• • •
When they were out of sight of the waiting room and other families, Rick turned to Michael. “Mom told me about your lack of relationships. I couldn’t have been more surprised to see you with Ileana at your warehouse.”
“I don’t take every woman home to meet my parents.”
“I think you’ve been pretty tight with Mom and Dad since Billy died. I think Mom would know what’s going on with you.”
“I’m a big boy. I don’t share everything with my mother.” Or anybody. “Is there a point to this?”
Rick ran a hand through his short dark hair. “What’s your relationship with Ileana?”
“What business is that of yours?”
“I’m making it my business. I saw the way she looked at you just now with her heart in her eyes. But you don’t look at her that way.”
What was Rick talking about? Ileana wasn’t in love with Michael. “We haven’t been dating long.”
“If you don’t put Billy to rest, you’re not going to get past the dating stage.”
“I told you I put him to rest. He’s not between me and Ileana.”
“If you say so.”
“I do. Now let’s drop the subject.”
Rick stared at him, the muscles in his jaw working. “Ileana seems like a decent woman. If you’re not serious about her, you should break it off now before she gets hurt.”
“Do you want me to stay angry at you?”
“No. I just want you to think.” Rick massaged the back of his neck. “So what’s happening with your case?”
“Nothing’s happening. I talked to Detective Washington yesterday. They haven’t heard anything from their contacts in organized crime nor have they spotted any suspicious activity in my industry. My business hasn’t been bothered, and Ileana says there’ve been no break-ins on the retail end since we went to major crimes. All of us have increased security patrols. I hope whoever it was thought we were too much trouble.”
“Don’t relax until Washington tells you it’s all clear.” Rick looked down the corridor. “Dad’s back. I’ll go sit with him awhile. Go ahead and take a break.”
As Rick walked away, Michael was tempted to find a coffee machine, maybe get a snack, or just go outside for a breath of Miami air, but before he could decide, a hand touched his arm.
“Michael?”
When he looked in her face, all he saw was concern...for him. It warmed him.
“What did your brother say to upset you?”
“I’m not upset.” He gathered her close to him and whispered in her ear. “Let’s take a break. Want to use a condom?”
She stared wide-eyed and interested at him. “Here?”
“There’s a unisex bathroom down the hall. No one will know.”
Ileana glanced down the hall then licked her lips. “Okay.”
No one was looking. They slipped in unnoticed and locked the door. In moments they bared the essentials and Michael sheathed himself in a condom. He lifted Ileana’s dress up. She raised a leg around his left hip, opening herself to him. He plunged inside where he belonged. Only him.
Ileana strangled a groan. They made love hard and fast. He tried not to thump her into the wall, but his mind whited out with pleasure toward the end. At least he remembered to groan into her neck. She bit her lip, her nails dug into his butt as her body spasmed around his.
He nuzzled her neck, kissing the spot where he’d accidentally marked her. To hell with what Rick said.
“You’re all tense again,” she noted.
“I don’t like being here...in the hospital.”
“I’m sure you don’t.”
He kissed her. She always seemed to understand. She could offer compassion and passion, comfort and joy, wisdom and beguiling innocence. Her mix was intoxicating.
They washed up and returned to his family. Michael was fairly certain he and Ileana had satisfied looks on their faces, which were a dead giveaway to what they’d been doing. Rick’s raised eyebrow confirmed it. His father said nothing.
When they finally saw his mom settled in her private room, she was groggy, her smile loopily happy.
“Michael. Rick. My boys. If only Charlie were here instead of on his honeymoon.”
“Mom, the surgery went fine,” Michael reported.
“Always so serious now. I wish you’d smile more. And Rick, where’s Analise?”
“At home, Mom. She’s on bed rest.”
“Oh.” Her face sobered. “You shouldn’t have come then. Your family needs you.”
“You’re my family, too. I need to be with you.”
“Such wonderful boys. Ileana, aren’t they wonderful?”
“Yes, Mrs. Ziffkin, you’re very lucky to have them.”
“You could have one of them yourself, if you wanted.”
If his mother only knew.
Ileana squeezed Jane’s hand. “Now that you’re out of surgery, I need to go to work.”
