‘Yes, you are.’
She looked up at him, startled.
‘No, I can’t read minds. But I’d have to be completely devoid of feeling not to guess that you’re nervous about this.’
And then before she could respond he bent his head and kissed her, and kept on kissing her until his lips had blotted out the fear and the doubt inside her.
As he lifted his mouth she breathed out slowly. ‘Was that for luck?’
He shook his head. ‘No. I’m just insatiable, remember?’ Leaning forward, he tapped on the glass behind the driver’s head ‘You, however, are the smartest, sexiest and strongest woman I’ve ever met. So come on—let’s go and introduce you to the other side of your family.’
*
As it turned out, even before Laura tentatively stepped forward to greet her, Cristina was surprised to find that meeting the woman she’d alternately envied and despised for so many years was easier than she’d anticipated.
In fact, although both women were clearly on edge, their main reaction to one another seemed to be not resentment and hostility but surprise.
Maybe that was down to the fact that they were alike in so many ways. Weirdly alike. Same height, same eyes, same way of standing with one foot turned out.
It was still awkward, of course—how could it not be? And perhaps if Luis hadn’t been there they might have carried on making polite but wooden conversation about Laura’s hotel and Cristina’s journey. But something in his quiet, calm manner seemed to ease the tension between them, so that both she and Laura began to relax, and the three of them spoke easily for five minutes or so before Laura offered to find a nurse and tell her that Cristina had arrived.
While she was gone, Luis pulled her close. ‘You two seem to be getting along okay.’
Cristina nodded. Her skin felt too tight, and she didn’t seem to be able to breathe properly.
‘I didn’t think I’d like her,’ she said shakily. ‘Or that she’d like me. I was just so hung up on the fact that we were only half-sisters.’
He drew a finger over her cheek. ‘Two halves make a whole.’
Her mouth trembled, but when she looked up at him, his eyes calmed her.
‘It’s going to be all right.’
‘Is it?’
He nodded automatically, but as she looked up at him the expression on her face stayed his heart. ‘Your father has asked to see you, carino. Let’s just start with that.’
‘Cristina!’
It was Laura. Beside her stood a young woman dressed in a pale blue tunic and trousers.
‘We can go in now.’
The short walk to her father’s private room seemed to take for ever. Her heart was beating painfully fast, and if it hadn’t been for Luis’s hand firmly gripping hers she might well have turned and run.
But in him there was something reassuringly solid—not just in his grip but in his manner. It was nothing overt. On the contrary, he was quiet and courteous. There was, though, a subtle natural authority about him that seemed to resonate with those around him.
Watching the busy hospital come to a virtual standstill, she felt warmth swell in her chest. She had never imagined trusting a man—and right now she had never felt more vulnerable—and yet with Luis by her side she felt safe in a way that she’d craved since her father had ripped any ability to trust away from her at the age of thirteen.
And now she was going to see him for the first time in eleven years…maybe for the last time.
She hadn’t seen him since that terrible scene in the hotel. Enrique Lastra had been stocky then, with a broad, square head like a bull and mass of thick black hair that had earned him his nickname—Mino, from minotauro, the half-man, half-bull of Greek mythology.
But there was nothing imposing about the man in the hospital bed.
True, he had that same mass of hair. Only now it was almost white. An ache was building in her
chest and she stared at him dazedly, barely registering Laura’s hand on her arm as her sister pulled her towards the bed.