“He could have broken his neck, Father,” Jane murmured. “Could have ended up paralyzed.”

“Yes.” Father Ramon nodded. “That’s exactly right.”

“Is Dondi okay?” Mack asked in a gruff tone.

“Yes.” He didn’t mince words. “He’ll be fine. But the point is that noble impulses can lead to disastrous results if you don’t think.” His fist crashed on the table, making everyone but Loup jump. “Understand?”

They nodded.

“Good.” Father Ramon pulled out his chair and sat. Sister Martha and Anna sat on either side of him. He made a shooing gesture to Katya and Maria, who were on kitchen duty, and they hurried to retrieve dinner. “Let us give thanks,” Father Ramon said, folding his hands. “Thanks for the food that we eat, and thanks that our young friend will survive unharmed. Thanks that due to Katya’s flirting and a homesick soldier’s indulgence, our covenant here remains whole.”

C.C. snickered.

“I’m not finished.” Father Ramon pointed at him. “As penance, all of you who fought will serve guard duty for the next month, because I’m sick and tired of hearing Garza’s and Salamanca’s punks harass us and our parishioners.” He hoisted his water glass. “Despite the fact that you all had the ill grace to defy my edict, at least you had the good grace to win. And against my better judgment, I must confess that this pleases me. Any questions?”

They shook their heads.

“No, sir!” Mack added crisply.

“Good.” Father Ramon drank. “Amen.”

SIXTEEN

Things changed in the way that things do.

Word that the orphans of Santa Olivia had defeated a gang of young Salamanders leaked. The Salamanders sought revenge. The youngsters of the Garza Gang tried their hand. There were a handful of short, sharp scuffles in which the Santitos, the Little Saints of Santa Olivia, fought to a win or draw.

It won them respect.

Word came from on high that the church wasn’t to be bothered. The marauding, taunting gangs vanished.

Loup missed them.

Puberty descended on the Santitos, dividing them. Diego and Maria were already a lost cause, as was Katya, fond of flirting with soldiers. C.C. and Mack were the next to shoot up in height, shoulders broadening and voices deepening. Even Jaime and Jane embarked on a cautious, prickly courtship that involved a good deal of bickering and breaking up.

Miguel Garza finally convinced Floyd Roberts to give him his first prize match. He didn’t win, but he went the distance. True to form, instead of pushing himself harder, he rested on his laurels and slacked off on his training. When he fought in his second match six months later, he was caught flat-footed and knocked out in the sixth round.

“My turn comes next,” Tommy told Loup with surety.

He wasn’t the only one who thought so. Rumors were beginning to circulate in Outpost that Tom Garron was an up-and-coming contender. He worked tirelessly as Floyd Roberts’ right-hand man at the gym, and he trained relentlessly. Tommy had succeeded in winning the admiration and respect of most everyone he encountered. Still, Floyd held off granting him a prize match.

The year that Loup was thirteen, Tommy finally got his first prizefight and the church got a new orphan.

The latter happened first. Loup was in the bell tower with T.Y. the day that Pilar Ecchevarria arrived. Technically, the bell tower was off limits and had been ever since Father Gabriel had plunged to his death from it over two decades ago, but the Santitos had long used it as a trysting place and it was one of the many things to which a blind eye was turned.

On that day, T.Y. was teaching Loup to kiss.

“Close your eyes,” he complained. “I can’t do it with you staring at me.”

“Okay.” She closed her eyes.

T.Y. kissed her with slightly dry lips, then stuck his tongue in her mouth, wiggling it against hers. He pulled away. “It feels weird.”

Loup opened her eyes. “Yeah, no kidding!”

“No.” He flushed. “I mean you do.”

“Maybe you’re doing it wrong,” she suggested.

T.Y. shook his head. “I’m doing it exactly how Jane showed me. You feel weird, that’s all.” His flush deepened. “Sorry!”

“Maybe Jane was messing with you,” Loup murmured.

“I don’t think so.” T.Y. sounded miserable. “She was trying to make Jaime jealous.”

A commotion in the outer courtyard broke the awkward silence that followed. They peered over the edge of the bell tower to see a solidly built woman of middle years marching toward the church’s front door, dragging a much younger woman behind her by the hand and haranguing her all the while.

“Wanna see what’s up?” T.Y. asked in a brighter tone, grateful for the distraction.

Loup sighed. “Sure.”

By the time they’d descended from the tower, the young woman was waiting alone in the vestibule, looking bored and sulky. Despite her expression, she was a pretty girl with brown hair shot through with a streak of blond and an abundance of nubile charm.

