She looked startled, although he couldn't imagine why. They had always been able to read each other.

"Why did you do it?" she asked. "After everything we went through, you still had to go after my father's company?"

Damian sighed. He didn't want to talk about all the things that had torn them apart, not when he was seeing her after so long, but he told her what she wanted to know. "Because even after he put me away, he wasn't done. Your father sent someone in here to rough me up, with a warning to stay away from you. He said that if I ever tried to contact you, I wouldn't have to worry about serving out the rest of my sentence because he'd put me in a box long before then."

"When? When did he do this?"

"A few months after I got here." Damian could feel the pieces of the puzzle moving around in her head. He wished he could get inside her mind and rearrange every single piece so they weren't wasting this time, this precious time discussing Warren Fucking Sedgewick.

"So you sold your Sedgewick Hotels stock short and sent his shares plummeting. You must have lost a lot of money. Why shoot yourself in the leg? Why not just take over?"

"I don't react well to threats, Skye. And that company was built on dirty money. Cartel money. I would have given anything to see the look on Warren's face when it all came tumbling down."

"Well, that's never going to happen now. He's gone, Damian. My father died a few days ago. You got your revenge. It took a while for everything to crumble, for him to lose everything, piece by piece. The stress was too much for him. Foreclosures and debt collectors. Everywhere he turned. He had a stroke last year, and then another one a few months later. He didn't survive the third one. So congratulations. You finally did it. You avenged MaMaLu."

"Good." Damian sat back and folded his arms. He should have felt a small measure of victory, of justice, but it did nothing to fill the Skye-less hole that was gnawing away pieces of his soul. "I can't say he didn't deserve it."

"Don't, Damian. It's time to let it go. My father meant to get you and MaMaLu out of there. He was going to get you new lives, new identities. He came looking for you after MaMaLu died, but you were nowhere to be found. He couldn't undo what he did, but he never meant you or MaMaLu any harm."

A sick, slow heaviness curdled in Damian's veins, the initial burst of happiness at seeing Skye dissipating like cool ether. She wasn't here for him. She was here for her father.

"So that's it?" he asked. "That's why you showed up? A year later? To berate me for something he started? I walked away, Skye. For you. But he couldn't leave it alone, could he? He just had to try to strong-arm me into keeping my distance. As if I could ever bring myself to contact you. You deserve better. I knew that. He knew that, but he had to prove that he still held the cards."

"That's not why he did it!"

"Then why, Skye? Why? I lost MaMaLu. I lost you. I lost eight years of my life. Why the fuck couldn't he just leave me alone?"

"Because!"

"Because what?" Damian slammed his palms down on the table. "I hated that fucking bastard and I'm glad he's gone. What did you expect, Skye? Did you expect an apology? You want me to say I'm sorry?"

"Stop it, Damian." Skye could see the guard making his way towards them. "I thought it would be different. I thought you would be different. But you're still filled with so much rage."

"And you're still defending him." Damian got up and let the guard cuff him. His outburst was going to cost him. He wished Skye had never come. He wished he'd never known her or Warren Sedgewick. He wished he could stop the pain that was shooting through him. "I guess blood will always be thicker than water."

Skye's face changed at his parting remark. She looked both heart-broken and enraged. The last thing Damian saw as they led him away was her back, shoulders hunched over the table.

That was the only time Skye came to see Damian in prison. He didn't see her again for the rest of his incarceration, not once over the next seven years.

DAMIAN STOOD AT THE ENTRANCE of Casa Paloma, by the tall wrought iron gates that had once barred his way. The first thing he'd done when he got out of prison was to put in an offer, and he stood now as master, where his mother had been the help. The few prospective buyers with the means to afford the property had turned away from the daunting task of restoring it. Years of neglect had left it in disarray. Vine-smothered walls and balconies obscured Casa Paloma's graceful lines. Overgrown trees encroached like dark shadows around the edges. The garden had transformed into a jaundiced mess of dry, tangled weeds, trash bags, and empty beer bottles.

Damian removed the chains and pushed the gates open. They squeaked from worn, rusty joints. The main house stood before him, its boarded-up windows staring at him with pale, blank eyes. Damian walked past it, ignoring the flurry of grasshoppers that clamored out of his way, to the small, modest building in the back that had once housed the staff. It was a single row of dormitory style rooms with a communal bathroom and kitchen. He stood outside the third door, overcome with nostalgia and a strange, tight knot in his throat. MaMaLu's broom was still leaning against the wall, mummified in layers of dust and cobwebs. Damian shuffled his feet at the entrance.

"It's me, MaMaLu," he said, trying to get the words past his clenched throat. "Your Estebandido is home."

The door remained shut. There was no one to let him in, no one to stare him down for being a bad boy. Damian leaned his forehead against the door and traced the frame. Flakes of peeling paint fell on his shoes. His let his hand rest on the knob for a minute before walking in.

