The men began to flee. They barrelled towards the sliding doors and then thinking better of it, helped each other up the fence. One of them was moving noticeably slower than the others. He clutched his right shoulder, red dripping from the gaps in between his fingers. He more so fell over the fence than hopped over it. Julio and I watched them in a heavy silence. 

The hands that had gripped the gun with the strength of iron were trembling. The weapon fell from his grasp and he turned to me with quivering lips. I held out my arms to him and he collapsed into them and squeezed me tightly. He was crying. 

“I couldn’t let them hurt you,” he said between sobs. “I was scared they would kill you.” 

“They didn’t. We’re okay, Julio. You did good.” I held him as police officers rushed into the yard. The trail of blood made it obvious where the men had gone. They shouted at each other, some running back to try and catch the men and others coming towards Julio and I. An officer picked up the gun that had been discarded in front of Julio. The one beside him asked us if we were okay. 

“Yes, Julio shot one of them with his father’s gun,” I said, feeling strangely sober despite the recent events. Perhaps it was having Julio beside me, clearly more broken than I was. One of us had to be brave and Julio had already taken his turn by firing the gun. 

The officer nodded as a tall figure sprinted into the yard. It was Vincent. Gone was the apathetic expression he had been wearing all morning. It was replaced by a pained frown. His chest was heaving with labored breaths though I imagined he hadn’t had to run far from his vehicle to the yard of the house. He scanned the yard and shrugged off the officer who asked him to identify himself. I watched his eyes take in the blood on the grass and the sway in his balance. 

“Vincent!” I called out as Julio peeled himself off of me. 

Vincent’s head snapped in my direction. He looked as if he could melt into the ground after spotting me but he ran over instead. He scooped me into his arms and let out a delirious chuckle. It was such a distinct difference from how he had been at the station. He had been hiding any trace of emotion then but now it felt like he was pouring all of his emotions onto me. Against him, I could feel how fast his heart was thudding in his chest. I squeezed him back and breathed in the signature scent I had come to love. 

“You scared me half to death,” he said into my ear. 

I heard the grass shift under someone’s weight. I had forgotten that Julio had been standing only a foot from us. 

“What is he doing here?” 

We released each other. Julio’s perplexed expression flickered back and forth between the two of us. His tear stained face was red and his eyes were bloodshot. 

The cover had been compromised for a while since the anonymous caller had found out who Vincent really was. With such an obvious attack like we had experienced just minutes prior, there was no point in trying to hide things anymore. Things were coming to a crescendo and all cards were on the table. 

“He’s not actually my coworker,” I said before Vincent could try to explain. Julio should hear it from me. “He’s a detective who I’ve been helping in trying to figure out what really happened to Adonis.” 

Julio’s eyebrows pulled together. “He wasn’t guilty after all?” 

Vincent shook my head. “No. We’ll have to explain more of it later. Right now, we should get you two to the station for some questioning. There’s a lot to sort through.” 

Julio nodded his head slowly as if still trying to get a handle on everything. Then, with a glance down at his PJ’s, he asked, “Can I brush my teeth first?” 

_______________________

I was too afraid to ask what had become of Darren. The last I had seen him, he was fighting with two of the men. They had stayed with Darren for a while and when they finally joined us in the backyard, Darren was nowhere in sight. When Vincent helped Julio and I into a police car, an ambulance was just driving off. It probably had him inside, in what condition, I did not know. 

There was no longer a place for Darren in my life and a large part of me was still angry at him for what he had done but that didn't erase the two years we were together. I didn't love him anymore but I didn't want him dead. 

"He's in an emergency surgery," Mac said as he entered the conference room in the station. I was sitting in one of the rolling chairs, leaning into the desk on my elbows. Vincent sat beside me while Lennon and Kyra sat across from us, heads buried in paper work. "We won't be able to speak with him for a while." 

Emergency surgery. 

I didn't want to imagine the damage that had been inflicted on him. Broken ribs, fractured bones, internal bleeding. He was in a world of pain because he wanted to protect me. As horrible as Darren had been, I could at least commend him for his bravery in trying to stall the attackers.

"Are you okay?" Kyra asked, her perfectly beautiful cadence dipping slightly. 

"Yeah," I said, squaring my shoulders. It was odd. So much had happened, enough to cause the wear and tears I had been bearing since childhood to fatally rip. However, a strange peace had settled over me. I felt like I was beginning to see clearly for the first time in a while. "What is the plan now? You all heard what Darren said, right?" 

"Yes. Our only option is to begin interviewing your family. All roads seem to be pointing to them," Lennon said. It was probably the stress of the day but he appeared much older than he had when he first invited me into the office. His wrinkles were deeper and more prominent.

