by Janet Dailey
Light footsteps entered the hall. Sheila turned her head toward the sound, moving too quickly, and a wave of dizziness drained the color from her face.
Consuelo appeared in the bedroom doorway, smiling. “Buenos días, Sheila.”
“Buenos días.” The greeting sounded weak even to Sheila’s ears. “How is Juan this morning?”
There was a positive declaration in Spanish that he was much better before Consuelo clicked her tongue at Sheila and teased her about something. Sheila frowned, certain she hadn’t understood the woman. She blamed it on the dull headache, deciding it had affected her concentration.
“What did you say, Consuelo?” She asked that the remark be repeated.
A second time didn’t improve her comprehension of the Spanish words. Consuelo tried again, combining them with sign language and pantomime. Sheila’s mouth opened in shock when Consuelo made a cradle of her arms, rocked an imaginary bundle, pointed at Sheila, and said, “bebé.”
“It isn’t possible,” Sheila gasped in protest. But a swift, mental calculation said it was more than possible. It was quite likely true. She was pregnant. Her hand moved across her stomach, as if it might feel the child growing inside her.
It was as flat and smooth as always. For now. How naïve of her not to have suspected, Sheila thought angrily. A month and a half, two months. God, she couldn’t even remember.
Immediately, Consuelo recognized that Sheila hadn’t known. The gentle woman hurried to assure her that it was wonderful news. Sheila understood more by the woman’s tone than her actual words. For a moment, she could feel nothing but shock and confusion. Then she caught the gist of a comment concerning how pleased Ráfaga would be. And Sheila suddenly realized he would have to know she was carrying his child.
Somehow she managed to get Consuelo out of the room so she could be alone to think this discovery through. A part of her glowed with the knowledge that she was carrying Ráfaga’s child. But there was fear, too—fear because there were no doctors for miles. She would be bringing a child into the world under conditions that could only be classified as primitive.
As for Ráfaga, he wanted her now, when she was shapely and beautiful But how long would his desire last when her stomach grew as fat as a melon and her long legs had all the grace of a waddling duck?
Sheila started to cry.
Chapter 22
The silence during the noon meal was heavy. Sheila knew her eyelids were still swollen from crying and her features were drawn with tension. Ráfaga had to have noticed. His alert, yet hooded gaze had continually inspected her face all through the meal.
There were only the two of them in the house; Consuelo was in her own home with Juan. This was the time to tell Ráfaga about the baby. Her hands closed around the empty coffee mug in front of her.
There was no easy way to say it. Trembling, Sheila lifted her chin, a faint challenge in the gesture, and blurted out, “I’m going to have a baby.”
Nothing flickered in his dark eyes. “Yes,” Ráfaga said, as though he were confirming her statement.
“You knew?” she asked with a slight frown of disbelief.
“Do you think I do not know every inch of you?” There was a cynical lift to one corner of his mouth. “Do you think I would not notice the slightest change in your body?”
Her announcement had not brought any pleased light to his dark eyes. There was none of the gladness or pride that Consuelo had suggested would be there when she told him. He didn’t want the baby, and Sheila felt something die in her heart.
“What is it you want of me?” Ráfaga inquired, studying her closely, a blandness to his look.
“I want you to be happy about the baby,” Sheila wanted to cry. Instead, she shrugged and said, “Nothing,” her shoulders hunching forward.
“Do you not want me to arrange for an abortion?”
“An abortion?!!” Her hand moved protectively to her stomach, as if at that moment he could somehow take the life she carried within her.
“Many American women have come to Mexico in the past to rid themselves of babies they did not want. Is that what you wish?” he asked with infuriating calm.
My God she thought, how could he suggest such a thing? This was his seed she carried, his baby. How could he believe that she would want to get rid of it?
“No.” Her voice was coldly drawn from her throat. “That is not what I wish,” Sheila declared, rising from the table. She needed to get away from him before she lost her temper and did something that might ultimately harm their baby.
