Page 31 of 4 Weddings and a Feud

“No, I…I’m not going there.”

“Oh?Ohh.” Her eyes widened. “You’re meeting Violette?” She grimaced. “Or someone else?”

“No. No!” As easy as it would’ve been, everything in him rebelled at the thought of Mary thinking he was leaving her for another woman. His shoulders slumped. “It’s my mother.”

ChapterThirteen

“Whoa. Fancy,” Mary said after Alex flashed his key card at the sensor and beckoned her through the door into the nicest lobby she’d ever seen—and she’d visited a lot of high-end hotels in her hometown.

Alex said nothing. Fair. He didn’t want her here. He’d made that clear through his silence as he’d gripped the limo’s steering wheel. But after he’d told her why he needed to get to the nursing facility in the suburbs, she’d needed to come. Why? That was complicated. He probably thought it was curiosity. That she wanted to witness how far his snooty mom had fallen. But she didn’t think it was that, or at least, it wasn’t all that.

She’d come here for Alex. For the terrified look in his eyes after he’d gotten that call. He looked like he needed a friend. And that’s what she was. Even though she’d felt like a whole lot more when he’d held her in his arms outside the jazz club. Around women, he had one setting—smolder—and he couldn’t turn it off.

Friends,she reminded herself. She cared about him, and she couldn’t let him go alone to check on his mom late at night.

Though, from the tension in his shoulders, he probably would’ve preferred it.

She sympathized with the person whose job it was to keep all this white marble tile clean as they passed a couple of seating areas. Vases of cheery flowers brightened the dimly lit space, which must get fantastic light during the day from the large windows. Soothing landscapes and still-life paintings adorned the wood-paneled walls.

“Evening, Kim.” Alex stopped at the desk, which looked nothing like a hospital counter. It looked like the one in his office, a regular wood office desk with a bouquet of daisies in a vase. “I have a guest tonight.”

“Good evening.” The white woman smiled at her. “Could I see your ID, please?”

Mary handed it over, and the receptionist used a tablet to scan it before handing it back. “Go right ahead, Mr. Villa.”

He stepped around the desk to the elevator doors. When he scanned his keycard at the pad, the door slid open. Inside, he scanned his card again and pressed the top button. The silence stretched long between them on the ride up to the sixth floor. A million questions tickled the tip of Mary’s tongue, but she held them back. Alex would speak when he was ready.

The elevator doors opened, and she stepped through into a hallway that could’ve belonged in any hotel in the city except for the faint scent of disinfectant. The marble, wood paneling, and artwork continued here, and there was another vase of flowers on a table at the end of the hallway. God, the florist bill in this place!

Doors lined the hallway. She jogged to keep up as Alex strode down the hall to the last one on the right. He paused before it, his head bowed.

“She’s changed a lot since you knew her. Some of it’s because of my dad. A lot of it’s because of the stroke she had a few years ago.”

A stroke. Of course. She remembered the crooked smile in the photo on Alex’s desk. When he paused for several seconds, she asked, “Will she remember me?”

Shoving his hands into his pants pockets, he kept his face averted. “There’s nothing wrong with her memory. Though she gets confused sometimes. In addition to the physical effects, her emotions are heightened. And when she gets emotional, they call me. I can usually calm her down.”

Remembering how frail his mother looked in the photo on Alex’s desk, she said, “I imagine her physical symptoms are frustrating. She was always so strong.”

He finally looked at her. “Strong? I don’t think I’d have used that word, even back then. Proud and opinionated, yes. But none of us were strong. Not like you.”

He squared his shoulders and faced the door. This time, he didn’t scan his card, but he looked into a scanner mounted on the wall. The lock clicked, and he walked through, holding the door for her.

The inside didn’t look like any hospital room Mary had ever been in. It looked like an apartment, and not one Mary could afford. She passed a small kitchen on one side and a powder room on the other before the wide entry hall opened to a spacious living room with a six-person dining table at one end.

Alex followed the sounds of voices—one soothing, one sobbing—into a bedroom that was larger than Mary’s living room. The sheets on the bed were rumpled, and all the lights were on. A tiny figure hunched in an armchair; she buried her face in her hands as her shoulders shook. An Asian woman in black scrubs sat in the other chair, her hand on Mrs. Villa’s back, murmuring softly. The nurse looked up, a relieved expression on her face, when she saw Alex.

“Look who’s here, Mrs. Villa,” she said. “It’s your son.”

Although deep grooves surrounded her mouth and eyes, Mrs. Villa was still beautiful. Her long blond hair was now white and stuck up on one side of her head. She wore a light pink satin robe belted over matching pajamas. When she looked up, tears streamed down her face.

“Alessandro, tell these people I want to go home.” Despite the waver in her voice, the imperious tone reminded Mary of the orders she used to bark at Alex when they were teenagers.

He dropped to his knees in front of her. “Mama, you know there’s no home to go back to. We lost it years ago.”

Lost it?What was he talking about?

“I mean your place. You always took such good care of me. Not like these people.” She looked down her nose at the nurse, who snatched her hand off her back.

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