This Side of Heaven

'I honestly don't know.' Cyn touched Emilio's meaty forearm and looked up into his squinty black eyes. 'Ever since they took Ramon up to surgery, he just sits there. He won't talk to me. He won't let me help him.'

'Si, he is like his padre. A strong man who thinks he needs no one.' Emilio patted her hand where it rested on his arm. 'He needs you. He will accept your help, later.'

As his words began to sink into her consciousness, Cyn wanted to deny her suspicions, but the facts could not be dismissed. Clutching Emilio's rock-solid arm, she asked him for the truth. 'Is Ramon Carranza Nate's father?'

'Si.' A hint of a smile softened Emilio's battered face. 'I have worked for Senor Carranza since before he met Nathan's mother. Since I was a boy of sixteen.'

'You knew Nate's mother?'

'A most beautiful woman, Senorita Grace Hodges. As beautiful as you with her long blond hair and big green eyes. Senor Carranza loved her greatly.' Emilio's eyes glazed over with memories.

'But Nate thought his father was dead.'

'Si, it was his mother's wish, and they agreed it would be best for the child. Under the circumstances.'

'You have to tell Nate, tell him everything. He has a right to know, and there is no one else who can tell him.' She re­alized she was taking a chance that Nate would respond in a positive manner to the revelation that Ramon Carranza was his father. But regardless of how he would react to the news, he had to be told the truth.

'You think he wants to know?' Ernilio asked, giving Cyn a skeptical look. 'He is a hard man. His heart may be closed to the truth.'

'There's no way to know unless we try.'

Emilio nodded, the tentative smile widening as Cyn took his hand, and together they entered the waiting room. Cyn sat down beside Nate. Emiho took a chair opposite the sofa. When she touched Nate's shoulder, he flinched, but still didn't open his eyes.

Cyn felt his big body tense beneath her touch. 'Nate, Emilio wants to tell you—'

'That Ramon Rafael Carranza is my father.'

'You knew?'

'No, not until... Sitting here, I finally figured it out.'

'He was never your enemy.' Cyn couldn't tell what Nate was thinking, but she could guess, knowing him as she did. 'His interest in you was personal.'

'Yeah, I guess it was.' Nate opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling, then darted his gaze at Cyn. 'But he was a little late in showing fatherly concern, don't you think?'

Nate closed his eyes again, and Cyn knew he was trying to blot out the truth—a truth he had yet to understand.

'Emilio can tell you about your parents,' she said, longing to comfort him, to ease the pain she saw in his eyes, to remove the anger she knew was barely hidden beneath the surface of his falsely calm exterior.

Nate opened his eyes, uncrossed his arms and sat up straight. 'What about them?' he asked, glaring at the huge man sitting across from him.

'You will listen, Nathan Hodges?' Emilio's dark eyes pleaded with Nate. 'You will let me tell it all so that you will understand why you mustn't hate your father.'

Cyn held her breath, praying for Nate's acquiescence. 'Don't you think you owe it to yourself as well as your parents to know the truth?' she asked.

'So talk,' Nate said, his voice brutally harsh. 'I'm lis­tening.' Bending over slightly, he let his hands drop be­ tween his knees as he looked down at the shiny tile floor.

'Senor Carranza owned a casino in Havana. He was al­ready rich and successful at thirty-five, and had very influ­ential friends. The most prominent friend was his father-in-law, Luis Arnaz.' Emilio hesitated briefly as he watched Nate for a sign of reaction. Seeing none, he continued. 'Arnaz had arranged his daughter's marriage to Se­nor Carranza... a business arrangement ten years be­fore ... before your mother came to Havana.'

'What was my mother doing in Havana?' Nate asked, finally glancing over at Emilio.

'She had just graduated from college and came down on a holiday with some of her friends. You must remember that Havana in 1949 was a playground for the rich and fa­mous.'

'She met him at his casino?' Nate couldn't imagine the sadly beautiful woman who had been his mother as a care­free young woman jaunting off to Cuba with her friends.

'I was there... that night.' Emilio's voice cracked with emotion. 'It was magic between them the moment they saw each other.'

The words were like a tight fist squeezing at Nate's heart. Once, he would have thought the notion of love- at-first-sight ludicrous, but since meeting Cyn, he admitted that it was possible. Hadn't she trapped him in her spell the first night he'd seen her on the beach? Had it been that way for his father the first moment he'd seen the young and beau­tiful Grace Hodges?

'They were very much in love,' Emilio said. 'He wanted to marry her, was willing to give up everything to have her.'

'Then why didn't he?' Nate asked, hating Ramon Car-ranza for allowing his sweet mother to have gone through the shame of giving birth to an illegitimate child.

'Luis Arnaz found out about your mother. He threat­ened her life.' Emilio placed his hands on Nate's shoul­ ders, his thick fingers tightening. 'Arnaz demanded that your father break all ties with your mother. He swore that he would have her killed. Senor Carranza knew that his fa­ther-in-law was capable of carrying out the threat.'

Jerking away from Emilio, Nate stood. He felt like run­ning, hard and fast. But he knew he couldn't run away from the truth. Ramon Carranza was his father. He had loved Grace Hodges, and had deserted her in order to save her life. All the bitterness and hatred of a lifetime churned inside Nate, his anger nearing the boiling point. He needed some­thing to hit, some faceless enemy to pulverize.

He balled his hands into tight fists, corded the muscles in his back and neck with such tension he could feel the strain in every nerve ending. And then she touched him. Gentle, soft, loving, her touch ignited the tinderbox of emotions within him. He turned on her, his eyes fierce with a slow burning heat that became white-hot.

Cyn gazed up into the eyes of the man she loved and saw such torment, such pent-up rage, that she couldn't bear to look at him. Mindless of anything except the need to com­fort him, Cyn wrapped her arms around his tightly coiled body.

Swiftly, brutally, he encompassed her in his arms, hug­ging her to him with the savagery of a dying man holding on to his last hope for survival. 'Cyn... Cyn...'

'I'm here. I'll always be here. I'll never leave you.' She felt his body shaking as she held him, her hands caressing his broad back.

They heard a woman's commanding voice ask, 'Is there someone here with the Carranza family?'

Nate and Cyn turned around. Emilio stood. All three of them moved toward the nurse who was waiting in the door­way.

'I'm Ramon Carranza's son,' Nate said. 'How is my father?'

'They've brought him down from surgery,' the white-uniformed woman said. 'You may go in to see him shortly, but Dr. Brittnell wants to talk to you first.' * * *

Ramon Carranza was dying. The doctors gave them no hope. It was only a matter of hours, perhaps even minutes. Emilio had sent for a priest.

For forty-two years, Nate had wondered about his un­known father, sometimes hating him, sometimes longing for him as only a child can long for a missing parent.

In the last few minutes he had remembered everything his mother had ever told him about his father. She had painted the man in glowing terms. Nate had never doubted that she loved his father, the mysterious man she had called Rafael. Grace Hodges had told her son that his father had been half Cuban and half Seminole Indian. That he had been a handsome man with a smile that could charm the birds from the trees.

When Nate had questioned her about why his father wasn't with them, Grace Hodges had told her son that his father was dead. As a child, he had not understood; as an adult he had accepted his mother's explanation as the truth.

'We can go in to see Ramon now,' Cyn said, squeezing Nate's hand.

They entered the critical care unit together, hand in hand. Ramon looked very old and very tired as he lay on