Deep Purple (8 page)

CHAPTER 10

"
Y
ou must come to Tucson and make the
paseo
, Catrina,” the thirteen-year-old Atanacia said.

Looking at t
he beautiful young Mexican girl dressed in white flounces, it was difficult for Catherine to believe she was the bride of the big, red-headed Welshman sitting across from Don Francisco. Her husband, Sam Hughes, was thirty-three. Atanacia was a child bride indeed. And yet her black eyes sparkled with adoration for the giant of a man at her side. The couple was returning from a honeymoon in Santa Fe and had stopped over to visit with Sherrod, who occasionally bought whipsawed lumber from Sam. The sawmill in the Santa Rita Mountains was just one of the many businesses the Welshman had his hand in.

“
A
paseo
is a stroll—-a promenade, isn’t it?” Catherine asked.

Sam laughed, and the after-dinner hot chocolate sloshed in the tiny cup held between his ham-hock hands
. “It is. But in Tucson the
paseo
is special. Tell her about it, Sherrod.”

Sherrod
’s eyes sought hers. “On Saturday night the men walk in one direction about the plaza, Catherine, and the unmarried women in another. When eye contact is made—and acknowledged—the couple drift apart from the others to walk together.”

“
It’s Atanacia’s way of matchmaking," Sam interjected. “Now that she is married, she thinks every single female should also be.”

Atanacia said, “
Oh, Catrina,
mi esposo
, he has not the tact. I think of the
paseo
because you are so
hermosa
and there are so many hombres in Tucson without
esposas
.

Catherine could have sworn she detected a smothered snort from Law, who sprawled at one end of the camelback sofa. A quick glance beneath her lowered lids sh
owed him hastily sipping the chocolate.

“
I’m afraid the children would be very unhappy to lose Catherine,” Sherrod put in with a smile, “even if it was to a local wife-hunter.”

From there the conversation turned to children, with Atanacia declaring she wan
ted fifteen. Lucy sat silently next to Sherrod. Her beautiful face was pinched, the lovely lips drawn tightly. Catherine wondered how the woman could be unhappy when she had everything that Catherine wanted—a home, children, a husband. But Lucy was clearly morose, and Catherine could not decide who looked the worse at the moment, Lucy or herself.

It had been almost a week since she had been riding, since that day beneath the Joshua tree, and she could tell the difference in how she felt. With the lack of ou
tdoor exercise, her complexion had reverted to its lackluster hue, making her eyes too large for her small-boned face.

She was indeed the coward Law called her. She could endure the putrefying stench of the rotting limbs and festering wounds of the soldier
s she tended, but the mocking eyes and teasing lips of Lorenzo Davalos were unbearable; and thus she was bound as surely as a chained prisoner to the Stronghold, afraid of meeting him on her rides, afraid of actually going to the Joshua tree.

For a week sh
e had not seen him. For a week she had paced her bedroom, walked the small courtyard, and haunted the dim rooms, feeling as if her life were ebbing from her there in the Stronghold. She needed the sun and the wind!

And now Law was back, invading the Strong
hold, to taunt her.

Even at that moment she could not ignore him. For the Stronghold
’s other guest, her traveling companion Hiram Ogilvee, brought Law’s name into the conversation. “Yep, I could have sworn it was you I saw in San Francisco last month, Law.”

Don Francisco shot a disgusted glance at his stepson, “
I doubt Law has that much get up and go to turn up in San Francisco, Hiram. But if you did see him. it was no doubt in one of the Barbary Coast’s gambling palaces.”

Law crooked a smile. "Now, you kno
w Hiram would never be found in any of those notorious establishments, would you, Hiram?”

The surveyor general blustered, “
I should say not! It’s the riffraff and deserters from the war drifting into places like San Francisco and Tucson that are encouraging such vices.”

“
And the lawyers are the worst,” Sam said. “They’re coming to Tucson like bears that have smelled honey. They hope to make a killing representing the Mexican grandees in substantiating their grant claims before the Department of the Interior.”

