by Tina Beckett
“I can see that.” He touched her arm, noticing she didn’t shake him off. “I only have one question.”
“Is it about the baby?”
“Yes, it is actually. I also came to check and see how you’re doing. You have a lot more color today than you did the last time I saw you.”
“Maybe because I was busy puking my guts out the last time you saw me. I’m learning if I down saltine crackers by the boxful, it keeps the nausea at bay. Actually, though, I feel much better today.” She tightened her ponytail, and he noticed lines of exhaustion under her eyes. “Now, what’s your question?”
He wasn’t sure this was the time, but he had to know. Had to try to figure out how to deal with everything that had happened. “Why did you start off by saying ‘these’ when you were talking about your pregnancy?”
There was silence for several long seconds. Finally he tried a more direct approach. “Is there more than one fetus?”
Twins ran in his family. He was a twin. He had an aunt who’d also had two sets of twins.
He waited for Cassie’s answer. When she did speak, she didn’t look up at him.
“Yes. There are two.”
Rafe’s stomach bottomed out. “Are you sure?”
“I had an ultrasound this morning.” She dropped into a nearby chair, and Rafe lowered himself into the one next to her.
“And the tech told you there were two?” Was he really hoping the ultrasound had been read incorrectly?
“It wasn’t a tech. I asked one of the OB/GYNs to do the scan. I saw them with my own eyes. There are two babies.”
His head was spinning so fast he had trouble finding anything to say for a few seconds. She must have sensed his confusion because she started to get up. He stopped her with a hand on her arm. “Please, wait.”
When she sat back down Rafe put his elbows on his knees, his hands folded in front of him, as he tried to make sense of things. He couldn’t remember being at such a loss since the time he’d sat in a waiting room very much like this one, hoping beyond hope that he’d made the right decision, and that Alejandro would survive his surgery.
“Are they okay?”
“It’s hard to tell at this stage. Their hearts are both beating.”
His throat tightened. His father’s heart had been beating as well, only he hadn’t been okay at all. And now, although that heart continued to beat, it was in Alejandro’s chest. “Can they tell anything at all?”
“Not for a while. Blood tests can check for chromosomal damage, but as for Zika, the doctor is doing a test to check for antibodies.”
He unclasped his hands and shifted his body to look at her. He hadn’t lied when he’d said she had more color than she’d had two days ago. She was beautiful, her eyes soft with concern, maybe because she knew how conflicted he was.
But there was no way she could know that. No way she could know how painful it was to hear about beating hearts and uncertain days.
“You’re sure they’re mine?”
“I’m seven or eight weeks along.” Her voice was quiet. “I haven’t slept with my ex for probably ten or eleven weeks.”
“I guess that settles it, then.”
“Yes.” She covered his hand with hers. “I’m so sorry, Rafe. I wish I could rewind the clock so that none of this had happened.”
So that they hadn’t slept together? Or so that her ex hadn’t cheated?
He wasn’t even sure he wanted to know the answer to that question. “We used protection.” They’d already covered this territory, but he kept coming back to this one point.
“Sometimes it fails. You know that as well as I do.” Her hand left his, and she stared straight ahead.
“Hey.” He slipped his fingers under her chin and turned her back to face him. “I didn’t mean that as an accusation. I was trying to take away some of the guilt. You didn’t set out to get pregnant. Neither of us did. It could just as easily have happened with Darrin.”
“How did you know his name?”
He swallowed back his guilt. He hadn’t been snooping. “Your phone rang while you were asleep the other morning. I was standing near it and his name came up on the screen. There was a heart and so I assumed... There’s no chance you’ll work it out with him?”
“No. I want to put that time in my life behind me.”
Would she one day say that about him? About the time they’d spent together?”
He wasn’t sure why, but that thought made him uneasy. “I want to help.”
“Not necessary. Didn’t you hear what I told Darrin on the phone? I’ll raise them by myself.”
“Don’t you think they deserve to know their father?”
She sighed and leaned back against her chair. “I just want to make it through today, Rafe. And then tomorrow and the next day. I can’t worry about what might or might not happen seven months down the line. Besides, if the tests come back positive for Zika antibodies...”
Her voice faded away, but he knew exactly what she had been going to say.
If there was a possibility that the babies were exposed to the virus—one that made barely an impact on the mother, while wreaking havoc with any baby that might be growing in her womb—she might be faced with yet another problem.
And just like his father’s death, Rafe would be powerless to help her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
DANTE VALENTINO CRADLED Renato in his arms as he took the baby from his mother. During the course of all the testing they’d discovered that the sagittal suture in his skull had prematurely fused. The resulting craniosynostosis would force his head to expand along the other sutures, causing it to become narrow and elongated if not corrected.
The neurosurgeon who’d been called in to examine the baby would have to be Rafe’s brother—her luck wouldn’t have it any other way. The two men had the same dark hair and dark eyes, but although Rafe had said they were twins, they didn’t look any more alike than Rafe’s other brothers. Except they were all equally hunky.
