Marriage, Bravo Style! Read online

  “You think I want to take that away from you? If you do, you’re wrong. I don’t.”

  He started to reach out, thought better of it and lowered his hand without touching her. “Of course you don’t. But you would. That’s who you are, Elena. You’re the woman a guy chooses for a lifetime. You’re not someone who spends the night with a guy and then walks away in the morning.”

  She pressed her fingers to her temples, shook her head. “How can I be both flattered and insulted at the same time? That has to be impossible, right? But still. I am.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  She groaned. “Why doesn’t that help?”

  “Listen. This isn’t something you want to get into with me.”

  “Could you please not tell me what I want?”

  “When I’m finished making this deal with your dad, it would be over with us. I would be gone and that would be it. You wouldn’t be changing my mind. Are you willing to accept that?”

  She stared at him. Oh, she was so tempted to insist that she was willing—even if she wasn’t. Tempted to take tonight and glory in it. And try her very best to get him to see things differently before he left San Antonio.

  Slowly, she shook her head. “No.” It was one thing if it didn’t work out. She could accept that. But to go into it knowing his heart would be closed against her? Uh-uh. “I think you’d better just go.”

  “Yeah.” He stood.

  She got up, too, and followed him to the front door.

  Before he left her, she caught his arm. “Wait.”

  “Elena…” The regret in his eyes was as clear as the yearning.

  She went on tiptoe and kissed him. One last kiss, a deep, slow one, their tongues twining together, her breath coming faster…

  But then, before it went beyond a kiss, she dropped back on her heels and stepped away. “Goodbye, Rogan.”

  With a last nod, he left her.

  Mercy called the next morning as Elena was getting ready for school. The first words out of her mouth were, “Well? How was it?”

  Elena told her sister the truth. “It was great. But we’re not going out again.”

  “Huh? You have to know that makes no sense at all.”

  “Well, whether it makes sense or not, that’s how it worked out.”

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “Uh-uh.” Elena had decided she was moving on. She was not going to dwell on what might have been.

  “I’m here,” Mercy offered. “Ready to listen if you change your mind.”

  “I know. And I appreciate that.”

  “I had such high hopes for him.” Mercy sipped something—probably the hot water with lemon she’d been drinking in the mornings since she learned she was pregnant again. There was a crunching sound: saltines, no doubt.

  Elena said, “Well, sometimes things just don’t end up the way you wish they would—how are you feeling, anyway?”

  Mercy put up no argument about the change of subject. “Mostly good. But, ugh, the morning sickness. It’s worse than with Lucas.”

  Elena sympathized.

  And when she hung up, she felt proud of herself. Yes, she was disappointed over the situation with Rogan. Very. To have finally felt that special something with someone. And then to have to accept that it wasn’t happening, that you and the other person wanted different things.

  But she hadn’t cried on her sister’s shoulder. She hadn’t made a big deal of it. And she hadn’t even mentioned her interest in Rogan to anyone else. It really wasn’t a big deal, just a date. One date. A lovely date. The best.

  At least until the end.

  She went to work, concentrated on her classes and her students. And got through the day well enough. True, the world seemed a little bit grayer, somehow. A little less vivid.

  The sense of promise, of anticipation, that had buoyed her since she met Rogan last Friday afternoon was gone.

  But it was okay. In a week, she’d be asking herself, “Rogan who?”

  Life was not passing her by. She just hadn’t met the right guy yet. And anyway, who needed a guy? She had a good life, a full one, just as it was.

  After school, she had a Young Historians meeting and from there, she went to the gym. There was a certain guy, a cute pediatrician, who came in to use the weight machines around the same time she did.

  They started talking, joking around. He asked her if she wanted to go out and get some dinner later.

  She said she’d love to. They agreed to meet at a restaurant on the River Walk at seven-thirty. He was waiting when she got there.

  It was…nice.

  Nice, and nothing more. When they parted, he said he hoped they could have dinner again sometime. She nodded and smiled and left it at that.

