Mendoza's Miracle Read online

  As much as she wanted to object, to defend herself and her feelings, she had to admit that there was something about Javier Mendoza that called to her.

  Something she couldn’t explain.

  Javier had been surfing the channels on the television in his hospital room for several minutes, but he couldn’t seem to find any shows that interested him.

  A tennis match only made him resent the fact that he wouldn’t be able to play for months, if not years. And the news stations reminded him of how much he’d missed during the time he’d spent in the ICU.

  Hell, he could hardly remember what his life had been like outside these white walls, and as he thought of his hospitalization and the long road to recovery, frustration swooped down on him again like a hungry vulture unable to wait for his hope to completely expire.

  With the dark shadow came the urge to throw the remote across the room, even though he’d never been prone to displays of temper. Instead, he placed his index finger over the red power button, shutting off the TV.

  As the screen faded to black, Leah entered the room. Just the sight of his pretty nurse was enough to make his frustration ease and his mood take flight.

  Talk about a nice diversion…

  A grin tugged at his lips, softening what had been a grimace only moments ago.

  At first glance, Leah, who stood about five foot four, wasn’t what Javier would call a striking woman. After all, he’d never seen her wearing anything other than hospital scrubs and a matching pair of Crocs on her feet. But with each passing day, as he looked beyond the loose-fitting clothing that masked her femininity, he’d found a lot to admire.

  Her long, straight hair was a pretty shade of auburn, although she usually kept it pulled back with a clip or woven in a single braid. She wore very little makeup—if any. But she had such a wholesome beauty that she really didn’t need any of the usual female props.

  He wondered what she looked like on her days off or when she spent a night on the town. In fact, he’d like to know a lot of things about her, like what her life was like outside the hospital.

  Was she married?

  He certainly hoped not.

  As she moved through his room, he wondered if she was dating someone special. It was difficult to imagine men not clamoring to be her one and only. How many women were as comforting, as gentle, as sweet?

  A couple of times he’d been tempted to ask if she was single and unattached, but he hadn’t, and he wasn’t sure why. He supposed he hadn’t wanted his nurse to know that he found her that attractive. If he hadn’t been laid up—and barely able to walk—it might be a different story. In fact, the old Javier wouldn’t have thought twice about asking her out. But he was a far cry from the man he used to be.

  “I take it there’s nothing good on television,” she said.

  “Nope.” He set the remote aside.

  “The dinner cart will be here shortly,” she added.

  “I can hardly wait.”

  Catching his sarcastic tone, she turned to him and smiled. “You’re lucky. The food at San Antonio General is actually pretty good.”

  Maybe it was, but his appetite had yet to return. In fact, the only reason he even looked forward to mealtime was because it helped to pass the time from morning to night, making him come one day closer to discharge.

  But why focus on all that mundane reality when he had Leah with him?

  “Hey, Florence,” he said, using the nickname he’d dubbed her with when he’d first began to see her as a woman and not as his nurse. “I have a question for you.”

  “What’s that?” She neared his bed, checking the ice and water level in the small plastic pitcher that sat on his portable tray.

  “What does your husband do for a living? Is he in the medical field, too?”

  She paused as if his comment had thrown her for a loop. “My husband? I’m not married.”

  Javier fought the urge to smile at that news. “Oh, no? I just assumed that a woman like you would have a man in her life.”

  Her hand lifted to the boxy pink top she wore and she fingered the stitching along the V-neck.

  Was she nervous? Off balance? Flattered maybe?

  He liked to think so, even though he wasn’t in a position to follow through at this point.

  Before either of them could speak, a woman’s voice sounded in the doorway.

  At the cheery “Hello,” both Javier and Leah turned to see a tall, willowy blonde walk into the room carrying an arrangement of spring flowers that hid her face.

  Savannah Bennett?

  As the blonde lowered the multicolored blooms, he realized that’s exactly who’d come to visit.

  “I hope you don’t mind me stopping by,” Savannah said. “I’d been wanting to see you for weeks, but I’d heard that your visitors had been limited to family members.”

  No one had told Javier that only his relatives were allowed to see him, although he hadn’t much cared either way. In fact, he’d rather not deal with visitors at all—whether they be family or friends.

  “But then I ran into Rafe at the grocery store this afternoon,” Savannah said. “He told me you were eager to have company. So here I am.”

  Eager? That was a crock, and Rafe knew it.

  More irritated at his brother’s interference than Savannah’s surprise visit, he forced himself to be polite. “Thanks for stopping by.”

  He wondered if Savannah noticed that his tone lacked sincerity. After all, they hadn’t dated in a couple of months—well, make that four or five, since they’d split up way before the tornado had struck Red Rock.

  Savannah had wanted more from him than he’d been able to give her—like a commitment. And while he’d made no bones about being a happy bachelor, she seemed to think that she was the one woman who would eventually change his mind. So there’d been a few tears on her part, but he’d suspected she would have been a lot more hurt and disappointed if he’d strung her along.

