He held up the acceptance letter, taped back together from its torn pieces.

“I didn’t earn this because I’m a Barrera,” he said, and his voice did not shake.

“I earned it when I still believed I was completely alone in the world.

I want you to know that, before you know anything else about me.”

Chapter 19 — She Came Back

Then the doors opened, and Griselda was there.

“I am his guardian,” she announced to the room, loud and certain, as though certainty could still save her.

“That boy belongs to me.” But there were officers behind her now, moving into the room, and Cristóbal was already at a screen — and onto it came the bank records, and the documented injuries, and, last, Araceli’s voice, filling the silent hall.