Authors: Phoebe Conn
She twisted it on her finger. “How could I have forgotten getting married? Did we take photos?”
She had him there. “No, we intended to have a proper wedding later. Can you remember going to the memorial for Jaime?”
She closed her eyes. “Maja said this is Sunday, and I try to count back, but my thoughts won’t go in a straight line.”
“Please don’t worry.” He kissed her forehead but hid how frightened he’d been, and still was.
Lieutenant Montoya rapped lightly on the door and looked in. “Good, you’re both here.”
Ana looked up at Alejandro with a fearful gaze. “It’s Lieutenant Montoya, Ana,” he responded. He held her hand to cover the ring. “I hope you’ve no more questions.”
Montoya gave an apologetic nod. “It’s an inopportune time, I know, but things must be covered. Can you tell me something about the accident? Were you being followed? Did Mr. Maxim turn to escape a pursuit?”
Tears filled Ana’s eyes. “I don’t know what happened. You’ll have to ask Gian Carlo.”
“I’m so sorry to upset you, but we’ve been unable to locate him,” Montoya replied. “His MG is totaled, and he must provide an accident report, but he left the scene of the accident in the ambulance with you and has disappeared.”
“He hasn’t disappeared,” Alejandro countered. “He was here at the hospital until Ana got out of surgery. He didn’t mention being chased. He would have told me had it happened.”
Montoya took out his notebook and pen. “When did you last see him?”
“I was trying not to look at the clock, but it was late last night. I thought he’d gone home.”
“He didn’t return home last night.”
“Girlfriend,” Ana whispered.
Alejandro squeezed her hand. “He’d wrecked his MG, so he must have called someone to give him a ride home. Maybe he stayed at her home rather than his own.”
“Ah yes, it’s a possibility. He should surface soon. I need for you to look at some photos from the memorial service. You left rather early, and there were a couple of men who arrived later. It’s possible you know them.”
“Why didn’t you ask them their names?” Alejandro inquired.
Montoya’s smile slid into a predatory smirk. “I did, of course, but that doesn’t mean the ones they supplied or wrote in the memorial book were accurate.” He pulled a manila envelope from his coat pocket and shook out the candid photos taken at the memorial. “Do either of these men look familiar?”
Alejandro slid Ana’s hand under the covers to hide her ring before he reached for them. “Ana suffered a concussion and her vision isn’t clear yet, so she’ll need a few days before she can identify anyone from a photo. They don’t look familiar to me, though.” He returned the photos to Montoya. “Maybe someone else at the memorial knows them.”
“Perhaps.” The lieutenant did not look pleased. “How are you, Miss Santillan? I was so sorry to learn you’d been hurt on your way home from the memorial.”
“How do I look?” she asked.
Alejandro tried not to laugh, but that was the Ana he knew. “As you can see, she’s doing very well for the injuries she sustained. She needs to rest, though, so please don’t stay long.”
Apparently losing interest, Montoya moved toward the door. “I’ve stayed long enough, Mr. Vasquez. Good afternoon to you both.”
Ana closed her eyes. Alejandro thought she’d fallen sleep, but after Montoya closed the door, she looked up at him. “I don’t like him, do I?”
“No, not at all. He’s working on Jaime Campos’s murder. Do you remember Jaime?”
“Please hand me another strawberry. Thank you.” She ate it in small bites. “Someone killed him. What a waste. He was an excellent photographer. What could have happened to Gian Carlo? Does he blame himself for the accident?”
“It was his fault, and he readily admitted it, so I doubt he’d hide.” He turned as Dr. Pallares came to the door.
“Good afternoon,” she said. “I’m happy to see you’re awake, Ana. May I speak with you privately, Mr. Vasquez?”
“Are you in trouble?” Ana whispered.
“I hope not.” He stepped out into the hall and followed Dr. Pallares to a secluded spot in the hallway around the corner. “What’s wrong? I thought Ana was doing as well as could be expected.”
