Faith in the Flesh Read online

  An Ellora’s Cave Romantica Publication

  www.ellorascave.com

  Faith in the Flesh

  ISBN 9781419916991

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

  Faith in the Flesh Copyright © 2008 Maria Isabel Pita

  Edited by Ann Leveille.

  Cover art by Syneca.

  Electronic book Publication July 2008

  With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502.

  Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000. (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/). Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted material. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the authors’ imagination and used fictitiously.

  Faith in the Flesh

  Maria Isabel Pita

  Trademarks Acknowledgment

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Barbie: Mattel, Inc.

  BBC World News: The British Broadcasting Corporation

  Bombay Sapphire: Bacardi & Company Limited

  Coke: The Coca-Cola Company Corporation

  Dockers: Levi Strauss and Co.

  Ford Taurus: Ford Motor Company

  Styrofoam: Dow Chemical Company

  Velcro: Velcro Industries B.V.

  Chapter One

  I realized what I had missed most about Miami was the sky. Up in Boston’s North End, where I had lived for over five years, the sky is often a deeply depressing gray trapped between stone buildings dark with age. I kept leaning over the black steering wheel of the burgundy Ford Taurus I had rented at the airport, my snow-clouded vision hungrily drinking in the radiant south Florida sky. A sky the same clear blue color of my last boyfriend’s eyes…but I definitely didn’t want to think about him.

  It was over between me and my most recent ex. He seemed a real treasure at first but he’d turned out to be no more than a very good imitation of a man. Ever since I had left him I’d been experiencing much more relief than sadness. For a brief time we’d shared a passion for the outdoors, and climbed more than one mountain together, but a hiking buddy is one thing and a husband is another. Ever since I was a little girl I had believed I was destined to experience a love that would take me to unimagined heights inside.

  I was still searching for that Mount Everest of passions, refusing to settle for anything less. I had come to prefer my own company to being with the wrong man, which I had discovered was infinitely worse than being alone. When you’re by yourself you can be entirely yourself instead of struggling to fit into the often mysteriously cramped space of someone else’s particular predilections and perceptions. The man I kept dreaming of would appreciate all of me, in every sense. I was sure of this—he would treasure every idiosyncrasy of my personality along with the unique curves of my flesh and I would never have to pretend with him about anything.

  In all my previous relationships I invariably compromised, restructuring my thoughts and feelings in little ways that did not seem significant in themselves but after the inevitable breakup, when I added them all up, the result was always the same—a relationship and a routine at odds with my deepest being, which continued stubbornly expressing itself through dreams of true love. I had learned that being with the wrong man was like sitting down to a meal lacking in so many vital ingredients and spices that it was more frustrating for me than fulfilling.

  I was fasting again, in between boyfriends, driving down 37th Avenue in sunny south Florida at ten o’clock in the morning. The city had changed a little since I left it shortly after graduating from Florida International University with a bachelor’s degree in fine arts. Numerous tall condo buildings had sprung up on the highly coveted border between Miami, one of the poorest cities in the nation, and Coral Gables, which costs as many dollars to live in as there are leaves on its beautiful old trees. I idly wondered exactly how much people were paying for those glorified bee hives, most of which were painted what appeared to be the city’s most popular legally approved pastel color, a shade somewhere between yellow and orange. The new buildings had all grown quickly up out of the concrete, satisfying a growing demand for homes that dreamed of being lusciously desirable tropical fruits worth sinking your financial teeth into.

  Momentarily stopped at a traffic light, I flipped down the visor, slipped off my leopard-skin designer sunglasses and quickly examined my face. It was mid-May and already stunningly hot outside. I had quickly switched on the engine and cranked up the air-conditioner in the parking lot of the rental office but the oven-like temperature inside the car when I first got in had taken its toll on my makeup. My black eyeliner had pooled at the corners of my honey-brown eyes and my nose already needed another dusting of clear powder. The air-conditioner’s delicious arctic breeze caressed my shoulder-length hair but just the short walk from the rental office to the car had aroused rebellious waves in its dark brown fullness. I remembered one thing I didn’t miss about Miami—the often one-hundred-percent humidity.

  I plucked a tissue out of my black leather purse, dabbed delicately at the corners of my eyes, thrust the tissue into my purse again, slipped my sunglasses back on, flipped up the visor and accelerated beneath the green light. I knew exactly where I was going. I had attended more than one wake at this particular funeral home. This time it was my ninety-three-year-old grandfather’s older sister who had passed away. My great aunt Ana Maria Cabezon had finally joined the angels with all her wits still in her possession at the remarkable age of one-hundred-and-two. She didn’t leave a wheelchair behind, only the elegant cane she’d used to get around her little house and to walk up and down Coral Way, where she did all her shopping and banking until the day of the night she went to sleep forever.

