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Synopsis
Award-winning photographer Alejandro Miranda hasn't been home to Key West in years—not since he left to explore broader horizons with his papi's warning "never to come back" echoing in his ears. He wouldn't be heading there now if it wasn't for an injury requiring months of recuperation. The drama of a prodigal son returning to his familia and their beloved Cuban restaurant is bad enough, but coming home to the island paradise also means coming face to face with the girl he left behind—the one who was supposed to be by his side all along . . .
Anamaría Navarro was shattered when Alejandro took off without her. Traveling the world was their plan, not just his. But after her father's heart attack, there was no way she could leave—not even for the man she loved. Now ensconced in the family trade as a firefighter and paramedic, with a side hustle as a personal trainer, Anamaría is dismayed that just the sight of Alejandro is enough to rekindle the flame she's worked years to put out. And as famillia meddling pushes them together, the heat of their attraction only climbs higher. Can they learn to trust again, before the Key West sun sets on their chance at happiness?
Release date: April 27, 2021
Publisher: Zebra Books
Print pages: 352
* BingeBooks earns revenue from qualifying purchases as an Amazon Associate as well as from other retail partners.
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Anchored Hearts
Priscilla Oliveras
“Mami, you’re kidding me, right?” Anamaría Navarro slowed her Honda Pilot for the red light at the intersection of White Street and Glynn Archer Drive and gaped at the dashboard screen as if her mom could see her shock.
“Nena, why would I joke about someone’s health and a mamá’s worry for her child? How could you think that of me?”
Anamaría bit back a frustrated sigh. Ay Dios mío, talk about exaggeration. The Cuban mami guilt coming through the line was thicker than the humidity enveloping Key West outside. And even late-April heat in the Keys was no-joke hot.
“We’re not talking about a generic ‘someone,’ Mami, and you know it,” Anamaría pressed. “This is—”
“Exactamente. This is familia. So, you will go and help. Because it is what familia does,” her mami insisted.
¡Coño! Anamaría smacked the butt of her palm on her steering wheel as she mumbled another damn! She didn’t have to be video chatting with her mami to see the reprimand on her softly lined face. The parental disappointment and expectation were evident in the firm tone.
The light turned green, and Anamaría checked her rearview mirror for traffic moving into the left lane next to hers. When she glanced forward again, her gaze caught on Key West Fire Department Station 3 nestled on the far corner. For a hot second she considered pulling into the station’s parking lot. Whining to her brother Luis about their mami’s unreasonable request.
But thirty years of living with and loving a Cuban mami told her that while whining to her brother might make Anamaría feel better, nothing would change their mother’s mind.
Frustration bubbling, Anamaría flicked her blinker down to signal her intent, then executed a smooth U-turn.
“Mami, I already told you, I only have an hour and a half before I go into back-to-back-to-back workout sessions with clients. I was running home to make a protein shake and update something on my website. I don’t have time to go play nursemaid.”
Especially not to him.
Her gut clenched. Her heart fluttered the tiniest bit. Anamaría gritted her teeth, ignoring the reactions to the man she’d sworn to forget.
On the other end of the line, the maternal guilt factor upped the ante in the form of a heavy, downtrodden sigh. “That is plenty of time, nena. Elena is worried Alejandro’s wounds may have become infected on his long trip home. You will put her fears to rest by checking his injury. This is nothing different than getting a call when you are at the station. Do you not want to help her?”
Anamaría bit down on the not really that sprang to her tongue. It would be a partial lie anyway. “Normally, I’d do anything for Señora Miranda. Pero esto—”
“But this, nothing. I know you and your good heart. You will go because she asked for you. Porque she needs you. Now tell me, how close are you to the Mirandas’ home now? ¿Ya casi llegas?”
A surprised puff of air rushed from Anamaría. How the heck did her mami know to ask if she was almost there?
Annoyed, if somewhat bemused, Anamaría glanced at the dashboard display again where La Reina scrolled across the screen. Not for the first time in her life she wondered if her mami, aka “The Queen,” had managed to implant a tracking device in her children at birth. Somehow, Lydia Quintana de Navarro had this uncanny ability of keeping close tabs on her four kids, even though they were all now adults.
“Sí, I’m about five minutes away,” Anamaría muttered as she continued heading south on Flagler. Ahead on her left, the red-and-white electronic marquee for Key West High School flashed with end-of-the-school-year announcements.
“Muy bien. I knew I could count on you to do the right thing,” her mom said, not even trying to hide her smugness. “Please be nice to Alejandro. Pobrecito must be in so much pain.”
Anamaría rolled her eyes. Poor thing? The idiot should have been more careful if he planned to hike the Puerto Rican rainforest alone.
“I’ll be polite. That’s the best I can promise.”
The odds of her being nice to the man who had broken her heart were about as good as a snowball’s chance of surviving a Key West summer day. There was damn good reason why she hadn’t spoken to Alejandro Miranda for over ten years.
“Por favor, dile que sigo rezando por él,” her mom insisted.
“Mami, I’m sure he already knows that you’re praying for him.”
In fact, prayer chains had been activated throughout their comunidad the second news had reached them of Alejandro’s scary hiking accident a couple weeks ago. Despite his asshole behavior before and in the months after their breakup all those years ago, even Anamaría had murmured a few Our Fathers for his recovery. That Catholic school guilt could be a real revenge squasher sometimes.
Still, she had no desire to play messenger pigeon for the man to whom she had nothing left to say.
Fingers gripping her steering wheel, she made the left onto Bertha Street, then shortly after turned right onto Laird. Her breaths quickened the closer she drew to the house that had been her second home since eighth grade at Horace O’Bryant Middle School.
Well . . .
Except for those first few months after their breakup. When it’d been too painful for her to visit. To even drive down this quiet neighborhood street.
The same way it had been with so many other places around Key West. Memories attacking her in quick succession. Sharp cross-hook-uppercut jabs delivering blows as if she were a punching bag.
Gravel crunched underneath her car tires as she parked in front of the Mirandas’ place. Her gaze cut to the cinder-block and peach-painted stucco privacy wall edging the single-story home’s perimeter. Through the white-painted wood peep-through border at the wall’s top she stared at the front door.
It had taken her a while, but she’d learned to deal with the sad expressions on many of the faces of the loved ones inside. The ones who, like her, had been left behind, forgotten, by the same hardheaded man whose presence, almost twelve years later, forced her visit today.
