Page 18 of Freedom Fighters
Chapter Four
Cristián surprised Daniel by hugging him hard. When the younger man stepped back, he wore a huge grin. “Danny, I can’t believe it.”
“Daniel, you snot-nosed kid,” Daniel growled, although he wanted to grin like an idiot, too. “Damn, you’ve gotten tall while I wasn’t looking.”
“I was fourteen, last time you looked,” Cristián pointed out. He waved toward the stairs that led upto the main floor of the house. “Mom is in the kitchen. Come and say hello.” He pushed his glasses back up his nose and turned and climbed the stairs three at a time. Cristián had the long legs the whole Peña family were blessed with.
Daniel eased the heavy pack off his shoulders, then shrugged off the flak jacket. He transferred the Glock to his thigh pocket and removed the holster. IsabelaPeña didn’t like guns in her kitchen. He wouldn’t leave it anywhere he couldn’t reach it, though.
His smile kept threatening to break out. Just standing in the front hallway of this house brought back vivid memories of living here. Fighting with Duardo. Teasing the girls. Giving Cristián a hard time whenever the opportunity arose, which wasn’t often because Cristián had always been smarter thaneveryone else, even at ten years old.
Daniel climbed the stairs. When the third one creaked as it always had, his heart squeezed in remembrance.
Isabela waited at the top of the stairs. She wrapped her arms around him, her eyes glittering with tears. “We thought you were dead,” she said brokenly.
“Just one of my nine lives,” Daniel told her. She was as tall and as slender as he remembered,although the gray in her hair was new. Had he contributed to that? He cut the thought off, as Olivia’s voice whispered in his memory.You’re not the terrible person you think you are.
Olivia. His wife. He paused for a fraction of a second to savor the fact. While hiking to Pascuallita from the coast where the boat had dropped him, even while he’d dealt with a pair of Insurrectos he’d come across,the memory of Olivia—her warmth, the scent of her hair and that she had committed to him irrevocably—kept him warm and his inner core bubbling with what he had only in hindsight recognized as pure happiness.
Daniel held Isabela at arm’s length. “It is so good to be here.”
Isabela gave him a tremulous smile and dashed her hand across her eyes. She sniffed. “Say hello to everyone else.” She liftedher chin, indicating something behind him.
Daniel turned and was almost knocked off his feet as Pía Isabela slammed into him. Her arms went around his neck. “Daniel! You’re really here!”
Trini Juanita stood back, although she was smiling and her cheeks were wet. Daniel held his arm out and she stepped into it, just like that, with no hesitation or distaste. He pressed his cheek against the topof her head and his heart hurt.
This was happiness, too, he realized.
He caught Cristián’s gaze over the top of the two girls’ heads. Cristián was smiling, too. Only, as Daniel’s gaze met his, his smile faded.
“Dinner!” Isabela declared from behind him and Daniel’s stomach rumbled.
* * * * *
They sat at the table for many hours, not because the meal lasted that long, but because there wasso much to catch up on. When Isabela pulled yet another bottle of mescal from the cupboard and cracked the seal, Daniel realized how late it was. He also realized with a jolt of surprise that he had been doing most of the talking.
He hadn’t realized how cut off from affairs Pascuallita—and most of Vistaria—was. Cristián’s Facebook group gave them nominal information. Even though communicationwas two-way, using the open code the group provided, Duardo and Téra had been spare in personal news.
Daniel understood that wariness. Every code could be broken, given enough time and information. If the Insurrectos figured out the group’s wrestling fan code, then everything Téra and Duardo shared would lead the Insurrectos directly back to this rambling old house.
Duardo’s marriage was a surpriseto them, although it seemed to Daniel it wasn’t the staggering shock for them that it had been to him. He related the meeting between him and Duardo on the beach at Baha Coralina five nights ago, when Duardo had laid him flat on his back.
He laughed when he realized the women in the room were disappointed he couldn’t report on the wedding itself, as he hadn’t been there. Their disappointmentevaporated when he told them Minnie was pregnant.
“I suppose you’re still playing the field, Daniel,” Isabela said, pouring him another glassful of mescal.
“Not anymore,” Daniel said.
Everyone looked at him.
“You’ve found someone,” Isabela said quietly. “I’m so pleased.”
“Who is she?” Cristián asked and sipped his tea. He hadn’t touched the mescal at all.
“My wife,” Daniel said and his pridein being able to say that swelled in his chest.
This time, the surprise in the room was unanimous.