“
I'm just grateful that Cristo Rey’s deed has been cleared,” Elizabeth said. She picked up the
chocolatera
. “Mr. Ogilvee— Sam—more hot chocolate?”

Hiram held out his cup for the woman to refill, but Sam shook his head, saying, “
No, we need to get on to bed. I mean to be on the road early tomorrow before Cochise and his gang hit the trail. You know, don’t you, that a band of his up in the Dos Cabezas Mountains butchered up that archaeologist-—what was his name?”

“
Stridehope?” Catherine gasped. "Not Jonathan!”

"That's a shame!”
Don Francisco said.

For a few moments the occupants of the parlor discussed the tragedy of the archaeologist
’s death. Catherine could feel Law’s lazy, speculative gaze on her. Damn him! He alone had caught her disproportionate distress.

That night when everyone had retired, she lay in her bed, trying to will herself to sleep. Her thoughts churned around Jonathan Stridehope. He had been the kind of man with whom she would be content to spend her life. And yet she had never tried to ima
gine his lips kissing hers. She smiled wryly, thinking he would probably have gone down on one knee and requested permission to court her. Wasn’t that the kind of man she wanted for a husband?

Then why was she p
ossessed by thoughts of Law Davalos? She was as possessed by the want of him as Lucy was by the want of opiates. Law’s rangy physique stalked her thoughts during the day and invaded her dreams at night.

Her drifting mind froze as she heard the jingle of sp
urs coming down the portico. Like everyone else in the Stronghold, she had begun to leave her door open to catch the hot night’s faint summer breeze. Now she could see the man silhouetted outside her door, a silhouette so tall that the bent head brushed the door’s lintel.

A scratching against the adobe brick reached her ears, then a match's phosphorescent flare illuminated the rugged face as a cigarette was lit. Law
’s cat eyes looked at her. “Evening, Cate,” he said and strolled on off, leaving the horrid stench of his cigarette to remind her he was not some will-o’-the-wisp she had imagined.

Resolutely she turned her back to the door and fluffed her ticking pillow, determined to sleep. Yet Lucy
’s faint crying reached her from the adjacent room, and a few minutes later Sherrod appeared at her door. “Catherine,” he said softly, urgently.

She sat up, clutching the covering before her. “
It’s Lucy,” his shadowy voice said. “She wants you.”

“
I’ll be right there. Let me get my robe.”

The young woman was drawn up in
the rocking chair. Her bare toes stuck out from beneath her gown’s lace hem. The coal-oil lamp cast an unflattering light on her watery blue eyes and shiny red nose. Her flaxen yellow hair looked as dry and stiff as straw.

“
I caught her taking this,” Sherrod said, passing Catherine a bottle. “Laudanum. I thought I had gotten rid of it.”

“
Tell him I need it,” Lucy beseeched Catherine.

Running a hand through his rumpled hair, he said, “
I’ve talked to her about the laudanum. I’ve told her how dangerous the habit can be. But she thinks I’m just being cruel to her.”

Lucy began to tremble violently, and Catherine said, “
Come on to bed, Lucy. You’re tired.”

The woman rose and clung to her. “
Will you stay with me?”

“
As long as you want.” She tucked the muslin sheet over Lucy and sat on the bed's edge, holding the woman’s rigid hand. Sherrod went to sit in the rocker. His dark eyes were shadowed with fatigue.

When Lucy
’s hand slackened, she said, “The laudanum is easily obtained through the mail-order houses, Sherrod. You must make certain you check all the supplies that are freighted in from Tucson each month.”

“
But. dear God, why? Why does she need it?”

“
Fear.”

“
Fear,” he echoed. "Of what?”

"Of not being able to cope, maybe. And other things. There are lots of fears
that men don’t understand.”

"Cope! She doesn
’t have to worry about coping. Catherine! She has servants for herself, and a tutor for her children, and my mother carries all the responsibilities of running the house. Lucy has nothing to worry about!"

Cather
ine rose from the bed. "I think she'll sleep the rest of the night.” Before she reached the door, he was there, stopping her. "Why can’t she have your strength, Catherine?”

