even though her face was stiff with tension. “They’re all still in Mexico. So far, Juan is the only one who got a visa to work here. They’re all trying, though.”
“Have you called them?”
With her hands slowly rubbing her belly, almost as though she didn’t even know what she was doing, she shook her head a second time. “If I call my mama, she’ll call his and I don’t want them to know when there’s no way for them to get here. No money.”
“How about friends?”
“We really don’t know many people yet. We haven’t been here that long, and with getting ready for the baby and all…”
He glanced at her belly and away. “How long before you’re due?”
“A month.”
That was how long he had left to wait, too.
But while he had to wait alone, young Maria Gomez might not have to. Blake excused himself, made some telephone calls, and within the hour was able to tell Maria that her mother, as well as Juan’s, had been wired money and—as was often the case in emergency situations—had been granted permission to spend a week in the United States. They’d be with her by the time Juan was coming out of recovery.
That was when the young woman started to cry. And as Blake sat there, holding a very frightened expectant mother, he prayed to a God he’d quit relying on sometime during his travels. He prayed for Juan and Maria Gomez. For their little baby. And for himself—a man ten years older than Juan Gomez, who’d never fathered a child and might never have a chance to do so.
Might the next month somehow find miracles for all of them.
Because, God knew, only a miracle or two would get any of them through the weeks ahead.
IF JULIET HAD ANY DOUBTS left about Mary Jane’s story, they were gone by the time the child finally fell asleep half an hour after her bedtime. Marcie had yet to leave her room.
“You going to hide in here forever?” Juliet pushed open the door to her daughter’s former playroom.
“No.” Marcie sat on the floor, leaning back against the wall, a tissue in her fist. Her eyes were red and swollen.
“You want to tell me about the conversation Mary Jane interrupted?”
Marcie did, immediately, confirming what Mary Jane had already told her and more.
“I’d like to be able to tell you I understand why you lied to me, and that I’m not hurt,” Juliet said, sitting on the edge of the bed. “But I can’t. I don’t understand why, if you really wanted to talk to Hank, you didn’t tell me. The decision is yours to make. We’ve both always known that. And I am hurt. Really hurt.”
Her twin’s lips parted, trembled. Tears slowly filled her eyes. The sides of Marcie’s hair were damp. She’d long since cried away any makeup she’d had on.
“I know.”
The admission didn’t heal the hole in Juliet’s heart. She’d accepted many challenges in her life—met most of them head-on—and come through stronger. She was prepared to face whatever else life decided to hand her. She’d just never expected Marcie to be the one doing the handing.
They’d come through everything together. Everything.
“Why?”
“I—” Marcie broke off. And that, more than anything, scared Juliet. Even now, face-to-face, there was a wall between her and her sister. She had no idea what to do with it.
“What, I’ve imagined the bond between us all these years? Imagined the trust?”
“No.”
She glanced at her sister’s bent head and wanted to scream. Or cry. “Then what?”
“I’m not like you, Jules, so sure of everything all the time.”
Juliet slid down to the floor, her knees up to her chest. “I don’t know what you mean. I’m not sure of anything.”
“Sure you are.” Marcie smiled, but the expression held as much sadness as anything else. “You got pregnant, and you knew just what to do. Oh sure,” she added when Juliet had been ready to interrupt. “You were scared, but you knew you couldn’t marry Blake, knew you shouldn’t tell him, knew you had to take the bar exam, and you knew that, eventually, you’d get what you wanted out of life.”
Okay. Maybe. She supposed. So why, looking back, did she remember a different kind of feeling—the feeling that she was losing the opportunity to ever have what she really wanted?
“I’m not sure, Jules.” Marcie’s soft, teary voice brought Juliet’s thoughts back to the bedroom.
And the fact that she was looking at the broken trust between her and the other half of herself. She and Marcie had always been able to talk to each other about anything. What had happened to change that?
“Okay, you’re not sure. That’s no reason to lie to me about talking to Hank. I didn’t ask you not to. Or even ask you if you were talking to him. You’re the one who came to me and asked me to filter the calls because you didn’t want to speak with him again until the baby was born. And being not sure is a reason to talk to me. Haven’t we always done that, come to each other, when we needed help?”
Marcie didn’t say anything, but the conviction in her troubled blue eyes told its own story.
“What?” Juliet asked. “At this point you might as well tell me.” She didn’t figure there was anything else Marcie could say that would hurt her more. She’d never understood, until that moment, how one could hurt too badly for tears.
They’d come. She knew that. Later, when she was alone in her bed.
“I didn’t think you could help me.”
“That’s crazy!” Juliet’s defenses were up, a first for her with Marcie. It panicked her. She didn’t know what to do. “Who better than me, Marce? I was in the same position you’re in right now. And I love you more than anyone in the world.”
“You don’t know that,” Marcie said. “You have no idea how much Hank loves me.”
So that’s what this is about. Two months ago, for the past fifteen years, Marcie had talked about the lack of fire between her and Hank, the lack of a feeling strong enough to get them to the altar. But now that she was pregnant, suddenly she was seeing things she’d never seen before?
Had it been that way with their mother, too? Had she known, before she got pregnant, that she and their father weren’t in love?
Was Marcie just like her after all? Another believer in fairy tales? Another woman looking for a man to take care of her? Another dreamer?
Another gray body lying naked in a tub, waiting for a daughter to come home? To dress it with shaking fingers to preserve an irrelevant modesty when the authorities arrived?
“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Marcie said, and Juliet stared, wondering for a
