Maxwell Rogers doesn’t ask for much. Content with his job as a motel clerk and a small apartment in inner-city Fort Worth, what he wants more than anything as he approaches forty years of age is a lifelong companion. The last thing he expects is that the new Mexican housekeeper at the motel would take over his heart in an instant.
Antonia Suarez is dismayed to find that she will have to deal with a white man – Max Rogers – as part of her new job. Still suffering the trauma of having been abused and used for the past two years by white men, she cannot even bring herself to look at him until they have worked together for another two years. But when he begins to show an interest in her, she is surprised and taken aback. When she finds that she is beginning to return the interest, the old self-defensive fear pops up, forcing her into denial, and causing her to make a fool of herself – and Max – at her employer’s wedding reception.
But convinced that Antonia is “the one” for him, Max continues to pursue her, even after she reveals the horrific past that has brought on the hatred and fear of white men she still struggles with. But those emotions cannot last in the presence of Max’s affections and attention, and Antonia begins to wonder if she has finally discovered real love.
However, as time goes by the differences between them begin looming larger and larger, until they become seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Just when Max decides that keeping Antonia would be worth any kind of change to eliminate the obstacles, he encounters a scenario that rocks his world and tears him apart – and convinces him that his pursuit of the young, beautiful Mexican was all a mistake.
At the same time, Antonia’s world is turned upside-down as her past catches up with her – and promises to give her back the simple, familiar life of her childhood that she has not dared desire since leaving Mexico five years ago.
Can the huge misunderstandings that are between them be overcome by their unspoken love for each other?