“I’m just going to go to sleep,” she murmured. Her eyelids were already drooping.
Michael walked Ileana down to the elevator. They’d driven in separate cars so she could drive straight to Calderon. He took her in his arms.
“Thanks for coming. I’m glad you were here.”
“I was happy to do it.”
They kissed, a lingering promise.
“Later,” she assured him.
“Come for dinner?” he asked as a family arrived to wait for the elevator.
“I’ll be there.”
“I’ll grill fish,” he offered.
“I don’t know if I can sleep over,” she whispered.
“Try,” he begged into her ear.
They kissed again, and then he released her. He didn’t want her to leave, but she had no real reason to stay. He was amazed—and grateful—she’d come today. He hadn’t even realized he needed her here. Or that he’d needed her at all.
“Castro is dying!” Ileana’s young cousin squealed when Ileana walked into Calderon at nearly eleven o’clock. “Or dead already,” her cousin added.
Ileana skidded to a stop in mid-step. “What?”
“It’s on the news. Castro turned over power to his brother. He’s dying. Some think he’s dead already. This is wonderful news!
Tio
Esteban said to tell you to come to his office as soon as you arrive.
Ileana ran up the stairs, all professional decorum forgotten. Castro dead! It was what her grandparents and parents had wished for, for decades. All the exiles in Little Havana dreamed of the day. She could hardly believe it had come.
Her father’s office door was open. She skidded around the corner and hung onto the jamb. Juan Carlos and several other staff members were there.
“Papá, is it true?” Ileana asked.
He looked up with such joy on his face—before he remembered to scowl at her—that her heart pounded with joy, too.
“We are going home!” he announced.
“Home?”
“To Cuba. Calderon is going home where it belongs. The island will be opened to tourists at last, and Calderon will serve their needs. We will have to import for awhile until we become self-sufficient.”
“You’d leave America?”
“And you will, too. Our family, the other merchant families, and most of the residents of Little Havana. We have lived in exile long enough. It will be good to see home again.”
Her nails dug into the door frame. “But it isn’t
my
home.”
“Of course it is. You are Cuban. You belong in Cuba. Your children will be born in our homeland. Cuban children. It is a wondrous day!”
“How soon?” asked her elderly uncle.
“If we are lucky, we will be home in a couple of months.”
Her uncle crossed himself and wept with joy.
They were leaving. Ileana sank into a chair. She’d never thought she’d be separated from her parents and the rest of her family. Would her brother stay or go? Cuba probably needed good doctors. Would she be the only one who stayed?
Because she knew for certain she wasn’t going. Cuba wasn’t her home—America was.
“Will we sell our stores?” Juan Carlos asked.
“Sell the stores?” Ileana repeated.
“Having offshore interests might be good,” her father agreed. “Especially while we’re finding local sources of distribution.”
“Wait,” Ileana interrupted. “I could manage the American stores.”
“You’ll be in Cuba,
niña
.”
“No, I won’t.” All the faces in the room turned to her, showing a range of emotions from disbelief to disgust, appalled to disdain. Her father’s face was tight with temper.
“I was born in this country. I’m American,” Ileana stated.
“You are Cuban, Ileana. Pure Cuban blood flows through your veins. We never intended to stay here. We were only waiting for Castro’s regime to end. We are taking our children and grandchildren back where they belong. Our families, Ileana, and you are family.”
She gritted her teeth in frustration as the people in the room talked about what they would take with them, what kind of transport they’d need, what their options were for selling the stores. They were all crazy. She wasn’t going to live in Cuba.
As the day wore on, the phone rang off the hook. Everyone they knew wanted to see if they’d heard the news, to tell what they knew, and to see what the Calderons were doing, and when they planned to go.
Ileana wanted to scream. She was terrified that in his euphoria her father would do something rash like sell the stores.
She walked down the hall to Juan Carlos’s office. He was closer to her age. Surely he was more sober and rational. She closed the door and sat in his spare chair.
“Are you going to Cuba?”
“I never really thought about it before. My parents talked of going home the same as yours did. But I’ve never been there.”
Ileana leaned forward. “So you can talk some sense into my father.”
