He wouldn’t hurt Tía, though, and the fact that Angela trusted him here in her boss’s sanctuary proved that she knew he wasn’t a threat. At least not physically. If he could cause the collapse of this damn bar around Tina Cervantes’s ears, he would. She deserved to lose something; his sister had lost everything. And the destruction had started down on that stage tucked into a front corner of the bar.
He swallowed hard, trying to chase the sour taste out of his mouth. He’d been a fool to involve her in his desperate plan to provide stability and safety for Cody’s now motherless son. She couldn’t be trusted not to talk, though she’d sworn she could. He’d thought he could buy her silence, if not loyalty, but he wasn’t sure he even had that. If she talked, his parents would find out and be crushed. And he’d endanger the only solution he’d come up with to assure his nephew’s future.
His phone vibrated, and he pulled it out. The wallpaper showed a smiling little boy, chubby-cheeked with wheat colored hair and blinding blue eyes. His nephew, Justin.
The number belonged to his friend and former partner, Marc Dryer. Marc still worked out of Rafael’s father’s Dallas office, chasing around the globe to investigate problems within the oil company, assess threats, evaluate investments—the go-to man. A job they’d done together, before Cody launched a music career.
Wearily he clicked the phone on.
“Marc, what’s up?”
“Nothing, man. Just called to see how you’re doing.”
“I’m good.”
“Hmph. Look, you’re punishing yourself. Tell your dad you want to come back to Houston. I may be flying out to the Middle East next month. I’ll need you with me.”
“I have some loose ends to tie up here, Marc.”
They talked briefly, and then Marc said into a sudden lull, “So are you still going to do it?”
“Yes, and don’t lecture me. I am.”
“Man, you’ve got rocks in your head. Cotton brains. A . . . ”
“Save it,” Rafael snapped. “I’d do anything to make up for what I couldn’t do for Cody, and you know it. Do you think I don’t know how I let Mom and Dad down? And my nephew doesn’t have a mother. How do I fix that?”
Marc didn’t answer at first, but then he sighed heavily. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “But dude . . . I’m almost sure hiring a wife won’t work.”
Chapter Three
When the front door of the club swung open at four and a petite woman bustled in, Esmeralda straightened in her chair and peered at the newcomer doubtfully. If this was her aunt, her memories were faulty. The high-piled raven hair glinted under the soft lighting, and elaborate gold earrings fell almost to her shoulders. The woman wore a long, flowered skirt that stopped high enough off the ground to show delicate feet accented by the lace up heels. Esmeralda didn’t remember her aunt being so petite. Even in heels, this woman was short.
The tight, low-cut top exposing a wealth of cleavage . . . well, she wouldn’t have noticed that about her aunt on those brief moments she’d visited with her as a child, would she? When she looked carefully at Tía’s face, she knew. Tía bore little resemblance to her sister Adriana; the eyes and the nose were completely different. The broad lips, though . . . their mouths would have been identical if Adriana had smiled more. In Esme’s memories, Tía always smiled. Now, though, the woman who had come in looked serious and unhappy, and the sullen mouth clearly identified her.
Drawing a deep breath, Esmeralda rose to her feet and walked towards her aunt. “Tía Tina—TT!” The double initials were a nickname that Esme and her brother used for their aunt, apparently because at some point Beto had been unable to pronounce his aunt’s formal name.
Tina stopped, utter shock freezing her face. Seconds ticked past and Esmeralda felt nerves clench in her stomach. Suddenly the faint aroma of the menudo oozing in from the kitchen made her nauseous.
Then Tina crossed over to her, and placed hands on her arms, then her face. “Esme? Esmeralda Salinas, is this really you . . . all . . . . all . . . . ” She wrapped Esmeralda in an enormous hug. “Where’s everyone? Did Angel feed you? Has anyone given you something to drink? Angel!”
“I’m fine,” Esmeralda assured her. “It’s so good to see you, TT.”
