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The walk between the church and the clinic could not be described as short. It took Gloria more than half an hour in the Texas September sun to make it all the way. But the steps and sidewalks gave her more than enough time to think about all the jumbled fragments in her mind.
Not only had Rigo stepped back into her life—run back in when she’d called him in a panic, truthfully—she was coming to rely on him. It was as though the hurricane had blown away the ugliest pieces of their past as it pushed inland.
“Gloria!” Dr. Pete Shipley stuck his hand out from behind a brown-stained refrigerator balanced near the curb in front of the birth center and waved. “I’ve been wondering about you. How’s your parents’ restaurant?”
“A mess. About like that break room refrigerator you’ve got there.” She gestured toward the rings of duct tape circling the appliance, holding the doors shut.
Pete wiped his forehead with the back of a rough work glove. “That’s for sure. I didn’t have it in me to even open this thing up. I’ve spent my life in ERs and delivery rooms, and I just knew I couldn’t take the mold and the smell of rotting food that would be in here. There’s not a big enough emesis basin in the world for how I’d handle this.”
Gloria nodded her head. “I was at Huarache’s yesterday. About the same thing. Except I couldn’t just move a commercial-sized fridge out to the street. I had to go in. I wished I’d had a Darth Vader mask.”
“Luke. I am your freezer.” Pete gave the James Earl Jones impression his best shot.
She let out a hoot of laughter at her boss’s joke. “Something like that.”
“It’s good to see a smile on your face, Gloria. I was worried about you when I heard you’d stayed with Tanna.” He continued picking up debris in the yard of the clinic and tossing it in a pile down by the curb. “Watch out. There are nails on the ground.”
She tossed the shingles toward the pile and dusted off her hands. “Fair enough. My work gloves are at Huarache’s. How’s the clinic?”
Instead of answering, Pete turned around and faced the little green one-story cottage that housed the clinic. “Come on inside. We need to talk about what’s next.”
Gloria leaned against the doorway in what had been the waiting room of the Provident Women’s Health and Birth Center. She’d known this was coming, but hearing the news for certain made her knees buckle a bit.
“I’m really sorry, Gloria. I know this is tough. I hate having to close the clinic, but the loss is just going to be insurmountable.” Pete sat with a thud on the metal chair in the corner and focused blankly at his hands with a look of desperation. “Since the power failure was caused when the water swamped the substation, and business interruption insurance is tied to the windstorm policy, we’re not going to get any kind of reimbursement for the days we’d be closed. It would take months to get the clinic reopened—months without any kind of income. And I just don’t see us getting enough from the regular insurance once we finish repairs to cover the difference.”
Although she knew Pete wasn’t exaggerating the dire situation, and although she’d given serious consideration to her next steps, hearing once more about the changes in her life made her mind spin.
“I think my home is a total loss, and now to go along with that, my job is a total loss, too. And then there’s all the mess from last night.”
“What mess? Everything okay?” Pete stopped staring at his open palms and looked up. “Well, aside from the obvious.”
Gloria could have kicked herself for letting that last part slip. She blamed it on the roller coaster of emotions. Pete had always been a great person to work with, a skilled doctor and a good boss. But she’d never discussed relationships or other deep personal matters with him, and it seemed strange to start now.
Then again, it wasn’t like they’d be working together anymore.
“I’ve been staying with the aunt of my ex-boyfriend from high school, Rigo. He lives there, too. And he helped me safely deliver Tanna DeLong’s baby.”
A smile cracked Pete’s face. “Gloria?”
“I know. I’m not sure what is more mind-boggling. Losing my house, losing my job...or wondering if I’m losing my mind.”
“Well, what are you going to do about it?”
“Sell the house to someone who will tear it down and rebuild it so I don’t have to. Take the MCAT. Apply to Lone Star University’s medical school and eventually get a job with Provident Medical Center.” She kicked at a red Lego piece from the children’s area that had been swept to the waiting room.
Pete raised his eyebrows. “Really, Gloria?”
She nudged the Lego with her toe again. “Oh, you meant about Rigo.”
“Yeah.” He matched Gloria’s slowly emerging smile with one of his own. “About Rigo. What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. Go with the flow, I guess.”
Pete’s smile jumped to a full-fledged boyish grin. “You? Go with the flow? You have lost your mind, Gloria Rodriguez.”
They’d worked together for about two years. It hadn’t taken the doctor long to diagnose her need for order and organization. “Probably so, Pete.”
“There’s a first time for everything.”
“To everything there is a season.” The quote from Ecclesiastes had never seemed more appropriate.
Her now-former boss nodded. “Indeed there is.”
“So what are you going to do?”
