Elena snatched the brush. He propped a foot on the side of the tub. She frowned, then momentarily commenced scrubbing his toenails with vigor.
“I want the truth, Antonio.”
“You have the truth.”
Pressure on the brush increased as she worked furiously. Thick, stiff bristles jabbed into his skin. Ouch! Was the confounded woman going to scrub all the hide from his feet? He cried out in pain and she flashed him a warning look. No, she wasn’t going to give up. And her anger was growing fiercer by the moment.
He jerked his foot back into the water as a matter of self-protection. “Damn it, El, you would flog a dead horse.”
She flung the brush to the floor, then stood and planted her hands firmly on her hips. “But I am correct. There is trouble with this woman? Something you have not told me.”
“There should be no trouble.”
“I do not need the authorities nosing around! You know something, more than you are telling me! I can see it in your eyes.”
Elena was working herself into a panic. “I know as much as you do.” But he did know something he hadn’t shared. The girl was different. She spoke words he had never heard, and was privy to information no woman could possibly know. There was something else. Sonny told him that the woman who had come to lead The People to freedom was not of this world. Perhaps not even from this time. The Star Woman, his cousin named her.
He shook the idea from his mind when Elena laid a distracting, yet comforting hand on his shoulder.
“Do you think she is a fugitive, querido?”
She was back to being sweet again? Actually, it wasn’t impossible to believe the woman had fled authorities. Perhaps that was why she refused to tell him her name. “You are imagining things, Elena I am the only fugitive in this house.”
She arched a thin, dark brow. “Or perhaps you are keeping secrets from me?”
“I have told you everything. I am tired and have no time for talk.” At his words, Elena’s lips pursed into a pout. A good time to change the subject. He gestured to an unwrapped cake of lavender soap out of his reach. “Fetch that for me.”
With much ceremony Elena leaned across and snatched the soap, then stood and dragged the stool around the head of the tub.
“The soap?” He held his palm upward, reminding her. She muttered a curse in Spanish and he turned in time to catch her working the milled bar into a thick, fragrant lather. Oh, no…she was not going to bathe him.
“I will do that, Elena.”
She leaned forward and began soaping his neck and shoulders from behind, working her gentle hands over him quickly. “But is it not more enjoyable when I bathe you?” She purred at his ear.
The seductress.
Antonio closed his eyes, savoring the touch of Elena’s soapy hands on his skin. He had not come to her tonight for comfort, yet he had to admit it was good to have a woman’s gentle attention. He leaned back and closed his eyes while her fingers moved over his body expertly. She knew what he liked, what he needed. She always had. Her warm breath tickled his ear as her palms slid sensuously down his shoulders and upper arms, then circled back around. Her fingertips playfully grazed his nipples and he jerked, biting back a groan.
“I am sorry I did not believe you. I know you would tell me everything,” she whispered at his ear.
Liar. She was telling him what she wanted him to believe as she seduced him by degrees. Or thought so. Her palm smoothed downward to his navel and lingered. He swallowed hard, his pulse pounding in out a deafening tempo in his ears, his cock twitching in anticipation of her touch. He wanted it, yet he didn’t. But she was torturing him to the edge of insanity.
Her hand slid lower, promising him a few moments of sweet relief. Her fingertips brushed him and he closed his eyes, waiting. But she abruptly sat back on the stool and sighed disinterestedly before continuing to soap his shoulders and upper arms again.
Teasing witch!
As she washed him, thoughts of his planned meeting with Diablo intruded, as did his regret over his decision to leave behind the wagon in the alley loaded with provisions. Elena and her ladies had gone to much trouble to aid him in supplying The People with food, but with troops fast approaching, he wasn’t certain how much time remained. The wagon would only slow his travels, possibly by several days. He would make better time on horseback with a smaller cache of weapons. Food would have to wait.
He closed his eyes, his thoughts straying to the red haired woman down the hallway. He hoped she was resting comfortably, that Maeve and Molly were tending her properly. He had instructed Elena to care for her until his return in a few weeks and supposed that might be at the root of Elena’s jealousy. Or did she suspect his attraction to the other woman?
