From the threshold of Sawyer’s room Zafiro watched Sawyer move his legs and arms. Sweat poured off his face, shoulders, and chest as though he’d only just emerged from a bath.
His health was returning just when she would take his life.
But when would she do it? she asked herself for the hundredth time. Her decision to kill him was already four days old. But the first day she’d been too busy with a second attempt to build a chicken coop. She still hadn’t completed the task, and in her opinion one couldn’t commit a slaying when one hadn’t finished one’s chores. The day after that she’d gone to the convent to advise the nuns about Sawyer’s encounter with Mariposa and also to have them borrow Rudolfo’s gun again. Of course, she hadn’t told them why she needed the gun. Telling a group of nuns that she would soon be a murderess just didn’t seem to be the right thing to do.
When she’d returned to La Escondida from the convent, she’d seen to all the chores. After having climbed up and down the mountain and then toiled for hours, she’d been too weary to carry off an assassination.
Yesterday had been Sunday. Taking a life on the Lord’s day was something she refused to even consider. And today…well, today she hadn’t found a second of time for the killing. Tia hadn’t left Sawyer’s room since daybreak, and Zafiro was not going to perform his execution in front of the dear woman who believed him to be her son.
Another dilemma also plagued her. What manner of death would she choose for him? The decision deserved much careful thought.
She had the gun, yes, but what was the most comfortable way to die?
“Now that I know he is out of danger, I go to rest, Zafiro,” Tia said. Stifling a yawn, she swept her hair out of her eyes, then tried to swat Jengibre off the bed, to no avail. The chicken merely positioned herself more comfortably within the nest of sheets.
Tia let the hen be. “Zafiro, you will watch Francisco for a few hours and make sure he sleeps peacefully?”
Zafiro couldn’t imagine a more peaceful sleep than death. “Si, Tia. I will do what I must to give him a long, long rest. Please go sleep now.”
When Tia was gone Zafiro fidgeted with her skirt for a while, then paced around the room, her heart skipping beats every time she concentrated on what she was about to do. Finally, she stopped in front of the window and gazed out at the peaks of the Sierras.
“Forgive me, Grandfather,” she whispered to the mental image she had of him. “I know you never killed. Not once, and neither did Maclovio, Lorenzo, Pedro, or my father. But there was always another way for you and the men. Some way to avoid spilling blood. For me there is no other way. I must kill this man because I can think of no other way to protect our people.”
Her head bowed low, she left the room, but returned shortly and laid an array of items on the floor near Sawyer’s bed. As she closed and locked the door, tears burned her eyes.
Santa Maria, she was about to destroy a life. Slaughter a young, healthy, and vitally handsome man who should have at least fifty more years ahead of him.
This day, this beautiful, sunny morning, would be his last.
Drying her wet cheeks with the back of her hand, she sniffled and tried to summon the courage she would need to send Sawyer to his Maker.
“This chicken laid an egg in my bed.”
The sudden sound of his voice caused her to shriek with surprise and whirl to face him. “You scared me!” Taking deep breaths to try to slow her pounding heart, she saw him watching her intently.
Had he heard her speak to her grandfather about the killing? “How long have you been awake?”
Sawyer tried to shrug, but his shoulder injury wouldn’t let him. Still, he felt better and he realized he was no longer sick with fever.
In fact, he was hungry. “I woke up a few seconds ago when I heard your sniffling. I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m sorry.”
His apology made her feel worse. He was nice, she mused. Just as the nuns said he was.
It would sure be a lot easier to kill him if he were rude and cruel.
“You’re the girl from the convent. Why were you crying?”
“My tears have no business with you, Sawyer Donovan. And do not be nice to me.”
He frowned. If her voice had been any sharper she could have sliced steel with it. “Don’t be nice to you?”
“That is right. Do not be nice to me.”
