Wildflower Redemption

by Leslie P. García

  “I don’t believe this.”

  “Something made Brian think he could get you back if you saw Lily again,” Aaron said. “Lily tore your heart out. Will you really be able to forget that scene? I don’t think I can. What if the bastard doesn’t leave right away? What if he stays here and you see Lily at every turn?

  “Luz, I’m doing this for you, whether you believe me or not. I want you to have time to change your mind if you want Lily back in your life.”

  “Just get out, Aaron.” The words whispered out, but then she straightened and wiped stray tears from her cheeks. She walked to the door and opened it. “Go.”

  After a minute, he did. On the top step he turned. “I couldn’t bring Chloe to say goodbye,” he said. “I—none of us needed that. And Luz—” He stopped, and even from that distance she heard his sigh. “Never mind,” he said, and she closed the door.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  When your world collapses, the best thing to do is plod on through the rubble. Luz snorted at her own dark thoughts, but there didn’t seem to be much point in denying to herself that Aaron’s departure had thrown her back into darkness.

  She went through the days as she had after coming back to Rose Creek, doing what needed to be done, without much passion, but at least with commitment to the animals. The mare she, Aaron, and Ann had saved no longer needed medical attention, Luz had two mixed breed puppies she was seeking homes for, and the rest of her motley crew all remained unchanged.

  Only Aaron and Chloe were missing.

  “I should really name the mare,” Luz confided to Ann, when she came over to visit. “If Chloe were here, I would have asked her.”

  “You miss her, too, don’t you?”

  “Yeah.” Luz sighed. “I do.”

  “You know, they might be back. There’s still tomorrow and the weekend before school starts again.”

  “You say it like I care.”

  “Because you do,” Ann said quietly. “And if he comes through that door—”

  “He won’t. I changed the stupid lock he fixed.”

  “Luz.”

  “Drop it, Ann.” She softened her tone. “Please?”

  Ann shrugged. “Tell you what. If you haven’t found a home for Lady, I’ll buy her for Andrea when she’s old enough.”

  “Who’s Lady?”

  “The mare.” Ann patted her belly. “And you’ve met Andrea, or at least seen her sonograms. Don’t you like the name ‘Lady’?”

  Luz smiled. “We’ll see. She’s a really good size for kids, isn’t she?”

  Ann took a sip of her orange juice and sighed. “I hate orange juice. My mom drank everything—even wine—and I came out okay!”

  They were silent for a moment, lost in their respective thoughts. Then Ann straightened and stretched. “Did you finish the journal?”

  “Yes. I won’t say I feel better, but I suppose I understand why she didn’t want anyone to know anything, either. She shouldn’t have felt guilty, Ann. She hired a man my dad didn’t trust to help her, but she always thought the best of everyone. Then she blamed herself for being friendly to him and offering him beer that time. Thought maybe the folks in town wouldn’t believe that had been all there was, especially if they ever saw the painting.”

  “Worst thing anyone can do is stay quiet, though,” Ann said thoughtfully. “Bet if she could ever have imagined that he’d kidnap you…”

  “Let’s not talk about that,” Luz interrupted. “I’m putting the past behind me now. All of it.”

  “Know what you should do, Luz?”

  “What?”

  “Go up to the Hill Country and see the bluebonnets before they’re gone. March is half over and the weather’s already warm.”

  “I can’t get away. Besides, you used to go with me. And before that, I’d always take Mom. I missed that ritual when I was in Atlanta.”

  “Exactly. Start a new ritual. Get your head clear. Hey, I heard Esme’s moving up there this summer.”

  “Yeah, I heard. I’m surprised, but maybe she’ll find what she wants somewhere else. I didn’t, but she might.”

  “Go see the wildflowers,” Ann said again. “Ram and I will stay overnight.”

  Luz raised her eyebrows. “Hope there aren’t any problems with your mother-in-law?”

  “No, she just fusses over us too much. Ram and I could use a romantic night alone.”

  “A romantic night?”

  “Don’t look so shocked. Pregnant people can enjoy sex.”

  “That’s not why I’m worried,” Luz retorted, smiling a little. “For some reason, romantic nights at my place are just doomed.”

  She thought for a few minutes while Ann forced down the rest of her juice. “Maybe I will,” she said eventually. “The last time Mom and I went, Mom came back so happy and at peace. I want that.”

  “Go find it, then.” Ann straightened, and checked her cell phone. “Time for me to get busy. This weekend?”

  “What’s the rush?”

  “Really?” Ann asked. “Do you know how quickly the bluebonnets fade?”

  “Not that quickly, but if the two of you need my place that badly, come on down. I’ll get a hotel overnight on Saturday and be a bum again for a whole day.”

  “And I’ll call Ram and tell him we’re gonna have a weekend away!” Ann grinned. She pocketed the phone and went out the door whistling.

  • • •

  The bluebonnets were spectacular. There were scattered bluebonnets even around Rose Creek, but as she headed north, the fields became blue sheets of color, tossed out on a landscape green from spring rains.

