by Tina Beckett
Rafe murmured, “Dios. They’re here already.”
Why did he make that sound like a bad thing?
She glanced up to see that his brothers and a woman were standing by the front counter, talking. And watching. One of them jerked his head to motion Rafe over. Except that when he started to move toward them, the brother she hadn’t met shook his head. “Bring her with you. And tell me you’re not following in the footsteps of these feos.”
She wasn’t sure what the man was talking about but, whatever it was, Rafe wasn’t happy about it. His whole body tensed. “Hermano, no comienza conmigo.”
Had he forgotten that she understood Spanish or did he just not care? Because that “Brother, don’t start with me” had been full of irritation. But about what?
“I’m not starting anything. Are you?”
Rafe just shook his head. “Cassie, this jerk is obviously Dante. Actually, they’re all jerks. And ugly, to boot. Except for Carmelita. She keeps us on the straight and narrow. At least she tries.”
“It is not easy, you boys are a handful.” The woman’s Spanish accent—much thicker than Rafe’s or any of the other brothers’—was charming.
Cassie smiled. “I can well imagine.” They might be a handful, but they were the best-looking bunch of brothers she’d seen in a long time, despite Rafe’s claims to the contrary. And they dwarfed the manager, who stood in the middle of the group like a proud little mother hen. If you’d plopped the Valentino brothers together someplace like Mad Ron’s, they would have easily been mistaken for bouncers.
“Will you not introduce me, Rafael? Manners. Manners.” The woman reached out and gave Cassie a light kiss on the cheek.
Rafe’s face infused with color. “Of course. This is Dr. Cassandra Larrobee. We just came from a business meeting at Buena Vista Hospital about la Zika.” He glared at his brothers, addressing them as a group. “So, why are we here again?”
“No particular reason.” Santi looked the picture of cunning innocence. “But since you and Dante are the Elders, we thought you should have some input on the...er...tomatillos.”
What? She could have sworn that the other man had said there was an issue with the bodega’s inventory when they’d been at the hospital.
Dante frowned. “Knock it off with the ‘Elders’ business. And tomatillos? You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Boys,” Carmelita said. “I have not seen all of you together for a while, so if it must be over a can of tomatillos, bueno. It also gives me a chance to meet Rafe’s—”
A cry interrupted her. “Help! Please help me!”
Cassie looked round to see a woman staggering into the doorway of the bodega, a huge splash of what looked like red paint staining her shirt. A maternity top. And her stomach was...
That wasn’t paint. It was blood!
The room erupted in chaos, all of the brothers rushing toward her. Santi grabbed the woman just as her knees buckled. Carmelita was already ripping a lounge cushion from a nearby rack, tossing it onto the floor while Santi and Rafe helped the woman down onto it.
Rafe’s face was pale as he called to Dante, “Lock the door. Now.”
Had she been shot? Cassie hadn’t heard anything, but the blood was in the wrong spot for it to be labor, although the woman looked like she was full term.
Alejandro was already on the phone, speaking with someone. “I don’t know for sure, but we need police and the EMTs down here.”
“Can you tell us what happened?” Santi eased the woman’s shirt up over her swollen belly. Cassie was horrified to see what looked like a deep gash to the left of her bellybutton. It had to be six inches long.
“She...she wanted my baby. Said I didn’t deserve...” The words were interrupted by a long scream, as the woman’s abdomen visibly tightened. She was in labor!
A gush of blood spurted from the wound as the muscles contracted. Dante rushed to another rack, coming back with several packages of gauze. Ripping into one of them, he handed a huge wad of the bandaging material to Santi, who knelt and held it against the wound, trying to staunch the bleeding.
The men looked at each other just as Cassie figured it out: someone had tried to cut the baby out of her womb.
“Mierda!” Santi pushed harder. “Where are the police?”
Cassie knelt beside the woman’s head, trying to coach her through the rest of the contraction as she gave a pitiful moan. Who could have done such a thing?
If help didn’t come soon, they would be in danger of losing both mother and baby.
Rafe was on another phone. He squatted down beside them, glancing at Cassie with worried eyes. Then he leaned in to whisper to her, “They want you to ask her if she knows the name of who did this.”
“Now?” The only thing she cared about at the moment was helping the victims.
He nodded.
Damn. She suddenly knew why they wanted the information right now. If the woman died without naming her attacker, the police would have little to go on. She swallowed hard, tears coming to her eyes as she smoothed a few locks of hair from the young woman’s sweaty face. With her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail and yoga pants, she looked to be in her early twenties. So young. She could have been headed anywhere, happily going about her life. And then something like this happened. It was unfathomable. She tried to get the woman’s attention.
The contraction had subsided, the grip on her hand easing, although she was still moaning in pain. “What’s your name?”
“S-Samantha.” The fear was evident as her hands went to her abdomen and came away slick with blood despite the pressure on the wound. “Am I going to die? Is my baby...?”