He looked out the window framed by dingy brown curtains that had once been white with colorful polka dots, then back at Gloria. “I’ve already put in a call to the director of Global Medical Mission. I’ll get the clinic cleaned up and closed up, put the property on the market and get the insurance paperwork in motion. And then I think it’s time for me to leave Port Provident and move on. I don’t know where they’d send me, but I’m open. You know it’s been a dream I’ve had for a long time.”
She knew about dreams, the ones that never strayed far from the corners of the mind. She’d tried for so long to put the memories of her relationship with Rigo to sleep. But time and circumstance had acted like an alarm clock in her life, wrenching her out of the motions she’d been subconsciously going through for so long.
“So I guess that’s it.” Gloria looked around the little clinic she’d grown to love. She’d started working here as a refuge from the worst moments in her life. Not having to work on the L & D floor at the hospital gave her a buffer from memories that, until this week, had brought her to tears every time she thought about them. The Provident Birth Center had restored her faith in birth and her ability as a midwife when she hadn’t been able to save her own son.
She would miss this little clinic. But she’d never forget the lessons she’d taken to heart here.
Pete stood up and pulled a slip of paper out of the back pocket of his dirt-stained jeans. “I guess so. Here’s your last check, Gloria. I’m sorry it had to come to this. I hope things work out for all of us in this new chapter we’re being pushed into.”
“I think they will, Pete.” A smile pushed into the corners of Gloria’s lips. “You know what they say—‘That which doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.’”
Losing liters of blood, her own child and her husband hadn’t killed her. Starting over alone hadn’t killed her. It took a hurricane to make her see the reality, but she would never deny the truth again.
“I know I’m stronger now,” she said, and she meant every word.
In the time of her life that Gloria now thought of as “PH,” or pre-hurricane, nothing settled her mind like an evening walk around the neighborhood. She would use the sidewalks of Port Provident to organize her thoughts about a birth she’d attended, something Gracie had said or even her sadness about being alone.
Today, though, walking back from the clinic, Gloria’s mind raced at a pace far more quickly than her feet had ever taken her.
Pete had laughed at her declaration that she was just going to see where things led. But she’d witnessed a different side of Rigo lately and she didn’t see how she could do otherwise. She’d seen a man who defied Mother Nature herself to bring people to safety. She’d seen a man who held her while she faced her deepest fears and opened up about his own.
And she’d seen a man who quite literally would have saved her and those who depended upon her from drowning if it had come to that, even though they hadn’t talked for years or parted on good terms. Concentrating only on her thoughts and not stepping on scattered debris, Gloria realized her footsteps had brought her back to the place where they’d always brought her.
Home.
Right in front of her stood 909 Travis Place. But it looked very different than it had last time she saw it. Just as at the clinic, the refrigerator sat on the curb, sealed with bands of duct tape. All of her living room furniture had been pulled out to the covered front porch. Books lay open on a sheet of plywood, as though they were trying to dry out. Beige carpet, stained darker brown from sand and seawater, sat rolled intertwined with its blue-and–yellow-flecked under-padding. They looked like amorphous logs at the edge of the grass.
A flash of movement was visible in the open windows. Cautiously, she walked up the sidewalk to the front door, which stood wide-open.
Rigo came into view, dragging a jagged piece of drywall almost as tall as he was.
“Glo?” He rested the dusty rectangle of white against a corner of the living room wall. “I thought you were at the clinic.”
“I was. I thought you were running an errand.”
He wiped a hand carelessly across his sweaty brow. His dark hair clung to his forehead in damp tendrils.
“I am. More or less. I’m helping out a friend.”
Gloria ran her fingers along the door frame, tracing the grain of the wood. A lump settled into her throat. She tried to swallow it away before speaking. “You’ve been here the whole time since we left the church?”
Rigo nodded.
“You did this for me?” She almost couldn’t believe it. He’d made more progress in just a few hours than she had yesterday in almost an entire day at Huarache’s, her parents’ restaurant.
“You said it was going to be too hard for you to come over here for a few days. Mold is already setting in. I just didn’t want things to get any worse than they already are.”
Gloria looked up at his sweat-stained face. She’d seen him a million times in the heat of the day, usually killing time on the beach after surfing or getting in a workout by running up and down the sand. But she stared at him as if she’d never seen him before.
Truthfully, she never had seen him like this before.
Even when they’d been teenagers, head over heels for each other, he’d never done anything on this level for her. The old Rigo would have been more concerned about himself. He would have been helpful, but not all in.
“I don’t know what to say,” she finally got out.
He smiled. The confidence in that simple gesture spoke wordlessly, straight to her heart.
“You don’t have to say anything. You don’t even have to do anything. The electricity is scheduled to come back online in the morning and they plan to open the causeway in the afternoon. People can start coming back home. Take care of your parents. Take care of the restaurant, of Gracie’s place. Do what you need to at the clinic. I’ve got this.”
