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clothes?” Isadora asked angrily.
    â€œI don’t need any others,” she replied, refusing to supply her relative with the information that her salary barely covered her apartment rent and gas for the car, much less fancy clothes.
    â€œHow economical you are,” Ramon purred.
    Isadora had glared at him, jerking up her purse and cashmere sweater. “You should have married her!” She threw the words at him. “She can cook and clean and she dresses like a street person! She probably even likes children!”
    Noreen had colored, remembering being with Ramon in the soup kitchen downtown at Christmas.
    â€œHow would you know how street people dress?” Ramon asked his wife coolly. “You won’t even look at them.”
    â€œGod forbid,” she shuddered. “They should round them all up and put them in jail!”
    Noreen, remembering the woman and two little children who’d accepted their meal with such gratitude, felt sick to her stomach and turned away, biting her tongue to keep it silent.
    â€œSpend what the hell you like,” Ramon told his wife.
    Isadora’s eyebrows had risen an inch. “Such language!” she’d chided. “You never used to curse at all.”
    â€œI never used to have reason to.”
    Isadora made a sound in her throat and stalked out, motioning curtly to Noreen to follow her.
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    Just a week before Isadora died, she was taken with a mild bronchitis. Ramon had promised to accompany a fellow surgeon to Paris for an important international conference on new techniques in open-heart surgery. Isadora had pleaded to go, and Ramon had refused, reminding her that flying in a pressurized cabin on an airplane could be very dangerous for someone with even a mild lung infection.
    Typically Isadora had pouted and fumed, but Ramon hadn’t listened. He’d stopped by Noreen’s station in the cardiac unit at O’Keefe’s and asked her to stay with Isadora in their apartment and take care of her in his absence.
    â€œShe’ll find a way to get even, if she can,” he’d said, curiously grim. “Watch her like a hawk. Promise me you won’t leave her if she takes a turn for the worse.”
    â€œI promise,” she’d said.
    â€œAnd get her to a hospital if there’s any deterioration at all. She has damaged lungs from all that smoking she used to do, and she’s very nearly asthmatic,” he’d added. “Pneumonia could be fatal.”
    â€œI’ll look after her,” she’d said again.
    His dark eyes had searched hers relentlessly. “You’re nothing like her,” he’d said quietly.
    Her face had gone taut. “Thanks for reminding me. Are there any other insults you’d like to add, before you go?”
    He’d looked shocked. “It wasn’t meant as a insult.”
    â€œOf course not,” she’d replied dryly. She’d turnedback to her work. “I know you can’t stand the sight of me, Ramon, but I do care about my cousin, whether you believe it or not. I’ll take good care of her.”
    â€œYou’re an excellent nurse.”
    â€œNo need to butter me up,” she said wearily, having grown used to the technique over the years. “I’ve already said I’ll stay with her.”
    His hand, surprisingly, had caught her arm and jerked her around. His eyes were blazing.
    â€œI don’t use flattery to get what I want,” he said curtly. “Least of all with you.”
    â€œAll right,” she’d agreed, trying to loosen his painful grip.
    He seemed not to realize how tight he was holding her arm. He even shook it, having totally lost his self-control for the first time in recent memory. “Make her understand why she can’t go on the plane. She won’t listen to me.”
    â€œI will. But you should be pleased that she wants your company so much.”
    His grip tightened. “One