Shattered Lullaby

by Rebecca York

  For just a moment, she allowed her fingers to tangle in his hair. She heard him make a low, muffled sound. Then, shifting his grip, he pushed the fabric out of the way and cupped her hips and bottom. Before the touch could turn into a caress, he gave a mighty thrust upward with his powerful arms.

  “Yes!” she exclaimed as she worked her elbows over the concrete edge. When he gave her one more push, she toppled onto solid ground.

  As she lay there, he vaulted up and flopped down beside her, breathing heavily. “Did I hurt you?” he gasped out.

  “No.” She reached for his hand, knit her fingers with his. For long moments she lay in a patch of weeds, feeling their scratchy stems against her legs and arms. And yet, the darkness and her mood had transformed the scraggly yard into a magical place. A soft breeze had sprung up, and it sifted through her hair like caressing fingers as she stared up at the sky. It was absolutely cloudless, and the canopy of stars spread across the heavens was like diamonds on a field of black velvet. Had they ever before sparkled so brightly here in the city? she wondered as her hand tightened on Miguel’s.

  “Thank you,” she whispered. “I was so frightened down there. And then you came, and everything was all right.”

  He didn’t answer at once. When he spoke, the words were clipped. “It was nothing.”

  The flat tone of his voice sent a little shiver over her skin. Her hand tightened convulsively on his.

  Stiffly, he pried his fingers free from hers and stood, making a production of brushing the dirt from his slacks.

  “Miguel?” she questioned, pushing herself to a sitting position.

  When he didn’t respond, she tipped her head up questioningly. He’d held her, rescued her, acted as if he cared. But now...

  The feeling of magic had evaporated. Standing, she stared at the lines of his face. In the beam from the flashlight, they had turned as harsh and uncompromising as those of an ancient Mayan sculpture, and she was struck by the sudden sick feeling that nothing between them would ever be the same again.

  “How did you know where to find me?” he asked, slipping his hands into his pockets.

  “I—” She gave a little shrug. Reaching down, she took off her shoes and shook out the dirt that had accumulated inside, using the interval to collect her scattered wits.

  “Was it that little snitch, Luis? He thinks—”

  “What does he think?”

  When he didn’t reply, she responded to his earlier comment. “He’s not a snitch.”

  Miguel sighed. “It wasn’t his place to say where I was.”

  “I was persuasive,” she managed. “I made it sound important.”

  Holding her breath, she waited for him to ask what had been so urgent. But he stuck with his own agenda. “Coming here was a foolish thing to do,” he chided. “You fell into that damn cistern. What if someone else had found you?”

  “They didn’t.”

  Glad that the darkness hid the sudden desolation in her features, she reached out, laid a hand on his arm. “I needed to talk to you.”

  “About what?” he finally asked, his voice sharp, almost angry.

  She had come to tell him she was carrying his child, but as she stood there next to him, she felt the words sticking in her throat.

  “Jessie, I am very grateful to you for taking me in when I was sick,” he said, making it sound like that was the sum of their interaction.

  She swallowed painfully. “I thought there was a little more to it than that.”

  “You tempted me to do something that, to be blunt, shouldn’t have happened.”

  His answer stung her like a lash raking across her skin. “You’re wrong!”

  He ignored her arid went on. “It was a mistake. I was lonely, and a man has needs.”

  At the merciless words, she gasped and tried to drag in a breath, but an enormous weight was constricting her chest. For a long, terrible moment, she thought she was going to suffocate—or faint and give herself away.

  She clenched her fists, her nails digging into her palms. The light-headedness passed, and she gasped in air. It seared her lungs like an inhalation of fire or ice.

  “I thought that making love meant something to you,” she whispered.

  He didn’t answer, and she finally understood that she had been deluding herself all along. She had been imagining a future for the three of them—herself, Miguel, and the child they had made together. But she had simply been a convenience for him. The time he’d spent with her meant no more to him than a respite from the bleak life he had been leading.

