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Her eyes went round. “Are you absolutely out of your mind?”
Lyse actually laughed at that, and Emma cut her piercing blue eyes to her. “Sorry,” Lyse said, sobering.
“No, I’d like to know what’s so funny.”
Lyse was scared again. “I’ve wondered probably a couple dozen times in the last few weeks if Omar is completely crazy,” she said. “I’m glad that I’m not the only one.”
Emma stared at her for a moment, and then the corner of her mouth curled upward. When she glanced at me, her expression had returned to fondness. I grinned. “You know you can’t stay mad at me.”
“I might not be able to.” She jerked her head in the vague direction of the office. “But you know Angel’s not so soft on you. She can stay with me; you go talk to your brother.”
Lyse looked up at me, panicked. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
I cupped her cheek. “You’re safe here,” I said. “Emma’s the least scary out of all of us.”
She had gone back to her mixing bowl. “Only because I’m the newest,” she said. “You’re lucky that it’s me here and not Lili. She’d tear you both into chunks before you ever got to Angel.”
I pressed a kiss into the space between Lyse’s eyebrows. “I won’t be gone long,conejita.” I looked at Emma, who was trying not to study us with too much interest. “Look after my girl for a second?”
Emma let out a breath. “El cielo te ayude.” She motioned for Lyse to join her. “Do you know how to make golfeados?”
Lyse shook her head. “I like to eat them, though.”
Emma smiled. “Come shred the cheese for me, and I’ll make sure you get the first one out of the oven.”
I watched them for a moment, enjoying the picture of the two of them together, before I headed for the office. There was no use putting this off anymore…and as much as I trusted Emma, I didn’t want to leave Lyse on her own for too long.
Angel was behind the desk when I walked into his office, and for a split-second, it was like Padre was still there. Their expressions, when pissed off, were the same. He wasn’t looking at me; whatever was on his desk was far too important. So I stood and waited. Padre once kept me waiting for four hours, and I’m sure Angel was remembering that now.
“Who the fuck do you think you are?” Angel finally asked, still not looking at me.
This man is not my older brother, I told myself. If we were just Angel and Omar, I would be sarcastic. I would shoot my mouth off…but this was Angel the Head of the Castillo Family, and I couldn’t rely on humor now. “I’m your enforcer,hermano.”
Angel looked at me, and a chill shot down my spine. If anyone else looked at me like that, I would have already put a hole through their skull. But it was Angel, and even if my hands twitched, I didn’t reach for the gun at the small of my back. He noticed the movement, of course, and he sneered. “Are you?” he demanded.
My jaw clenched. “I have always been loyal toyou, Angel,” I said, and my wording was deliberate. Toward the end of my father’s reign as head of our family, I had sided with Angel when our Padre sent the Rojas thugs after Emma. I chose my brother and stood beside him as he took over.
“Have you?” He threw a file at my feet, and I picked it up. It was security footage from the night of Lyse’s engagement party. I flicked through the images: full-color images of me bringing down some of the deadliest men in the Rojas family. The final image was of Lyse standing between the Rojas boys and me.
“You knew that I went there,” I said, looking through the images. “I wasn’t hiding that from you.”
“I wouldn’t have cared if you killed a thousand of those bastards,” Angel said. “Butwhyare there pictures, Omar?”
I bowed my head. “I forgot the optics,” I admitted. “I didn’t even look for cameras.”
Angel threw another folder at me. “You forgot the cameras in another place too,cabrón.” I didn’t want to pick up the folder; I knew what would be in it. “Pick it up,” Angel ordered through his teeth. My hands shook as I bent to pick up the folder. “Look at it,” he added when I simply held the folder for too long.
I opened the folder and saw myself holding a pillow over my father’s face. I closed the folder again. “What do you want me to say?” I asked when Angel didn’t speak. “He set you up and put you in a coma. He nearly got Emma killed.”
Angel held up his hand. “I’m not angry that he’s dead,” he said. “I wanted him dead. Isenthim to that place to die alone.” He shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe just how stupid I was. “Do you have any idea what would happen to you if these pictures got out? There would be no protecting you!”
“You don’t think I know that?” Anger exploded in my gut. “I killed our father,” I hissed, lowering my voice just enough. “Idid that. There’s no going back from it.” I motioned for him to keep talking, completely forgetting my own pep talk about not being sarcastic. It was too hard to remain polite when I was shaking with this much anger. “Come on,hermano, read me the rest of my sins. I know you want to.”
Angel wasn’t amused. “Read your sins? That’s what you want? Okay, I told you to come home; you ignored me for days. I told you to leave the Rojas family alone, and you triednegotiatingwith Luis for territory.KidnappingLuis Rojas’s daughter, and then bringing her here.” My stomach dropped, but I kept my face neutral. “Does that about cover it, Omar?”
I nodded. “Yes,” I said. “That covers it.”
“How could you bring her here? After everything her family has done?”