  The small parking lot behind the funeral home was full of cars but I miraculously managed to find a spot. I shut off the engine, dropped the rental key into my purse and quickly opened the door. I was suddenly excited about seeing my family again, especially since I knew they couldn’t be too annoyingly loud and boisterous inside a funeral home. One thing living up in Boston had done was reinforce my awareness, initially instilled in me by my soft-spoken American father, of just how loud Cubans can be when they get together. Except Dad, whom Mami had divorced years ago, I imagined absolutely everyone I was related to would be at the wake, and so would their friends and their friends’ friends and so on. Cubans seem to love funerals almost as much as weddings.

  * * * * *

  John watched the burgundy Taurus make a sharp daredevil turn into the parking lot. Definitely a woman driver, he thought to himself, smiling as he squinted out at the rows of cars shining in the sunlight. He had just stepped outside for a moment to enjoy a refreshing breath of the hot, humid air that challenged his lungs almost like a mouthful of water and felt wonderful. He hated the artificial cold and shadow-draped stillness of the funeral home behind him.

  He observed the door of the burgundy Ford opening and then a cool white high-heeled shoe
stepping onto the burning-hot black asphalt. His squint deepened appreciatively as he followed the leg up and up to a black skirt enticingly cut at mid-thigh. Nice… Mm, very nice, he thought, thrusting his hands deep into the pockets of his black pants as he watched the woman walking toward him. She appeared to be somewhere in her twenties yet there was a mature gravity to her confident, unhurried stride that appealed to him. A classical nose held up a pair of sunglasses with leopard print handles—two impenetrably dark pools above a mouth like a flower in full bloom. In his opinion it took a truly beautiful woman to wear bright red lipstick without looking cheap and this woman was beautiful, no doubt about that. Her dark hair, parted dramatically on one side, flowed down in a long, deep wave that nearly covered one of her eyes. Being a film noir movie buff, John immediately compared her to a brunette Veronica Lake and suddenly he was in absolutely no hurry to leave the funeral home. He leaned back against the glass door and stepped back inside.

  * * * * *

  I saw the man in the black suit step back inside the building. He had been standing in front of the back door, tall and motionless as a shadow cast by a lamppost except for his visibly broad shoulders. I felt him watching me as I approached but apparently he didn’t find me very interesting since he didn’t bother to wait for me to reach him before vanishing back inside, and his indifference made me somewhat cross.

  For Christ’s sake, Ariana, I thought, you’re at a funeral home, not a nightclub! I seemed to be in the habit of mentally scolding myself lately. I hoped this meant I was developing an increasingly healthy objectivity toward my thoughts and feelings.

  The white silk tank top I was wearing beneath a black cotton jacket was clinging to my perspiring skin by the time I made it into the building. In the dim light and chilly atmosphere, people walked across the plush carpet in front of me with the slow, silent grace of fish swimming deep underwater where the sun’s light barely reaches. I shivered, sensing a depth of grief surrounding me I knew could not possibly be coming from the room in which my aunt was lying. The almost palpable current of sorrow possessed an undertow of tragedy. It was flowing out from one of the other viewing rooms, and a quick glance in as I walked past told me it was full of young people. No wonder.

  “It’s Ani! Ani’s here!” My mother’s hushed cries steered me in the right direction.

  “Hola, Mami!” I had to bend over slightly to hug my blonde, reassuringly tender, mother. “Ay, Mami,it’s so good to see you again!” I sighed. It had been too long since I experienced the sweet comfort of resting my head against the breasts that had suckled me nearly thirty years ago.

  “Ani, mi amor, you look beautiful! Look, Elsa, Ariana’s here!”

  “My God, it can’t be!” Elsa, my mother’s best friend since childhood, exclaimed as quietly as she possibly could. “Look at her! She looks so sophisticated!”

  And so began the endless introductions and re-introductions in what for Cubans were painfully hushed voices. I had never been able to get all my relatives straight in my head and I didn’t bother trying to do so now. There were cousins and nieces and aunts and nephews and great versions of all of those plus a few great, great ones, and then there were the countless friends that went all the way back to the Thirties in Cuba, which practically made them family. There were so many people attending my great aunt’s funeral that they were forced to mill out in the lobby and take turns paying their respects in the room where the body lay. It would have been impossible for me to actually greet everyone and I somehow managed to reach my grandfather without being intercepted. He was attended by the court of his closest relatives, sitting enthroned in a chair beside the flower-bedecked casket.

  “Abuelito,” I said tenderly, genuflecting beside him. As always his thin, tall frame was impeccably dressed. When I was a little girl he always seemed like an old movie come to life, from the wide-brimmed black hat resting on his frail lap down to his silver-studded cane, he was the picture of elegance.

  “Ay, Ani!” He sighed deeply. “You have to have faith!” He lifted one of his arms and wrapped it briefly around me in a frail embrace. “You just have to have faith, Ani,” he repeated, shaking his head sadly.

