“Lordy, your father is still at the mine looking for you. We had best send someone to fetch him.” The morning came back in a rush then. “I think I told him.”
“Told him what?”
“That we are getting married. Soon as I found you, that’s what I said.” He chuckled.
Aurelia leaned against him, felt his arms tighten around her in a protective, wonderful embrace. “What did he say?”
“He didn’t reply that I heard.” Carson touched spurs to Sunfisher’s flanks. “How ’bout we go get an answer while it’s still fresh on his mind?”
Chapter Twenty-one
By the time Pia and Santos returned at the end of the week, all that was left to decide was the location of the wedding, for as Doña Bella confided to her new daughter-in-law, “Even if Carson was willing, a week is hardly enough time for a conversion.”
“I know where we can have the wedding,” Pia told the family, including Zita and Rodrigo, who had been persuaded to stay the week. “In the garden.” She looked to her new husband. “Don’t you agree, Santos? Wouldn’t our garden be a perfect place for their wedding?”
“Our garden?” Doña Bella inquired. “We have no—”
“She means the garden behind the convent school,” Santos explained, a gleam in his eyes the still-barely-single men in the group were quick to note.
Aurelia’s euphoria had returned in increments during the week as they made wedding plans and wrapped up the mine difficulties.
Her father had not given his blessing to this union, her mother reminded her from time to time. Doña Bella’s distressed tone every time she voiced Don Domingo’s objection caused Aurelia to wonder which of them had not accepted the marriage—her father or her mother.
“The church has been her life,” Aurelia explained one afternoon when she and Carson sat in the patio. He strummed a guitar, while she sat on the fountain edge, studying him, thinking. “She never dreamed her only daughter would be living in sin or that her grandchildren would be born out of wedlock, which will be the case since our marriage cannot be consecrated by the priest.”
His fingers stilled on the strings. For an indeterminable time, he stared at her, grim-faced. “What about you, angel? You never dreamed such, either.”
“We won’t be living in sin. Not in my mind.”
“Nor in mine. But I wasn’t raised in a convent school.”
“Papá will come around,” she assured him. “As soon as he stops worrying over Tío Luís’s betrayal.”
“I hope so. I don’t want us to leave Catorce without his blessing.”
“Neither do I,” she admitted, “but if we have to, we will. I’m going to Texas with you, Carson. Don’t think you can get away from here without me.”
He grinned at that. “Don’t think I would try.”
The household was aflutter on the day of the bride and groom’s return. Pia’s parents had agreed that the couple should stay at the Mazón mansion so the girls could spend time together before Aurelia left.
Zita, too, became a permanent fixture, since Rodrigo decided to wait around to see how Santos was taking to married life.
“Thinking of taking the plunge yourself?” Carson had teased.
“Might as well. All my amigos are getting hitched. Won’t have anyone left to carouse with.” But the gleam in his eyes whenever Zita entered the room betrayed his real reason for considering the state of matrimony.
Siesta had just ended when Serphino alerted the household to the arrival of the bride and groom.
Everyone rushed to the stable yard.
“Don’t ask her about it,” Carson whispered to Aurelia.
“Do you think I would ask that?”
He chuckled. “When you get a notion in your head, I doubt there is anything you wouldn’t ask.”
In spite of the family standing nearby, she slipped an arm around his waist. “Not that,” she whispered. “That’s something I will never talk about.”
“Never?”
“Never with anyone but you.”
Their first glimpse of Pia and Santos reassured both of them. Carson grinned.
“Even if you wanted to ask,” he whispered, “don’t reckon there’s a need.”
His throaty voice brought a skip to her already-throbbing heart. The sight of Pia and Santos, so radiant and obviously pleased with themselves, filled her with happiness for them.
And with impatience to get on with her own life. She and Carson had not found a single opportunity to be alone—really alone—since Pia and Santos’s wedding. Time was wasting.
