In the Shadow of the Mountains

by Rosanne Bittner

  “I want a hug, too,” David told her as she turned to answer the door. She bent down and hugged him, remembering how starved she and her siblings had been for signs of affection from their mother. She wondered how different Elly might have been if Bea had been more attentive to her. “I love you,” she told David, kissing his cheek. “You pay attention to Miss Campbell now and be a good boy.”

  Rose took Sharron from her. “Let’s go to the kitchen and get out your papers,” she told David. He followed her into the house, going to the kitchen while Irene headed for the door. She was still smiling at the thought of little Sharron thinking she had out-run David when she swung open the door.

  Her smile quickly faded in surprise, then returned, as her startled heart rushed with a thousand emotions. “Ramon!”

  “Hello, Irene.” He stood in the doorway looking more handsome than ever. He held a tiny little boy, who looked nearly the same age as Sharron. The child was as dark and beautiful as his father. “May we come in?” Ramon asked.

  Irene realized she had been literally staring at him, and she gasped, stepping aside. “Of course! Ramon, I never expected…I mean, I’m so surprised. It’s wonderful to see you again.”

  He moved inside and she closed the door. She reached out then and touched the little boy’s hand. She already knew Ramon had a son, had read in the News about the wife of Ramon Vallejo dying in childbirth. She had realized the agony losing a second wife must have been for Ramon, but she had not contacted him, unsure how he felt about her now, realizing he needed time to grieve. “What is his name?” she asked.

  “This is Alejandro Ramon Vallejo. A gringo would shorten that to Alex.” The boy stuck a thumb in his mouth. “He is just two years old, and right now he is tired from our long trip on the train. He fell asleep in the buggy I rented to come out here.”

  She smiled, almost wanting to cry at seeing him again. “Rose is putting my Sharron down for a nap. There is an extra bed in her room if you think he would go to sleep there.”

  Their eyes met, and she was sure she saw the same look of love and adoration she had always seen in his eyes. “That would be fine.”

  There was a moment of commotion then as Miss Campbell arrived and introductions were made. Irene showed the woman to the kitchen, then took Sharron from Rose and brought her back with her to Ramon. He smiled, and his eyes lit up when he saw her. “So, this is the little girl who caused such a stir in Denver,” he said, looking her over. “Irene, she is a most beautiful child.”

  Irene kissed her cheek. “Thank you. I brought her here to keep her away from the cruel gossip and stares I knew she’d get in Denver. Follow me and I’ll take you to Sharron’s room.” She turned and walked through the sprawling central room of the house, leading him to a hall and into a bedroom decorated in pink. Ramon studied her beautiful form as she walked, thinking how little she had changed, sorry for the emotional horror she had suffered over the last two years. He laid his son on a small bed, touching his hair and soothing him to sleep, while Irene closed the shutters to darken the room. She put Sharron down for her nap, and the girl curled up with her favorite stuffed animal. Irene turned then, facing Ramon in the darkened room.

  “I did not know if I should come,” he said softly. “You have been through so much—the gossip, the ugly divorce.” He stepped closer. “When I first heard, Irene, I wanted to come to you—to help you, comfort you, to tell you you must not let the knowledge of your Indian blood make you ashamed, for it is not something to be ashamed of. When the news first hit the papers, you were already on your way here, and my Anna was finally pregnant, after so many years of trying. I did not want to do anything that might upset her, so I stayed in Denver.”

  She smiled softly. “I understand. I’m so sorry, Ramon, about her death. It must have been so terrible for you, after losing Elena and your first son.”

  He sighed deeply, his eyes suddenly misting. “She had a choice. The doctor said he could kill the baby and take it from her, and she would live. She had been trying so long to give me a child. She would not let the baby die.” He turned away. “It was a terrible way for her to die. Afterward, it just…it took me a long time to get over it. For a while I could not think of you, or my business, or even my son. I almost hated him at first, but I realize now he is my gift from Anna, and he is innocent of all of it.” He leaned over and patted the boy’s bottom. “He is my son, and I love him. I hired a woman to nurse him the first several weeks, then hired a nanny to feed him by bottle and care for him. I have slowly learned to accept Anna’s death, learned I must keep going, for Alex’s sake.”