Her command didn’t make a bit of sense to him, but he complied. “All right. Get the hell out of my room to do all your damn crying, woman, and get this blasted chicken out of my bed.”
She stared at him, unable to believe what she’d heard him say. “What?”
“You said for me not to be nice to you.” Grimacing, he touched the thick white bandage on his shoulder. “And considering the way I feel, it’s a hell of a lot easier to be mean than it is to be nice.”
“You are in my house, and you dare to be mean with me?” She marched toward the bed, stopping a few feet away. “I do not think you have enough pickles in your barrel.”
“Pickles?”
“Your barrel needs more pickles?” Zafiro rephrased the question. Oh, how did that expression go? “You are crazy.”
Finally, he understood. “I’m one pickle short of a barrel.”
“Yes, that is what I said. Now, do not be mean with me in my own house.”
“You don’t want me to be nice, and I didn’t ask you to bring me here, got that? The last thing I remember is being attacked by a cougar, so it must have been your own decision to bring me into your home and—”
“If you had not chased me from the convent, none of this would have hap—”
“I thought you’d stolen—”
“Well, I did not steal anything—”
“How was I supposed to know—”
“Basta! Enough! I will not listen to you say one more word!”
Her shouting quieted him, but not because her anger intimidated him. Actually, he couldn’t have cared less how mad she was.
It was his preference to study her in silence that induced him to cease arguing with her.
And study her he did.
Standing in the middle of the sparsely furnished room, she rocked back and forth on her heels. Her ebony hair flowed down her body like melted midnight, the ends of those thick tresses curling around her gently rounded hips. Her breasts strained against her white blouse. They weren’t overly large, but her shirt appeared to be too small for her.
“You are staring at my breasts.”
Her immodest statement made him smile. “Sorry.”
“You cannot help it. Azucar said that men like to do that, so I think that it is a liking you were born with. Men also like to touch and taste women’s breasts. I know everything there is to know about lovemaking.”
“Oh, really?” The conversation seemed highly improper, but if it didn’t bother her, he certainly wasn’t going to let it bother him. “What else do you know?”
“Everything Azucar told me.”
“I see. So who is this authority on lovemaking, your beau? Husband?”
Zafiro raised one eyebrow. “Azucar is a woman. A very experienced woman. Her name means ‘sugar’ in Spanish. I do not think there is anyone in the whole world who knows as much about lovemaking as Azucar, but it would take me too long to tell you all the things she has explained to me.”
Sawyer decided that if Azucar—with all her experience—was as beautiful as this dark-haired girl, he’d like to meet her. “I’ll be in this bed for a long time. You could tell me a little bit, couldn’t you?”
“You will not be in the bed for much longer.” He’d soon be in his grave, she thought.
She had to tell him. He had every right to know his fate. Drawing herself up to her full height she prayed he wouldn’t notice how her knees were shaking. “You are going to die.”
He smiled again. “I have to admit that I’ve had better days, but I don’t think I’m going to die.”
“You are.” Pretending there
was something in her eye, Zafiro quickly wiped away another tear.
Santa Maria, she had to get hold of herself! She was her charges’ sole protection, and who was more important, after all? This stranger, Sawyer Donovan, who had never done a thing for her? Or her people, who had taken care of her since her mother left her in their care when she was a newborn?
“You are going to die, Sawyer Donovan. I want you to die, and for that I am very sorry.”
Her admission stunned him into a long moment of silence. “If you wanted me to die why did you bring me here and sew me up? Wouldn’t it have been easier to just leave me on the mountain and let that cougar and the vultures—”
“I did not sew you up. Tia did.”
Sawyer decided that Tia was the plump woman with the motherly demeanor. “She might have sewn me up, but you did your share, too.”
“That was before. Things have changed. Your life, it does not have the value of a pile of peas now because—”
“Peas.” Hadn’t he heard her mention peas before? “What is it with you and peas? I remember you saying something about them… I don’t know. A few days ago, I guess. Something about letting the peas flow.”
