The Commander

He’d thought she was awake at first, when he’d spoken in her ear, but now he wasn’t sure. She lay motionless under the cotton blanket. All he could do was stare helplessly at her and feel his rage growing. It should have been him lying there.

Without warning, he thought of the night before the wedding, the last time they’d been together while she’d still loved him. He could even remember what she’d worn that evening. A dark-blue dress, clingy, sexy, with tiny sparkles all over it. She’d had sandals that matched, two straps of navy leather and little else. The shoes and the short hem had shown off her tanned legs and the color had deepened the gray in her eyes. The outfit wasn’t her usual style, but she’d told him she’d seen it in a shop window in Pensacola and it’d made her think of him and of the Caribbean. She’d been so excited about the honeymoon she’d talked about it more than the wedding.

Lena moaned softly, a painful sound that sliced right into his heart. Andres leaned over the bed, taking her hand in his. Her fingers felt like ice and he rubbed them gently to warm them, wishing he could do more, but knowing he couldn’t.

“I’m here, querida… I’m here.”

FROM THE HALLWAY, there were windows into the patients’ rooms and during visiting hours, the blinds were pulled back. Anyone passing by could see inside. Carmen watched carefully as Andres took Lena’s hand. His movement was filled with emotion, his entire body straining with the effort of caring for her, listening to her…loving her.

It couldn’t have been more obvious had he stood up and shouted it to the world, she thought. He still loved Lena McKinney. The part he held back from everyone else, including her, he gave to Lena and probably always had. Carmen felt a wave of anger and resentment wash over her. He’d taken advantage of her and she’d let him.

She stared, her bitterness etching its way deeper inside her psyche, then she turned away from the glass and walked down the hall.

TUESDAY MORNING, Lena woke up slowly. Her mouth was dry, her throat parched, but for the first time, her mind felt clear. Even though the nurses had already gotten her up and forced her to walk, for some reason, she was more aware of her surroundings than she had been previously. They’d pulled the chest tube, too, an unpleasant experience to say the least. She’d drifted through most of that, wishing she were somewhere else.

Her eyes followed the lines of the room until they came to the chair in the corner. She wasn’t sure why, but she’d expected to see Andres. Instead, her father was dozing in the wingback, his head tilted against the padded side.

She studied him for a moment. She’d never noticed that his hair was so thin or his wrists so bony and white. Had her accident affected him that much or had she simply never taken the time to truly look? Shaken, she started to sit up, then gasped as a lightning strike of pain hit her lower chest.

The sound woke him, and Phillip rose immediately, his eyes widening as he saw her pain-etched face. He was at her bedside in a heartbeat. “Lena? Baby? What’s wrong? Do you need the doctor?”

He hadn’t used that term of endearment in years, and the sound of it now made her grin weakly. “Hey, Daddy…” she croaked. Each word was painful, each breath torture…but not as much as it had been. “Could I just have some water?”

He reached for a nearby pitcher and poured her a glass, then helped her drink through the straw. “You look better,” he said, staring down at her with a critical eye. “Are you sore? How’s the incision?” The questions came as rapidly as a cross-examination. “Can you breathe all right?”

“Don’t you have something better to do than sit here and bother me?” she asked hoarsely.

“Not at the moment, no.”

After the death of Dorothea McKinney, Lena’s mother, Lena and her father had become very close, each depending on the other for love and support. They’d grown apart through the years as Phillip had become too controlling, and the relationship had changed into a seesaw of love and manipulation. His violent opposition to Andres had pushed Lena away even more. But seeing him here now, sitting in her hospital room when she knew he had work to do made Lena feel like a little girl again, loved and protected.

The emotion lasted only a second. Sensing her regained strength, he spoiled the moment with his very next words.

“What in the hell did you think you were doing, Lena?” He knit his eyebrows together in one angry line as he set her cup back down. “You could have gotten yourself killed out there! And for what? I can’t believe you let yourself do this—”

Lena tuned the words out, just as she did each time her father acted this way. He was the only person on the planet she let talk to her so disrespectfully. She would have crucified any of her team if they’d dared do the same.

After he ran out of steam, Lena defended herself. “I was doing the job I’m paid to do,” she answered. “I’m a cop, Daddy. And I’ll always be a cop.”

His lips were a firm line, and she knew what part of the argument was coming next. He had begged her to go to law school, to join her brothers at the firm, but she’d wanted to be a policewoman. “Nonsense! There’s plenty of time for you to go back to school. You could walk into the firm and be a partner in no time.”