Annoyed by her current predicament, Anamaría jerked the gearshift to park, then wiped her sweaty palms on her leggings. She sucked in a deep breath, slowly releasing it like she would instruct a victim in danger of hyperventilating. When that did nothing to slow her mid-cardio workout pulse, she reached for her water bottle and took a hefty swig.
“¿Llegaste?” her mom’s voice cut through the hazy memories trying to push their insidious way to the surface in Anamaría’s mind.
“Yes, I’m here. I gotta go, Mami. Te llamo más tarde.”
She chugged another gulp, certain that her promise to call later wouldn’t stop her mom from bugging her before then. When it came to overstepping the boundaries of propriety and privacy with her children, her mom didn’t baby-step over it. She freaking leapt.
All with good intentions of course. Lydia Quintana de Navarro lived and breathed for her husband and children, their extended familia, and their entire comunidad. That also meant when she felt she knew what was best for someone, there was no shying away from letting them know it. Or from using her wily passive-aggressive skills to get her way, particularly with her kids and grandkids.
Like a truth teller affirming Anamaría’s thoughts about her mom’s meddling, her mom’s voice stopped Anamaría seconds before her finger hit the end call icon on the dashboard screen.
“God has a plan for you, nena. I know He does.” Her mami’s tone softened with concern at the same time it sharpened with the conviction of her faith. “Dios te bendiga, mi vida.”
Before she could reply to her mother’s usual “God bless you, my life” farewell, the call was disconnected.
God has a plan for you. The sage advice replayed in Anamaría’s head as she rubbed her thumb over the AM Fitness logo imprinted on the side of her water bottle. This—AM Fitness—had to be that plan. She sure hoped so, anyway, because it was her only focus now.
The black-and-red script in a font meticulously selected because of its strong, energetic vibe indicative of the brand she sought for her burgeoning business reminded her of how far she’d come. Sure, it had taken her awhile, but she was finally in a good place.
Her heart had mended. Her conviction that she’d made the right decision by staying behind had solidified. Her anger at Alejandro’s mulish behavior had dissipated to mere indifference. Well, until his surprise return.
A surprise she refused to let derail her.
Ignoring her trembling fingers and the annoying jitters in her stomach, she tugged the keys from the ignition, grabbed her backpack, then left the safety of her vehicle.
Like many in this older Midtown neighborhood, the Mirandas’ was a modest, single-story stucco house. Theirs was painted the same welcoming soft peach as the privacy wall, with dark gray hurricane shutters bookending the windows. Alejandro and his younger brother, Ernesto, had spent their entire lives here. Until their father, in a fit of anger Anamaría felt certain he’d never meant, threatened to ban Alejandro from their home if he chose to turn his back on running the restaurant that was their familia’s legacy.
Despite the threat, Alejandro had boarded that plane to Spain. Off to seek fame and fortune on his own terms. Without his father’s blessing. Without her.
As she stepped onto the sidewalk, the humid breeze snagged a few strands of hair that had fallen loose from her ponytail, blowing them across her cheek. She tucked them behind her ear and squared her shoulders, then paused in front of the wide wooden door nestled in the privacy wall’s alcove. Overhead, sprawling bougainvillea with their deep green leaves and bright fuchsia flower petals climbed the slanted overhang in a colorful canopy. The sweet-smelling vines offered shade to those who entered, but the plant’s sharp thorns were as prickly and harmful as the memories of Alejandro she had struggled to uproot from her heart.
Shit, if she was honest with herself, she’d admit that the sweat dotting her upper lip was a nervous reaction to seeing Alejandro again after all these years, not the hot island climate. That didn’t mean anyone else needed to know.
All she had to do was put on her game face. Channel her I-don’t-give-a-damn attitude that challenged any sexist, chauvinistic firefighters at work to question her abilities when it came to saving their asses. Treat this visit like another routine 911 call. Alejandro, another random patient she might need to load in the back of her . . . or, bueno, his mom’s sedan . . . for the short drive to the emergency room at Lower Keys Medical Center if need be.
So what if instead of her firefighter gear she wore exercise clothes, having come directly from a private workout with a guest at the Casa Marina Resort. Her sundress from church was a balled-up, wrinkled mess inside her gym bag. No way was she wasting twenty minutes driving to her place in Stock Island, just outside of Key West, and back to freshen up. Not for him.
She refused to care whether or not she looked her best for the man who had walked away from her so easily.
Straightening her spine, Anamaría reached for the weathered metal door handle.
Her plan was simple. Get in and out quickly. Keep chitchat to a minimum. Remain professional and focused on her job—not the man—while she checked Alejandro’s vitals and the pin sites of the external fixator keeping his surgically aligned tibia shaft in place while his compound fracture healed.
No doubt Alejandro had come back kicking and screaming. Metaphorically speaking anyway. That had been the general consensus during the conversation she’d tried to tune out around the table at her familia’s mandatory weekly dinner the other night.
Nothing short of desperation and the need for assistance with his daily care—with a heavy dose of maternal insistence, no doubt—could have finally brought the prodigal Miranda son home.
Anamaría figured Alejandro wanted to be back in Key West about as much as she wanted him here.
That would be . . . not at all. As in zip. Zero. Zilch. Nada.
If luck was on her side, her visit now would be a quick “all’s well” checkup. With Señora Miranda’s fears for her eldest’s well-being calmed, Anamaría could be on her way having fulfilled her duty, intent on maintaining her distance until he left again.
Because he would leave again. Everyone knew that.
Only this time, when Alejandro Miranda boarded his flight to wherever his photography skills took him, he would not be taking her heart with him.
After having decided almost two years ago to quit waffling and just do it—her younger brother’s wise, albeit borrowed-from-Nike advice—she was finally taking steps to make her true career dreams a reality. Thanks to social media influencer mentoring from her brother Luis’s fiancée, AM Fitness had started getting more buzz, Anamaría’s platforms were accruing more followers and subscribers, and, most recently, a talent agent had offered her representation.
There was absolutely no time for distractions or strolls down a memory lane plastered with Dead End signs.
Alejandro Miranda was her past.
Anamaría’s eyes were focused on the future.
All she had to do was get through this one awkward meeting. Then they could go their separate ways again.
A tiny pang of regret seared a hot trail through Anamaría’s chest.
Stubbornly she stomped on the hurtful sparks like the dying embers of a careless fire. She didn’t have time for regrets. Instead, shoulders back, head high, she pushed through the wooden door, ready to face the man who had shattered her once tender heart.
