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He shrugged. “Yes. I wasn’t trying to scare you. Now you interrupted me, and you should know who I am.”
She gestured for him to continue. He so closely resembled her mother’s treasured photographs of Miguel that looking his way made her heart ache. They had gotten off to a poor start, but she couldn’t help but feel the fault was his.
“My mother’s name was Rosa Sanchez,”
he began. “Her parents worked for my, our, grandparents at the ranch outside Zaragoza. She and Miguel grew up together, but she was merely a servant’s daughter and not nearly good enough for him. He says he didn’t care what his parents thought and wanted to marry her. That’s why he was sent to the United States for college, although he was no scholar. He swears he didn’t know my mother was pregnant when he married yours. By the time he returned home, I was a year old and my beautiful mother was dead.”
She wondered if Miguel betrayed every woman he met. She had to force herself to ask, “What happened to her?”
Santos waved as they passed two pretty young women in a convertible Porsche. “When our grandmother told her that her beloved Miguel had married an American girl, she hanged herself in the stable.”
“Dear God,” Maggie cried. “It’s no wonder you don’t like me. I’m surprised you agreed to meet me at the airport.”
He replied with a softly voiced curse. “I wasn’t given a choice, Magdalena. You’ll soon learn how Miguel Aragon runs his household or how our grandmother runs it for him. I despise the bitch. She’ll tolerate your presence rather than welcome you to our home. Our Aunt Cirilda is equally vicious. She’s a viper in high heels and blood red lipstick.”
Even if snakes lacked feet and lips, it was a convincing mental image. His hostility echoed her own so loudly she felt an unexpected kinship with him. Another woman would have reached out to touch his arm in silent sympathy, but her hands reminded tightly wound in her shoulder bag’s long strap.
“Thank you for the warning. I haven’t kept up with the Aragon family tree. How many brothers and sisters do we have, and will they all be clustered around our father’s bedside?”
“He refuses to stay in bed, and I doubt he even knows how many children he’s sired, but the others you’ll meet are all legitimate. Vida Ramos was his second wife, and she gave him a daughter and son. Maria Luisa is twenty, and as silly and conceited as her friends. Enrique is seventeen and too wild to care that his father’s dying.”
Maggie nodded thoughtfully. Clearly he could provide a ready reason for disliking everyone he mentioned, and while his opinions would undoubtedly prove valuable, she thought it would be wise to keep an eye on him too. And how does that make you feel? Craig’s voice whispered in her ear.
She glanced toward the clear blue of the Mediterranean. They were driving along the Costa Daurada, or Golden Coast, and she realized Santos hadn’t told her where they were bound. “Is Father in a hospital?”
“No, he’s at the house near Tarragona. It’s not nearly as large as the ranch, but it’s easier for everyone to reach, and he loves the sea. The twins are there, Esperanza and Concepcion. They’re the daughters from Father’s third marriage to the opera diva Marina Nuñez. Perhaps you’ve heard of her?”
“Sorry, no. I’m not much of an opera fan.”
“There’s no cause for sorrow there. The shrew can barely carry a tune. The twins are thirteen and so thin they are no more than hangers for their designer clothes. They hope to become super models like Heidi Klum and marry rock stars. They wear so much makeup they look like circus clowns. After Father divorced Marina, he wed an Englishwoman, Margaret Hyde-Fox. She died in a plane crash, and Father adopted her son, David, but he refuses to use the Aragon name. He’s also seventeen. Everyone calls him Hide the Fox, or just Fox. He hates us all, but I prefer him to Enrique.”
Santos was so relentlessly negative she wished she could overhear his description of her, but decided she’d rather not. “So, there was your mother, then mine, followed by a woman named Vida, then Marina the opera singer, and Margaret was Father’s last wife?”
Santos sent her a quick scowl. “You can’t count my mother among the wives, and he may marry again. His nurses are all young, pretty blondes, just what he likes.”
Her curiosity piqued, she turned toward him. “What sort of woman appeals to you?”
Santos flexed his hands on the wheel. “The same kind, but I’ll never marry.”
“You’re awfully young to make that decision.”
“I’m not swearing myself to celibacy,” he exclaimed with a deep chuckle. “I’ll just avoid marriage. I’m the only one Father raised. He always expected me to embrace whatever woman occupied his bed, and there were a great many he didn’t bother to marry.”
“Santos,” she sympathized softly.
“Did you imagine Miguel Aragon was a saint? Now, let me finish without interrupting me again,” he scolded. “I don’t recall how many times I came downstairs for breakfast and found a new woman seated at the table. They were all beautiful redheads or blondes. Father has an absolutely pathetic weakness for blondes.”
Now positive her father would be disappointed to find her hair as black as his own, Maggie slumped down in her seat and cautiously kept quiet.
“Often the new woman would have a child or two, and I was expected to share all my wonderful toys with my new playmates. The few women Father did wed remained awhile longer, of course, but like all the others, the end always came. One morning I would wake to find my new brothers and sisters had vanished during the night, but another set would soon arrive to take their places. A few I had actually grown to love and missed terribly, but there were so many over the years that now I can’t recall all their names.”
Maggie could scarcely imagine the chaos of growing up in a home with a constantly shifting cast of characters, but Santos made it plain he didn’t want sympathy. She offered her own story instead. “I was raised by my mother and stepfather. I have two half sisters but no brothers, and I’m very glad to have met you. Although I can’t stay long, I won’t slip away like the others, but you’ll have to help me stay in touch.”
After a brief hesitation, he dipped his head. “I can’t promise much, but I suppose I could try.”
“Thank you. I’ll have to make a note of everyone’s names or I won’t be able to keep them straight.”
At last a relaxed smile crossed Santos’s lips. “Names will be a challenge, but I’ll help you. Perhaps you’ll stay long enough to hear all of Spain shouting mine.”
