by Martha Hix
Yet she could be base. Erasmo grinned. She could be very base and devoid of morals. That was how he liked her best.
Many times in the distant past, she had spread her velvet-soft legs for him . . . had wrapped her bowed lips around his dark and throbbing member. Yes, she had been more than willing to share his bed. In the beginning she did it for curiosity’s sake, he was certain. The lady had sought to find out if the ugly and hulking mestizo made love differently from one of breeding and class. Erasmo had shown her it was very different.
There had been an inextinguishable fire between them which flared higher than class distinctions. And for a while, so long ago—more than three years it had been—Erasmo had lived under the foolish illusion that she would become his wife.
Then Miguel had coerced him into joining the army. It had seemed a noble deed, bringing a bunch of ungrateful rebels into line, thus keeping the rights to Tejas soil. Erasmo had been proud in agreeing to serve under his friend’s command.
Packed and prepared to depart for the far side of the Rio Bravo, he had pulled Mercedes close to tease. “Follow me to war. Become my soldadera.”
She slapped his unclad thigh. “I’m not a camp follower!”
“I know.”
“Then why did you ask such a thing of me?”
“Ah, my sweet Mercedes, it is because I can’t live without you. Marry me, little crab,” he said. “Become my wife as soon as I return to Vera Cruz.”
She refused. Matter of fact, his marriage offer had infuriated her. How dare he? Why should she wait for him? If he wanted her hand, then he could give up his loco en la cabeza ideas of chasing off to Tejas! Erasmo hadn’t been fooled by her ultimatum. Two things he had known for certain back then. First, he would not renege on his promise to fight. Second, Mercedes knew it. She had used her argument to take the emphasis off herself, for never would she accept his roughened hand.
They had parted.
Erasmo de Guzman, infantry sergeant under Don Colonel Miguel Sierra y de Leon, made the journey north to serve under the Eagle and Serpent flag. He lived the horrors of war, the degradation of defeat. And more. The Tejano rebels—a more despicable lot never lived!—had enslaved hundreds of Mexican soldiers. Including Sergeant Erasmo de Guzman.
For months he had been maltreated by his vindictive captor. The kindest thing a person could say about Polack John Johnston was his beer belly wasn’t as big as his hatred for Mexicans. Polack John, much larger than the then-emaciated Erasmo, and having supposed right on his side as well as a cato’-nines, took a special delight in kicking his captive’s ribs. When he wasn’t striping the slave’s back. Erasmo couldn’t count the incidents, but he had no trouble recalling the words that went along with the beatings.
“You chile-eatin’, cactus-suckin’ dog, get them lazy bones workin’! And”—the lash would fall—“that’s for the Alamo! Take this one for Goliad! And this one’s cuz I cain’t stand the look o’ yer ugly Meskin face!”
And the Tejanos claimed the Mexicans hadn’t fought fair.
That had hurt Erasmo more than forced labor or kickings or lashings. In the beginning, he believed in fair play and the equality for all men. In the beginning. Many nights under the moon that rose above the Brazos river, he had vowed to take his measure against the evil Johnston. He had, by the autumn of 1836, amended his intentions to include anyone of the Tejano persuasion.
By the time he and his fellow soldiers were freed by their “masters,” Erasmo was in no condition to care about anything beyond reaching the succor of Mercedes’s arms.
His only source of delight as he started his trek had been seeing Polack John’s death quiver. Erasmo had been robbed of vengeance by a rattlesnake.
His head hanging in dejection and his body in rags, Erasmo had returned on foot to Vera Cruz. Two years ago. He had held on to the hope that Mercedes, his little crab, would hold him to her breast while he shed his held-back tears.
She hadn’t held him to her breast.
Thinking back on the day he learned she married another, Erasmo shuddered. In shock, he had taken a typically austere room at a mesón. Not a sip of water, not a morsel of food passed his lips for three days. He had done nothing but stare at the ceiling. On the fourth day he tried to face the reality of living without Mercedes.
He tried. Mother of God, how he tried! But it wasn’t enough, the honor and integrity of standing beside his best friend’s widow. Nor had he gained peace of mind from trying to force his government into treating all of its citizens fairly.