That evening after dinner the entire family sat in the patio beside the fountain, where Santos demanded to be brought up to date on the situation at the mine.
“Luís took me for a fool,” Don Domingo stated flatly.
“You trusted a friend and brother-in-law,” Carson told him in quiet tones. “You cannot fault yourself for that.”
The older Mazón stared into the fountain a time before returning to his son’s question. “He had been stealing from me from the beginning,” he admitted. “Before we built the mint, Quiroz was taking ore out for him, hiding it in that chapel, then smuggling it, to Guanajuato. They had a good thing going.”
“So that is how he financed his high living?” Santos mused.
“And how he planned to finance his run for the governor’s office,” Don Domingo added. “He told me the story. I went up to the jail before they moved him to Potosí. He said he had to change his tactics after I started talking about establishing a mint. Since we would no longer ship ore, he would need a way to get to the coinage.”
“That’s where Enrique came in?” Santos asked.
Don Domingo’s teeth clenched. He nodded, still unable to discuss the young man who had ingratiated himself to the Mazón family to the extent that Don Domingo had intended to give him his business. And his daughter.
“Anybody learn the true story behind Enrique?” Santos inquired.
“Like he told Carson,” Aurelia answered, “he learned his trade in the mines in Peru. He never saw the University of Madrid. His family was not old Spanish, either. In fact, he was orphaned young. And now he is in jail. He will be branded a criminal for life.”
“Where did Tío Luís find him?”
Aurelia shrugged. “Men like Tío Luís can always find other evil men to do their bidding.”
“Stop calling that man tío,” Doña Bella instructed them. “Guadalupe petitioned for an annulment of her marriage when she learned the truth. My sister may be a social climber, but she was not involved in Luís’s illegal schemes.”
“So now it’s over,” Santos mused.
“Sí,” his father answered, “thanks to you for taking matters into your own hands.” He turned serious eyes on Carson. “And to you, Jarrett. You saved my business and my daughter’s life, at great risk to your own.”
Carson squirmed under the scrutiny. “Rodrigo here played a part in the final scene.”
“And to you, Don Rodrigo,” Don Domingo added.
“So what does that mean, Papá?” Aurelia questioned.
He studied her with weary eyes, looking to Carson, then back to his daughter. His face was grim-set when he answered. “It means if you decide to go through with that thing up at the garden, I will be there.”
Her heart pumped waves of happiness through her body, sending moisture to her eyes. “Gracias, Papá.”
Ignoring her, Don Domingo scraped back his chair. “Time for us to retire, Mamá. You children stay down here a while if you like. I will send Lucinda to keep watch.”
Carson followed them to the staircase. “Gracias, Don Domingo. This means a lot to both of us.”
“Do not thank me, Jarrett. I could see my choices—agree to it or lose her. I do not approve of the way you are going about it, but I will not stand in your way.”
Carson nodded.
“About Rancho Mazón,” the elder Mazón added. “Santos had the right idea. You are a man who gets t
hings done. You will do a good job running the ranch.”
Aurelia’s eyes glistened when Carson returned to sit beside her. “Papá agreed,” she whispered.
He nodded, still a bit dazed. “Conditionally—I think.”
Santos broached the subject. “What have you decided about the ranch?”
“We’ll give it a shot,” Carson said. “First, we need to visit my family.”
Santos laughed. “That may take a while, compadre, considering how they’re strung out.”
Carson laughed, too.
“We plan to return by early spring,” Aurelia told them.
“By that time, our house here in Catorce will be finished,” Pia said.
Santos nodded. “And you two can set up housekeeping at Rancho Mazón.”
“Can’t promise we will stay forever,” Carson told him. “But it’s a good place to get started.”
Rodrigo spoke up. “Why don’t I drive those Arabians to the ranch for you, Jarrett? Save you having to worry about them.”
At that suggestion, all eyes focused on Rodrigo and Zita, who sat blushing beside him.