The room was much smaller than he remembered. A single shaft of sunlight lit up the dark, musty space. There was no lingering scent of the jasmine hair oil that MaMaLu used. The fabric partition between their beds lay crumbled on the ground, from the night they'd taken MaMaLu away. There were no tostadas waiting for him, no glass of horchata, but what broke Damian that quiet morning was her bed. MaMaLu's bed was never unmade, but now it sat there, sheets pulled back, pillow askew, covered in dust. They had dragged her out, and it had stayed behind, empty and forgotten, unmade for the last twenty-three years.

Damian was moved to action. He took the bed sheets outside and shook the dust out of them. He pounded the pillow, turned the case upside down and shook it some more. He made the bed up, stretched the sheets out tight so not a single crease marked the surface. He turned down the top sheet and tucked the ends in. He returned MaMaLu's pillow, stood back, repositioned it, and stood back again. A speck of dust settled on the covers, and Damian, determined to have nothing mar MaMaLu's bed, started the whole process over again.

He was still fussing over the sheets when the bottled up sensation that had been building in his throat erupted. Damian had not cried for MaMaLu, not in Valdemoros when they'd told him she was dead, not when he placed sunflowers on her grave every year, and not when he opened her little Lucky Strike tin. His grief had been curtailed by rage. But now the rage was done. He had avenged her, made El Charro pay, made Warren Sedgewick pay. They were gone, and with them, his burning need for vengeance. Damian had nothing to hold on to, nothing to keep the storm of tears at bay. All the deep, dark emotions that had tormented him lay hollow and spent, like a pile of powdery skeletons. Hate was an illusion, rage was an illusion, vengeance was an illusion. They were all empty husks that he had watered and nurtured, and in the end, they bore no fruit.

Damian crawled into MaMaLu's bed and rolled up into a ball. He was a boy when he'd left and he had returned a man. He had been alone then and he was alone now. The only difference, the only cruel, bitter difference, was that he had lost his one chance at redemption. He had been so busy holding on to hate, that he had let go of love.

Damian thought of the last time he had seen Skye.

You're still filled with so much rage, she'd said.

He finally understood what she'd been trying to tell him.

THE TASK OF RESTORING CASA Paloma was colossal, but Damian had both the time and the resources. For eight years, he had run his company from prison. His direction was necessary, but his presence was optional. Damian had achieved what he had set out to do, but it had brought him no comfort. He found solace in gutting and painting and patching the main house. He ripped the vines off the facade, cleaned out the pumps so the fountains worked again, and hired a team of landscapers to restore the grounds. He had the roof replaced with terracotta tiles and gave the exterior stucco a fresh coat of white paint.

Slowly, the house started looking alive again. Flowers bloomed in the garden. Butterflies and hummingbirds returned. The place had been ransacked over the years, but a lot of the original furniture remained, along with the chandeliers. Skye's mother, Adriana, had had a flair for drama. Damian wasn't sure if he wanted to keep the velvet curtains in the dining room. He sat at the table where Warren had once convened with El Charro and his men, and considered the heavy crimson fabric. It added a touch of old world opulence, but it also blocked out much of the light.

A soft thud interrupted his thoughts. The renovation crew was gone for the day, but old houses made all kinds of noises. Damian ignored it and got up to examine the curtains.

There it was again. Another little thud. Damian spun around. It was coming from the antique hutch he used to hide in, the same hutch from where he'd spied Skye and MaMaLu interrupting Warren's meeting. Damian stood before it and heard a distinct thump. Whatever was in there, possibly a bird or stray cat, had seen him. On the other hand, it could be something not quite as harmless, like a snake. Damian got on all fours and opened the door slowly.

She was a bony little thing with brown skin and a long, messy braid. Her knees were folded up to her chin and she peered at him with huge, cocoa eyes. She was wearing a white shirt with a school crest, and a navy skirt. Her socks were askew, one pulled up to her knees, the other at her ankle.

"It's okay," said Damian, as she eyed him warily. "You don't need to hide." He held out his hand, but she refused to take it.

The last thing he'd expected to find was a little girl hiding in the hutch. Perhaps her father was one of the workers he'd hired, and she'd come looking for him. Perhaps she walked by on her way to school and curiosity had drawn her into Casa Paloma-years of walking by an abandoned house that was suddenly ablaze with activity. The renovation crew had been in and out in muddy pick-up trucks, drilling, clanging, banging, hammering. Wheelbarrows of broken tiles and old flooring were lined up by the gates, but flowers spilled from the hedges and what was once dull and dead was now lush and green. Damian was surprised no one else had ventured in. The little girl was his first visitor, and she was obviously scared for getting caught.

"I'm not going to hurt you." He sat back on his heels and waited while she assessed him. He must have passed her threat level detection scan because she crawled out of the hutch and stood before him, fidgeting with her skirt.

