Do Not Become Alarmed(44)

“Buenas noches,” she said.

The man smiled at her. He was missing a tooth. “El terremoto,” he said. “Has sentido?”

“Perdón?” she said. Was he asking if she’d heard something?

“Terremoto,” he said. “Has sentido?”

“No.”

He smiled. “Air-quick.” They had stood the carpet on its rolled end, and he made a motion with his free hand, moving his fist back and forth. “Air-quick.”

She frowned.

“No ha sentido,” the woman said.

“No has sentido?” the man asked, still smiling.

Nora shook her head. She hadn’t heard a thing. Except his weird questions.

When she got back to the hotel room, Raymond opened the door in a bathrobe. “Where’d you go?” he asked.

“Just walking. I couldn’t sleep.”

“You can’t disappear on me. I was about to come looking.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Did you feel the earthquake?”

“When?”

“Just now.”

“Oh!” she said, sinking to the bed. “That’s what they were saying. They asked if I’d felt it.”

“It was long,” Raymond said.

“I thought this maintenance guy was making an obscene gesture,” she said.

“What gesture?”

She made the jerking-off move. “He kept saying, ‘Air-quick.’ I was so confused. But he was miming an earthquake.”

“Maybe,” Raymond said, doubtful.

“No, he was.”

“That was a serious earthquake. I can’t believe you didn’t feel it.”

“I’m kind of distracted.” She felt a cold ache in her stomach as she said it, because it sounded like she was implying that he should be so distracted, too, as if it were a competition. But he didn’t have all the reasons she did.

“What’s up with you and Liv?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

“Really?”

She nodded.

He tried to put his arms around her, but she hopped up from the bed.

“I can’t,” she said. “Not with the kids gone. I just—can’t.” She moved toward the bathroom, the only private space in this claustrophobic, airless hotel room. She couldn’t stand to be looked at.

“What do you want from me?” Raymond asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

She closed the door and sat on the edge of the tub, trying to breathe.





24.



ISABEL WAS NOT tracking time well. She kept losing chunks of it. Somehow she was in her bed downstairs in the house, but she didn’t remember getting there. She could see Marcus and June in the other bed, their heads sticking out over the covers. Isabel felt protected by their presence, even though that was stupid.

She fell asleep and dreamed of the river, of floating on the inner tube. In her dream, she tried to swim back upstream after Hector, but the current was too strong. It was impossible to make headway.

Then someone was shaking her awake. She scrambled back in fear, but it was only the housekeeper, Maria, whispering urgently in Spanish. Then Maria moved to shake Marcus and June in the other bed, whispering to them to be very quiet, to follow her. Isabel tried to stand. She could feel the pain between her legs. It stung.

Penny and Sebastian were in the entryway, rubbing their eyes.

“Where are we going?” Penny asked.

“A mi casa,” Maria whispered. She unlocked the deadbolt with the key around her neck and guided the little ones outside.

Then June’s high, piercing voice cried, “The bunny!”

Isabel froze. So did Maria. They stood listening to the quiet night. But no footsteps came running.

“I’ll go get it,” Isabel whispered, and she stepped back in and closed the door, in case June made any more noise. This was a moment for decision. Was it smart to run off with the housekeeper? George was supposed to be her rescuer, her protector. He had beaten his brother in the fight for them. He had a plan. And now Maria was going to mess it up.

Barefoot, she climbed the stairs to the main floor, then climbed the second flight to the third floor, where the brothers slept. Everything was quiet. She tiptoed past the old man’s empty bedroom.

She listened at the next door, then pushed it open. There was the big framed baseball poster on the wall. George’s cap hung on a chair. His head was dark on the pillow. If she woke him and told him Maria was stealing the children, he would be grateful.

But what would he do to Maria? And what was his plan? Maybe Maria stealing the children was his plan, and Isabel was messing it up. She was back on the third floor, when she shouldn’t be.

She would count to ten, and if George woke up, it would be a sign that she should stay. She began to count silently. One, two, three—

She got to ten and he slept on.

She would count to ten one more time. Just in case. One, two three—

He didn’t wake up.

She tiptoed back down the two flights to her room and found the bunny huddled between the pillows of June’s bed, in the tumbled covers. She scooped it up and went outside, to find Maria actually wringing her hands.