He could hear Shadow’s frantic barks, knew that Tom and the others would be conducting the slow, tedious excavation necessary to reach him where he was trapped.
As he drifted in and out of consciousness, he imagined what it must have been like for Allie to be trapped like this and terrified, her fate in the hands of strangers. It was little wonder that she didn’t care to repeat the experience, albeit vicariously.
Even for him, knowing that his life was in the hands of experts whose skill was unquestionably the best, there was a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach that his luck might have run out. Trusting Tom and the other members of his crew didn’t seem to figure into it, when he was too blasted close to bleeding to death, too much at risk of being crushed at any second.
Worse, he kept imagining Allie’s reaction to the news. His frustration mounted with each second that dragged on, with each moment of uncertainty she must be facing. He hated himself for putting her through it, yet he knew if a choice had to be made, he would do it again. What he did was important, necessary work and he was good at it. Most of the time, anyway.
He had to resist the desperate desire to begin his own frantic excavation. For one thing, he knew he had to conserve his strength. For another, every movement caused blinding pain. He had to put his faith in the men he knew like brothers.
As he waited for help to come, he cursed his injuries, not because of the pain, but because Allie would see them as more proof that she had made the right decision. He cursed the fact that there were news crews on the scene to report every detail back home.
When the frustration and pain got to be too much, he concentrated on staying calm, staying alive. It wasn’t just survival instinct that kept him going. It was Allie. He’d made her a promise and he had to fight with everything in him to be sure he kept it.
He was not going to die, buried in the very rubble from which he was supposed to rescue others, not now, not when he’d finally found the best possible reason for living: a woman he loved with all his heart.
Chapter Fifteen
Allie hadn’t been able to concentrate all day. She had an uneasy sense that something terrible had happened. She told herself she was being ridiculous, but she couldn’t shake the feeling.
She felt a light pat on her hand and gazed into Kimi Foley’s tear-filled blue eyes. The four-year-old was still struggling to master sign language, and today’s lesson had been frustrating for both of them. Allie’s attempts to get either of her parents involved had failed miserably. The Foleys had also been reluctant to let their oldest daughter step in and take the lessons so that she could help Kimi.
“What’s wrong with me?” she signed, her expression miserable.
“Oh, baby,” Allie whispered, then signed, “Nothing is wrong with you. You are very special.”
Kimi’s hands moved hesitantly, then fell still as she searched for some way of expressing her feelings. Tears rolled down her cheeks. Even without the words, Allie understood.
“Sweetheart, you are going to have all the words you need one of these days. I promise.”
“My friends,” she began, then stopped, clearly struggling to go on.
“What about your friends?” Allie encouraged.
“They don’t play with me,” she signed with a weary little sigh, then crawled into Allie’s lap for comfort. Her arms crept around Allie’s neck.
Choked up by the child’s obvious pain, Allie wondered if her parents had any idea what they were doing to her. If the isolation of sudden silence was overwhelming for a nineteen-year-old, as Allie had been, what must it be like for a little girl who’d lost her hearing when she was barely able to speak and whose vocabulary was limited?
She glanced up to find Kimi’s father standing in the doorway, his expression anguished.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Is she okay?”
“She says her friends won’t play with her,” Allie told him. “Most likely it’s because they don’t know how to talk to her, so they just stay away.”
“My God,” he whispered, then tapped Kimi on the shoulder and held out his arms. His daughter scrambled into them and buried her head on his shoulder. He looked at Allie. “What do I do?”
“It would help if you and your wife, maybe even your children, would take the sign language classes. At least Kimi would be able to communicate at home.”
He nodded. “We’ll do it. I hadn’t realized how she must feel. I wanted so badly to pretend that she was normal.”
“She is normal,” Allie said fiercely. “She just can’t hear.” She regarded him intently. “Do you think I’m normal?”
He looked dismayed by the question. “Of course.”
“One day Kimi will be able to communicate just as well. Although she may not have the verbal skills, because she was so young when she lost her hearing, she will have compensated in other ways. But she needs your help now for that to happen.”
“She’ll have it,” he said with grim determination. “I’m not sure how we’ll manage it, but we will.”
Allie walked with them to the front door, then smiled at him. “I will do whatever I can to accommodate a schedule that works for you.” She tucked a finger under Kimi’s chin. “See you soon,” she signed.
Kimi mimicked the gestures. And, his big hand awkward, her father did the same. A slow smile spread across Kimi’s face.
As the father and daughter left, Allie breathed a sigh of relief. For the first time in weeks, she felt confident that things were going to work out.
When she turned to go back to her office, she found Gina waiting for her.
“Come with me,” her boss signed, her expression somber.
“My next patient’s due in a few minutes.”
“Carol’s taking her,” Gina said.
Alarm flared at once. Allie’s heart began an unsteady rhythm. Although the instructors occasionally backed each other up with patients, Gina usually preferred the same therapist to work with each one.
Unless there was an emergency.