  And the baby?

  She simply couldn’t bring herself to tell him that his reckless interlude with her had created a new life.

  He stood with his arms folded across his chest, unreachable, unapproachable.

  “Miguel.” His name was a choked whisper.

  This time she didn’t expect an answer. In fact, she didn’t even know why she had spoken. Sharp, searing pain knifed through her—pain more deep and lasting than any physical blow. Wincing, hoping the pain didn’t show in her face, she took a quick step back, then another, before turning and stumbling across the uneven ground. All she could think was that she had to get away from this man who had hurt her in ways she hadn’t imagined possible. She almost fell, caught herself, and hurried to get out of the yard—and away from him as fast and as far as she could.

  HE STOOD LIKE A MAN turned into granite, watching her—wanting desperately to go to her, to catch her in his arms, pull her to him. But he didn’t allow his body to act on the strong image in his mind. Instead, he stood and suffered her pain while he watched her leave. As she disappeared through the fence, he felt part of himself dying.

  He had hurt her with his sharp words. The ploy had been ruthless and deliberate, because he knew that the only way he could force her to give up on the two of them was to make her think that he didn’t want her.

  It wasn’t true. He wanted her more than he wanted his freedom; needed her as much as he needed air to breathe. Sometimes, alone at night, thinking about the time with her was the only thing that kept him from going insane. Yet he had already made too much trouble for her—with the police and the INS and Los Tigres. And the trouble would only multiply if he let things go any further.

  His ears strained as he listened to her footsteps pound down the alleyway. If he hurried he could stop her. Yet he knew in his soul that sending her away was the best thing to do.

  He let himself follow her only as far as the fence, shouldering his way through the boards, watching to make sure that she made it to the street with no trouble.

  When he heard the sound of a car starting, he sprinted down the alley in time to see her car pull away from the curb with a jerky motion. He could see her behind the wheel, her face white, her eyes fixed straight ahead with an expression that caused a razor-sharp twisting in his gut

  Yet he told himself he had done the right thing—the honorable thing. His life was in danger. And hers would be as well if he let her get close to him again. So he stood with his insides bleeding, staring at the rapidly diminishing taillights of her car and feeling as if everything that made life worth living was fading as those lights disappeared.

  Chapter Ten

  As soon as she got home, Jessie called her gynecologist and told him about the fall. After a quick examination in the hospital emergency room, he assured her it looked like no damage had been done. But she still spent the next few days watching anxiously for signs of trouble. When none appeared, she finally breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn’t hurt the baby with her dumb stunt.

  Yet her life was hardly back to normal. She went to work and did her job. She dutifully cooked meals and ate them because she had to nourish the child growing inside her. She went through the motions of living. Yet she felt numb inside. In a way, that was a blessing. It was better than the raw pain she had felt before she’d turned and staggered away from Miguel.

  Sometimes she could stand outside herself and analyze wh
at had happened to her. She had invested too much hope in the idea of finding Miguel. She’d thought he cared about her—that he’d care about the baby. In her fantasies, she’d figuratively sung herself to sleep with a lullaby about the three of them living happily ever after. But he had shattered that lullaby as easily as he’d shattered her heart.

  She’d been so terribly wrong about his feelings, and the realization was crushing. But, really, if she were brutally honest, she couldn’t blame him. The time they had spent together was so short—not long enough for him to have bonded with her.

  It was different for her. She had a reason to feel connected to him. But he didn’t know about the baby, and she wouldn’t try again to tell him—at least not until after the child was born. Then he would have a right to know that he was a father.

  She should be making plans for the future, she knew. Yet she found she was incapable of anything beyond simple day-to-day survival. All she could do was get herself through each twenty-four-hour period, wondering how she was going to face the next one.

