Jeremy’s last lob found its target. “That’s three strikes!” he shouted. “You’re out!”
“Ejoli!” Jose yelled and fired back a mud bullet.
Amusement warmed her as she noted New Mexico’s strange, iridescent sunlight was tanning her son’s skin nearly as brown as Jose’s. And her son had shot up an inch, at least, in the three months they had been in Taos.
Finally, with the major work over, most of the Indians returned to their fields. Only a few remained, a couple of women to apply a pearly white finish to the interior walls, four or five men to replace the split cedar ceiling with logs hewn from nearby mountain forests.
And Man. He had finally returned to help finishing the adobe’s restoration.
No one could ignore his presence. She tried. Softly humming “Ramona,” she used a sheepskin to stroke the walls with tierra blanca. The sheen was composed of water, flour and rare white gypsum found in the area.
“You are content today.” Startled, she glanced up, shielding her eyes against the tender morning sunlight. It was the first time he had actually spoken to her. He knelt on a timbered spruce rafter above her, his massive, muscled body perfectly balanced. He worked adeptly with an adz, moving in a rhythmic silky stroke.
“Yes.” She didn’t know what else to say. She stared up at him, entranced by those sculptured lips. Aware of their sensual danger, she forced herself to glance away shyly. She was shocked at how easily his commanding presence had broken through her resolve to ignore him. Suddenly, she wanted him to take her there on the rich earth in front of the remaining workers. Let them watch, as his long brown fingers stroked up the whiteness of her thigh, nudging aside her underwear and . . . .
“That is good,” he said with a wolfish grin, as if he divined her erotic fantasy, and went back to laying the newly smoothed latilla in the precise herringbone pattern of the others.
But he did not return the next morning, and she felt that sense of well-being evaporate just as the sparkling dew was evaporated from the grass.
Sorely disappointed, she went back to work, only to find Tony and Henri strolling toward her.
“I must look a mess,” she said, tugging the bandanna from her head and shaking loose her curls now long enough to fall vexingly into her eyes.
“Actually, quite nice,” said the affable Henri, peering through his beer-bottom, wire rimmed spectacles at her. He wore his jaunty little brown beret. “You’ve got some color in your face.”
“At least, I can offer you water now.” She indicated the well, rebuilt of stone with its new wooden top.
Like Man, Tony wore that noncommittal expression Anglos called Indian reserve. “You like house?”
Her gaze went to the creamy white adobe, aligned without benefit of plumb-line. Wooden canales or water spouts poked out on all sides of the roof. Above the front door, the low-beamed zambullo required even her to duck when she entered. The windows were set in the deep wells a trifle crookedly. The massive outside door, with its iron bar across the inside surface, angled a little askew. Still, her restored home had an irregularity that sweetened the total effect. Best of all, there was an anteroom, more a storeroom with a high window, that would make an excellent studio for her painting. “Very much.”
“Built with true Taos disregard for exactness,” Henri observed, his hands thrust in the pockets of his green sweater. “Oh, here. A home warming gift.” He thrust forward a pouch.
As she held it, he fished from its corn meal contents one of those charms, a small turquoise stone crudely resembling a bear. “It’s a fetish. The corn meal’s sacred, and if you put the bear in your house, he will protect it.” He winked. “Tony assures me of this.”
“Very powerful,” Tony said.
Touched by Henri’s thoughtfulness, she cradled the stone fetish in her palm, glanced up at him from beneath her lashes, and asked with a sly smile, “And do you believe in this power?”
He shrugged. “As much as I believe in mediums or geomancers. You know, the wizards who find underground streams.”
“You can’t be serious?”
“The way I see it,” he shrugged. “life is enhanced by its mystery.”
Some might call Henri a sponger, she thought, but there was so much more to the little man than met the eye.
After the two left, she set to work clearing the debris from the rough plank floor that had replaced the hard mud one. She was standing at the window with a burlap sack of abandoned items – a wrench, sandpaper, a horsehair rope – when she saw him coming down the path from the Pueblo.
Man of the Heavy Lids.