She shook her head. It didn’t seem right. He’d done enough. She wanted to find a way back to friendship again. Not to be in his debt, or for him to be in hers. “I just need a little time, Rigo. You have a job to do. You don’t need me in the way.”
He pushed the sweaty hair back off his forehead. “You’re right.”
She was glad he saw it her way. Just friends. Clean slate. No one beholden to the other.
Rigo looked straight at her. He reached out a hand and lifted her chin so that their gazes met. A decade melted away in an instant as his eyes turned two shades darker, the iris almost matching the black of the pupil in the center.
She knew this look. She’d once lived for this look.
“I don’t need you in the way, Gloria. I just need you.”
Gloria’s breath came short. That sounded like more than just friends, more than she was willing to give.
She opened her mouth to say something, to set him straight. He pulled the finger from under her chin and laid it lightly upon her lips, warning her to silence. She felt a tingle like a minty lip balm across the soft skin.
Rigo shook his head, telling her he wasn’t finished. “And I’m going to do whatever it takes to prove I came back for the right reasons. I’m going to earn your trust back.”
He trailed his finger off slowly. She stood perfectly still, unable to break that hard stare. Standing in the doorway of a house full of memories, she couldn’t think of anything except that look.
“And once I do, I’m not stopping there.”
Rigo couldn’t believe he’d been so direct. The look on Gloria’s face told him that he should have thought that one through before he spoke. But he couldn’t help it.
“I came back to apologize to you, Gloria. To set things right between us.” He needed her to know. “But I know now I’m not going to be right without you. Not ever.”
She still didn’t speak. The silence began to spread, threatening to shut down the hard-won emotional truce that had settled between them during the past week. His heart still pumped furiously, but the adrenaline began to turn to ice. In the past, Rigo dealt with overwhelming emotions and uncomfortable situations by just turning and walking away.
But he’d learned he was stronger than that. Rigo’s counselors had shown him that he had never backed down from a wave, he’d never backed down from a bullet—and he used that knowledge to know he wasn’t going to back down now.
“Glo. Please. Just say something. If I’m making you uncomfortable, tell me. But I’m not leaving. Not this time.”
She spoke, so softly he almost missed it. “You can stay.”
He watched the rise and fall of her chest. Measured, steady. Almost too measured, as though she were focused on the simple act of breathing.
“I don’t want to upset you.”
“You didn’t upset me. You surprised me.” She paused and ruffled her fingers through her hair, shifting her gaze downward. “You scared me.”
Rigo nodded. That was understandable. He’d scared himself. “How so?”
“Because I don’t think I want you to stop there, either.” The words came out in a low-pitched rush, as though she were trying to get them out before she was tempted to take them back.
His heart sputtered a bit, it raced and then thudded with the realization of what he’d said. And with the responsibility. He knew the reason that their dreams had shattered rested on no one’s shoulders but his own. He also knew that righting that wrong rested on his shoulders.
Lord, make me worthy of her.
“So where do we start?” Rigo wanted to be respectful of the hint of fear he still saw in Gloria’s eyes. Clearly, she felt the same attraction he did. And clearly she still remembered the past. He was willing to let her take the lead. He owed her that much.
“Well, lunch today was nice. It was good to just share conversation and a meal.”
He’d take her out to the best restaurant in town, three meals a day, to show her he meant what he said. But they were just days past a hurricane taking over their hometown, laying waste to electricity, buildings and fresh food.
Rigo let his gaze rest on Gloria softly. She’d always been pretty, but the years since they were teenagers had allowed her face to grow into true beauty. He loved that she was still petite enough to tuck perfectly under his shoulder and wrap his arms around. He wanted to earn the right to do that again. He knew that, in spite of the havoc the hurricane had brought, he needed to find a way to honor Gloria’s request. He wanted them to rebuild in whatever manner brought her the most comfort. If that was over the quiet company of a meal, then he would make that happen.
“Meet me at the top of Inez’s stairs at eight o’clock.”
“Wait, what?” She gave a skeptical look from the side corner of her eye.
He broke into a grin as the plan came together in his mind. “I’d like to take you out on a date. Would you please do me the honor of dining with me tonight?”
Rigo’s breath caught in his throat. It felt like asking her out for the first time all over again. Roll together all the times he’d asked her to homecoming and prom, and he’d still never been as nervous as right now. So much more was at stake than a dance after a football game and some high school popularity points.
“Rigo. There’s a dusk-until-dawn curfew on. We can’t go out to dinner. And don’t you have to work?” The quizzical look in her eyes intensified and caught the light, giving them a glassy shine.
“Gloria. I help enforce the curfew. But I have a plan. And I don’t have to be back on shift until eleven tonight.” He couldn’t keep the smile off his face. He felt like she was going to say yes, and it made him happier than he’d been in years.
