Without a word, he took his cell phone from his pocket and handed it to me.
I was punching Federico’s number when the doors to the ER swung open and a nurse came through. I froze and watched as, after a brief interchange with the receptionist, she started toward the area where we were sitting. The three of us stood as one.
“How is he?” I asked, after the nurse confirmed we were waiting for him.
“His vitals are stable,” she informed us in a professional voice. “But we want to keep him through the night for observation.”
“I want to see him,” Ryan said.
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible.” The nurse’s tone became imperious. “He has requested to be left alone. So you’ll have to wait until morning.”
He’s planning to do it again, I thought while Ryan insisted. “Bécquer doesn’t know I’m here. He would see me if he knew. I’m his nephew.”
The nurse shook her head, her annoyance unmistakable now. “Not tonight.”
I grabbed Ryan’s arm and pulled at him, afraid that if he continued pressing the nurse with his demands, he would ruin not only his, but also my chance of seeing Bécquer.
“It’s all right, Ryan. You’ll see him tomorrow,” I coaxed him.
He was about to argue when Rachel set her hand on his other arm. “Come on, Ryan. Your mother’s right. Let’s go. You can come back early in the morning.”
Ryan hesitated for a moment then nodded at Rachel and shaking himself free of my grasp, moved back.
I asked the nurse for more details about Bécquer’s condition while I waited for Rachel and Ryan to reach the exit doors. Then I steered the conversation back to the issue of seeing Bécquer.
“I won’t bother him,” I told her, trying to keep the anxiety from my voice. “But I would very much like to stay in the room with him tonight.” As she shook her head, I rushed in, “You must let me stay with him. He’ll try to kill himself again. He admitted that much to me.”
A flash of anger crossed the nurse’s eyes. “I assure you your brother will not hurt himself here. In this hospital, we observe the highest standards of safety.”
Turning her back on me, she disappeared through the swinging doors.
“He’s not my brother,” I said to no one in particular as I watched the door swing, alternately inviting and rejecting me. I considered following her, but glanced at the reception desk and noted the girl had followed our conversation and was watching me.
Frustrated, I went back to my seat and considered my possibilities. Going home was out of the question. Whatever high standards the hospital had, I knew Bécquer was not safe. I would wait for another nurse to come by and ask her to be taken to his room. In the meantime, I would pray the haughty nurse was right.
Lucky for me, Ryan had forgotten to ask for his phone back. This time Federico answered on the first ring.
“He got it wrong,” he said after I repeated what Bécquer had told me during the ambulance ride. “I just talked with the Elders. Their sentence was to make him human. ‘A life for a life,’ that is how they phrased it. He will die eventually, of course, as all humans do, but the messenger was not supposed to kill him. He’s not supposed to be paralyzed either.”
“Bécquer said that Cesar did it so he could not flee.”
Federico swore. “Cesar? No wonder. I should have guessed.”
“Guessed what?”
“Cesar hates Bécquer. So he obviously twisted the Elders’ words to push Bécquer to kill himself, then paralyzed him just for his enjoyment. It fits just perfectly with his treacherous mind. His immortality has only increased the thirst for blood and depravity that made him infamous when he was human.”
“Who was he as human?”
“He was Cesar Borgia. The one who inspired Machiavelli to write The Prince. The bastard son of that other Alexander, the Renaissance pope who ruled the Church with the libertinism and nepotism of an absolute king.”
“Oh!” I said. For what else can you say when history, the history you studied at school becomes alive on a Saturday evening in, of all unlikely places, the waiting room of a hospital?
“Listen, Carla. I have to hang up now. I need to talk with the Elders again. They forbade me to help Bécquer before, claiming that his paralysis had happened after he became human. But if Cesar caused it — ”
“Then you can heal him?”
“I hope so. As I hope they will send somebody to talk to Bécquer. He needs to explain to them that Beatriz stole his blood for they believe he changed her on purpose. Once this point is clarified, they may even revert their sentence. In the meantime, you keep Bécquer safe, all right?”
“Of course,” I said, as if I could.
A thousand times more eager to see Bécquer now that I knew the Elders did not want him dead for I hoped knowing this would stop him from trying to kill himself, I walked to the desk. Unlike the nurse, the receptionist seemed sympathetic to my request, or maybe she was just bored and glad to have something to do.
“I’ll check with the nurse,” she told me.
She punched a number on the phone and conveyed my request. “I’ll tell her,” she said shortly.
“What is wrong?” I asked prompted by the note of concern I had noticed in her voice.
“Probably nothing,” she said lightly, but her eyes did not meet mine as she gestured toward the elevator. “They want you upstairs. Third floor. A nurse will meet you there.”
Too impatient to wait for the elevator, I ran up the stairs, arriving at the third floor flushed and out of breath. But it was fear, and not the running, that made my heart pump faster.
The nurse who had talked with us before was waiting for me by the elevator. Her haughty look, I noticed, was gone.
“I apologize,” she said when I joined her. “You were right, about your brother. He tried again.”
“Did he? Is he — ”
“He’s all right. We got him in time. But I believe it would be better if you stayed with him.”
“Did he swallow more pills?” I asked as I followed her down the corridor.
“No. He charmed one of the nurses into bringing him flowers. We always have extras from the maternity ward. New parents are too busy with their babies to carry all the bouquets they get. He smashed the vase and tried to cut his wrist with the broken glass.
“You have to give him points for ingenuity,” she continued. But the image her words evoked of the blood spilling from Bécquer’s veins was so vivid in my mind that I felt dizzy, and for a moment I saw black.
“Are you all right?”
I opened my eyes. The nurse had grabbed my arm. I was glad she had, because my knees had grown weak. I took a deep breath. “Yes, of course.”
“He’s not your brother, is he?”
I shook my head. “No. He’s not.”
“I didn’t think so.” I blushed — was my attraction to him so obvious? — “He was pretty vocal about not having any sisters. And also about not wanting anybody with him.”
“Yet, you let me come,” I said as we resumed walking.
Her smile disappeared. “In my experience, a suicide attempt is a cry for help. A disability is tough on a relationship. Until he has come to accept his condition, my advice is that you tell him that you love him. Unconditionally.”
As I struggled with my reply, she stopped and knocked briefly on a closed door and, without waiting for a response, entered the room.
Chapter Nineteen: The Pact
Bécquer was lying back on a half-raised bed. His hair, tousled and matted with sweat, framed a face so white it could have been a sculpture.
I stood by the door, not sure how to proceed while the nurse checked his IV and took his vitals. Ignoring her, Bécquer stared at me with his dark, sunken eyes. Still totally still, and silent. That he was still was not surprising as his arms, set parallel to his body, were strapped to the bed. The silence he broke at last, when the nurse left closing the door. Polite and distant, he thanked me for coming and asked me to take a seat next to his bed.