“And give you an excuse to come back this way?” Santos questioned.
“Suits me,” Carson agreed. “Only Santos and I had best warn you about these girls.”
The girls protested, but Santos and Carson persisted, ribbing Rodrigo, telling secrets—a few of them—while the girls fidgeted, blushed, and generally tried to hush them up.
“In other words,” Santos finished, his hand massaging the back of Pia’s neck in a way that made the other two men squirm, since they were still under the watchful eye of the dueña, “if you are not interested in a life filled with intrigue and chaos, you had best hightail it.”
Rodrigo handled the insinuations in typical charro fashion, strutting a little more than the average man would have done. “I have kept my eyes open the last couple of weeks, and from the looks of things, you two can use an extra hand keeping these ladies in line.”
The wedding was set for mid-morning two days hence. Since it would not be church sanctioned, there was some question about using the garden. In the end Padre Bucareli relented, with the provision that no one from the cathedral or convent attend. After all, Don Domingo always financed the feast of San Francisco and a number of other parish projects.
The alcalde agreed to perform the civil ceremony.
“Hope he doesn’t recognize me,” Carson quipped.
Aurelia laughed, too happy for anything to dampen her spirits. “If he does, we can spend our honeymoon in jail.”
“Not on your life, angel. I promised you a surprise.”
For her wedding gown, her mother insisted on a silver faille costume that had never been worn, but Aurelia objected. Searching her wardrobe, she pulled out an old gown, one of her favorites, designed of tissue taffeta with large bouffant sleeves and a wide skirt she always had trouble maneuvering down the staircase. It swished and crinkled when she walked.
And it was yellow.
“That skirt will not fit in the carriage,” her mother objected.
“For the short ride to the garden it will, Mamá. I will wear riding clothes when we leave.”
“I still think you should take one of our carriages on your wedding trip instead of riding horses,” her mother fussed.
To no avail, of course, since traveling all the way to Texas in a carriage would present more problems than they bargained for, broken axles and such.
The sun was high by the time they reached the garden. Pia, Zita, and Doña Bella had all squeezed into the carriage at Aurelia’s insistence.
“Please ride with me. I won’t see any of you for months.” But if she had thought to chatter on the way to the ceremony, she hadn’t counted on a last minute case of jitters.
“It’s natural,” Pia consoled. “You know how nervous I was all day long. If only my wedding had been in the morning.”
“You can still back out,” her mother suggested.
Aurelia gripped her mother’s cold, clammy hands in her own, which closely resembled them. “I have no doubts about Carson, Mamá. No doubts about anything. It’s just…”
She paused, knowing her mother would never understand. Pia would. And from the looks of their developing relationship, Zita might someday.
But she doubted that her mother had ever experienced the depth of emotions she had known with Carson in the short time they had been together.
Thinking on it, her pulse quickened and her hands warmed. She would not see these three special women for several months, but it seemed even longer since she had lain in Carson’s arms.
And he had said he had a surprise for her.
Anticipation warmed her cold feet and she skipped toward the garden, her bridesmaids rushing to catch up.
“Pia, the setting is perfect.” Aurelia twirled in a circle as she viewed the fountain, the sundial where the alcalde would preside, the fruit trees glowing in red and gold autumn splendor against towering green pines. Jagged mountains rose around them as a backdrop to it all, lending a majesty not to be found inside any building, no matter how grand, no matter how sacred.
Then she saw Carson approach, flanked by Santos and Rodrigo. He wore the black charro suit from Santos’s wedding, as did his attendants, their sombreros carried in their hands. Her father, similarly attired, kept pace.
At the sight, tears formed in her eyes, and by the time Carson reached her, they threatened to roll down her cheeks.
His eyes warmed her, caressed her, reassured her. Reaching into an inside pocket, he withdrew a handkerchief with which he dabbed her tears. “Figured I might need this,” he whispered, before greeting her mother and the girls.
