My younger brother stood beside the window. He slid the hood of his sweatshirt off and shifted his glance from me to Lina, who slipped her hand into mine, her eyes wide on him.

The last time I’d seen Zach had been when he’d had a three-week leave two years ago. Those three weeks had been cut short. I still remembered that. He looked different now. Older than his twenty-four years. His dark hair wasn’t cut quite as short as was required by the military anymore. He wore black from head to toe, and I could see the ink of a bright new tattoo creeping up one side of his neck. From the scruff on his face, he hadn’t shaved in more than a week. His eyes had lines around them that hadn’t been there two years ago, and a scar split his right eyebrow in two.

I waited until Zach turned his attention to me and felt a sense of relief when a cocky grin softened his features.

“Well, well, brother. You got good taste. But I’ll be honest, you bringing home a girl is about the last thing I expected to see.”

“Who is this?” Lina asked.

Her worried eyes fell on me.

“This is my kid brother, Zach.” I closed the door and took a step toward Zach, looked him over. He was built big, like Raphael and I, but he seemed to have gotten bigger, his eyes harder. “They teach you how to break into people’s houses in the military?” I asked, giving him a grin, trying to hide my worry as I drew him in for a hug.

“Among other things,” he said, hugging me back tightly, then releasing me. He cleared his throat and looked beyond me to Lina.

“This is Lina Guardia.” He was clearly waiting for more. Lina stepped forward and extended her hand, which he took. I noticed how his gaze shifted to her shoulder and arm, to the tattoos there. They were so natural to me now. A part of her. I forgot people’s reactions when they first saw them.

“Nice to meet you, but you gave me a hell of a scare,” Lina said.

I moved to the kitchen to take two beers out of the fridge. “Lina, why don’t you go have a shower.”

“Oh, I can do that later—”

I handed Zach a beer and set mine down on the counter. “Now’s good,” I said to her. She opened her mouth to protest, but I shook my head and went to her, took her wrists, and walked her backward toward the bathroom, very aware of Zach’s eyes following us. “I need to talk to my brother. Alone.”

She hesitated, glanced over my shoulder once, but acquiesced.

“Fine,” she said, then turned to walk into the bathroom.

Once the door closed and the shower ran, I picked up my beer and took a seat on the couch.

“Are you in trouble?” I asked, knowing he was. He had to be. No word in months, then he turns up in my apartment, standing in the dark like some criminal, looking like he hasn’t showered in too many days.

“Nothing I can’t handle.” He gestured to the bathroom. “Church allow girlfriends now?”

“I’m leaving the church.” I shook my head. “I left. We’re only here until a few things get straightened out. Then I’ll take her home. She’s Sofia’s sister.”

“Ah. That’s why she looked familiar.”

Zach had met Sofia on that trip home two years ago.

“The Lord works in mysterious ways.”

The sarcasm in his tone grated. Neither of my brothers had cared much for my choice to join the seminary.

“What’s going on, Zach?”

He drew his hoodie over his head and tossed it aside, then sat down and set his empty bottle on the coffee table. I saw that the tattoo I’d glimpsed on the side of his neck wrapped around his arm. It was a two-headed snake, mouths open, fangs bared. But more disturbing was the skin of his other arm. Bumpy and scarred. As if it had been burnt.

“How do I say this?” he started, asking himself the question. “You might get a letter in the coming weeks telling you I’m MIA or died in action or some bullshit. Well,” he faced me. “It’s just that: bullshit. I got fucked, brother.”

“MIA or dead?”

“Mission went wrong. Most of my men died. Thirteen of them, to be exact.” He shook his head. “I should’ve died.”

“How? When?”

“About three months after I saw you. A mission the American public will never hear about.”

“Where have you been for the last nearly two years then?”

“Like I said, I should’ve died. The less you know the better.”

“Are you in hiding?”

He thought about that for a few moments before answering, then shook his head. “No, not hiding. Just got into the country a few days ago. I’m here for answers.”

“Zach—”

“Tell me about the girl.”

He clearly didn’t want to talk about whatever was going on with him. It seemed everyone around me had secrets. “I ran into Lina by accident. She was supposed to be in Chicago. Turned out she’d moved to New York City and had managed to get herself a job with a Russian mobster.”

Zach chuckled. “Mind if I grab another one?” he asked, motioning to his beer.

“Help yourself.”

He got a beer and returned. “So, a Russian mobster?”

“And his son. That’s almost taken care of now, but she’s got Feds tailing her. Security, they say. They need her testimony. And since I’m getting the feeling you don’t want to be found—”

“That’s who the two buffoons across the street are. They’re doing a bang-up job protecting her.”

He touched his bottle to mine in a mock toast.

“I can handle them, don’t worry about me. So you and…Lina, was it?”

“Yeah.”

“You left the church for her?”

“I wasn’t yet ordained.” Why did I always feel defensive about it, like I needed to explain this piece? Why did it matter?

He studied me. “You love her.” It wasn’t a question.

I nodded.

The shower switched off, and we both turned to the bathroom door. Zach swallowed half his beer.

“I need to get out of here.” He reached into his pocket. “I just need you to do one thing for me.”

“Anything.”

He handed me a sheet of paper with a name and a long series of numbers written on it.

“I need money wired into this account. My share of the family business.”

“That’s a lot of money.”

“And you can’t transfer it out of my account in Italy. They’ll track that. I need it done differently. I’ll pay it back.”

“I don’t care about you paying it back. Who’s they?”

“Less you know, the better, brother.”

“I want to help you, Zach.”

“This’ll help me. Can you do that?”

“Yeah,” I said reluctantly, wanting more. Wanting to do more. “I’ll figure out a way.”

He nodded. “Thanks.” He looked around. “I need to get out of here.”

“It’s the middle of the night.”

“Best time for disappearing.”

“Zach—”

He looked at me. “I just need to shower. Shave my face. I must look a sight.” He ran a hand through the scruff of his jaw.

I didn’t deny it.

“If I can borrow some clothes? A cassock, maybe?”

I studied him, knowing his mind was full, already on what he felt he had to do. “Anything you need.”

“Thanks.” The bathroom door opened, and Lina stepped out wrapped in a towel, a cloud of steam behind her.

“I’m pruny,” she said. “Do you need me to go back in?” She made a face.

Zach smiled, but I was too worried to. “No,” I said as Zach and I stood. “That’s fine.” I turned to my brother. “Go ahead in. Take whatever you need. I’ll get some things together for you.”

He nodded and patted my arm before making his way to the bathroom. He paused when he neared Lina, admiring the ink on her arm, shoulder, and back.

“Nice.”

“Thanks. Yours too.”

The bathroom door closed, and the shower switched on. Lina came to me. “What’s going on?”

“I’m not sure exactly.”

“Is he staying?”

“No. I need to pack some things, in fact. Can you maybe get some food together for him?”

“Sure. I’ll make a couple of sandwiches.”

“Thanks.” I took my wallet out of my pocket as I headed to my closet, glad I had a few hundred dollars in cash to give Zach until I got that money transferred for him. Lina helped me pack for him and, not half an hour later, my brother said good-bye and slipped out the door looking like a different man—clean-shaven, the clothes he’d had on in the trash can, wearing one of my suits, a long dark coat, and carrying a duffel bag of my clothes, including a cassock, and the food Lina packed.

I watched him disappear into the night and wondered where he was going. Because I knew what he was doing. Trouble wouldn’t have any problem finding him. Zach was going out looking for it.