Sitting on the worn floral-print sofa in his familia’s living room, Alejandro Miranda cursed the bad luck that had dragged his ass back to Key West. The island home he’d left behind over a decade ago, by choice and by force.
His mami sat on one side of him, his abuela on the other, their dark eyes pools of concern. Across from him, his sister-in-law, Cece, and two-year-old niece, Lulu, perched on the matching love seat pushed against the opposite wall, their gazes trained on him expectantly. His brother, Ernesto, leaned against the armrest, hovering at his wife’s side, uncertainty pinching his brow.
Trapped by their intent stares and unspoken expectations, Alejandro jabbed his fingers through his hair in frustration. Being back in his childhood home made him think about that old copy of Thomas Wolfe’s You Can’t Go Home Again he’d found at a secondhand bookstore in London several years ago. The title had initially grabbed him, but it was the words on the pages inside that really resonated.
According to Wolfe, you could never return to your old life, your old ways, even your old hometown, and find things the same. Ha! The guy obviously hadn’t tried going back to a Cuban familia rooted in tradition.
Sure, some things had changed. Cece and Ernesto had been about to start high school, barely making heart eyes at each other, when Alejandro had flown the restrictive coop his papi ruled. Curly-haired, pudgy-cheeked Lulu hadn’t even been a thought in her parents’ pre-pubescent minds. Now they were a family of three, with another about to arrive. And he had missed it all.
But the old portrait of his papi, mami, Ernesto, and him, snapped at the Sears studio twenty-plus years ago, still hung in its clunky frame on the pale blue wall above the love seat. A throwback frame you wouldn’t find in any gallery that displayed Alejandro’s prized photographs today.
Worse, the strange mix of disappointment and hope on his mami’s, abuela’s, and Ernesto’s faces weighed as heavily on his shoulders now as it had back then.
Twelve years away and still he sensed their keen desire for him to quit shirking his responsibilities. To come back and work alongside his papi, preparing to take over the restaurant someday. A life sentence that would shackle Alejandro’s dream of traveling and photographing the world.
It was the reason why he had stayed away for so long. Well, one of several.
“Your papi is sorry he couldn’t be here to welcome you home,” his mom said. She slid to the edge of the sofa, leaning forward to plump the leaf green throw pillows cushioning his injured left leg resting on top of the rattan coffee table.
“Por favor,” he muttered. “Let’s not pretend. If I hadn’t been stupid enough to fall off that rock ledge in El Yunque and wind up in this damn—”
“¡Oye! Language!” Ernesto interrupted. He jerked a thumb at his daughter, busy murmuring something to the baby doll cradled in her tiny arms.
¡Carajo!
The second damn nearly slipped out before Alejandro swallowed it. He wasn’t used to having a kid around. Unless they were the subject of his photograph, and then his camera kept him occupied and at a professional distance.
He dipped his head in apology at his brother and Cece.
“If I hadn’t wound up in this position,” Alejandro continued, “I’d be on my way to Belize for my next shoot. Not . . .”
Not here, surrounded by the people he had let down. Girding himself for when his father came home from Miranda’s, their familia restaurant that was his pride and joy. The legacy Alejandro had spit on by walking away.
“Gracias a Dios que estás bien,” his abuela said softly.
Yeah, thank God he was okay. If “okay” meant slipping down a fucking waterfall and busting the shit out of his leg, then being forced to return to the home he could no longer claim as his to face the people he was destined to disappoint.
He squelched the sarcastic retort. It would only hurt his familia. Instead, he bit his tongue and sagged back against the worn sofa cushions. His leg ached, signaling the time neared for him to swallow another over-the-counter pain pill. He’d given a hard pass to the opioid and acetaminophen with codeine the doc had tried prescribing post-surgery in Puerto Rico. No way would he risk developing any sort of dependency or addiction. There’d been a time after his divorce when he’d come way too close to relying on the bottle to dull his thoughts. Years later, that flirtation with dependency still haunted him.
“How are you feeling, hijo?” His mami finger-combed his hair, a gentle caress that reminded him of times past. When he’d lain on this same couch or the double bed in his room and she’d soothed him when he was sick.
“Your face is pale,” she complained. “And you feel a little warm. Are you hurting?”
He shook his head, lying but unwilling to cause her more distress. His jaw clenched tightly against the ache radiating from two of the pin sites high on his shin, a couple inches below his knee.
“Kiss it better, ’Buela,” his little niece suggested.
Despite the fatigue and disillusion crushing him, Lulu’s cuteness drew his smile. Her pudgy cheeks plumped even more when she grinned back at him.
“I’m not sure that’s going to work, chiquita, but thank you for suggesting it.” He winked, pleased when a cute giggle burst from her mouth. She hugged her bald baby doll to her chest, twisting from side to side.
Her innocence reminded him of the toddler he’d photographed once in a remote Costa Rican village. Spending time with the villagers and volunteers as they toiled at constructing a rustic school building and the eco-brick steps leading up a slight incline to the site had been a humbling experience. One of many he was thankful for over the years.
Cece caressed Lulu’s curly hair, her expression gentle with maternal love when she looked over at him. “It’s good to see you, Ale. Even if it is like this.”
She thrust her chin at the Ilizarov external fixator with its four rings and multiple wires piercing his shin, holding his tibia in place. Lulu had already been warned to keep her distance from the cyborg-looking contraption after racing over to greet him and nearly bumping against the rings.
Carajo, just thinking about the agony her knocking into his leg would have caused made him wince.
“Gracias,” Alejandro replied to Cece.
He wanted to tell her it was good to be here. But they all knew it would be a lie.
Unlike them, he had always itched to be outside, not cooped up at the restaurant. He was more interested in seeing their small island from behind the lens of his camera. Capturing the beauty, wonder, and details so many missed in the busyness of life.
Making his own way in the world, not following someone else’s.
His eyes drifted shut on the past. The differences between them that still held true today. The differences that disappointed them, especially his father.
This visit was only for a short time. Until he was healed enough to have the external fixator rings and pins removed, allowing him more mobility. Then he’d be able to handle the stairs at his town house in Atlanta and he’d be fine on his own. As he had been for years.
Getting out of the wheelchair meant getting back to the job that gave his life purpose. And helped silence the occasional cry of loneliness that howled in the dark of night when his defenses were low.
“I still think we should have driven straight to the emergency room when we arrived here,” his mami said, concern lacing her words.
He swiveled his head on the back sofa cushion to meet her worried gaze. “Let me rest a few minutes; then I’ll remove the dressings and clean the sites. I’m sure everything’s okay. I’m just tired.”