“Then why have you told me?” Ráfaga’s question checked her footsteps as Sheila turned.
“I told you.” She held herself rigidly, not looking back. “Because you are the baby’s father. I thought you should know.”
She was trembling uncontrollably, tears stinging her eyes. There was the scrape of the chair leg as Ráfaga rose from the table. Her heart hammered frantically against her ribs. Every muscle was poised for flight, but he didn’t approach her. His striding walk was carrying him to the door.
When Sheila heard it open and close, her hand groped for the chair she had just left, needing its support as her legs threatened to collapse. She found it, sinking quickly into its seat. Burying her face in her hands, she began to cry. She would have Ráfaga’s baby, but she would lose him. It wasn’t a fair exchange.
The supply of tears ran out. Sheila was numbed to all but her own torment. She didn’t hear the door open or the sound of footsteps approaching. She still believed she was alone with her misery when a hand touched her shoulder. Her head jerked, her blurred eyes seeing Ráfaga standing beside her chair.
“Don’t touch me!” The chair clattered to the floor as she moved to elude his touch. Sheila faced him rigidly, retreating when he moved toward her. “Don’t come near me!” she hissed in bitter anger and hurt, a wounded animal lashing out at the one who had injured her. “Haven’t you done enough? Why can’t you leave me alone?”
The room was small. Within moments she was cornered against a wall, his hands seizing her arms, refusing to let her go. There was an unrelenting grimness about his mouth.
“Listen to me, Sheila,” commanded Ráfaga.
“I don’t want to hear anything you have to say!” she cried. Her hands were straining against his chest, but he was making no attempt to draw her closer.
“You will listen,” he insisted harshly. “There is a priest I know who will marry us and keep silent. It will not be legal in the eyes of the government, but to the eyes of God we will be man and wife.”
“Don’t be patronizing!” Sheila rejected his proposal violently. “I wouldn’t want to endure the shame of a marriage to you!”
He gave her a hard shake, his teeth bared. “I wish to have our union blessed by the Church and to give you the protection of my name.”
“I don’t want either one!” Her protest was choked with pain. A surfeit of pride insisted she must deny the offer he made only because of the child she carried. Sheila reinforced her refusal with a lie. “I don’t want you!”
For a moment the fire blazing in his dark eyes seemed about to consume her in its raging inferno, Roughly, he pulled Sheila to his chest. The hard fingers digging into her arms lifted her up on tiptoes. The heat between them made it difficult for Sheila to breathe.
“What is it that you want, then?” he demanded savagely. “Do you want me to let you go? Is that it? So you can go to your parents and have the baby there with them? Do you wish to do that and hear him called a bastard?” Ráfaga did not give Sheila the opportunity to make a single response. “I will not let you go! If that is what you hoped, you can wipe it from your mind. I will never permit you to leave me—nor the child that was conceived by our love. We will be married by the priest, and the child, when it is born, will be baptized by a priest! He will be raised here in this house, in this canyon, with whatever brothers and sisters that may follow.”
Her heart stopped beating, then soared. “Do you want ou
r baby, Ráfaga?” Sheila sighed.
“It is the flesh of our flesh. Do you think I would deny it?” He frowned angrily.
“I don’t know.” She closed her eyes, making a small, confused shake of her head. “I thought... When I told you, you seemed so—”
His fingers dug into the flesh of her arms in hard demand. “Do you want our baby?” Ráfaga put the same question to Sheila.
“Yes.” There was no uncertainty at all in her answer. “Yes, I want the baby.” She reaffirmed it more forcefully, although her voice was hardly more than a whisper. “I love you, Ráfaga.” She opened her eyes and saw the flicker of doubt in the darkness of his. “You thought I didn’t want the baby,” she accused in disbelief.
“It was possible.” His gaze roamed her face, still not totally convinced. “You were brought to this canyon against your will. I forced you to lie in my bed.” One arm was released as his hand moved to her back, faintly caressing while he drew her possessively closer. “I had you punished when you ran away from me. How could I expect you to want a baby conceived with me? When I saw the redness of your eyes, I knew you had shed bitter tears of regret at the discovery.”
