in their thinking?”
Esteban’s mouth flattened into a thin line. “It appears not.”
“You think he had her killed because she was with other men?”
