River to Cross, A

by Yvonne Harris

  “How well do you know our Jake?” Maria asked.

  Elizabeth hedged, wondering what Jake had told Ricardo outside about her and what she should say. These people were his friends.

  “I hardly know him at all. I didn’t meet him until a few days ago, after I was kidnapped and they sent him to get me.”

  “Nobody sent him. He sent himself.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Maria chuckled. “The story I heard was, when you were taken last week, he went into Colonel Gordon’s office and said he was going to Mexico to bring you back. He didn’t ask permission to go because crossing into Mexico is a violation of international law, and Colonel Gordon couldn’t give it. Jake had planned to go alone, but U.S. Army Intelligence got wind of it and insisted he take two more Rangers with him. Seems both Austin and Washington want to know if Diego had a hand in killing your brother.”

  Which was what Jake had told her, Elizabeth thought. She drew a deep breath of relief. He hadn’t lied to her. For some reason, that was important. The last of the tension drained away.

  She’d been with only men for a solid week, and it felt good to talk with another woman. They chatted about everything, including the Texas Rangers.

  “Who are a different species altogether, I’m beginning to suspect,” Elizabeth said. “I’m not even sure they’re human.”

  Maria chuckled. “I notice you didn’t smile when you said that. He’s getting to you, eh? Well, he’s not as tough as he seems.”

  Elizabeth’s eyebrows went up. “I don’t know. He seems pretty tough to me.”

  “Until you get to know him. Growing up, he didn’t have much of a family. He loved his mother dearly but hated his stepfather, who drank and beat her. And then he beat Jake for trying to stop him.”

  Elizabeth nibbled on her lower lip. “He’s never let on.”

  Maria nodded. “He probably never will. He’s private about a lot of things. At fifteen he left home and joined the Army. At the time, the Army was desperate for new leaders, young men with manners and muscles. They grabbed him on the spot and sent him to specialty schools. At seventeen they made him a second lieutenant. Mind you, they thought he was three years older than he was.”

  “That’s so sad,” Elizabeth said. “I had no idea. . . .”

  Maria went on, “He also speaks Spanish, French, and Nahuatl, the language of my Aztec ancestors. It’s an asset to anyone who works in Mexico, particularly men like Ricardo and Jake. Your brother was also learning it.”

  A small red flag shot up in Elizabeth’s mind. “You know my brother?”

  Maria smiled. “You look a lot like him. Must be those bright blue eyes you both have. Jake brought him down to meet Ricardo a couple of months ago.”

  Elizabeth’s breath caught in her throat.

  Ricardo Romero was Lloyd’s connection in Mexico.

  And it got him killed.

  “Hey, inside, you ladies decent?” a male voice called.

  “Yes, she is,” Maria said, laughing. She looked at Elizabeth. “I knew he’d be back.”

  Jake and the two boys came into the kitchen. At his side, thumb in her mouth, Jakina held his hand.

  “I didn’t hear you ride in,” Elizabeth said. “You forget something?”

  He nodded. “Need to find out from Ricardo where the nearest telegraph office is to where I’m going. Last time I was in San Jose they had one, but they might’ve moved it. I don’t want to be asking around where it is. It could raise questions.”

  Jakina removed her thumb and patted him to get his attention. He stooped and she whispered in his ear. Smiling, he turned her shoulders and gave her a nudge in Elizabeth’s direction.

  Jakina walked to Elizabeth and peered up at her. She turned to Jake and nodded. “Uncle Jake says you’re boo-ful.”

  Elizabeth raised her eyebrows at Jake. “You said that? That’s so nice.”

  “Ruthie’s description of her aunt Elizabeth,” he said smoothly. “Run along, kids. Go play and let the grown-ups talk.”

  Both boys headed for the door. Jakina gave Jake a quick hug and ran after them. The door slammed behind them.

  “Those kids do anything he asks,” Maria said. “He’ll make a wonderful daddy someday.”

  “Then he better hurry up and get married if he wants a family. In his line of work, his life expectancy isn’t the greatest,” Elizabeth said.

