by Holly Bargo
The hope in Cecily’s expression faded. “They don’t know how long?”
Latasha shook her head. “I’m sorry, Cece. There’s still more about and head injuries and the brain that we don’t know than what we do. He’ll come out of it when he’s ready.” Or he won’t, she added silently. But Cecily didn’t need to hear that depressing addition to the thought.
Cecily nodded, grateful for her friend’s plain speaking.
“How long have you been here, Cece?”
“I don’t know.”
Latasha nodded and figured she’d ask at the nurse’s station. She also figured that Cecily would continue to sit in that chair without budging unless someone forcibly budged her. She turned her attention to Iosif, who met her gaze with a quizzically raised eyebrow.
“You’ll make sure she gets home. Please?”
He nodded.
“Good. If we’re gonna have a chef visiting with us, we can at least have her cook for us once or twice.”
Iosif grinned at her. Neither Latasha nor he cooked with any enthusiasm and they both missed dining at Pyotr’s well-stocked table.
“You hear me, Cece?”
“Hm?”
“Focus, Cece. Iosif will make sure you don’t pine away in here.”
“You want me to cook for you?”
“You bet, girlfriend.”
Cecily gave her an indulgent smile. It was nice to know that some things never changed. “Sure. It’s the least I can do.”
Latasha nodded, stepped forward to give her best friend a quick hug, and then excused herself, saying, “My shift’s over at eleven. I’ll be home by half-past. Don’t worry about cooking tonight. I’ll be too tired to eat.”
Cecily nodded and agreed with her. “When do you work tomorrow?”
Latasha grinned. “Early shift tomorrow: seven to three.”
“Supper at five then?”
“Make it six o’clock. Iosif thinks eating supper earlier than that is barbaric.”
“Okay, six it is.”
“Great. I’ve got to get going or my shift supervisor will give me hell.”
With those parting words, Latasha departed as briskly as she had entered, a skinny, caramel-skinned force of nature whose genial bullying was applied to friend and patient alike.
Not bothering to look at Iosif, who had moved to lean against a wall, Cecily commented, “It’s amazing what she’s done. Her family is a joke, losers all of them. That Latasha hasn’t ended up some crack whore in the streets is incredible.”
Iosif grunted. He agreed. What he never revealed was that Latasha’s brother Billy hadn’t been shot by a rival gang member, as she thought. He knew exactly where that bullet had come from and regretted its inaccuracy. Only his word kept Gennady from finishing the job.
They remained in the dim, quiet room late into the evening until Iosif said, “Come. You are tired and will do Pyotr no good if you pine. I will bring you back tomorrow morning.”
She rose, grimaced as her stiff muscles protested. With a teary sniff, she brought Pyotr’s hand to her lips and kissed his palm. “I’ll be back tomorrow, Pyotr,” she whispered. “Wake up for me. Please.”
She allowed Iosif to guide her through the hospital’s rabbit warren of a floor plan. They did not see Latasha on their way out. Once they arrived at Iosif’s home, Cecily thanked him and retreated to the guest bedroom without thinking about eating. In all truth, she did not feel hungry.
Her appetite had not returned by morning, but she ate mechanically of eggs and toast. Iosif drove her back to the hospital where she told him she could find her way. He nodded, understanding her desire to be alone. His cell phone rang and he heeded his boss’ call. Work did not stop merely because Maksim’s enforcer lay in a coma. The Bratva merely assigned the task to another fighter.
Once again, Cecily spent hour after hour sitting beside Pyotr’s bed, holding his hand and talking to him. She even sang silly nursery rhymes her mother once sang to her infant children. Then she began to tell him stories of her rural childhood.
“One day my best friends—they were twins—spent the night. Early the next morning, Mama woke us up, calling ‘Girls!’ Rosebud, Charlie, and their eleven piglets had escaped their pen. Carrie, Connie and I all rushed out in our pajamas to chase them back to their pen.” She sighed and giggled. “Carrie and Connie were from the city, which seemed like a metropolis back then. Batesville’s hardly more than a village compared to Cleveland or San Antonio.”
