As it turned out, Tim had taken Peggy up to his room shortly after the incident by the pool, and no one had seen either of them since, which indicated, at least to her, that they’d spent the night exploring the sacrament—and each other. At some point, Brenda had tried the door, but Tim had locked it and she was reduced to shouting accusations in the hallway till she tired of that and either went to her own room or not, nobody seemed to know. But Paulette, who was an early riser, had seen her getting into the Jeep with Carlos and her two matching pink suitcases for the flight that would take her to Mexico City and from there across the continent to Boston, a place that seemed as remote as the moon from this perspective. They’d all have to go back—and soon—but the thought was just a blip on her radar as the smell of jasmine drifted across the patio on a soft ocean breeze and Reina set a cup of coffee and a plate of huevos rancheros, salsa and tortillas before her.

“Muchas gracias,” she said, and then, trying out her Spanish, “¿Cómo está usted?”

“Muy bien,” Reina returned, showing her teeth in a bright pleased smile. She was in her mid-twenties but looked younger, with a bush of black hair she tied back in a ponytail. “¿Y usted?”

“Muy bien.”

Since that exhausted her Spanish, she just smiled back until Reina dipped her head in acknowledgment, scooped up the dirty plates and went back to the kitchen, at which point Corey, who’d been squirming in his seat during this exchange, folded back a page of his comic and held it out so Fitz, who did know Spanish, or a whole lot more than she did, could see it. “Dad?” he said.

Fitz looked up. “Yes?”

“What’s a mentiroso?”

The comic—he angled it so she could see it now too—showed a pair of cowboys with wide-brimmed Mexican hats, neckerchiefs and holstered guns. One, who was quite obviously the good guy, had his hand twisted around the bad guy’s neckerchief and was saying, “Usted es un mentiroso, señor,” which was surely some sort of insult or curse, but what exactly?

“Mentiroso?” Fitz said, setting his book down on the table. “That’d be a liar. Let’s see if I can remember: Miento, I lie; mientes, you lie, familiar; miente, he, she or it lies; mentimos, we lie, and so on—mienten, they lie. You really should learn the forms of the verbs if you’re going to pick up Spanish, I mean, that’s the first thing . . .”

“And what’s the second thing?”

“That’s easy—the language of love. Te amo, mi amor, you know that one?”

“Not really.”

“Go try it on Nancy—she’s your girlfriend, isn’t she?”