Elena nibbled at his ear lobe, drawing his thoughts back to the moment. She feathered a trail of soft kisses on his wet skin, down the side of his neck and over his shoulder, then across his upper back. It had been a year since he had been intimate with a woman, even longer since he last visited Elena’s bed. She was trying her damnedest to seduce him, not that it would take any great effort now. He was rock hard. He shuddered when her lips touched the nape of his neck.
“You are an evil witch.”
She laughed softly, then rose and moved to the side of the tub. “Come to bed with me and you will see how true those words are.” Her words slid across his heightened senses like silk. She extended her hand when he did not move. “You are troubled tonight, mi amor. Come. Let Elena ease your mind.”
Hesitating, Antonio stepped from the tub. Elena drew a thick towel around his waist and hips. She reached up on tiptoe and threw her arms around his neck, drawing his mouth down to hers.
“It has been over a year since I’ve taken a man to bed,” she murmured against his lips. Pressing her pelvis against his, she began to softly rock against his erection. “Does that please you?”
Her confession didn’t please him as much as it surprised him. He found it difficult to believe a woman with her voracious sexual appetite would remain celibate. Though knew her to be selective about the men she entertained, abstinence was never her strong suit. Still, he suspected pretty young Lola—the newest girl in the parlor—had been keeping Elena company in his absence.
Lifting up on tiptoe, she seized his face in her dainty hands and pressed her lips to his. Her hot silky tongue thrust past his teeth, tangling and mating with his in an erotic dance. She kissed him hard and deep as if she could not get enough, the soft, low moans in her throat threatening to send him hurtling over the edge.
His cock strained against the confines of the towel that separated them, aching for the quick comfort her body could provide. But he did not want Elena.
He wanted the red haired woman.
When he’d found her injured and unconscious the day before, his only concern was for her care. When they’d shared a brief kiss at the stream, he tamped down his desire. Now, she was all he could think about.
Remembering the woman he was with, he broke the kiss. “El, honey.” His breath rushed out. “I have a meeting with Diablo in a short while.”
She clung to him, panting. Her cheeks were flushed, her dark eyes misted with desire. Her mouth curled into a slow, sensual smile. “I will not let you go unless you promise to return to me once you have finished your business.”
He wasn’t certain he could. Everything depended upon how his meeting fared.
“I cannot make promises. You know I must leave Albuquerque tonight.”
She released him and he turned and padded unsteadily over to the bureau.
For years he kept a change of clothes in one of her drawers, one that Elena added to over the years. He pulled out a crisp, white shirt, gray woolen trousers, and a pair of long men’s drawers. Those appeared new. He smiled. So Elena was still trying to keep him civilized. He tucked the underwear back into the drawer, having no need for them. And he preferred his soft buckskin breeches to itchy woolen pants. A clean shirt however, was welcome.
<
br /> Elena stole up behind him, pressed her body against his back and he drew in a sharp breath at the realization she was now completely nude. Her slender arms snaked around his waist. She snuggled against him, her full warm breasts pressing against his cool, damp skin. She felt so damned soft and he could not keep from reaching around to caress her bare hip.
“I cannot bear to let you go yet. Let me hold you I my arms, Antonio, if only for a while.”
Shivers skittered up his spine at her plea. He heard the desperate need in her voice, a lonely, aching need that mirrored his own at that moment, one that went far beyond mere physical desire. He had known Elena since childhood, the housemaid’s daughter at his grandfather’s ranch in California. They’d been inseparable playmates once. She knew him as no one ever had—the deepest longings of his heart, his darkest secrets of his soul. He knew all her demons as well.
Her fingers found the tuck in the towel but his hand covered hers before she could remove it. “Elena,” he warned.
“Do not be impossible, Antonio. There is plenty of time.”
His grip eased up and the towel pooled at his feet. He turned to face her, sucking in a breath as her fingers curled around the length of him. It had been too long and he was helpless to stop her.