A man obsessed, Erasmo hadn’t been able to stay away from Joaquin Navarro’s wife—even though she either shunned him or treated him with contempt. Never had she allowed him so much as the tiniest of kisses.
He deserved the raw treatment, he knew. If he had stayed here rather than chasing after Miguel, she might still be his. Never by name, but at least in his arms. If only . . . If only she would give him a nod, Erasmo would turn his back on any and everything. If only . . .
The carriage bounced. The jolt and Don Valentin’s blunt snort of somewhat intruded sleep yanked Erasmo to the present.
“You there, stop the coach. Alto!”
Erasmo recognized the feminine voice. Mercedes! His head spinning, his face splitting into a grin, he parted the curtains to see that they were way short of Alejandra’s home. What was Mercedes doing on the road to Campos de Palmas?
The carriage halted. Don Valentin moved, but only to settle down onto the cracked leather seat. Erasmo opened the creaking door and jumped to the ground. Moonlight afforded him clear sight of Mercedes Navarro.
His heart raced.
In a rustle of silk and above the tropical night sounds, she hurried forward. He gave thanks to the Virgin Mary that he had bathed and dressed in his finery—a silver-studded bolero to match his sombrero, plus tight breeches to outline his formidable equipment.
“Erasmo, you mustn’t show yourself!”
“Why?” He took her hand while breathing the lovely scent of lavender and beloved woman. “And what are you doing out here by yourself, mi chiquita jaiba?” he added protectively, affectionately.
She pulled her fingers from his hand. “I am not a crab,” she whispered, mindful of the driver’s big ears. “And if I were, I am certainly not your crab.”
“What’s going on here?”
Both Erasmo and Mercedes looked up at the window. Don Valentin leaned out of it. “What’s going on here?” he repeated, yawning. “And who, señorita, are you?”
Mercedes turned to the barouche and extended a hand upward for the old grandee’s kiss. “I am Señora Navarro of Hacienda del Noche. You, I presume, are Don Valentin of Merida.”
He kissed the offered fingers, then cupped his ear with his other hand. “What was that you said?”
She repeated her introduction and shouted, “Pray, have your man turn this carriage around. Our former president, Señor Santa Anna of Manga de Clava, has chosen this evening to honor my esteemed sister with his presence.”
“How did that happen?” The octogenarian reared his head up, striking it on the window frame. “Ouch!”
At the same moment Erasmo slammed his fist into the mitt of his other hand. “¡Madre de Dios! She told Montgomery that we Federalists would be there. Yet he puts her in jeopardy . . . I will cut his heart out!”
Cautious not to allow the older man to hear either her tone or words, she scolded, “Erasmo, shut your mouth—for once. You involved my sister in your intrigue, and it’s come to no good. Which is just like you: politics, politics, politics! Anyway, she sent me to tell you, ‘Leave at once.’ Help the driver turn this conveyance around. And go.”
He was at a crossroad. He could go after the bastard who had done Alejandra false. Or—to hell with Federalism!—he could press his case with Mercedes. There was no question in his mind, not really. This was the opportunity he had been praying for.
His voice a sexual growl, he asked, “What will you give me if I do?”
&nbs
p; “A kick in the groin if you don’t,” she came back, and relinquished his arm to return to her spot below the window. Stretching on tiptoes, she shouted, “Will you, Don Valentin, please have your carriage turned around?”
“That goes without saying, señora,” Don Valentin returned. “But I see nary a horse nor even a burro. And I see the coffee depulper is in use.” He pointed toward a torch-lit area a quarter mile away, where, faint from this distance, hoppers were droning monotonously and a score of voices were lifted in song. “Those rascals have surely fortified themselves with alcohol, so we must escort you to safety.”
“I will walk. I choose to walk. Say no more.”
“Señora Navarro, we cannot allow you to return by yourself. That would be ungallant.” The grandee tapped his cane on the carriage ceiling. “Santos,” he yelled in a croak, as if the young man couldn’t hear him anyway, “get down from that perch and help the grand lady in here.”