Allie’s pulse was racing by the time Gina closed her office door.
“What is it? Is it one of my parents?”
Gina shook her head.
“Oh, my God,” she said, sinking onto a chair. “It’s Ricky, isn’t it? The earthquake in China. Maria told me he had to go. What’s happened?”
“There was a cave-in at the building he was searching. He was trapped in it.”
Tears spilled down her cheeks. “Is he…?” She couldn’t even bring herself to complete the question.
“Tom called Maria. He says Ricky is alive, but he’s been pretty seriously hurt. The doctors over there are still checking him out. There could be internal injuries, but the worst of it seems to be a blow he took to the head from a steel beam that shifted. He’s been unconscious since they pulled him out. They’ll know more in a few hours. Tom’s been at the hospital the whole time. He’s keeping in touch with Maria. If you want to be at home with the family, we’ll cover for you here.”
Obligations warred with the terrible need to know whatever news there was the instant it was available.
“I should stay,” she began, but Gina cut her off.
“You should be with Ricky’s family, at least until you get some further word. You can decide tomorrow if you’re ready to come back in.”
Dazed, she nodded. “Yes, that’s probably best. I’d be useless this afternoon, anyway.”
“Call me and let me know what’s happening,” Gina said. “I’ll be praying for him.”
Allie nodded, then raced to get her purse and head for Maria’s.
The whole family had gathered there by the time she arrived. No one seemed the least bit surprised by her rush to be with them. First Maria and then Mrs. Wilder pulled her into a tight embrace.
“He’s going to be fine,” Mrs. Wilder said, her expression set stubbornly. “Our Enrique is strong.”
“Of course he is,” Allie agreed. “Hardheaded, too.”
T
hat drew a smile from the older woman. “Who should know that better than you and I, right, niña. He loves us, and that will make him fight to come back to us.”
Allie glanced at the TV, saw that it was tuned to a station that was reporting the tragedy. There was a clip showing the efforts to get Ricky out of the building, then another one as they loaded his still body into an ambulance. Filled with dread, Allie turned away.
Don’t you dare die, she raged inside. You have to come back to me. You have to!
Suddenly she understood the decision that Nikki had reached to take Tom back into her life. Allie realized it wouldn’t matter whether she married Ricky or not. She would always be terrified when he was away, would always wait anxiously until he came back home. If that was true, then why let her fear cost them whatever precious time they might be allowed? She just prayed she would have a chance to tell him.
A few minutes later Nikki arrived, along with an official from the fire department. Mrs. Wilder and Maria headed for the kitchen and began cooking. Allie followed them, needing their presence as reassurance that everything would turn out okay. Those two women, more than anyone else in the house, believed it with all their hearts. Allie wanted to share their faith, but the arrival of the fire department official scared her. She was fearful that he had come because he was anticipating bad news.
“Sit,” Maria ordered. “You’re pale as a ghost.”
Allie did as she was told and accepted a glass of brandy, even though she almost never touched alcohol. Still, she took a sip of the amber liquid and felt the heat spread inside her.
One sip was enough, though. She put the glass aside, aware that Maria was studying her worriedly.
“I’ll be okay,” she assured her.
“Of course, you will,” Mrs. Wilder said, patting her shoulder. “It’s just that this came as a shock.”
Tears welled up and spilled down her cheeks. “What if…?”
“None of that,” Mrs. Wilder commanded. “The phone is going to ring and Tom will tell us that Ricky is awake and complaining like always.”
She left the kitchen with a plate of sandwiches before Allie could respond. Allie stared after her with admiration. “She has such faith,” she said to Maria. “I envy her that. I’m scared to death.”
“Don’t let her fool you. So is Mama, but she believes in God’s mercy and in His goodness. She’s counting on that to bring her son home safely.”
“I pray she’s right,” Allie said.
“What will you do when he gets here?” Maria asked, her expression troubled. “I see the love shining in your eyes, but everything that has happened today has confirmed your worst fears, hasn’t it?”
Allie nodded, grappling with the emotions that had welled up inside her since the minute Gina had delivered the terrible news. “But it’s also proved something else,” she said slowly, wanting to tell Maria about the decision she’d made.
“Proved what?”
“That I don’t want to lose a single second of whatever time I could have with him. Nikki realized that about Tom. And Jane always knew it about her husband. I didn’t understand what they meant when they first told me, but after today, I think I do.”
Just then, her timing impeccable as always, Jane walked into the kitchen, her colorful attire like a ray of sunshine in the gloomy atmosphere. She opened her arms and gathered Allie close. “I saw on the news and came right over.”
“We’re not going to lose him,” Allie said with a surprising surge of conviction. “He has too much to live for.”
“Does he?” Jane asked, studying Allie with a penetrating look.
Allie nodded.
“That’s news that will definitely get him back here,” she said, winking at Maria. “Don’t you think so?”
“Absolutely,” Maria said just as the phone rang. She grabbed it. Her expression brightened almost at once. “Well, if it isn’t my baby brother.”