  Luz drove without a real destination in mind, not too worried about finding a room. Spring break might be in full swing, but college and high school kids would be out on beaches, not reveling in the perfect beauty of a field of wildflowers.

  She turned off I-35 in Hondo, getting away from the frenzied rush of traffic and taking quieter roads. She pulled in eventually to a tiny rest stop looking out over a field full of flowers that crept out from under the pasture fence and carpeted the drainage ditch and the bank sloping away from the parking area.

  She smiled as she wandered over and sat down at one of the two concrete tables. She and Ann and she and her mother had always stopped here, absorbing the special aura of peace and beauty the landscape offered. The fact that few other motorists found it as special was a bonus.

  Afternoon sun massaged her shoulders; here in the Hill Country, the temperature was cooler than in Rose Creek, but still warm enough to lull into her a state of mindless contentment.

  Tires crunched on the gravel behind her and she stirred reluctantly, glancing over her shoulder to be sure the newcomers didn’t look like trouble.

  When she saw the green SUV, her heart thudded painfully. Damn you, Ann.

  She started for her truck, but Aaron cut her off.

  “Hello, Luz.”

  “I can’t believe Ann set me up. Let me by, Aaron.”

  He reached out and caught her wrist. “In a minute. Just let me say something.”

  Luz looked around. “Where’s Chloe?”

  “Never mind Chloe, this isn’t about her. It’s about us.”

  Luz shook her head and pulled her wrist free. “There is no ‘us,’ Aaron. There was just you deciding what I could or couldn’t do with my life.”

  He looked out across the bluebonnets for a long moment, and then turned back to her.

  “Maybe you’re right. I didn’t think so—I really believed what I said, Luz. That you needed time to see if you’d be okay without Lily after seeing her again. And if not—I thought I was giving her back to you. By letting go.”

  He walked a few steps away, into the flowers. “I never thought I’d be able to do this,” he said.

  “Do what?”

  “Walk in all these glorious wildflowers.” He walked back up the slight slope, and tilted her chin up to gaze into her eyes. “You did this, Luz. You helped me laugh, and you helped me le
t go. There are things we can never let go. But you helped me be okay with having more.”

  “More?”

  “More than fear that I could lose Chloe. More than just the love I have for her.” He let her chin go, catching her hand instead and raising it to his lips, pressing a gentle kiss to her palm.

  “Maybe when I told you I wanted you to have time, it was fear, I don’t know. I couldn’t stand to have Chloe lose a second mother. Maybe I was just seeing her pain in Lily—and my pain in you.”

  Luz looked up at the clear sky, then back at him. “That day that you left, I felt like I lost a daughter for the second time,” she said softly. “Losing Brian didn’t hurt, but losing you…” She closed her eyes, shutting out the memories. Shutting out the hopeful light in Aaron’s eyes.

  “Trust me to stay, Luz.” His words whispered out to her, and his eyes pleaded. “Trust us to be right together. To give our love for each other its rightful place.”

  When she opened her eyes, he was still there. And his eyes still spoke truth to her fear. “All right,” she conceded, stepping closer to him. “We can do that. We can put our love first so we can build an unbreakable family.”

  She actually heard his sigh of relief. He reached out and tilted her face up, worry still clear in his face. “I practiced what I’d say on the drive up,” he murmured. “None of the words came out the way I wanted. But as long as they’re right…”

  “You’re wrong about one thing, though,” she murmured, wrapping her arms around him. “This is about Chloe, too. Do you trust me to love her?”

  He closed his eyes for a brief second, then leaned forward and kissed her forehead. “I trust you with everything that matters to me—her life and mine.” He urged her close and lowered his lips to hers, kissing her with sweet passion. With total trust. Then he pulled away just a little. “That’s my final offer,” he whispered. “Take it or leave it.”

  “Oh, I’ll take it,” she whispered back, and pulled him close again.

  About the Author

  Leslie P. García grew up here and there, spending much of her childhood in rural Georgia, and virtually all her adult life in deep south Texas. Married and surrounded by children and grandchildren, much of her writing touches on family. A passion for animals, a twenty-year teaching career, and the strange twists and turns that life can take have provided more stories than time to write.

  Wildflower Redemption is the first in the Texas--Heart and Soul Series. Watch for Esmeralda Salinas’s story in the future.

  Leslie loves to hear from readers, and can be reached at all the electronic haunts:

  E-mail: lesliegarcia2000-author@yahoo.com

  Facebook: www.facebook.com/LeslieP.Garcia

  Please drop by Return to Rio for updates, guest posts by exciting authors, and other miscellaneous content!

  More from This Author

  (From Unattainable by Leslie P. García)

  Jovani Treviño slipped from the pickup, his boots thudding dully on the dry soil as he looked around carefully but not with particular unease. A crescent moon climbed up over the far side of the interstate, but here darkness allowed considerable isolation. Cars speeding by on the freeway wouldn’t notice him, and if they did, hopefully they’d avert their eyes, assuming someone needed to take a leak.