  Inevitably, the days slipped past, and her body changed. By the end of the summer she was wearing extra-large-size clothes and feeling fluttery little movements inside her tummy that must be the baby kicking. They made the pregnancy take on a new kind of reality. In another four and a half months she was going to be totally responsible for another human being, and she’d better start making some important decisions.

  FAR TO THE SOUTH, in San Marcos, gray clouds hung low, forming a thick, wet blanket over the landscape. And rain fell in a steady downpour that beat against the tin roof like a thousand fingers drumming in sequence. It was a warm rain that brought no relief from the endless heat. Carlos Jurado dragged a handkerchief across his damp brow, then swore softly as a fly that had worked its way through the window screen circled around his head. He swatted at it with the handkerchief and missed.

  Damn insects. Damn heat. Damn rain.

  He hated this place—especially his new living quarters. Yet he had chosen them for their geographic location—and for their isolation. This was where he needed to be while he prepared for his new life.

  Two weeks ago he’d moved far from his comfortable estate to a backwater province near the southern border. The whitewashed stucco buildings of the jungle compound were cramped and dark. Electricity was provided by a generator that ran only eight hours a day. And drinking water had to be trucked in.

  There were none of the luxuries that he appreciated so much. But it was the best accommodation he could find in a region where most of the natives lived in huts with walls of bamboo stakes and roofs of woven palm fronds. And the move was a necessary step in the process of turning himself into another man.

  Ironic, he thought. He was following the example of Miguel Valero. Pulling the doctor’s file from the plastic case he kept with him at all times, he riffled through the pages. A few months ago, he’d gotten his hopes up. It seemed the lead hadn’t panned out; his agents hadn’t found Valero yet.

  But they would. Soon. The bastard couldn’t hide forever.

  And then Carlos Jurado would be free to disappear for good. And another man would come back to life—a man who had died ten years ago.

  JESSIE WAS AT HER Light Street office when Erin Stone appeared in the doorway. Coming into the room, she closed the door behind her. The gesture was so unlike Erin that Jessie felt a tingle of alarm.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  Erin let out a long breath as she stood with her hands clasped, her back to the door. “I was just on the phone with Jim Alvarez. Has he, uh, said anything to you?”

  “About what?”

  Erin shook her head. “He wants me to fire you.”

  “What?” The paper cup Jessie was holding slipped from between her fingers and landed on the desk, splashing water all over the computer printout unfolded across her blotter. She stared down helplessly at the spreading pool.

  Erin hurried forward and grabbed a wad of tissues from the box on the filing cabinets. Together she and Jessie dabbed at the water.

  “What a mess,” Jessie murmured, glancing quickly at her friend. From Erin’s expression she knew that neither one of them was referring to the water.

  “Yes.” Erin wadded up the tissues and threw them into the trash.

  Finally, Jessie cleared her throat. “What, uh, specific reason did he give?”

  “He said you’re a bad example for the women of the community.”

  Jessie felt her jaw clamp tight.

  “You know what he’s like. He’s the kind of guy who insists on what he calls ‘traditional values’—even when they don’t quite fit the reality of today’s society.”

  “Yes. He can be judgmental. Come to think of it, I caught him staring at me yesterday. I bet he gave you a very fulsome description of my dumpy body.”

  Erin laughed. “How did you guess?”

  “I’ve heard him do it before when he was picking apart an unwed mother. Funny how a married woman never looks quite so distasteful.”

  A flicker of apology crossed Erin’s features. “Uh, probably you should have told him you were pregnant, instead of—you know—letting him hear people gossiping about you.”

  Jessie sighed, knowing Erin was right “I didn’t want to talk to him or anyone else about the baby,” she whispered.

  “I understand. And I know what you’ve been going through. But he doesn’t.”

  “And he wouldn’t care if he did!”

  Erin nodded. “Yeah. He reminded me that you’re scheduled to teach another course for teenage girls on ‘Just Saying No.’ He asked me how an unmarried pregnant woman could possibly take on that assignment.”

