Chapter 1

Alexandra Cortez Winslow was seven years old, with long straight black hair, creamy white skin, and big green eyes, which she had squeezed shut as she lay facedown on her bed, trying not to listen to her parents argue. Sometimes their fights lasted for hours. They always ended with a door slamming, and then her father would come up to see her in her bedroom and tell her everything was fine.

They had been arguing for an hour this time, and Alex could hear her mother screaming. She had a hot Latin temper, and Alex could remember her parents’ arguments for as long as she’d been alive. They had gotten worse in the last year or two, and afterward her mother would be gone for a few days, or a few weeks sometimes, and everything would be quiet for a while when she came back. And then it would start again, like tonight. Her mother had said at dinner that she wanted to go to Miami for a few days to see friends, her father had reminded her unhappily that she’d just been there, and then they sent Alex upstairs. Her mother didn’t care who heard them fight, but her father always sent Alex to her room. She put her pillows over her head as she tried not to listen, but you could hear them all over the house. They lived in a residential neighborhood of Boston, and sometimes Alex’s friends next door said they could hear them too. Her mother did most of the shouting, and threw things sometimes, while Alex’s father tried to calm her down before she broke something or one of the neighbors called the police. That hadn’t happened yet, but he was afraid that one day it might.

Carmen Cortez and Eric Winslow had met in Miami when he was there on a business trip. He was the head of a construction firm that built office buildings and specialized in banks. He was there for a job they were bidding on, and had gone to dinner alone at a lively restaurant on the first night of his trip. He had seen a group of attractive young people walk in, and heard them speaking Spanish when they sat down at a table next to his, and a spectacular-looking young woman had instantly caught his eye. Sensing him watching her, she had glanced over and smiled at him. He was a goner after that.

Eric was a sensible man with a quiet life. He had been married to a college professor who had died of breast cancer two years before, after putting up a noble fight. They had no children, and had made a conscious decision not to have any, due to health problems his wife had had all her life. They had never been unhappy about their decision, and accepted it as a reasonable choice for them.

He had done well at his job over the years, Barbara enjoyed her work teaching American history at Boston University, and they loved their home, which felt too large for him without her. He had expected them to spend their golden years together and hadn’t anticipated being widowed at forty-eight. That hadn’t been in their plan, and once she was gone, he felt like a marble in a shoebox, rolling around, lost at home, as he sat alone reading in his den every night. Everything seemed so meaningless without her. He traveled for business frequently, but there was no one to come home to, no one to tell about the projects he was working on, and he had thought this trip to Miami would be no different. The silence in the house would be deafening when he got back. Their housekeeper, Elena, still came in several times a week and prepared meals she left for him in the freezer, and he put them in the microwave when he got home from work. He had no family, no siblings, no children, and he felt like a fifth wheel now with their friends, and spent most of his nights and weekends alone. His only pleasure and distraction were the crime thrillers he loved to read. He had a bookcase full of them.

He was surprised when a live salsa band started playing at the restaurant during dinner the night he met Carmen, and even more so when she got up and invited him to dance. She was wearing a short, low-cut red dress that clung to her perfect body, and she told him that she was a model and occasional actress. She had come from Cuba at eighteen four years before. They danced for a few minutes, and then with a warm smile she went back to her friends. He had no idea what had gotten into him when he agreed to dance with her, it was unlike him, but she was so dazzling that when she walked over to him, he couldn’t decline. She concentrated on her friends after that, and he noticed that they laughed a lot, and he felt faintly ridiculous, but he gave her his business card when he left the restaurant, and told her where he was staying in Miami. He was certain that a woman as vivacious and young as Carmen would never call him.

“If you ever come to Boston…” he said, thinking of how foolish he sounded. He was twenty-eight years older than she was, more than twice her age. He realized full well how old he must seem to her and her friends, but he had never met another woman as exciting in his life. She had black hair and green eyes, light olive skin, a tan, and a flawless body. He thought of her all night, and was stunned when she called him at the hotel the next morning, before he left for a meeting. He invited her to dinner, and she told him where to meet her, and he was obsessed with images of her all day.

She looked fabulous when he saw her at the restaurant, wearing a short black dress and high heels. They went dancing after dinner, and then to a bar she suggested, and they talked until four A.M. He was fascinated by her. She explained to him that she was a trade show model, and had dreams of going to L.A. or New York for a big acting career. And in the meantime, since arriving from Havana, she had worked as a waitress, a model, a bartender, and a disco dancer to make ends meet. She spoke excellent English, with an accent, and he thought she was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen. He was leaving for Boston the next day, but he said if his firm got the Miami project, he’d be back in town frequently. In the end, he returned to Miami two weeks later, just to see her. They had a fantastic weekend, and within a month, he was head over heels in love, and totally besotted with her. It seemed foolish at his age, but he didn’t care.

