by Pam Crooks
“Yes,” he said. He wanted to make her understand. It was imperative she did. “Ramon de la Vega has killed Americans for his revolution. Their lives mean nothing to him, only their money. President McKinley has ordered him stopped.” Jeb took a step closer to her, but she sucked in a breath of protest, and he halted. “Thousands of people will be killed if this revolution of his begins. Villages and cities will be destroyed. The Mexican people will suffer.”
Her throat worked but she said nothing.
“Nicky could be caught in a cross fire.”
Jeb didn’t want to scare her. But she had to know the facts. The harsh reality.
Her eyes closed. She trembled.
“Corporal Martin and Sergeant Bender have betrayed the president’s orders,” Jeb said. “As soldiers of the United States Army, providing the rebels with arms is inexcusable.”
“Yes.” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “And what of Sergeant Bender?”
“He’ll pay the price, too. When I find him.”
Jeb must prevent the rifles from falling into the rebels’ hands. He had the knowledge. The need.
He could do nothing else.
“What of Nicky?” Elena asked, as if she read his mind. “Is another man’s treason more important to you than him?”
“Elena.”
She asked questions he had no answers for. Both situations needed solving. Each as important as the other.
He reached out, slid his fingers beneath her hair, curled them around her neck. Smooth and warm, her skin. And so damned soft.
She trembled at his touch. Would she skitter away from him as she always did?
He braced for it. She didn’t, but she wanted to.
He could feel the want.
“Don’t be afraid of me,” he murmured. “I’m not a monster, Elena.”
“You just killed a man,” she said shakily. “What am I supposed to think?”
“He would’ve killed me. And you. Both of us, first chance he got.”
She bit her lower lip. “Maybe.”
“He’d spilled his guts. We knew too much.”
Her eyes closed, then opened again. She took a breath, let it out. “Yes.”
“Look at me.”
Her head tilted and her lashes lifted. In the firelight, her eyes mesmerized him. Pools of jungle-green so deep, so dark, he’d drown in them if she let him close enough to climb in.
He’d never hurt her. He wanted to assure her of that. Make her believe it. His fingers tightened on her neck, just enough to bring her nearer. She had to know what he wanted. She had to know, too, she could push away if she had to.
She didn’t.
His head lowered.
He touched his lips to hers, moved over them ever gently to soothe the ugliness of what she’d seen, what he’d done.
The kiss lingered, allowed him to learn the feel of her lips, their incredible softness. Her mouth trembled. Her vulnerability, he knew. The courage his kiss cost her.
And then her lips began to move, too. Tentative. As if she explored the sensation he gave her and found it not unpleasant. He let her discover what it was like to kiss a man, gave her time to know she wouldn’t be hurt from it.
He ended the kiss as gently as he had started it. Before she was ready, he suspected, seeing how slow she was to open her eyes again. And when she least expected him to.
“Get back into your bedroll, Elena. Try to sleep.” He withdrew his hand from around her neck and stepped back, the warmth of her skin lingering on his palm. “I’m going to take care of the corporal, then I’ll turn in, too.”
“All right.” She touched her tongue to her lower lip.
He couldn’t tell if her behavior embarrassed her. Or if she simply wanted one last taste of him. He left camp and disappeared into the darkness, taking Corporal Nate Martin’s body with him.
Chapter Nine
The soldier’s death forced a detour in their journey the next morning. There was no help for it, Elena knew. Traitor or not, they just couldn’t leave his body behind to feed the wolves.
Not that he didn’t deserve it.
She was only beginning to understand the political repercussions of what he’d done. Sergeant Bender’s escape had certainly worsened matters. Where had he gone? Back to Mexico? De la Vega? Certainly not the army! Especially when he realized the corporal wouldn’t be joining him ever again—and why.
Would he suspect Martin had confessed?
How could he not?
The possibility of the arms deal going through remained strong. Was there any hope the shipment of guns could be intercepted and stopped before they reached Mexico? Elena had no idea. If only Jeb had learned of it sooner, he could’ve gone to the proper military authorities and demanded action.
Or taken care of matters himself which, she suspected, he had a deep need to do. Except Sergeant Bender held all the cards, the information of when and where the guns would be delivered. And by whom.
Besides, they had to think of Nicky. They had to keep riding. They had to find him as fast as they could.
Before they resumed their search, however, they rode into Fort Duncan outside of Eagle Pass with the corporal’s body draped over his horse and tied to the saddle. Jeb left firm instructions with the officer in charge to call for a coroner and keep the body under heavy guard. A brief explanation wired to a certain Lieutenant Colonel Eugene Kingston finished the matter.
Elena was only too glad to leave the corporal behind. After leaving the fort, they crossed the Rio Grande, skirted the Mexican town of Piedras Negras and rode hard toward San Ignatius.
They halted on a ridge overlooking a gently rolling valley. At last, the village sprawled before them, a quiet farm community surrounded by grassy pastures and fields of wheat and corn.
Nicky had been here. Just yesterday.
The knowledge made him seem closer, within reach, and stirred her flagging hope. She scanned the hills beyond the village, and beyond those, the pine-and-oak-covered Sierra Madres.