Her lips pursed, bringing his thoughts back in time. He wanted to kiss her. For real. Not just the light touch to the head he’d given her in the nursery. But he knew he couldn’t. Dinner was in the plan. Real kissing wasn’t.
At least not yet.
“I have no idea what you’ve got up your sleeve. But that goofy grin tells me something’s going on in your mind.” She relaxed the curiosity in her stare.
“Do you trust me?”
The words were simple, but the answer was not. If she said no, he knew he’d have to live with that. His actions had brought them to this point, after all.
But his thoughts broke and the prayer of the past days flowed into his mind. Lord, make me worthy of her forgiveness. And then a postscript. Give me the chance to show her the change You’ve brought about in me.
“Not entirely.” She pointed a slim finger at him, the bubblegum-pink polish roughened and chipped at the end of the nail. “Prove me wrong. You have one chance.”
That was the Gloria he knew and had loved. Feisty. Issuing orders. Not the scared, shattered Gloria of late. He knew how to deal with sassy, secure Gloria.
He knew how to sweep this Gloria off her feet.
One chance was all he needed.
It felt silly, but Gloria rummaged through the upstairs closet at Inez’s, looking for something nicer to wear than the sweaty and stained T-shirt and shorts that had become her defacto uniform. Of the few things she’d brought in her suitcase, she hadn’t packed anything that fit the bill—because who expected to dress for a date during a hurricane? She felt exhausted, grubby and anything but date material.
A lightweight jersey dress that appeared to belong to one of Inez’s granddaughters hung at the back of the closet. Judging by the style, it had probably been purchased about ten years ago. Gloria shrugged her shoulders—Rigo was a man, and a beach bum at that. He wouldn’t notice if something was in style or not. And it was pink and summery and definitely not a dirty T-shirt. It made her feel special and dressed up after days of wearing muck.
She didn’t know why thinking about this evening brought butterflies to her stomach, or why she’d want to spend any effort on salvaging a sundress that wasn’t hers. Or trying to fix her hair into some semblance of order. Or to do anything to not look grubby and disheveled.
But it did seem to matter. More than she was comfortable admitting. And as the minutes ticked closer to eight o’clock, Gloria’s butterflies began to dance and twirl even more noticeably.
At one minute until eight, a knock sounded at the door of the bedroom where Gloria had been staying.
Before words could even be exchanged, Gloria caught Rigo’s gaze sizing her up from head to toe and in between.
“You look beautiful, Gloria. I don’t know where you found a dress in the middle of a disaster recovery zone, but you did. You’re amazing, as usual.” Rigo beamed broadly. “I thought I would come and pick you up. I’m just glad I don’t have to face your dad. He doesn’t really like me.”
“He doesn’t like how you treated me. He used to like you just fine.”
“Well, that’s good. It means he’ll like me again one of these days.” Rigo put out his arm, like Fred Astaire leading Ginger Rogers to the dance floor. “Because I’m never going to treat you like that again.”
Gloria hoped not. She’d accepted this invitation out of her new belief that she had to forgive Rigo in order to move on. If he inflicted one more bruise on her battered heart, she knew she’d never heal enough to trust or forgive again. The stakes were high and although she wanted to be positive, a part of her held back. It would be skeptical until proven otherwise, no matter what the rest of her wanted to believe.
“Come this way.”
Rigo led her down the hallway to a small door at the end. Painted a polar shade of white, it was smaller than the other doors and didn’t quite fit with the rest of the features of Inez’s Victorian home. In her few days here, Gloria hadn’t even noticed it.
“You’re going to need to duck a bit,” Rigo said, turning the heavy brass sphere of a doorknob.
The small door swung silently on matching brass hinges.
“It’s like Alice’s door to Wonderland,” Gloria said.
Rigo nodded. “It’s Inez’s door to the attic. But it is definitely a door to all sorts of wonder. There are trunks and boxes up here filled with items that have been in my family for generations. Watch your step.”
Gloria tiptoed around a narrow path between boxes and birdcages and rolls of old fabric, jewel tone colors subdued by years of dust.
“Why exactly are we up in your aunt’s attic?”
He pointed at a staircase barely wide enough to hold two feet, side by side. “You’ll see. Give me your hand.”
This time it wasn’t life and death. She didn’t need to be saved from swirling waters. This time, the simple touch of Rigo’s hand holding hers weighed upon her fully.
She could dress it up as forgiveness or second chances. But it was time to face the truth. She was here, with this man in this moment, because she had lived for far too long in a world like those bolts of fabric she’d just passed—neglected, muted and far from the original purpose.
Instead of being used, valued and admired, they were stuck in a corner of an attic. She’d been stuck in a corner, too.
She wanted to feel special again and connected to someone. To be a part of something greater than just herself.
Gloria wanted to be loved.
Holding Rigo’s hand reminded her of a time when she had all of that. Could she find it again with him?
