He’s dealing with a tragedy no one’s ever prepared for. When you lose someone like he has…like I did…you lose part of yourself, too. Then it becomes so hard getting up in the morning to face the normal things you’re supposed to. People stare at you and whisper, they pity you and they mean to be kind, but it hurts so much and you have to put on this brave face and pretend that you’re doing well when everything inside you wants to crumble. You don’t know what to do, yet life has to go on even when it doesn’t make as much sense as it used to.” She sighed. “So that’s why you have to be patient with him. Your daddy’s starting over again, and his footing isn’t very sure yet.” Like hers wasn’t. But something about holding Ana Maria made it seem better. Maybe it was because she already missed her medical practice, missed the one solid thing in her life that had never let her down, other than her sister, and Ana Maria reminded her of that stability. “You just wait. It will get better gradually, and pretty soon neither of you will remember the first few clumsy days.”
Pacing over to the door, Bella was about to turn and pace back to the window when she glanced down at the papers Gabriel had tossed at the trash can and missed. After she’d bent to pick them up, it had been her intention to throw them away, but what she saw caused her to pull Ana Maria to her chest even more. It was an adoption pamphlet. No! That couldn’t be right. Gabriel couldn’t be… Was he actually thinking about giving up his child for adoption? Giving away his baby and start over? “No,” she gasped, throwing the adoption information in the trash. She’d thought his detachment would disappear once he was over the shock. It was too soon to make this kind of decision—too soon, too reactionary. But she’d been wrong about Gabriel, and this went far beyond not thinking clearly.
She looked at the trash can, wanting to kick it she was so angry. Those brochures were crumpled and intended for the trash, weren’t they? Could he have considered the idea, then changed his mind?
Or maybe he’d already signed the adoption papers and didn’t need the information brochures any longer. It was a thought that turned her stomach.
“Gabriel,” she whispered, the full weight of a sadness she didn’t even grasp dropping down on her as she dragged her way back to the window. It was such a beautiful sight out there, with the neatly manicured gardens below. Beautiful green grass, perfectly sculpted shrubs lining the walkways, flower-beds all done in reds and whites, white wicker benches on the lawn. All of it made so much sense. Went together the way it should. But glancing down at Ana Maria, who’d settled into her arms to nap, she couldn’t find any sense in what she feared Gabriel was about to do. No sense at all.
Just like there was no sense in the way she was feeling over it—betrayed.
“You didn’t touch the pastries you ordered,” Gabriel commented casually an hour later. Entering the hotel room, he wasn’t bogged down by the bundle of packages she’d hoped he might be bringing. Packages full of baby clothes would mean he wasn’t going to give Ana Maria away. But all he had with him was a small bag with a couple of new sleepers in it. Nothing else, and she’d had so many things on her list—receiving blankets, newborn soaps and lotions, bootees. Which only served to refuel all the raw emotions she’d been feeling from the moment she’d found his adoption literature.
No, she wouldn’t do this. Wouldn’t get involved. It was none of her business and she meant to keep it that way. She had her own problems to fix, her own hard decisions to make, and getting involved in his life in any way was just crazy.
Sucking in a sharp breath, Bella squared her shoulders, marched past Gabriel and straight out the door, without so much as a glance backward or a goodbye. Tears welled in her eyes all the way from his room to hers, and she fought them back, biting hard on her lower lip, hoping the pain would distract her emotions.
But it didn’t. Back in her own room, of all the things to do over a stranger, she collapsed on her bed, drew herself up in a ball and cried like she hadn’t cried since the day she’d heard about the airplane crash. She had no right to those tears, neither did she understand them, yet once they started they didn’t stop for nearly an hour. And at the end, when her eyes were all puffy and red, her face blotched, and she was dabbing cold water on herself, she glanced at the distorted face in the mirror, wondering who’d she been crying for. Her sister? Ana Maria? Gabriel?
Or her own broken heart over so many things she knew and possibly some she didn’t?
Bella searched her own eyes for a moment, then bent low over the vanity sink and splashed more cold water on her face. Better that than finding the answer she was afraid she’d discover if she kept on looking.
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