Yours to Keep (29 page)

“Y te dije que me dejaras hablar,”
Ricky said sharply, rapid-fire.

Ethan was suddenly aware, in a primal way, that he was alone in a dark parking lot at night. He could yell, but he wasn’t sure who was left in the office. He hadn’t seen anyone as he’d left. There might be Beacon cops cruising the general area, but with the traffic on Route 50 they’d be unlikely to hear him even if they were nearby. And, still, he wasn’t quite afraid. A deep stubbornness set in. This guy had no right to tell him what to do. No right to try to scare him. “Does Ana know you’re here?”

Some emotion flickered across Ricky’s stony features. “Don’t see her again. And don’t tell her I came to see you.”

“She’s a grown woman.” Ethan could feel anger starting to boil up in him, a dangerous, hasty feeling. “She can make her own decisions.”

“We don’t fucking care what she thinks!” roared the shadow, in a voice that came much closer to what Ethan had initially imagined would issue from that body. “Do you think we’re kidding around here? I know where you work. I know where you live. I know you have a son—”

Ricky cut the big man off. “Shut the fuck up, Ernie.”

But Ethan had heard enough. Theo.

“You leave my son out of this.”

Ricky took another step forward, but Ethan held his ground, anger anchoring him. “It doesn’t work this way. You can’t—”

The large man, Ernie, got in Ethan’s face again. “Who’s gonna stop us? You?”

“You can’t threaten me,” Ethan insisted.

“We’re not threatening you.” Under other circumstances, Ricky’s voice might have been almost cajoling.

“No, we’re threatening your—”

“¡Coño!”
Ricky said to Ernie.
“¡Cállate. Vamanos!”
He turned to Ethan, and his face was hard, his eyes sharp and almost panicky. “Tell her something. Tell her anything. You realized you can’t go through with it. You don’t love her. I don’t care what you tell her. Just stay the fuck away from her.”

With that, he began to back away, and the two of them retreated, one step, then another and another, until they had almost rejoined the other shadows, the narrow strip of scrubby forest that separated the medical offices from the parking lot behind them. A tiny ridge of primitive land between two asphalt countries.

“Ricky …” But the words ran out. There was nothing to say.

Then the shadows were gone.

Ethan yanked the phone out of his pocket and dialed, 91—

He stopped.

To him, cops meant safety. They gave lost children directions and helped drivers maneuver through construction zones.

But to Ana and her family? Cops were the enemy. The cops in Massachusetts probably wouldn’t deport you for speeding, but he bet they got pretty pissed when noncitizens threatened citizens.

Calling the cops, sending them to Ricky’s—to Ana’s—address, simply wasn’t an option.

And Ricky must have known that.

He put the phone away.

He dug inside his pockets for his car remote, juiced the locks, climbed in. He put the key in the ignition but didn’t turn it.

The clock caught his eye: 6:50. He was late now.

He pulled out his cell phone. He had her number. He should call her. Tell her he was on his way.

Because of course he was going to ignore Ricky and his bullshit. His
bluff.

If that’s what it was.

What if that guy, what if Ricky, was serious? They hadn’t pulled a gun or a knife, but it was completely within the realm of possibility that either or both men had weapons. He knew nothing about them. They could be gang members, drug dealers. They could be vicious, murderous.

They could be bluffing.

They were probably bluffing. He would take the chance that they were bluffing.

He took a deep breath and turned the key in the ignition. One notch. Two.

He froze.

He could take that chance.

He could bet his own life on the possibility that Ricky and his friend weren’t violent. But he could not bet Theo’s.

Jennifer and Alyssa and Mrs. Abrams had exhausted the conversational possibilities of Thanksgiving and moved on to Christmas.

“We’ve typically traveled over Christmas vacation.” Jennifer broke off a small bite of her scone, then put both pieces back on the plate while Ana eyed the scone hungrily. “But, with the salary rollbacks at Steve’s work, we’ve decided that’s one of the things we’re going to let go. So this year we’re going to do it at home.”

“There was a great article in the
Times
yesterday about belt-tightening,” Alyssa said. “Even people who still have jobs are spending differently than they used to. I know we’ve definitely decided not to put the pool heater in this year.”