The sight of him holding that baby made her wonder what Rafe would look like holding theirs.
Except he might never choose to do that, especially after she’d said she wanted no help. It had probably been a mistake to blurt that out, but she desperately wanted her babies to have a stable, loving environment, free of people walking in and out of their lives. But wasn’t Rafe right? Didn’t she have an obligation to allow him to see them?
She didn’t know.
Dante stood and placed the baby on the exam table next to his mother’s hip. “I’ve seen his chart, and I know the craniofacial surgeon has already been in to see him, but I wanted to do my own assessment.”
She knew his surgery schedule over at Buena Vista Hospital was a killer, so the fact that he’d come all the way to Seaside to see Renato touched her. The brothers’ parents had definitely raised the boys to be compassionate, no matter how hard they might try to hide it. Dante was as gruff as Rafe. Maybe more so, if the rumors around the hospital were to be believed. And yet he cared about Renato. Just like Rafe had seemed to do when he’d insisted on examining the baby in person.
Cassie touched the young woman’s hand. “Do you have any questions for Dr. Valentino?”
The baby had progressed remarkably well, his breathing problems all but gone, and as far as developmental milestones went, so far he seemed to be hitting them all, except for his head size and the craniosynostosis. Whether that was caused by the Zika virus or was just one more incidental finding was unknown. Either way, the suture fusion would have to be corrected.
Renato’s mother was ecstatic that the news wasn’t worse, as she’d heard of severe cases of microcephaly in her home country from the virus. Women were afraid of getting pregnant, including the woman’s sister.
“The surgery. It will fi
x his head size?”
Renato’s mom had been fixated on that one point. Maybe she thought if his head was a normal size it would mean he would be free from any lingering problems. The truth was they might never know fully what variants had been caused by the virus and what hadn’t. It would likely take years of research to determine that.
“It will allow his brain to grow and encourage his skull to grow along normal lines.” Dante glanced at the mom. The answer was succinct, not withholding information but not handing out false hope either.
Like the kind she’d been dishing herself? Realistically there was less chance that she had been exposed to Zika than a lot of the women who came through Seaside. But that would change as the virus got more of a foothold in the country. There would be more Renatos, unless a way was found to fight either the virus or the mosquito vectors.
“You can do the surgery?” Renato’s mom asked.
“I’ll do it in conjunction with another doctor. We’ll need to set a date. You’ll still be in the country?”
“Yes, we live here now. I wished Renato and his brother to have what I did not.”
The woman had a lot of reasons to rail against the universe for what had happened to her son, but she wasn’t. She seemed grateful for everything Seaside could do for her and her baby.
Maybe Cassie should focus on the good things about her own life, rather than dwelling on the terror of the unknown. There was nothing she could do to change anything at this second in time. She could figure things out as they came at her. Not the way she normally lived life, but right now it was all she could do.
Dante looked up at her. “Seen Rafe recently?”
Even as the question registered she could feel the heat building in her face. He didn’t mean anything by it. He knew that she and Rafe had seen each other because of their respective jobs, but it didn’t make her any less uncomfortable. Did the brothers know she and Rafe had slept together? That she was pregnant?
The epidemiologist didn’t seem like the type to kiss and tell, but his siblings and Carmelita had seemed inordinately interested in her at that meeting at the bodega. Thank heavens Cassie hadn’t known she was pregnant at the time or they might have seen something in her face that gave it away.
Had Dante seen something now? Something she wasn’t quite able to hide?
“We’ve met to discuss some of the cases, yes.” That was pretty vague, wasn’t it?
His brothers were eventually going to find out. Unless Rafe intended on keeping the whole thing a secret. She couldn’t see him walking away from his kids, though, no matter how many times she told him she wanted to raise them on her own.
Dante made a soft sound. She had no idea if it was about Renato, or about what she’d said. And unless he told her otherwise, she was going to choose to believe it was about their patient.
The man took out his own measuring tape and wound it around the infant’s skull, writing down the measurement. “He may need to wear a helmet to help shape his head for a while.”
“A...what?” The woman looked confused.
Cassie drew the shape of a helmet with her hands. “It’s a kind of hat that will help his head grow in the correct direction. How long will he need it?” She directed that question at Dante.
“A year or so. It’s part of the baby’s recovery plan. The surgery will get the process headed in the right direction, but the helmet will make sure he has the best possible outcome.”
Dante held one hand on the baby’s chest to keep him in place while he scribbled on the chart. The crinkle of the paper cover beneath the baby seemed inordinately loud in the room.
“I will do anything to help him. My family...” The young woman swirled her hand in the air, as if searching for the right word. “They very worried about Renato.” She glanced toward the baby as if wanting him back.
Dante must have sensed it too because he laid down his pen and picked the baby up, carefully cradling him in two hands, and handed him to his mother. He glanced at Cassie. “I’ll let the hospital know that he’ll need to be put on the surgical schedule. Make sure she has the paperwork.”