He braced one elbow atop the bureau as she stroked him, sometimes slow, sometimes fast. The fingers of her other hand curled into his testicles, kneading them expertly as he spiraled toward a heaven that felt more like hell. He wanted this, yet he didn’t. He wished it were the red haired woman pleasuring him…the siren of his dreams.
“No!” He grasped Elena’s wrists, halting her.
She blinked as if startled, her lips momentarily pursing into a thin line as her eyes widened in awareness. She knew.
“You bastard!”
The open palmed blow to his cheek stung. Her coal black eyes shot daggers into his. Delicate nostrils flared in anger. Her voluptuous breasts rose and fell with each heavy breath. Dark, voluminous curls had come unpinned and now draped over one delicate shoulder.
Without uttering another word, she turned and stormed away. A single hairpin clattered across the oak floor as she made her way to the dressing table. He watched as she snatched up the red gown.
Closing his eyes, he drew in a deep, calming breath, preparing for the onslaught of her rage which was sure to follow.
“Who is she, this other woman who has your affection tonight?”
He dragged a hand down his face and swallowed hard as guilt tore at his conscience. He watched her in the mirror’s reflection. “What do you mean, Elena?”
She thrust her arms into the gown’s sleeves, then wheeled to face him, eyes flashing. “Is it that red-haired woman down the hallway who occupies your thoughts?”
He started to speak, then stopped. It was a trap. “She isn’t much more than a child, Elena. I certainly have no designs on her.”
“The woman you brought here is no child!” she screeched. “She is a woman. I do not like that you indulge your private fantasies about others when we are together.” Her eyes narrowed on him. “You think she is beautiful—more so than I?”
He did not answer, but suspected his silence answered for him.
Dark eyes blazed. “You want to sleep with her?”
He hesitated. Yes. No. Hell, he didn’t know.
Yes.
But he gave a safe answer. “No, I don’t want to sleep with her.”
“You lying bastard!” She picked up a slipper and threw it at him. “If you do not want me as your lover, then go! Go to the red-headed little bitch and fuck her all you like!”
He’d never seen Elena so jealous or enraged. Then it dawned on him. This wasn’t about his attraction to the other woman. It was about the brutality Elena suffered from comancheros when she was fifteen; the fact he’d taken a Navajo wife afterward instead of her. Her jealousy of other women always made perfect sense. She now perceived the younger, beautiful woman as a threat.
He moved closer, but she whirled, placing her back to him, pouting. “Now, now, Elena,” he soothed. “Do not be angry.” He gripped her trembling shoulders from behind and squeezed gently. “You know how I’ve always felt about you.”
She turned in his arms and clung to him, sobbed against his chest like a child. As he stroked her hair, he thought of how alike they had once been, how in some ways they still were. Maybe he hadn’t done the right thing by not marrying her long ago, but he had done what he thought best for her at the time. He’d found her infant son a loving family among the Navajo.
And he bought her this house—the finest in Albuquerque.
Lifting her, he carried her to the bed and laid her down. She gazed up at him, her red-rimmed eyes still shimmering with tears as he climbed in beside her. He brushed his knuckles across her cheek.
“Do not touch me!” She turned her face away and pouted like a child.
“Elena. Don’t behave like this.”
“Go to your damned meeting with Diablo.” She still would not look at him. “Better yet, go to that woman you dragged into my house. Sleep with her. See if I care.” Her lower lip trembled and her eyes filled with fresh tears.
“You are still lovely, El, like that girl I once knew at my grandfather’s ranch.”
“I do not want pity from you, Antonio,” she whispered brokenly. “I do not think I can bear it.”
He caressed her cheek with his fingertips. “I would not say something I did not mean. You are lovely—the most beautiful woman in the Territory. Am I correct?” But Elena would not be consoled.
“Our lives would have been different had the comancheros not come to the valley that summer, Antonio.”
How well he knew. It was the summer that changed everything between them. “Shhh. Don’t speak of it. Keep that dark memory in the past where it belongs.”