No pool heater. Oh, God, they weren’t going to ask her about her belt-tightening, were they?
“Well,”
she’d have to say,
“we’re eating more of the dried beans instead of the canned. And we’ve cut back to a gallon and a half of milk per week instead of two. Oh, and we’ve told the kids they can have two boxes of breakfast cereal per week, but after that they have to eat oatmeal.”

Why had she thought that Mrs. Abrams would want to be her friend? She’d labored under the delusion that sharing tastes in clothes and books could make up for the vast, vast divide between them. She’d been as naïve in her own way about them as these kind, well-educated women were about her.

“I told the kids one activity per season this year,” Jennifer said. “And not gymnastics. That place has gotten more and more expensive.”

Mrs. Abrams nodded vehemently. “The only thing more expensive than that is doing theater. Two hundred bucks to participate, and then you’ve got to volunteer your time, and on top of that there are all these fees that come up—tickets, costumes, jazz shoes, makeup. It really adds up.”

Ana’s family had paid an activities fee for Marco to participate in football. The parts of his uniform that weren’t provided by the school they got used through a swap. On the rare occasion they had to buy something for him—he’d needed a bigger helmet this year—they paid cash for it at the local thrift store. He’d never done another activity in his life—no piano lessons, no art lessons, no theater, no gymnastics. For that matter, neither had she. It had been all Ricky could do to get her through high school.

They all looked at her, and for a moment she thought they were waiting for her to tell them about her belt-tightening measures, but she realized that while she’d been lost in her own head they’d come to some kind of agreement. To ask her another question.

Jennifer took a deep breath. “This is a little awkward.”

Oh, no,
thought Ana.
Because the other questions haven’t been awkward enough?

“Rena mentioned that they’re requiring CORIs now for the Recommended Tutors list—”

Ana wondered if the horror she felt was apparent on her face. She couldn’t even look at Mrs. Abrams. How could she?

“—and we wondered … we were thinking maybe there was something we could—”

Ana had begun shaking her head, but Jennifer was still talking. “—do to help. I think if we did some research about the CORI thing, I think it would turn out that it’s not constitutional, what the lawyer’s doing, and maybe if we all signed a letter urging him to drop that rule—”

“No.” Not now, not when she was so close.

“But—”

“No,” Ana said again. An overwhelming desire to flee came over her, so strong that she actually had to hold on to the seat of her chair to keep herself in place. “Please. Please don’t do anything like that. Thank you. Thank you so much for thinking of me. For thinking of what you can do. But no, please, please, don’t do that.”

“But it’s not right,” Jennifer said. “It’s not fair.” The women exchanged glances, worried, sad.

Ana was so tired that all she could do was shake her head again.

Jennifer reached out a hand and let it rest on the table just shy of Ana’s. “Of course not, if you don’t want us to. And we won’t … you can count on the fact that—”

Mrs. Abrams interrupted her. “Ana, I want you to know, I wouldn’t have told just anyone. Alyssa and Jennifer are my closest friends. We’ve been friends for years and years. They’re discreet.”

Ana nodded, forced herself to smile with something that might resemble gratitude. They were, after all, good women. People who wanted to help. But they didn’t understand, didn’t understand anything. Didn’t understand about marriages of convenience or budgets that constrained the purchase of things they thought of as necessities. Didn’t understand questions that were hard to answer, secrets that really, truly needed to be kept. Didn’t understand how the tiniest poke could send everything tumbling down.

They were good women, but she didn’t belong with them. She didn’t belong, period.

Chapter 26

Ana was the last of the four women to leave Starbucks, lingering behind—ostensibly to use the restroom, but actually to make sure that none of them saw the moment when tears overwhelmed her. The little coffee shop, which had been a warm sanctuary to her when she entered an hour ago, now felt steamy and claustrophobic, and she was grateful for the icy feel of the fresh air when she stepped into the parking lot. Ethan’s car was parked in one of the reserved Starbucks spaces, and she wanted climb in and beg for reassurance.

She wanted to tell him what she’d been reminded of in Starbucks—that she was not like the women of Beacon—and she wanted him to tell her it was okay. To embrace her and console her and comfort her. And tell her that he loved her the way she was, illegal and wrong and ill-fitting, but
her,
his Ana.