  At home, she congratulated herself on getting right back out there. She worked on her lesson plans, graded papers. Went to bed early.

  Life was good, she reminded herself. Rich. Satisfying. She didn’t need Rogan Murdoch to make it all complete.

  Wednesday was a gray day, the sky heavy with clouds, promising rain.

  During second period, one of the hall monitors came in with a note for her from the principal, Loretta Singh. Loretta needed to speak with Elena immediately.

  Elena felt a little shiver of apprehension, like a trickle of ice water down her spine. Loretta never called a teacher to the office in the middle of class unless there was some major problem that had to be dealt with immediately.

  An irate parent, a family emergency…

  Whatever the issue was, it wouldn’t be good.

  She turned the class over to one of her star students and headed for the office, walking fast, her poor heart going a mile a minute, her stomach tied in one big, hard knot.

  She knew when she stepped into Loretta’s office that it was going to be really bad.

  And it was.

  Loretta spoke gently. “Elena.” She smiled, but her eyes were shadowed. “Please. Sit down.”

  Sit down. It was what people always told you to do before they delivered the kind of information that could make your knees buckle.

  Elena felt for the guest chair and eased herself down into it.

  Once she was safely seated, Loretta spoke again. “I just got a call from a Mr. Murdoch.”

  Rogan? Had something happened to Rogan? Or maybe his sister or one of his brothers? But if it had, why would he be calling her? It made no sense.

  No. It had to be someone in her family. Papi? Caleb or Irina? Dread squeezed her heart like a vise.

  Loretta continued. “Mr. Murdoch asked me to tell you that your father’s had a heart attack.”

  My father, she thought numbly. And then she wondered, Papi? Davis? As much as she wanted to deny her relationship to Davis, right at that moment, she had no idea which father Loretta meant.

  Loretta added, “It happened at Cabrera Construction, he said. Your father’s business?” Papi. Oh, God. It was Papi then. “Elena, would you like something…some water? Are you—?”

  Elena waved a hand. “It’s okay. I’m…I need to know. Where is my father now?”

  “Elena—”

  “Really. Please. Where is my father?”

  “He’s being rushed to Sisters of Mercy Hospital.”

  Chapter Six

  At Sisters of Mercy, they sent her to the third floor, the cardiac unit.

  The open waiting area was on a wide balcony that overlooked the floors below. There, families sat huddled together, trying to read magazines, looking drawn and worried, speaking in hushed tones.

  Elena’s mom had arrived before her. Luz was dressed for work in a slim skirt, high heels and a white silk shirt. Around her neck she wore the triple strand of Mikimoto pearls Javier had given her eight years ago to mark their twenty-fifth anniversary. Maybe Luz’s presence should have surprised her, but it didn’t. Elena knew that when disaster struck, the first person her dad would call would be Luz.

  Rogan sat beside Luz. And another man, a little younger, s
at beside him. Even with her mind eaten up with worry for her father, Elena knew who the other man was: Cormac. Rogan’s brother. He had the same green eyes and square jaw.

  The men stood as Elena approached.

  Luz jumped up, too, and held her arms wide. “Oh, m’hija…”

  Elena ran to her and gathered her close. “Mami…” She wanted to cry. Crying would have been a relief. But somehow, the tears wouldn’t come.

  Luz took her by the shoulders. “Your sister and Luke are on the way.” Her eyes were wet. She blinked, as if willing the tears away. But one escaped and trickled down her cheek.

  Elena reached up and smudged it away with her thumb. “Dad…?”

  Her mom’s mouth trembled. “We don’t know. He’s still in surgery.”

  “But…he’s going to be okay, right? He’s going to be fine?”

  Luz touched the side of Elena’s face. “Yes. He will. I know he will.” She spoke with conviction. But there was a world of worry in her eyes.

  Elena grabbed her close again, hugged her so hard, whispered, “I’m so scared, Mami….”