“I will.” Surgeries like this one, where there was a specific window in which the repairs needed to be done, were marked on a huge calendar at the nurses’ station. It not only reserved a surgical suite, it also served to make sure there weren’t any gaps in treatment. Surgeons like Dante were in short supply and wait times could be long.
He rolled his tape measure and dropped it in one of his pockets. “Tell Rafe hello when you see him. And that we need to have another family meeting. Soon. I heard he’s been spending quite a bit of time in the air lately.” He said it with a smile, but a shiver went over Cassie.
She assumed being “in the air” meant Rafe was going up in that glorified parachute. Maybe his brothers were worried about something happening. Except it hadn’t sounded like that. “I’m sure you’ll see him before I do.”
Brown eyes met hers, crinkling at the corners. “Oh, I doubt that. How about whoever sees him first has him get in contact with the other?”
Once again, heat flashed up her neck and oozed into her face. The last thing she wanted was for Rafe’s brother to tell him she was itching to see him.
“That’s not necessary. At all. I’m not in a rush to see him.” She gulped as the little white lie came to her lips. “We only see each other about business anyway.”
Dante reached a hand out to Renato’s mother. In it was a business card. “It was nice to meet you. We’re going to do everything we can to make sure Renato gets the care he needs. If you have any questions, please feel free to get in contact with me.”
He was giving out his personal number? Surely not.
But hadn’t Rafe given the patient’s mom his private cell phone number as well? It would seem that these men really did care about making life easier for their patients.
What about for the women in their lives?
That was a question better left unasked. Two of the brothers were married. So were Dante and Rafe the last holdouts of the family?
She didn’t have time to wonder for very long, though, because with a nod and a last stroke of the fuzzy hair on top of Renato’s head, Dante was gone.
* * *
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” A figure separated himself from the wall of the hospital corridor.
Relief swamped Cassie’s chest that it was Rafe and not Darrin. Although she really didn’t expect to see her ex again, since she’d reassured him the babies weren’t his. And that she didn’t want any of his money. He’d seemed relieved it was over.
“Sure.” She slowed so he could fall into step beside her. “I haven’t had any more suspected cases of Zika this week, if that’s what you’re going to ask.”
“It was. In part.”
The “in part” made her stop to look at him. A horrible thought filtered through. Had Dante called him after he’d left the exam room and told him she was looking for him? Because that would be just too...too...mortifying.
“I talked to Dante.”
Oh, hell. She was right. Her heart rate sped up to a painful rate. “I honestly didn’t tell him I wanted to see you, so I don’t know what he—”
“You were with Dante? When?”
Her brain screeched to a halt. “Well, not ‘with’ in a personal sense. We were discussing a case.”
And why had she felt the need to explain any of that? If anything, it made her feel guiltier.
“Which case? He didn’t say a word to me. He just said that he was going to operate on one of Seaside’s suspected Zika babies and I was curious if you knew which one.”
Of course that was the reason. Although why he’d come all the way down to the hospital to ask was beyond her. “A phone call wouldn’t do?”
Rafe’s gaze left hers
for a second, wandering down the hallway before coming back. “That brings up the ‘in part.’”
She knew there was something more to it than what he’d just said. “Okay.”
“I was going to ask you not to say anything to my brother about your...” His fingers fluttered toward her midsection in a way that made her laugh.
“About the babies? Why would I say anything to him about that?”
“I don’t know. I thought maybe you were excited and wanted to share the news.”
Was she excited?
Yes. She was. More than she wanted to admit. But he had to know she wouldn’t go blurting it out to everyone she came across.
“I haven’t told anyone except my friend Bonnie and the obstetrician. My mom and dad don’t even know yet. And I don’t plan on telling them until I know for certain that everything is...”
His jaw tightened. “Until you know for certain everything is okay?”
“Yes. I don’t want to worry them unnecessarily.”
“How long before you tell them?”
She stopped in front of the window of the nursery where Renato’s cot was, staring through it at the baby. “I’ll have another ultrasound in a few weeks. Once I know the babies are developing normally, I’ll tell them.”
She wanted to just ignore the possibility that something could go wrong. But, of course, burying her head in the sand wasn’t an option. And it wasn’t in Cassie’s nature to close her eyes and pretend things were fine when they weren’t. She hadn’t done that with her ex’s cheating, and she couldn’t afford to do it with the babies.
And if her Zika tests came back positive? She didn’t really expect them to, but it still worried her. Maybe because the embryos she carried inside her were innocent. They’d done nothing to deserve contracting the virus.
Neither had Renato. He seemed happy enough, despite everything. He was cooing and so much less agitated than he’d been when he was born. Was he going to be able to overcome his difficulties?
Cassie hoped so.
But right now she needed to make sure Rafe knew the score. “I’m not going to show up at the bodega and announce my pregnancy to your family, Rafe, if that’s what you’re worried about. That is not up to me.”