by Cox, Deborah
He forced his mind back to the present. It couldn't happen again. He wouldn't let it. He'd find her if it was the last thing he did.
A set of small booted footprints that led away from the wagon drew his attention. She'd been running, the idiotic woman. Damn. What was she doing out here alone? She didn't even know enough not to expend that kind of energy in this heat, where just standing still sapped a man of all his strength.
He had gone to the hotel looking for her around noon, intent on reasoning with her. She couldn't handle a job like this—taking a million dollars in gold from Lucifer himself. He'd hoped to convince her with logic. But when he'd described her to the hotel clerk, he'd been told she'd checked out that morning.
She had no transportation, so the next logical stop in his search had been the blacksmith’s shop where he’d met with grudging cooperation. Seems the blacksmith was more concerned about her being out on the road alone than he was with her being in the company of the likes of him.
“She’s heading for Eagle Pass,” the smithy had told him. “That’s all I know.”
Rafe suspected he knew more than that, but he didn’t have time to wrangle the information from the stubborn old man. He had what he needed for the time being-enough information to track her down.
Even with all the delays he'd encountered, Rafe had been able to set out a little past noon. If she'd started out mid-morning, as he suspected, she would have reached this point about three hours ago. And three hours was a long time to be in this heat without water.
He mounted again and followed the footprints. At least she'd had the sense to head south toward the road. Maybe she'd been picked up by a cotton caravan on its way to Eagle Pass. Maybe she'd crossed paths with outlaws or comancheros.
Stop it! He'd go mad if he didn't stop thinking about the past. It was the heat, the emptiness, the buzzard circling slowly overhead in the distance....
His heart froze in sudden realization. Driven by fear, he spurred his horse into a gallop, heading straight toward the buzzard, dreading what he might find when he reached whatever the carrion bird had in its sights. He almost prayed, something he hadn't done since that other day so long ago.
She lay there beside a mesquite tree, so still, so quiet. He leaped from his galloping horse and ran to her. She didn't react when he lifted her head. Her face was beet red from a vicious sunburn.
A soft moan escaped her parched lips. He ran back to his horse, and returned with a canteen.
"Ma'am, ma'am!" he called, lifting her head again. "Do you hear me?"
She winced and groaned but didn't open her eyes. He held the canteen to her lips and tilted it slightly.
"Drink," he commanded, gently but firmly.
She swallowed the liquid and wanted more, but her stomach couldn't take it. Her eyes opened. When she looked up at him, he recognized the signs of dehydration in her dull, cloudy pupils. She wouldn't have lasted much longer.
"Papa," she murmured. "Papa, why didn't you come?"
Picking her up, he carried her to his horse. He managed to mount with her in his arms and turned his horse to the west, hoping the water hole he had seen on his last trip through this way was still drinkable. At least there would be shade and a good place to set up camp.
"I thought you weren't coming, Papa," she murmured against his chest. He resisted the urge to comfort her, to smooth the damp hair from her face and soothe the crease of pain on her forehead.
"Please don't ever leave me like that again," she pleaded in a childish voice. "I'll be good, I promise."
Nudging his horse into a walk, he held her closer against him. He told himself it was to keep her from falling, but something in her helplessness and her determination touched a part of his heart he'd thought long dead.
Swallowing convulsively, he tried to remember that she was a complication and nothing more.
* * * * *
The sun had been down an hour before the girl stirred, sat up, and looked around in confusion. Rafe said nothing, just continued stirring the beans in the pot over the fire. Her eyes bore a hole in him. She didn't seem exactly happy to wake up and find she'd been rescued by him. He couldn't say he blamed her, but still it annoyed him. He could have left her there to die on the side of the road. He could have done a lot worse.
He ladled a plateful of beans and took them to her with long, impatient strides.
"It was me or the buzzard," he told her. "Sometimes you have to take what you can get."
She sat where he'd propped her against his saddle, her hair in disarray around her shoulders, her clothes covered with a thin coat of Texas dust. She gazed up at him and the plate he held out to her without comprehension.
"Maybe you would have preferred the buzzard," he said. At least she was alive. Now she was about to tell him everything he wanted to know about Luis Demas and a million dollars in gold, whether she knew it or not.
Finally she moved, dropping her gaze to the plate he pushed toward her, crossing her arms over her chest, and turning away.
For a long moment, he studied her delicate profile, her soft skin marred by the ravages of the sun. Her arms folded beneath her breasts caused her chemise to gape open, drawing his gaze to the hint of creamy white flesh beneath. He swallowed hard and used annoyance to control his body's reaction.
"Here, eat this." He held the plate of beans out to her again, but she continued to ignore him. "This might not be up to your usual standards, but you have got to eat something. If you refuse, I'll have to feed you myself."
She jerked her head around, glaring at him. When her first attempt at speech yielded nothing but a hoarse croaking sound, she cleared her throat and tried again. "You wouldn't."
"Do you really want to find out?"
She still refused to take the plate. "What are you doing here?"
He held out the plate silently, determined not to speak until she took it. Finally, she accepted the food with an angry sigh.