Damian remembered all too well the feeling of knowing you were in trouble, but not knowing how you were going to be dealt with. In many ways, it was worse than the punishment itself.

"What's your name?" he asked.

She stared at him for a moment, before dropping her gaze to her shoes. They were scuffed up and looked like they had been put to good use.

"Do you live around here?" He leaned closer, trying to meet her gaze.

"Get away from me!" She swung her leg back and kicked him hard, right in the balls.

There was moment of poignant eye contact between the two.

Dude, how could you? Damian looked at the girl in disbelief before he crumpled to the floor, his hands cupped between his legs in testicle-protection mode.

OhGodnofugwtuf. That.shit.fucking.hurt.

He doubled over, trying to catch his breath.

Pain radiated out of Damian's testicles, igniting his midsection in hellfire before settling in his kidneys. Every muscle from his knees to his chest felt like it was cramping all at once. Damian's head started spinning. He felt violently nauseous, but he suppressed the desire to hurl because the slightest movement amplified the pain. After a few sharp, agonizing breaths, the pain gave way to a dull throbbing that radiated out with each heartbeat.

Damian opened his eyes. The girl was gone. His nuts were destroyed. Obliterated. He was pretty sure of it. He lay on the floor, taking stock of the rest of his body.

Legs? Yup, still there.

Arms? Present. And functional.

Torso? All systems go.

Junk?

Come in, junk? Alive, captain. Not happy, but alive.

Damian took a deep breath and stared at the empty space in the hutch. He had survived eight years in prison, but one kick from a little girl had sent him into a fit of convulsions and existential crisis. He remained curled up like a baby and started laughing. For the first time since Skye and the island, Damian laughed long and hard, holding his throbbing balls as they protested with twinges of indignation.

THERE WAS ONE ROOM THAT remained untouched in Casa Paloma. Damian had ignored it for as long as he could, and although the door to Skye's room remained shut, it called him every time he walked by. When Damian finally walked in, he awakened childhood ghosts that laughed and sang and jumped up and down on the bed. They scattered faded paper animals in his path and filled his head with whispers of distant memories. Damian was defenseless against them now. He had no barrier to keep them at bay, no chains of anger or hatred to tie them down with. He heard them, saw them, felt them all.

This was where Skye had chucked up chocolate peanut butter ice cream. Well, whatever hadn't landed on his shoes.

Here, he'd watched her scrutinize her reflection and ask him to make her a cardboard tooth.

Here, they'd held hands in a circle-him and MaMaLu and Skye-before Skye said her bedtime prayer.

As Damian swept the room and cleared the cobwebs, the memories became sharper, clearer, more painful, but at the same time sweeter, like little shards of glass candy that dissolved into pockets of nostalgic flavor, to be sampled and tasted and savored, again and again.

Damian rolled up the dusty bed covers and pried the plywood off the window. The sun streamed in, lighting up the walls and corners and bookshelves. The tree outside Skye's bedroom had grown taller; the branch he'd used to climb in was now scraping the roof. Damian tilted his head back, following it, and saw a pair of brown legs dangling through the leaves. It was the nut-busting girl, with her scuffed-up, nut-busting shoes. She was leaning against the trunk, reading a book, unaware of being observed.

Damian instinctively cupped his balls.

What the fuck was she doing back here?

He ducked back inside and considered boarding the window up again. His balls still ached, but he had to hand it to her. She wasn't one to tangle with. He laughed and started sorting through the shelves, thumbing over the books that MaMaLu had once read to him and Skye. The best stories were the ones that weren't there, the ones she'd made up. They hung suspended around him. Damian took a deep breath, wanting to inhale them, to fill up his lungs with MaMaLu's voice and her words. He stretched his arms out, rotating three hundred and sixty degrees, taking it all in and . . . stopped short.

A pair of dark eyes was watching him.

The girl was sitting on one of the lower branches now, level with the window. She was wearing a school uniform again. Her book was tucked in the waistband of her skirt and she looked like she'd been ready to scoot down the tree when she'd seen him.

It wasn't Damian's finest moment, chest puffed up, spinning around in a dusty room like a would-be ballerina. He put his hands down and met the girl's stare. Perhaps if he gave her the old western, squinty-eyed glare, she'd resume her descent.

She didn't. She squinted back at him, smug in the knowledge that the branch wasn't going to support him, so he couldn't get to her even if he tried.

A few seconds into the stare down, Damian felt the corners of his mouth lifting. He managed to transform it into a snarl and turned away, busying himself with the task of cleaning up the room. He kept the girl in his periphery. He wasn't about to drop his guard in case she decided to go all ninja on him again.

He was almost done when he found a pile of colorful papers, the kind he'd once used for origami. Skye had gotten them for him, and he had an instant flashback of the delight on her face whenever he made her something.