  He breathed deeply as he straightened and met her eyes again. His gaze moved over her appreciatively, and in the darkened room a hundred notions of passion suddenly rushed through Irene’s blood. It was as though both of them suddenly realized that for the first time since that first kiss fifteen years ago, they were actually free to act on their emotions. For Irene it was an almost startling realization. Was that why he was here? What were his feelings now, after being through so much? She wasn’t even sure of her own feelings anymore, except that there was no mistaking how hard her heart was pounding at this moment, no mistaking the warmth that rushed through her blood.

  “I’m glad you came, Ramon,” she told him. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anyone from Denver.” She dropped her eyes. “I haven’t even seen my parents. I just…haven’t been able to bring myself to go back there, and I have asked them not to come here.”

  He shook his head. “Irene, part of the reason I am here is because I have been afraid you are not letting yourself face the truth. You cannot hide down here forever. And you should not keep blaming your mother and father. They must have thought they were doing the right thing.”

  She met his eyes again. “You’re sticking up for my mother?”

  He smiled softly. “She talked to me about you once. She knew how I felt about you, and she was not very kind. I have not much use for Bea Kirkland, but I will say that in spite of her behavior, her love for you was very real, Irene. Whatever she has done, I believe she thought she was protecting you. And anyone could tell how much your father has always adored you. It is not good for the soul to turn your back on your parents, Irene. Think how it would break your heart if one of your children did the same to you.”

  She sighed deeply and turned, going to the door. “Did one of them send you here, thinking you might be the only one who could reason with me?”

  He grinned, following her out of the room. “No. I have not even seen them. It is just that you have been on my mind for many months now, and Anna’s death made me think more deeply about a lot of things.” He looked down at her, touching her arm hesitantly. “Mostly it made me think about how much mothers are willing to sacrifice for their children. Anna gave her life for Alex. Your mother risked losing your love in order to do what she thought was right for you.”

  Again she felt the old passions returning. How quickly he could stir her most basic womanly needs. “I know what you’re trying to say, Ramon. Part of the reason I came here was to protect the children, but also to give myself time to think, to reckon with the truth about myself. I haven’t abandoned my parents. I just need time away from all things familiar.”

  He nodded. “I have had such needs.” He reluctantly let go of her, and she wondered how a man could get so much more handsome as he got older. She was thirty-one now, so Ramon must be at least thirty-five, she reasoned. There was still no hint of gray in his thick, dark hair. A few added pounds had landed in all the right places, making him look even more robust and virile. He wore dark denim pants and an expensive black silk suit jacket over an open-neck shirt that revealed some of his firm chest. A silver and turquoise necklace graced his neck, accenting the dark skin.

  She smiled softly. “Come out to the courtyard with me, Ramon. I’ll have Jenny get us some lemonade, or would you prefer wine or tea or something else?”

  “Lemonade is fine. It is a hot day.” />
  Irene turned, wondering if the day only seemed hotter because of Ramon’s presence. Ramon was wondering the same, thinking how beautiful she looked in the simple white shirt and the riding skirt she wore. Her still full, firm breasts filled out the shirt nicely, and her slender hips swayed in perfect proportion to the rest of her supple body as she led him to the courtyard. As they walked through the big, sprawling living room, he noticed his carved horse on her fireplace mantel. So, she had brought it from Denver. Yes, she still cared. “I see you chose a Spanish-style home,” he told her. “It is very beautiful, Irene.”

  “Thank you.” They walked into the sunshine. “Your people had the right idea, Ramon, building stucco houses. They’re much cooler.”