"You're welcome." He walked across the small camp and taking the bean pot from the fire, sat across from her, using the wooden stirring spoon to eat directly from the pot.
"You've been following me since San Antonio," she said.
Rafe blew on a spoonful of beans to cool it and watched her as he ate. The warm glow of the fire reflected in her eyes and seemed to set her pale silver-blonde curls ablaze. Even in the dark, he could see the redness of her skin. She would suffer in the morning.
"It's a good thing for you I was following you," he finally replied. "You know, in some countries if someone saves your life, you become their slave forever."
"Why are you following me?"
His gaze slid down her neck to her breasts beneath the stark white fabric of her chemise. He'd removed the ridiculous coat and large man’s shirt she’d been wearing so she could get air. He'd even mopped her heated face and chest with his wet kerchief. The chemise was still damp and clung to her in a way that made his blood grow warm.
Even if there hadn't been a million dollars in gold and El Alacran's scalp to consider, she would have been worth chasing into the wilderness. Whether he would have done so or not was another matter, but there were a lot of reasons why a man would pursue a woman like her.
"Eat," he ordered again, returning his attention to his own dinner, struggling to forget the glimpse of her inviting skin, the firmness of the flesh beneath her gaping bodice. "We'll fight later."
"I'd rather fight now."
He looked at her across the fire once again, and once again his eyes dropped to the damp material stretched across her breasts. She pulled the blanket he'd wrapped around her closer together in front. When his gaze lifted to hers, she met it squarely.
"I couldn't take advantage of your condition like that, ma'am," he said. "You're far too weak to put up a good fight. Now eat."
"I want to know why. What are your intentions?"
Ignoring her, he took another bite of beans. She was regaining her strength. Maybe she'd be able to travel in the morning after
all.
For a while there he hadn't been sure. She'd been pretty far gone when he'd found her that afternoon, but he'd managed to get enough water down her so that the suppleness had returned to her skin. Now she was strong enough to wage a verbal battle with him.
Did she have any idea how lucky she was? She was still glaring at him, waiting for him to respond to her challenge, but he wasn't going to speak another word until she started eating. She knew it, too. Finally, she gave up and began digging the spoon into the beans and shoving them into her mouth.
"Are you always so stubborn?" he asked with an involuntary grin.
"Yes."
"Well, it almost got you killed this time. What the hell were you thinking, setting out alone like that?"
She took another bite of beans and swallowed them before answering. "I've got to get to Eagle Pass."
"Why?"
"My mother is sick," she murmured, refusing to meet his gaze.
He grinned at her crookedly. "The first rule of lying is that the lie has to be at least halfway believable."
She threw her plate down with a loud, angry crash. "You don't have to tell me about lying. I've been lied to by the best of them."
"Have you now?" Her voice was becoming more and more shrill. He hoped she wasn't going to get hysterical.
"Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Patronizing. Like you think I've never had a problem greater than a—a torn stocking"
"I know, you've been through a war. You're a seasoned veteran, aren't you?"
"I have been through hell, Mr. Montalvo!" Her voice rose in the silence. "Or at least I thought I had been through hell until today. Today I found out exactly what hell is."
He smiled cynically at that naive statement. Looking at her angry countenance and the slight trembling of her lower lip, he felt a little sorry for her. She hadn't known what she was getting into when she struck out on this adventure. His gut clenched at the thought of what might have happened.
"No, you didn't," he said quietly, suddenly unable to meet her angry gaze.
"How would you know?"
He tossed the dregs of his coffee into the fire, fighting to subdue the demons of memory. "Because I've been to hell, lady," he said in soft, measured tones, "and this ain't it. So why don't you just tell me what Luis Demas told you in San Antonio."
"I don't know what you're talking about." She took a bite of beans, unable to hold his gaze.
"You've got two choices. Play dumb and I'll leave you here to fend for yourself. Level with me and I might agree to help you."
"I never asked for your help. Never!"
"You need it now. You know it and I know it."
"Well, if you know so much already, why should I tell you anything?"
He smiled in spite of his anger. "You're a natural born bluffer, aren't you?" He noticed the angry tilt of her chin but continued undeterred. "You're not about to admit to anything until you know what I know. But you'd better understand this. Your time is running out."
He dumped what was left of the beans in the fire, then tossed the bean pot aside as he stood and walked toward his horse.
"Wait!"
Her threadbare voice reached out to him, tugging at his soul. She had mistaken his actions. She'd believed he was leaving now. He turned to face her as he reached his horse, his heart aching at the defeat in her eyes, even though he knew he would use her misinterpretation to his benefit.
"Gold." She whispered the word, but it was unmistakable.
"Where?"
"I won't tell you. I'll take you there, but I won't tell you where it is."
Damn her stubbornness. He should just show her how easily he could make her tell him what he wanted to know. So why didn't he? Maybe he was just as much a fool as she was. He picked up his bedroll where he'd dropped it earlier.
"Get some sleep," he said harshly.
"Then you'll help me?"
"Help you? Yeah, since you're hell bent on getting yourself killed—or worse—I'll help you." He threw his bedroll on the ground beside the fire and kicked it out until it lay flat.
“But sooner or later, you’re going to have to tell me where we’re going.”