It seemed like another lifetime, but Damian's fingers yearned for the feel of that paper. He picked up a green sheet, yellowed and faded now, but still the brightest thing in that room, and folded it into a swan. It was the last story he remembered MaMaLu telling him and Skye, before all of their lives had changed. Damian felt like he was picking up where he'd left off, except MaMaLu wasn't there anymore, and Skye wasn't there anymore. No one was. Except a little girl who was watching him like he afforded her more entertainment than the book she was now pretending to read.

Damian offered her the swan, but she ignored him, keeping her eyes on the book. So, he placed it on the windowsill, picked up two bags filled with garbage and went downstairs to dump them. When he came back up, she was gone. And so was the paper swan.

DAMIAN WAS PAINTING THE KITCHEN when he spotted the girl again. She seemed to stop by at the same time every day, after school. She was kneeling by the pond, feeding the fish that he had just reintroduced into the water. A half peeled orange lay on her lap. She nipped each segment with her teeth and turned it inside out, picking out some of the flesh for the fish and eating the rest.

To Damian, it was one of those perfect snapshots of childhood, the way her world was condensed into an orange and a fish pond, surrounded by sunshine and grass. She was completely immersed in that moment, free of past and future, in it for the sheer enjoyment of the here and now-the things that can be grasped and lived and experienced. It was a lesson Damian needed to learn. He had let the past overshadow his life. He didn't know what the future held, but he had now. And now was a beautiful, cloudless day. Damian pictured the ocean before him, calm and endless. Although his boat was docked nearby, he hadn't been on the water since prison. He'd been so caught up with restoring Casa Paloma that he hadn't taken the time to enjoy his freedom, and more importantly, he hadn't felt like it. But as he watched the little girl finish her orange and rinse her hands in the pond before leaving, Damian yearned for the wind and the sea again.

He put away the paint, locked the house and spent the afternoon getting reacquainted with old friends: his boat, a blue, blue sky and a sparkling ocean.

Damian made more paper swans for the little girl. He left them lying about where he knew she'd find them: tacked to the gate, sitting on the porch, hanging on a string from the tree by Skye's window. She never talked to him, but she always took the swans, and she always left before it got dark.

Damian stopped by one of the outdoor markets that had sprung up between Casa Paloma and Paza del Mar. He picked up fresh fruits and vegetables and meat. He was almost done when he spotted cans of tuna stacked on a shelf.

I made you something, Skye had said.

Her ceviche had turned out to be the foulest thing he'd ever tasted, but those four words, those four words had blown his tightly guarded world apart. No one had loved him or fought for him, or made him feel the way Skye had. The way she still did.

Most days, Damian kept busy enough to ward off thoughts of Skye. Nights were different. At night, he had no defense. He lay in bed with a hunger so wide and so vast that he felt himself get swallowed up in it. Nothing, not even the Lucky Strike box under his pillow, could keep him from falling into the soul-sucking hole in the center of his heart.

As he drove home from the market, Damian wondered where Skye was, if she had found someone who deserved her more than he did, someone who brought her more happiness than pain. He had deliberately kept himself from any information about her. If he knew where she lived, where she worked, where she shopped, he couldn't have stopped himself from looking her up, and he wasn't sure what he'd do if he saw her again, even if it was just from across the street. Living without her was agony, but the thought of seeing her with someone else, no matter how happy and fulfilled, was unbearable.

Damian dropped four bags of groceries in the kitchen and went back to the car for the rest. As he reached the main door, the little girl walked past him, dragging the rest inside.

"Can't you make anything else?" She plopped herself up on one of the stools and placed a paper swan on the counter.

"You don't like swans?" He had left that one tucked under a stone by the pond, a few days ago, with its neck peeking out.

"Why do you only make swans?"

"Because my mama told me about a magic swan that hides on the grounds here. I haven't found one, but you remind me of it."

"Me?"

"Yes. You make me laugh. That's some powerful magic. And I think you're going to grow up into a beautiful swan."

"Are you calling me an ugly duckling?" She hopped off the stool and confronted him.

"No. I'm just . . ." Damian cupped his groin and jumped back instinctively. He didn't like the way this little girl had him hopping around like a bunny rabbit. "You know what you are? You're a big bully. You kick me, you spy on me, you walk in and out of here without my permission, and now you're trying to intimidate me."

They glared at each other, her hands on her hips, and him guarding his balls.

"What does 'intimidate' mean?" she asked.

"To frighten, terrify, or push someone around."

Her scowl softened. She seemed to like the idea. "You're funny," she said, her face breaking into a grin.

"And you have dimples." Damian faked disgust.

She stood quietly and watched him put things away.

"This place looks pretty now," she said. "It was always sad."

"You like it?"

"It's nice." She regarded him for a moment. "What's your name?"