She knew him by his light step, his stately carriage. He moved at ease with himself, as if in tune with some unheard harmony. She was filled with a crazy sense of elation.
Man crossed the threshold, ducking his mammoth frame beneath the low set zambullo. His autocratic presence dominated the small room. In his arms, he cradled sweet-smelling plants, freshly uprooted. “I go for these. Your home needs them.”
She blushed furiously under the scrutiny of those all-knowing eyes. She ducked her head, uncharacteristically shy. Her mind’s image of him did not do him justice. He was not merely handsome, he was staggeringly beautiful. “What are they?” she murmured, her eyes downcast, her gaze purposefully fixed on the plants.
“Sage, snakeweed, alegria.” He began to climb the ladder to the latticed rafters.
Her eyes followed him hungrily. “What for?”
“To smell your home. The alegria make easy your white-man cough.” He was wedging the herbs between the roof and the ceiling.
Did this mean he cared about her?
“We do not have your cough . . . or your white-man’s influenza.”
“No arguing there.” The influenza of 1918-19 had wiped out nearly forty million people worldwide. With already low resistance from malaria, she alone in Brendon’s house had succumbed to the influenza and had been left with a persistent low-grade fever, sporadic weakness, and a constant cough—and an aversion to garlic, which almost everyone had eaten or worn around their necks in hopes of avoiding being a casualty of the epidemic.
As Man fashioned the herbs in their bower, their fragrances drifted over her. “We don’t need these diseases. What for you?”
Startled, she blinked. From above, he watched her with intense regard. At a loss for words again, she mumbled, “Do you think I wanted this—this sickness?”
He stared a moment longer, his gave unwavering, as if he was trying to make up his mind, as if he was warring with himself. “One day, we walk.”
Her heart was pounding at at frantic pace. “Walk? Where? Why?”
“Always questions. Can you not simply obey?”
“Obey?” she whispered.
“Yes.”
“Obey you?” She couldn’t quite keep the dismay from her voice. Growing up in a male-dominated household, submission was something she had rebelled against, sometimes futilely. Could she trust this man? Could she give herself over to his control for the sake of her healing?
“Yes.” For a long moment, his gaze held hers, as if compelling her to submission. Then, his eyes released her and he returned to anchoring the herbs.
Shaking her head, trying to get a grip on herself, she continued her own work. But she was powerfully aware of this arrogant, commanding man only yards away from her. They were alone in the small adobe. The temptation to beg him to kiss her was almost more than she could resist. Her breathing was more a panting. If his finely attuned senses picked up on her ferocious desire, she would wither in embarrassment.
When he was finished, he descended the ladder and paused at the window ledge, where she had placed Henri’s gift, the bear fetish. He had moved closer into her space. A giddiness weakened her knees, while his strength seemed to grow all the more impregnable. Silently, he traced the fetish’s turquoise lines with one long forefinger.
His sensual lips . . . stop staring at his mouth for God’s sake. “Henri said it would protect me,�
� she explained in what seemed babbling to her.
Kiss me. Kiss me. Kiss me.
He looked at her thoughtfully. Was he jealous? She doubted it. “From what?”
“I wished it would protect me from wanting you,” she blurted.
“Wanting me?” he asked slowly, carefully, as if to make no mistake about the freighted words.
She would not retreat into a dignified rebuttal. She had blundered this far. Did she have the courage of her truth? “Yes,” she breathed, stepping closer. “I want you to kiss me. I want you in me, Man. I want you filling the cavities that the years have emptied.”
She wasn’t certain if he clearly understood the preciseness of her selected speech, but her impassioned expression . . . he must have. He blinked, as if trying to absorb her words. Then, his huge hands cradled either sided of her small face. She could smell the fragrant herbs on his fingers. For a long moment, his eyes searched hers, as if looking for other meanings hidden behind her pupils. “You are sure about this?” His voice was deceptively gentle.
She stood high on tiptoe and flung her arms around his muscle-corded neck. Hungrily, like a small bat preying on a bull, she fastened her mouth on his, her lips parted, drawing into her his vital juices.