  Luz rubbed her back, stroked her hair. “I know, I know. Shh, now. It’s okay. We’ll be strong. Recias, eh?”

  Elena pulled back and drew herself up. Her mom was right. They had to show fortitude. Falling apart at this point wouldn’t help her dad—or anyone else, for that matter. “Yes,” she answered firmly. “Very strong.” She turned to the two brothers, still standing side-by-side. “Hello, Rogan.” They shared a nod. “And you must be Cormac.”

  Rogan’s brother took her hand. “Elena. I wish we could have met under better circumstances.”

  “Me, too. I, um, take it you were both with him…when it happened?”

  “At your dad’s office, yes,” Cormac confirmed.

  “Come on,” said her mother, putting a coaxing hand at her back. “Let’s all sit down….”

  So they sat in a row—Luz, Elena, Rogan and Cormac. Luz felt for Elena’s hand. They held on to each other, good and tight. It helped, a little.

  Down the row of chairs, a woman said, “It’s been hours.”

  “Soon,” whispered the man beside her. “I’m sure we’ll hear some news soon.”

  Elena turned to Rogan. “How did it…” Her throat clutched. She had to swallow, hard, before she could finish the simple sentence. “Happen?”

  Rogan met her gaze directly. She saw concern in his eyes. And deep sympathy, too. But of course, he would understand. He’d lost both his parents, after all.

  He knew what this horror felt like, knew much too well. “We were in your dad’s office, going over the profit and loss statements.”

  “Was he upset about something?”

  Rogan shook his head. “He was laughing.”

  She blinked. “Laughing?”

  “Yeah. Cormac had made some joke. I don’t even remember it now. Your dad laughed. And then, all at once, he grabbed his left arm and stood up, so hard and fast that his desk chair went flying back and hit the wall behind him. He said his arm hurt. And then he started to fall.”

  Cormac said, “Rogan got to him, caught him before he hit the floor.”

  Rogan picked up the story again. “I got him over to the corner couch, kind of half dragging him, and eased him down onto his back. Cormac was on the phone by then, calling 911. Your dad grabbed the front of my shirt. He was having trouble breathing and his color was really bad, but he somehow managed to tell me that he wanted me to call your mother—and you and your sister. After that, he faded out on us. I gave him CPR. But only briefly. The paramedics came fast.”

  “That’s good!” She said it a little too loud, a little too desperately.

  “Oh, yeah.” He nodded, his gaze locked with hers. She knew he was willing her to believe—that her dad was going to make it. That for her, the horror would have a better ending than it had for him.

  Her mother let go of her hand and stood again. “Mercedes…”

  Elena looked over and Mercy and Luke were coming toward them. She got up, hugged Luke as her sister and mother embraced, then hugged her sister, too. It seemed a little ridiculous, all this hugging.

  At the same time, it felt absolutely necessary.

  They all sat down. Rogan introduced his brother to Mercy and Luke. And then they told the story of what had happened at the office again.

  Luz asked after Lucas. Mercy said that Aleta was with him.

  The waiting began anew, punctuated by ringing cell phones answered in hushed tones.

  “Yes, he’s still in surgery….”

  “No, not yet.”

  “We’ll call as soon as we know….”

  Lunchtime came and went. They decided to take turns going down to the cafeteria in the basement—except for Luz. She refused to leave the waiting area. And then nobody really wanted to get up and leave. It seemed too dangerous to go. Something momentous might happen in their absence. The doctor could finally appear and tell them that Javier was going to be fine.

  Or not.

  Finally, Rogan and Cormac went downstairs together. They were back in ten minutes with sandwiches and fruit and bags of chips, enough for everyone. They passed the food around.

  “Eat,” Rogan commanded, when Luz tried to wave her sandwich away. “Just a few bites, at least. You need nourishment, Luz. To keep your strength up.”

