Barefoot with a Stranger (Barefoot Bay Undercover #2)(66)
Mal nodded and gestured for her to leave, but the woman’s gaze drifted over the stacks of papers to the computer, and then she gasped.
Busted for the laptop, no doubt. That’d cost Mal twenty more.
But her eyes weren’t on the computer. They were on the rosary, on the table where Chessie had left it.
“El Sagrado Corazón.” She pointed to the beads. “Please to touch it?”
“Of course,” Chessie said, picking up the rosary to hand to her.
The woman took it with loving care, caressing the beads that clearly meant something to her and pressing the cross to her heart for a moment. “Donde consiguiste esto?”
Mal wasn’t about to tell her where he got it, or who its real owner was. “Fue un regalo. A gift.” He shot Chessie a look that he hoped she’d understand meant don’t offer this as payment.
She didn’t say a word, though, keeping one hand on her computer and looking far more nervous about losing her laptop than the rosary.
The woman held the string of beads in the air, letting the cross turn on its beaded chain. Then she took it to the window and held it up, the red jewel at eye level. “Ahh,” she said, pointing to the heart. “Está grabado.”
“What did she say?” Chessie asked.
Mal stepped closer. “It’s engraved?” And then he remembered what was special about these crosses. They had the owner’s name and usually a prayer engraved inside. Had it been engraved when Gabe bought it?
The woman nodded as she held the cross still, letting the light filter through the stone, where there must be tiny words.
“Un bebé,” the woman said.
“A baby?” Mal stepped closer, but Chessie was faster, inching next to the woman, who handed her the rosary.
But the woman had lost interest in the rosary, tapping the money in her hand as she brushed by Mal. She mumbled an offering of ten more minutes and then left the room, closing the door behind her.
“Oh my God, Mal,” Chessie whispered, peering at the stone with the window light behind it. “It is a message! You’re right.” She turned to him, surprising him with eyes wet with tears. She handed it to him, her hands—her whole body—shaking. “Read it.”
He took the chain and held the cross to the light, the center made up of a round red jewel about half an inch in diameter. Mal squinted at the tiny letters, each word punching his gut.
Gabriel Rafael Winter 29 Junio 2011
“Chessie.” His voice was thick in his throat. “We found him.”
“We haven’t found him yet.” She was already at the computer, fingers flying, typing so hard and fast it was a wonder she didn’t break the keyboard. “But I have a name and a birthdate and a beautiful, working password of chimneyeight—thank you very much—that just opened up a world of possibilities.”
He stood behind her, putting both hands on her shoulders just to feel the vibrations humming through her body. The buzz of determination and relentless optimism and…hope. The woman was damn near overflowing with the one thing he hadn’t even thought existed.
“Got it!” She practically jumped out of her seat. “I found him, Mal! I found him! Look.” She pointed to a line of text, and he read it out loud.
“Gabriel Rafael Winter, nació el vente y nueve de junio, en el a?o dos mil once, a Isadora Winter.” He squeezed her shoulders and translated. “Born June 29, 2011, to Isadora Winter.”
“Oh my God, look, Mal.” She pointed to a word on the screen. Adoptado. “Does that mean what I think it means?”
“Yes,” he replied. “He’s been adopted.”
She put her hand to her mouth. “Someone adopted my nephew? How can Gabe ever get him back, Mal? How?”
“I don’t know. But first we have to find him.”
Chapter Twenty-one
By the time they neared their hostel, they had a plan, which Chessie clung to as tightly as the rosary that had been engraved for her nephew. Ramos was the person who’d given Chessie the rosary, and surely he’d known what he was doing when he handed her that information.
Mal didn’t one hundred percent agree with that, but he was willing to go back to see Ramos in the morning on the off chance he’d tell them who’d adopted the child. But he was sure that Se?or Ramos helped local orphans, which most likely also included getting them out of the country, which would explain his secrecy, and he wasn’t likely to easily spill the name of the family who had Gabriel.
She put the rosary in her bag and took Mal’s hand as they walked into the dark and dingy building they currently called home. They headed downstairs to the basement and down the hall, but Mal stopped short five feet from the door.
“What’s the matter?” she asked.
He pointed to the scruffy thatched mat in front of the door. “I left that corner over the threshold so it would only move if someone’s been in the room.”
“Housekeeping?”
Even as she said the word, she knew how ridiculous it was. They hadn’t seen anyone who looked anything like a maid since they got to this dump. He turned, surprising her, suddenly pulling her into a tight, deep embrace.
“Mal, I—”
His mouth came down hard on hers, a breath-stealing kiss so unexpected she grunted and tried to pull back, but he was having none of it, pushing her against the wall and devouring her mouth.