  “Hear that, Maria? Did she just propose to me, or did I hear wrong?”

  Maria looked up, grinning. “Heard wrong, I think. By the way, what’s this story I hear about you sleeping in her bed last night?”

  Elizabeth stiffened. “Oh, for heaven’s sake. Don’t believe it, Maria. Your friend fell into my bed sack because he was too drunk to stand up.”

  Maria looked genuinely surprised. “What? When did you start drinking, Jake?”

  “Right after she bit me,” he said.

  “After she what?” Maria snapped a glance at Elizabeth. “Did you really bite him?”

  Elizabeth dropped her face in her hands and blew out a sigh. “It’s a long story.”

  Jake started for the door. Once there, he stopped and turned around. “It’s mostly true. Gus and Fred loaded my coffee with whiskey, so I was drunk. They’re all having a great time with that at my expense. Nothing happened. She was out of that bed sack like a lightning bolt.”

  He pushed the door open and jerked his head toward the yard. “Come on, Duchess. Let’s take a walk.”

  Elizabeth stood on a flat gray rock jutting out from the riverbank and gazed at the tranquil scene before her.

  The shallow Rio Verde, dull pea green in the sunlight, moved lazily in the gorge between two mountains. The pine trees crowded on the surrounding hillsides grew straight and tall.

  “It’s so pretty,” she said.

  Jake sat on the bank, legs outstretched. “This may be gone by this time next year. Where we’re standing could all be underwater. The river’s low now, the water controlled by the small irrigation dams upstream.”

  She noted the edge in his voice and turned to face him. For the first time, his face was tense, his eyes stormy. Surprising for a man who was usually so calm and in control.

  Jake pointed up the river toward the gorge. “If Diego doesn’t get the support he wants, rumor has it all the dams could go some night. That would turn everything around here into a big lake.”

  “What about the Romero place.”

  “Everything flooded, and the house uninhabitable.”

  She looked up at the white farmhouse. Its thick adobe walls seemed as solid and immovable as the mountains. But they weren’t. Their walls were made of sun-dried bricks of mud and straw and would collapse if underwater for any length of time.

  “Diego intimidates the local farmers, getting them to back him against Guevara. If they don’t, things happen,” Jake said. “Last month a rancher disappeared. Another had his small dam, upstream from here, fail in the middle of the night. That one little broken dam put a foot of water over hundreds of acres of corn and wheat and drowned a flock of sheep.”

  She left the rock, walked back and stood on the bank, leaning against a large willow tree. Looking out over the water, she asked, “How do they stop it?”

  “By stopping Diego.”

  She shook her head. “Him again. It’s all connected, isn’t it? Diego, the Romeros, you, me, Lloyd.”

  He gave her a sharp look.

  She pushed away from the tree and moved closer to him. “In last week’s paper,” she began, “Lloyd printed what General Diego threatened to do in this part of Chihuahua. I asked him where he got his information, but he wouldn’t tell me. He ran an inch-high headline on page one: guevara sends troops. Under that were articles on threats to the dams and the possible overthrow of the Guevara regime.”

  “I read it,” Jake said. “Diego, of course, denies everything. Lloyd gave away too much too soon. Diego is furious that his plans were leaked, and humiliated that an American newspaper publi
shed them. Now Mexican soldiers sent by the president are stationed along the river.”

  “Was my brother killed in retaliation for that article?” It was a question she didn’t want to ask, being afraid the answer was yes, and yet she needed to know. Jake and his men had rushed into Mexico after her for a reason.

  Jake stared out at the river, then shook his head. “I hope not.”

  “So the dams are safe for now?”

  He nodded. “Because of the troops.” He was silent for a moment, and then he turned and met her gaze directly. “When all this is over, you and I have to talk.”

  “Let’s talk now.”

  He held his hand up. “I can’t. Not yet.”

  She frowned. “Maria said you and Ricardo were scouts in the Cavalry, that you worked together.”

  “Sometimes we did. They call it Reconnaissance now.”