  She gave in and took the food. He held out a sandwich to Elena next. Ham and cheese on wheat, she noticed. Not that it mattered. At that point, it was fuel. Period.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, and then, because it somehow didn’t seem like enough, she said it again. “Thank you.”

  He nodded. She hoped he knew what she meant: Thank you for everything. For being there when my dad needed you, for being here now.

  After everyone got food, Rogan took drink orders and hit the vending machines.

  They ate—not a lot, but at least they made a pretense of it.

  It was like a picnic, in a macabre sort of way. The kind of picnic Elena desperately hoped she’d never be involved in again.

  And then she found herself thinking that moments like this had their own kind of value. With the threat of death so near, she felt frighteningly alive. And connected, deeply connected—to her mom and her sister, to Luke. And to Rogan, too. And even to Cormac, whom she had just met.

  When the meal was done, they waited some more.

  A woman doctor appeared—but not her dad’s surgeon, Luz said. The doctor went and knelt in front of one of the other groups. A woman in that group gasped and burst into tears.

  A man held her as she cried.

  They all got up and followed the doctor away.

  Elena ached for that family. She kept seeing her dad’s face last Sunday, on Easter morning. How tired and old he’d looked. Should she have known that this was coming? It seemed now, in hindsight, that she should have. That all of the signs had been there. Since he and her mom had separated, he really hadn’t been taking very good care of himself.

  Finally, at 4:26 according to the clock on the wall, another doctor emerged. Luz rose at the sight of him and the rest of them followed her lead. That doctor came right for them. A tall, pale-haired man in green scrubs, with a mask hanging off one ear.

  When he reached them, he spoke to her mother. “Mrs. Cabrera, your husband is…” The doctor continued speaking, but Elena’s heart was beating so loudly, making a roaring in her ears, that his words came out in a weird, rushing blur.

  She did get that her dad had made it through the surgery. A quintuple bypass. That soon they would be moving him to the Cardiac ICU. He was disoriented, the doctor said, but conscious. And he was asking for his wife.

  Elena and Mercy had moved in close on either side of Luz. Each took an arm, to support their mother—and at the same time, it seemed to Elena, to hold each other up.

  Luz whispered something under her breath. A fervent prayer of thanks, it sounded like. Then she asked the doctor, “My daughters? Would it be all right if the
y came in, too? They need to see their father, to know that he is all right.”

  “Of course,” said the doctor. “Follow me.”

  They went, holding on to each other. The men, already getting out their cell phones, stayed behind in the waiting room.

  Down a long hallway and through a set of wide steel doors, they entered a small room full of equipment and nurses. It was the room where they took patients right after surgery. Four curtains on tracks hung from the ceiling. Two of those curtains were drawn aside, the areas within empty, except for all that equipment. But in the far corner, a curtain was pulled shut.

  There was a gurney bed behind that curtain—Elena could see the steel legs. Someone was groaning in there. And there were hospital personnel around the patient. She could see their duty shoes, the cuffs of their scrub pants.

  She wondered if she and her mom and her sister should be in here dressed in their street clothes. Was that safe?

  But the doctor had brought them here. It must be okay.

  The fourth curtain was half-drawn. She saw that just about every machine in there was hooked up to the man on the bed. And she saw graying hair on a pillow. Another step and she saw her dad’s white, drawn face, his half-closed eyes. He looked so small to her in that rolling steel-railed bed, so small and wasted.

  But then he saw her mother. His eyes opened all the way. And his too-pale face seemed to light up from within. He tried to speak around the breathing tube. All that came out was a croak. But there was no doubt that whatever he meant to say, it was something tender. Something loving. And his hand moved against the sheet that covered him, fingers reaching in spite of all the tubes hooked to the back of it.

  And Elena knew then, she was absolutely certain. That he was going to be all right. That he and her mother would reunite. That sometimes the impossible can come true, in spite of the most terrible betrayals.

  If there is love enough.

  If there is real forgiveness.

  Her mother said, in a voice of such love and pain—and such hope, “Javi…” And she went to his side.