The lines in Santi’s face were tight. “The baby is moving, Samantha. We’re all doctors, and Cassandra is a neonatologist who specializes in newborns. You’re in good hands. And the ambulance should be here any minute.”
“He’s right. One of us will be with you the whole way.” A nudge from Rafe reminded her what she was supposed to ask. “Samantha, I know this is hard, but do you know who did this to you?”
A sob erupted from her throat and she nodded. “Yes. It...” The words faded away as her head went back, another hoarse cry filling the air. “Ahhhhh...it’s starting again.”
Another contraction. Even as she said it, Santi pressed down with the bandaging material, putting strong pressure on the wound. It was soaked within seconds. “Dante, I need another package.”
His brother was already on it, opening one and giving him a fresh bundle of gauze.
No gloves. None of them were using any. But then again there hadn’t been time to do anything except to leap into emergency mode.
“Breathe.” Cassie murmured instructions, glancing up at Rafe. His face was pasty white and he looked like he was going to be sick. She could understand a normal person getting queasy, but Rafe was not only an epidemiologist, he had a medical degree. And yet he looked like he was staring into the face of death. She sent him a questioning glance, but instead of it pushing him into action he stood up and took a few steps back, looking down on the scene, the phone still to his ear. He said something to what must be the police officer on the other end.
Alejandro, who was standing nearby, put a hand on his shoulder, giving it a squeeze. If anything, the gesture just made things worse, judging from the skin stretched tightly across Rafe’s cheekbones.
Cassie couldn’t dwell on that, so she focused her attention on keeping the woman actively breathing through the contraction, watching for signs that she was going to pass out from blood loss.
The contraction eased and Samantha stiffened. “I think I’m going to be...”
Anticipating her words, Cassie tipped the woman’s head to the right just as she vomited bile. No blood. A weird thing to be thankful for, but she was. If Santi had been telling the trut
h about the baby’s movements, it was another thing the young woman could hold onto. Anything to give her hope.
Where was that ambulance? She couldn’t even hear sirens yet. But in a city this size there could be all kinds of holdups, and the bodega was kind of out of the way, from what she’d seen as they’d driven over. The traffic snarls in the narrower streets of the neighborhoods could also be an issue.
Dante also moved to Rafe’s side. “Estás bien, hermano?”
She and Alejandro weren’t the only ones who’d noticed something odd about the epidemiologist’s behavior. Maybe he wasn’t used to being on this side of the scene when it came to emergencies. He dealt more in prevention and discovery, but he was a doctor, so surely...
Rafe waved them both off with a brusque, “I’m fine.” But anyone could see the man wasn’t fine. None of them were. Samantha was fighting for her life and for that of her baby. It was a horrific thing for anyone to witness.
The pile of blood-soaked gauze had grown to a small mound on the floor.
A faint siren sounded in the distance.
Thank God!
Samantha heard it as well. She tightened her grip on Cassie’s hand. “My fiancé’s old girlfriend, her name is...” her eyelids fluttered and then came open again as she struggled to focus “...Bridget...”
The woman’s voice faded away.
“Samantha? Stay with us. Can you hear me?” She leaned closer, trying to rouse her again.
Dante knelt and took her pulse. “She’s getting weaker.”
“I hear the ambulance now,” Cassie said.
“Rafe or Dante, can one of you take my place, while I catch the squad outside? I want to fill them in.”
Dante glanced up at Rafe, who held the phone to his ear before moving to Santi’s spot. Was he still relaying information? Or was he too paralyzed by the way things were playing out?
Cassie was upset too, nauseous, in fact. She should be irritated by Rafe’s detached reaction to the situation, but instead she was worried.
A professional reaction, nothing more.
Something about the way Dante had asked if he was okay struck a chord. She knew of cases where relatives facing terrible tragedies pulled together and comforted each other.
But this woman was a complete stranger, wasn’t she?
Hadn’t Rafe said his mother had suffered several miscarriages—had risked traveling to the United States for just such a reason? Maybe seeing all this blood from a pregnant woman had triggered some distant memory that he just couldn’t face. He’d asked her not to mention their conversation to his brothers but did that even have anything to do with this? None of the rest of them appeared as distraught as Rafe was.
It didn’t matter. What did was the woman currently fighting for her life. She forced her attention back to Samantha, calling her name and trying to get her to respond. It had no effect. Samantha’s body, however, was on an unstoppable course. Her contractions were closer together. Stronger. Less than two minutes apart now. If they didn’t get her to a hospital soon...
Santi came back in with two EMT workers, one wheeling a stretcher and the other carrying what looked like a tackle box of equipment. With three of the brothers belting out instructions, an IV was soon started and Samantha was lifted onto the gurney. “Where’s she going?”
“Buena Vista is closer.”
Alejandro stepped up. “That’s more my turf, I’ll ride in with her.”
“Are you sure you’re up to it?” Dante asked.
“Yeah. I’ll be fine.”
Cassie wasn’t sure what that was about, but as long as they got the patient into that ambulance, she didn’t care which one of the brothers rode with her.