  “And when I’m kidnapped by Mexican soldiers, Texas Rangers come after me and hide me in a former spy-buddy’s house. Am I seeing a connection here?”

  “Later.”

  “You’ve met my brother, haven’t you?”

  Jake hesitated, then said, “Your brother was respected and well liked. So is your father. I took a delegation from our Ranger camp and Fort Bliss to his wife’s funeral. A week or so after, Lloyd came out to the fort to see me. We had dinner together there, and at your house a couple of times. Once he had me bring Colonel Gordon with me to your house.”

  He stopped and gazed at her, his eyes unreadable—a blank look she’d come to despise, a look which locked everyone else out. Like an animal burrowing into its hole, he was gone. Would he lie to her? There was only one way to find out.

  She took a deep breath. “Maria told me that Lloyd has been down here. Is that true?”

  Jake dragged a hand down his face and sighed. “I brought him here to meet Ricardo.”

  “Why?”

  “I was following orders, orders I believed in and still do. I thought by exposing what was going on here, Lloyd could help the United States and his fellow Texans avoid another confrontation with Mexico.”

  “Whose orders?”

  “I can’t answer that, but they came from very high up.”

  “And Ricardo?”

  “The same. From someone high up in the Mexican government. Both countries want peace, Elizabeth.”

  “So if you hadn’t introduced my brother to Ricardo, would he still be alive right now?” Her voice wobbled.

  “I don’t know the answer to that. I refused when he first asked me, but he went over my head.” He paused, then added, “And then they came and kidnapped you.”

  “Coincidence?”

  He shrugged. “As Rangers we’re trained not to trust such things as coincidence. When I said I was going after you, things fell into place almost instantly. No problems getting into Mexico, and once we were there, we never saw a soldier until after we had taken you away from the Mexicans.”

  Jake shook his head. “I’ve said all I can say now. Let’s put the rest of this conversation off until we get back home. Agreed?”

  “For now,” she said.

  But in the back of her mind, questions were stirring, each one demanding answers. From out of nowhere, doubts about him began assaulting her thoughts.

  Who was Jake Nelson really?

  Besides the little that Maria had shared about Jake’s boyhood, everything else she knew about the man was what he himself had told her. He wasn’t married, had been in the Cavalry, Special Forces, and the Frontier Battalion.

  She nibbled her lip, trying to remember what she’d read about the Battalion. It was formed for two reasons only—Texas border patrol and Texas law enforcement. The Indians were mainly gone and not a problem anymore. The Battalion now concentrated on Mexican bandits and American outlaws, bank robbers, train robbers.

  The Battalion, they said, was highly selective, so Jake Nelson must be very good at something.

  Not much to go on, she thought.

  She started back toward the house.

  Jake caught up with her and walked alongside. He glanced up and frowned at the sky. “Wind’s kicking up,” he said. “Weather might not hold. I’d better get going.”

  “Did you really come back this morning just to talk to Ricardo?”

  “To be honest, no. I rode back because I figured you needed me. When I left this morning, you looked like Ruthie did when I found her that day in Texas—one scared little girl. I couldn’t leave you like that.”

  She turned away from him, looking in the direction of the house, disturbed that he’d read her so easily.

  “You seem surprised that I came back,” he said.

  “I suppose I was afraid I’d never see you again, that you might have left me here for good.”

  “On purpose? Ever? Why would you think that?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t really know you, Jake. I don’t know what to expect from you.”

  “So you expected the worst.” The skin around his eyes tightened. He shot a hand out, yanked her into his arms, and crooked her chin up.

  When his gaze slipped to her mouth, everything went very still inside her. Surely he wasn’t going to—

  Yes, he was!

  It was an angry kiss, although whether angry at himself or at her, she couldn’t tell. She tried to push him away, but his fingers were wound in her hair.

  For an instant she felt a flash of fear.

  Of him? No, not of him.

  She was afraid of herself and the attraction building between them.