But Juan Carlos shook his head. “
Tio
Esteban was born in Cuba, the same as my parents. He has every right to want to go home. It’s been a long time in exile for them.”
“But Calderon doesn’t have to go with them, or at least not all of it.”
“It’s going to take a lot of capital to shift Calderon to Cuba. We’re going to have to liquidate assets to get that capital.”
She clenched her fists against the edge of his wooden desk. “We’re a viable company, thriving in fact. It doesn’t make sense to destroy what’s growing in order to start from scratch.”
“It’s not your decision, or mine. It’s
Tio
Esteban’s company. He can do as he wishes.”
“But he’s stepping down. He could have named a successor prior to a move to Cuba. If it’s me, I won’t want to move the company.”
“And if
Tio
Esteban knows that, he won’t choose you.”
“But you won’t tell him, will you?”
Juan Carlos sighed. “You’re blood, Ileana. My mother is your
suegra
, your
novio’s
mother. I want the presidency, but I won’t betray you to get it. Besides, I think your father will hold onto the reins until after we relocate.”
Worse and worse.
“So if you want the presidency, you’ll move to Cuba...just as I will,” he told her.
“Do you want to go?”
“I’ll do what I must.”
“Please, tell me the truth,” she begged.
Juan Carlos looked away. He had Roberto’s profile. Through blood and his brother, Ileana was doubly tied to him. And to his mother, her
suegra
, her future mother-in-law.
Juan Carlos chose his words carefully. “I was born in this country. I’m an American citizen. We have freedom here the rest of the world just dreams about, including the people in Cuba. Their standard of living is lower than ours. This city, this country, is amazing. I love it here.”
Ileana’s heart soared with hope.
“But from my teens I worked at Calderon, and from the time Roberto died I knew I could be the heir. I’ve worked hard to learn all the facets of the business so I could be a good president. If I must move to Cuba to be the heir and the president, I will do so.”
“I see. And the idea of retaining some of what we’ve built in the U.S.?”
“I believe I know
Tio
Esteban’s mind on this. He wants to leave nothing behind here.”
That included Ileana. She got the message. “Thanks for your candor.”
“Ileana, don’t fight your father on this. This is a dream come true for him.”
And a nightmare for her.
• • •
“He’s planning to move Calderon to Cuba,” Ileana told Michael as they lay together in his bed after their first urgent coupling.
Michael studied her face, her tense fists against the navy sheets. She’d called him on his cell phone earlier to tell him the news. And it was all over the TV. He’d caught it on CNN when he arrived home from the hospital. The news touched him as it did everyone in Miami, but not like it touched Ileana.
He had to know. “Will you move too?”
She turned anguished eyes to him. “I’m American!”
“So is your father. He’s a naturalized citizen.”
“Not in his heart, in any of their hearts. They’ve just been biding their time here. They’ve never truly assimilated. Look at Little Havana, look at its name. America is their mistress. They’re going home to their wife.”
“So you’ll stay here?” A part of him was thrilled.
Ileana sat up and faced away. “If I want a chance to be president, I’ll have to go. Juan Carlos hinted that my father wouldn’t name a successor until we’ve relocated.”
“What if he names your cousin? Will you return home?”
She faced him. “To what? Calderon won’t be here. I’ll have no job, no family. Most of my friends will emigrate.”
Michael couldn’t offer anything concrete like marriage. “You could work for Citadel. We could use someone with your skill and knowledge.”
“I was raised at Calderon. It’s in my blood. It should be my birthright.”
“As Cuba is your birthright.”
“No.” Ileana said it quietly, with defiance. She rose and grabbed her dress, pulling it over her head. “I need my running clothes from my car. Is there a park nearby?”
“I’ll go with you.”
They donned tank tops, shorts, and running shoes. Ileana’s movements were brisk and Michael was glad to see she had a well-used pair of Nikes. She was familiar with jogging. They stretched and then began a four-mile loop he ran at least three times a week.
Ileana ran fluidly like a deer. At first, her expression was intense, but after a few blocks, it relaxed. Michael wished he could do the same. He didn’t want her to go, didn’t want this time with her to end. But when she’d asked why she should stay, he hadn’t said for him.