Luis (Royal Caleva #2)

CHAPTER 24

Luis surfaced into wakefulness and wished he hadn’t. It felt like someone had swung a wrecking ball into his abdomen while every other part of his body throbbed with pain of varying degrees. He would swear that even his hair hurt.

He opened his eyes to find himself in a hospital room, connected to an alarming number of blinking machines.

And then memory flooded back.

Eve telling him goodbye. The overwhelming urge to vomit. His legs so painful he couldn’t stand. Eve calling for help before he blacked out.

What the hell had happened to him?

Judging by the number of wires and tubes attached to him, it was something serious. Or they were being extra careful because he was the king. Since he was never ill, it was hard for him to judge.

He glanced around the room to find Raul and Grace asleep in recliners. His heart contracted. If they were in the room, his situation must be worse than he thought. Yet warmth flowed through him to see both his children sitting vigil over him.

Eve was not there, though.

Loss hollowed him out. Had she abandoned him already?

He closed his eyes. A single tear seeped out and trickled into his hair, a sign of weakness he despised, but he couldn’t stop it. He didn’t want to put on a reassuring face for the benefit of his children or a strong, regal mask for the benefit of the medical professionals.

He wanted Eve so he could be just a man who felt like he had been dragged to hell and back.

No, she wouldn’t leave him when he was seriously ill. She must be nearby.

His glance swept over his children again, taking in their sweatshirts and rumpled hair and the blankets they had wrapped around themselves. They had been here for some time.

The lack of light around the edges of the shade covering the window indicated it was night. But which night?

He closed his eyes, trying to conjure a memory of what happened after he arrived at the hospital.

Mikel’s voice drifted through his mind. What had he been saying?

Poison.

Luis’s eyelids snapped open. He wasn’t ill. He had been poisoned. But how? He had eaten only food prepared by his own staff. He started to shake his head, but it hurt too badly to move. Mikel must be wrong.

On the other hand, Raul and Grace were sleeping in the room with him.

“Raul.” His voice came out as a raspy whisper. He worked some saliva into his mouth and tried again, pushing this time. “Raul!”

Grace stirred, sliding out of the chair to tiptoe up to his bedside, her gaze focused on his face. “Dad?” she whispered. “Are you awake?”

“Yes,” he croaked, his heart swelling with the joy of being called Dad.

Relief lit her face as a tear snaked down her cheek. “Oh, thank God!” She turned and spoke in a low but carrying voice. “Raul! He’s awake!”

His son bolted out of his chair to the bedside, brushing Luis’s fingers ever so gently. Raul’s careful touch told Luis more than Raul had meant it to. “Pater! Gracias a Dios! We should call the doctor.”

“Not yet,” Luis said. “I need to hear from you what happened, what is wrong with me.”

Raul and Grace exchanged worried glances across his bed, but Raul said, “You were poisoned with thallium. It’s a heavy metal that was once used in rat poison. But you’re responding well to the treatment.”

He had been poisoned. “How?”

“Mikel is working on that,” Raul said. “It can be absorbed through the skin, though.”

“How long have I been here?” Luis asked.

“You collapsed while talking to Eve about four hours ago,” Raul said. “No one outside this wing knows other than Mikel and your security detail.”

“Muy bien,” Luis said, closing his eyes in gratitude that the country was not aware of his condition…yet. Hopefully, he would recover swiftly enough to inform them after the fact.

“Do you want to go back to sleep?” Grace asked.

He opened his eyes again. “Is your mother here?”

“Yes,” Grace said. “I promised I would text her when you woke up. Is that all right?”

Longing made his heart clench. “Please ask her to come in,” he said.

“Eve may have saved your life,” Raul said, his expression intense. “She recognized the symptoms of thallium poisoning from her work with animals. She told Mikel to have the doctors test for it right away.”

“I owe her so much,” he murmured, blinking hard to fight back another damned tear. He was so weak that his emotions were controlling his body.

“She’s on her way,” Grace said before shoving her phone back into her jeans pocket. “Would you like some water?”

