to the Keys and back more times than you could shake a stick since he’d returned to the States four months ago. He’d flown into Boston for no good reason at all. Putting off the inevitable, most likely. If he was going to do this, he wanted to do it right. Fixing fifteen years of messed-up family history wasn’t going to happen overnight. He looked up at the evening sky as if it held the answer to his unspoken question. What made reconnecting with family so hard?
He swung his leg over his bike, the strong thrust of his foot bringing the Beast to life with a satisfying roar of the engine. The Beast and he had steadily worked their way down the coast, picking up paramedic shifts here and there as he went. He could’ve walked straight into any ER he chose after all the frontline doctoring conflict zone after conflict zone had demanded of him. But “downgrading” to a paramedic had fit right. He wanted the raw immediacy being first on the scene required. A penance for everything he hadn’t set right when he should’ve.
What kind of man abandoned his kid brother when he needed him the most? Left his older brothers in the lurch when they’d been doing the best they could with a bad situation?
A boy who’d been loaded with too much responsibility? Or a plain old coward?
Time to see if a decade-plus of being a Marine had made an actual man out of him.
He shifted gears again and headed toward Little Heliconia. The neighborhood he’d been born and raised in held more of his demons than anywhere else in the world. And he’d seen some hellholes in his time.
Santi reached the familiar corner, leather boots connecting with the ground as he debated whether or not to make the turn. A horn sounded behind him and he fought the urge to kickstand his bike and give the impatient driver a little lesson in common courtesy. Waiting two seconds wasn’t going to kill anyone. His heart caught for a moment.
At least, not in this scenario.
He sucked in a deep breath, flicked on his blinker and took his bike into a low dip, knee stopping just shy of the asphalt as he rounded the corner.
The lights were on in the back alleyway, but he couldn’t see anyone. He turned off the ignition a couple of doors down from the one he knew like the back of his hand, pulled off his helmet and let the night sounds settle around him. The chirrup of tree frogs and steady hum of the crickets kept cadence with the wash and ebb of the waves just a couple of blocks away, but the thud and thump of his heart won out. He’d driven past about twenty times since he’d been back. This was the first time he’d stopped.
“Ay! Dante! Don’t forget to put orange soda on the list this time, pero. We’re out.”
Santi’s spine stiffened as he heard his older brother give the admonishment. Rafe’s words had always held more bark than bite and it didn’t look like much had changed. The sound of his voice transported him right back to the time and place when everything had changed. He couldn’t even remember why they’d all been in the shop. There had been nothing unusual in it. But the command to get down on the ground had been a first. In less than a minute the “perfect family” had been irrevocably altered.
“Not my fault this time, Rafe. Blame it on la fea!”
Santi stifled a guffaw. Still calling each other “the ugly one,” were they?
“You boys! Stop your bickering and get back to work. I don’t want to be here all night.”
“Don’t worry, Carmelita. We’ll get you back home in time for your favorite soaps.”
“No seas tonto,” Carmelita shot back, appearing at the back doorway as she spoke over her shoulder. “I know how to record things now on my thingamajig. I’m every bit as modern as you boys.” She cracked a small area rug out into the empty space of the alley, a cloud of dust left billowing in the pool of streetlight with barely a chance to settle before she was in and out of the doorway with another one. Her efficiency had seen them through the darkest days of their lives. She may not have been blood—but she was all the family they’d had after that day.
“Carmelita, give me those. I can finish up.”
Santi froze when his little brother appeared alongside their adoptive auntie, then he slowly leaned back on the seat of his bike as if the darkness could envelop him more than it already had.
Carmelita clasped Alejandro’s stubbled chin in one of her chubby hands and gave it a loving shake, then patted his cheek as if he were a toddler. “You’re a good boy, Alejandro, but I’m not an old woman yet. You already work too hard at that hospital of yours. All of you boys do.”
Alejandro clucked away her talking-to and wordlessly took the next mat and gave it a sharp shake.
Santi felt a sting hit him at the back of his throat. His lungs constricted against the strain of trying to swallow back the sour twist of emotion fighting to get out.
Alejandro had changed. Hardly surprising given the last time Santi had seen him he’d been in his midteens. His little brother was a man now. About the same height—six feet with an inch or two more for good measure. He’d been a good-looking kid and the same held true about the man standing not twenty yards away. No thanks to him. He’d bailed when his brother had needed him most. And from the looks of things, he’d done more than all right without him.
Santi swore softly, then swore again when Alejandro turned at the sound.
No. He couldn’t do this. Not tonight. Still too soon.
His body went into automatic pilot, turning the key, kick-starting the bike into a roar of disparate sounds that melded into one. The engine, the quick-fire gear changes and the piercing screech of rubber twisting on tarmac couldn’t drown out his thoughts as he took the sharp turn out of the alley and without a second’s hesitation headed to the bridges so he could hit the Keys and get himself straight again.
“STOP KICKING THE desk already! What’s it ever done to you?”
Amanda smiled as she told her friend off and Saoirse pulled back her booted foot just as it was ready to connect with the ER check-in desk for another thud.
“I’m tired of waiting. Where is this guy anyhow?”
“Ah!” Amanda’s eyes lit up and she leaned conspiratorially across the counter. “It’s a male person, is it? Do you know if he’s single? I can’t believe you didn’t talk to that guy at Joe’s going-away party. Muy guapo. They don’t make them that handsome and available all that often, Murph. You should’ve pounced.” She did her best cat-pounce look, managing to look completely adorable in the process.
“Enough! I’ll figure out my little problem outside work hours, thank you very much.” She pursed her lips and gave her friend a wide-eyed glare.
“I’m just saying, beggars can’t be choosers and you had an amazing option last night...” Amanda paused for effect. “Until you bailed.”
“I didn’t bail!” What’s so bad about bailing when all you have to offer is yourself? The self her ex couldn’t see fit to marry...on their wedding day.
“And I’m no beggar,” she tacked on for good measure—as if it would make a grain of salt’s worth of difference to Amanda.
“Yeah, right. Tell it to the deportation police.” Amanda pulled out her phone and scrolled through the images until she hit the one she wanted and turned it toward Saoirse.
The calendar. As if she needed a visual aid to remind her the days were passing faster than the sands of time. Or were those the same thing?
“Three months, Murph. Three months to find some talent who is going to put a ring on that finger by the end of your course.”
“I told you, I’m not in the market for a ring. Or a romance. None of that. It’s a green card I’m after. Nothing more.”
“C’mon.”