His powerful hands gripped her narrow shoulders, moving her away from him, only slightly. “Then this is a thing you must choose to do.” His eyes held her immobile. His voice was hypnotic. “Unbutton your shirt.”
He stood watching her, dominating her. Her head ducked, her fingers fumbled at her buttons. The last button loosened, she still could not look up at him.. Slowly, his fingers pushed aside the panels of the light blue gabardine work shirt. Her small breasts, with no need for a rubber brassière corset that so unmercifully compressed her breasts and buttocks were exposed. Under his bold, hot regard, her pinkened nipples hardened. She thought she heard herself sigh – or was it his sharp inhalation
He took control from her. His burning gaze never leaving her face, he unfastened her jodhpurs and slid them down over her boyish hips to puddle at the floor. Then, dropping to one knee he removed, first one riding boot than the other. Involuntarily, her hand went to his shoulder for balance. At the electrical current that zipped through her palm, she gasped. Then there was such a thing as chemistry.
His mantle dropped to the earthen floor to become their bed. His breech cloth fell away with a tug of his fingers, and his imposing erection sprang free. Anger darkened his eyes, though she wasn’t sure at which of them his anger was directed. “We do this then. Quick. Hard.”
Her lips trembled. “Would you . . . would you kiss me first.”
His lids snapped closed. When he opened them, his black eyes blazed like the fires for the condemned. “That is not about . . . about love thoughts.”
Her lips quivered. “No romance?” Her small effort at smiling was pitiful. “I am a beggar. I’ll take whatever you dole out.”
His fierce features did not register if he understood her words. But her submission he did. His powerful hands clamped on her shoulders, forcing her down. Unable to help herself, her lips brushed his the dusky flesh of his penis, and he uttered a low growl. On her back now, she looked up at her fierce lover. Distantly she heard her own heavy breathing. He knelt over her. His palms braced at either side of her ribcage, his knee forced apart her thighs. Then he paused. His face clouded. “You want this . . . this hurt?”
“Yes,” she breathed.
Man took possession of her then. With a mighty slam, he drove into her, impaling her. His huge penis plowed her delicate folds roughly, almost punishingly. Again and again. Pounding at her. Hammering her flesh as thoroughly as he had the timbers of her home. As if he could drum his urge for her out of his body. Exorcise her from his mind. Over and over. His engorged organ battered her, rammed her. Tears sprang to her eyes. The pain at this intrusiveness inside her was overwhelming, greater than she had expected. It had been so long. He was so much larger than Brendon. Filling her. Filling her every space. Her fingers gripped his mighty biceps with each forceful plunge. She groaned loudly.
He paused. His concerned gaze searched her face.
“Don’t stop,” she whispered urgently.
Somehow in the hour s that followed, his pace subtly altered. Slowly he sank into her, waiting for her now pleasurable gasp. Then slowly he withdrew. And slid into her again. Slowly. Very slowly. His harsh, wild features never relented . . . until he heard her repeated gasps of pleasure and felt her body arc toward his hips, meeting and joining his in a dance of intense pleasure. Then, at last, at her shrill outcry, a small crescent of a smile broke those full, sensual lips.
No exchange of words. Only his heat. And his semen. “I want you in my mouth,” she said.
Astonishment flared in his eyes. But he let her feverish hands have her way – and her lips and tongue. His enlarged penis stretched her mouth wide, so that she thought she might strangle. And yet she couldn’t get enough. Swallow enough of his salty essence. The next time he came, she directed his rigid flesh so that it spurted all over her, bathing her in its restorative fluid. Time after time. Oh my god, she was now imprisoned by her lust for this man. For Man. Addicted to him.
And she was moist again. All over. All through her.
At last, he relented and withdrew his thick penis, releasing her from the exquisite torture. She was still panting. Her heart threatened to burst from her ribcage. He lay alongside her, his breathing erratic, his heavy thigh and his soft/hard but still substantial penis draped over her thigh. They stared into each other eyes, both staggered by what had transpired. Her thoughts were in a riotous jumble. Oh my God, I have waited all my life for this! Doubting if it was even plausible. . . . expecting some extraordinary in an ordinary world.