Chapter 5
Felipe Delgado, known to allies and enemies alike as El Alacran, sat at a table in a cantina in San Tomas, Texas, with a weeping mulatto girl of perhaps sixteen on his knee. His left arm encircled her slim waist. With his right hand he lifted a glass from the table beside him and tossed down a shot of tequila, then poured himself another and downed it as well.
They had crossed the Rio Grande in broad daylight, riding into the sleepy little town before sundown, forty bandidos—Mexicans, Americans, Indians—loaded down with weapons, sunlight glinting off silver studs and the weapons they fired into the air.
The citizens, an equal mixture of Mexican and Anglo, had run for safety, knowing there was none to be found. It was not the first time bandidos from across the border had vented their savagery upon San Tomas.
The sounds of sporadic gunfire, women screaming, and men laughing reached El Alacran from the street outside, and his lips curved into a cruel smile. There had been nothing in this stinking town to warrant his interest, not enough gold to fill a single saddlebag, not enough jewelry and silver to fill even one wagon. It would have been a complete waste, if not for the women.
He laughed, squeezing the girl on his lap tighter, enjoying the smell of her fear and the feel of her squirming body against his groin.
She was probably a virgin.
He plunged a hand inside her loose peasant blouse and closed his fingers over a soft young breast, eliciting a cry from her. His mind reeled from the tequila and from the exhilaration of today's violence. His body pulsed with anticipation.
Still, he remained lucid enough to think of his options. If she were a virgin, he could demand a high price for her on the other side of the border. But his body quickened when he imagined how tight she would be, how she would scream and fight when he took her, and he knew he would not be delivering a virgin to Piedras Negras, not this one anyway.
He wrapped his right hand in the girl's dark hair, pulling her head down to him, capturing her lips in a brutal kiss. He ignored her flailing hands, which pummeled and clawed at his shoulders and arms, laughing deep in his throat at the excitement her ineffectual efforts aroused in him.
The door to the cantina opened and closed behind him, but he didn't bother to turn and look. His men were positioned outside. No one who posed a danger to him could get past them.
But when he heard a chair scrape away from the table where he sat, he glanced past the struggling girl to see Diego Munoz turn the chair around and straddle it.
El Alacran released the girl's head. She tried to escape him but he held her easily, controlling her with one arm while he poured another drink and waited for his most trusted man to speak.
"Luis finally showed up in San Antonio," Munoz told him.
El Alacran's chiseled features shifted almost imperceptibly at the announcement, but he held his silence. Munoz dropped his gaze, so El Alacran knew there was more.
Munoz took a deep breath and resumed, "Luis is dead, jefe."
"Dead?" El Alacran bellowed, his deep baritone voice ricocheting off the stone walls of the cantina.
"He was shot by vigilantes."
"Perdicion!" El Alacran swore. "How did this happen?"
Munoz shrugged. "I do not know. We watched him all night. He got away from us only for a moment."
"And did you get close to him? Did he talk?"
"No and si jefe. I did not get close to him, but he did talk, only not to me. There was a woman."
"What woman?" El Alacran banged his fist on the table, nearly upsetting the bottle of tequila.
"I do not know. I'd never seen her before—a gringa with pale hair. She ran out in the middle of the street. I saw Luis talking to her just before he died. There was a man with her: Rafael Montalvo."
F
or a moment, El Alacran sat stone-faced, then he began to laugh mirthlessly. "So, my old friend Rafael. It seems we are destined to meet again."
"That's not all, jefe." Munoz swallowed convulsively. He was obviously prolonging the moment when he would have to impart whatever information he still possessed.
"Out with it," the comanchero growled.
"Valdez, he's dead too. Montalvo shot him near Castroville a few days ago."
El Alacran's smile faded, his expression darkened.
Perdicion! He is killing off my men one by one, the bastard!"
Valdez's death had nothing to do with Luis Demas. Valdez's death was part of another matter between him and Montalvo, a matter he had considered long settled. He hadn't seen Rafael in five long years and had begun to believe that his adversary must have gone east to fight in the gringo war. But then he had reappeared on the border and started systematically going after all the men who had ridden with him five years ago.
It had to stop, and soon. But right now he had more urgent matters on his mind.
El Alacran rose from the chair, still holding the terrified girl by the waist. She renewed her struggles with the same results as before. She was no match for him, and he had no intention of releasing her.
"What do you want me to do?" Munoz asked.
"Rest!" El Alacran said, his voice booming in the small barroom. "You've earned a little enjoyment, my friend. Then tomorrow you can take three men and return to San Antonio. Bring them to me—both of them—alive. I leave tomorrow for Chihuahua. And take Carlos with you. It's about time he grew up a little."
Munoz watched as El Alacran dragged the girl through a door to the left of the bar. The nervous bartender scurried over to the table with a fresh bottle of tequila and a clean glass. Munoz gladly accepted both.
He had fared much better with El Alacran than he had dared to hope. But for all his surface calm, the chief was close to exploding with rage at that moment.
He heard the girl scream from the adjoining room, followed by the bandit's merciless laugh. Lucky for him, El Alacran had another object for his fury tonight.