A sense of relief washed over Allie, and then Maria was pulling her close. “My brother would like to hear the sound of your voice.”
Allie swallowed hard. “Enrique Wilder, you scared us half to death,” she scolded.
Maria grinned at the response on the other end of the line, then said, “I will not tell her that.”
“Tell me what?” Allie demanded.
“He says he didn’t come back from the dead just to have you yell at him.”
Allie chuckled, then spoke into the phone. “If you think that’s yelling, just wait till I see you in person.” Her voice faltered then as it sank in just how close she had come to losing him. “I love you,” she whispered. “Just come home soon.”
Then she turned away, put her head on Jane’s shoulder and let the tears fall.
I love you. Just come home soon.
Ricky clung to Allie’s words over the next few days. Impatient to get home and see her, he had to battle the doctors for permission to make the trip.
“Being with my family will be the best medicine,” he told them, but to no avail. They were determined not to let him go until they had completed a dozen different tests, repeated them, analyzed the results and concluded that he wouldn’t die en route. He could have told them that there was no way he was going to die, not when Allie was waiting for him half a world away, but he doubted they would buy his assessment of his prognosis.
It was Tom who finally persuaded them to let him go, but only after mustering the resources to get Ricky onto a medical transport flight that would take him home with a nurse in attendance.
“Thank you,” he told his best friend.
“Hey, nobody’s more anxious than I am to get you back to the States. You are not a good patient. I’m more than ready to turn the hovering over to Allie and your mom.”
“You’re staying?”
Tom nodded. “The job’s not done. Give Nikki a kiss for me and tell her I’ll be home to help her plan that wedding soon.”
Ricky grinned. “Maybe we can make it a double ceremony.”
“Why Allie would want to marry a stubborn cuss like you is beyond me, but if she does say yes, we’ll give it a shot,” Tom agreed. “Maybe that way at least one of us will actually remember our anniversary and keep the other one out of trouble.”
“Now that is an incentive,” Ricky agreed. He regarded his longtime partner soberly. “I owe you, pal. I know you moved heaven and earth, just about literally, to get me out of there. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you.”
“The whole team was there every second. You’re one of us. We weren’t about to lose you. Now go home and get well so I don’t have to shoulder your load the next time we get a call.”
Soon after Tom left the plane, the nurse brought Ricky the pain pills he’d been refusing for days now. She persuaded him to take them by reminding him that it was going to be a long flight and he’d want to be well rested when he got back to Florida.
“You don’t want to scare your family half to death when they see you, do you?”
Because the jostling he’d taken en route to the airport had sharply reminded him of every single ache and pain in his body, he gave in. A couple of pain pills would wear off long before they reached home. He intended to be wide-awake and fully alert when he saw Allie. He wanted to remember every single thing about their reunion. Not only that, if he proposed and she said yes, he didn’t want her to be able to claim later that he’d asked while in a drug-induced state.
He was out of it for most of the endless flight, but the minute the pilot informed them that they were an hour out of Miami, Ricky called the nurse over.
“Can you help me shave?”
“You want to look pretty for your wife?” she asked with a grin.
“I’m hoping she’ll agree to be my wife.”
She laughed. “Then you really do need a little sprucing up. Let’s see what we can do.”
There was only so much improvement that could be made because of the bandages, but Ricky thought the bright-turquoise Florida Marlins cap
gave him a jaunty look. Given how Allie felt about the team, maybe it would help his cause.
As soon as the plane was on the ground, he spotted his entire family on the tarmac waiting for him, along with an ambulance ready to take him to a Miami hospital to be checked out thoroughly before he could be permitted to go home to his own bed, where he desperately wanted to be.
His gaze frantically searched the gathering before finally coming to rest on Allie. She was so beautiful, she took his breath away. She was the reason he’d survived, the thought that had kept him fighting to stay alive. Her words on the phone had given him hope. Not just the admission that she loved him, but the promise in her voice that she wouldn’t take that love away ever again.
Of course, once she got a look at him, all broken and bandaged, she might have second thoughts. He turned to the nurse. “What do you think? Can I get the girl looking like this?”
“Sugar, you’ll sweep her off her feet. Just try to get past the black-and-blue stage before the wedding. It’ll look lousy with the tux.”
Ricky wished he could walk off the plane, but it was out of the question. He was carried out on a stretcher, the transporters pausing at the base of the steps to let his family surround him. His sisters hugged him gingerly, tears spilling onto his face.
“Hey, cut the waterworks,” he pleaded. “I’m not dead, and you’re ruining the outfit.”
“Move out of my way,” his mother chided her daughters, shouldering them aside to bend down and press a kiss to his cheek. She murmured to him in Spanish, then crossed herself and added a quick prayer.
“I’m going to be okay, Mama.”
She winked at him. “I never doubted it. You have a reason for living. ¡Sí?”
A Love Beyond Words Page 18