  As if he’d read her thoughts, the pressure on her mouth eased. He slipped his palms around and cradled both sides of her face. Slowly, gently, a warm mouth covered hers again—an affectionate, drawn-out kiss, coaxing, not demanding.

  She was aware of the man in her arms, of muscle under shirtsleeves, of the unyielding hardness of his chest.

  He didn’t hold her tight against him. Instead, he held only her face with his fingertips and kissed her again. He touched only her lips with his, softly, so tender she nearly wept.

  Emotion welled inside her. Even as she told herself not to, she slid her arms around his neck. Eyes closed, turning her face with his, she kissed Jake Nelson back.

  When the kiss ended, he wrapped her in an embrace and held her tight. It felt good. He felt good.

  Finally her eyes drifted open again. The man in her arms looked as dazed as she felt. He shook his head as if to clear it, then let her go. He stepped back, looking down at her as though he’d never seen her before.

  “Duchess, you are trouble,” he said softly.

  “Do you always manhandle women like that?” she said, shocked by her response to him.

  He blew out a slow stream of air. “You said you didn’t know what to expect from me. I decided to prove you right.”

  “Well, you did. You certainly surprised me.”

  He gave a short huff. “I think I surprised myself more.”

  With that, he spun around and started across the field to the trees where his horse was tied.

  “You can be sure I’ll be back,” he called, swinging himself up into the saddle. Without a glance back at her, he rode away.

  A gust of wind whipped her hair across her face. She raised a hand and held it back, away from her eyes, and watched him ride up the hill with a sense of relief. He slowed the horse for a moment, shouted something to Ricardo at the barn, and galloped off.

  Head bowed, Ricardo prayed over the food set before them on the big round table. “Bendíganos a Señor y estos tus regalos, que estamos a punto de recibir de tu prima, por Cristo nuestro Señor, Amén.” Bless us, O Lord, in these thy gifts which we are about to receive from thy bounty through Christ our Lord. Amen.

  Elizabeth listened, adding silent words of her own to his prayer. She wasn’t praying for the blessing of food. She was asking the Lord for guidance, for anything to help her deal with a man she didn’t understand, a man who disturbed her.

  For Maria’s sake, she pretended an inter
est in dinner. Maria had fixed a wonderful meal—a heaping platter of tender lamb chops, potatoes, and a cast-iron kettle of corn, onions, and red peppers.

  Fred was thoroughly enjoying the spread of food and told Maria so every time he passed his plate for more.

  Meanwhile, Elizabeth’s thoughts chased around in her head, returning again and again, not to the meal but to a man on a big gray horse, racing away from her as fast as he could go.

  If he was that anxious to get away, why did he kiss her?

  And why in the world did she kiss him back?

  She was under no illusions that she was important. This whole operation was driven by one country’s—perhaps two countries’—desire to avoid war.

  Like a chess piece, she was only a pawn in a game with high stakes. She felt vulnerable, unsure of herself in these unfamiliar surroundings. She desperately wished she were home—in Washington, in her own house, in her own room.

  Fighting a sudden wave of homesickness, she wondered how her father was handling everything. By now, he knew about Lloyd and probably about her, too. He would be frantic and on his way west as fast as he could get here. She loved him dearly, her heart aching for him.

  She looked up when a clock chimed somewhere in the house.

  Jake had said he’d be back for her, but what if he couldn’t come back? What he was doing was dangerous. Anything could happen. He could be captured or killed.

  A cold feeling spread through her chest.

  Of course he was coming back.

  She closed her eyes in a long blink. Look after him, Lord.

  Elizabeth scolded herself. For a moment this afternoon, she’d forgotten who Jake Nelson was, what he was—a Texas Ranger—and he, not she, controlled this operation. His kiss had underscored that for her in big red letters.

  A mistake.

  And kissing him back was the biggest mistake of all.

  She got out of her chair and excused herself, explaining she had a headache and she needed to lie down. She thanked Maria for the meal and said good night to Ricardo and Fred. Dejected, she started up the stairs to her bedroom.

  Once back in Texas, she’d never see Jake Nelson again—which was exactly the way she wanted it.