  Of course, Rafe had no way of knowing any of that. Javier had never been one to kiss and tell—or to break up and vent.

  Leah, who’d been standing by his bed, took a step back, as though trying to bow out graciously.

  She wasn’t going to leave him alone with Savannah, was she? Not that it mattered, he supposed. It’s just that he… Well, he didn’t want Leah to go. Not when she provided the only upbeat moments in his day.

  “Hey, Florence,” he said, trying to recapture the playful moment they’d been having—or that they’d been about to have before Savannah’s arrival.

  Leah paused, her expression unreadable. “Yes?”

  For a moment he was at a loss for words. But he wanted to let both women know he and the blonde weren’t romantically involved, at least not any longer.

  “I’d like to introduce you to a friend of mine,” he told his nurse. “Savannah’s a paralegal at a local law firm. Or she was, the last time we talked.” He turned to his unexpected visitor. “Are you still working for Higgins and Lamphier?”

  Savannah nodded, her demeanor a bit stiff and a frown creasing her brow.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” Leah said with a casual smile. Then she nodded toward the doorway. “I’d better get back to work and let you two chat.”

  Javier could have argued, asked her not to leave. But then what? His obvious attraction to his nurse would have only complicated any future discussion he had with Savannah.

  And his life was complicated enough as it was.

  Chapter Two

  As Leah slipped into the hall, a whisper of uneasiness breezed through her. She could have sworn that Javier had been about to ask whether she was single and maybe even…

  Available?

  Okay. So maybe she’d only imagined
that’s what he’d been getting at.

  When it came right down to it, she wasn’t sure why he’d asked those questions or what he’d meant by them. The minute Savannah what’s-her-name had entered the room, their conversation had ended before it even had a chance to take off, so all bets were off.

  And really, wasn’t she better off not knowing what Javier had planned to say next? The last thing she needed to do was to create any unnecessary workday drama.

  Still, the line of questioning had taken her aback and made her face the fact that, in spite of her efforts to remain completely professional, she was growing a little too fond of one of her patients.

  Of course, she would never act on her attraction. She was too committed to her job to let anything like that get out of hand.

  As she made her way to the nurses’ station, glad to be back on the job and out of Javier’s room, she held her head high, her shoulders straight. Yet disappointment threatened to drag her down for the count. She was sorry about the way things had played out.

  And why was that? she wondered.

  Probably because she cared more for her patient than she should. So for that reason alone she really ought to be glad that Savannah’s arrival had interrupted their conversation.

  And she was.

  Yet she’d flinched when the beautiful blonde had entered Javier’s room, and she’d found her emotional reaction to the visit more than a little bothersome. After all, Javier was a handsome bachelor. He probably had a slew of women in his pre-hospital life. How could he not?

  So why would one woman’s visit surprise her? And why would it leave her so unsettled, so uneasy?

  She supposed that was because, at least up until now, only his family had come to see him. And she hadn’t given his love life much thought.

  Well, now…that wasn’t entirely true. She’d thought about the women he might have dated in the past, but in all of her musings they’d been faceless beauties.

  Of course, that was no longer the case. Now one of them had a face—a pretty one that suggested Javier liked tall, sophisticated blondes who dressed to the nines and were skilled at applying makeup and styling their own hair.

  Leah clicked her tongue, scolding herself for making that kind of assumption. Maybe she was connecting all the wrong dots. How did she know that Savannah and Javier had actually dated? Hadn’t he downplayed that possibility?

  If he had no idea whether she still held the same job, how could he and Savannah be romantically involved? Clearly, he hadn’t seen her in a while.

  Leah’s uneasiness began to lift at that conclusion—until she realized he’d spent more than two months in the hospital. He’d also been in a coma for nearly half that time. And he’d suffered some confusion and memory loss when he’d first come to.

  Then, to make matters worse, she remembered what his brother Rafe had suggested to the family earlier this morning.

  So it was easy to conclude that Savannah’s hospital visit hadn’t been a coincidence. In fact, Rafe had set it into motion when he’d run into her at the grocery store earlier today.

  It hadn’t taken much of a leap for Leah to realize that, even if Javier had made it sound as if he and Savannah were merely friends, that hadn’t always been the case. At one time, they must have been more involved than that.

  As Leah took a seat behind the desk, she had to admit that she didn’t like the idea of Javier having a girlfriend, which meant that her feelings had grown to the point that they bordered on that fine line between sympathetic and inappropriate.

  Bordered? She was afraid that she might have crossed the line already, and that she was more attracted to her patient than a nurse ought to be.

  So the way she saw it, she would either have to request a transfer to another floor or fight her feelings so she wouldn’t compromise her professional ethics.

  With the dilemma still weighing on her mind, she reached for a chart belonging to another of her patients and tried to pretend she was busy. Yet even though she studied the paperwork in front of her, her thoughts were a million miles away.