“Bueno, I would feel better if you saw a professional.” His mami ran her fingers through his hair once again. The familiar gesture both soothed and left him longing for a simpler past.
“Don’t be silly. I’m fine,” Alejandro assured her.
“Humph, so I am silly for worrying about my son now, ha?” she demanded with a sniff. “That’s what you think of me?”
Arms crossed as he leaned against the far wall, Ernesto returned Alejandro’s exasperated grimace. They were familiar with this routine. When their mami was like this, you’d better pack your bags. Elena Miranda had a first-class ticket for you on a guilt trip you couldn’t avoid.
The fact that he’d held firm in not returning all these years, despite her heavy-handed attempts to lure him home, spoke of the yawning distance separating Alejandro and his father. The bridge connecting them having long been burnt to the ground.
“A mother should not want what is best for her children?” his mami droned on.
“I didn’t say—”
“Bueno, since you refused to go see the doctor, I asked someone to come see you.”
If he didn’t feel like death warmed over, he might have laughed at her over-protective nature. “Mami, few doctors make house calls anymore. Not the ones my insurance company will cover anyway.”
“I didn’t call a doctor. I called familia.”
Fatigue weighing on him, Alejandro slowly shook his head, not following. They didn’t have any physicians in their family. “What do you mean?”
Her brow furrowed, his mami exchanged a worried glance with his abuela, then shot a “don’t say anything” parental warning at his brother, who in turn threw an apologetic grimace Alejandro’s way.
Why did he suddenly feel like everyone else shared some kind of insider info he wasn’t privy to?
Unease slithered down his spine.
“We only need someone with medical experience to properly clean your wounds and tell me if I should make you go to the hospital,” his mami said. “When the physical therapist comes later this week, I can ask any new questions I have.”
“Someone with . . . wait. . . .” Alejandro shot a “what the hell, how could you let her” glare at his traitorous brother.
Ernesto ducked his head, a sure sign he knew what their mami was up to but refused to, or more like was wise enough not to, get in her bulldozing way.
“Mami,” Alejandro’s voice sharpened. “Who did you call?”
Her eyes narrowed at his gruff tone. A warning for him to curb his disrespect.
The stubbornness tightening his mami’s lips and the calming hand his abuela laid on his forearm answered Alejandro’s question as if the two women had spoken.
Dread descended like a dark storm cloud rolling in from the ocean.
“Por favor, tell me you didn’t—”
A sharp knock on the front door interrupted him. Before anyone could move, the hinges creaked in protest as the door slowly opened.
The rich, lilting voice that haunted his dreams, no matter how hard he tried to banish it, called, “Hola!” as Anamaría Navarro stepped inside.
“Anamawía!” Lulu squealed.
Dark curls bouncing, his niece hopped off the love seat. Her pink sandals slapped the gray and white tile as she ran with open arms toward the woman he hadn’t spoken to since their last uncomfortable Skype video chat over a decade ago. The night she unequivocally confirmed his worst fear, discarding him like chum tossed overboard.
Lulu’s skinny arms wrapped around Anamaría’s thighs in a tight squeeze. Joy lit his ex’s hazel eyes, sucker-punching him with vivid memories of her greeting him with a similar glee.
She bent to rub a hand on his niece’s back, her long dark ponytail swooping over her shoulder. “Hola, Lulu, this is a nice surprise.”
Lulu craned her neck to peer up at Anamaría, adoration dawning over her cute face. Damn if Alejandro couldn’t help but understand exactly how the kid felt. No matter how often he called himself a fool for yearning for someone who obviously hadn’t felt the same.
“Tío Ale, tiene an owie,” Lulu announced. Like the Frankenstein contraption encircling his leg wasn’t clue enough.
“Yes, he does have an owie,” Anamaría answered. “A pretty big one. But your abuela and abuelita are going to take good care of him. Just like they do with you.”
“Will you come pway wif me soon?”
“I hope so. I need me some Lulu time.” Anamaría hunkered down and tugged one of Lulu’s curls, eliciting a sweet giggle from the child.
The closeness between the two—the niece he’d only seen the one time Ernesto and his family had visited him in Atlanta and the woman who’d basically said he wasn’t enough for her—felt like a poisonous lance in his side. He may not fit in here, but it was obvious Anamaría still did. Without him.
Holding her baby doll tightly against her chest, Lulu skipped back to her parents. “Anamawía gonna babysit me!”
“Not today. But we’ll see when, mamita.” Ernesto gave his daughter’s butt a nudge to help her clamber onto the love seat.
“Text me, Cece, and I’ll let you know when I’m free. I’m sure you two could use a date night before your bundle of joy arrives.”
Cece circled a hand over her huge, beach ball–sized belly that stretched the material of her yellow blouse. A tired smile tugged up the corners of his sister-in-law’s wide mouth as she murmured her thanks.
Anamaría sent Lulu a wink and rose from her haunches.
His shock at her arrival waning, Alejandro allowed himself to take in her figure, on gorgeous display thanks to a pair of formfitting black leggings and a tight pink tank, the words AM Fitness in a black scrawling font across the front. With her matching black and pink Nike sneakers and slicked-back high ponytail, she looked primed for an athletic photo shoot. She could have easily replaced one of the models for the Women’s Health spread he’d shot in the Bahamas last year.
The enthusiastic teenager he’d known and loved had matured into a vibrant woman. All lush curves and honed muscles, the latter no doubt hard earned from her work as a firefighter paramedic and fitness trainer.
Without acknowledging him, Anamaría made the round of hello kisses and hugs with Ernesto and his family, even tickling Lulu’s baby doll under the chin, eliciting another precious giggle from Alejandro’s niece.
His ex crossed to the sofa, the scent of the tropical lotion she had always preferred tickling his nose when she stooped to brush a kiss on his abuela’s wrinkled cheek. The two exchanged warm smiles as his abuela patted Anamaría’s hand with a murmured Dios te bendiga, nena.
The age-old wish for God’s blessing may be a trite phrase easily tossed out by many. But in this house, with the mini altar in the far corner, its pillar candle lit during his abuela’s daily prayer of the rosary, words of blessing held weight. His mami had already stopped at their altar earlier, giving thanks for her answered prayers for his return.
Anamaría hugged his mami, waved off the offer of a drink, set her black backpack on the tile floor next to the coffee table, and finally, finally, turned to him.