She went around to the passenger side and knocked on the window for admittance. The button popped up and she opened the door and slid in beside him, the tears coming faster and freer now. They were rolling down her cheeks, and she waited for him to ask if she was all right, but the question didn’t come and didn’t come, and she turned to look at him, and the look on his face, illuminated by the parking-lot lights, chilled her through. It was a dead look.

She saw the moment that he registered her anguish, a little crack in the mask, a glimmer of concern behind fatigue and numbness. “Ana? Are you—okay?”

She swiped the tears back and nodded. “Are you?”

He hesitated. Took a deep breath that he didn’t let out for a long time, seemed to hover on the narrow edge of a decision. He had his hands on the steering wheel but hadn’t restarted the car, although from time to time his hand moved to the key in the ignition, as if he were toying with the notion of turning it. He exhaled finally and said, “I’m fine. Just very tired. But you’re not. Did something happen?”

“They know I’m illegal. They all know.”

“They who?”

“Mrs. Abrams. Her friends. They know I’m illegal, they know we’re getting married. They think—”

Ricky’s words. She couldn’t say them out loud.

“Those rich doctors. Always looking for people to save.”

“I can’t be your charity case.” The words burst out, much louder and harsher than she’d meant to say them, but the dam was broken and she couldn’t stop. “Dr. Handsome’s poor, pitiful, illegal wife.”

She’d startled him with her vehemence. He probably thought she was a psycho now. Aside from the time Theo had committed his nearly suicidal flirtation with Route 50, she’d never seen him lose his temper or raise his voice, and he probably didn’t know what the hell to do with her.

Whatever it is that’s freaking you out, I swear we can fix it. I will do anything to fix it.
Those had been his words to her, and she’d believed them, taken them into her like a creed.

But he wasn’t trying to fix it now. He was staring at the center of the steering wheel as if it held the secret to everything. He wasn’t taking her into his arms. He wasn’t comforting or consoling or telling her that he didn’t care what the town of Beacon thought of her,
he loved her.

“Ethan?” she said quietly.

He didn’t turn to look at her. Even in the dim light she could see the lines, the exhaustion, in his face. As if something had made him see what she’d seen—that it was too much, that the work of trying to make their worlds compatible would never be done.

“It’s so hard …” he said haltingly. “Is it supposed to be this hard?”

She felt as if he’d struck her. Punched her in the stomach and slapped her across the face at the same time. For a moment she couldn’t breathe at all, and when she sucked in her next breath it was painfully audible in the quiet car. “I didn’t … you should have told me you were having second thoughts.”

Now his expression was pleading, and she thought,
He’s breaking up with me, and he wants me to forgive him for it. He wants me to understand.

Of course he was. He’d hung in longer than anyone else, but in the end—she cast her mind back over the previous couple of days. Maybe it was the moment when James made that crack about them being a family, and Ethan realized that her expectations were outrunning his feelings. And they were. She’d fallen in love, and this had stopped being a marriage of convenience, which is what he’d offered her, and started being …

Well, if you believed the look on his face, it had started being a prison. “I’m not—” he began.

But she’d grabbed the door handle and was swinging it outward, catapulting herself out of the car.

“Ana, come back!”

“I should have known. It would be one thing if it were love, but for you to do this, put yourself on the line like this—God, what was I thinking, asking you to do this?”

“Ana—”

She’d slammed the door and was walking away now. He started the car, pulled out of the space, and drove alongside her, rolling the window down on her side. “Ana.”

“Enough chasing me.”

“You can’t walk home.”

“I’ll call the shuttle.”

“Let me drive you.”

“No. No. Just go. You’re making it worse.”

“I don’t want to go.”

She didn’t turn around. Couldn’t turn around to face him. But she’d stopped trying to run away, for the moment. She couldn’t run away, because he was the kind of lovely man who’d have to chase after her and finish things, and she didn’t think she could ever bear to see him again. Not ever. “I know you don’t. But I saw it now, looking at you. I can’t ask you to do this. Our worlds are so different. I don’t belong in yours. And you—”