Midnight Rider

by Diana Palmer

“Because you have done too much already,” he replied tersely. “You raised me. You sent me to university. Everything I am, I owe to you. I will ask no more of you.” He sighed heavily. “I could not marry Bernadette without being honest with her. I told her that I am not in love with her, but that I believe we will have a pleasant life together. And we shall. But you and Lupe will always be welcome here, whether or not she approves.”

  “Would her father not have loaned you the money without requiring you to marry her?” the condessa asked.

  “He might have. But...well, there were other factors. And there was the gossip.” He moved; Bernadette could hear his footsteps, followed by a long sigh.

  “If only you had not kept her out all night and dishonored her, my grandson,” the condessa said.

  There was a harsh sound. “I did not dishonor her!”

  “She accused you of doing just that!” Lupe inserted. “She bragged about it to us just as a hussy would.”

  “I would never have believed her capable of such a lie!” Eduardo said.

  “She told everyone,” Lupe invented, almost purring. “I have learned that the vaqueros did not spread the gossip—she spread it herself, to make sure that you would have to marry her.”

  Bernadette felt her heart contract. That was a master stroke of Lupe’s, that lie. Eduardo would never believe now that Bernadette hadn’t started the gossip. And it told her one other thing; that he’d thought of asking her father to make him a loan without the condition of marriage.

  She stood there devastated. He had said there were dark places in his soul, and now she understood for the first time that it was those places that his grandmother and Lupe were adept at reaching. She was so numb that she didn’t hear his footsteps moving toward the door until it was too late to escape.

  He jerked the door open and saw Bernadette standing there. He didn’t know that she spoke any Spanish, so he wiped the accusation from his features and composed himself to look as normal as possible.

  “Bernadette,” he greeted formally. “Shall we go downstairs?”

  “Of course.” She knew her voice sounded odd. She felt odd. She’d just been assassinated verbally and she couldn’t do one thing about it. If Eduardo believed the lies of his grandmother and Lupe and did not even ask her for an explanation, what could she say that would sway him?

  It was some sort of consolation that he didn’t know her facility for his language. He would never know that she’d overheard the conversation. She’d been dreaming that he was falling in love with her, that he felt more for her than just desire, and was happy—actually happy—to be married to her. Now he was incensed because he believed she’d started the gossip about them—and lied to him.

  “Out of the frying pan and into the fire,” she muttered.

  “I beg your pardon?” he asked politely.

  She forced a smile to her lips. “Oh, nothing. I was only thinking out loud.”

  His black eyes narrowed. “How are your lungs?”

  “They’re fine.”

  “Lupe was genuinely sorry about the perfume. She asked me to convey her apologies to you.”

  She stopped and looked up at him. “The only regret Lupe has is that the perfume wasn’t strong enough to bring on an attack that would kill me,” she said, shocking him. “She and your grandmother hate me. They’ll say or do anything that will break up our marriage. If you don’t know that by now, you’ll find it out sooner or later. But it will be too late,” she added with quiet bitterness. “If I leave you, Eduardo, I won’t come back. Not ever.”

  “This is an odd time to speak of leaving me, Señora Ramirez,” he said coldly, using her married name as Americans would use it. In Spain, a woman kept her own family name, although her husband’s was used in various ways.

  “It’s the last time I intend to speak of it,” she replied. She searched his eyes, seeing not what she wanted to see, but what was really there—resentment, disillusionment. She sighed. “I really was blind, you know. I was building castles in wet sand all the time.” How could she have believed that the truce would last? There were those dark places in his soul; there was the fact that they had fought with each other for years.

  He was scowling at her. “You make no sense.”

  She smiled sadly. “I know.”

  She followed his gaze as he looked around them, noticing that the guests were obviously waiting for the newlyweds to join the party in the reception room.

  “Shall we go in?” Bernadette asked with forced gaiety. “I’ve tied my hair up so that it won’t impede the axe.”