Erasmo seized opportunity. He clamped his fingers around Mercedes’s wrist, daring her to protest. “Don Valentin, it would be best if we didn’t take the chance of Santa Anna seeing your coach,” he said. “You two have been at odds in the past, you know. And you’re right about Señora Navarro. She shouldn’t walk alone. We are old friends, aren’t we, chiquita-jaiba? —” the term of endearment was mouthed for her ears only “—and I should be honored to escort her back to the dinner party.”
“We wouldn’t want Santa Anna seeing you either,” she pointed out between clenched teeth.
“I won’t take a step beyond the stable. I’ll mount a fine mare and be riding with all my might . . .” He scratched his thumb across the soft, sweet flesh of Mercedes’s palm. “. . . before you can say ‘Remember old times in the woods.”’
He heard her breath catch. He detected a small tremble where he grasped her wrist. Or was that his own shiver? “Are you happy with your doctor man? Does he give you what you want in life? Do you ever wish for what we shared?”
He glanced at her face. The moonlight couldn’t afford him clear vision of her cornflower-blue eyes . . . yet he sensed the passion building in them. His voice a murmur, he asked, “My darling Mercedes, will you allow me to take you?”
She turned away. Her shoulders were straight, then they slumped. Again, she whipped around. Her words were addressed to the ancient Yucatecan.
When she finished, Don Valentin nodded. “Sí, that is the sensible thing to do.”
Erasmo de Guzman, twenty-six years old, and three years without cherishing his adored Mercedes’s lush body, had endured her wrath, both edges of her tongue, and her fits of aggravation. That was in the past. Tonight—may fate rain on her high-born husband! —she would once more fold her aristocratic legs around the scarred back of a peasant.
Tonight.
This was going to be one helluva night.
Reece had to protect himself against those plotting against him. Thus, he went against Alejandra’s demand by bringing Antonio López de Santa Anna here for a purpose: to show he had nothing to hide . . . and that he was wise to their trick.
Reece expected trouble. He was no stranger to it.
At a rectangular table built to accommodate ten, but set for four, three diners were seated for dinner. Alejandra headed one end, Antonio sitting at the other. Reece’s chair was to her right, centered between them.
Not for the first time since Alejandra had ushered the two men into this dining room, that empty chair gave Reece pause. If not for Antonio, there would be two such seats. Could it be . . . ? Had it been set for the Federalist Alejandra had mentioned the other night? If so, she was not in cohoots with the cur of Manga de Clavo.
Now that was a weak-minded thought.
Reece sorted the situation and came up with a solution he could be comfortable with: Alejandra had said Federalists would be here as a stall tactic and to follow through with the lie—one of several, to be sure—she wanted the table to appear to him as if those “Federalists” were delayed. Or somesuch. As soon as the opportunity arose, he intended to find out what was what.
Awaiting that golden opportunity, he glanced at Alejandra. The flawless, pale face that had been shocked upon acknowledging the unexpected visitor was now animated in fury. Obviously she cared not for being foiled in her plans. He liked a woman with spirit.
Despite her anger, she had never looked lovelier to Reece. His groin began to warm, blood swirling to his shaft. He shifted in his chair, reveling in the sheer beauty of Alejandra. A gardenia as delicate as her complexion was fashioned into her chignon. A diamond necklace, sprinkled with emeralds and rubies as vibrant as the Mexican flag, rested on the swell of her breasts. Fingerless gloves accented her graceful arms and hands. She would, of course, have been stunning in a flour sack, but she wore a low-cut gown of taffeta and lace, its green hue emphasizing the verdant highlights of her hazel eyes.
Beautiful was Widow Sierra.
So was a pearl-handled bowie knife.
Both could be deadly.
Reece turned his inspection to the decor. The dining room’s ambience couldn’t be faulted. Everything was spit and polish, gardenias and camellias, candlelight and crystal. Food and wine were being served while from outside, in the courtyard’s shaded discretion, the primitive and sensual sounds of marimba floated through the half-opened doors.
“May I take your plate, Señor?” asked the serving girl.
