And Catarina watching it all, pretending that she was nothing but elated for them. “But, your mother—” she tried.
Laura shook her head. “My mother is no help. She’ll be there, of course, but I want—I need you, to help me not be afraid. Marcus is even more frightened than I am.” She caught up Catarina’s hand and squeezed. “Please.”
Catarina squeezed back, keeping that firm press free of the trepidation she felt. “Of course.” Firm and confident. As if she actually might know something about bringing a baby into the world. “I’ll be happy to help.”
“Thank you.” Laura’s smile flashed for a moment before she leaned in. “Oh, and one last thing. I’m going to that barn dance no matter what,” she whispered fiercely in Catarina’s ear. “And you’re going to tell me what you really know about this new cow hand.”
Chapter Five
The heat of the sun was melting into twilight by the time Catarina was free to walk down to the creek bank. Even in the deep red of dusk, she easily found her way to her favorite spot under the pepper tree, where she retreated nearly every summer evening.
After leaving the Obregon household, Catarina had fallen into the rhythm of her chores, pushing away any stray thoughts that begged at her mind’s door to enter. Teresa’s snipes, Laura’s baby, her own helplessness: Tonight, she’d promised them. I’ll give you space tonight.
The dishes had been wiped, the cast iron pots scrubbed and seasoned, and the kitchen set to rights, allowing her to finally escape the sweltering house to savor the refreshing evening air. Tomorrow, it would all begin again—the neverending late-summer rhythm of harvesting, canning, and preserving, along with the seasonless chores of cooking, cleaning, and sewing. For now, though, she could sit and simply be.
The creek gurgled a greeting, running merrily down Mount Portola to the valley below. Soon enough, the occasional trills of bushtits would give way to the low hoots of owls, and the coyotes would rise from their day beds to call to the moon. It was the perfect time to be still, to listen to silence of the mountains, and to dream of the future.
A future in her own little corner of the world, where she would enact a benevolent, yet firm, rule over her husband, children, and home.
She caught at her bottom lip with her teeth, worrying it gently. When she was twenty, it had been a fine joke, to think she would never marry and have a home of her own. But now, at twenty-six, it seemed a bitter truth.
But perhaps she deserved this punishment. She disobeyed her parents, resented the happiness of her closest friend, was more vain than Narcissus. And yet, when she tried to call forth the proper remorse for her sins, all she could summon was:
I want more.
She might want more, but all she received was exactly what she had before. Today—and the day before and the day before that—were perfect examples. All those women at the circle had something to look forward to—Laura had her baby, Teresa had her growing children, Isabel would one day marry Joaquin, and even Ines might hope for Felipe to propose, one day.
Catarina could only expect that her future days would be exactly as today had been, as all the days of the past had been. All of the work of her hands would be in service to her mother, rather than to herself.
Her gaze blurred and she blinked rapidly against the fading yellow-blue ribbon of light marking the horizon, the trees darkly cut out from it. Clamping her mouth shut against the sobs clogging her throat, she pressed hard against her eyes.
She clasped her knees, lowering her head to the protective space between her crossed arms, unable to fully release her grief even here, in this private place all her own. She couldn’t pull off her mask long enough to do so, although she couldn’t even say which mask she wore now. The sobs threatened to break free from her tight jaw, but she simply stopped breathing in order to smother them.
The sound of soft footfalls coming along the creek startled her out of her gloom, her breath coming in a hissing rush, the sharp scent of the pepper tree scratching at her nose. She peered through the veil of leaves, discerning from the shadows the dark shape of a man heading toward her hiding spot.
With its cottontail flashing, a rabbit burst from the underbrush, frightened out by the man’s approach. He paused at the rabbit’s zig-zagging flight, then continued toward her, the fallen peppercorns popping beneath his feet.
Mr. Merrill had found her, hiding here in the spot no one else came to.
She tried to melt into the shadows, but a watery hiccup escaped her clenched throat. Clearly having heard her whimper, he came closer, her nerves straining with each crackling step. The footfalls ceased within inches of her and when she dared to look up, he loomed over her. A square of fabric was clenched in his fist. He offered it to her without a word.
She reached for it hesitantly, finding the warm skin of his hand instead. Sliding her fingertips down the length of those long, strong fingers in something dangerously close to a caress, she curled her hand around the end of his fist to find the handkerchief there. Her heart began to echo in her ears as the soft fabric slipped along her fingertips.
“Buenas noches, Señorita.”
That voice again. A shivery sigh escaped her lips at the velvet stroke of it across her ears. That nasal twang, the terrible mangled mess he made of the Spanish should have been off-putting. But instead, it was… seductive.
A shudder ran through her, half pleasure, half fear, cutting straight through her misery. She dabbed at her eyes with his handkerchief, the wetness soaking through, chasing away the pleasure from his voice and bringing shame along behind. To be caught crying like an infant, even in the still of the dark, was simply not done. Thank goodness he hadn’t verbally acknowledged her tears. Once she had herself under control, her mask back in place, they could go on as if it had never happened.