  “What?”

  She didn’t reply. She walked ahead of him, smiling at everyone, the very picture of happiness.

  It was much later when she said goodbye to her father and climbed into the carriage with Eduardo and the two hostile women, that she realized how she must act in the company of assassins.

  She smoothed the skirt of her pretty dress and pulled her filmy shawl closer about her.

  “It was a beautiful ceremony,” Lupe told Eduardo. “A little long, I believe. But my arrangements were adequate, don’t you think?”

  “You did a wonderful job,” Eduardo replied. He glanced at his wife. “Don’t you agree, Bernadette?”

  “Oh, everything was lovely,” she said brightly. “And I did appreciate the many vases of pink roses. Fortunately, I had enough medicine to counteract the effects of the pollen.”

  Lupe bristled. “Flowers are necessary for any wedding,” she said.

  “Certainly they are, and Bernadette grows roses,” Eduardo said.

  Bernadette could have added that she spent a lot of time avoiding them when her garden was in full bloom. Eduardo knew that, too. He didn’t want to admit that Lupe had gone out of her way to make it difficult for Bernadette at the altar.

  “I was disappointed in the gown,” Lupe continued coolly. “I would have gotten one from Madrid, instead of Paris. But I suppose the designers—”

  “My gown was from Madrid,” Bernadette interposed sweetly, “though purchased in New York.”

  The condessa tugged at her own shawl. “I had wondered,” she said hesitantly. “The lace was very familiar.”

  “It should have been,” Bernadette replied without meeting the other woman’s eyes. “I understand that the lace I chose was used for generations by Cortes brides.”

  There was a faint intake of breath.

  “You chose it for that reason?” Eduardo asked, surprised.

  Bernadette averted her gaze to the darkness outside the swaying carriage. “It seemed appropriate to continue such a long-standing tradition.”

  There was a painful silence from the other side of the carriage. Neither of the women spoke again until the carriage arrived at Rancho Escondido.

  * * *

  LUPE SAID GOOD-NIGHT WITH reluctance and obvious envy. The condessa followed suit, but her eyes didn’t quite meet Bernadette’s.

  Eduardo led the way up the staircase and to the left, where the suite reserved for the married couple was located.

  Bernadette had already decided that she wasn’t going to share a room with him, when he opened a door that led into a bedroom done in a motif of white and pink with embroidered curtains and bedspread and canopy. It was so exquisitely feminine that she couldn’t have imagined a man sharing it.

  He noted her expression and nodded. “This will be your room,” he said tightly, “for the duration of our marriage.”

  She lifted both eyebrows. “You have no interest in sharing one with me?” she prodded, knowing full well his reasoning and enjoying his discomfort.

  His chin elevated and she saw his teeth clench.

  “You said that you wanted me,” she persisted. “Don’t you anymore?”

  His face was as bland as a rock. He stared at her and narrowed his dark eyes. “Tell me how the vaqueros knew that we spent the night together in the desert.”

  “I did tell you. Right after you arrived at my father’s ball, but I’ll be glad t
o remind you. The vaqueros knew because one of them overheard us talking to my father about it, of course.”

  “What if I say that I don’t believe it, that I think you spread the story to make it impossible to back out of this marriage?”

  “I offered to back out of that part of it, and so did my father.”

  He knew that, but what he’d heard from his family had warped his common sense. He glared at her. “Do you deny spreading the rumor?”

  “I deny nothing,” she replied coolly. “You must decide for yourself if I make a habit of lying.”

  He knew that she didn’t. But, on the other hand, why would Lupe lie to him on this matter when he was beyond her reach as a prospective husband?

  “And until you do decide,” she continued, “I have no wish to sleep with you, so this arrangement suits me quite well.”

  His gaze went over her carelessly. “I hope you rest well, Señora Ramirez. You will be called in time for breakfast.”

  How nice to look forward to another verbal battle, she thought irritably. She glared at him as he walked back to the door. “How long are your relatives going to stay?”