  Irene asked Jenny to get the drinks, and she offered Ramon one of the white, wrought-iron patio chairs that decorated the courtyard. She bent down and picked a rose, then took another chair across from him, holding the rose in her hand. “So, tell me, Ramon, how are things in Denver, now that Colorado is finally a state?”

  He leaned forward and removed his jacket, rolling up his sleeves as he talked. “There was a grand celebration in Denver. The capitol building is nearly completed. It is quite beautiful, with a golden dome.”

  She smiled. Of course it would be golden. The term was being applied to the whole new state of Colorado.

  “Now there is a new man in town as wealthy as the Kirklands, it seems. He has built an opera house, and has brought in builders from the East to design and build a grand hotel that will have real elevators and a ballroom that hangs on cables so that the floor will bounce properly for the dancers.”

  “Ramon! Can that be done?”

  He shrugged. “Anything can be done if a man sets his mind to it. There is a lot of big money in Denver now besides Kirkland money, Irene. More mansions are going up on Kirkland Hills. I am kept so busy that I do not mind the competition from other builders who have come in. Lawrence Phipps has moved into town. He has become wealthy producing steel. He is having a pipe organ built into his house. That big real estate man—Kitteredge—has hired me to build a house for him, with a dining room big enough for a table that will seat a hundred people at once.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t believe it. What about Mother’s new house?”

  He grinned. “Oh, it gives stiff competition to the others. It is the biggest showpiece in Denver—four stories, a ballroom on the third floor that is much bigger than the one in the original house, servants’ quarters on the fourth floor instead of off the kitchen, several bathing rooms, running water, gold door knobs. She even had me order a twenty-five-thousand-dollar stained glass window from Tiffany’s in London. And she is first on the list to have one of those new contraptions installed; they’re called telephones. Can you believe a device has been invented so that one person can actually speak to another person across town?”

  She frowned, “You mean, you can hear each other’s voices?”

  “Sí. It is most amazing. I have not seen one yet, but I have read much about them, and they are already being used in the East. I am sure it will not be long before we will have them in Denver, and they say that someday people will be able to talk to each other clear across the continent, from New York to San Francisco. You can imagine what that would do for business dealings. I am sure your mother is thinking the same thing.”

  Irene sniffed at the rose, leaning back in her chair and thinking about her mother. Her heart ached with confusion. She still loved her parents, but she had not quite been able to forgive them. “Yes, I can just imagine. I’ve learned to accept Mother’s near passion for K-E with a grain of humor.”

  “Sometimes that is the best way to face things that are painful,” he told her.

  There was so much to say, but they were so afraid to say it. “Do you see much of Red? I worry about him. I know what my sister is like.”

  Ramon shook his head. “Things are not so good for Red. I am afraid your sister is gaining quite a reputation in Denver, and it is not a good one. It is rumored…” He hesitated.

  “You can tell me, Ramon. I’ve learned Elly and Chad were …affair behind my back for years.”

  His eyes widened in shock. “My God, Irene! She is your sister!”

  “She has always hated me because I’ve always had what she wanted. Elly is a selfish, confused young woman, Ramon. I should hate her, but I can only feel sorry for her.”

  Ramon shook his head. “The rumors are that Elly sleeps with Red’s clients to help make deals. I am afraid she is not just breaking Red’s heart, but she is bleeding him dry financially. Now they are building another house. It is as though she is trying to keep up with her mother, to show she can build her own fortune now that she gets nothing from K-E. Red is a rich man, but he does not have the kind of money the big moguls like your parents and the others have.”

  “Poor Red. I’m so sorry.”

  He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “It must have been a horrible thing for you to learn about your sister and Chad.”

  The sick feeling moved into her gut again at recalling the day John told her. “It was,” she answered. “It hurt terribly to think my own sister would do such a thing. As far as Chad was concerned, I wasn’t surprised.” She held his eyes. “I had already learned Chad was the one who had been carrying on with Susan Stanner before she hanged herself, Ramon.”

  He sighed deeply. “My God,” he said softly.

