“Mira gave me the stage. She thought I was in league with the Common,” I lie and shrug. “Her fatal mistake, my opportunity.”

“And here I was thinking Mira was your girlfriend,” Valeria says in mock disappointment.

“Mira Goodwin better be prepared for the day she sees me again,” I spit, like it’s a threat and not my greatest pipe dream. I clench my fists for better effect.

Valeria titters, looking pleased again.

Finally, she lifts her hand for her goon to stop the water.

I brace my nerves for the woman’s cries for air.

They never come.

She doesn’t move.

This sends Andrés’s screaming into overdrive, the man’s heartache pouring from his chest in one shrill wail.

Somewhere to my right, Valeria says something in her code tongue.

I level my eyes on the Texas State Guard leering back at me in the mirror. She died while I just stood here. In the reflection beside mine, the cartel man’s hands tear the cloth away from the woman’s empty face.

I make myself look.

She was young. Only a few years older than me. Her big chestnut eyes had so much left to see in this life.

Is no one going to close her eyes? I think.

I say nothing.

Andrés’s shrieking turns into a raspy curse. “Algún día tus fortalezas arderán y tu familia no tendrá suficiente agua en el mundo para apagar las llamas. Te lo prometon.” Someday your strongholds will burn, and your family won’t have enough water in the world to put out the flames. I promise you.

Valeria pounces, unsheathing Mira’s knife from my boot. How did she . . . ? There must be cameras in my room.

She’s been surveilling me. Does she know I’ve been trying to escape too?

Reaching her prisoner, Valeria twists a fistful of Andrés’s damp hair and yanks back his head. His exposed throat glistens with sweat.

She drags my knife’s blade teasingly across his bare chest. The razor-sharp tip hovers above an artery just below his left ear.

“My mother doesn’t approve of me getting my hands dirty,” Valeria says, “but I’m not the kind of girl who likes to just sit and watch.”

Breathing hard through his nose, Andrés bravely faces his imminent death with his wide eye boring into his executioner’s. He must know she wants a struggle, and he’s refusing her the satisfaction.

He’s a fighter.

And what am I? Think fast or this guy dies.

I take a step forward before she starts to cut.

“I have to say, it’s not how I’d do it,” I sneer. “Is this really how you stop a plague? It’s all just so . . . underwhelming.”

Amazingly, my dig halts the blade.

“If you want to show Governor—the Lone Star as you call him—just what his progeny is capable of, you’ll have to think bigger than this.”

“Are you seriously referring to that stupid catchphrase? Everything is bigger in Texas?” she scoffs, clutching at her purple gemstone. Did Roth give her that necklace as a gift?

I want to choke her with it.

“Show the capo and your future lieutenants that you won’t just cut down militia mice . . .”

I take a step closer, pulling her in with my strings. “You’ll burn them.”

Valeria purses her glossy lips, pondering.

“You will be the start of the flames,” I press, drawing from the captive’s threat. “It’s not how you’ll end.”

She lowers Mira’s knife, then points the blade at me instead.

My blood, a quarter the same as hers, freezes. Did she sniff out my bullshit?

“I knew we were going to be friends,” she says, lively, like she’s not standing next to a woman she has just made a corpse. “What do you have in mind?”

“Oh, I’ve got some ideas,” I reply, exaggerating this half truth. I can learn to think like a murderous villain. It’s in my genes.

If I play this right, I can create an opportunity to break not just myself free, but a captured militia member as well.

It’s not just my life on the line anymore.

I try to make eye contact with Andrés. Give the broken man some hint of hope that I’m on his side. But when he looks at me through one glaring slit, it’s clear that to him, I’m a monster in a Guard’s uniform. No better than my diabolical aunt standing next to me.

But that’s not my truth. Hands behind my back, I trace the rebellion tattoo carved into my right wrist, reassuring myself of who I am.

I’m a Common member, burning yellow underneath this facade. Rebellion in my heart, just like him.

I told myself in the south Texas desert that fighting for truth is greater than my own well-being.

Now’s my time to prove it.

Resist much, obey little.

MIRA

The debate about which crossing to choose was heated and tedious. During the three-and-a-half-hour car ride, it was nothing but border maps, strategies, and minor blowups, but in the end we took a vote.

Seven to one.

I couldn’t help relishing the outcome. The last time Alexander and I sparred over the best game plan to cross an international border, I was outvoted.

Now it’s Alexander’s turn to lose.

Tonight, I’ll take the wins where I can get them.

Northeast of our position, a mile up the road, a string of lights appears, cutting across the darkness like a fuse caught on fire.

Headlights. Moving directly toward us.

I flick my eyes to my wristwatch: 2:54 a.m.

Right on time.

Pulling down the visor of my new ballistic helmet—one of the many gifts I found in Ciro’s offering—I throw Alexander a look. Told you.

He scoffs, yanking up his night vision goggles.

Theo’s father argued for our mission to take us to the Gulf and travel by boat. Avoiding the wall. No surprise there, considering he spent his newfound life in Canada as a shipping magnate.

But Lucía’s plan is far better; it’s shorter, and if everything proceeds as designed, faster.

Besides, Lucía’s pulled it off before.

“You’re a genius,” Kano whispers, adrenalized, shaking the mastermind’s shoulder in lieu of applause.

Lucía readjusts the translator device that hugs her upper ear like a silver cuff. Another offering from Ciro. The tech translates languages seamlessly and discreetly, and is disguised as a simple piece of jewelry.

“Or crazy,” Lucía mutters to herself, but my device picks up her whisper.

“Just another word for brave,” I remind her and everyone listening.

Skye approaches Lucía’s side, hiding her translator under her tight jet-black braid. “Maybe now we can better understand each other.”

Lucía purses her lips.

On my right, Ava folds and puts away her map, staring out at our target.

We’re ninety yards from the Big Fence. And the bridge. The Unmapped Passage, Lucía calls it, the crossing that will lead us over the Rio Grande and into Mexico.

Our only cover is the natural cloak of darkness. We must be quick and quiet. We abandoned our SUV miles ago, and if this ends in disaster, all we can do is run.

The plan will work, I prod my nerves.

I turn my gaze from the oncoming trucks, south toward the bridge’s towers and gate, and feel a rush of power as I watch the Border Guards staring directly at me. Seeing nothing.