The physician stuck her hands into her coat pockets. “She is. We ran several tests when she came in yesterday, and one will show if a woman is pregnant even before she knows it herself.”
Afraid he knew what was coming, he braced his hand against the wall. “Are you saying she’s pregnant?”
“Yes, but she’d not have missed a period yet. After being so badly injured in the accident, she could miscarry. I think it would be a kindness if we didn’t mention the possibility of a baby just yet. Were you two hoping to have children?”
Dumbfounded, he didn’t know how to respond. Ana had said she would have married Miguel Aragon had he lived, but they’d never talked about marriage or children as a general subject of conversation. He had no idea what she’d want. Hell, they weren’t married in the first place, and he’d gotten himself in much too deep. “Don’t most couples want to have children?”
“Some do and some don’t. You’re both young, and I thought you might want to postpone becoming parents.”
He straightened up. “Let’s concentrate on getting Ana well, and then we’ll talk about having babies.”
“Whatever you wish, but I wanted you to know the truth. I don’t usually keep things from my patients. Ana is bruised from head to toe, and with the pain meds, she might not make a decision she’d be comfortable with later. I doubted you’d want that to happen.”
“No, of course not. Thank you for telling me first.” He waited in the hallway while she went in to see Ana. He continued to feel sick that she’d been hurt so badly, but she’d shown him a glimpse of her usual feisty sparkle. A broken leg would impact her career, although she could pose for ads seated, if the scar on her cheek healed to a faint scar. She’d balked when he’d urged her to pursue photography, so apparently she wasn’t ready to retire from modeling. Or she hadn’t been prior to the accident.
Where a baby fit into her life, he didn’t know. She could hire a nanny, but somehow, he thought she’d want to raise a child herself.
If
she wanted to raise a child. Sometimes condoms failed, so he thought he was the likely father. He’d assumed she took the pill like most young women he’d dated, apparently not. He swallowed hard. He’d claimed to be her husband, but there was a huge difference between that ruse and being slammed in the gut with fatherhood.
Chapter Twelve
After Dr. Pallares left, Alejandro looked in on Ana, but her eyes were closed, and he wouldn’t disturb her. He called Fatima before leaving the hospital. She’d gone to Ana’s condo to feed the kittens and wanted him to come and tell her everything Ana hadn’t disclosed.
The kittens rushed to him as he came through the door. He scooped them up and scratched behind their ears before setting them down. “They’re getting big. Did Ana really think she’d find a good home for them?”
“At first, I believe so. But I don’t want to talk about Romeo and Juliet. Would you like some coffee?”
“Yes, please.” He’d grown up with servants, but Fatima was far more than a housekeeper to Ana, and she might know important things he didn’t. She was dressed in a navy blue dress, probably the one she’d worn to church. They took chairs at the dining table rather than move into the living room, and she brought a plate of lemon cookies along with the coffee mugs.
“These are Ana’s favorites.”
“Give me a bag, and I’ll take some to her.”
The housekeeper studied him closely. “You look as though you haven’t slept. Now tell me the truth. How is Ana?”
She was right—he hadn’t slept more than an hour or two last night, if that. The coffee was the best he’d tasted since his last visit there. He reached for a cookie. “I don’t think she likes being fussed over.”
“No, not at all. Now stop stalling.”
He smiled at her gentle scolding. “She can’t remember the accident.” He gave her a brief summary of Ana’s injuries and didn’t make them sound less serious than they were. “It’s going to be a long while before she can walk a runway. Makeup artists will be able to cover the scar on her cheek, but by the time she’s well, she could have lost interest in modeling.”
Fatima pulled a tissue from her pocket and wiped the tears from her eyes. “This is just so awful and unfair. She’s such a good person, she really is.” Romeo jumped up on a chair and onto the table. She brushed him off. “The kittens are incorrigible.”
“Of course they are; they’re cats. I won’t tell you not to worry, but Ana is receiving the best of care. When she’s able to leave the hospital, I plan to take her on a cruise. She’ll be much happier on board one of our ships than in a rehab facility, or here watching her favorite movie videos over and over.”