Could she trust him?
Could she trust herself?
She tightened her grip, feeling the curve of Rigo’s fingers and the heel of his hand mold to her own. She followed his footsteps up the narrow stairs.
The door at the top of the stairs swung open as they approached it. A quick jolt ran through Gloria. Doors shouldn’t just open.
“Good evening, sir, madam.” A young man in board shorts, a T-shirt and a bow tie nodded at Rigo and then Gloria as he spoke. “My name’s Kevin, and I’ll be your host tonight.”
Gloria stepped through the open door. “What’s all this?”
“Welcome to Inez’s Rooftop Grill,” the young man said.
A small square table covered in an antique lace table cloth and framed by two nondescript metal chairs sat in the middle of the small patio area, which was ringed with a narrow white-painted rail topped with gingerbread-style trim. Candles were gathered in a small cluster at the center of the table, and they also graced the tops of other furniture and the porch railing. In spite of the pitch-black night, the stars twinkled and the white utility candles glowed warmly.
“I knew there weren’t any restaurants back open anywhere on the island, but I knew of a really special place. Only a handful of homes on Port Provident have this rooftop deck—it’s called a widow’s walk. I’ve been coming up here to watch the stars since I was a kid.”
“Widow’s walk? What an odd name for a porch.” Gloria had never heard the term, although she’d been on a few of these rooftop perches throughout the years. It made her think briefly of her own status as a widow. But she pushed the thought aside. As much as she would always carry her time with Felipe and Mateo with her, the past was not going to have a part of her mind tonight.
She would live in the moment and look to the future.
“The legend says that these little roof walks were where women would go and watch for their men to come home from sea, and they would often wait in vain. I doubt that’s for real, but it’s an interesting story. Can’t you just see some turn-of-the-century woman out here in petticoats watching the horizon?”
Gloria nodded. “A very romantic legend, if a little tragic. I love the history that’s all over Port Provident.”
The makeshift maître d’ gestured toward the folding table and chairs. “Will this table do, sir?”
There were no other tables on the porch. At only about twenty feet long, the little deck-like area made for a pretty solitary makeshift restaurant.
Rigo pulled out a chair for Gloria. “Yes, Kevin, this will be just fine.”
As she sat down, he scooted her toward the table. The heavy antique lace tickled the tops of her knees exposed by the sundress’s short hemline.
“Rigo?”
“Yes?”
“How do you know Kevin? Who is he?”
A smile broke the look of mild concentration on Rigo’s face. Gloria could tell he was as nervous as she felt. Good. Strength in numbers.
“Kevin’s one of my lifeguards. You’ve had his cooking before. He grilled the steak.” Rigo beckoned the young man back to the table. “Sir? What do you have on special tonight?”
“I’m glad you asked. We have grilled flounder fillets, served over a steaming plate of ramen noodles, with a side of canned green beans from our legendary propane stove.”
Kevin pointed to the edge of the narrow porch. Inez stood behind another small metal table. A tabletop grill blew a small line of smoke out the side. She stirred a pot on a two-burner propane stove and waved a black nylon cooking spoon in Gloria and Rigo’s direction.
Rigo cupped his hand to the side of his mouth and loudly whispered to Gloria. “Chef Inez is well-known in these parts for her caldo, but we didn’t have enough bottled water to make that tonight.”
“How did she pull off flounder?” Gloria’s mouth watered just thinking about a main course that didn’t start off as powder in a box.
“Well, not only is he an amazing maître d’ and rescued four swimmers over Labor Day weekend alone, Kevin here is an accomplished fisherman. He went down to the jetty earlier, and this is what he came back with. The catch of the day.”
“This is a very special restaurant, it seems.” She studied the glow of the candles. Gloria recognized them as the same white candles they’d used to light the room when Tanna was in labor. Only a handful of days had passed since that chaotic night, but it seemed like a lifetime.
She knew without a doubt that she was a different person than she was only days ago when she called Rigo in an act of panic. Hurricane Hope had come in and blown her winds and swirled her waves, leaving no doubt Provident Island was changed.
In those same hours, it seemed Hope had taken hold of Gloria’s heart and changed it, as well.
“Whatever it takes, Gloria. If it’s building you a restaurant under the stars because there aren’t any others open in Port Provident, then so be it.” Rigo’s tone sounded measured—his patrol voice—and she knew he meant what he said.
Breaking her focus on the little flickers of light dancing on the candlewicks, Gloria looked up and smiled. “Thank you. You put a lot of thought into this.”
“Sir? Ma’am?” Kevin came back over to the table with two bottles of water and two slim white packets. “May I offer you our house specialty? Fresh mixed powdered lemonade. It’s an old recipe, purchased from the shelves of a big box store.”
Gloria tried hard not to laugh. Kevin obviously had earlier directions from Rigo and took his job seriously.
