Hope House (32 page)

“He needs to sleep in his crib.”

“
No. He’s sleeping in here with us. If I wasn’t afraid I’d crush him I’d bring him in bed with me.”

“Angie, once you let the kids sleep in bed they’ll never want to go back to their rooms.”

“
So what. I just love them to pieces. When Auntie Angie sleeps over we snuggle. If you don’t like it, too bad.”

“Whatever. Give them kisses for me.”

“
So where are you? Your nanny called me freaking out. Said she had a date tonight and you never came home. Bad enough to skip out of work but
—”

“I’m in Haiti.”

“
Was that on the plan? I thought we weren’t getting any more babies for a while.”

“No it wasn’t. It was a last minute thing.  I had to get down here in a hurry and take care of some problems.”

“
You don’t sound so good. Are you okay? Tell me what’s going on
.”

“You know I don’t like to get you too involved in the business, Angie.”

“
Mickey, you’ve got two kids here who need you. If their father gets killed tonight on some crazy Rambo stunt, I need to tell them why you were there.”

Mick pulled back from the phone. What was she talking about? “Why would I get killed?”

“
Um, you’re in Haiti, it’s the middle of the night. You’re probably out there to kill someone . . .
”

“Don’t say that on the phone. Are you nuts?”

“
Are you? Think about it Mickey. Look where you are. Are you so stupid you think you’re safe out there? What do you have a magic cape or something?
”

Mick gulped. He wasn’t safe was he? Why hadn’t it occurred to him to be frightened? Why did he always feel invincible?

“I’m not stupid,” he assured her.

“
So what do I tell the kids? If you die out there because you can’t ever admit defeat what happens to the boys?”

“I won’t die. And it’s not just a matter of pride, Angie. It’s not about admitting defeat. I’m trying to hold the business together. Hold our family together.”

“
You want to hold the family together then you should be home asleep with your sons. You’re just like Daddy
.”

“No I’m not.”

“
Yes you are. Business comes before everything
.”

“Yeah well, Daddy’s still alive isn’t he?”

“
Too bad for me. Jerk.”

“Angie, don’t disrespect our father.”

“
Fuck you, Mickey Mouse. He doesn’t deserve respect.”

Mick leaned against the seat as he squinted in the darkness. The headlights weren’t bright enough. He used to think he could make the drive from Port Au Prince to Maison D’Espoir in his sleep, but he had no idea it could be so dark. Where the hell had the moon gone to?

“
You there?”

“I’m here,” he said. Daddy did deserve respect. He had done everything he could to keep things together. Sacrificed so much. Done a lot of things he didn’t want to do. No one understood that better than Mick. Of course he’d rather be home asleep with Luke, his blind stuffed animals, and the baby, but there was work to be done. Killing to be performed, to save Maison D’Espoir. Angie, God bless her, would never understand.

“I won’t die. But if do, my will says you should take the boys. I’ve made provisions for both of them. I updated the will when I adopted Donnie.”

Silence. Shit. The phone had cut out.

“Angie!”

“
Daddy?”
Luke’s voice came on the line.

“Luke, what are you doing up?” A lump lodged in his throat.

“
Auntie Angie is sad. She crying. You make her cry.”

Mick shuddered
. What the hell
was
he doing out here so far from home? Angie was right. Mick had turned into his father and up until two minutes ago thought that was the best thing in the world. Now he couldn’t be more ashamed.

“I’m sorry, Luke. I love you.”

“
Wuv you too, Daddy.”

The phone was silent again and Mick waited. But this time it really did cut out. No signal. Of course there was no signal. He was in the middle of freaking nowhere. Hot hellhole Haiti.

“Shit!” Mick banged the steering wheel.

As he pressed the pedal hard and picked up speed, he decided that after this mass slaughter, he vowed to be home more and to stop killing people. There were plenty of underlings who could do that for him. No reason to risk his life. His father had been lucky but what if Mick’s luck ran out?

3.

Maison D’Espoir, Haiti, predawn-Gloria

Gloria sat on the stool in the delivery room, in awe of the little girl she held, swaddled in a pink blanket. The baby weighed in at seven pounds and was twenty and a half inches long. Her eyes were closed and she was caked in dried blood and amniotic fluid, but she was beautiful. “My little miracle,” she said.

Across the room, Martine covered Anni’s head with a fresh white sheet. She and Kurt wheeled her from the room. Gloria watched as the dead girl was wheeled away.
Who would take the baby now?

Dr. Tad had talked Martine and Gloria through the emergency C-section as best he could. He wanted to help but was too weak to sit up much less do what needed to be done. Martine had made the incision, and had done the job perfectly, thank God. But Anni had already been well on her way to death. By the time Gloria helped Martine lift the child from the mass of red wet tissue, Anni was gone. Kurt rushed over and cut the cord and Martine got the baby breathing.

Now it was an hour later. Dr. Tad was in and out of sleep, in and out of lucidity. And Gloria had been unable to do anything but hold the baby and stare at her in wonder.

“Gloria, tell Martine to bring me the papers. I’ll list you as the birth mother, say you delivered her here,” Dr. Tad said from his bed.

“You can’t do that.”
Why, am I protesting? I know this baby is meant for me.

“Yes, I can a-arrange it. It’s the least I can do. She’s your granddaughter but no one will ever have to know. When she’s older you can just tell her that you were vacationing here and went into early labor.”

“And I could bring her home. Just like that?”

“You’ll want to take her to the hospital in Port Au Prince to get her checked out but you can give them the papers. She’ll be
your
daughter. You have every right to bring her home.”