“Only because I thought you wouldn’t want the baby or me.” Her trembling fingertips traced the outline of his carved cheekbone and jaw. “In a few months, I’ll be so fat and ugly that—”
“No.” His hand covered her lips. “Even when you are heavy with child you will be beautiful.” His voice was husky and low, the midnight velvet of his eyes gazing deeply into hers. “Do you remember the time that you tried to escape in the storm and later sat in front of the fire to warm yourself? I watched you then, wrapped in a blanket I put around you. The firelight was dancing in your hair and I imagined you sitting there, your belly swollen with child. At that moment, I knew a desire such as I have never felt before. I thought to satisfy it by taking you. But having you once was like drinking water from the sea. I found I needed to possess more than your body. I wanted your mind and heart and soul. I love you, querida, as I have never loved another woman.”
Sheila felt her heart would burst with joy. She had waited so long to hear those words, and she had given up hope that he would ever say them, that he would ever feel the love for her he had just professed.
“I love you.” It was almost a vow that she uttered softly.
Ráfaga smiled, with his mouth and his eyes. “Soon the baby will begin to swell your belly.” His hand moved to her stomach, his fingers spreading over it, igniting a fire within Sheila. “When it does, I will look at you and feel that same surge of desire, querida. I will never stop wanting you or loving you.” His voice became deeper and huskier as his hand slid beneath her blouse to mold itself around the fullness of her breasts. “Think of the countless hours I will spend watching our child suckle at your breast. Do you now understand the happiness I knew when I realized you were with child?”
“Yes.” She laughed with breathless joy, tears shimmering in her eyes. “Yes, I do.”
“And you will consent to letting the priest marry us?”
“Yes.” Sheila nodded.
His dark brows drew together in a frown. “I regret that I cannot offer you the legality of a government ceremony, but my name is too well known to—”
“I know. I don’t mind,” she insisted.
Ráfaga breathed in deeply, pain flickering in his eyes. “I have no right to ask you to share this life with me. I can offer you so little, and you give me so much.”
“All I want is your love. I have had all the rest. It wouldn’t mean anything without you. I know that. You must believe it.”
“I only know that I cannot let you go,” he declared, roughly crushing her against him as his mouth descended to accept the invitation of her lips.
Three days later the golden light of dawn was spreading across the sky. Ráfaga’s hands were gently cupping Sheila’s face. His dark gaze shifted beyond her to Laredo, already in the saddle and holding the reins to her horse.
“It is time to leave, amado,” he told her quietly.
“Please, Ráfaga, come with us now.” Sheila asked him to change his mind.
“No.” He shook his head, smiling to lessen the hardness of his tone. “It is a long ride. You will need to rest at least a day when you get there, and I cannot risk being that long in a place where I could be ecognized—unless,” Ráfaga teased mock’ngly, “you wish to visit me in jail.”
“No, of course not.” Sheila lowered her head, but she hated being separated from him, even for a few days.
“I will leave tomorrow.” He lifted her chin with his thumb. “The next time you see me, we will stand before the priest.” His mouth closed over hers in a hard, brief kiss before he firmly guided Sheila to the bay and helped her into the saddle. His hand rested on her thigh as he looked at Laredo. “Remember,” Ráfaga told him crisply, “go directly to Father Ramirez. Speak to no one else. He knows me and will find a place for you to stay that is safe.”
Laredo nodded his understanding and handed the bay’s reins to Sheila. “I’ll take care of her, Ráfaga.”
Her eyes were filling with tears as Sheila looked down at Ráfaga. His mouth had thinned into a grim line, but the darkness in his gaze held the smouldering light of his love. Her lips parted to protest again that she didn’t want to go without him.
His hand came down hard on the bay’s rump. The horse jumped forward in alrm. Sheila checked its flight for an instant, then urged it forward. In seconds, Laredo was riding beside her.