She talked until her voice turned hoarse. Leaning over and resting her head on the mattress beside Pyotr’s body, she dozed off, which was how Latasha found her when she stopped by to let Cecily know her shift had ended.
Latasha shook her shoulder gently and softly called her name. With a start and a snort, Cecily woke and blinked in confusion.
“Hey, girlfriend, it’s me. Time to go home and fix supper.”
Cecily nodded dumbly and allowed Latasha to guide her upright and lead her away. Her actions mechanical and practiced despite a lack of attention, Cecily fixed a simple meal for her hosts that nonetheless had them wishing she would stay in Cleveland. She ate what she cooked and retreated to the guest room.
Latasha looked after her, expression worried. She turned to Iosif and whispered, “I’ve never seen Cece so depressed. She can’t keep on like this.”
Iosif wrapped his arms around her and drew her close to his body. She laid her head against his chest and listened to his response: “You will be there for her when she falls. That’s all you can do, vozlyublennaya.”
She sighed. “I love it when you call me that, even though I’m not really sure what it means.”
“Sweetheart.”
She raised her face toward his and he leaned down to kiss her, a long, tender kiss that both soothed and aroused. Latasha blinked, dazed, when the kiss ended. He looked down into her dreamy face and wished she were not so adamant about protecting her virtue.
“You are an anomaly,” he said.
“I’m not a virgin,” she admitted sheepishly and averted her gaze. She began telling a story she never told anyone. “When I was twelve, one of my oldest brother’s friends raped me. It was a gang initiation stunt for him—Da’Shawn did it to another girl. It almost wrecked my entire life.” She leaned her head against his chest again as Iosif’s arms tightened around her. “Mama found out what happened and told me to get an abortion if I were pregnant. I wasn’t, but I... I couldn’t deal with it. I was pretty wild for a few years. Defiant and reckless. Then one of the teachers at school took me aside and talked to me. She got me to admit what had happened and took me to see her priest.”
Latasha stopped for a moment, blinking back tears and gathering her composure to finish her story. She continued: “Mrs. Torelli and Father Ed made me realize that I wasn’t to blame for what happened and that no one had the right to take from me what I did not give.”
“They were right,” Iosif agreed and fought the burning fury that made him want to go out and kill something. With his bare hands.
“Leroy and Da’Shawn were killed in a gang fight when I was a freshman in college,” she said. After a pause, she added, “I didn’t go to their funerals.”
Iosif pressed a kiss to the top of her head and said nothing, could think of nothing to say that would help. Latasha looked up at him.
“It’s not that I don’t love you, Iosif. It’s just that I can’t give up control.”
“You need never to fear me,” he whispered.
Chapter 14
The next four days passed with unbearable slowness. Every morning, Cecily would head to the hospital to sit beside Pyotr’s bed. Every evening, she would return to Latasha and Iosif’s home where she paid for their generous hospitality by cooking gourmet meals for them. Vitaly and Gia visited, bringing their baby. Cecily loved holding the baby and felt horribly empty after handing the tiny girl back to her doting parents. She said nothing of her relief that Great-grandpa Maglione did not visit. Giuseppe Maglione might not have bee
n a large man, like Maksim Andrupovich, but he frightened her more than Maksim ever had.
Giovanni Maglione was hot. Smoking hot. Too bad all Italian men didn’t look like him.
In the darkness of the guestroom where she slept, she reflected upon her reaction to Giovanni. Or, rather, her lack of reaction. She admired his dark good looks as one would admire a beautifully carved statue. Sure, he was gorgeous, but he did not stir her blood.
Only Pyotr stirred her blood.
She bought some magazines in the hospital’s gift store and read them aloud as she sat beside Pyotr’s still form. Cecily told him stories about growing up on the farm and about her job as Jaime Tobiano’s head chef. She related the stories Mrs. Macdougal told to her about growing up a southern lady before the advent of color television and computers, when ladies still wore gloves—white in summer, black in winter—and women were still expected to go to their husbands as virgins.