At her mention of a drink, his thirst rose up like a demon. “Yes, very much,” he said.

Grace picked up a cup with a handle and a straw. “Shall I hold it for you?” she asked.

Luis considered the pain it would inflict to lift his arm and decided to rely on his daughter’s help. There was a strange pleasure in that. “Please.”

She leaned in to bring the straw to his lips, taking care not to tangle with any of the lines attached to his body. The ice water tasted better than the finest champagne, refreshing the inside of his mouth and soothing his parched throat. He drank several sips before releasing the straw. “Thank you, hija mía. I needed that more than I knew.”

As Grace set the cup back on the bedside table, the door eased open.

When Eve glided quietly into the room, peace flowed through Luis like a warm tide. Her face was bare of makeup, her hair was yanked back in a messy ponytail, and she still wore the same blue dress as when she had come to his room. Now it was wrinkled and partly covered by a sweater.

She had never looked more beautiful.

“Querida!” he said.

Raul made a startled movement, and Luis realized what he had revealed to his son.

Eve did not acknowledge the endearment, but the worry on her lovely face eased. “I’m so glad you’re awake,” she said. “We were very concerned.”

He wanted to grab her hand and pull her onto the bed with him, to feel the warmth and softness of her body against his. “I understand that you saved my life by realizing that I had been poisoned by thallium. There are no adequate words to express my gratitude.”

Tears gleamed in her eyes but did not fall. “I only sped up the testing process. The doctors would have figured it out on their own.” She swallowed. “How do you feel?”

“I have had better days.” He did not want to worry Raul and Grace. “But I will recover.”

“Do the doctors know you’re awake?” Eve asked.

“I would prefer not to inform them yet,” Luis said. “Being with my family is curing my aches and pains.”

“Are you in pain? Where?” she asked, her gaze skimming over his body with renewed anxiety.

He managed a rueful smile to cover the truth in his humor. “Everywhere. Even my hair. But it is bearable.”

She did not return his smile. “What about Mikel? He should know,” she pointed out.

Mikel’s name brought darkness into the room. His head of security would be digging into the ugliness of who had done this to Luis, and how and why. Luis did not wish to face that yet, not when he was basking in the company of three people he loved with all his being.

The thought snapped his gaze to Eve’s face. Yes, he loved her. It seemed impossible in such a short time, but he knew his own heart. Before she had come into the room, he had felt incomplete.

He needed to tell her that…when he could stand up and take her in his arms and kiss her objections away.

“Raul, please let Mikel know I am awake,” Luis said with an inward sigh as the weight of being king settled onto his shoulders again.

Raul nodded and tapped at his phone, waiting a moment before saying, “He is on his way from the conference room.”

“Gracias, hijo mío,” Luis said, wishing Mikel had been somewhere farther away and feeling guilty for it. He should be grateful for Mikel’s devotion.

“If I might have some more water, please?” he said to Grace, wanting to savor a few extra moments of her solicitude before the world intruded.

He had time for three sips before the door opened to admit Mikel.

“Se?or!” The word seemed to burst from his usually imperturbable security chief. Mikel approached Luis’s bed and bowed low. “I rejoice to see you awake. How do you feel?”

“Better now that I am surrounded by my friends and family,” Luis said in a non-answer. He had caught the combination of relief and guilt on Mikel’s face and did not wish to add to the man’s concerns. “Thank you for getting me to the hospital so quickly, my friend.”

“Do not thank me,” Mikel said, his face stark with regret. “Se?ora Howard called for help and also suggested that the doctors test for thallium poisoning. She is to be credited for your swift treatment.”

Luis caught the look that Eve cast at Mikel, a quizzical lift of her eyebrows and a sardonic smile. He would ask her about it later.

“I am fortunate to have an entire team of protectors,” Luis said before he forced himself to ask, “How is your investigation progressing?”

“I would not wish to trouble you with that now,” Mikel said, skimming his gaze over the others.