“Yes, that is what I said. To let the peas flow means to tell what you are hiding.”
“Spill the beans. Beans.”
“Peas, beans, or even radishes…What does it matter? A vegetable is a vegetable—”
“And the expression you just tried to use is not worth a hill of beans. My life is not worth a hill of beans.”
“It means the same…”
“Maybe. But the way you said it didn’t make sense.”
She bristled. “Do you make funny with me?”
He ignored her irritation. “No, I am not making fun of you. Who are you, anyway?”
She ignored his question. “A cat died from being curious, you know.”
“Curiosity killed the cat.”
She nodded. “Whose cat was it?”
“What?”
“Whose cat—”
“No one’s cat. It’s only a saying.”
She couldn’t understand why anyone would make up an expression about a cat who didn’t even exist, but she had more important things to do than try to untangle such twisted logic.
She had to put Sawyer to death. Her heart skipping beats again and her palms so wet with perspiration that she could not even dry them in the folds of her skirt, she walked nearer to the bed and pointed to the various articles she’d arranged on the floor.
Sawyer looked down and saw a knife, a long piece of rope, a bucket of water, and a gun.
“Choose your death, Sawyer Donovan. I can shoot you, stab you, hang you, or drown you. Or,” she added, spying his pillow and slipping it out from under his head, “I could suffocate you. It is your death. You choose.”
Her announcement shocked him. “You… You’re going to kill me? Why?”
“Because you know who we are.” Visions of Sawyer leading Luis to La Escondida filled her mind, causing her to shudder inwardly. Even the possibility of Sawyer turning her men in to the law horrified her.
She bent and picked up the knife, a long, rust-covered dagger with a handle cocooned in old spider webs.
Sawyer eyed the knife. What with his injuries, could he stop her if she lunged at him in the next moment?
God. Beautiful though the woman was, she was deranged. His apprehension deepened. “Look,” he said, his gaze moving back and forth from her eyes to the ancient blade in her hands, “I have no idea who you are, so—”
“You try to blind me with fleece.” Zafiro tapped the flat side of the knife on her palm. “You do know who we are, because Maclovio opened the sack and the cat jumped out.”
“Maclovio?”
“Again you try to be as dishonest as a carpet. You talked to Maclovio only four days ago, and after that you spoke our name. You are only grabbing at hay because you do not want to be killed. You know we are the Quintana Gang. Because you know, you must die.”
“Who?”
“The Quintana Gang!”
He searched his memory for some clue as to who the Quintana Gang was, but continued to feel more confused by the second. “I don’t know any Quintana Gang.”
Zafiro didn’t reply; she merely looked at him. Her gaze traced the chiseled planes of his face: his high cheekbones, long, straight nose, and sharply defined jawline.
Tia had washed his hair earlier, and now, as it lay spread over the mattress and his massive shoulders, it shone like antique gold. Zafiro longed to touch it. To feel how thick it was and to see how it looked sliding through her dark fingers.
He blinked, his action drawing her attention to his eyes. She’d never seen eyes such as his—golden, flecked with warm brown.
Instinct told her that those eyes could coerce a woman into doing anything. Anything at all.
The thought quickened her breath and loosened her thoughts. “You are the handsomest, youngest man I have seen in ten years,” she said softly. “I…part of me wishes I did not have to kill you. But…but life, it is not roses to sleep on, and I cannot keep my cake if it is in my belly.”
He stared at her so hard that his eyes stung. “I’m trying to pull the wool over your eyes, someone let the cat out of the bag, I lie like a rug, I’m grasping at straws, life is no bed of roses, and you can’t have your cake and eat it, too.”
She stared straight back at him. “That is what I—”
“No, it’s not what you—”
“You will be a dead man in only minutes, and you would waste the last of your life arguing with me, Sawyer Donovan? You have more nuts than a fruitcake!”