  Only moments passed before a second, dark vehicle pulled in behind him. The driver switched off the headlights but left the parking lights on. Jovi reached into the cab and pulled the lever to open the hood then moved to the front of the truck. Seconds later the newcomer joined him, extending his hand briefly.

  “Jovi.”

  “Hey, Rick.” Almost immediately, both turned their attention to the engine.

  “So — you gonna apply for the job at Nueva Brisa?” the newcomer asked.

  “Tomorrow,” Jovi agreed, turning at a slight rustle in the weeds that framed the roadside clearing, then relaxing when he realized the noise couldn’t have come from anything large.

  “Still jumping at shadows?” Rick shook his head. “We leave the job, but the edge never leaves.”

  “You don’t let anyone leave,” Jovi retorted, slapping a mosquito seconds too late, and rubbing his arm. “Tell me why I said yes again.”

  “Cause you’re one of the good guys, we pay well, and you get to be close to your mom while she gets back on her feet. It’s win-win, Jovi.”

  “Cut the bull, friend. I left DEA because no one wins — the work’s important, but the war’s unwinnable, Rick.”

  Rick Ortega shrugged his thin shoulders. “Maybe.”

  “And this one smells.”

  “Why?” He nudged Jovi with an elbow. “Cause we’re looking at some honey the locals call untouchable?”

  “Unattainable.” Jovi motioned Ortega back and slammed the hood. “Your reasons for looking at this woman are shaky at best, and if I’m investigating her, I damn sure won’t be thinking about her looks.”

  “Touchier than ever,” the DEA agent muttered.

  “And in a week or two, when my plane lands in Florida — I’m done, Rick. No more arm-twisting, no favors. I’m serious.”

  “Look, I know you mostly came until your mom beats her pneumonia — not so much to help us. But you’re perfect, Jovi — the border’s home to you, but you’ve been gone long enough you’re an outsider now.”

  “Hell, I was always an outsider. Everywhere.”

  “Whining isn’t your style, amigo,” Ortega chided. “You know how things are. No trust left — our side or theirs. The cartels are winning. For Christ’s sake, they’re slaughtering innocents on the streets a mile from here.” He jerked his head toward the tree-framed skyline. Behind those trees, the Rio Grande whispered its newly violent song to the night. “Check her out, that’s all. She worked for a major importer, but quit suddenly. Her father left her some money, but — ” He shook his head. “Something’s not right, buddy.”

  Jovi glanced at him. “Because her father left money?”

  “No. Because insurance aside, her father shouldn’t have had money to leave. The ranch is a joke — big property value, but no livestock except horses. On paper, he sold horses — horses we’re not real sure existed. Horses! No market for horses right now, going on back even before his death. The man went through a bitter divorce from the wife, yet got big bucks from the ex father-in-law, Lionel De Cordova.”

  “De Cordova? Man!” The name surprised him. “But for all his sins, I never heard he trafficked.”

  “We know some of the younger cousins do. Nobody’s tagged him, true. But the foreman you’re replacing? Arrested in Sinaloa several weeks ago. Arranging to drive a load to El Paso.”

  “So she has to know?”

  Ortega shrugged. “Hard to say. The man’s a Mexican national, and the story wasn’t broadcast here. We only found out through our sources. But if he worked out of her barn … ”

  “She either knows or she’s stupid?” he suggested.

  Again, Ortega made a slight gesture of denial. “She’d been in New York and Houston more than home until recently. She worked for an import firm with headquarters in Houston and branches all over Mexico, as well as in several border towns. The horses were more or less at the mercy of the foreman and the two grooms.”

  “Sketchy at best,” Jovi pointed out again. “This is my last call, though,” he repeated, walking to the driver’s side and pulling the door open. “This job’s too hard on the soul, Rick. Too much lying and too many half-truths — and to save what?”

  Ortega paused by the open door as his friend climbed back in. “Did I tell you that little four-year old girl — Lisa, remember her? She turned seven yesterday. They put her photo on one of those news lead-ins.”

  “Damn you,” Jovi snarled, thinking of the child he, Ortega, and others had found cowering in the corner of a crack house after a deal turned particularly violent. And her brothers, 5 and 8, lying broken on the floor in their own blood. His last official case — the last case he’d tried to stomach.
/>
  “Sometimes we win,” Rick insisted, and slapped his arm. “Suerte,” he ended, walking away.

  Luck. Jovi shook his head, turned on the truck, and poked the radio button. He wouldn’t need luck if he kept his mind on work and on the stable full of thoroughbreds waiting for him in Florida. As he eased back onto the access road, blessed darkness and George Strait’s melodious voice surrounded him.

  To purchase this ebook and learn more about the author, click here.

  In the mood for more Crimson Romance?

  Check out Take Me Out by Leslie P. García and others at CrimsonRomance.com.