“I suppose we’ve blown that.” A soft laugh huffed from her lungs. “But then, neither of us could claim to have been untouched when we met.” She raised his limp hand and kissed the palm. She set his palm back down, keeping her hand loosely clasped over his. “Sex with other boyfriends was just sex, you know? Nothing really special, just something that felt good.” She shook her head and sighed, recalling the disappointing experiences prior to landing in Pyotr’s bed. “But with you...wow. It’s not just sex, it’s making love. And it practically blows the top of my head off. I’d never go to any other man’s bed, because no other man could make me feel so wonderful.”
She paused. Tears trickled down her face. Really, she thought by now her supply of saltwater would have run dry, she’d wept so much that week.
“It’s not just the way you touch me,” she confessed. “It’s the way you talk to me, really listen to me like I matter. I never particularly mattered to anyone before you. You don’t treat me like I’m stupid. Latasha and Gia do that sometimes. They don’t mean to, but sometimes they just can’t help it. I’m so ordinary compared to them.”
Pyotr’s hand twitched. Cecily gasped and wondered if she’d imagined it. She kept talking.
“I love you for the way you take care of me, like I’m precious to you.” She sniffed back more tears. “I love you, Pyotr. I can’t emphasize how much you mean to me. I want to have babies with you, build a family with you.”
She leaned forward and rested her head on the edge of the mattress and wept. Again. Dear God, would she never cease weeping? Her hands clutched at the thin blankets covering Pyotr’s big body, the muscles still bulging, not yet atrophied.
“Wake up, Pyotr. Please, come back to me,” Cecily cried, her words broken.
Pyotr lay still, but for the shallow rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.
“Jaime wants me to leave you for him,” she wept as her tears soaked the sheets.
A heavy weight fell on Cecily’s head and she heard a rasped, “Moy.”
“Pyotr!” she shrieked, rearing up. His hand slid off her head. She blinked rapidly as she searched his face for awareness.
“Pyotr!” she cried again as his eyelids fluttered. “You’re awake!”
Cecily sprang to her feet, knocking the heavy chair back. Its wooden legs screeched loudly on the tile.
“Pyotr’s awake!” she bellowed.
Pyotr winced at the volume and she closed her mouth with a snap of her jaws. However, the bellowing resulted in the rapid arrival of medical personnel who attempted to push Cecily out of their way. However, she grabbed onto her fiancé’s hand and refused to let go.
Cecily understood little of the rushed commands and coded conversation between doctors and nurses. She cared even less as she stared into her lover’s ice blue eyes. Finally, she realized that one of the doctors addressed her directly: “Miss Carrigan, please step aside. We need to examine Mr. Idaklyka.”
She glanced at Pyotr, who murmured hoarsely, “Stay.”
She glanced at the doctor and replied, “No. I’m not leaving him. Never again.”
The doctor gave her a stern look, displeased at having his authority flouted. “Miss Carrigan, why don’t you take this opportunity to inform Mr. Idaklyka’s friends and family that he has regained consciousness? That way, you can help him while we examine him.”
“I’m staying right here.”
“Fine, then step aside and allow us room to work. We don’t want him relapsing, do we?”
With that threat, Cecily released Pyotr’s hand and took a couple of steps backward. “I’m staying with you, Pyotr,” she reassured, keeping her voice resolute. “I won’t let you out of my sight.”
He acknowledged her devotion with a tiny nod and resigned himself to the attentions of medical personnel who poked and prodded and asked him innumerable questions. Standing there and watching the flurry of activity, Cecily pulled out her cell phone and called Vitaly, Iosif, and Maksim. Each man blurted something profane, yet joyful and relieved, in Russian before barking assurance at her that they would join her in the hospital shortly.
The doctor in charge finally finished his examination and gestured to Cecily. She approached him, wary of his discouraging expression.
“Miss Carrigan,” the doctor said in a low voice, “I must warn you not to expect Mr. Idaklyka to bounce back to what he was like before the head injury. He may never be like he was before.”
She nodded uncertainly, already not liking where that conversation led.
