by Anne Stuart
It was blistering hot, even for one who was used to it. She didn’t dare go swimming—there were newcomers in the area, soldiers, people who didn’t want to be seen. She hadn’t yet sent word to Matteo and for very good reason.
The baby wasn’t ready to travel.
Mother Ignacia had been right about one thing. Sister Mary Agnes hadn’t lasted long—within three days of the emptying of the convent the old nun had breathed her last. She’d received her last rites more than a week before, and she hadn’t regained consciousness. It had been a good life, a long one, serving God, and Carlie hadn’t even wept when she’d laid her out.
But the Reverend Mother had been wrong about something else. Caterina Rosaria Morrissey de Mendino had delivered her baby easily enough, a small, healthy little boy she’d named William Timothy. And then she’d quietly, swiftly died.
Matteo had come to bury them. Matteo had crossed himself, muttered something about seeing to her escape, then looked askance at the newborn. “The baby will never survive,” he’d said. “And just as well.”
“What do you mean?” Carlie had demanded, exhaustion and shock tearing away at her fundamental calm.
“This country has had enough of the Mendinos. They have ruled San Pablo, bled it dry for the past forty years. It is better than no trace of them remain. God has chosen to take the little one’s mother—if God doesn’t take the baby, then the soldiers will. They, or the rebels.”
“Caterina had nothing to do with her father’s crimes.”
“She was the daughter of the presidente. Her son would be of the same line.”
“Son?” Carlie had said instantly. “What makes you think the child is a boy?”
Matteo had looked confused for a moment. “I thought you said…”
“Caterina gave birth to a baby girl,” Carlie had said firmly. “She named her after her mother.”
Matteo had crossed himself. “Poor little thing. I promised Mother Ignacia I would find a way out for you, Sister Maria Carlos. I can’t promise I can find a way for the baby.”
“I won’t leave without…her.” The hesitation had been so brief Matteo hadn’t noticed.
“I will see what I can manage.”
It had been three weeks. The baby had grown stronger, the supply of powdered formula and clean water had been more than sufficient, and it seemed as if everyone, including Matteo and the baby’s father, had forgotten their existence.
For that Carlie would only be grateful.
It was bad enough that she was alone in the midst of a revolution-torn country, with an infant, no weapons and no disposition to use any if she were to possess them. But that baby was the only grandchild of the notorious Hector Mendino, deposed and executed dictator of San Pablo.
Hector Mendino had fathered no children. His second wife already had a daughter from her previous marriage—Caterina—and Mendino had adopted her. Caterina had always disliked her brutal stepfather, but that hadn’t stopped Mendino. And it wouldn’t stop the rebels, who saw any connection to Mendino as something to be wiped out.
There was no way Carlie was going to let anyone wipe out the threat of one tiny little life. Timothy was a blond-haired angel, with nothing like Hector Mendino’s heavy, brutal good looks. He probably looked like the American soldier who’d married Caterina. The American soldier who should arrive, sooner or later, to collect his son and wife, only to learn he was now a widower.
The fighting had been growing steadily closer to the mountain area surrounding the convent. At night Carlie would lie in bed and listen to the sound of gunfire in the distance. Timothy lay in the crib near her narrow cot, and the sound of his light, even breathing would calm her. Nothing, nothing would be allowed to hurt him.
She’d moved into Caterina’s room in the infirmary, rather than drag all the baby paraphernalia back to her tiny cell. Caterina’s clothes still hung in the closet, her jewelry sat in a small satin bag on a table. All except for her wedding ring. Billy Morrissey would want that, she knew, when she told him of Caterina’s death. She’d slid it on her own hand, keeping it safe for him.
She was miserably hot and tired. Timothy hadn’t slept well the night before, and consequently neither had she. The generator was out of fuel, there was no way to cool the place, and the current thick heat was worse than she could ever remember. The baby was napping peacefully now, his diaper changed, his tiny belly full, his miniature thumb tucked in his mouth. Without hesitation Carlie stripped off the heavy layers of clothing that comprised her old-fashioned habit, ruffled her fingers through her short-cropped hair and headed for the shower.
