Ana’s philosophy about cooking was if she covered every dish with cheese and onion, they tasted great. Well, not flan, of course. Because her father was diabetic, she used low fat cheese and watched his portions although he did pretty well keeping track himself.

“Who’s going to be here tonight?”

Her father stood, held on to the back of the chair before he walked across the room. He was only sixty-one but appeared much older. A day at the store wore him out now. She’d made him go to the doctor but he said nothing was wrong with her father, not physically. How long did it take to recover from the death of a wife? Obviously, a year wasn’t enough.

“Robbie and Martita are coming with Tonito and the baby. She said she’d bring a cake,” he said.

“Luz, Quique and Raúl also?” Ana listed the other siblings who lived in Austin. Her brother Robbie, his wife and their small family were fun to be around, and Martita made wonderful cakes. “I want to be sure so I can make enough enchiladas for everyone and still leave some for your lunch Saturday.” If Quique didn’t eat them when he went through the refrigerator later.

“Well, Raúl will probably stop by. He’s between gigs.”

Raúl was always between gigs. Fortunately, he had a steady job at the family’s furniture store Robbie managed. “Is he between girlfriends?”

“I’m never between girlfriends,” Raúl said as he came in from the garage.

“Oh, yes, I know. Women always throw themselves at you. Poor dears.” Ana pulled tortillas from the fridge. Store-bought tortillas, another shortcut her mother would never have considered.

“¿Cómo no? Why not? They can’t resist my smile or my guitar.”

What was he going to do in the future? Raúl floated through life, making it on his dark good looks, great smile and personality, plus a dab of talent.

“Hey, Ana, no te preocupes. Don’t worry.”

“Why would I worry about you?” She took out a slab of white cheese and began to grate it.

“Because you always worry about me and Luz and Quique. We’re all young.” He pulled one of his guitars from the hall closet and came into the kitchen. “We’ll grow up someday.”

Ana rolled her eyes. “I hope so.”

“We’ll never be as responsible as you are.” He ran his fingers over the strings. “After all, you were born responsible, but you don’t always have to worry about us.”

“Yes, she does, Raúl.” Her brother Robbie followed his five-year-old son, Tonito, into the kitchen and placed a cake on the counter. “That’s what Ana does. Worries about her family. She’s a rescuer.”

“Someone has to do it,” Robbie’s wife, Martita, said. “It’s a full-time job. I refuse to take it on.” She handed Marisol, the baby, to Robbie and sat at the kitchen table. “But sometime, chica, you are going to have to stop taking care of your family and find a life of your own.”

A life of her own? An interesting concept. Taking care of her family was, well, habit—one she’d never tried to break until she realized how dependent her father was getting on her. That, and the short drive from her little efficiency to the hospital were the reasons she’d moved. Not one to make changes easily, she felt this one was enough for now.

“You want a date?” Raúl said. “I could fix you up with some guys.”

“Thank you,” Ana said politely, but she’d never take him up on that. Although she was only twenty-eight, all his friends were years younger than she in both age and maturity.

“Don’t ever go out with any of his friends,” Robbie said. “None of them are serious about anything.”

“Why don’t you come to church with us?” Martita said. “There’s a big singles’ group there.”

Ana smiled but didn’t answer. Other than weddings and funerals, she’d seldom been to church, although Martita had often invited her to the community chapel her family attended. Ana’d never consider going to church only to find a date. It didn’t seem quite right to her.

After dinner, they gathered in the family room to sing “Adelita” and “De colores” and other family favorites. Raúl and Quique sat on the bench by the fireplace and strummed their guitars. Her father leaned back in his blue recliner while Martita held her kids on the other recliner, the one Ana’s mother had always sat in. Everyone else relaxed on the sofa while Tonito played with his trucks on the floor.

As she watched, Ana was filled with love and with a terrible feeling that this was to be her life: to watch while her brothers and sister married and had babies and the babies grew up and married. And through those years, she’d worry about them, every one of them, exactly as Raúl and Robbie said she would. Forever. She knew that about herself, too.

Sometimes, like now, she wanted more. Now that she’d reached her professional goal, she needed to look ahead. What she wanted now was a family of her own.

Odd—she hadn’t thought about marriage for a long time, not since high school when Tommy Schmidt had wanted to marry her after graduation. Her drive to be a doctor had broken up their relationship. There hadn’t been anything serious since. Oh, she’d dated, but she’d been so wrapped up in her family, in her push to finish medical school and her need to learn everything she could, to be the best doctor possible, to finish the residency, that she’d never found time for a relationship. Hadn’t really wanted one.

Now that she was almost there, what would she do?

Was it too late for her to have a life and family of her own? If she did, she was going to have to leave the warm, comfortable circle of her family and enter the world of dating. The whole idea bothered her. She wasn’t good at flirtation or chatter, and her intensity frightened men.

Then the image of Mike Fuller’s unsmiling face danced in her brain. As much as she tried to force his image away, she couldn’t. As far as she could tell, she didn’t intimidate him.

She could not, would not even consider him. How many times did she need to remind herself he was too young for her? No, that was an excuse. How old was he? Twenty-two, twenty-three? Six or seven years wasn’t that much of an age difference.

But there were other reasons. To her, he seemed unmotivated and that bothered her, a lot. And he was so guarded, so wary and uncommunicative.

No, Fuller wasn’t the man for her, but, well, other than Raul’s friends he was the only unmarried man under fifty she knew.

What really scared Mike was that he could always tell when Dr. Ramírez was in the hospital. He knew when he walked into the E.R.—without even seeing her—if she was there. He didn’t understand how this happened. It couldn’t be the scent of her perfume because she didn’t wear any.

So how did he know?

He refused to believe in psychic phenomena, but every time he spotted her in the E.R. for the first time in a shift, it didn’t surprise him.

If he wanted to know for sure, her schedule wasn’t hard to figure out. She worked three of seven nights each week. Sometimes he thought about going to the nurses’ station and trying to glance at her schedule. Inconspicuously of course because staff was always around.

Besides, the idea of actually planning this and carrying it out felt a little strange, as if there was actually something between the two of them, a relationship of some kind. He shuddered. After Cynthia and with the uncertainty of his life now, even the word scared him. No, there wasn’t a relationship between him and Dr. Ramírez, and he could never consider the possibility.

Nevertheless, when he walked in that day at 3:00 p.m. for a double shift, he knew she was there.

Ana gently probed the leg of the crash victim. She couldn’t feel anything odd. Of course, the swelling didn’t allow for a complete manual examination. “X-ray,” she shouted and turned to glance over her shoulder.

He was there. Fuller. Getting ready to transfer the victim to a gurney so the other orderly could push the gurney of another patient into its place.