“You must understand that many coma patients suffer from confusion, an inability to control their own bodily functions and movement, and may not even be able to focus their eyes properly. Your fiancé may not be able to communicate clearly with you due to the centers of his brain which process language being, for want of a better word, scrambled.”
She gasped in dismay.
“Recovery will take time. There’s no predicting how much time.” The doctor paused, then added, “Since Mr. Idaklyka wasn’t unconscious for too terribly long, I’m hopeful that he will recover quickly. He won’t have as much to relearn. His muscles haven’t atrophied.”
Cecily nodded again, understanding the lack of specificity.
“Even if his eyes are closed, always assume he is aware,” the doctor cautioned. “He may be awake, he may be asleep. He may understand what you say, he may not. Assume he does and take care with your words. Encourage him. Speak to him clearly, don’t talk to him as though he were a child, because he’s not.”
Cecily nodded and replied, “I understand.”
“Good.” The doctor glanced back at Pyotr, who once more lay quietly and unresponsive. “Victims of head injuries who wake from a coma often do not have control over their reactions. He may act belligerently toward you. Don’t take it personally; it’s the injury, not him. Eventually, we hope, he will regain full mental and physical capacity. It will simply take time and persistence and patience.”
“Thank you, Doctor.”
He patted her on the shoulder, having delivered his litany of caution, and took his leave, promising that he would return in a few hours to check up on Pyotr. Cecily returned to her seat and took Pyotr’s limp hand in hers. She squeezed it lightly; he did not squeeze hers in return.
“It’s not like TV, is it?” she mused, then called Jaime.
“Cecily! It’s good to hear from you,” the celebrity chef’s voice carried across the long-distance connection with good cheer. “How is everything?”
Her throat closing up with emotion, she choked out the words, “Pyotr woke up.”
“I see,” Jaime replied after a miniscule pause. “That is good news, no?”
“It’s very good news. Wonderful news.”
“Then you will come back to me sooner than planned, no?”
“Er... no.” She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Jaime, I can’t come back until Pyotr can travel with me.” She glanced at her fiancé. “He’s got a lot of recovery to get through.”
Jaime’s voice turned stern. “Cecily, I cannot hold this p
osition open for you indefinitely. There are many good cooks who will jump at the opening in my kitchen.”
“I... I know, Jaime. I truly appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”
He grunted, paused, then decided. “I will give you another week to come back to me. After that, you will not have a job here.”
Cecily’s shoulders sagged with relief. She truly did love her job at La Lengua Felíz. Jaime Tobiano challenged her. When she excelled, his compliments brought a sense of satisfaction and pride that nothing else could. When she erred, he shouted and then took the time to explain what she did incorrectly and would even show her how to do the task properly. Cecily made sure he never had to show her anything more than once.
No classroom could stimulate her like working for Jaime did.
She thanked him and the call ended. Looking at Pyotr, she whispered, “I really hope you recover sufficiently to travel to San Antonio with me.”
No sooner had the words left her lips than Maksim, Vitaly, Iosif, and Gennady arrived.
Gennady looked at Pyotr lying still on the bed and said, “I thought you said he was awake.”
“He’s sleeping,” Cecily said, keeping her voice quiet.
“Sleeping?”
“He’s recovering from a severe head injury. If he needs to sleep, then we let him sleep,” Cecily said, rising to her feet and putting herself between the big men and the patient.
Gennady raised an eyebrow at her defiance. Cecily wanted to quail, but she stubbornly held her ground. She’d heard whispered rumors about Gennady and had no desire to discover whether they were true. But neither would she allow anyone to impugn her fiancé.
“Leave be, Gennady,” Maksim muttered. He took a few heavy steps toward the bed and rested a big hand on Pyotr’s arm. “Pyotr, do you hear me?”
Pyotr’s eyelids fluttered, but his eyes remained closed.
“I think he hears you,” Cecily said.
Maksim slanted her an inscrutable look, but seemed to accept her statement.
“Pyotr, you’ve been released,” Maksim said, being sure to enunciate every syllable. Then he repeated the statement in Russian.