How far into the country had Ramon taken her baby? There were so many hills and mountains, she couldn’t begin to fathom which direction the revolutionaries might have fled. How could she and Jeb possibly locate them?
The night Nicky had been kidnapped, she had been sure she could find him all by herself. In her anguish at learning he was gone, she’d been convinced she could.
How foolish she’d been. So utterly naive.
Without Jeb…
She turned to look at him. Her glance drifted over his profile, the strong line of his jaw, roughened with dark stubble. Engrossed in his thoughts, he wasn’t aware she studied him, and she recalled last night when he had kissed her.
All day, the memory had popped back into her head when she least expected it. Jeb Carson was a dangerous man. He’d ruthlessly defended himself, defended her, and the sobering result would be forever branded into her mind.
But he’d been gentle in his kiss. Incredibly so.
An enigma, Jeb Carson.
Unable to help it, her glance lingered. He chewed absently on a toothpick, his dark eyes sweeping the area in slow assessment, then lifting, as hers had, to the mountains miles beyond.
He said nothing for long moments. Just chewed on his toothpick, rolled it from one side of his mouth to the other.
“What are you thinking, Jeb?” she asked finally.
He glanced at her. “About you.”
“Me?” Her head swiveled back toward the valley. Had he been remembering their kiss, too? “You should be thinking of my son instead.”
“I am. Indirectly.” He leaned from the saddle and plucked her new hat off her head. “I was thinking how to sneak you down into the village without everyone seeing all that blond hair of yours.”
The hat dangled from its cord against her back. She didn’t bother replacing it, though the late-afternoon sun still shone bright and hot.
“What’s the matter with my hair?”
“Too conspicuous. T
he whole town will be talking about the green-eyed, blond-haired gringa who rode in.”
“Hmm.” She’d probably be the only American woman in the place. “And we don’t want word of me reaching Ramon.”
“No.”
“Do you have a plan in mind?”
“I’m working on one.”
“Care to let me in on it? My hair, you know.”
He reached out, fingered the strands. “Got to cover it all up.”
“Why can’t I just wear my hat?”
His hand drew back. He shook his head. “Not good enough.”
“I’ll pin my hair up so it doesn’t show.”
A corner of his mouth lifted, and he tossed aside the toothpick. “And you’ll still look like a green-eyed American gringa.”
“So you want to disguise me?”
“Yep.”
“How?”
“Going to have to steal something for you.” His focus returned to the village. “Bet you never stole anything before, did you?”
“Never.”
“Times like these, it’s okay.”
She couldn’t help a disbelieving laugh. “You’re making your own rules as you go, aren’t you?”
“That’s how a man survives. Making his own rules.” He straightened in his seat. “We’ll ride down to the village and ask some questions. Before we do, see that line of clothes over there?”
He pointed to an adobe structure in the distance, a lone farm an easy ride away. A few sheep grazed in the yard, and a sorry-looking burro, but the place seemed otherwise deserted.
“Yes. Some poor peasant’s laundry.”
His expression turned serious. “Listen up, Elena. This is what we’re going to do.”
Berto eyed the two riders approaching his cantina with grave suspicion. There were not many people who bothered to ride out this way. San Ignatius was only a poor village, isolated and boring. With Piedras Negras not too far away, there were more exciting places to visit than this.
He set his hammer aside, kept them in view through the adobe’s window. They rode slowly. In no hurry. A gringo sitting straight, proud, on his horse. A woman, hunched and weary on a burro.
Curiosity threaded through Berto’s suspicion. Maybe they would not be too much trouble. The woman looked old and feeble. Her rebozo covered her head, her clothes faded and worn. He could not see her face the way she kept her head bent. And maybe he did not want to. How could the gringo not feel sorry for her, eh?
They drew closer and halted. The gringo dismounted first, and Berto could see he was very tall. Dark. He had not shaved for a while and he wore his hat low, but he did not appear nervous, did not even glance through the open door of the cantina to see who was inside.
Berto wondered if the gringo had come to the village sometime in the past. But he did not think so. He had lived in San Ignatius all his life. He would have remembered this one.
The gringo helped the old woman off the burro and pressed a walking stick into her hand. She moved as if her bones hurt, and compassion stirred inside Berto. If she was tired and aching, she was probably thirsty, too.
He abandoned the table leg he had been trying to fix, broken with so many others last night. Por Dios, he had been fixing tables all day and he welcomed the diversion a couple of strangers would bring.
“Who are they, Berto?”
Wiping her hands on a towel, his wife of nearly forty years peered around the curtain covering the doorway to the cantina’s kitchen. Strangers made his Alita nervous, and after yesterday’s trouble she was more nervous than usual.
“I have never seen them before,” he said, tying an apron around his waist. He had not had a customer for a couple of hours now, and he had removed the apron while he repaired his furniture. Now it was time to put it back on again.
“She looks sick,” Alita said, frowning.
“Maybe she is. Go back to the kitchen. Find them something to eat.”
Hearing footsteps, Berto turned. The old woman entered first. She leaned on her walking stick, each step shuffling, slow. Berto could not tell how tall she was, or how thin. The rebozo covered too much of her, but anyone could see how frail she was. Did she suffer from disease?