“It’s . . . I can’t believe you’re here, girl! And looking like you just stepped out of one of them fashion magazines!” She pinched Esme’s cheek with silver nails that sparkled. “And I don’t mean beautiful, I mean you look starved!” She chortled a little. “Well, okay, you’re gorgeous, too, but you seriously need to eat!”
“I’m fine,” Esme repeated. “I had a late lunch.” And menudo would make me puke right now.
Angel hurried in just then. “¿Me hablaste?”
Annoyance came and went in Tina’s face. “You know I called you, and you know I don’t want you to use Spanish unless there’s a reason to. Did you feed my niece?”
Color tinted Angel’s cheeks. “She didn’t want anything, Tía. I did ask.”
“Please don’t scold her, TT. She insisted, but as I told you, I’d just eaten. I really didn’t want food.”
“Okay. And darling, I have a little favor to ask.” Tina turned to Esme. “Please, please, don’t call me TT. Or Tina.” She smiled, not quite enough to take the emphasis off her order. “Bad for business. No one calls me anything but Tía.”
“Well, I guess I can do that. I mean, you really are my aunt.” Esmeralda grinned.
“Exactly. And all my best clients are family, too,” her aunt said. “Make them feel like family and they’ll come here every time. Angel, where’s Tom?”
“In the back, checking stock. We’ve been watching. If anyone comes in, he’ll be right out.”
“Good. Can’t have a bar without a bartender, can we? Go tell him it’s time for him to be out here, Angel.” Tía turned back to Esmeralda. “So, darling, exactly what brought you to the exciting town of Truth, Texas?”
“Two things,” Esmeralda admitted, watching her aunt’s face carefully. She reached out and caught one of Tía’s hands, squeezing it. “I wanted to see you.” She paused, fighting back her nervousness, and managed to smile a little. “And I decided to take you up on your invitation.”
“My invitation?” Tía withdrew her hand and cocked her head a little, her glance quizzical. “What invitation, querida mía?”
Her aunt’s endearment puzzled her a little, since she’d just told Angel not to use Spanish. But at least the tone seemed positive.
“When you were in Chicago, you told me I should just drop by whenever—that I’d always have a home. I . . . I decided to drop by and see . . . if you’d still have me.”
Tía looked like she’d been punched in the gut. All color left her face, and one hand went to her chest, clasping the place over her heart as if she were in danger of falling over.
Esme wanted to die.
“Tía, I’m sorry. I wanted to surprise you. I should have called.” She circled her hands in the air helplessly. “I’ll rent a place for a few days. If you have time, we’ll visit—”
“You didn’t call,” Tía hissed. “Moving in is a big deal, Esmeralda!”
“Of course it is,” Esme acknowledged, her cheeks flaming. “I’m so sorry . . . I . . . ”
“Never mind,” Tía ordered, pulling herself together. The tight lines around her mouth eased into the grin Esme remembered so well. “I guess I did that a couple or three times, even to your Mom.”
“She’s your sister,” Esme reminded Tía. “She . . . ”
“Tries to love me,” Tía retorted, nodding sarcastically. “And mostly fails.”
The door opened, and a couple of men walked in, choosing a table near her aunt. They were middle-aged and dressed in ranch clothes—worn shirts and boots, jeans that bore rips from riding through cedar or fighting barbed wire and losing. Not the Rose Creek kind of cowboys. Excitement pricked in Esme. Solid men, cowboys. Not these men, who probably had wives and half-grown children, but maybe she wo
uld quit looking for men and find a man. The man. She allowed herself a tiny smile. If the man looked anything like Rafael Benton, she could certainly live with that.
“Hola, Tía!” one of the men called in Anglicized Spanish. “Got Roy and me some menudo coming out yet?”
“You betcha, Chuck!” Tía turned to the bar. “Tom, take care of my boys, won’t you?”
He nodded and headed off to the kitchen.
“None of my business, but . . . who’s your friend, Tía?” The cowboy smiled at Esmeralda, “If you don’t mind my asking,” he added.
Esmeralda would have introduced herself, but Tía wrapped an arm around her, squeezing her. “My niece, Esmeralda. Folks call her Esme.”