His body tensed, but he fought to maintain a neutral expression. To hide the anger, lingering bitterness, and disillusion of their past. All the while he greedily cataloged the features he had conjured in his dreams.
Her oval face with its high cheekbones, expressive hazel eyes, and slightly pointed chin remained as beautiful as ever. The faint crow’s-feet lightly raying out from her eyes, telltale signs of laughter and days squinting under the bright Key West sun, added to her allure. The serious slant of her full lips made him ache for the enticing grin she’d so readily flashed at him in years past. And now easily shared with others in his familia instead. The round dark brown beauty mark an inch below the right corner of her mouth made him itch to press a kiss to it. Only, he was no longer free to do so.
That right had been taken away from him the moment she changed her mind and chose to stay here. Refusing to follow him
“Nena, why would I joke about someone’s health and a mamá’s worry for her child? How could you think that of me?”
Anamaría bit back a frustrated sigh. Ay Dios mío, talk about exaggeration. The Cuban mami guilt coming through the line was thicker than the humidity enveloping Key West outside. And even late-April heat in the Keys was no-joke hot.
“We’re not talking about a generic ‘someone,’ Mami, and you know it,” Anamaría pressed. “This is—”
“Exactamente. This is familia. So, you will go and help. Because it is what familia does,” her mami insisted.
¡Coño! Anamaría smacked the butt of her palm on her steering wheel as she mumbled another damn! She didn’t have to be video chatting with her mami to see the reprimand on her softly lined face. The parental disappointment and expectation were evident in the firm tone.
The light turned green, and Anamaría checked her rearview mirror for traffic moving into the left lane next to hers. When she glanced forward again, her gaze caught on Key West Fire Department Station 3 nestled on the far corner. For a hot second she considered pulling into the station’s parking lot. Whining to her brother Luis about their mami’s unreasonable request.
But thirty years of living with and loving a Cuban mami told her that while whining to her brother might make Anamaría feel better, nothing would change their mother’s mind.
Frustration bubbling, Anamaría flicked her blinker down to signal her intent, then executed a smooth U-turn.
“Mami, I already told you, I only have an hour and a half before I go into back-to-back-to-back workout sessions with clients. I was running home to make a protein shake and update something on my website. I don’t have time to go play nursemaid.”
Especially not to him.
Her gut clenched. Her heart fluttered the tiniest bit. Anamaría gritted her teeth, ignoring the reactions to the man she’d sworn to forget.
On the other end of the line, the maternal guilt factor upped the ante in the form of a heavy, downtrodden sigh. “That is plenty of time, nena. Elena is worried Alejandro’s wounds may have become infected on his long trip home. You will put her fears to rest by checking his injury. This is nothing different than getting a call when you are at the station. Do you not want to help her?”
Anamaría bit down on the not really that sprang to her tongue. It would be a partial lie anyway. “Normally, I’d do anything for Señora Miranda. Pero esto—”
“But this, nothing. I know you and your good heart. You will go because she asked for you. Porque she needs you. Now tell me, how close are you to the Mirandas’ home now? ¿Ya casi llegas?”
A surprised puff of air rushed from Anamaría. How the heck did her mami know to ask if she was almost there?
Annoyed, if somewhat bemused, Anamaría glanced at the dashboard display again where La Reina scrolled across the screen. Not for the first time in her life she wondered if her mami, aka “The Queen,” had managed to implant a tracking device in her children at birth. Somehow, Lydia Quintana de Navarro had this uncanny ability of keeping close tabs on her four kids, even though they were all now adults.
“Sí, I’m about five minutes away,” Anamaría muttered as she continued heading south on Flagler. Ahead on her left, the red-and-white electronic marquee for Key West High School flashed with end-of-the-school-year announcements.
“Muy bien. I knew I could count on you to do the right thing,” her mom said, not even trying to hide her smugness. “Please be nice to Alejandro. Pobrecito must be in so much pain.”
Anamaría rolled her eyes. Poor thing? The idiot should have been more careful if he planned to hike the Puerto Rican rainforest alone.
“I’ll be polite. That’s the best I can promise.”
The odds of her being nice to the man who had broken her heart were about as good as a snowball’s chance of surviving a Key West summer day. There was damn good reason why she hadn’t spoken to Alejandro Miranda for over ten years.
“Por favor, dile que sigo rezando por él,” her mom insisted.
“Mami, I’m sure he already knows that you’re praying for him.”
In fact, prayer chains had been activated throughout their comunidad the second news had reached them of Alejandro’s scary hiking accident a couple weeks ago. Despite his asshole behavior before and in the months after their breakup all those years ago, even Anamaría had murmured a few Our Fathers for his recovery. That Catholic school guilt could be a real revenge squasher sometimes.
Still, she had no desire to play messenger pigeon for the man to whom she had nothing left to say.
Fingers gripping her steering wheel, she made the left onto Bertha Street, then shortly after turned right onto Laird. Her breaths quickened the closer she drew to the house that had been her second home since eighth grade at Horace O’Bryant Middle School.
Well . . .
Except for those first few months after their breakup. When it’d been too painful for her to visit. To even drive down this quiet neighborhood street.
The same way it had been with so many other places around Key West. Memories attacking her in quick succession. Sharp cross-hook-uppercut jabs delivering blows as if she were a punching bag.
Gravel crunched underneath her car tires as she parked in front of the Mirandas’ place. Her gaze cut to the cinder-block and peach-painted stucco privacy wall edging the single-story home’s perimeter. Through the white-painted wood peep-through border at the wall’s top she stared at the front door.
It had taken her a while, but she’d learned to deal with the sad expressions on many of the faces of the loved ones inside. The ones who, like her, had been left behind, forgotten, by the same hardheaded man whose presence, almost twelve years later, forced her visit today.
Annoyed by her current predicament, Anamaría jerked the gearshift to park, then wiped her sweaty palms on her leggings. She sucked in a deep breath, slowly releasing it like she would instruct a victim in danger of hyperventilating. When that did nothing to slow her mid-cardio workout pulse, she reached for her water bottle and took a hefty swig.
“¿Llegaste?” her mom’s voice cut through the hazy memories trying to push their insidious way to the surface in Anamaría’s mind.
“Yes, I’m here. I gotta go, Mami. Te llamo más tarde.”
She chugged another gulp, certain that her promise to call later wouldn’t stop her mom from bugging her before then. When it came to overstepping the boundaries of propriety and privacy with her children, her mom didn’t baby-step over it. She freaking leapt.
