Esmeralda’s hand is the first part of her I see, reaching up to sink her nails into Miguel’s too wide shoulders as if she were sinking her claws into a hunk of meat. He stiffens, standing just a little bit straighter. His size dwarfs her, but her stature has never been an obstacle before. She directs him out of the way, away from the door. When her eyes land on me, they seem to shutter. It’s a quick thing, gone in a moment before her usual mask of cheerfulness drops into place.

“Ah, Ana. Mija. What are you doing here?”

She’s never asked me that before. It’s enough to startle me into a baldly honest answer. “I’m here to see Rosalita.”

“Oh, my dear, I’m afraid that won’t be possible.” Shouldering Miguel aside as if he were nothing, she folds her hands primly in front of her, looking for all the world like one of the governesses Kiki and I ran off when her father was still trying to convince us we needed one. “We have a very important client in at the moment, and I’m afraid he’s insisted on the utmost discretion.” She gestures as if to usher us away, like we were children begging at her door for scraps. “Surely, you understand.”

Kiki and I share a look. We’re good at that. Communicating with nothing but our eyebrows.

Something feels off, I think at her.

Agreed, she thinks back.

But what Kiki actually says out loud is, “Of course. We wouldn’t dream of troubling you. It’s only, I have something very important to ask her and—”

Esmeralda cuts her off. “I’m afraid she is otherwise engaged.”

Otherwise engaged. That’s a very nice way of putting it.

“But—”

Esmeralda smiles at us, tight-lipped like she’s losing patience with us. Now, that is a look I’m more than familiar with. “Girls, I will inform Rosalita that you called upon her. I’ll make sure she gets word that you were here. Now if you’ll excuse me.”

She doesn’t wait for us to excuse her. She does that thing with her hands that people do when a gnat is flying by their faces, annoying the ever-loving shit out of them. She shoos us away like two buzzing flies.

“Fine, we’ll get out of your hair,” I say, allowing myself to be shooed. In the stables around the corner of the building, I can hear Tornado’s distinctive neigh, as if he can sense that I’ll be coming back to him sooner than anticipated. “But we’ll be back later.”