He placed his huge hand above her left breast, still damp with his sweet-salty essence. Even her hairline was saturated. His expression was grave. “Your heart . . . this is what it wanted?”
“Yes . . . no,” she whispered. “This won’t be enough.”
At that, his eyes glowed with the scorching black smoke of hell. “It must be.”
“Then this is it? Only this, no more?” She felt like crying irrational tears over the loss of what was almost paradise.
“Yes,” he said firmly.
She couldn’t hide the horror in her voice. She put her hand over his. Her question came in a breathless space of forced sounds. “And what is it your heart wanted?”
His unrelenting expression set in a stone frieze. He blinked several times, as if considering his answer. She could tell he was searching for the right English expression. Then his beautiful lips seemed barely to move. “Disappointment.”
“Oh,” she gasped, feeling as if a fist had slammed into her stomach.
Then he was gone, as surely as if he had been a trick of her imagination. The Trickster, the Coyote.
* * * * *
The contents of Brendon’s letter didn’t please Alessandra but, at least, she and Jeremy were safe. So far. Letter in hand, she climbed the stairs.
Peg’s bedroom door was ajar. She sat at her dresser in a pink-flowered morning wrap. Her fingers paused in the act of unrolling the paper curlers from her hair. She stared in the mirror back at Alessandra. “You’ve been with Man.”
Alessandra’s breath drew in sharply. “Did he tell you and Tony?”
“No. Man doesn’t share his confidences. Your expression says it all. It’s radiant. Won’t you sit while I finish?”
Gingerly, Alessandra crossed to the oriental tasseled hassock. She was raw from Man’s repeated invasion of her delicate folds by his massive battering. And aching from the loss of him, from what she would never experience again. Well, at least, I have known this out-of-body rapture at least once. I should be grateful. But, no, I am a selfish glutton, always wanting more. A disgusting addict to romance, sex, love, lust, whatever.
Besides a sitting room, Peg’s bedroom opened onto a sleeping porch shared with Tony’s bedroom. Two swinging hammock
s had been strung on the porch. Peg spooled another paper from her hair. “Do you want to talk about it?
If anyone could understand her predicament, Peg could. Peg had been married when she had begun the affair with Tony. But Alessandra shook her head. “No, talking about it won’t help. This is something I must sort through myself.”
“The Indian mentality is difficult to wrap one’s mind around. I do know that Tony spoke to him about you, although I don’t know what was said. Tony likes you a lot, you know. And if Tony likes you, then you are in good standing with the Taos community.”
“For someone who has a national reputation as a spokesperson for the avant-garde, Peg, don’t you find Taos somewhat provincial for your taste?”
“Au contraire, I was suffocating in industrialized society. After the war, eastern values had declined, including mine.” She paused, tossing the wadded papers on the cluttered vanity bureau. “To be frank, Alessandra, I sought out sexual liaisons and justified the less sleazy in the name of marriage.” Gone was Peg’s ingénue guise, replaced by a saucy smile. “Well, some I did and some I didn’t.”
Alessandra smiled back. “You’ve just given a description of Washington’s most influential people, madam.”
Peg leaned toward her, the ruffled apricot peignoir parting to reveal ample breasts. “Alessandra, Willa Cather once told me that the Great World War split the world in two, and it would never be the same. Well, that was what Taos did for me. It showed me I had been merely looking at life, not living it, that there was life beyond the five senses. Tony taught me to stop listening with my eyes.”
“To stop listening with the eyes,” she murmured. “I like that.”
Peg brushed out her spiraled hair. “Lest, you think I am a hopeless romantic, I will be even more frank with you and reveal that my beloved Tony not only left his former wife, another Taos Indian, for me . . . but also left me with syphilis.”
Alessandra coughed and shifted uncomfortably, trying to conceal her shock. And then stark fear. What if Man had given her syphilis? Her cough turned to a suppression of laughter. I’m dying of tuberculosis, and I’m afraid I might be afflicted with syphilis!
Indian Affairs (historical romance) Page 6