The water was blessedly cool as it sluiced over her body, and she stood beneath its fall, comfortable for the first time in days. In all these years she’d never grown accustomed to the heat. Sister MaryAgnes used to tease her, tell her she should go back to the States and join an order that advocated modern clothes and air-conditioning. And Carlie had managed to smile in return, secure in the knowledge that no one would ever make her go back.
She stepped from the shower, reluctant to leave its coolness, and pulled one of the threadbare towels around her body. Timothy would sleep for hours now, and Carlie couldn’t afford to waste time daydreaming in the shower. There were diapers to fold and some sort of meal to forage. Beans and rice, her staple, would have to do, washed down with water. It had been all she’d had to eat for weeks now, and her bones were beginning to stick out. She glanced at herself in the mirror as she continued to towel her body dry.
It was just as well she’d chosen a religious life, she thought wryly. She was hardly the epitome of any man’s dreams.
She was too short, barely topping five feet. Too skinny, with small, immature breasts, narrow, bony hips and small, delicate hands and feet. Her dark hair was hacked off as short as it could go, since it was usually tucked under a simple white wimple. She looked into the mirror and saw her parents’ faces staring back. Her mother’s blue eyes, her father’s dark brown hair and high cheekbones. Her mother’s stubborn, generous mouth and short nose. Her father’s pale skin and freckles.
Her face was all she had left of them. They were long dead, their blood soaking into the jungle floor of San Pablo, as was the blood of so many others. She would be damned before she let them hurt Timothy, as well.
There was no noise beyond the closed door of the bathroom. Timothy still slept soundly. And yet Carlie paused, her hand on the doorknob, the oversize towel draped around her body, all her senses suddenly alert.
She heard it then. A sound so faint it was almost indiscernible. A faint, scraping sound, as someone moved about the bedroom.
She turned, looking around the bathroom, but she’d left her long black habit tossed across the bed. There was one window in the room, high up, but she could reach it if she stood on the toilet. She could climb through—she was small enough to fit—and she could be away from there before the intruder even realized she was gone. She could be gone, but she would have to leave Timothy behind.
There was no question in her mind. The towel was threadbare but the size of a small blanket. She wrapped it around her more securely, reached for the door and opened it, as silently as she could.
He was leaning over the crib. At first all she could see was his back, his long legs, dressed in camouflage and khaki, and she felt a sick knot of dread in the pit of her stomach. “Don’t touch him,” she said, wanting to sound dangerous, but the words came out in a breathless plea.
He turned slowly, and there was a gun in his hand. A very large, nasty-looking gun, pointed straight at her.
For a moment all she could see was the weapon. If he shot her, who would take care of Timothy? Panic clouded in around her, but she fought it, lifting her head to stare at his face.
That’s where she got her second shock. This immense, dangerous-looking man pointing a gun at her was no member of Mendino’s black-shirted brigade, and no ragtag revolutionary ready to kill for his beliefs. The man staring at her through eyes the color of amber was undoubtedl
y an American.
“Billy?” she managed to choke out, stepping toward him, out of the shadows, ignoring the threat of the gun.
It was no longer a threat. He tucked it in his belt, staring at her, an unreadable expression in his eyes. “Don’t you know your own husband, Caterina?” he responded.
She blinked. “You’re not Billy,” she said. She’d seen an old photograph among Caterina’s belongings, and this man looked nothing like Billy Morrissey. The man in front of her was much taller, whipcord lean, with long dark hair that would be tolerated by no military. It was tied behind his head with a leather thong, and his face was cool, distant and severe. He was no kin to the tiny cherub still sleeping soundly. Therefore he was a danger.
“I’m Reilly,” he said, as if that should explain everything.
It explained nothing. “Where’s Billy?” she asked, fighting to keep her concentration. She glanced over at the bed. Her habit lay there, in an anonymous pile of black-and-white cotton, but there was no way she could casually stroll over and grab it.