Reece shifted his attention. The meal’s first course—some sort of salad—was taken away, untouched by either him or Alejandra. His lack of appetite had nothing to do with the unappetizing oranges and almonds that had garnished the greens. What was the matter with him, wanting to bed Alejandra? What happened to his determination to remember the Alamo, and not give Antonio’s accomplice the upper hand? The beribboned cock-o’-the-walk now slurping up turtle soup was behind that visit Alejandra had made to Casa Montgomery, and if Reece were to disregard that fact, he’d be a dolt of the first water.
The courtyard musicians struck a new tune, the vocalist singing about women betraying men. It seemed fitting.
Reece fiddled with his soup spoon, his curiosity running at full tilt, as he glanced across the table to that empty chair. The urge to mention it ate at him like a buzzard did carrion. Yet something else chewed at him. Just a small substance known as his conscience. If Alejandra was honest about her Federalist connection . . . That seemed doubtful. And . . . remember the Alamo.
“I’d say it’s wicked of your other guest, not making an appearance,” he probed.
“Well, uh, y-yes. That is so.”
“I agree.” Antonio nodded, continuing the noble spirit he had donned since arriving at the late Don Miguel Sierra’s hacienda. “I would not have missed—”
Interrupting in a tone as warm as a St. Louis blizzard, Alejandra clipped out, “My s-sister ought to be here. She’s been detained. Apparently.”
Detained. Right. His suspicions confirmed by the flimsy, convenient excuse of a sibling—always handy in times of need—Reece parked his elbows on the walnut tabletop. “Is that so?”
“Why would I lie about a thing like that?”
“You tell me.” Putting her on the spot didn’t fill Reece with pride. What could he do, though? He had a point to make. Besides, with Alejandra in collusion with Antonio, what would it hurt to put her in the line of fire?
“Your sister is the one you mentioned the other night? The one who works with you?” He waited in vain for an answer. “You remember what you said, don’t you? That night you extended your invitation, I seem to recall you mentioned that others would be here. Never would have guessed you meant your sister.”
Antonio was listening and watching.
Candlelight reflected Alejandra’s emerald-and-diamond earrings, but those light-points were dull compared to the prisms of her revealing hazel eyes.
She would make a terrible gambler.
Which didn’t have a damn thing to do with right here, right now, and what was right. Or wrong. Right or wron
g or in between, Alejandra had battle in those eyes.
The silence was so profound that Reece could almost hear foghorns in New Orleans.
“What a terrible shame that the lovely Señora Navarro cannot be with us tonight,” Antonio said, unmuzzling the quiet. “Let us hope she has not taken ill.”
“She is not infirm.”
Antonio cocked his head. “My dear Doña Alejandra, you are not yourself tonight. It is unlike you to be short with others.”
“You insult me, making such a remark,” she responded while Reece chuckled inwardly at the other man’s statement. Alejandra had professed not to be well-acquainted with Antonio, but Antonio damned sure seemed to know a lot about her.
Continuing to study his hostess, Antonio asked, “Do you not wish my presence?”
“Of course you are welcome here.” Her tone was less than convincing. “My house is your house.”
Never having had the ability to leave well enough alone, Antonio said, “Perhaps you are unwell, Doña Alejandra. My beloved Ines tends to get fractious from time to time, too.”
“I am quite well, gracias a Dios. Have some of the fruit ice, General. It will clear your palate for the next dish. And with any luck, it will turn your concern from my state of health.”
Reece listened to her irritation. Indeed, she was transferring her anger at him to the man who had set her on her devious course, but wasn’t she carrying it all a bit too far? After all, Antonio was her associate.
Or was he?
Thinking along that line brought forth Reece’s purpose in being here. He waited a moment before confronting her with the lie that tied her to the conspiracy against him. “Alejandra, I know you’re pleased to entertain Antonio . . . just as pleased as you were to see him at San Fernando Church.” Shock sliced across her features as he said this, and Reece suddenly wished he hadn’t. Why hadn’t he confronted her in private about her lie? Well, hindsight was always better than foresight . . . and he was in it this far. “When was that? About six or seven weeks ago, as I recall.”