Julio makes his way back to the living room and sits on the couch next to me, where I’ve settled into the corner and into a mild panic attack. “What do you need to tell me, Carlotta? If it’s about your laptop, I already noticed it doesn’t have the school sticker on it. But I’ve overlooked that, because you deserve a reward every now and then.” Julio wraps both his hands around his mug. “Though I wish you would have asked me. That was a big expense. What if I needed it for groceries?”

“I know. I’m sorry.” Wait until he hears what else I’ve done. But first things first. “El Libertador is Sheriff Moss.”

Julio blinks. “What? What do you mean?”

“The sheriff of Houghlin County? The one whose office deported our family three years ago? Yeah, he’s El Libertador.”

Julio sets his mug on the flimsy wood coffee table in front of us. Some of the coffee sloshes out, making a ring around the cup. “You can’t go around saying things like that, Carlotta. What would even make you say such things? If El Libertador finds out—”

“I’ve struck a deal with El Libertador,” I say. Ohmigod. This was supposed to be a delicate conversation. I’m handling this delicate thing as if with a hammer. “He’ll give Mama and Papi safe passage. If I do what he says.”

“No, I’ve struck a deal with El Libertador,” Julio counters. “And if you’ve been talking to him since our meeting, then you’ve been putting my deal in jeopardy.” His brows knit together. Julio’s freedom—the freedom that comes with everything going as planned—was short-lived. Deep down, I mourn the loss of it. Because this conversation isn’t even halfway over. And Julio deserves freedom.

I shut up then, too, because he couldn’t be more right.

I’ve put so much in jeopardy. All for a boy. But Arden’s not just a boy. He’s a piece of me that’s been missing. A vital part of my heart that makes everything else function correctly.

I will never function correctly again.

“I didn’t mean to meet with El Libertador. It’s just that … I’ve been dating someone.”

“You’ve been dating someone, Carlotta? Without telling me? Without asking me?” His hand gestures are all over the place, erratic movements that get speedier the madder he gets. I get somewhat pissed that he’s going to go there. He’s not my father. Technically I don’t have to ask. But our situation is just a little outside the Normal Box. “Who is this boy?”

I swallow. I can’t look him in the eyes when I say, “It’s Sheriff Moss’s son.”

Julio goes quiet. So quiet that I can’t hear his breathing, even though his chest is heaving up and down like a bull focusing in on its next target. “Tell me. Tell me everything. Right now.”

So I do. From the beginning. All of it, no detail spared, except the extent of the kissing. That’s mine to keep to myself and remember how I want. I don’t want Julio’s opinion tainting what were the best moments of my life.

I tell him about the faux robbery, how I met Arden. I tell him about Arden being the one who actually found me the job at Uppity Rooster. I don’t know why I even bother to paint Arden in a positive light though.

Julio will hate him in about five minutes anyway—if he doesn’t already—just for being the sheriff’s son. And my boyfriend.

I tell him about our little prank spree (I say prank, because really, if we were caught for any of them—except for that last one—we’d get slapped with misdemeanors maybe) and that I secretly cut down on my shifts at the Breeze just for this purpose. And then I tell him about our stupid joyride. The one that ultimately led me to the truth about Sheriff Moss.

And I tell him about the deal I struck with the sheriff in the interrogation room of the county jail with the only camera in the room under repair.

And Julio says nothing. He says nothing for a long time. I stay quiet too. I’m giving his temper space to breathe. I feel the malevolence expand into the room and settle in. The furious energy in here could be picked up on thermal energy radar.

“Julio, we can’t trust the sheriff.” I say it as gently as possible. Before my eyes, Julio has turned from a free spirit to a chained and shackled vassal again. And I’m the reason for it.

But these are things that need to be said. Sheriff Moss will find some way to screw us over. I know it. I’ve made a dark enemy out of that man. This won’t end well for us. We are the ones who stand the most to lose, and lose we will.

“There is no other way, Carlotta,” Julio says finally, defeated.

“Maybe we could just keep sending Mama and Papi money. American dollars buys them a lot in Mexico. They should be living pretty well. Better than us, actually. We could just send them a monthly allowance or—”

Julio’s eyes are wide, accusing. “They are our parents, Carlotta Jasmine Vega. They belong with us. We are a family.”

“Don’t yell at me, Julio. I know you’re mad. And I get why, and I’m sorry. So sorry. But there’s got to be another way. We’ve got to remove El Libertador from the equation somehow.”

“We’ve already made the deal with El Libertador. We’ve already paid him. We’ve already put that trust in him.” He sits up straight then, and looks me in the eyes. “Which is a better place for my trust to be than with you, I see.”

Wow. That hurt worse than I was anticipating. And I didn’t realize how badly this conversation was going to fail. He’s not listening to me at all. Just accusing me and blaming me. El Libertador is still a saint, whose only misfortune was to have to deal with me. In Julio’s eyes, I’ve shifted from hardworking little sister to the lowest scum on the earth. It’s all over his face. I stand up from the couch and take a few steps back, toward my room. This is where the conversation needs to end, I’m sure of it.