When she slipped her hand through his elbow, he fastened it there with his other hand, clasping her with a firm touch, steady and loving.
The civil ceremony was brief, ending when the alcalde advised Carson that he could kiss the bride.
“Wait a minute.” Carson fished into another pocket. “We forgot something.”
Her left hand trembled when he slipped the gold ring on her third finger. He grinned that wry grin of his. “Something a lady once gave me for luck.”
She looked from the gold ring to his loving eyes. “Something a gentleman once gave me for love,” she whispered.
“One of the few good things to come from Guanajuato.” Carson eyed Rodrigo. “That, and a good friend.”
He kissed her then, soundly but quickly, and they left the garden. Before he handed her into the carriage, however, Padre Bucareli and the nuns approached, hugging her in turn. They did not voice approval—in fact, they made no mention of the marriage—but she could tell they still loved her, and that sent Carson digging for his handkerchief again.
“Keep her out of mischief,” the padre advised Carson with a twinkle in his eyes.
“I will try, padre,” he answered.
It was harder to leave than she had expected. Even Santos blinked back tears when he hugged her goodbye.
“Couldn’t send you off in better hands, Relie. Jarrett will take care of you.”
“Spring isn’t far away,” Pia added. “You can stay with us in our new house before you move to the ranch.”
Doña Bella hugged her daughter silently, then buried her face in her handkerchief, while Don Domingo shook Carson’s hand.
“Take care of her, Jarrett. She has been raised proper; might not take to wilderness living.”
Santos laughed at that. “She’ll do fine, Papá. You will see when they return.”
Only Zita and Rodrigo remained dry-eyed, and Aurelia recognized the look all too well. They were as engrossed with each other as she and Carson had been at Pia and Santos’s wedding.
“Don’t get married until we return,” she whispered in Zita’s ear.
“Then hurry back,” Zita urged.
They rode away, each pulling a pack mule, one laden with Aurelia’s satchels and a trunk, the other with provisions Carson had insisted on seeing
to personally.
She knew where they were going, although she did not intend to spoil his plans by letting on—to the lodge where Santos and Pia had spent their honeymoon. She had overheard Carson and Santos discussing it the evening before.
They entered the tunnel and rode past the chapel carved into the side of the mountain, the chapel that had caused so much heartache, the chapel where Carson had saved her from the clutches of Nuncio Quiroz.
“We could have had the wedding there, I suppose, if…” Her words drifted off. No use talking about things they could have done. They were set on a course of their own choosing, one she would not change for anything in the world.
“Maybe we can have our children christened there,” he replied.
She let the darkness of the tunnel enclose them like a giant black womb, nourishing his words, her thoughts, their situation. They still had many things to work out in the days and months and years ahead. But they would do it. She did not for a moment doubt that.
Before they reached the cutoff to the lodge, he drew rein and studied a crumpled map that he had fished from his pocket.
“The cutoff is about a kilometer or so further,” she supplied without remembering she had intended to feign surprise when they reached the lodge.
He glanced at her, that wry grin tipping his lips. “Oh? You know where we are headed?”
She lifted her chin, challenging him, unwilling to give herself away.
Finally, he returned the map to his pocket and pulled the reins toward a dim trail that led down a steep incline in the opposite direction from the lodge.
She sat her horse a minute.
“Come on. You led me across this country once,” he told her. “Now it’s my turn.”
An hour of hard riding later, they crossed a creek and headed up the side of a mountain. He drew rein again, this time in a sparse grove of oak trees beside a cave carved into the cliff.
“It isn’t what you would call a waterfall,” he mused, indicating a creek that tumbled down the mountainside. “But with your imagination, I expect we’ll never know the difference.”
Dismounting, he swept his Stetson in a wide arc. “Your honeymoon suite, ma’am.” He lifted her from the saddle and carried her inside. “Stay put, while I get things settled.”
Silver Surrender--Jarrett Family Sagas--Book Two Page 35