The gringo followed her in. He filled the doorway, shutting out the sun for a moment when he strode through. He paused, let his eyes adjust to the dim interior. He pointed to a table near an open window. Berto could barely detect the woman’s nod of acknowledgment.
His curiosity about them ran stronger than ever. A mismatch, if he ever saw one.
“Buenos días!” he said, hurrying forward. He had stared long enough. Whatever their relationship, it was none of his business, only that they carried money in their pockets. “Sit, sit!” He pulled out a chair, helped the old woman in. “What would you like? A cold drink? You have traveled far to our little village, eh? And it is hot this afternoon.”
“What do you have?” the gringo asked. He sat across from her and spoke before she could reply.
“Alita makes good lemonade. Not too tart. Not too sweet. Just right.”
“Lemonade for her, then,” he said. “I’ll take a beer. And bring us two plates of whatever it is that smells good in the kitchen.”
His voice was low, deep, his Spanish flawless and smooth. Few would argue with a voice that carried such command, and the woman did not seem to care he ordered without consulting her. She just stared at the tabletop, her hands in her lap.
“Sí, sí. Uno momento.”
Berto hurried to the back and nearly collided with Alita, eavesdropping behind the curtain.
“What is she doing with him?” Alita demanded in a hiss, stealing one last peek before she let the covering fall back into place. “He is too dangerous-looking for one so frail.”
“It is better to know what business he would have with her,” Berto retorted in a hoarse whisper. “She will only slow him down for wherever he needs to go. Why would he bother?”
Alita grunted in agreement and handed him two plates heaped with steaming rice, frijoles and tortillas.
“Try to find out, Berto. We cannot have any more trouble. Everyone in San Ignatius will expect us to find out who they are and why they are here.”
Berto sighed. Sometimes it was a burden owning the only cantina in the village where strangers stopped first to slake their thirsts and fill their hungry bellies. Gossip would spread quickly. There would be many questions about these two, and it would be up to Berto and Alita to learn answers.
“They are probably harmless,” he said. “But I will visit with them and see what they have to say. They have asked for lemonade and beer. Bring their drinks out quickly.”
He left the kitchen and slid both plates onto the table, then added silverware. The gringo nodded his thanks. Berto thought he heard the old woman whisper hers, but he could not be sure.
After Alita brought the lemonade and beer, the stranger picked up his fork. Berto noted his shadowed gaze lingered on the woman; when she did not follow suit, he pushed her plate closer, a silent command for her to eat. Only when she did, did he do the same.
He cared about her, Berto realized, and the knowledge only increased his curiosity further. He found his broom and hoped it did not look too obvious when he swept the floor on their side of the cantina.
He listened, but they did not converse. They ate their meal in no hurry, though there were only a few hours of daylight left. Did they intend to spend the night here, somewhere in San Ignatius?
Who were they?
Alita gestured sharply in their direction as she scrubbed the bar he had already scrubbed this afternoon. Her curiosity was as strong as his—and his wife could be an impatient woman sometimes.
Now was one of those times. He could wait no longer.
“My name is Berto, señor.” Pasting on a broad smile, he stopped sweeping and inclined his head toward the bar. “My wife, Alita. We are happy you stopped by to see us this afternoon.”
The gringo slowed his chewing lon
g enough to incline his head in acknowledgment of the introductions. But he said nothing by way of his own.
Disappointed, Berto tried again.
“And this is… I am afraid I do not know what to call her, señor. She is a friend of yours? Or a relative…?”
His voice trailed off. He had to be careful. She was an old woman. He did not want to anger the gringo. Or insult him.
“Neither,” the stranger said. “I found her.”
“Found her!” As if she were a stray dog? Berto could not hide his surprise. “But where?”
“Wandering along the Rio Grande.”
Berto clicked his tongue in sympathy and wondered if she had gone loco. Had she no home? No family? No friends to watch over her?
“I hope you do not mind me asking, señor, but what was she doing there?” His gaze slid toward the woman. She had shifted in her seat so that her body angled away from him. She huddled over her food, as if she wanted to disappear under the plate.
Maybe she did not like them talking about her. Berto felt guilty for asking so many questions.
“She was looking for someone,” the dark-eyed stranger said.
Berto resumed sweeping. Mexico was a big country. Texas, too. How would she find anyone in such a large area? It would be impossible if she did not know just where to look.
“We’re hoping you can help us.” The gringo finished his beer, set the glass down and, for the first time, gave Berto his full attention.
He stopped sweeping again. “Me?”
“Ever hear of a man named Armando?”
His blood froze. He exchanged an uneasy glance with Alita, then cleared his throat. “There are many Armandos in Mexico, señor. I could not possibly—”
“Heard he was seen around here yesterday. Rides with Ramon de la Vega.”
Just hearing the rebel’s name set Berto’s blood to boiling. He spat on the floor. “Bastardo!”
“Ee-aa!” Alita cried out. She hastened from around the bar and clutched his arm. “He is a Federale, Berto!” she hissed. “He is using us to find them.”