“Yes, please. It sounds lovely.”
Kevin cracked open each narrow plastic bottle of water, then poured a packet of bright yellow crystals in each, replaced the lid and shook each bottle dramatically off to the side.
For emphasis, he twirled one bottle around his head. Just as emphatically, water sloshed out of the bottle and cascaded over Gloria’s head and down the front of the borrowed knit dress.
She closed her eyes. “Not quite the shower I’ve been dreaming of for a few days, but it’ll do.”
Rigo jumped up and brought a square of folded paper towel to her aid, pressing it to the top of her hair and down her face, soaking up the small rivulets still making their way downward. He knelt at her feet, his chin even with her shoulders. His presence felt so near she wanted to move away.
But she didn’t.
She just sat there, quietly absorbing the moment while the flimsy towel absorbed the water.
“Well, there goes your tip, Kevin.” Rigo cocked an eye at the erstwhile waiter.
“Sir, in my entire career of waiting tables, that has never happened.” The teenager never broke character.
“How long’s that been, Kev?”
Kevin brushed back floppy bangs from his brow line. “Well, sir, about five minutes.”
“I knew I should have been stricter in the interview process.” Rigo stood and handed Gloria the paper towel. “Can you get the lady a new house specialty—stirred, not shaken this time—and check on our flounder?”
Kevin nodded and took three steps over to the outdoor kitchen.
“You okay, Glo?”
She wished he hadn’t moved back to his side of the table. “Sure. It’s just fake lemon water. It’s a little sticky, but I haven’t had a real shower since I don’t even know when, so this is probably the least of my problems.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Rigo sat back down in his chair.
“What?” She was a little taken aback by his nonchalance. It wasn’t a big deal that some lemonade mix had spilled on her, but she’d put forth a little effort to get ready for tonight. Maybe, in spite of what he said, her attempt at dressing up hadn’t meant a whole lot. But still, that little part of her heart that was beginning to come out of hibernation wanted him to care.
He leaned back and looked at her with a measured gaze. “It doesn’t matter. You’re beautiful. Always have been. No sweat or lemonade will ever change that. It’s not about what you wear. It’s about who you are.”
“Rigo, I’ve...”
He held up a hand, palm facing toward her, and spoke. “Stop. Don’t say another word because you’re going to deny it. I know the last few years have been rough for you. I know those days have put doubt in your heart. I know I helped put a lot of that doubt there. But you have to believe me when I tell you that you’re the same person you’ve always been.”
A few tears started to prick at her lower eyelid. She couldn’t look at Rigo, so she looked at the candle glow and hoped the wetness would fade away. “I’ve changed. There’s no two ways about it.”
“Gloria, I’ve seen you call a person from your past that you didn’t want to call in order to protect someone in your care—you put her safety ahead of your own comfort. I’ve seen you stay completely calm and deliver a baby in the middle of chaos. I know that you’ve put in countless hours at your parents’ house and your sister’s house to make sure they can salvage as much of their stuff as possible. And I know you walked an elderly woman to church so she could have the comfort of her faith and friends after a hurricane.”
Inez waved her spoon defiantly. “I heard that. Who are you calling vieja?”
“Sorry, Tía. You’re not old. Please don’t burn the flounder in retaliation,” Rigo called out over his shoulder without turning around.
Rigo lowered his gaze and met Gloria’s eyes through the flames. “Even when you’re bossy, it’s just because you want what you see as the best for others. You’re all heart, Gloria, and you give all you’ve got without realizing it—even to your own detriment. How many people have you helped in the last two years without stopping to ask for help for yourself?”
She couldn’t cry in front of him. She just couldn’t. But she couldn’t speak, either.
“I know you haven’t. The first person I asked about when I returned to La Iglesia was you. I wanted to know what time you came so I could stay out of your way for a while, until you’d had a chance to deal with the fact that I was back. Pastor Ruiz said you came to the late service every week, but he hadn’t talked to you since planning Felipe’s funeral.”
She shook her head and hoped Rigo thought the solitary tear that snuck down her cheek was lemonade. “I just...I didn’t have anything to say. Everything I’d lived for was gone. Praying about it wasn’t going to bring them back.”
“I understand. When my dad finally made me see I had a problem with alcohol, I didn’t want to talk to anyone, either. I’d made mistakes, and they were my own, and talking to some counselor at a rehab center wasn’t going to change the fact that I’d hurt you or that Felipe might still be here if I hadn’t called him for backup. I have a lot of regrets, Glo. But through time and counseling and returning to the church, I’ve tried to make sure that my regrets don’t become retreads.”
“What do you mean?” He sounded so sure of himself, of where he’d been and what he’d learned. Their situations were obviously different, but she missed being that confident.
Oh, how she missed the old Gloria.
