“Antonio is fine,” I assured him, my voice as flat as his.

Marcus nodded, trying to force himself to believe. Then he pressed his forehead to mine and sighed, his whole weight leaning into me. I closed my eyes, my cheekbones feeling the flutter of his hair. He needed a trim. We all did. We didn’t exactly have time for stuff like that anymore.

“I have to find him,” he whispered.

“I know.”

He exhaled against me, the heat of his breath warming my chapped, red cheeks.

“This has to end eventually, no?”

We both knew there was no answer to that question, and he really wasn’t looking for one. He needed something else right now. So I shifted my lips toward his, barely a flutter, and we kissed in a way so sad and desperate that the sensation was instantly familiar—only now I was on the other side. Marcus moved his fingers to my hair, and I could feel him trying to forget the world, forget his fears, forget where he was. I knew what he wanted. I had been there myself not too long ago.

I grabbed at his neck and pressed hard against his mouth, moving my tongue until I felt a change within him, the strike of a match. He pushed me against the boarded-up window of a village shop, the splintered raw wood sticking to the wool of my coat as his mouth moved with a new excitement. I moaned slightly, and he slid his hand behind my head, gripping my hair, protecting my scalp from the hard wood, and pulling me closer.

Around us, crowds continued to push past, and I could feel torches glowing brighter, hotter, closer.

Much closer.

I cracked open my eyes and was startled by a man standing inches away, a fiery stick in his hand and a creepy grin on his bearded face. I jolted, pushing Marcus—visions of Department D, deadly spies, and endless threats of set-ups flashed in my head. Panic spread across Marcus’s flushed face as he noticed my reaction.

Then he turned toward the stranger.

Only then did the man move the torch closer, illuminating his face.

That was when I recognized his familiar features—the dark hair, the double dimples, and the near-black eyes that ran in their bloodline.

“Hola, hermano.”