Squaring her shoulders, she sucked in a deep breath, pushing her sadness down as she pulled the air in. She tried her voice.
“Good evening, Señor.” She fought to keep the shivers out, but it sounded splintered. He must have caught it as well, since he continued to loom over her in a passable imitation of Mount Portola.
The mask wasn’t on as tightly as she might have liked, displaying entirely too much of herself for comfort. At least the darkness would hide the worst of her tear-stained face. And one could divert a man’s attention perfectly well without any light. Perhaps even better without.
“I’m sorry,” she offered when he said nothing more.
“Don’t be. Rough day?”
Such sympathy in those few words. It hurt as much as Laura’s pity had earlier.
The tears started again, because truly, nothing had been wrong. Her life was charmed. Which was why she was sitting by the creek in the dark, sobbing into a man’s handkerchief.
“No,” she choked out. “It was a day like any other.”
He crouched beside her, air swirling round her from his approach. The silence stretched between them again, melding with the darkness to form a comforting kind of covering, one that she might hide behind without wearing one of her disguises.
“You shouldn’t be here with me,” she said after a time, the breeze drying the tears left on her cheeks.
“I know.” But he stayed where he was, and she let her silly heart be glad for it.
“Why were you out here?”
She heard him shift next to her. “Went to check on Spot. The creek sounded so sweet, I thought I’d walk alongside it for a bit.”
“Spot is a dog’s name, you know.”
His amusement came out as soft puffs from his lips. She could almost imagine those exhales traveling the distance between them to caress her cheek. “He’d be mighty offended you said that.”
“If your horse is so proud, perhaps you shouldn’t have given him a dog’s name.” She reached for the mask of the flirt then, thinking to move the conversation into more familiar channels. But then she remembered the screen of the twilight, his non-acknowledgement of her tears, and set it aside. She was t
oo weary to wear it properly anyway.
She reached toward the dim outline of him. “Your handkerchief.”
“You keep it.”
She rubbed the bit of cloth as she pulled it back. Rough, indifferently hemmed—it was the handkerchief of a man with no lady looking after him. If he had a wife, she’d be more careful with the hems. She’d embroider his initials there as well—perhaps his brand, once he had one. Little tokens of herself for him to carry throughout the day.
Catarina crushed the fabric in her fist, the weft of it straining as she pushed it into her palm.
“If it was a day like any other, why are you crying?”
Because I’m a horrid person.
Because I want more.
She didn’t want to speak of herself. She wanted to talk of him. “Have you decided to settle here permanently?”
“Yes.” A pause, while his breath drew slow and true. “I’ve been from Los Angeles to Bakersfield to here. And in none of those places could I imagine myself like I do here. Running my own spread, herding cattle with my brand, riding land that I own—I can see all of that when I gaze out on this land.”
It was as if he had reached to her soul, tapping into her innermost wishes the way a water dowser tapped a well.
A place of his own. She knew what that yearning felt like, that need to point to a place and say, “That. That is mine.”
The self-pitying sadness rushed to enclose her again, the weight of it forcing out her next words into the space between them. “I would like to be the boss of my own place.”
“You want to run a cattle ranch?” There wasn’t the barest hint of amusement in his voice.
“No,” she laughed. “I’m not Franny. No, I want to run my own house.” She paused, searching for the proper way to state her confused feelings. “My mother runs this house absolutely,” she said carefully, “which is her right. I love my mother dearly and I know she loves me, but—” She took a steadying breath. It was disloyal to admit this next—but it was also true. “I long for the day when I leave her house and have one of my own.”
How simple that dream sounded. And how hard it had proven to make real.
“It sounds like you need a husband, Señorita.”
Her laugh was bitter. “Yes, I suppose I do.” A queer sensation coiled in her stomach at the realization she was sharing herself so deeply with this man. Yet in the still of the evening, they were both drifting free from the corporeal world. Here and now, he was merely a voice in the shade of evening, as was she. “You need a ranch, and I need a husband. You’ll be more successful than I. The US government isn’t giving away husbands.”
Silence fell again. She’d said too much, but she couldn’t very well snatch it back. What right had she to complain? Her parents loved her, wanted what they believed to be the best for her—how dare she demand more?
Her vanity, her envy, her need to rule over something of her own; such things were base, malign, and yet they were part of her. She might tear out something vital if she tried to remove them.
He didn’t speak, no doubt disturbed at what she’d said. Sometimes she horrified herself with the depth of her urge to be free of her mother’s reign.
“A home of your own.” His voice was a lick of velvet from the darkness. “Just a little corner where you could be queen, where everything is just as you want it. Yes, I can understand that.”
She pulled her knees in to her chest as far she could, hugging them tightly. He wasn’t horrified—he understood. “It would be something, wouldn’t it?” she whispered.