“Daddy…”

He ignored her warning tones. “You’re too damned bright to waste your talents on that rinky-dink police force. You could do so much better. If I’ve told you once—”

“You’ve told me a thousand times,” she interrupted, “and you don’t need to tell me again. I know how you feel about it.”

Her impudence brought out his old trump card. “Your mother would not have liked this.”

The words usually wearied Lena, but somehow this time they did just the opposite. She pursed her mouth tightly, her lips the only part of her body she could move without causing pain.

“Then consider that your fault,” she answered sharply. “You taught me there were things worth fighting for. You taught me the difference between right and wrong.”

“The difference between right and wrong…” His stare was blue and piercing—Dorothea had been the one to give Lena the granite-gray eyes—and suddenly Lena understood they’d come to the heart of the argument. “Is that what you think you were doing when you saved Casimiro’s life?”

He said the Spanish surname incorrectly. Time and time again, she’d told Phillip how to say Andres’s last name, but he insisted on his way. Finally she’d realized he was deliberately trying to denigrate Andres by mispronouncing his name, and she’d given up trying to rectify the mistake.

He spoke in a biting voice. “If that’s what you think you were doing—”

“I was doing my job,” she reiterated.

Not that she’d done it very well, she thought to herself. Each time she’d woken, that had been her only coherent thought. She’d screwed up. Big time. No unauthorized person should have been anywhere near that airport, and if she had been paying attention to her work instead of Andres, she wouldn’t be in a hospital bed now.

“Well, I can’t believe you almost got yourself killed for the likes of him. He isn’t worth the time of day, much less your life. I don’t want you having anything to do with him, Lena.” His voice rose stridently, as if he were winding up a case. “You can’t trust him and he’ll hurt you again. Do you hear me?”

“Everyone can hear you. But it doesn’t matter one way or the other. I have no intentions in that direction, I can assure you.”

“I’m glad to see you’ve finally gotten some sense about the son of a bitch because I don’t care how important he is, the man’s still a worthless bastard.”

With the last word ringing in the air, the door of Lena’s room suddenly swung open…and Andres stood on the other side.

Lena’s eyes swept over the man in the doorway. Dressed in a navy suit, his chiseled shoulders filling the opening, Andres held a crystal vase of Brazilian orchids, their petals snowy white and curved against the somber color of his jacket.

“Am I interrupting?”

His voice was reserved, polite even, but he’d heard what Phillip had said. Something in the set of his expression told her this and she was assaulted instantly by a complicated storm of emotions. She spoke quickly before her father could reply. “P-please come in, Andres. You’re not interrupting a thing.”

He walked inside and set the vase down on the table beside her. The faint, sweet smell of the flowers drifted over Lena’s bed. When they’d been together, he’d always brought her orchids.

“They’re beautiful,” she said despite herself. “Thank you.”

When he didn’t reply, she looked up. Andres and her father were locked in a staring battle, the tension so fierce between the two of them Lena could almost see the cloud of pressure taking shape over her bed. She wasn’t surprised since they’d always disliked each other, but there was something different in the air this time. Something thicker, denser.

Surprisingly, her father looked away first. He reached for the briefcase he’d left beside his chair, and spoke—to Lena only. “I have to get back to the office. If you need anything, you call me, baby.”

She accepted his kiss on her forehead then watched him go out the door. He said nothing to Andres. Didn’t even acknowledge his presence.

Her gaze went back to the man she’d almost married. He stared at the closing door with a brow-marring frown that cleared only after he realized she was looking at him.

“What is it with you two?” she asked in exasperation.

“You don’t really want to know.”

“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”

“Your father loves you,” he said after a second. “Let’s just leave it at that.” He moved toward the window and looked outside before turning to speak again. “Tell me how you feel today.”

“Better,” she said automatically. His answer hadn’t satisfied her. For a moment, she considered pursuing the topic, even though she knew Andres would say no more. Why on earth would there be even more animosity between the two men now? When Andres had left her at the altar, Phillip had gotten what he wanted.

“Better?” He raised one eyebrow. “¿Verdad?”

“Yes. I feel more clear, if that makes sense. Still sore, but more with it.” She reached again for her water, but he did as well. Holding the plastic cup closer, his fingers over hers, he bent the straw toward her mouth. His touch was warm, his whole hand covering hers.

“I can do it myself,” she said.

“I know that.”

They stared at each other for a second, the same old sparks flying between them, heating her up. Lena took a deep breath and pulled the cup away. He acted as if it didn’t matter one way or the other, stepping back from the bed with a neutral expression.

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