She stared at the ceiling. “Many times I wish you had not found me or knew what had become of me—a whore.”
“You don’t mean that.” He wiped away a tear from the outer corner of her eye with his thumb.
“Mama could not even look at me when I returned. She cried every day. She would not care for me when she learned I was pregnant. She tossed me out of the house. I had no one to turn to except you. But you did not abandon me. You took my child to your mother’s tribe where you knew he would be safe. They gave him a home.” She looked at him, blinked back tears. “Why did you care, Antonio? I am not your blood.”
He wasn’t certain, except that she had been his best friend for most of his young life. He spent eight months tracking her, finally freeing her from the filthy crib where she had been enslaved.
“That first day when they sold me in El Paso—nine men used me, Antonio.”
Tears welled up in his eyes, and he fought down the lump in his throat that threatened to choke him. She had been young and innocent then. “Do not speak of it anymore.” But the look in her eyes was hollow, as if she weren’t there with him at all, but reliving that terrifying time in her mind.
“I wanted to die after the first comanchero took me, but it became easier as time went on. I would close my eyes and think of you and let them do whatever they wanted. By the time we reached El Paso, I had lost count of how many times they’d taken me.”
Her arms went around his neck and she clung to him. He stroked her back gently, held her as she cried softly. “Oh, Antonio, I do not mean to ramble on about the past. It is only my fear speaking again. I am afraid to lose you. I have no one who cares for me. What if the soldiers capture you? How will I survive?”
“They won’t catch me. I have eluded them thus far.”
She kissed his face feverishly. “Please say you will return tonight after your business with Diablo is complete. Come back to me. Let me love you properly before you depart.”
“I can’t promise.”
* * * * *
Elena fought back tears as the pain of his leaving squeezed at her heart. She sat on the edge of the bed and watched him dress. He cou
ld lie all he wanted about the woman he delivered into her care, but she knew something had transpired between them. She felt it, sensed it in his coolness toward her. Was this the last time she would see him?
No more words passed between them. He did not smile or look back as he set his hat on his head and opened the door. It was always the same goodbye.
Only after he slipped from her room did she allow herself the luxury of crying over a man whose heart she would never possess.
She had made a mistake at fifteen by becoming involved with Franklin Cole and his get rich quick schemes. Of course Antonio knew nothing about Cole or how she had actually run away with the man to escape her impoverished home life. Instead Antonio believed she had been abducted by bandits, sold into prostutution and that her child, Diego, was the result of a rape. The baby had been Cole’s issue, the result of her young, foolish heart’s affair.
Cole had been passing through the California valley that summer, peddling wares to all the ranchos. She had been mesmerized by his magic tricks and his dashing good looks. How stupid she’d been, thinking he would whisk her away from her life as the daughter of a washer woman for the wealthy De los Santos family.
When Cole left to seek his fortune in the Nevada silver mines, leaving her pregnant and penniless in El Paso, she used the skills he taught her to become a high-priced whore to survive. Men—even poor ones—she soon learned, paid more for exotic tricks and adventurous scenarios, more than the pittance earned by lowly crib girls.
At the window she watched the bustle of carriages and horses on the street below as shadows grew long. Even before she ran away with Cole, she’d known Antonio would never marry her. She was a mestizo, the daughter of Mexican peasants. Despite his Navajo mother, the De Los Santos were wealthy and of pure Spanish blood. Due to differences of social class, his family would never have approved of her.
Not wanting to think about the past, she drew the curtain closed and crossed the room as long shadows flickered and danced in the buttery glow of dying lamplight. Even so, her thoughts strayed back in time and she thought of her son, Diego, who would be fourteen now. She wondered who he resembled—her, or Franklin? She quickly dashed the thought away. She did not want to know, not wanting to see the face of that evil bastard in her son’s innocent eyes. Still, she supposed any mother would always wonder about the child she had given away.
Ride The Wild Wind (Time Travel Historical Romance) Page 7