  “I know, abuelito, I know.” I kissed his cool, paper-dry cheek tenderly. “I’ll be back,” I promised and, straightening up, I crossed my hands over my womb and went to stand over the casket for a respectful moment. I was glad it was closed. I would much rather remember my great aunt gesturing passionately with her hands, her black eyes glowing with memories as she told one of her endless stories.

  Aware that almost all the eyes in the room were on me, I crossed myself then turned and walked with the slow elegance of a model down a runway to let all my curious relatives get a good look at me. My mother Rosa was still standing near the entrance of the room, engaged now in a quietly intense conversation with Ernesto, an editor for El Nuevo Herald.

  “Hola, Ernesto,” I said, smiling.

  “Ani!” He smiled at me warmly. He and my mother had known each other since I was a little girl. “How are you, young lady? You look stunning.”

  “I’m great, thank you,” I replied somewhat truthfully and bent to whisper in Rosa’s ear, “I’m going to grab a coffee, Mami. I only had one cup on the plane down from Boston. “

  “Oh please!” She shooed away the disgusting thought. “That dirty water they call coffee? Go have some real coffee and then hurry back. Everyone’s dying to talk to you.”

  “I know.” They all wanted to grill me about my love life to determine if there was a potential husband on the horizon.

  Firmly clutching my purse like my independence, I hurried across the plant-filled lobby. A faint throbbing in my temples was threatening to become a pounding headache if I didn’t get some caffeine into me soon.

  I had almost made it to the little coffee bar at the back of the building when an arm in a black suit suddenly barred my way in. “Allow me,” said a deep, quiet voice.

  I glanced up and met intensely dark-gray eyes. “Thank you…” I felt breathlessly caught by the black holes of his pupils. They seemed to be mysteriously pulling me into them, crushing my ability to think straight.

  He smiled. “My pleasure.”

  Despite the fact that he was invading my personal space by standing so close, I had absolutely no desire to escape the warm gravity of his body as I walked ahead of him into the narrow coffee bar. It was empty except for an old man standing behind the counter wearing a white apron beneath a profoundly indifferent expression.

  I set my purse down on the counter and perched carefully on one of the stools. I didn’t have to look at the man seating himself beside me to be aware of the fact that he had noticed the way my skirt hiked up my thighs when I sat down. Shyly pleased by his attention, I sat up straight and crossed my bare legs. I would not even consider wearing pantyhose in such a hot climate.

  “What are you in the mood for?” the stranger asked me, and the pitch of his voice vibrated across my nerve endings in a strangely wonderful way.

  I hooked one of my high heels into the metal support bar running the length of the counter to brace myself as I glanced at him. His brown hair was cut so short I wondered if he was in the military but I immediately dismissed the possibility. The way he was leaning against the counter was much too sensually relaxed for a soldier. By way of reply I said to the waiter, “Un café con leche y una tostada, por favor.”

  “And a cortadito for me, please.”

  The old man blinked as he absorbed our orders then turned slowly around to begin filling them.

  “We’re going to be here a while,” the handsome stranger remarked, the trace of a smile still warming his lips.

  It pleased me he sounded more amused than impatient. “Yes,” I agreed, primly clasping my hands on the counter, not knowing what else to do with them. I was just a little annoyed by how strangely awkward this man was making me feel. I had dated a considerable number of attractive men in my life so I couldn’t quite understand why this o
ne in particular was having such a profound effect on my physical coordination.

  “Aren’t you going to tell me your name?” he asked when I glanced at him again.

  “Ariana,” I replied, no longer resisting the desire to look straight at him.

  He held out his right hand. “John.”

  I realized my own hands were clenched when I had to pry them apart in order to return his firm grasp. I have always felt you can tell a lot about a person from their handshake and I approved of his so much my heart started beating faster. In that instant I noticed that his slender upper lip rested over a slightly more tender lower lip and they were both surrounded by a five o’clock shadow that struck me as sensually deliberate and that made his smile seem even softer somehow.

  “So.” He turned slightly on his stool to lean back against the wall facing me. “Who died?”

  The offhand way he asked such a momentous question made me snap, “You obviously didn’t lose anyone near and dear to you.”

  “I’m sorry.” He turned toward the counter again abruptly. “I didn’t mean to sound flippant. It’s my defense mechanism against things I don’t feel like dealing with.” His profile took on a serious cast that made him even more strikingly attractive. “I’m working on it, “he added, giving me a rueful sideways smile.

  I immediately regretted my sharp tone. “My great aunt passed away,” I informed him in a mild, forgiving voice. “She was one-hundred-and-two.”

  “Wow.” He glanced up at the ceiling as though trying to see through it and catch a glimpse of the old woman’s incredibly resilient spirit. “Cubans seem to live an amazingly long time,” he observed, studying me soberly.

  “Some of them do, maybe too long. Why are youhere?”

  “The sister of a friend of mine was killed in a car accident.” He turned his head to watch the old man’s ritually slow movements. “She was only eighteen.”