  Okay, so they weren’t all that far away. They were just down the hall, with Javier and the attractive blonde who’d come to visit him. A frown slowly stretched across her face as she realized she had no one to blame for her green-eyed uneasiness but herself.

  For some reason, while he’d been on the third floor at San Antonio General, she’d come to think of him as…

  Well, unattached, she supposed. And even pondering his romantic status had been the first hint that her interest in him was out of line.

  So now what? Should she request a transfer to either the obstetric or pediatric ward? That might help.

  Trouble was, Javier’s mood lifted whenever she was around. And Margie Graybill, who worked the night shift, had told his family that Javier never cracked a smile, no matter how hard she tried to coax one out of him.

  “You must have a special touch,” Javier’s father had said to Leah the other day. “His attitude is much better whenever you’re on duty.”

  She liked to think that she had managed to reach him when other nurses hadn’t. So if she was one of a few who had the ability to draw him out of his somber mood, how could she ask for a transfer?

  What kind of nurse would she be if she gave up on her patient when he needed her most?

  Leah had lucked out. She’d finished the rest of her shift without having to go back into Javier’s room. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t aware of who went in or came out.

  Savannah had left the hospital shortly after she’d arrived, which had pleased Leah more than it should have, especially since she’d made up her mind to maintain a professional attitude when it came to Javier. But there wasn’t anything remotely professional about the rush of relief she’d felt when the blonde had left his room after only a few minutes—five or six at the most.

  Leah glanced at her wristwatch, realizing it was about time for the shift change. Thank goodness she didn’t have to work tomorrow. Taking a break from her handsome patient would help tremendously. She’d shake those inappropriate thoughts and feelings that surfaced whenever she was near him.

  As she opened the last patient’s chart and prepared to make a note before leaving the hospital for the next couple of days, Leanne Beattie, the nurse’s aide who delivered meals to the third floor, said, “The guy in three-fourteen doesn’t seem to like anything we serve him.”

  The guy in 314 was Javier.

  Leah glanced up from the note she was writing, “What do you mean?”

  “Well, he hasn’t eaten much of anything today. He didn’t touch his breakfast and only picked at his lunch. As far as I can tell, he left everything except the chocolate ice cream on his dinner tray. So I thought I should mention it.”

  “Thanks, Leanne. Loss of appetite is a side effect of one of the new medications he’s on, so I’ll be sure to tell his doctor.”

  Of course, the depression his family had been concerned about might also contribute to him not eating, although Leah wasn’t convinced that they were right. Whatever was bothering him only seemed to flare up when he had visitors.

  But either way, she’d like to see him start eating better. He was going to need his strength when he moved to the rehab unit and his physical therapy became more vigorous than it was now.

  On her drive home that night, she thought about her own dinner and what she’d like to eat. For the most part, she avoided red meat, fats and processed foods. But she’d had the munchies ever since she’d left Savannah and Javier alone in his room, so she decided to give in to temptation and pick up a cheeseburger and fries.

  She didn’t allow herself those kinds of indulgences very often, but she figured the fast food would be filling—and it was better than fixing herself a salad with low-fat dressing, then po
pping open the freezer and wolfing down the rest of a carton of rocky road ice cream, which was what she’d probably end up doing when the veggies didn’t hit the spot.

  And on a night like this, she didn’t think a salad was going to be enough to hold back temptation.

  As she pulled into the drive-through of her favorite fast-food restaurant, she realized that people sometimes craved foods that they’d grown up eating. There were days when nothing else would do the trick.

  At that thought, a game plan began to unfold.

  She didn’t have to work tomorrow. Why not take lunch to Javier? She could pick up something tasty that was a change from the usual hospital fare he’d been served. Maybe that would spark his appetite and entice him to eat a full meal.

  So the next morning, after cleaning her small apartment, she took a shower and slipped into her favorite jeans and the new black sweater Aunt Connie had given her for her birthday. Then, after applying a little makeup, brushing out her hair and pulling it back in a ponytail, she drove to the most popular Mexican restaurant in Red Rock, which Jose and Maria Mendoza owned.

  Jose was related to Javier’s father, Luis, although Leah wasn’t entirely sure of the exact connection. They might be cousins, she supposed. Either way, it was probably safe to assume the entire Mendoza clan spent a good deal of time eating at Red.

  Actually, she was surprised that none of Javier’s relatives had come up with the idea before. But she wouldn’t think about that now. Instead, she would surprise him by taking him lunch.

  At a few minutes after eleven, Leah arrived at Red and parked her car out front. So far, not many people had gathered, but she knew it was only a matter of time before the lunch crowd would begin to roll in.

  She’d only eaten at the restaurant once before, and that was several years ago. But she’d been impressed by the historic building, which had once been a hacienda.

  The Mendozas had done a great job decorating with nineteenth-century photographs, antiques and Southwestern artwork that lined the walls.