“He asked me to come for you and the kid. What is it?” He turned back to stare down at Timothy.
“A girl,” she said automatically. A girl stood a marginally better chance at surviving the male-dominated warfare of San Pablo.
He kept his back to her. “A girl?” he said. “Billy would’ve liked that.”
“What do you mean by that?”
He turned back. “Billy’s dead, Caterina. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you that, but the sooner you accept it the sooner we can get the hell out of here.”
“I’m not Caterina,” she said numbly.
He had a narrow, dark face. Not particularly handsome, but arresting. It twisted now, in a kind of gentle contempt. “Lady, I’m not in the mood for playing games. Billy told me where I’d find you. You’re here, the baby’s here and everyone else is long gone. Your clothes are in the closet, your jewelry’s on the dresser and that looks like Billy’s ring on your finger or I miss my guess. So don’t try to tell me you aren’t Caterina Morrissey because I’m not going to believe it.”
“All right,” she said in a surprisingly steady voice. “I won’t.”
“I’ll get you and the kid out of here and back to the States,” he said. “I promised Billy and his parents I’d see to it.”
“And how do you plan to do that, Mr…. Reilly, did you say?”
“Just Reilly. I was in the service with Billy. I just had the sense to get out in time. But I’ve been trained, Mrs. Morrissey, by some of the best. I won’t let anyone get to you.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why? You rather be called Miss Mendino? That could bring trouble down on you real fast. Most people didn’t like your father much, and they tend to hold grudges.”
She stared at him for a moment. He must have realized she had just come from the shower and was wearing nothing but a towel, but he ignored it as unimportant. A good sign. He was a big man, with a sense of coiled strength about him. Not bulky, but very strong. He stared at her impassively, and that, too, was reassuring. He didn’t care about her. He didn’t care about the baby. He was simply doing his duty. A last favor for an old friend. And he didn’t strike her as the kind of man who would fail in anything he set out to do.
“Call me Carlie,” she said faintly.
“That’s a hell of a nickname for Caterina,” he said.
“It’s what I’m used to.”
He nodded. “How long will it take you to get ready?” His eyes drifted down over her body, impassive, incurious. Thank God, Carlie thought.
“A couple of days at the most. I have to pack enough for the baby, and I need to be in touch with Matteo—”
“Matteo’s dead,” Reilly said flatly. “He was killed a week ago by renegade soldiers. They were looking for you.”
A wave of sickness and guilt washed over Carlie. “How do you know? How long have you been here?”
“Two days. I had to wait until it was safe enough to get in here. They’re looking for you, you know. You and Mendino’s grandchild. They’re all around here.”
“Who are? The rebels, or the soldiers?”
Reilly smiled then, a slow, cynical smile that still had an astonishing effect on his austere face. “Soldiers on the north side of the convent. Rebels on the south. Cliffs to the west. Jungles and swamp to the east. Choose your poison.”
“It’s up to me?”
“Hell, no. I just thought you might like being consulted. We’re taking the jungle.”
“There are pit vipers in the jungle.”
“I’d rather face a pit viper than a political fanatic any day,” Reilly said. “We’ll leave at sunrise.”
“I can’t be ready—”
“We’ll leave at sunrise, Caterina,” he said. “Or I’ll take the baby and go without you.”
She stared at him. She had no doubt whatsoever he would do just that. No matter if he didn’t know how to take care of a newborn, no matter if he had to strap him to his back amid grenades and rifles and machetes. He would do it, without a backward glance.
“I’ll be ready,” she said, allowing herself the sinful luxury of a glare.
There was no sign of triumph on his dark face. “I thought you would,” he said. “Where do I find food in this place?”
“There isn’t much. Beans and rice. And baby formula.”
“It’ll do,” he said in a neutral voice. “I think I’ll pass on the formula, though. Aren’t you breast-feeding?” Those embarrassingly acute eyes dropped to the direction of her chest with all the interest of a farmer checking a breeding sow.