Luis half lifted one hand to wave a dismissal of Mikel’s discretion but laid it on the blanket again when he realized it was attached to an IV line. “If you have any answers, we would all like to hear them.”

“Of course, Su Majestad,” Mike said, his eyes blazing with ruthless determination. “We found the delivery mechanism for the poison. It was the book about fencing strategy that was given to you by Felipe Camacho.”

“Camacho was one of the group complaining about the military base,” Raul said, his voice hard.

Luis dredged up his encounters with the man but could remember nothing intense enough to incite murder. “He wanted to return to the imaginary good old days of Caleva, when honor and decency reigned. I don’t know why that would cause him to want to kill his king, especially in a way that would be so easy to connect to him.” Luis shook his head. “How did the book poison me?”

“Thallium poisoning can transpire through the skin,” Mikel said. “Random pages in the book are infused with thallium, so when you touched them, it transferred to your fingers and worked its way into your tissues and bloodstream.”

“I paged through it a couple of times before tonight.” He hadn’t actually read it since he had been distracted by thoughts of Eve. “I didn’t become ill until now.”

“The doctors can explain it more thoroughly, but evidently it built up in your system gradually,” Mikel said.

“It’s a heavy metal,” Grace added. “It gets more concentrated over time with additional exposure.”

Luis nodded to her. “That brings us to the question of Camacho’s motive. Surely neither the military lease nor the minor incidents Camacho complained about are reasons for murder.”

“When we find him, we will ask him.” Mikel’s face was like granite. “He left the country two days ago, but we are on his trail. I will let you know when he is in custody.”

Luis nodded. Mikel would be relentless in his pursuit of Camacho. The man didn’t stand a chance of escaping.

Suddenly, exhaustion swept over Luis like a wave.

“Perhaps you should call the doctor now,” he said, letting his heavy eyelids drift closed.

Eve saw panic cross Raul’s face as he pushed the call button.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “He’ll slip in and out of sleep as his body sloughs off the poison.”

In truth, she hated to see Luis’s eyes closed. When Grace had texted her that Luis was awake, Eve had cried tears of relief that she had quickly washed away before racing down the hall to his room. While Luis still looked too frail and weak, his ice-blue eyes held their usual blazing intelligence and focus, and his smooth baritone grew stronger every time he spoke.

Now the vitality seemed to drain from him again.

Dr. Ibarra and three more medical personnel hurried into the room. “Is there a problem?” Dr. Ibarra asked.

“No,” Luis said, his voice a low rasp. “I thought you should know that I am awake.” His eyelids fluttered open. “I am just not sure how long I can stay that way.”

Dr. Ibarra turned to Luis’s visitors. “Would you please step outside so we may examine our patient?”

“I would like to speak with you as soon as you are finished,” Raul said, in what was clearly a command.

“Of course, Su Alteza Real,” the doctor said with a nod.

Mikel held the door as they filed out into the hallway. Eve was glad she had insisted that he be called into the room. She had caught the intense relief on the face of the usually unflappable security chief. He had needed to see that Luis was recovering.

“Let’s go to the waiting area,” Eve said, taking in the drawn faces of Grace and Raul. “The doctor will find us there.”

Once again, Mikel ushered them through the door before he disappeared into the conference room.

Raul sank onto one of the sofas while Grace curled into an armchair beside him.

Eve was about to perch on the arm of Grace’s chair when the prince dropped his head into his hands. His shoulders shook silently, and Eve realized he was sobbing. She changed directions to sit beside him.

“Raul, your father is going to be fine. You saw how alert and strong he was. He just needs more rest.” If she said it firmly enough, it would be true.

Raul nodded into his hands but didn’t lift his head. His voice was muffled as he said, “It’s the relief. Before, he looked so…” His shoulders shook again.

“I know,” Eve said soothingly. And she did. “But when he was awake, he was entirely himself.”

