LITMIR.BIZ

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eyes softened for a moment. “You’re a good doctor, aren’t you?”

      “I try to be.” She wasn’t sure what to make of him again. The man was vacillating between someone who fascinated her and someone who, likewise, scared her. She didn’t know what it was about him…his circumstances, his natural way? But she felt drawn to him. Or maybe it was to Ana Maria.

      Yes, that was it. Ana Maria was desperately in need of the emotional bond only a parent could have for a child…a bond Bella wasn’t seeing in Dr. Velascos. She was reacting to that. That’s all it could be. “Which is why I’m worried. It comes with the territory. I worry about all my patients.” And she worried about Ana Maria, who wasn’t even her patient.

      “I suppose we all do, don’t we?”

      His comment was more offhand than direct, as if his thoughts were somewhere else. Perhaps they were. “I know this is all confusing for you, Gabriel. But it will get better, I promise. It’s just going to take some time to make the adjustments and for now Ana Maria will be fine. Babies, even as young as she is, are very resilient.” Odd, her need to comfort him. But he seemed like he needed encouragement from somewhere. In brief moments, he looked so…lost.

      Good heavens, what was she doing, getting involved like this? Gabriel and Ana Maria were in good hands with Dr. Navarro and his nurse, and that problem was solved. But hers was not, which was why it was time to pull back the emotions. Time to quit looking for ways to put off the inevitable, and getting involved with Gabriel the way she was trying to do was just another way to avoid what she had to do. She recognized that. Accepted it. “Look, if you need something, Dr. Navarro will be able to help you. He seems like a very capable doctor and I’m sure he’ll put you in touch with a good pediatrician.” She pulled the blanket back from Ana Maria’s face, brushed a thumb over her soft, chubby cheek, then stepped back, feeling a sudden sadness she didn’t understand. “Take care of yourself, Gabriel. You and Ana Maria will have a wonderful life together.”

      CHAPTER TWO

      SHE’D eaten a little dinner, not so much because she’d wanted it but because she’d needed it. Something about holding little Ana Maria in her arms that afternoon had filled her with a longing that scared her. That, added to the dread of what she was here to do, made her meal a necessity, but not an enjoyable one. And now, hours later, she was tired of tossing and turning, and she simply couldn’t sleep. There were too many unwanted thoughts galloping through her mind, keeping her awake.

      This was so hard, knowing that she was about to face the worst thing she’d ever faced in her life. Until now, she’d been able to blot out her sister’s death, pretend this trip to Peru was merely a holiday where she could take a stroll through the countryside, mingle with the people, eat the cuisine, see the sights. But it wasn’t that at all, and the nearness of what she needed to face in order to heal herself was pounding at her.

      She wanted to do this, but could she? Could she open Rosie’s clinic and make her sister’s dream a reality? Being someone who always took the sure, steady path, the way she did, this seemed almost crazy. Rosie had been the one who had taken the risks, who had looked at life as an exciting mountain to climb. Bella, though, had been the one who had stuck to the flat paths, who hadn’t veered off.

      But she was veering in a big way now, wasn’t she? It was terrifying but it seemed right, fulfilling Rosie’s promise this way. If that’s what she decided to do.

      Bella was worried about Ana Maria, too. And about Gabriel, who probably didn’t need someone like her worrying about him. Yet she worried anyway, wondering why she’d latched on to the two of them almost immediately. Possibly her need for something that made some sense in her life? Something that made sense in the middle of something so confusing? Treating a sick child made so much sense to her. But Bella didn’t dismiss the possibility that fixing on Gabriel and his daughter was a distraction because she knew herself, knew how she’d wanted to avoid the obvious. Once she stepped into her sister’s dream, took it on as her own, her sister would be gone forever and she couldn’t face that, wasn’t ready to face that.

      Whatever the case, there were too many reminders around her of how fragile life could be. She understood that now, more than she had any other time in her life. She was pretty sure Gabriel did, too, and he coped by being distant. She coped by…well, that was the problem. She wasn’t sure how she coped because she hadn’t allowed herself that yet.

      Oh, she was strong enough. It had become a requirement with the way she and Rosie had grown up orphans from an early age, being tossed into so many situations where they had been tolerated but not loved the way children deserved. She’d been strong in medical school, too, and in her medical practice. It was easy, being strong, but lately she’d wondered if that strength had been a sham. Because deep down, when it had counted, she hadn’t found any of that strength she’d thought would be there. “You’re a fake, Arabella Burke,” she said, looking at herself in the mirror as she paced by it for the twentieth time in the past few minutes. “A great big fake who didn’t even know she was faking. Which makes you pretty pathetic, doesn’t it?”

      She didn’t stay at the mirror long enough for the image in it to reply. The truth was, she didn’t need conciliatory words, or more of the lie she’d been telling herself all this time. Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the strongest of them all? Why, it’s Bella! Bella, the queen of self-deception.

      Rather than taking on a heated debate with herself, Bella pulled on her pink chenille, floor-length bath robe, stepped into her pink bedroom slippers, and headed to the hall, determined to pace up and down until she was exhausted. A nice brisk walk, in a place without the mirror image waiting to taunt her, was good, she decided as she set off, her footsteps silent on the thick, padded carpet.

      Five minutes of power-walking from one end of the hall to another didn’t have the desired effect, though, because Bella felt none the worse for her near-marathon pace. But as she was about to set out on her second round by tackling the stairs, the elevator doors at the other end of the hall whooshed open and a young man in neatly pressed gray slacks and a maroon jacket scuttled out, heading straight to the first room on the left. She watched with mild interest, not because it was interesting as much as any diversion was good. It did seem awfully late to have room service delivered, though. Probably some other poor soul who couldn’t sleep, asking for a glass of warm milk.

      Warm milk! Why hadn’t she thought of that? Perhaps its soothing effect would help her. Besides, it seemed much more appealing than running up and down the hotel stairs in her pink nightwear, trying to wear herself out. “Excuse me,” she said to the room attendant, trying not to be too loud about it.

      He acknowledged her with a nod as the hotel door at which he stood cracked open and he handed in a covered tray. That’s when she heard it…the sound of a crying baby in the room. Naturally, her attention fixed on that as the attendant backed away from the door and the man inside thanked him.

      Gabriel Velascos! She recognized his voice but she wasn’t fast enough to get to the door before he shut it. A couple of loud raps remedied that, and a second later he opened the door to her, immediately blinking his obvious surprise. “Do you have built-in radar?” he asked, his voice more weary than stiff. His eyebrows did raise as he took in her pink nightwear.

      “Maybe I do.” He was dressed in jeans, and an unbuttoned white cotton shirt that proved a startlingly sexy contrast to his dark skin. Bare feet, mussed hair, the total image of him caused Bella to step back when he opened the door all the way. She shouldn’t be harboring these kinds of thoughts for him. He had been widowed only three days, for heaven’s sake! A man in mourning. He probably hadn’t even had time to bury his wife yet.

      Hormonal reaction, she decided. Biological clock ticking hard and fast. A particularly pointless ticking for a woman who was on a road with an uncertain ending to it. Or maybe she was finally tired. “I heard Ana Maria…”

      “She’s been crying for the past hour, and I can’t get her to sleep. I had room service bring me sugar water because I thought she might be hungry, and if that doesn’t work…” He shrugged.

      Bella

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