Kurt walked back into the room at that moment, prompting Tad to ask, “Should I list him as the father?” Tad asked.

Kurt flinched and Gloria assumed she had her answer. Maybe they would be a couple after this, but maybe they wouldn’t. Maybe his lack of an explainable past would make it an impossibility to commit even if he wanted to. And did he want to really? 

“Yes,” Kurt said, breaking her from her thoughts. He walked to Gloria and kissed the top of her head.

“But what if—” she started to ask.

“What if? Anyway, this kid deserves to at least know I was in the picture when she was born. I cut the cord. I feel like I gave her life even if it wasn’t in the conventional sense.”

Martine next walked in, a mixture of happiness for the baby and grief for Dr. Tad fighting for prominence on her face. “Can you get me the birth forms?” Tad asked to her, his voice growing more weak by the minute.

“How will Gloria get the baby home? The forms say Hope House in Florida and she doesn’t have the special plane Mr. Puglisi uses to smuggle them over or the friends in Customs.”

Gloria now had another piece of the puzzle, how Mick got the babies to the U.S. without all the red tape of foreign adoptions.

“There are some real Maison D’Espoir forms. I used one for Boni’s baby. They’re behind the other ones, in the back of that drawer.”

Dr. Tad stiffened up and dug his heels into the bed. New rivulets of sweat broke out all over him. The darkness had spread to his collar bone and Gloria could see it under his johnny. He didn’t have much time left.

“Hurry,” he said through gritted teeth.

Martine ran out.

“I am so sorry, Gloria. You will never know how sorry I am,” he said.

“I forgive you.” She turned from him and looked into the baby’s big eyes, which stared up at her. Little blond lashes and tufts of light hair. “It’s all right now.”

Martine came back in and handed him a form on a clipboard to sign. “I will fill the rest out for you,” she said. “You just sign here.”

“You know how?”

“I have seen you do it many times. Gloria can help me with the words if I don’t know them.”

He signed the form then gave it back.

“Martine please give me some more Morphine now.”

“I just gave you some. If you get too much you could die.”

He stared at her sadly. “I know. And I’m sorry for that too.”

“But what about Belize?”

“I’m not going to make it. You’ll have to go without me. I’ve given you all the paperwork. You go yourself. Take the money from the account. I put it in your name too.”

Gloria had a glimmer of respect for this man. He was at least dying with some dignity. Leaving all his money to a Haitian surrogate showed on some level he had good character, even if he had caused so much heartbreak.

“I do not
want your money. I want you to live.”

“I’m not going to live. I’m sorry but I’m not. I’ve always had a weak heart and never told you, but this infection has weakened it further. Even if I got treatment for the arm immediately, it’d be too late. Please, Martine. You have to be strong. I have to know you’re going to go to Belize and get that money and have a nice life.”

She walked to the cabinet and retrieved a vial. “I will go to Belize. I do not want to give you this medicine, but do not want you to suffer. I love you, Doctor Tad.”

“I love you too, Martine. And I’m sorry that we can’t be together.”

She nodded. “I am sorry too.”

Tears rolled down the girl’s face and she inserted the needle into the IV.

“Gloria come closer. Please,” he said.  She handed the baby to Kurt and went to Tad’s side.

“Martine will give you my journal. Keep it or destroy it but please don’t ever show anyone. Promise me you’ll never try to track down those children and will never tell what went on here.”

“But—”

“No. You can’t. No one must know. It will ruin all those lives. It’s your secret.”

“What about all the other eggs?” Kurt asked.

“I can show you,” Martine said. “They are stored in barrels dipped in fog.”

“Liquid nitrogen,” Tad said, fading away.

  “You will set them all free?” Martine asked. “Dump them from
the barrels and into the river so they can swim away?”

Gloria was touched by Martine’s innocence. Out of the mouths of babes. “Yes,
we will set them free.”

4.

Maison D’Espoir, Haiti, predawn-Martine

Martine watched Gloria and Kurt with their baby. They were a good couple, decent people. She wondered if they were married. Gloria was kind and took the time to explain things to her just as Dr. Tad had for the years he had known her.

She filled out the hospital forms for Gloria and packed them in a bag with some bottles of formula and diapers.

“You should go now. Leave right away,” she told them, handing the bag to Kurt.

“Come with us,” Gloria said. “We’ll take you back to Port Au Prince.”

“No I must stay here until—”
She didn’t want to say the words and Gloria understood. Until Dr. Tad passed on. “Boris will take me when the time comes. I have much do here.”

“I’m gonna shut this place down before I die!” Tad yelled.

They all spun around to see Dr. Tad standing up, crooked and weak. His eyes showed that death was close. His anger was trying to reclaim him, fight his battle a little longer.

“Martine, get the girls together. Tell them to take everything. Everything! I want this place stripped down to nothing. And when I die, all this is over. No more surrogates or adoptions. The end of the Puglisi breeding enterprise once and for all.”

“It’s not just here,” Kurt said.

“What?”

“They have other centers in foreign countries,” Gloria explained. “Different locales each with a specific appearance to their children.”

Dr. Tad fell against the bed and slipped to the floor.

“You must have known,” Kurt said.

Martine prayed he would deny it, but he did not. Instead he nodded. “When I took Gloria’s fetus, Mick had me take a few others too. From all over the place. Not a lot. Five or six. But all I did was deliver the fetuses
to him. Nothing else. I didn’t know what happened to them. I guess I hoped Gloria’s was the only success.” He looked to Martine, then to Kurt and Gloria.  “I should have known. Of course he would have used them, started other centers. But he never told me so I thought it was just here. I can’t believe he lied to me all this time.”