All with good intentions of course. Lydia Quintana de Navarro lived and breathed for her husband and children, their extended familia, and their entire comunidad. That also meant when she felt she knew what was best for someone, there was no shying away from letting them know it. Or from using her wily passive-aggressive skills to get her way, particularly with her kids and grandkids.
Like a truth teller affirming Anamaría’s thoughts about her mom’s meddling, her mom’s voice stopped Anamaría seconds before her finger hit the end call icon on the dashboard screen.
“God has a plan for you, nena. I know He does.” Her mami’s tone softened with concern at the same time it sharpened with the conviction of her faith. “Dios te bendiga, mi vida.”
Before she could reply to her mother’s usual “God bless you, my life” farewell, the call was disconnected.
God has a plan for you. The sage advice replayed in Anamaría’s head as she rubbed her thumb over the AM Fitness logo imprinted on the side of her water bottle. This—AM Fitness—had to be that plan. She sure hoped so, anyway, because it was her only focus now.
The black-and-red script in a font meticulously selected because of its strong, energetic vibe indicative of the brand she sought for her burgeoning business reminded her of how far she’d come. Sure, it had taken her awhile, but she was finally in a good place.
Her heart had mended. Her conviction that she’d made the right decision by staying behind had solidified. Her anger at Alejandro’s mulish behavior had dissipated to mere indifference. Well, until his surprise return.
A surprise she refused to let derail her.
Ignoring her trembling fingers and the annoying jitters in her stomach, she tugged the keys from the ignition, grabbed her backpack, then left the safety of her vehicle.
Like many in this older Midtown neighborhood, the Mirandas’ was a modest, single-story stucco house. Theirs was painted the same welcoming soft peach as the privacy wall, with dark gray hurricane shutters bookending the windows. Alejandro and his younger brother, Ernesto, had spent their entire lives here. Until their father, in a fit of anger Anamaría felt certain he’d never meant, threatened to ban Alejandro from their home if he chose to turn his back on running the restaurant that was their familia’s legacy.
Despite the threat, Alejandro had boarded that plane to Spain. Off to seek fame and fortune on his own terms. Without his father’s blessing. Without her.
As she stepped onto the sidewalk, the humid breeze snagged a few strands of hair that had fallen loose from her ponytail, blowing them across her cheek. She tucked them behind her ear and squared her shoulders, then paused in front of the wide wooden door nestled in the privacy wall’s alcove. Overhead, sprawling bougainvillea with their deep green leaves and bright fuchsia flower petals climbed the slanted overhang in a colorful canopy. The sweet-smelling vines offered shade to those who entered, but the plant’s sharp thorns were as prickly and harmful as the memories of Alejandro she had struggled to uproot from her heart.
Shit, if she was honest with herself, she’d admit that the sweat dotting her upper lip was a nervous reaction to seeing Alejandro again after all these years, not the hot island climate. That didn’t mean anyone else needed to know.
All she had to do was put on her game face. Channel her I-don’t-give-a-damn attitude that challenged any sexist, chauvinistic firefighters at work to question her abilities when it came to saving their asses. Treat this visit like another routine 911 call. Alejandro, another random patient she might need to load in the back of her . . . or, bueno, his mom’s sedan . . . for the short drive to the emergency room at Lower Keys Medical Center if need be.
So what if instead of her firefighter gear she wore exercise clothes, having come directly from a private workout with a guest at the Casa Marina Resort. Her sundress from church was a balled-up, wrinkled mess inside her gym bag. No way was she wasting twenty minutes driving to her place in Stock Island, just outside of Key West, and back to freshen up. Not for him.
She refused to care whether or not she looked her best for the man who had walked away from her so easily.
Straightening her spine, Anamaría reached for the weathered metal door handle.
Her plan was simple. Get in and out quickly. Keep chitchat to a minimum. Remain professional and focused on her job—not the man—while she checked Alejandro’s vitals and the pin sites of the external fixator keeping his surgically aligned tibia shaft in place while his compound fracture healed.
No doubt Alejandro had come back kicking and screaming. Metaphorically speaking anyway. That had been the general consensus during the conversation she’d tried to tune out around the table at her familia’s mandatory weekly dinner the other night.
Nothing short of desperation and the need for assistance with his daily care—with a heavy dose of maternal insistence, no doubt—could have finally brought the prodigal Miranda son home.
Anamaría figured Alejandro wanted to be back in Key West about as much as she wanted him here.
That would be . . . not at all. As in zip. Zero. Zilch. Nada.
If luck was on her side, her visit now would be a quick “all’s well” checkup. With Señora Miranda’s fears for her eldest’s well-being calmed, Anamaría could be on her way having fulfilled her duty, intent on maintaining her distance until he left again.
Because he would leave again. Everyone knew that.
Only this time, when Alejandro Miranda boarded his flight to wherever his photography skills took him, he would not be taking her heart with him.
After having decided almost two years ago to quit waffling and just do it—her younger brother’s wise, albeit borrowed-from-Nike advice—she was finally taking steps to make her true career dreams a reality. Thanks to social media influencer mentoring from her brother Luis’s fiancée, AM Fitness had started getting more buzz, Anamaría’s platforms were accruing more followers and subscribers, and, most recently, a talent agent had offered her representation.
There was absolutely no time for distractions or strolls down a memory lane plastered with Dead End signs.
Alejandro Miranda was her past.
Anamaría’s eyes were focused on the future.
All she had to do was get through this one awkward meeting. Then they could go their separate ways again.
A tiny pang of regret seared a hot trail through Anamaría’s chest.
Stubbornly she stomped on the hurtful sparks like the dying embers of a careless fire. She didn’t have time for regrets. Instead, shoulders back, head high, she pushed through the wooden door, ready to face the man who had shattered her once tender heart.
Sitting on the worn floral-print sofa in his familia’s living room, Alejandro Miranda cursed the bad luck that had dragged his ass back to Key West. The island home he’d left behind over a decade ago, by choice and by force.
His mami sat on one side of him, his abuela on the other, their dark eyes pools of concern. Across from him, his sister-in-law, Cece, and two-year-old niece, Lulu, perched on the matching love seat pushed against the opposite wall, their gazes trained on him expectantly. His brother, Ernesto, leaned against the armrest, hovering at his wife’s side, uncertainty pinching his brow.
Trapped by their intent stares and unspoken expectations, Alejandro jabbed his fingers through his hair in frustration. Being back in his childhood home made him think about that old copy of Thomas Wolfe’s You Can’t Go Home Again he’d found at a secondhand bookstore in London several years ago. The title had initially grabbed him, but it was the words on the pages inside that really resonated.