The vision came to her then, the one she dreamed every night under this very tree, her mind’s conjuring of that desired future. A small house, not as big as her childhood home, but cozy all the same, nestled against the protective curve of the mountains she would never leave. Children—her children—laughed and shouted and ran about the front porch, the carefree play only the best-loved children engaged in. And finally, her husband, riding in from the herd, coming home to the supper she’d cooked with pride…
She hadn’t realized she’d spoken aloud until he startled her out of the waking dream by saying, “Yes. Just that, exactly.”
Her breath caught. She felt not embarrassed, exactly, but raw, as if he’d seen not her bare skin, but rather her insides. “It seems silly, though, does it not?” Her voice broke as she went on. “A house, some children, some cows. These are all very simple things.”
“They’re not simple if you don’t have them.” His voice was rough, almost a growl, and sent gooseflesh rising along her bare skin under the layers of her clothes.
The weight of this unexpected intimacy was heavy on her, seeming to squeeze the very air from her lungs. A small, strangled noise escaped her—not a sob, not a moan, only a feeling she could no longer hold in.
He understood. He wanted more.
And she could never have him.
His hand found hers somehow in the pressing dark, a rough scrape of affection thanks to the calluses on his hands. She turned her hand over in his, so that they were pressed palm to palm. And then she simply savored the touch.
For all the stolen kisses and heated whispers she’d snatched at barn dances while her parents weren’t watching, she’d never done this with a man. There had been an anxious thrill behind those previous encounters, a quivering rush daring her on to more. There was nothing like that here. The sensations between them were warm, steady… deep.
If she married this man, they might sit on their front porch on an evening like this, him whittling something while she embroidered his handkerchiefs. And then, as the last slice of sun was about to slip behind the mountains, he would take her hand and squeeze it so.
She might have that. But at what price?
She’d seen her parents’ shared glances when Franny chattered on about him at dinner. Worried glances, that Franny went on so about such a man. Having the man himself at their table, married to one of their daughters—it’d likely be worse than hard looks at that point.
If they’d even be invited to dinner. Her parents might simply turn their backs on her. And when they did, half the town was like to follow. Few would dare anger her father by siding with her in such a situation.
Her siblings might cut her out of their lives. The town’s rancor she could learn to bear. But a life without her siblings…
She’d have him and a house of her own—and she’d be utterly alone.
Here, sitting with him in the dark, their hands linked and contentment enveloping them, she was sorely tempted. More than tempted; she yearned to reach for that dream they shared. A house of their own, herds carrying their brand, children with their mingled features—her chest wanted to split wide imagining it.
But in the years of isolation that were certain to follow, she would find the price too high to pay.
No, she mustn’t think she could have anything more with this man. She’d wish him all the best and send him on his way. No doubt over time she would see him—in town, at a barn dance as he courted a wife, watching his children in the annual school exhibition. She’d observe him in all that and do what she did best—put on her masks and pretend nothing was wrong, that her heart wasn’t aching.
But for now, she’d simply hold his hand and hold this memory in the years to come.
“I want more,” she said to him, to the night, to all of creation. This might be the last chance she ever had to say this to another living being. She wouldn’t miss the opportunity to confess it to a man who would more than understand what she meant.
“I do too.” As heavy a confession as hers had been.
The night took those declarations and swallowed them whole. His fingers tightened on hers and she squeezed back, until she couldn’t say who was holding whom tighter.
“Catarina! Prayers!”
Her father’s summons from the back porch was like a shotgun blast, shattering the spell between them. She pulled her hand free, but the sensation of his strong fingers, the warm palm, t
he callused skin, lingered. But with his hand no longer on hers, the sensation wouldn’t linger long.
“This can’t happen again,” she whispered as she rose and went for the house, his kerchief still clutched in her hand.
“I know.” Gently fervent.
A yearning to stay rose within her, so sharp it had her grabbing her skirts and hurrying for the house before she could give in to it. Her feet pounded loudly in the quieting night and her skirts churned wildly as she kicked away their attempts to trip her, but for once she didn’t care about her feminine vanity.
She left him there—alone in the deepening dark, with the soft rush of the creek and the first faint yips of a coyote pack his only company.
Chapter Six
Even after three weeks of being in Cabrillo, Jace had yet to tire of the scent of sagebrush.
The morning was still damp, tinting the air with the smell of hay. He sniffed again. Or wet grass.
Felipe rode beside him, the mustard reaching into the road to brush at the horses’ legs. A companionable silence was settled between them, the perfect accompaniment to a morning’s ride. Felipe’s cattle dogs followed behind, as obedient as always.
But every so often, Felipe would glance back over his shoulder, as if to check that no one was pursuing them.
“I don’t think she followed us,” Jace offered.
“You don’t know her.”
Jace actually was coming to know Miss Franny rather well, seeing as how she spent all day every day working alongside them. She was certainly impulsive, but she had a good heart. Which he supposed he’d known from the very first, given how she’d gotten him this job.
“She’d have shown up by now if she were.” Really, Felipe ought to go easier on the girl. But perhaps he couldn’t help himself.
Jace could sympathize with being unable to help oneself when it came to a particular woman.
Felipe’s jaw worked. “When I can’t see her, I worry. If she hurts herself…”
Summer Chaparral Page 8