“Hey,” T.Y. greeted her.

“Hey,” she said without interest.

Beyond a closed door onto a chamber where Father Ramon met with parishioners, voices were raised.

“… prefer that children be fostered by family members whenever possible,” Father Ramon’s deep voice was saying.

“That child’s body is the Devil’s playground!” the haranguing woman’s voice shouted over his. “If you don’t take her—”

Loup looked at the newcomer. “They talking about you?”

“Yeah.” The girl shifted in her seat. “My aunt. She caught my uncle messing with me.”

T.Y. whistled.

“It was no big deal.” The girl shrugged. “He’d pay me five bucks to sit on his lap and bounce around a little.”

“And you did it?” T.Y. asked, aghast.

Her hazel eyes flashed. “Hell yes, I did! They wouldn’t let me get a job, wouldn’t pay me a dime, expected me to wait on them and their brats hand and foot and be grateful I had a roof over my head. How else was I ever gonna get out of there? So yeah, I did it.”

T.Y. put up his hands. “Okay, okay!”

“He offered me ten if I’d let him play with my tits,” the girl said, mollified. “I told him to go fuck himself.”

The door to the conference chamber opened. Father Ramon stood there with a weary look on his face. The woman behind him was smirking.

“Pilar Ecchevarria,” he said to the newcomer. “Welcome to the Church of Santa Olivia.”

She stood, full breasts moving in an interesting fashion behind her worn men’s overshirt, and smiled sweetly at him. “Thank you, Father.”

He averted his eyes and addressed the older woman. “How old did you say she was again?”

“Thirteen,” she said sourly.

The Father sighed and crossed himself.

For better or worse, Pilar’s arrival changed the dynamic once again. Once she’d settled into the routine of the place and realized she was well and truly free of her unpleasant relatives, she turned out to be fairly good-natured and a little lazy. But even at thirteen, Pilar drew boys like honey draws flies—including the attention of the soldiers who lingered outside the gates to flirt with Katya and give her little gifts.

“Can’t you keep her out of my way?” Kotch snapped at C.C. and Mack.

They exchanged glances.

C.C. grinned broadly. “We can try.”

The Santitos paired off, broke up, and reunited in new configurations, endlessly bickering over the ramifications. Even T.Y. grew three inches taller and sprouted a few sparse hairs on his upper lip. With no Salamanders or Garzas to trouble them, flirting had replaced fighting and stickball as the activity of choice. The only ones left out were Loup, to whom puberty was slow in coming, and Dondi, too young for it yet.

“I miss the old days,” Dondi said forlornly to Loup.

She ruffled his hair. “So do I.”

It was near the end of the year when Tommy finally got the nod from Floyd Roberts. After a certain amount of negotiation, Father Ramon agreed that all the Santitos would be allowed to attend the fight, albeit with himself and Sister Martha and Anna as chaperones. They got a prime spot, massed behind the challenger’s corner with Floyd’s grudging blessing.

The arc lights were blazing.

They shone on Tommy as he entered the ring. He shrugged off his robe to reveal a sculpted physique resembling a young god’s, his fair hair haloed by the lights. The Outposters roared. Pilar Ecchevarria caught her breath.

“That’s your brother?” she asked Loup.

“Yeah,” Loup said absently.

She was watching the army’s current contender, all business. He was a big man with an Italian-sounding name and calm, watchful eyes. He and Tommy were well matched in height and reach, but she guessed he had five years and twenty pounds on her brother, all of it solid muscle.

“Hey, sweetheart!” Tommy leaned over the ropes, blue eyes twinkling. “So?”

“You’re not in the same weight class,” Loup said softly. “That guy’s gotta be a heavyweight.”

“Yeah, I know.” He banged his gloves together, bounced on his toes. “It’s close, but we waived it. You wanna fight, you gotta accommodate. Happens all the time here; you know that. And Coach doesn’t have any heavyweights. So? Whaddya think?”

Loup looked into her brother’s open, earnest face and saw what he needed. “Knock him dead, mijo.”

It was a good fight, but for the first time, she watched with a strange sense of emptiness. The first time Tommy took a jab to the face, Pilar let out a shriek and clutched Loup’s arm.

“Aren’t you scared?” she breathed.

“Yeah.” Loup smiled wryly. Pilar didn’t quite understand about her, but she’d put her finger on the matter nonetheless. “Yeah, I think I am.”