“As long as there’s no long-term damage.” Raul raised his head and rubbed his hands over his cheeks. Grace held out a box of tissues, which he accepted. “Dr. Ibarra feels the thallium concentration wasn’t high enough for that, but she said we have to wait and see.”

“Doctors are always cautious about a prognosis,” Eve said.

“I feel more confident of that after seeing him awake,” Raul said.

Eve gave his shoulders a quick squeeze and shifted sideways a couple of feet to allow him his space.

But Grace moved to sit beside her half brother, leaning her head on his shoulder. “Mom’s right. He just needs rest.”

Raul put his arm around Grace. Her daughter was so smart. The prince was now focused on comforting his little sister instead of worrying about his father.

That allowed Eve to give in to her fear that Luis would die, even though he seemed to be fighting off the poison’s effects with the help of the treatments he was getting. She felt herself begin to shake as the iron grip she had clenched around her feelings disintegrated. She leaped off the sofa and staggered over to the refrigerator, hoping the young people didn’t notice her wavering gait. For a long moment, she clung to the door handle and leaned her forehead against the stainless steel.

Luis wasn’t a dog or cat that had ingested the poison in an isolated barn. He was a human king who had merely brushed his fingers over it and who had the best medical care in the country.

Luis wouldn’t suffer nerve damage. His kidneys wouldn’t fail. He wouldn’t even lose his glorious silver mane of hair. He would rise from his hospital bed with his chin tilted at its normal regal angle, dress in one of his custom-tailored suits, and stride out of the hospital as though nothing had happened.

She closed her eyes to imprint that rosy image on her terrified brain.

“Mom? Are you all right?” Grace’s voice came from across the room.

Eve lifted her head and pulled open the refrigerator door. “Just debating what I want to drink.” She took a deep breath before she turned. Grace and Raul still sat side by side on the couch. “Can I get you something?”

“A double shot of tequila?” Grace’s voice held a sardonic note.

“Sounds good to me,” Eve said. “But the best I can offer is Calevan beer.”

“There’s a full bar in the cabinet to your right,” Raul said.

“If I drink anything alcoholic, I will fall over asleep,” Grace said. “Just water, please.”

Eve pulled three bottles of water from the fridge and brought them back to the seating area. The three of them sipped their water, too keyed up and exhausted to chitchat as they waited for news from Dr. Ibarra. Every once in a while, Mikel’s voice would penetrate the closed door of the conference room, too muffled to distinguish any words but snapping with authority, impatience, or anger.

Eve tilted her head to rest against the back of the armchair, her eyelids drifting closed. Instead of her invented picture of Luis fully dressed and walking, she saw him lying in the hospital room, still as death. She jerked her head up to banish the image.

The door from the hospital corridor swung open, and Dr. Ibarra came through. All three of them jumped to their feet. Raul met the doctor halfway across the room. “What did your examination show?”

“We are very encouraged,” Dr. Ibarra began. “Su Majestad’s vital signs are moving back toward normal.”

Eve had to grab the back of her chair to keep her knees from buckling in relief.

“He still needs rest, but we are confident he will make a full recovery,” Dr. Ibarra continued.

“Oh, thank God!” Grace said, her voice half a sob.

Raul ran his hand over his face, his shoulders sagging inward before he straightened again. “What would you guess the time frame will be?” he asked. “I do not wish my father to return to work until you say he is ready, but we must decide what and when to tell the media.”

Of course. Now that Luis was out of the woods, the fact that he was the head of the country became a pressing concern. Eve looked at Raul with respect.

The doctor grimaced. “Su Majestad wishes Se?ores Sanz and Vargas to come to the hospital later today. I advised against it, but…” Her shrug said that one could not override the king’s commands.

Raul made a wordless sound of frustration. “One moment,” he said to the doctor before going to the conference room door to knock and then open it. “Mikel, the doctor and I need your assistance.”

Mikel emerged from the conference room immediately. “How may I help?”

“Dr. Ibarra, would you please repeat what you told me about my father’s condition?” Raul asked.