According to Wolfe, you could never return to your old life, your old ways, even your old hometown, and find things the same. Ha! The guy obviously hadn’t tried going back to a Cuban familia rooted in tradition.
Sure, some things had changed. Cece and Ernesto had been about to start high school, barely making heart eyes at each other, when Alejandro had flown the restrictive coop his papi ruled. Curly-haired, pudgy-cheeked Lulu hadn’t even been a thought in her parents’ pre-pubescent minds. Now they were a family of three, with another about to arrive. And he had missed it all.
But the old portrait of his papi, mami, Ernesto, and him, snapped at the Sears studio twenty-plus years ago, still hung in its clunky frame on the pale blue wall above the love seat. A throwback frame you wouldn’t find in any gallery that displayed Alejandro’s prized photographs today.
Worse, the strange mix of disappointment and hope on his mami’s, abuela’s, and Ernesto’s faces weighed as heavily on his shoulders now as it had back then.
Twelve years away and still he sensed their keen desire for him to quit shirking his responsibilities. To come back and work alongside his papi, preparing to take over the restaurant someday. A life sentence that would shackle Alejandro’s dream of traveling and photographing the world.
It was the reason why he had stayed away for so long. Well, one of several.
“Your papi is sorry he couldn’t be here to welcome you home,” his mom said. She slid to the edge of the sofa, leaning forward to plump the leaf green throw pillows cushioning his injured left leg resting on top of the rattan coffee table.
“Por favor,” he muttered. “Let’s not pretend. If I hadn’t been stupid enough to fall off that rock ledge in El Yunque and wind up in this damn—”
“¡Oye! Language!” Ernesto interrupted. He jerked a thumb at his daughter, busy murmuring something to the baby doll cradled in her tiny arms.
¡Carajo!
The second damn nearly slipped out before Alejandro swallowed it. He wasn’t used to having a kid around. Unless they were the subject of his photograph, and then his camera kept him occupied and at a professional distance.
He dipped his head in apology at his brother and Cece.
“If I hadn’t wound up in this position,” Alejandro continued, “I’d be on my way to Belize for my next shoot. Not . . .”
Not here, surrounded by the people he had let down. Girding himself for when his father came home from Miranda’s, their familia restaurant that was his pride and joy. The legacy Alejandro had spit on by walking away.
“Gracias a Dios que estás bien,” his abuela said softly.
Yeah, thank God he was okay. If “okay” meant slipping down a fucking waterfall and busting the shit out of his leg, then being forced to return to the home he could no longer claim as his to face the people he was destined to disappoint.
He squelched the sarcastic retort. It would only hurt his familia. Instead, he bit his tongue and sagged back against the worn sofa cushions. His leg ached, signaling the time neared for him to swallow another over-the-counter pain pill. He’d given a hard pass to the opioid and acetaminophen with codeine the doc had tried prescribing post-surgery in Puerto Rico. No way would he risk developing any sort of dependency or addiction. There’d been a time after his divorce when he’d come way too close to relying on the bottle to dull his thoughts. Years later, that flirtation with dependency still haunted him.
“How are you feeling, hijo?” His mami finger-combed his hair, a gentle caress that reminded him of times past. When he’d lain on this same couch or the double bed in his room and she’d soothed him when he was sick.
“Your face is pale,” she complained. “And you feel a little warm. Are you hurting?”
He shook his head, lying but unwilling to cause her more distress. His jaw clenched tightly against the ache radiating from two of the pin sites high on his shin, a couple inches below his knee.
“Kiss it better, ’Buela,” his little niece suggested.
Despite the fatigue and disillusion crushing him, Lulu’s cuteness drew his smile. Her pudgy cheeks plumped even more when she grinned back at him.
“I’m not sure that’s going to work, chiquita, but thank you for suggesting it.” He winked, pleased when a cute giggle burst from her mouth. She hugged her bald baby doll to her chest, twisting from side to side.
Her innocence reminded him of the toddler he’d photographed once in a remote Costa Rican village. Spending time with the villagers and volunteers as they toiled at constructing a rustic school building and the eco-brick steps leading up a slight incline to the site had been a humbling experience. One of many he was thankful for over the years.
Cece caressed Lulu’s curly hair, her expression gentle with maternal love when she looked over at him. “It’s good to see you, Ale. Even if it is like this.”
She thrust her chin at the Ilizarov external fixator with its four rings and multiple wires piercing his shin, holding his tibia in place. Lulu had already been warned to keep her distance from the cyborg-looking contraption after racing over to greet him and nearly bumping against the rings.
Carajo, just thinking about the agony her knocking into his leg would have caused made him wince.
“Gracias,” Alejandro replied to Cece.
He wanted to tell her it was good to be here. But they all knew it would be a lie.
Unlike them, he had always itched to be outside, not cooped up at the restaurant. He was more interested in seeing their small island from behind the lens of his camera. Capturing the beauty, wonder, and details so many missed in the busyness of life.
Making his own way in the world, not following someone else’s.
His eyes drifted shut on the past. The differences between them that still held true today. The differences that disappointed them, especially his father.
This visit was only for a short time. Until he was healed enough to have the external fixator rings and pins removed, allowing him more mobility. Then he’d be able to handle the stairs at his town house in Atlanta and he’d be fine on his own. As he had been for years.
Getting out of the wheelchair meant getting back to the job that gave his life purpose. And helped silence the occasional cry of loneliness that howled in the dark of night when his defenses were low.
“I still think we should have driven straight to the emergency room when we arrived here,” his mami said, concern lacing her words.
He swiveled his head on the back sofa cushion to meet her worried gaze. “Let me rest a few minutes; then I’ll remove the dressings and clean the sites. I’m sure everything’s okay. I’m just tired.”
“Bueno, I would feel better if you saw a professional.” His mami ran her fingers through his hair once again. The familiar gesture both soothed and left him longing for a simpler past.
“Don’t be silly. I’m fine,” Alejandro assured her.
“Humph, so I am silly for worrying about my son now, ha?” she demanded with a sniff. “That’s what you think of me?”
Arms crossed as he leaned against the far wall, Ernesto returned Alejandro’s exasperated grimace. They were familiar with this routine. When their mami was like this, you’d better pack your bags. Elena Miranda had a first-class ticket for you on a guilt trip you couldn’t avoid.
The fact that he’d held firm in not returning all these years, despite her heavy-handed attempts to lure him home, spoke of the yawning distance separating Alejandro and his father. The bridge connecting them having long been burnt to the ground.