  “As long as they wish.”

  “I thought you told Lupe that she should pack?”

  He stiffened. “She pleaded not to be sent away without my grandmother’s company. I didn’t have the heart to refuse her, especially after her sincere apology.”

  “Was it sincere? How nice.”

  “You make fun of her.”

  “Now, why should I wish to make fun of your cousin?” she asked reasonably. “Your family is unique. Your grandmother has the bearing of royalty and your cousin Lupe is as beautiful as an angel.”

  He scowled. “You don’t like them.”

  “I don’t know them.” And I never will get the chance because they hate the very sight of me, she added silently. But she smiled at her husband, hiding her misery and disappointment quite carefully from him. “I will visit my father from time to time, of course,” she added. “And I would like to go and visit my brother soon, to tell him and my sister-in-law about the wedding. And to see their new baby.”

  “We will discuss this later,” he said. “It is hardly appropriate for you to travel so far this soon after our wedding.”

  “Why ever not?” she asked innocently. “If your family can camp here during our honeymoon, why can’t I go and visit my brother?”

  “Bernadette!” he said curtly.

  She lifted her chin pertly. “Do you think it’s appropriate to have a houseful of people wandering around here at such a...delicate time?”

  His cheeks went ruddy with temper. “It will not be a delicate time!”

  “Certainly not with an audience,” she agreed. “But they aren’t supposed to know that, are they? For all practical purposes, we’re a newly married couple.” She indicated the room. “And we’re going to be living and sleeping apart, for all the household servants to see and gossip about.” She smiled wider. “My, my, won’t that look as if...well, you know how it will look.”

  It would look as if he wasn’t capable of consummating the marriage, and he knew it. “If you continue this,” he said slowly, “you may invite a situation that will be quite unpleasant for you.”

  “You mean you might ravish me?” she teased.

  But he didn’t smile, as he might have only weeks before. He looked cold and unapproachable—and insulted.

  “A man does not ravish a wife.” His gaze was cold. “At the beginning of all this, Bernadette, I told you our alliance would offer a mutual slaking of passions. At the moment however, you do not appeal to me in that light.”

  “How odd, given what you said the nights we were in the desert and in the pantry.”

  “A lady does not speak of such occasions.”

  “I’m not a lady,” she replied. She smiled a little icily herself. “I’m the daughter of a railroad hand who built a fortune with his own hands.”

  “I’ve been a long time without a woman,” he said finally. “You were willing and I lost my head.”

  “I see.”

  He sighed irritably, putting his hands behind him. “I won’t invade your privacy and I’ll expect you not to invade mine. We should get along well enough. As we discussed, you have a measure of independence and freedom here that you didn’t have at home, and I will have a loan that was gained honorably, not through subterfuge and deception.” His eyes narrowed. “I never pretended to love you, Bernadette. I have been honest.”

  “And I haven’t?” she probed, trying to make him admit what had created this horrible situation between them.

  He drew in a long breath. “God help me, I don’t know.” He turned away. He felt empty and betrayed...and confused.

  “I’ll stay here for two weeks,” she told him. “If at the end of that time, your grandmother and Lupe are still here, I’m going to see my brother.”

  He whirled. “You think to dictate to me?”

  She didn’t back down an inch. “I’m telling you what I’m going to do,” she replied with great dignity. “You think that your family wants nothing except your happiness. You’re in for a rude awakening.”

  “I owe much to my grandmother,” he said harshly. “She took me in when I had no one. She raised me, fed me, clothed me!”

  “And made you aware every minute of your life that she’d done it,” she fired right back. “Isn’t that how she talked you into marrying Consuela?”

  He took two long, angry strides toward her and caught her roughly by both arms. “You will never speak to me of Consuela!”