Fatima offered a faint smile. “You really care for her, don’t you?”
It was easy to admit. “Yes, I do, but we haven’t been seeing each other long. Is there someone else she’s also been dating who’d like to know how she’s doing?”
Fatima’s posture stiffened. She drew in a long breath and exhaled slowly. “Ana sees just one man at a time, Mr. Vasquez. She doesn’t juggle her time between lovers.”
He reached for her hand, but she pulled away. “I didn’t mean to insult you, or Ana. She’s a beautiful woman, and I thought she might have other men who cared for her.”
She looked away. “She’s not been seeing anyone since Miguel Aragon died last summer. She adored him. I met him once when he came by to pick her up, and he had, well, I suppose magnetism is the word. He was such a handsome man, and when he spoke to you, he made you feel as though you were the only person in the universe. Santos has his looks, but I doubt he can work the same magic with women.”
Uncertain whether to be proud or appalled he had to be the father of Ana’s child, he shifted in his chair. He knew he ought to confide in Fatima and admit to a sham marriage, and the real stunner, that Ana was pregnant, but since yesterday afternoon, things were moving too fast, and he couldn’t find the words. “Would you please pack a suitcase for Ana for the cruise? She’d be able to wear long skirts and tops. I don’t think she’d want her short dresses. I’ll ask her when she’s ready to leave the hospital to be sure, but you probably know what she’ll need.”
“I’ll have everything ready. A cruise will be a good thing for her. Being on the sea will keep her from worrying too much about missing work.”
“I hope so.” He thanked her for the coffee and cookies and took some for Ana.
Ana was certain she ought to remember getting married, and she twisted the new gold ring on her finger. She liked Alejandro so much, and thought she might have married him and agreed to keep it a secret for a while. Perhaps they’d not wanted to announce the marriage while a murder investigation swirled around her. Wishing there was something more than a billowing fog in her brain, she struggled to recall details of her childhood and go from there. There had been pretty clothes, bright lights and cameras, but there had been so many years of the same routine, she couldn’t separate one from the other. Her mother had kept a diary. She was sorry she hadn’t had one of her own.
When Alejandro returned in early evening carrying a takeout bowl of vegetable stew, she was as elated as she could be with every part of her body aching. “Thank you, that smells so good. Clearly there are benefits to marrying you.”
“Thank you. Few women can be seduced with vegetables, but I’m doing my best.”
She couldn’t see his face clearly, but thought he must be smiling. She slurped the stew from the container rather than fumble with the spoon. “Was I no challenge at all for you?”
“You were a challenge in every respect. A major point might have been that I’m taller than you.”
“Are you calling me shallow?”
He pulled the visitor chair to her bedside. “Not at all. Can you remember when we met at El Gato?”
She closed her eyes to focus. “Wasn’t I in my Goth Girl outfit?”
“Yes, and I didn’t discover who you really were for, well, a while.”
Before she’d eaten half the stew, she couldn’t swallow another drop. “Do you want to finish this? It’s really good, but I’m full.”
“I brought some of Fatima’s lemon cookies. Would you like one?”
She reached out her hand. “You went to see her? Is she frantic over this?”
He gave her the smallest of the cookies and used the spoon he’d brought to finish the stew. “She’s worried, quite naturally, and I tried to reassure her. More importantly, I’m growing more fond of vegetables every day.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” She drew her lower lip through her teeth. “Alejandro, can we be serious for a minute?”
“You’re in a hospital bed. How could we be more serious?”
She frowned and winced when her cheek hurt. “I’m in real trouble here. Modeling can be unpredictable, and I’ve money set aside to live on, but I’m not going to be able to work for a long time. With a broken leg, I can’t even do Lamoreaux’s shoe ads. I don’t think I’ll feel up to having sex any time soon either. If no one knows we’re married, do you want to have it annulled?”
He got up to toss the empty container into the wastebasket in the corner. “There’s more to a marriage than sex, Ana.”