He had to do this alone.
Antonio’s hands tightened on the wheel as he drove along the coastal road, following the directions of
his GPS. The rain was thick here, and as the sun starting to lower toward the western horizon, a mist rolled in from the glassy gray sea.
Antonio felt butterflies in his stomach as he drove into the tiny fishing village with houses clinging to cliffs. Finally, he reached his destination, a squat stone building overlooking a bay filled with battered boats. And he blinked.
It was a hospice.
Its colorful shutters were bright against the gray stone and a profusion of flowers hung beneath the windows. Nervously, he parked his anonymous sedan behind the hospice and went inside. His clothes were anonymous as well, just a black T-shirt and dark pants. He didn’t want this woman—this stranger—to imagine that he was trying to impress her. But his knees were shaking as he went inside.
“Who are you here to see?” the receptionist said, not looking up from her magazine.
“Señora Loiola.”
“Her third visitor in two days,” the girl murmured in surprise. “So many visits!” She looked up. “Are you expected, señor...?”
“Delacruz.” Antonio saw the exact moment the receptionist recognized him. All those years he’d spent as the playboy billionaire of Madrid had apparently reached even this far north. “And no. She’s not expecting me. We’ve never met.”
“You’re a friend?”
“Apparently—” he gave a hard smile “—I’m her son.”
The young woman’s jaw dropped. She rose hastily to her feet. “I’ll show you to her room, Señor Delacruz.”
Going down a short hallway, which was lit too brightly and smelled of antiseptic, she knocked on a door and peeked in. “Are you available for visitors, señora?” He couldn’t hear the softly murmured reply. “There’s a gentleman here who says he’s your son.”
The receptionist turned to him with a big, artificial smile. “Please. Go in.”
Antonio hesitated, then squaring his shoulders, he turned to the door. From the corner of his eye he saw the receptionist surreptitiously taking his photo with her phone.
Inside, the room was dark, and filled with shadows. It took a moment for his vision to adjust.
Then he saw a small pitiful figure in the bed.
The woman was younger than he’d expected, perhaps in her midfifties, dark-haired and slender, with big dark eyes that seemed too large in her sunken, gaunt face. Especially now, when those eyes were glowing with almost painful hope.
“Is it really you?” she whispered. She took a shuddering breath. “My sweet boy?”
Antonio looked down at those dark eyes, so much like his own. And all of the air in his chest went out with a whoosh.
He’d come here to confront her, to accuse her of abandoning him as a baby, to berate her for what she’d done.
But he’d never once considered what might have happened to her.
He came forward into the shadowy room. On the table beside her, he saw a vase of fresh, vibrant flowers. Hana, he thought. It would be so like her to bring flowers to someone who was dying. Even a stranger.
“I’m Antonio,” he said slowly. His voice cracked a little. “Delacruz is the last name the nuns gave me, when I was left on the steps of a church in Andalusia.” He couldn’t keep the recrimination from his voice.
The woman blinked fast. “I’m Josune,” she whispered. “And I only learned yesterday that my baby lived. The baby I had thirty-six years ago.” Tears were welling in her dark eyes. Her voice was almost too quiet to hear. She took a shuddering breath. “I was sixteen when you were born, and they told me you were dead. They told me—”
Her voice cut off.
He looked down at her.
His voice was strangely uncertain. “You...you didn’t abandon me?”
“Abandon you!” Her black eyes blazed in her fragile face. “I never abandoned you, never!” She clasped her hands over the blanket in her lap. “Dr. Mendoza, my father, they both told me you died at birth. They wouldn’t let me see your body. They said it would give me nightmares.” She looked away sharply. Tears streaked down her face as she whispered, “If I’d known you were alive, if I’d ever even guessed...”