  Jessie looked down at her hands, which were clasped so tightly on her desk that the knuckles were white. “I guess I don’t have an answer to that,” she said in a small voice. “I wasn’t thinking about the course. I was trying to get through my life—one day at a time.”

  Erin moved forward and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “I know you’ve been doing the best you can in a bad situation.”

  “Apparently the best I can isn’t good enough. I—” She stopped, her voice cracking as she steeled herself for yet another upheaval. “I’ll give you two weeks’ notice. Or you can have my resignation today, if you prefer.”

  “Oh, honey, I didn’t come here to get your resignation,” Erin answered instantly. “I just want things to work out for you. I was thinking that maybe we’d pull you out of the rec center for the time being and have you work up here at the Light Street office full-time.”

  Jessie swallowed, unable to raise her eyes. She knew that if she looked into Erin’s face, she’d start to cry.

  “Unless you want a confrontation with Jim,” Erin added.

  Jessie shook her head, made an effort to compose herself. It was several moments before she could speak again. “I’ve put you in a bad position,” she said in a thin voice.

  “I don’t see it that way. You’re one of our best social workers.”

  “And you’ll be pulling me off my cases.”

  “Jessie, tell me honestly. Do you want to quit? I mean, are you finding that working full-time and being pregnant aren’t compatible?”

  She sighed, pushing away a lock of hair that had fallen across her face. It slipped back into its previous position the moment she moved her hand. “It’s not easy. But working keeps my mind occupied—even if I haven’t exactly been giving you my best.”

  Erin’s hand tightened on her shoulder. “Despite what you think, you’ve been doing a good job.”

  “Thank you for saying that—even though I know it’s not true.”

  “I wouldn’t lie about it. You hold yourself up to a pretty high standard. When you slip, you slip to the level of the average office worker.”

  The words were meant to be kind, but they still cut Jessie to the quick. She sat up, squared her shoulders. “Well, I’ll get back up to my previous level. I promise.”

  Erin gave her a r
eassuring squeeze before withdrawing her hand. “So maybe you can straighten out the mix-up with Mrs. Vargas’s child-support payments. The court can’t find the records.”

  “Do you want me to go down there and do battle with the clerk?”

  “Would you?” Erin asked gratefully.

  “Of course.” Jessie slipped open her bottom-right desk drawer and pulled out her purse. She’d been in the dumps for the past few months. Now she vowed to get back on track.

  ONCE, MIGUEL VALERO HAD been a civilized man. Now he functioned on a more primitive level, like an animal constantly on guard—even in sleep. He came awake suddenly, instantly alert as he lay in his narrow bed in a room where heavy shades blocked out the light. His eyes went to his watch. Three in the afternoon. Nobody from the barrio would come at this time.

  He lay without moving, waiting. He had changed his lair twice since the night Jessie had given away the location. This week he was living in a building where the rat population was minimal. So that was probably not the source of the noise outside.

  When a man-shaped shadow flickered on the other side of the window shade, Miguel’s hand reached for the gun that lay beside him. Tensely, he waited for the intruder to make himself known.

  “Dr. Miguel?” a small voice called out in Spanish.

  The tension eased. It wasn’t a man out there. It was a boy—his head and shoulders magnified in the shadow on the shade.

  There was a tap on the window. “Dr. Miguel?”

  Sighing, he got up and went to the door. When he opened it, Luis darted into the room, his face partially obscured in the dimness.

  “Do not sneak up on me like that! You could get hurt,” Miguel advised mildly.

  The kid nodded tightly, but otherwise he didn’t move. Miguel motioned him closer.

  “Is someone sick?”

  “Not sick...”

  Jurado’s men had found him, he thought with a stab that was part alarm, part resignation. He’d known he shouldn’t have stayed in Baltimore. But the community had kept him anchored here—and the woman he had hurt. He hadn’t talked to her in months, hadn’t even gone downtown to watch her from the shadows, because that would have been too painful.