“I mean I don’t want to keep making the same mistakes. I left Port Provident PD voluntarily, but I wasn’t in a good place and it meant I didn’t leave on the best terms. But I’ve come back and found a job that lets me still serve the community and keep the people who live and visit here safe. I didn’t need a do-over. I needed the chance to do better.”
Maybe they weren’t so different after all. “Like how I moved from the hospital to the birth center after I lost Mateo. I feel like I can do more for my patients there because of the way we’re structured. I’ve even been able to really be there for clients who have lost a baby. It’s almost become a passion of mine. I don’t want anyone to ever feel as alone as I did that night, in a hospital bed, all by myself, knowing the whole world had changed for me.”
“Gloria.” Rigo reached out and took her hand. “That right there proves my point. You’re all heart. And if nothing else comes out of tonight, but you leave here knowing that...well, that’ll be enough for me.”
She felt an active pushing on her heart, like the forward motion of a wave, nudging her back from the deep waters she’d called home for far too long. It was time to come back to shore. The years hadn’t changed her irrevocably, as she’d feared. Instead, they gave her insight and compassion to do her job—her life’s calling—even better. That was the gift of Mateo’s short life. He made her a better person. Having loved a good man who first picked her up when she thought she couldn’t give her heart to anyone again made her know that love wasn’t just a one-time thing. She’d lost before and loved again. Maybe history could repeat itself.
And she had a most improbable lifeguard to thank for the realization.
Rigo couldn’t believe the conversation they’d just had. So much had passed between them over the years that he wouldn’t have been surprised if anger or frustration had come up when they talked about the past. He knew that was about God, not about anything he could have said on his own.
“Sir, madam. Your flounder.”
Kevin presented two paper plates with a flourish. A filet of grilled flounder lay atop a pile of squiggly noodles flanked by a small group of green beans. Compared to the prepackaged food of the past few days, this looked like the best meal that had ever been laid on a table in front of him.
“Thank you, Kevin.” Rigo opened the folded paper towel and laid it in his lap as if it had been a napkin made from the finest linen.
Kevin nodded, making his bangs flap. Rigo had no idea how he swam with all that hair in his face. But he was one of the stars of Beach Patrol. “And now, sir, if you don’t need anything further, Chef Inez and I will leave you and the lady to your meal.”
Rigo could see Gloria gently bite her lip, trying to stifle a laugh at the fake-haughty tone of Kevin’s voice. If the beach patrol thing didn’t work out, Rigo would need to remember to advise Kevin to look into acting.
“No, thank you, Kevin. I believe that will be all.”
Kevin bowed solemnly, then opened the small door for Inez. She patted Rigo gently on the shoulder as she passed. Her eyes twinkled mischievously, reminding him of the stars above.
Heaven wasn’t too far away in a place like this, and he could feel the answer to his repeated prayers being worked, even now, under these stars.
The door closed with a click, and they were completely alone on the small widow’s walk. Alone with only the muted sound of rolling waves coming on shore a few blocks away and the glitter in the night sky.
Gloria must have harbored similar thoughts. “Look at them all.” She waved her hand above, sweeping across the sky. “Without the streetlights and such shining, they’re so clear and bright. I can’t remember ever seeing the stars shine like this.”
Rigo leaned his head back. He could see several constellations he remembered learning about when he was a child. It was easy to pick out the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper. “There’s the north star. Always pointing home.”
Absorbed in the display above, Gloria’s voice sounded almost dreamy when she spoke. “Always pointing home. I wonder where that is anymore.”
“What do you mean, Glo? Your home is here, in Port Provident.” Rigo twirled some noodles around the tines of his white plastic fork.
Gloria put a bite of flounder in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully before speaking. “I know. It’s just that I’ve wondered today about my house. What do I do with it? The damage is extensive. And it’s really more house than I need. We’d bought it to be a family place.”
“Well, what were you thinking of doing?” He took another bite and washed it down with the lemonade.
“Maybe just putting it on the market. Tear out all the damage, of course, but sell it instead of fixing it up. I could use the equity and maybe even some of the insurance to start fresh. Get a condo on the beach.”
He could tell by the look on her face that she was serious. “So you’ve thought about this?”
“I’ve thought a lot about fresh starts these days. I think it’s time to do something different.”
Rigo knew a lot had changed in the past few days. He hoped things weren’t moving too fast. She’d already spoken of how her home and her job and her memories had changed. He wanted to support her but didn’t want to see her newfound progress stalled out when she realized how much change she would be making. Sometimes those realizations led to progress-grounding fear.
“Are you sure?”
