But I really have no choice. I need to know if I can trust Nick or if he’s just trying to get close enough to take me down.

I step into Gringo’s humble apartment and Jorge follows closely behind me. The living room is clean, with two wicker armchairs and a melon-colored sofa. A glass table in the center of the room displays a dramatic O-shaped wooden sculpture. A sliding glass door is open, letting in the cool morning breeze and the whole apartment smells like coffee. It feels homey and comfortable.

“Have a seat,” Gringo says, motioning to one of the wicker chairs.

I sit down, placing my canvas bag of clothes at my feet, and my body tenses as he reaches under one of the couch cushions. I chuckle to myself when he pulls out a laptop and sets it down on the glass coffee table. He sits on the edge of the sofa and opens the computer, tapping on the keys for a bit.

“Okay, I can look the guy up, but I need the cash up front.”

“All of it?”

“All of it. Just set it down on the table.” I reach for the pocket of my hoodie and within a second, Jorge has his gun pointed at my head. “Slowly!” Gringo shouts at me.

I swallow hard, mostly for affect. Though having a gun pointed at my head does make me a little nervous, I can disarm Jorge and knock both of these bastards out faster than it will take them to piss their pants.

I hold my hands up to show that I’m not concealing anything, then I slowly reach for the wad of cash in my pocket. I place the roll of money equaling seven hundred euros on the table.

“How much is it?”

“Seven hundred.”

Gringo flashes Jorge a look of disgust then turns back to me. “I said one thousand.”

“All I have is seven hundred, but I’m good for the rest. I swear.”

“I don’t give a fuck if you swear!”

Jorge shoves the gun forward until it’s pressed against my temple. Fuck. These guys are in way over their heads.

“Listen to me,” I begin calmly. “I am a federal agent with the CIA. If you kill me, not only will you be arrested, but you’ll be tortured by federal agents until you give up everyone you’ve ever worked with.”

Gringo and Jorge laugh at this threat. I take a slow breath and smile as I realize that these bastards think they’ve got me.

“If you think a federal agent is going to withhold three hundred euros then you’re not as bright as I thought. I should just go.”

I stand from the chair quickly and Gringo reaches for something underneath the cushion. Jorge adjust his aim, but I twist around and grab his wrist before he can fire. His finger presses down on the trigger and the shot squeals past my shoulder and lands in the flat screen TV on the wall. Gringo retrieves a gun from beneath the sofa cushion, but I twist Jorge’s gun around and press my finger over his to shoot Gringo in the chest.

Gringo falls back onto the sofa as Jorge lets go of his gun. I don’t want to shoot him, but he’s already reaching for the door handle to escape. I shoot him in the head, then I grab the roll of money off the coffee table and my canvas bag of clothes and get the fuck out of there.

I keep my hood pulled tight over my head as I race down the steps of the apartment building. A woman in the apartments below is peering through her screen door to see what’s going on. I don’t pay her any attention. I keep running for five and a half blocks until I find a bus stop with a bus that’s just arriving. I hop inside and head straight for the back.

My heart is pounding like a sledgehammer against my chest. For a moment, I think I might be having a heart attack, until the bus gets about four stops away. Then I begin to breathe easier.

There are only a few people on the bus, so I use the relative privacy to change out of my hoodie and into the running T-shirt I brought with me. That’s when I notice the bullet Jorge fired must have grazed my shoulder.

Fuck!

I was supposed to get some information on Nick, and the black guy in the hoodie, then go to the city’s free clinic and get a pregnancy test. I’m not very experienced, but I know from watching enough television and movies that a late period often means a woman is pregnant. I’m five days late. Which means, if I am pregnant, it’s Daimon’s child.

The truth is, I never got a gynecological exam when I went back to see Dr. Grossman a few weeks ago to have my stitches removed. And without an exam, she refused to prescribe me any birth control. I didn’t want to admit this to Daimon, so I never brought it up. Then I read on the internet that something like fifty-percent of pregnancies end in miscarriage, but most women never know because they think the bleeding is due to their normal period. To me, this meant I had, at best, a fifty-percent chance of getting pregnant. I figured, if I made sure he didn’t come inside of me, there would be no chance. Now I just feel like an idiot.

I can’t go anywhere in this city now. Not while I’m wearing this clothes and sporting this two-inch bullet graze. I have to get the hell out of Santa Cruz de la Palma.

I ride the bus all the way back to Brena Baja. Then I stop at the corner convenience store to get some laundry soap and first aid supplies. It’s about time I washed my laundry in the concrete basin in the backyard. I’m halfway down the street, right in front of Nick’s house, when I hear him calling my name.

“Alyssa!”

I sigh and execute a half-turn toward his front door, hoping to conceal the bleeding cut on my shoulder. “Nick! I’m just going home to take a shower. I’ll be right out.” I start off toward my cottage, then I hear the gate creak as he comes after me. “I really need to shower and get my laundry going. I’ll be out in just a bit.”

I’m almost to my gate when he wraps his arm around my waist to stop me. “Alyssa, are you okay? What’s wrong with your shoulder?”

I clutch my canvas bag to my chest and take a deep breath as I turn around. Looking into Nick’s sparkling green eyes, I force myself to become emotional. I mean, a normal person would be hysterical if someone pulled a gun out and nearly shot them.

Jutting my bottom lip out, I sniffle. “I was attacked in the city, by a black man in a black hoodie. I was—” I drop my canvas bag onto the street “—I was so scared, Nick!”

I throw my arms around him and wait for him to stammer as he realizes his partner beat me up. But he just holds me tightly and rubs my back.

“Oh, baby. Are you okay? We’re you… I mean, what did he do to you?”

I grit my teeth as I try to come up with a good story on the spot. “I was in the city shopping and he must have seen my cash and he tried to rob me.”

“You were in the city?”

For a moment, I consider lying. He may have heard the news that there was a shooting in the city by now.

“Yes, I told you I was going shopping.”

“You said you were going for a run.” He lets go of me and looks me up and down, his gaze skimming over my T-shirt and lingering on my black jeans and steel toe boots. “Is that how you dress to go running?”

I snatch my canvas bag off the street and hold it out. “I changed in a restroom in the city, but …. but I was bleeding so much I didn’t finish changing. I knew I had to get home quickly.”

“Why didn’t you go to the hospital?”

“Hospital?”

“Yes, the place where people go when they’re sick or injured?”

We stare into each other’s eyes for a moment and I consider blurting out the truth that I was in the city looking for unsavory characters who would help me investigate him using the passport I stole from his cottage last night. But I take a few slow breaths instead as I formulate a better explanation.

“I was trying to get something for you, to surprise you.” I reach up, ignoring the pain in my shoulder as I take his face in my hands. “I was on my way to the clinic to get on birth control, so you and I could… you know, whenever we want.” My lips hover over his, allowing his craving to grow. “I want to fuck you. All. Day. Long.”