As the doctor went through her report again, Eve saw a mixture of profound relief and searing guilt on Mikel’s normally inscrutable face. The man must be exhausted to let so much emotion show. When Dr. Ibarra mentioned Luis’s requested visitors, Mikel’s mouth tightened into a grim line.

“You have to help me convince Pater to rest another day,” Raul said to Mikel.

Mikel nodded but swung his gaze to Eve. “Perhaps you would add your voice to our efforts,” he said. “His Majesty might give your words more weight.”

Mikel did not elaborate on why, but Eve felt a warm flush climbing her cheeks. He didn’t know that her relationship with Luis was over, but that didn’t stop her from wanting Luis to give himself time to recover.

“I’ll try,” she said before turning to the doctor. “Is he still awake?”

“He was when I left him,” she said.

Eve raised her eyebrows in a query to Raul. The prince nodded. “We’ll see him now, Doctor.”

Eve started to beckon for Grace to join them, when Raul—bless him!—said, “Grace, perhaps the newest member of our family can talk some sense into Pater.”

All four of them trooped into Luis’s room together. He opened his eyes as they approached his bed. “Ah, my favorite people have returned. I fear I won’t be good company since the doctor tells me I should sleep.”

“Exactly,” Raul said. “Which is why Bruno and Francisco should not come to the hospital later today. It’s Sunday. You have no official meetings scheduled. You must give yourself time to heal.”

“Ay, hijo mío, we have arrangements to make for introducing Grace to Caleva,” Luis said, his voice stronger than before.

“How do you think I will feel if you make yourself worse because of me?” Grace asked, her voice fierce. “I know I’m your daughter. That’s all that matters right now.”

“You are ganging up on me, I see,” Luis said with a ghost of a smile. “Well, Mikel, what is your argument for keeping me away from my advisors?”

Mikel did not smile. “If you die, I will never forgive myself.”

His words sliced the air with their stark truth. He was responsible for the king’s security, so he blamed himself for not preventing Luis from being poisoned. Eve wanted to tell him not to be so hard on himself.

“That is blackmail, mi amigo,” Luis said, his faint smile vanishing. “You will not shoulder the blame for this.” He swept his gaze around the monitors surrounding him. “No one could have anticipated rat poison in the pages of a book.”

“I must anticipate everything,” Mikel said, his voice vibrating with intensity.

“You are not God. You cannot control the entire world,” Luis said with the authority of a king. “Catch the man who did this, and you have done all that could be expected from any human being.”

“He has already been located in Spain. My people are on their way to take him into custody.” Mikel’s face held a grim satisfaction.

“Muy bien,” Luis said. “Congratulations on a job well done. I mean that.” He sighed. “I will not summon Bruno and Francisco. Instead, I will call them to explain what has happened and where I am.”

“I will do that, Pater,” Raul said. “Once you start talking to them, you won’t stop.”

Amusement glinted in Luis’s eyes. “You know me too well, hijo mío. All right, you speak with them. I will remain a useless lump in this bed for the rest of the day.”

Relief rolled through Eve. She didn’t have to contribute her two cents to the discussion.

“Eve, I would like to speak with you privately,” Luis said, ruining her reprieve. “The rest of you need to go get some real sleep. The doctors will alert you if I show signs of expiring.”

Raul and Grace looked cheered by their father’s sardonic humor, even though they both cast inquiring looks at Eve.

As they bid Luis good night, Eve twisted her hands into a knot of tension. What did Luis want to talk with her about in the middle of the night in his hospital room? She was so wrung out that she could barely think straight…but maybe he was counting on that.

When the door closed behind the others, Luis held out the hand that was free of IV lines. “Eve!” His voice held such a combination of longing and exhaustion that her heart clenched.

She came to his bedside and took his hand, savoring the feel of his warm, strong fingers closing around hers. How was she going to leave this man when just the barest touch made her want to throw herself on the bed to curl up against his poor, abused body?

“How do you really feel?” she asked, searching his beloved face to find dark circles under his eyes and his skin still drawn harshly over his bones.