“I think so. There’s not much left there to keep anyway. It’s a good house with a nice floor plan. Plenty of people will be returning to the island and will need to make a housing change, too. I’d think someone could take advantage of fixing it up the way they want to.” She chased the last green bean around the plate with the fork. “I have Felipe’s life insurance in savings—I never touched it. And I still get his pension. I imagine the city will make sure salaries and things like that get paid. So even if the clinic doesn’t open back up, I’ll still be able to buy a small condo and be okay financially for a while. You’ve helped me see past my fears. The idea of moving on isn’t so scary right now.”
“I understand that feeling, Glo. I didn’t really want to return to Port Provident at first. I’d made big changes in my life and I didn’t want to come back here and have everyone think I was the same old Rigo. It kept me in Houston, working dead-end security-type jobs for a while instead of coming back here, to Beach Patrol. But then, once I realized I just needed to come and do what I needed to do—I gave myself permission to make necessary changes to my plan if things didn’t work out—it made the decision a lot easier.”
“And did things work out?” She laid her fork down and looked up.
He thought quietly for a moment. “Some things have. Others are still a work in progress. So far, I haven’t needed to use Plan B.”
“But you’re happy with the changes you’ve made?”
Rigo stood and took a few steps to the railing. He leaned on it, looking toward the water. “I’m happy right now, here with you. And without those changes, I wouldn’t have this.”
Gloria left the table and joined Rigo at the white wooden gingerbread ringing the edge of the widow’s walk. Rigo turned slightly and moved one step closer to Gloria. He felt it in the air, like the unavoidable siren call of the sea that had turned captains into dreamers and left their women behind on rooftop perches to watch the skyline and wonder.
“Sometimes change moves you forward,” he said, putting his hand on the top of Gloria’s shoulder and turning her. “Sometimes, it takes you back.”
Like the roll of the waves, he leaned his head down and hovered briefly above her upturned face. When she didn’t pull back, he found himself unable to stop the forward motion. Kissing her swept the years away, like the tide washing clean footprints in the sand.
Her hand reached up and slid around his neck, her short fingernails leaving behind a tickle where they danced across the skin.
The kiss felt at once both familiar and new, as if the years had changed them but left their spirit untouched. As he pulled away, he knew that no matter what change came out of this—good or bad—he wouldn’t regret this moment and the chance to share a kiss with her just one more time.
As the kiss broke, Gloria’s arm slid across the neckline of his shirt and over his shoulder. Rigo could feel her touch like an imprint left behind, a memory he’d carry forever. He stood still, trying to read her face. Although he didn’t second-guess kissing her, he didn’t want to make the wrong move now.
“Are we forward?” she said. “Or back?” Her words picked up where their conversation had left off.
“What do you think?” Rigo tried to match her measured tone of voice.
She brushed the hair back from where the light breeze had blown it in front of her eyes. “Not backward.”
Rigo exhaled slightly. Good. He didn’t want to have moved backward.
“And this is definitely change. But I don’t know if we’re forward, either.” She turned away and focused on the faint lines of waves rolling in the distance. “I know that you’ve changed. I have accepted your apology, and I meant it. I’ve even told people that I can see the change in you—I’ve told it to myself. I want us to move on.” She let out a jagged sigh, the uncertain edges of which nicked Rigo’s heart. “But I don’t know about us moving on together.”
“I understand,” he said simply.
His head understood. But his heart felt as though it had been put in one of the headlocks he’d been taught at the police academy, designed to subdue a suspect and restrict their motion.
Wait. That wasn’t right. A heartlock. Designed to stifle newly growing feelings and restrict their expression.
Rigo’d been heartlocked.
And just like a suspect, he was going to have to accept it and deal with the implications of his conduct.
“Do you? Maybe you can explain it to me, then, because I don’t.” She spoke softly. He needed to concentrate to hear her over the night sounds from around the island. Without traffic below, the gentle whuff of the roaring surf could be clearly heard.
“You have a lot in front of you right now, Glo. I think you need to decide for yourself what changes you’re willing to make and what changes you’re not.”
The whuff filled the silence again as he tried to decide whether to let his heart speak or not.
It wasn’t much of a debate. If he didn’t say it now, he might not ever have the chance again.
“I’m not running out on you again. I’ve made mistakes and I haven’t been there for you in the past.” He swallowed hard to clear the lump in his throat before it rendered him unable to get out the rest. “I may have been a fool, Gloria, but I’ve loved you all my life.”
She reached up and wordlessly touched his sleeve, rubbing a small fold of the linen guayabera he’d pulled out of the back of the closet. Without a sound, she looked in Rigo’s eyes, then nodded.
The brown of her irises looked glassy, like they were holding back a thousand secrets. The silence tightened its grip on Rigo’s heartlock.
Gloria nodded again, opened her mouth to speak, then closed it without making a sound. She let go of his sleeve, then turned and squeezed awkwardly between the frame of the table and the railing. On footsteps that whispered, Gloria stepped through the tiny door and out of his life, taking Rigo’s anxious, restrained heart with her.