  “Why, you’re just like my father, aren’t you?” she asked. “I thought class and position meant nothing to you, but they do. You’re the outcast, the black sheep, the half-breed son of a Spanish nobleman and an American heiress with no morals. You want them to accept you, to approve of you, and you’re willing to do anything that old woman asks you to do to prove that you’re good enough to be a Ramirez!”

  There was just enough truth in the accusation to make him livid. “Be quiet,” he said harshly.

  He was near the end of his control and she was pushing him right over it. She knew it and was excited by it.

  “Wouldn’t you do anything for your grandmother?” she persisted wildly. “Wouldn’t you?”

  “Bernadette...”

  “She wants to tell you who to marry, where to live, what to do with your life. Did she tell you when to make love to Consuela, as well?”

  “Make love?” he echoed, letting go of Bernadette only long enough to slam the door and lock it.

  “You mustn’t,” she said huskily.

  “I must. And I will.”

  * * *

  HOURS LATER, EDUARDO LEFT THE room. Bernadette sat up. If only she could have accused him of rape! But it hadn’t been. At first his hands had been rough, but once he bared her breasts and put his mouth on them, she was lost. One hot caress led to another, one kiss to a deeper next one, one intimate touch to an even more intimate touch that made her writhe with unexpected pleasure and plead for more.

  She remembered that he’d laughed when she cried out to him in her blind search for fulfillment, that the hard thrust of him had lifted her right to heaven and all but sent her unconscious with the impact of so much sweet sensation. If there had been pain, she hardly recalled it through the hot throb of passion. Even in memory, her body began to swell and ache; how keenly aware she was now of her own capacity for pleasure, as well as Eduardo’s skill at providing it. She hadn’t imagined that she could let a man undress her and enjoy her body with all the lights blazing like this, or that she could be so brazen as to pull him down to her again even as they lay shivering in the aftermath of their first intimacy.

  She lay down and stared at the ceiling, wondering at the violently passionate nature she shared with her husband.

  CHAPTER TEN

  BERNADETTE AWOKE FEELING vaguely ashamed. For so many years, the specter of intimacy and its natural consequence, pregnancy, had fr
ightened her almost to death. Then, last night, so suddenly, all her fears had vanished in the grip of an insane passion. She hadn’t dreamed that she was capable of the sensations Eduardo’s strong hands and warm mouth had given her. Nothing had penetrated that mist of sensual oblivion, least of all fear.

  But now, she was truly a wife and there was every chance that she’d conceived. She touched her belly with curiosity and faint unease. If she was pregnant, would she survive? Was the New York physician correct in his assessment of her condition, that she could bear a child without dying in the process? He’d been right about her asthma. His unorthodox treatment had worked miracles. Exercise and fresh air were making a difference in her strength, and the medication he’d prescribed was helping her through the attacks. She flushed as she remembered the turmoil of the night before. She hadn’t had any problem with her lungs—except for the breathlessness that must surely be a side effect of so much hungry passion in a man’s arms.

  She could barely think of it without catching her breath. Had Eduardo felt such pleasure as he’d given her? She had heard his harsh groan just at the last, when she was too exhausted to lift an arm around him. She remembered the convulsive shudder of his powerful body. Surely she, too, had groaned and shuddered when pleasure had consumed her totally. She closed her eyes and could see him above her, see the perfection of his lean body without clothing, see the maleness of him that was both frightening and exciting. She had known nothing of men and women in bed. Now she knew too much. It would have been better never to have experienced such passion, because now she would go hungry for it every night of her life. Eduardo was unlikely to come near her now, because she had made him very angry. But it hadn’t lasted long, that anger. It had been transformed almost at once into an ardent, fiery passion that had exhausted both of them.

  She pulled on her clothes and sat down gingerly at her vanity to brush her long, tangled blond hair. She looked different, although she wasn’t sure exactly how. Her eyes held a new worldly wisdom, and her mouth had a softness that hadn’t been there before. She wondered if it would be noticeable to the other occupants of the house—especially to her husband.