“Your niece!” Both men stood up and walked over, holding out hands. “Well, welcome to Truth! We didn’t know our Tía here had real kin around.”
Esmeralda shook their hands, returning their smiles. “Just got here a couple of hours ago,” she admitted. “Nice meeting you.”
Tom and Angela came out with colorfully decorated bowls of menudo and a basket heaped with steaming tortillas.
“Enjoy,” Angel said, nodding at the pair as she left.
“Thanks, Angel,” they answered in unison.
“Excuse us,” Chuck said, nodding. “We have a date with some cow gut soup and cold beer.”
“Hmph!” Tía swatted Chuck’s arm playfully. “Keep insulting my native food and I won’t feed you. It’s not guts. It’s stomach.”
“That makes it all better.” Roy grinned, and the two headed back to dig into the food they’d just insulted.
Tía turned back to Esmeralda. “Look, honey, things are about to get busy—for a Thursday night. We’ll have our regulars, and this is tourist season. You look tired.” She reached out and patted Esme’s cheek, this time not pinching her with the metallic nails. “I’d be delighted to have you stay.”
Esme started to protest, but her aunt shushed her. “End of discussion. My house is on Cattle Court Road. Just go back down the main street. It turns into the highway, and half a mile out of town you’ll see a sign for Cattle Court Road on the left. There are only two houses there—the rest is part of a ranch, but the ranch house sits way back where you can’t see it from the road. My house is on the right. No dogs, but my handyman carries a gun.”
“A gun?” Esme asked.
Her aunt chuckled. “Don’t worry. He pulls double duty as handyman and watchman.” She fished out a cell phone. “I’ll call Andy and let him know not to shoot you.”
“Gee, thanks,” Esme muttered, and Tía laughed again.
“Welcome to Truth, honey. Drive safe.” Tía bussed her on the cheek. “Use anything you want. Probably won’t see you till tomorrow. Eat.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Esme turned to the door, her legs a little weak. She hadn’t eaten since breakfast, not wanting to leave Domatrix alone in the trailer on the way up, and anxiety and fatigue from the unexpectedly difficult drive and her aunt’s initial reaction had taken a toll. She couldn’t wait to get home. The word stopped her in mid-stride for a moment, and she almost stumbled. Home? Rose Creek hadn’t been. Truth didn’t feel that way. Not yet. She regained her balance, determined to give the tiny town a chance.
• • •
Rafael watched the conversation going on below him, aware that nobody could have told Tía he was here yet. Otherwise, she would have stormed up here in a rage and booted him out, demanding that he speak to her downstairs. Wondering what he’d been looking for.
He frowned. The one time Angel let him wait here before had seemed proof positive to him that the woman was hiding something. Tía had been livid to find him alone in the office, and accused him of going through her desk looking for valuables. She’d fumed that strangers were never allowed here, but they hadn’t been strangers. They’d met often, since he almost always accompanied Cody when she came, and given the wealth and position of his parents—and his own, for crissakes—she couldn’t seriously have been worried that he’d pocket anything of hers. Clearly, the woman was overly suspicious. In his experience, that kind of alarm over something unimportant was a sign that the person had things to hide.
He hoped Tom or Angel warned her before she walked in on him not even knowing he was here.
He could see well enough to gauge some of the interaction he saw between Tía and Esmeralda. He smiled a little. The name was one of his favorites, and it certainly matched her eyes. He remembered the green gaze, reflected back to him by the mirror on the door. He remembered more, too. The cotton shirt clinging to her damply, unbuttoned a little lower than she probably realized and not nearly as low as he would have liked. Damn, she was hot.
Tía’s expression changed from distant and annoyed to friendly. Maybe Esmeralda would even call it affectionate. How well did she know her aunt? He wouldn’t call their meeting joyous, by any stretch. At one point, Esmeralda almost looked as if she’d turn and walk away.
He gritted his teeth, but it didn’t help. Tía caused a lot of tears. It never seemed to bother her. He hoped Esmeralda was tough. But not tough like her aunt.