"You can watch behind the two-way glass if you'd like to," he added. There was trust in that sentence. They weren't hauling me into an interrogation room because of it and maybe because of how I helped Vincent, they thought I could contribute something by listening in. 

A single phrase echoed in my head at the prospect of my uncle and aunt admitting to having done something this bad. 

Do I even know them? 

All the birthdays, all the skinned knees, all the vacations, all the dinners amounted to nothing if this was true. It all led to the same thing. They had failed me. They betrayed me. 

They killed someone I loved. 

When Tìo and Tìa walked into the station, they looked absolutely puzzled. They hugged Julio and I with faulty grips, like their brains couldn't process what was going on and embrace us at the same time. They had so many questions, wondering why there were police at the house, why the two of us were at the station. Julio was quiet and I could tell he was mad at them. Whether it was for them leaving him alone in the house, if he needed space after what happened, or if he was beginning to distrust his parents as I was, I didn't know. 

"The police are going to want to question you," I said after my aunt released me. 

"What do you mean? About the break in?" my uncle asked, his brow creases deepening. 

"It wasn't a break in." 

The two of them exchanged bewildered looks. 

Vincent and I stood side by side watching through the two way mirror. Though he wasn't as icy with me as he had before the scare at my house, something was still off between us. I would catch him looking at me when he thought I wouldn't notice, something indiscernible in his eyes. I would ask him about it eventually but this wasn't the time. 

Tìa had gone in to be interviewed alone while her husband waited outside for his turn. She stood upright with her hands folded together. She was staring hard into Mac, the interviewer. 

Mac presented my aunt with a printed copy of the picture I had taken from her finance book. She cocked her head back in surprise. 

"How did you get this?" 

Mac ignored her question. "Where did the twenty thousand come from, Mrs.Morales?" 

She licked her chapped lips. 

"I don't know." She appeared embarrassed all of a sudden and before Mac could cut in to press again, she added, "My husband and I were financially struggling for a while. On the date marked down, twenty thousand dollars was sent to our bank account. It appeared on the website as if we had received payment from our jobs but neither of us had earned such a large amount of money in such a short time." 

She sighed, scratching the top of her head. "We weren't in the financial position to ask questions. We took it and moved on." 

"That sounds very irresponsible," Mac said, leaning back in his chair. "Do you have any suspicions about where it came from?"

She shrugged. "Nancy and Mickey have relatives on their father's side who are well off but after what happened with Adonis . . . Thinking back on it, I assumed that maybe he had been trying to help us out. He gave us some of the money he made doing illegal work." 

I turned to Vincent. "It can't be Adonis so what about what she said before. Could it have been my aunt Stephanie?" 

Vincent had his arms crossed over his chest and stroked his bottom lip with his thumb. 

"Maybe Stephanie lied. Maybe Nancy had asked her for her help when she found out your family was in jeopardy of losing the house." 

The rest of my aunt's interview was fruitless. She answered most questions with a simple "I don't know". I had to say that I believed her. Her expression of confusion was too genuine. Her hands weren't clean, that was for sure, but it seemed she knew nothing about the weird things that had been going on and she surely didn't sound like she knew the first thing about drug trafficking. 

When my uncle was interviewed, Mac asked him about the gun he kept in his closet. 

"Why did you purchase the weapon?" 

Tìo gazed directly into the glass, directly at me. I shifted nervously even though it wasn't possible for him to see me. 

"Mickey doesn't know this," he said, his gaze inadvertently trained on me, "but there has been talk of her father being released early from prison." 

"What?" I couldn't help but blurt it out. The word must have come out pained because Vincent placed a hand on my arm. "Did you know this?" 

Vincent shook his head. 

"I wanted to make sure that if it happened . . ." my uncle trailed off, his voice becoming haunted. "I wanted to make sure he couldn't come back for my girls." 

I got the sudden and intense urge to cry. It had hurt me deeply to know my uncle had hidden something so crucial from me, both the gun and my father's possible early release date. He thought he knew what was best for me yet, despite the love and protectiveness I saw in his face, he still hurt me.

Kyra came to find Vincent and I after the interviews were wrapped up. She was noticeably winded with baby hairs sticking up out of her ponytail. 

"We have a problem," she said, coming to a stop directly in front of us. "We can't get a hold of your sister. It's like she's dropped off the face of the earth." 

I couldn't think of the last time I had spoken with her. Since it was a weekday, I thought she would have been at work but Kyra made it sound like they had checked everywhere for her. 

I thought of the four men who had put Darren into critical condition. He could be dying. I thought of how they had come pretty close to doing the same to Julio and I. What if they got to her? What would they do to her and the baby? 

I gaped at Kyra. 

"Nancy's missing?"

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