Eric took Carmen to restaurants she had heard of but never been to, and they went for long walks on the beach. And on the second weekend he came to visit her, she stayed at his hotel with him. Eric was a handsome man, with a trim, athletic physique, and she said she wasn’t bothered by his age. He was aware of her financial struggles and offered to help her, but she always thanked him and declined. His firm didn’t get the project that they’d bid on in Miami, but three months after they started dating, in a moment of impulsive madness totally uncharacteristic of him, Eric asked Carmen to marry him. And she accepted.

They were married by a justice of the peace in Miami. Although her mother couldn’t leave Havana, a handful of Carmen’s friends were present, and he had arranged for a wedding dinner at the Fontainebleau Hotel, which Carmen loved. At the end of the weekend, Carmen took her three suitcases full of everything she owned and flew to Boston with him for the first time. When they arrived, he carried his exotic bride over the threshold into a world that was totally unfamiliar to her. Her first months were acute culture shock. The weather was cold and gray, and it snowed frequently, which she hated. She was cold all the time, bored while he was at work, and missed her friends. He took her to Miami after a few months to see her pals. They were all envious of her comfortable new life, although dubious about his age. And six months after they were married, Eric and Carmen were both surprised when they discovered she was pregnant. It was an accident, but after careful thought, Eric felt it was a fortuitous one. Having children had never been an option with Barbara’s health, but now the idea of a baby delighted him, and he hoped it would be a son to carry on his name. He would teach him to play baseball since he was an avid sports fan, and take him to games. He might even coach him in Little League. He thought a baby would help to bond Carmen to him, since she still felt out of place in his conservative Boston world and had no friends of her own there. She didn’t like his friends and found them boring, so they spent their time with each other.

Carmen was considerably less excited about the baby than he was, and didn’t feel ready for motherhood at twenty-two. It would shelve her modeling career for a year, although she hadn’t been able to get work in Boston, and she had nothing to do all day. Eventually she watched Spanish soap operas on TV until Eric got home from work, and waited for the baby to arrive. It was due in February. And having convinced each other it was a boy, they decorated the nursery in blue. Eric could hardly contain himself he was so excited, and bought a box of cigars to hand out on the big day.

Alexandra was born on the night of a blizzard in Boston. The delivery was worse than anything Carmen had imagined, and than he had feared. The doctor said it was normal for a first labor to be lengthy, and for the delivery to be as rough as it was. Carmen didn’t even want to see the baby once it was born. Eric had been in the delivery room with her, and there was a shocked silence when the doctor announced that it was a girl. It took Eric several hours to get over his disappointment, but once he held her, he fell in love with his daughter. Carmen was heavily sedated and asleep by then, and she didn’t adjust to the baby as easily as he did. Their housekeeper, Elena, took care of Alexandra when they got home, and all Carmen could talk about was getting her figure back and going to Miami to see her friends. She hadn’t been in months, since Eric didn’t want her traveling in the last stages of the pregnancy.

Going to a local gym every day and dieting, and as young as she was, Carmen got her figure back quickly, and when Alexandra was three months old, Carmen went to Miami for three days and stayed two weeks, partying with her friends. But she was in much better spirits when she got back. Eric and Elena took care of the baby while she was away.

She made regular trips to Florida every month after that, even worked a couple of trade shows while she was there, and left the baby with Eric. She still had no friends in Boston, and their life was too boring and traditional for her. It became rapidly obvious to him that motherhood wasn’t Carmen’s strong suit. All she wanted was to be in Miami with her friends. And when Alex was a year old, Eric discovered that Carmen was having an affair with a male dancer in Miami. He was from Puerto Rico, and she was tearful about it when she confessed and promised it wouldn’t happen again.

She had several slips in spite of that and committed numerous indiscretions over the years. She was lonely in Boston, she thought Eric’s life was tedious and dull, and so was he. Despite Carmen’s behavior, he did everything possible to keep the marriage together, for the child’s sake as well as his. He was still very taken with his wife in the early years, until it finally dawned on him when Alex was three years old that Carmen was never going to settle down and didn’t love him. She might stay with him for practical reasons, and the perks of his lifestyle, but she wasn’t in love with him. Eric’s worst fear was that she would take the child and leave him, and he didn’t want to lose Alex, or even share custody. He knew that if Carmen left him and took Alex to Miami, it would be an unsavory life for a little girl, among Carmen’s loosely behaved friends. Alex was his daughter and he wanted her to live a wholesome, traditional life, not the haphazard, dubious one her mother engaged in as soon as she went back to her old familiar world.

The only way Eric managed to keep the marriage together was by letting Carmen do what she wanted, come and go as she pleased, and he turned a blind eye to her affairs, although he could always tell when there was a new man in her life. She spent all her time on the phone, smiling happily when she got calls from him.