“A mother should not want what is best for her children?” his mami droned on.
“I didn’t say—”
“Bueno, since you refused to go see the doctor, I asked someone to come see you.”
If he didn’t feel like death warmed over, he might have laughed at her over-protective nature. “Mami, few doctors make house calls anymore. Not the ones my insurance company will cover anyway.”
“I didn’t call a doctor. I called familia.”
Fatigue weighing on him, Alejandro slowly shook his head, not following. They didn’t have any physicians in their family. “What do you mean?”
Her brow furrowed, his mami exchanged a worried glance with his abuela, then shot a “don’t say anything” parental warning at his brother, who in turn threw an apologetic grimace Alejandro’s way.
Why did he suddenly feel like everyone else shared some kind of insider info he wasn’t privy to?
Unease slithered down his spine.
“We only need someone with medical experience to properly clean your wounds and tell me if I should make you go to the hospital,” his mami said. “When the physical therapist comes later this week, I can ask any new questions I have.”
“Someone with . . . wait. . . .” Alejandro shot a “what the hell, how could you let her” glare at his traitorous brother.
Ernesto ducked his head, a sure sign he knew what their mami was up to but refused to, or more like was wise enough not to, get in her bulldozing way.
“Mami,” Alejandro’s voice sharpened. “Who did you call?”
Her eyes narrowed at his gruff tone. A warning for him to curb his disrespect.
The stubbornness tightening his mami’s lips and the calming hand his abuela laid on his forearm answered Alejandro’s question as if the two women had spoken.
Dread descended like a dark storm cloud rolling in from the ocean.
“Por favor, tell me you didn’t—”
A sharp knock on the front door interrupted him. Before anyone could move, the hinges creaked in protest as the door slowly opened.
The rich, lilting voice that haunted his dreams, no matter how hard he tried to banish it, called, “Hola!” as Anamaría Navarro stepped inside.
“Anamawía!” Lulu squealed.
Dark curls bouncing, his niece hopped off the love seat. Her pink sandals slapped the gray and white tile as she ran with open arms toward the woman he hadn’t spoken to since their last uncomfortable Skype video chat over a decade ago. The night she unequivocally confirmed his worst fear, discarding him like chum tossed overboard.
Lulu’s skinny arms wrapped around Anamaría’s thighs in a tight squeeze. Joy lit his ex’s hazel eyes, sucker-punching him with vivid memories of her greeting him with a similar glee.
She bent to rub a hand on his niece’s back, her long dark ponytail swooping over her shoulder. “Hola, Lulu, this is a nice surprise.”
Lulu craned her neck to peer up at Anamaría, adoration dawning over her cute face. Damn if Alejandro couldn’t help but understand exactly how the kid felt. No matter how often he called himself a fool for yearning for someone who obviously hadn’t felt the same.
“Tío Ale, tiene an owie,” Lulu announced. Like the Frankenstein contraption encircling his leg wasn’t clue enough.
“Yes, he does have an owie,” Anamaría answered. “A pretty big one. But your abuela and abuelita are going to take good care of him. Just like they do with you.”
“Will you come pway wif me soon?”
“I hope so. I need me some Lulu time.” Anamaría hunkered down and tugged one of Lulu’s curls, eliciting a sweet giggle from the child.
The closeness between the two—the niece he’d only seen the one time Ernesto and his family had visited him in Atlanta and the woman who’d basically said he wasn’t enough for her—felt like a poisonous lance in his side. He may not fit in here, but it was obvious Anamaría still did. Without him.
Holding her baby doll tightly against her chest, Lulu skipped back to her parents. “Anamawía gonna babysit me!”
“Not today. But we’ll see when, mamita.” Ernesto gave his daughter’s butt a nudge to help her clamber onto the love seat.
“Text me, Cece, and I’ll let you know when I’m free. I’m sure you two could use a date night before your bundle of joy arrives.”
Cece circled a hand over her huge, beach ball–sized belly that stretched the material of her yellow blouse. A tired smile tugged up the corners of his sister-in-law’s wide mouth as she murmured her thanks.
Anamaría sent Lulu a wink and rose from her haunches.
His shock at her arrival waning, Alejandro allowed himself to take in her figure, on gorgeous display thanks to a pair of formfitting black leggings and a tight pink tank, the words AM Fitness in a black scrawling font across the front. With her matching black and pink Nike sneakers and slicked-back high ponytail, she looked primed for an athletic photo shoot. She could have easily replaced one of the models for the Women’s Health spread he’d shot in the Bahamas last year.
The enthusiastic teenager he’d known and loved had matured into a vibrant woman. All lush curves and honed muscles, the latter no doubt hard earned from her work as a firefighter paramedic and fitness trainer.
Without acknowledging him, Anamaría made the round of hello kisses and hugs with Ernesto and his family, even tickling Lulu’s baby doll under the chin, eliciting another precious giggle from Alejandro’s niece.
His ex crossed to the sofa, the scent of the tropical lotion she had always preferred tickling his nose when she stooped to brush a kiss on his abuela’s wrinkled cheek. The two exchanged warm smiles as his abuela patted Anamaría’s hand with a murmured Dios te bendiga, nena.
The age-old wish for God’s blessing may be a trite phrase easily tossed out by many. But in this house, with the mini altar in the far corner, its pillar candle lit during his abuela’s daily prayer of the rosary, words of blessing held weight. His mami had already stopped at their altar earlier, giving thanks for her answered prayers for his return.
Anamaría hugged his mami, waved off the offer of a drink, set her black backpack on the tile floor next to the coffee table, and finally, finally, turned to him.
His body tensed, but he fought to maintain a neutral expression. To hide the anger, lingering bitterness, and disillusion of their past. All the while he greedily cataloged the features he had conjured in his dreams.
Her oval face with its high cheekbones, expressive hazel eyes, and slightly pointed chin remained as beautiful as ever. The faint crow’s-feet lightly raying out from her eyes, telltale signs of laughter and days squinting under the bright Key West sun, added to her allure. The serious slant of her full lips made him ache for the enticing grin she’d so readily flashed at him in years past. And now easily shared with others in his familia instead. The round dark brown beauty mark an inch below the right corner of her mouth made him itch to press a kiss to it. Only, he was no longer free to do so.
That right had been taken away from him the moment she changed her mind and chose to stay here. Refusing to follow him
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Anchored Hearts
Priscilla Oliveras
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