Carlie had already pulled the towel closely around her, and her arms were folded across her chest. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you I wasn’t Caterina, would you?” She tried one more time. She wasn’t used to lying, but fate seemed to have arranged this without consulting her.
“No, I wouldn’t believe it. Why aren’t you nursing the baby?”
“I’m too flat-chested.”
She was hoping to embarrass him. Instead she felt a flush of color wash over her. She had been in the convent, surrounded only by women, since she was seventeen, and in that time she had never considered discussing her breasts with anyone, male or female.
His eyes dropped again, considering. “Size doesn’t have anything to do with the ability to nurse.”
Carlie blinked. In her capacity as local midwife she already knew that, but she’d doubted the overgrown ex-soldier would be as knowledgeable. However, her embarrassment had reached fever pitch by now. “I’m not going to discuss anatomy with you,” she said stiffly.
“Good, because I’m more interested in food than your breasts right now,” he said in a cool voice. “Where the hell’s the kitchen?”
The mortification vanished abruptly, replaced by anger. “You’ll find it if you look hard enough,” she said. “In the meantime maybe you’d let me get dressed.”
Again his gaze swept over her body, and she realized he had absurdly long lashes in such a dark, masculine face. “Suit yourself,” he murmured. “I’ll make enough for both of us. But I wouldn’t bother with too much clothing if I were you. It’s hotter ‘n hell around here.”
Carlie thought of the enveloping habit lying on the narrow bed. It would serve him right if she appeared in the kitchen fully garbed.
But she wasn’t going to. It hadn’t been her idea, but the choice had been taken out of her hands. Sister Maria Carlos had already left for Brazil with the twelve other Sisters of Benevolence. Caterina Rosaria Morrissey de Mendino would go with Reilly and take her child with her.
There was no way she was going to entrust the baby to a stranger. She would see him safely out of there, and then she would tell him the truth. And not a moment before.
Chapter Two
Reilly closed the door quietly behind him, shutting Caterina Morrissey and her towel-draped body away from him. She wasn’t at all what he had expected. He’d known Billy for almost
fifteen years, and during all that time he’d never seen him fall for anything other than a stacked, leggy blonde. He’d assumed Caterina would be cut from the same cloth—Billy had certainly never said anything to lead him to expect anything else.
She didn’t look like the stepdaughter of a notorious Latin American dictator. She didn’t look like the pampered socialite who’d abruptly married an American army officer, run back home to San Pablo and her life of privilege when the novelty had worn off and then tried to rejoin him once she’d found out she was pregnant. The woman in the bedroom didn’t have the face of a woman used to getting her own way.
But then, who the hell was he to know what kind of face she had? He’d been far too distracted by her body, though he was pretty sure he’d managed to disguise that fact.
Like Billy, he’d never had a weakness for small, strong women. He preferred the large, decorative sort. The woman clutching a threadbare towel around her wet body didn’t seem like the kind who was used to having things handed to her. Maybe motherhood gave a spoiled brat character.
Interesting thought, but it was none of his damn business. He was there for one reason, and one reason only. To take Billy’s baby home to the States, where it belonged. If Billy’s widow wanted to come along, then fine. The Morrisseys would see to her, and unless motherhood had had a miraculous effect on Caterina Mendino she would be more than happy to hand the child over to her wealthy in-laws so that she could go back to enjoying life.
She hadn’t realized just how thin the cloth of that enveloping towel was. He was hot, he was thirsty, and she’d stood there, glaring at him, fiercely determined to defend her child, and the water had beaded on her smooth, pale skin. He’d wanted to cross that room and lick the water from her throat.
Even now the notion made him grin wryly. She was deceptively appealing. It was no wonder Billy had married her, the man who always swore it wouldn’t be fair to limit his attentions to just one woman. The woman in the other room had a subtle grace to her that was well-nigh irresistible.
It was a good thing he’d never been a slave to his powerful libido. It would take them a good four days to get back to the plane, and that was if they were extremely lucky, the weather cooperated and she wasn’t the hothouse orchid he’d assumed she’d be.