the shock in her eyes. And more than a little wariness. Santi wouldn’t have blamed her if she pulled a wheel-screeching U-turn, headed back to the hospital and requested a new partner. Punching things wasn’t his style but she’d aimed, shot and unwittingly scored a bull’s-eye. He’d made all of his brothers’ lives a whole lot more difficult than they’d needed to be after his parents had been killed, and hauling around the burden of guilt for the last fifteen years had all but buried him.
“Sore subject.”
“No kidding,” she muttered, slowing the vehicle and pulling into a parking lot across from the beach. She jerked the ambulance to a halt, unclicked her seat belt and shifted around in her seat to look him in the eye. “Right. This is my ambulance—”
“Uh-uh.” He shook his head. “I’m the senior one. I was told you were still in training.”
“That’s just a technicality.” Her jaw tightened.
“Not where I come from.”
“Where I come from—if the so-called senior partner starts acting all crazy we are cruising for Disasterville and I get to call the shots. I don’t know about you but I need this job. It’s the only thing keeping me sane and you’re not helping me keep my cool or my calm. So spill it.”
“What?” Not the world’s best dodge, but it would buy him a few more seconds.
“Don’t prevaricate.” She was serious now. “You’ve got a story and what is it you Americans say? ‘Better out than in’? Spill it so we can get your funk out of this cab and focus on work.”
“You want my funk?”
She stared at him wide-eyed then burst out laughing. “Yeah.” She nodded as the idea settled into place. “Don’t ask me why, but lay it on me. I am the funk master.”
Santi shook his head. This woman was as mad as a hatter. Good mad. He leaned back against his door, arms folding across his chest as he weighed up the pros and cons of playing along.
“So, what are you saying? You want to do this Vegas-style?”
Crinkles appeared at the top of her nose. “I presume you’re not referring to bathing in champagne and luxuriating among satin sheets?”
It hadn’t been what he’d been thinking, but now that she mentioned it...
“Whatever floats your boat, chica.”
* * *
Santiago dropped a wink that made more of an impact than Saoirse wished it had. She forced herself to purse her lips and give him an “in your dreams” look.
Then the penny dropped.
She was the one whose mind had slipped straight between the sexy sheets. Her brain played catch-up on the revelation.
“You mean what goes on on the road stays on the road?”
“Exactly.” Santi nodded, his full lips curving into a self-satisfied smile. “Glad to see you are keeping your finger on the American pulse.”
“That’s precisely what I’m trying to do,” she said with feeling.
A bit too much feeling for someone who was...er...living in America. She tapped her fingers impatiently on the steering wheel. “Would you hurry up and tell me what has got you all sensitive and girlie—”
“Whoa!” He held up his hands in protest. “Let’s not get carried away here. There’s only room for one princesita in this cab and it’s not—”
Saoirse silenced him with a zip-it yank of her fingers across her mouth. She’d had her princess days and they’d landed her alone and heartbroken. Her fingers crept up to the back of her neck, feeling the short hairs bristle under her touch. It hadn’t been that long ago she would have felt her thick hair swish along the small of her back. Her eyes flicked back up to Santi’s. By the looks of things he was quite merrily enjoying her discomfort.
Typical overconfident, survival-of-the-fittest male! Everything about him, his physique, his confidence, his whole being, exuded man. She’d have to develop an immunity to it. And from the effect his eyes alone had on her, now would be a pretty good time to show him his gorgeousness had absolutely no effect on her.
“Enough,” she said decisively. “Spill.”
“You know, Murphy, you’d be really good at blackmailing people. Or torture. Have you ever considered a career—”
She waved off his attempts to veer off course, making it clear by her gestures that he needed to start talking or get the boot.
“Fine. You got me. They’re my brothers.”
Saoirse shot a triumphant fist into the air with a whoop and ended up smacking it on the roof of the cab. “Ow! I knew it.” She shook her hand and gave her knuckles a quick covert inspection. “I knew it,” she said again, just to make sure he was aware she was still the one in charge here.
“And what are your parents? Doctors or models?”
“Dead.”
Saoirse felt her face flame with horror. Talk about open mouth, insert foot. Her parents had been just about the only reason she hadn’t flung herself off a jagged cliff edge the day of the wedding-not-wedding. She couldn’t imagine not having them at the end of a phone, at the very least. Video links were even better.
“I’m so sorry. I had no idea, Santi.”
“Don’t worry. You weren’t to know.” His voice had a heavy dose of robot about it now. She didn’t blame him. She couldn’t even say her ex-fiancé’s name without tearing up, and he was alive and kicking.
The look on Santiago’s face said Don’t even think about giving me sympathy, so she swallowed her pity and ploughed on. If they’d both just endured the worst year ever, they’d finally have something in common.
“Recently?”
“No.” He maintained eye contact almost as if he were giving a frontline report to a senior officer that half his men had been killed and the other half had been taken hostage by terrorists.
Her mind reeled back to the intensity with which he’d fought for the homeless veteran’s life yesterday. That hadn’t been about saving a stranger’s life. It had been about something personal. Something buried away deep in his heart.
She nodded for him to continue.
“My parents were killed twenty years ago at our—at the family bodega. A robbery gone about as wrong as they can when there are guns involved.”
He was painting a picture. It was hard to tell whose benefit it was for, but Saoirse clamped her lips tight now that she’d finally got him talking. Not that it made for easy listening. Just hearing the absence of emotion in Santi’s voice was chilling.
“I looked after my kid brother, Alejandro, who got snagged by a bullet while my older twin brothers, the ones you saw, went to med school. You were right about the genius part.” He marked up a point on the invisible scoreboard