Esmeralda was leaving. What was that song about watching women leave? He remembered the lyric suddenly and smiled. Would she hate him for thinking she had a pretty nice “badonkadonk”? Almost to the door, she seemed to falter, then stumble. He reached out, his hand pressing the cold, smoked pane of glass in front of him. As if he could help.
Bitterness surged through him. As if he ever could help. Dammit, Cody, I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have counted on me to save you. You should have—He forced the thought away. Cody hadn’t been able to help herself. His parents knew that, when they asked him to become her manager, assistant, bodyguard—to be the presence he’d always been. And just as he couldn’t reach through the glass to steady Esmeralda’s path, he hadn’t been able to reach Cody. He thought his parents truly forgave him. But he knew he’d never forgive himself. Never.
And now, Tina was jeopardizing his chance to undo at least a little of the damage. She’d promised to keep her mouth shut, and now he’d heard rumors from Lizzie Mae that she had mentioned his need for a temporary wife to her. Lizzie Mae herself wouldn’t talk, but she’d warned him that trusting Tina had been stupid. He smiled. Actually, her words had been stronger than that. When he’d told the elderly woman that he planned to hire a woman to marry him in an effort to placate his parents and possibly any court considering Justin’s well-being, he half-expected her to slap him silly with the ridiculously big Stetson she wore.
The door opened behind him, and he jerked away from the window.
“Having a private moment, Rafa?” Tía purred, her voice deep and gravelly as she approached him. “Watching my niece maybe and having a little fantasy?”
She’d hit too close to home, but he just shrugged. “And if I were? You didn’t seem too happy to see her at first. A little interest from the cowboys there and I think you saw dollar signs flash in front of your eyes! Planning on having her come in to sing like Cody would? No one could compete with Tía’s then, could they? Weren’t those two Cody’s first local fans? You might let her unpack before you start using her.”
She gasped in rage and swung at his face, but he’d seen her like this, all false anger and indignation, and he caught her arm easily and stepped back out of her reach.
“Don’t, Tía,” he warned, almost whispering. “Don’t you dare. You’ve done everything you’ll ever do to hurt anyone in my family, and someone like you isn’t going to hit me.”
“You’re trespassing,” she retorted. “Go! ¡Vete!”
“Angel let me in.”
She relented, her body visibly sagging a little as she turned away to stare across the room below. “Do you think I would ever have let harm come to Cody, if I could help it? You need to let go, Rafa! I do not believe your parents want you to suffer like this! I don’t want you to hound me like this!” She spun back to him, shaking with anger. “Your sister was a grown woman! I loved her, but
she didn’t love herself, did she? The drugs and her damned pride killed her, not me! She didn’t do anything to help herself.”
“But you let them in, Tía! All of them! All those hangers-on, all those groupies who came with their little poison gifts. All those false friends, ready to give her everything she wanted. Anything she asked for, she got. Why do you think she kept coming back here? When she needed a new drummer because hers wouldn’t quit trying to make her wake up and sober up, who got her a new drummer who would just keep pouring the alcohol? And you knew that bastard Harper was her biggest problem, but he was always welcome here. Always.” He stopped himself. He couldn’t bring Cody back by yelling at Tía, no matter what her role had been. He couldn’t antagonize her any more right now, either. Not when she’d threatened to tell the entire town that he planned on hiring a woman to marry him. He closed his eyes. If word got out, candidates would come out of the woodwork. Worse, his parents would be horrified, and wouldn’t trust him with Justin. Maybe not ever. His reputation would suffer. His stomach knotted. Worst of all, if Doug Harper found out before he married, he might decide to file for custody. If he was Justin’s father. No matter how sickening the idea was, it was possible. Maybe even probable. He pulled out his phone and pretended to check his messages, but Justin’s face—his sister’s face—always gave him the strength he needed to go on.
“Tía, Lillie Mae told me you’re talking about making my little plan public. You know that I can’t let my parents hear talk about the marriage not being real. You and I might not understand, but they were devastated by Cody being pregnant out of wedlock.”
“Your parents are uptight moralists,” Tía muttered. “And you’re the good little boy who wants to inherit everything someday, right?”
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