The woman hadn’t been carrying a purse when she’d lurched into the bodega. Cassie probably should have thought to ask, but in the ensuing emergency and with Rafe trying to get the name of whoever had done this to her, she hadn’t even thought to get Samantha’s full name, or ask the names of her fiancé and family. And now she was unconscious.
Her throat tightened. Even though she considered herself a hardened professional, it was difficult to keep her eyes from moistening. Maybe that’s where Rafe’s thoughts were too. Maybe his emotions had gotten the better of him.
One EMT held the IV bag while the other wheeled the gurney out the door. Going alongside them was Alejandro—now gloved up, thanks to one of the emergency workers handing him some. He’d taken over Santi’s job of maintaining pressure on the woman’s abdomen as they went over the curb and paused at the back of the truck. Pushing the stretcher against the vehicle, the wheels retracted. Alejandro ducked inside with the other EMT. Then the doors slammed and the second emergency worker leaped inside the cab of the truck.
They were off, sirens blaring as they dodged in and out of traffic on the narrow street.
Cassie sent up a silent prayer. Hopefully Samantha and the baby would both survive. She had no idea how far along she even was, but it had looked like late pregnancy. She put in an addendum to her silent request: for Samantha to be far enough along that the baby would survive the trauma and the birth.
There was no way to stop the labor at this point, not with the contractions as close together as they were. In fact, it was almost certain the doctors would deliver the baby by C-section in an effort to save the life of the mother.
Taking a shaking breath, she went back inside the bodega. The three brothers who’d stayed behind were huddled together, along with Carmelita.
Cassie went from feeling like she was part of a team working together to feeling very much like an outsider. And although it was a familiar feeling, she didn’t like it any better now than she had as a kid entering yet another home and watching the social worker and her new foster parents talking in soft voices about her.
As she had back in those days, she stood awkwardly to the side while they conversed, Rafe throwing an occasional glance at the floor of the bodega, where a bloodstained cushion and a pile of gauze were all that remained. Maybe she should at least make herself useful and clean up the mess.
She moved toward it, reaching for the nearest pile of gauze, when Rafe called out past his brothers, “Leave it. The police will want to take pictures.”
Of course. How could she have been so stupid? While it wasn’t a crime scene, a crime had been committed against the woman. In fact, Cassie could see a clear trail of blood droplets from where Samantha had careened into the bodega, begging for help. Some of those drops were now smeared from the feet that had tracked across them.
A knock sounded at the door. It was then that she realized someone had locked it behind her. Or maybe it automatically engaged whenever the door was closed. It had been propped open, hadn’t it, when she’d arrived at the shop with Rafe?
Santi went over, twisting the key in the lock and pushing the door open. Two police officers stood outside, and she caught sight of more than one patrol car just beyond the entrance, blue lights flashing.
The brothers gave the officers a rundown of what had happened and what Samantha had said. A cup of something hot was shoved into her hands, and when she looked up, Carmelita stood in front of her. “You looked like you could use something,” she murmured.
“I’m fine.”
“You are almost as pale as my Rafael.”
So Cassie definitely wasn’t the only one who’d noticed. “Is he okay?”
“His mami and papi were killed here. I think what happened today has brought it back.”
Shock rippled up her spine and pooled at the base of her skull. He’d said his parents had died, but he’d said nothing about them being murdered. “He said he lost them.”
“Yes, to some hijo de perra with a gun, who wished to take what they had worked so hard for.”
The woman probably shouldn’t be telling her any of this—
Cassie was a complete stranger. But Carmelita seemed like more than just an employee. She seemed like family. She had called Rafe “hers.”
“Rafe said you weren’t related to them.”
“To the Valentinos? Not by blood, no. But this is a close community. La familia. We take care of each other.”
“I see.”
Insiders and outsiders. And Cassie was definitely one of the latter.
Rafe had told her the bare minimum about his life and family, and after doing so had wanted her to keep what she’d learned to herself.
He’d told her nothing of consequence. Yet, in a very few sentences, this woman had revealed a whole lot of heartache.
Rafe appeared beside her. “The police want to hear your version of the events.”
“Okay.”
Perhaps Rafe suspected his manager was sharing secrets, or maybe the officers really did want to take her statement, but he deftly separated them, murmuring something to Carmelita who replied with a “Pfffft” and a toss of her head. Here was one woman who wasn’t intimidated by him. Or by any of the brothers, for that matter. She should take a page out of Carmelita’s book. Because Rafe put her on edge in a way no man ever had, not even her fiancé. Darrin had brought out softer feelings, like caring and trust—for all the good that had done. But Rafe... Maybe it was the Latino blood flowing through his veins. It brought out fiery emotions and hidden passion.
As it probably would in anyone who came across him.
When she finished speaking with the police, Rafe offered to drive her home, even before the scene had been cleaned up. “Please let me help.”
“No need. My brothers and I will handle it.”
The image of the group of them huddled together came back to mind.
Well? What of it? She wasn’t related to any of these people. In fact, the only reason she and Rafe had been together at all today had been because of their jobs.
