knew could bring help. It rang four times before going to voice mail.
“Tanna, go pack a small suitcase with whatever you need. We’re both going.”
She scrolled a little further through her contacts list.
Straight to voice mail.
Three more numbers, three more recorded messages.
Gloria was running out of numbers in her phone to call.
She scrolled through her list again. Maybe she’d overlooked someone.
Well, there was one more number she could call. She just hadn’t planned on ever calling it again. In fact, she couldn’t believe she hadn’t deleted it out of her phone two years ago.
Gloria’s fingers felt shaky as she connected the call. The phone stopped ringing and Gloria’s best hope for helping Tanna and her unborn child answered. “Vasquez.”
Although she hadn’t spoken to Rodrigo Vasquez in longer than she cared to remember, his short salutation made time stand still, and Gloria realized she knew his voice almost as well as she knew her own.
“Rigo, it’s Gloria. I need your help.” There was no time to catch up, which thankfully meant they wouldn’t have to discuss the night her husband died or why Rigo shut himself out of her life shortly thereafter.
“Gloria.” Rigo paused. “Wow, it’s been a while. What do you need?”
He didn’t hang up on her, so that was a start. Even though merely rediscovering his number in her contacts list made her shake with fear and memories, Gloria knew calling Rigo was the right move. She had to do whatever it took for the health and safety of her patient—even if it affected the safety of her heart. Quickly, in her mind, she prayed he wouldn’t leave her all alone again, not at this moment when she needed official help so badly.
“I need an escort off the island. I have a client in labor and I need to get her some place safe before the hurricane gets here.”
“I’m head of the Beach Patrol division now, Gloria, not back on regular patrol with Port Provident PD.”
“Your aunt told me that at church a few weeks ago. But no one else is answering their phones and I can’t call 9-1-1 for this, not with a hurricane on the way. I figure a first-time mom very early in the first stage of labor isn’t an emergency priority.”
“No, you’re right, it’s probably not. I was headed to check on a report of surfers on the east end—no one’s allowed in the water today. But I’ll radio Davis. He can go issue their citation and I can be to you in a few minutes. Where are you?”
“In the Gulf Air Apartments on Avenue R. Apartment L5.”
“On my way, Gloria—I’m close. Those apartments aren’t even safe. You shouldn’t be there to begin with. And they’re not going to make it through the hurricane unscathed. Those units are owned by a slumlord and have been falling apart for years.”
Through the phone, she heard the siren on Rigo’s truck begin to wail. “That’s why I called you.”
“Tanna?” Gloria called down the small hallway of the dingy apartment as she disconnected the call. “Are you ready? It’s time to go.”
* * *
In his years patrolling a beat around the streets of Port Provident, Rigo Vasquez had been through some of the island’s seediest crack houses, had shot criminals and had wound up with a few holes of his own, and ultimately watched as his best friend and patrol partner died.
But he’d never felt the slick, icy fear running through his veins like he did now, knowing Lieutenant Felipe Rodriguez’s widow waited on the other side of the door at the top of the stairs.
Rigo looked around the parking lot. Even as the new head of Port Provident’s Beach Patrol—a division of the police force that wasn’t just responsible for lifeguards and water safety, but also for keeping the island’s beaches safe and mischief-free—Rigo couldn’t keep from always assessing the scene. He was always on patrol. Rigo knew to trust his instincts, and he was thankful to have something small to keep his mind off what he was about to do.
He was about to face Gloria for the first time since the night his carelessness took everything away from her. Rigo knew he could never give her back her husband or her unborn child, and his gut squeezed tightly at the bitter memories.
But if he kept his focus and did his job, maybe he could get her out of here safely.
He owed that much to Felipe.
He owed that much to himself.
“Gloria! Open up.” He knocked on the door with his free hand, still gripping his weapon in the other.
Rigo felt his mouth go dry as he saw Gloria for the first time in almost seven hundred and thirty days. Not that he’d been counting. She’d changed, yet still looked completely the same.
Her hair used to come down to her shoulders, but now it fell in layers just past her chin. It seemed lighter, too, with more honey than mocha. But with the summer days just now beginning to fade away, Rigo figured those highlights were the work of hours spent with sun and sand, not in a salon.
Or maybe it was just the glow of the yellow bug light overhead. He didn’t want to think about it too much.
He looked past her into the small, dark apartment. Noticing her hair was okay, he figured, but Rigo didn’t want to see her eyes, didn’t want to remember all the tears. He wanted to get her and her patient to safety, tell himself it made up for the years of pain he’d caused and go back to his carefully orchestrated plan of quietly making amends while living separate lives on the small island.
“You ready?”
“Yes.” She let out a soft breath, like a feather floating away on the breeze. He wondered if she’d been holding it as she listened to his footsteps come up the stairs.
“Tanna? Come on, honey, we’ve got to go.” Gloria put her arm around a slightly built, very pregnant teenager. A scuffed-up suitcase rested at the girl’s feet. “Felipe will keep us safe.”
She’d called him Felipe.
He didn’t think anything could have hurt more than two years ago when the ER physician came out to tell him that his lifelong best friend, his partner on the force, was dead on arrival at the hospital. But now he knew he’d been wrong.
It was hearing Gloria call him Felipe.
It was hearing the love of his life calling for someone who’d been gone for years.
It was knowing that he couldn’t protect Felipe then, he couldn’t protect Gloria now and he couldn’t protect his heart ever.
“Rigo. I meant Rigo,” Gloria said as they stopped in front of his beach patrol truck. She looked up at him, then just as quickly looked away. “This hurricane has me distracted. Thank you for coming when I called.”
“Gloria, you know I’d do anything for you.”
She stared at him, unblinking.