His grip tightened. “Like death warmed over, which is perhaps accurate.” He brought her hand to his lips, pressing them against her palm in a kiss that reverberated down to her toes. “Thank you for saving my life.”

“I didn’t save your life.” She couldn’t stop herself from brushing the fingers of her free hand over the silk of his hair. “I don’t know why people keep saying that.”

He turned his head into her touch with a tiny moan of pleasure, and she stroked down his cheek.

“Dr. Ibarra is a highly qualified physician who is not prone to giving credit to others,” Luis said. “Yet she says that your suggestion about thallium allowed them to begin treating the poison much faster than they otherwise would have done. If you did not save my life, you prevented any lasting aftereffects.”

The thought of his beautiful, sculpted body damaged in any way made her flinch.

“I’m glad I guessed right,” she said, waving her free hand in dismissal. “Please don’t keep thanking me.”

“I will not mention it again, but know that my profound gratitude to you remains in my heart.” He frowned and brought their clasped hands up to rest on his chest. “We must talk, querida, but not here while I am weak and confined to this bed.”

Thank God! She wouldn’t be able to hold on to her resolution when he looked so in need of comfort, and especially not when he called her darling in Spanish in that deep velvet voice of his.

“Promise me that you won’t leave Caleva until we’ve spoken alone,” he said, his ice-blue eyes burning with the intensity of his request.

Her intention to sneak away to Iowa the moment the announcement about Grace was over went up in smoke. She had planned to put thousands of miles between them so she could reclaim her practical Midwestern good sense.

“I think we said all that was necessary last night,” she evaded.

“I have so much more to say to you, mi corazón,” he disagreed. “But this is not the place or the time. Please give me the chance.”

Now he was calling her his heart. Hope swelled, but she smacked it down. He was just feeling overblown gratitude for her part in diagnosing the poison.

“I’ll wait until we’ve talked,” she said in a rush.

“Muy bien.” His voice held relief as he squeezed her hand lightly. “I have another favor to ask of you.”

Nothing could be worse than knowing she would have to say no to him yet again. “Of course,” she said. “What can I do to help?”

“Would you stay with me until I fall asleep?” he asked. “With you, I do not have to be strong. I can just be a man who feels like shit.”

He had just shot holes in her hard-won resistance, but at least he didn’t know that.

“Let me pull up a chair,” she said, glancing around.

“No, here.” He patted the bed beside him with their clasped hands. “Next to me.”

Just a few minutes before, she had fought off the desire to lie down beside him. “I don’t know…”

“Please. Allow me that comfort.” It was part command, part plea.

His naked need destroyed her already disintegrating defenses.

“Okay, but I have to be careful not to disconnect anything,” she said, letting go of his hand to ease herself through the network of tubes and wires until she could stretch out on the bed.

He shifted so that he could drape his arm around her shoulders. “Come closer and rest your head on my chest. I want to see your beautiful, fiery hair.”

She carefully scooted until she was pressed against his side from shoulder to knee. Even through the sheets, the heat and solidity of his body felt so exquisite that she nearly cried. When he stroked his other hand over her hair, murmuring, “So smooth, like silk,” delicious shivers raced across her skin.

She felt his lips against the top of her head, the merest whisper of a touch, but her whole being was so sensitized to him that she could feel every tiny movement. His breath ruffling her hair, his pulse beating against her arm, the rhythm of his heart.

“Ay, Eve, I need this,” he said. “I need you.”

For now. He was weak and ill. He wanted a simple, easy kind of comfort. She could give him that. She snuggled closer, trying to weave her love around him like a cocoon of healing.

After a couple of minutes, the hand stroking her hair went still. His breathing deepened, but it wasn’t until the powerful band of his arm went slack that she was certain he slept.

Yet she didn’t move. It was too wonderful to be in bed one more time with this complex, demanding, brilliant man. Just as a man, not a king. She tried to memorize the masculine scent of him under the hospital smells and the way every part of him felt pressed against her.

Because this would be the last time.