Their fights were fierce and legendary when she was back in town. She drank too much when he took her to business parties, and flirted with every man in sight. She was a very badly behaved young woman, but strikingly beautiful, and every head turned when she walked into a room with him. There was a certain pride for Eric in being with her, but she was a wild free spirit he knew he would never tame, and could barely keep. She flew off at will and returned when it suited her, and neglected their child. She never asked to take Alex with her on her trips to Miami. Carmen was happy to leave her with her father, and he was relieved.

Alex was growing up listening to them fighting, or alone with her father when her mother was away. Eric took wonderful care of her, with Elena’s help. The housekeeper was like a loving grandmother to the child. She strongly disapproved of Carmen, and spoke to her harshly in Spanish. She spoke Spanish to Alex as well, as did Carmen. Alex was fully bilingual by the time she was three, and an adorable, loving child. She adored her father and loved her mother, but she also knew that she couldn’t rely on her mother. She could always count on him.

Eric took Alex to school in the morning, and Elena picked her up after school, even when Carmen was in town, while she went shopping, got her nails done, or spent hours on the phone with her friends in Florida. It was as though she wasn’t really there when she was in Boston with them. Alex tried to do little things for her mother, to make her happy, so they wouldn’t fight as much, but it never changed anything. Sometimes Alex thought that if she tried to be really, really good, her mother wouldn’t get so mad at them, but she did anyway. It was obvious even to Alex that her mother hated being there.

The fight that had driven Alex to hide under her pillows was no different from all the others, but it took a long time for the arguing to stop, and finally she heard the familiar door slam that meant it was over for now. She had seen her mother pack a suitcase that afternoon, and could guess where she was going. And a few minutes later, her father came up the stairs and opened the door to her room. It was still painted pale blue, and she knew why. Her father had told her that he had been foolish enough to want a little boy before she was born, and had no idea then how lucky he was to have a little girl instead.

He had started taking her to baseball games with him when she was five, and taught her about the players and the rules of the game. She knew more about baseball than most boys did, and he had been pitching balls to her in the backyard for years. He bragged to his friends that she was a good little hitter, had great hand-eye coordination, could hit a ball harder than any kid, and had an amazing pitching arm.

Eric always read to her at night before she went to sleep. He was addicted to spy stories and crime thrillers, and he encouraged Alex to read in her spare time. They’d been through all the classic stories for children her age, Charlotte’s Web, Stuart Little, the Winnie-the-Pooh books when she was younger, and Anne of Green Gables. He had recently started her on Nancy Drew books, although she was a little young for them, but she loved them. Reading was her escape from the tension between her parents and her mother’s bad moods. Books were her friends.

She was already on her second Nancy Drew book, and her father read her a chapter every night. She loved the mysteries Nancy solved, and how keenly observant she was.

“Ready for some Nancy Drew?” he asked with a smile as he walked into the room and Alex emerged from under her pillows with tousled hair and wide eyes, and nodded.

“Did she go away?” Alex asked in a constricted voice.

“She’ll be back in a few days,” he said reassuringly. Alex knew that was true, although she always worried that one day she might not come home. Her mother was a difficult person, she got angry a lot, and she didn’t like reading stories or playing games, but she was still her mother, and sometimes she put nail polish on Alex’s toes, which she liked a lot. Once her mother had put gold polish on her, and she had taken off her socks and showed her friends at school.

Eric took out the book from the bookcase in Alex’s room, and they settled onto her bed next to each other, against the pillows. They had started with The Hidden Staircase, and he told Alex they were written a long time ago, but were still very good. They were reading The Secret at Shadow Ranch now, which Alex was really enjoying. She loved the way her father read them to her, with lots of drama in his voice. He made the story sound really exciting.

He put an arm around her as they sat on the bed, and they read two chapters before she had to go to sleep. She had school the next day. As he finished reading, Alex looked up at him with her big green eyes.

“Do you think she’ll call from Miami?”

“I’m not sure,” he said honestly. Carmen was hard to predict, and sometimes she seemed to forget them entirely. Most often she did.

“Was she really mad when she left?” Alex asked softly, worried. He nodded, trying not to look upset about it, but she knew he was. It was like living on the side of a volcano, and hard on them both.

“Do you want to go to spring training with me?” he asked, to distract her. It was fun going on trips with him, and he had taken her to the Red Sox’s spring training once before. She nodded and smiled at him.

She changed into her pajamas, brushed her teeth, got into bed, and he tucked her in, kissed her, turned off the light, and then stood in the doorway for a minute.

“Everything’s going to be all right, Alex. It always is. Mommy will be happy when she comes home.” But not for long, Alex knew only too well. “Sleep tight, I love you,” he said, as he did every night.

“I love you too, Daddy,” she said, and closed her eyes, thinking of Nancy Drew and the mystery she was trying to solve in the book they’d read that night. Nancy Drew was so smart, and always figured everything out, as if she had magical powers. Alex wished she had those same powers to know when her mother would come back. Maybe by the time they finished reading the book.