Page 90 of No Darker Temptation

“I have a missed call from Lettie.” He lifts the phone to his ear. She answers on the first ring. “Hey, I’m with⁠—”

I can’t make out exactly what she’s saying on the other line but she sounds hysterical. A rush of cold travels through me as the blood in my veins ices over. Pedro’s expression darkens and at the next corner he makes a violent U-turn that sends my head smacking against the car door.

“Leticia, breathe, we’re on our way.”

“What’s wrong?” I ask. “Is everything okay?”

“Leticia—Leticia,” he says again. “No, of course you couldn’t get a hold of them, they’re…” His eyes travel to me before focusing on the road. “Just stay there! We’re on our way.”

“Where are we going?”

Pedro hits the gas. “To the hospital.”

Irush through a set of swinging doors, Pedro close behind, as a nurse calls out to us. I can’t hear anything over the roaring my ears as I find Lettie folded in on herself on a bench at the end of the hall. Sobbing uncontrollably, she lifts her head for a split second to gasp for air when she sees me. Immediately, her arms reach out and I sit on the bench beside her, pulling her against me.

“W-we were j-just having lunch and…and then…and…” She hiccups and I smooth a hand over her hair. “He started…and I— I just⁠—”

Pedro pauses across from us and gasps, slightly out of breath. “Damn. Did you run track in high school?”

I roll my eyes.

“How the fuck did you do that in those shoes?”

“Do me a favor and go find a doctor or something,” I snap at him. “Or better yet, get a hold of Alejandro or Diego. They should be here.”

Pedro digs his phone out of his pocket and starts dialing numbers. He paces the length of the linoleum floor while I pull Lettie into an upright position.

“Just breathe. Okay? Where’s Abuelo now?”

“They…took him.” She lets out another sigh. “I don’t know…I don’t know.”

As if on cue, a doctor in a white coat appears with a clipboard in hand and a stethoscope around his throat. He’s somewhere in his thirties with slicked back dark hair and a distinctly Mediterranean look, tan with hazel eyes. Eyes scanning the hall, he quickly lands on Lettie and a flash of recognition flickers across his face. Seeing me with her, he walks over and asks, “Sois vosotras la familia de Salazar Narvaez Murillo?”

Jesus Christ.

I have no idea how I’m going to get through a conversation in Spanish without any help but I should at least thank my lucky stars it isn’t Catalan. Lettie is inconsolable and Pedro just wandered into the waiting room where he’s in the midst of a phone call.

He asked if we’re family and I can answer that simply enough.

“Ella es su nieta,” I reply. “¿Dónde está? ¿Podemos verlo?”

“Sólo puede entrar la familia en este momento. La señorita puede pasar, pero tú tendrás que esperar aquí.”

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Okay he said that really fast but I think he told me Lettie can go because she’s family…I look down the hall for help but Pedro is too far away so I muster up the simplest, most elementary response I can muster.

“Yo también soy familia. Soy la esposa de su nieto.”

Alejandro will get a kick out of me pretending to be his wife.

The doctor nods and gestures toward a set of doors. “Pasa.”

We follow him and come to the end of an L-shaped hall. A blue door opens up into a small but private hospital room not so different from an American one. There’s a window and a television and most importantly, Don Salazar, lying quietly on a sterile hospital bed with a million machines singing around him.

Lettie runs inside and throws her arms around him, burying her face in the crook of his neck as she cries. The doctor, who introduces himself as Doctor Perez, spews off a series of medical terms I could never hope to understand. Bits and pieces stand out to me—heart, blood, age being a factor. None of it permeates my mind. I can’t hear anything above the incessant beeping and pulsing of the machines hooked up to Don Salazar’s body.

It reminds me of Mom.