“You’re the one who’s nuttier than a fruitcake, woman! God Almighty—”
“It is good that you are saying your prayers. Make your peace with God Almighty, pick your death, and I will make the necessary preparations to kill you.”
He heard her voice tremble and knew then that the notion of killing him was truly abhorrent to her. There might just be a way out of his predicament yet, he mused.
“Please,” he said, reaching out to hold her hand, “don’t kill me.”
She felt like curling her fingers between his. But, of course, she didn’t, because one didn’t caress one’s murder victim. “You are making this harder for me.” She yanked her hand from his grasp.
“Harder for you? What about me?”
“It is supposed to be hard on you. You are the one who is going to be killed.”
If he didn’t still feel slightly nervous, he’d have found her explanation amusing. But he remained wary because his would-be killer was definitely daft, and daft people were unpredictable.
He tried to think of another way to dissuade her from murdering him. “I want to be drawn and quartered.”
“Drawn and quartered?” She wrinkled up her nose as she pondered his wish. “Will that kill you?”
“After being drawn and quartered I’ll be as dead as a doornail.”
“What is a doornail?”
He decided not to explain a cliché she’d turn around and mangle anyway. “Never mind. Just draw and quarter me.”
She gave a slow nod. “All right. But first tell me what it is.”
“Four horses pull and tear off my two arms and two legs.”
Zafiro couldn’t suppress a violent shudder. “We only have Coraje and Rayo, our horse and burro. Coraje, he will not allow as much as a gnat to get near him, and Rayo suffers a bruised foot. Besides, to be drawn and quartered, it sounds very painful. I do not want you to feel any pain. I only want you to die.”
Her explanation was the stupidest thing he’d ever heard. Glancing down at her weapons again, he spied the gun. “The sound of gunfire’s so loud. Deafening, actually.”
Zafiro looked at the gun she’d had Sister Carmelita borrow from Rudolfo again. This time the pistol was fully loaded. “You will not realize that you have gone deaf because you will be dead. Besides, you will only hear the gunfire for half a second.
”
“Too long. I refuse to be shot, and that’s it.”
She nudged the pistol away with her foot and made a mental note to return it to Sister Carmelita as soon as possible.
Sawyer looked down at the various killing instruments again. “I’ve never liked the feel of something tight around my neck. I can’t even button the top button on my shirts.”
“But you were wearing a bandana.”
“It wasn’t tied tight though. It was so loose I barely felt it.”
Zafiro kicked the rope across the room.
“I’m already slashed to ribbons. Do you think I’d enjoy being cut into again?”
She laid the dagger on the table under the window.
“Feathers make me sneeze. I can never sleep with my nose too near the pillow.”
She booted the pillow under the bed. “There is only the water left. Please put your head in this bucket and drown.”
She might as well have asked him to please pass the salt, so nonchalantly did she give his death order. He tried to sit up, wincing when bolts of pain shot through his injuries.
Carefully, he lay back down. “Starve me to death.”
She shook her head. “I have been hungry many times, and I can tell you that an empty stomach is painful. You must drown.”
“I deserve one last meal.” While she went to get his food he’d escape, he decided. Even if he had to drag himself out of the house on his hands and knees, he’d escape. “A really big meal. Eight courses, plus dessert.”
“First you want to starve to death, and now you want to eat?”
“Yes.”
Zafiro sighed every bit of air from her lungs. “If you keep stalling you will die of old age before I have the chance to kill you.”
“Do you expect me to hurry along my own execution? Bring me some…some lobster.” He smiled inwardly, daring her to find a lobster in the middle of the Sierras. “Yes, lobster to start. Once I’ve finished that I’ll tell you what else I want.”
“Lobster?”
“You do know what lobster is, don’t you?”
Zafiro remembered eating lobster whenever she and the gang journeyed through small towns near the gulf. “Where do you think I will get lobster in these mountains?”
Bed of Roses Page 5