Passing the spring-fed pool, they took the narrow, rocky trail up the north face of the canyon. Single file, they rode with Sheila leading the way up the long, winding trail through a corridor of trees and rocks. Once the sun crested the eastern ridge, the morning blazed with light.
The bay was lunging up the last steep slope of the trail when Sheila heard the rifle shot. She reined the bay in sharply at the top and saw Laredo’s head jerk toward the sound. He spurred his horse to the top and dismounted, ignoring Sheila as he ran to a rocky overlook.
“What is it?” She joined him on the ledge.
The clear mountain air carried indistinguishable shouts of alarm. “My God, it’s a patrol,” Laredo muttered.
A large band of uniformed riders was galloping across the meadow in the direction of the adobe houses. The canyon hideout had been discovered. Her heart leaped into her throat. Ráfaga was down there. Pivoting, Sheila ran back to the bay. But Laredo was there, grabbing a bridle strap to stop her.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he demanded, holding the bay’s tossing head.
“Ráfaga’s down there. I have to go to him.”
“Do you think I don’t want to?” Laredo snapped. “He knows we’re out of danger, that we’re safe. All he has to worry about is getting himself out of there. If he can’t, then I can damned sure break him out of any prison they put him in. This is no time to be melodramatic.”
She recognized the logic of his argument, but she wasn’t ruled by logic. Digging her heels into the bay’s flanks, she whipped the horse with the reins. The bay dragged Laredo for two feet before he was forced to let go and the horse charged back down the trail it had just climbed.
Within seconds Sheila heard the clattering of Laredo’s horse behind her. At a wide spot in the trail, he forced his horse alongside hers.
“You can’t stop me!” she blazed.
“I realize that!” he flashed angrily. “I know I’m a damned fool, but I promised Ráfaga I’d take care of you, and I could never face him if I let you go down there alone.”
He spurred his horse into the lead. Above the scrambling of horses’ hooves could be heard the sound of gunfire in the canyon below. Ráfaga and his men were putting up a fight.
Their reckless descent brought them down the trail in a third of the time. At the pool, Laredo made a pointing gesture in the direction of the adobe house. where they had left Ráfaga. The majority of the gunfire was coming from the cluster of
houses to the west, but there was the sound of shots being fired near the lone house.
Laredo broke from the trees ahead of Sheila. Immediately a volley of shots exploded around him. Instinct made Sheila stop the bay as she saw him jerk convulsively, sawing on the reins. His chestnut horse was thrown off balance and fell. Laredo stayed on the ground after his horse scrambled to its feet, trotting back into the trees where Sheila waited. She was swinging a leg out of the saddle when she heard Laredo call to her.
“Get out of here!” His voice was riddled with pain. Sheila dismounted, wanting to go to Laredo and knowing if she stepped out of the trees, she would be forsaking their protection. She grabbed at the trailing reins of his chestnut.
“You can’t help me,” Laredo told her, grunting with the effort to speak. “I can’t move, so get out of here!”
With a sob of anguish, she knew he was right. Her gaze swung to the thatched roof of the house. Sheila turned and mounted the chestnut, leading the bay. She worked her way through the trees away from Laredo to the other side of the adobe house. Ráfaga was trapped inside it.
The clearing from the trees to the house seemed dangerously wide. She had to cross it to reach the house and Ráfaga. Sheila hesitated, then jammed her heels into the chestnut. The bay raced alongside as she whipped the chestnut across the clearing to the temporary protection of the east side of the house.
The patrol had struck first at the cluster of houses. The main force was only just beginning to extend its foray to the isolated adobe building. A rifle barrel glinted from a window at her approach, and Sheila reined in beside it.
“Ráfaga!”
Immediately he appeared in the windowframe. His eyes narrowed angrily at the sight of her, his features hardened and ruthless.
“What are you doing here?” he muttered savagely.
“I had to come back. Hurry!” Sheila urged, but he was already swinging out the window.
“Where is Laredo?” He had a foot in the stirrup and was mounting the bay when he asked the question.