  “You know about Chad and Milicent Delaney, that night I lost the baby. But Chad’s affairs aren’t the worst of it. That first time we came down here to live for a year, he—he showed me his jealous side. I know now that Elly probably planted the ideas in his head. He came home one day accusing me of carrying on with Hank Loring. He beat me until I was barely conscious, and he—” she reddened slightly, “he proceeded to show me to whom I belonged. He was so cruel in ways no one else knew about.”

  He clenched his fists, rising from the chair to pace. She could sense his anger. “If I had known—”

  “I knew exactly what you would do. That’s why I never told you. Now it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m rid of the man. It tears at my heart to be a divorced woman, but I couldn’t stay with him—not that he wanted me anyway once he found out I had Indian blood. For a few years after David was born, things were fairly decent between us—until Sharron was born. As soon as he saw her—” She stopped, waiting for Jenny, who brought the lemonade and quickly left again.

  “Chad accused me of …affair with you,” Irene continued, “because little Sharron was so dark. I was not about to let him drag your name into the gossip columns when you were perfectly innocent, so I went to my parents and demanded to know the truth. You know the rest.”

  He turned, his hands on his hips, his dark eyes holding her own. “It could have been true, you know, about you and me—not then, because of Anna—but many other times over the years.”

  She smiled nervously, her eyes suddenly tearing. “It’s all water over the dam now, Ramon. So much has happened to both of us.”

  He came closer, kneeling in front of her. “Sí. We have both suffered through many trials and heartaches, Irene; but we know where our strength came from, what kept us going.”

  Did he still love her? Had he come here then to try to recapture what they once had shared so briefly when she was only sixteen? Had there been too much hurt in between ever to find that love again? “Ramon, there is something you should know.” A tear slipped down her cheek. He reached up and brushed it away, and his touch made her shiver.

  “And what is that?”

  She swallowed. How could a woman feel as though she had betrayed a man who had never been her husband, had never had any kind of claim on her? She felt worse about her affair with Hank for Ramon’s sake than her own husband’s.

  “I told you Chad beat me because…he thought I was …affair with Hank Loring.”

  He smiled gently, taking her hand. “And your son was fathered by Hank, not by Chad Jacobs,” he s
aid, making it a statement rather than a question.

  Her eyebrows arched in amazement. “You…knew?”

  “I suspected. You forget that I knew the kind of man Chad was, knew how a woman with so much to give would feel starved by a man like that. I also knew Hank, the kind of man he was. I knew the terrible loneliness of being a widower, and how easy you are to love. When you came back to Denver after Hank’s death, and I saw the look on your face when you talked about it, I needed no further explanation.” He squeezed her hand. “If nothing else, we have always been the best of friends, Irene. Did you really think I would not understand what you went through during that time? I was not there for you, but Hank was, and I am glad that he was. If you had ended up marrying him, I would have been happy for you, because all that really mattered to me was that you should be happy, and away from that bastard Chad Jacobs.”

  “I felt like I had somehow betrayed you,” she murmured, trying to hold back tears.

  “I had no claim on you.”

  “Yes, you did,” she answered quietly. “You…owned my heart, Ramon. You always have.”

  Everything seemed suddenly quiet, as though they were in a small room together, rather than being outside. There was only the faint buzzing of a bee that landed on a nearby rosebush.

  “Do I still?” he asked hesitantly.

  Why was she crumbling so quickly? He had come here for a simple visit. Too many years had passed, hadn’t they? This should be a casual conversation for now. She should not have let it get away from her like this. She was surely making a fool of herself in front of him. Still, the look in his dark eyes told her he held the same fears about himself, that he had never meant for this to happen. Surely he still loved her to be talking this way. And what did she have to lose now? Her heart had been shattered a hundred times over. She had lived a life of lies and pretending, and she was not going to keep it up.

  “Yes,” she answered.

  His own eyes suddenly teared. “And you have always owned my heart.”