He took her hands, and she said, "Sherrod, no!”

“I’ve fallen in love with you,” he said in a tortured voice. "Oh, not like with Lucy—with her pretty facade.”

“
Don’t, Sherrod. Don't say these things. They only make it more difficult.”

He pulled her into his arms. “
They’ve got to be said. I'll know no peace until I do tell you. You’re real, Catherine. A woman with depth and feeling and substance. And strength."

She put her hands against his shoulders and pushed him away. Never had she thought she would be pushing men away.
  But one was married and the other a reprobate.  “Strength?” Her laugh was harsh. "I’m weak, Sherrod! Why do you think I came west? I'm running, running from myself.” She passed her hand across her eyes. "I don’t know what it is about this primitive land, but already . . . already I’ve done things I never thought I’d do.”

She raised her gaze to meet Sherrod
’s and saw the passion flaming in the eyes that were as blue-hot as a fire's core. She saw that he wanted to hold her, to reach out for her, that he was drowning as she was drowning. “Sherrod,” she whispered, “I’ve always dreamed of having a man like you in love with me. But one thing I won’t sink to is adultery. Isn't that what we’re talking about?”

She had thought to shock him, but his eyes searched her face. "What I feel for you is more than just desire, lust, whatever
my Bible-thumping mother would call it!”

“
But it'd still be adultery in the final analysis, wouldn’t it?” she demanded softly. “I can’t let that happen, Sherrod. It’d destroy me, and it’d destroy Lucy and you. Don’t do this to me. Don’t do it to us.”

He laughed then, laughter that held the hint of painful disappointment. “
I don’t suppose you’d be willing to become a Mormon, to be a second wife? No, don’t bother to look at me like that. I wouldn’t let you do it if you wanted to, Catherine. I saw the hell it brought to my father and my              mother. And Law and myself.              I swore I’d never do that to my family. And certainly not to you. I love you too              much. As badly as I want you, I’ll say no more.”

He released her hands, and
she fled to the safety of her room, but even it could not protect her heart.

CHAPTER 11

T
he wind in her hair, the sun on her face! Oh, it felt so good to be alive! The bay carried Catherine on fleet hooves past the Cienega’s tall poplars that waved like gigantic plumes, beyond the
rancheria
to where the grass thinned out and the high desert rose up to embrace her. It was the desert and the Huachuca’s rocky foothills she loved most of all—the landscape’s clean, pure lines, its clarity—clarifying even her mind.

Out there, galloping over ancient lava beds and alkaline terrains, she was able to think more clearly . . . to see that the warm feelings she had for Sherrod, the desire she felt for Law, only threatened her true happiness
—the permanent lasting happiness of a family. She had only to put the two brothers from her mind for another six months, and she would be at last relieved of her torment.

But always there rose up to mock her the sight of a Joshua tree. It was as if Law, as elemental as the m
ountains he prospected in, were haunting her ... so that now the image of those laughing eyes, the softly teasing mouth beneath the sensuous flaring of the aristocratic nose, crowded everything out of her mind, even Sherrod.

There existed only Law. And the
ache inside her.

Above the Huachuca Mountains, Stygian clouds burgeoned in seething masses of violent impatience. The hot wind carried the musty scent of oncoming rain. She guided her mount up out of the flatlands where the mountain runoffs could tumble w
ithout warning through the parched washes. On the higher ground she would avoid the threat of the flash floods.

Only as her horse picked its way along a
barranca’s
edge did Catherine become aware of the direction she was headed . . . the spot where she had last met Law. Oh, he really would not be there. He was no spirit that could appear at the moment she summoned him. It was just the mystical allure of the landscape. And that damned Joshua tree. That aimless Lorenzo Davalos was as full of guile and glib of tongue as old Marta of the
rancheria
, the washwoman who some claimed was a bruja, a witch.

Catherine saw the uplifted arms of the Joshua tree before she saw him. He was there. Sitting like some phantom on the gotch-eared sorrel, he loomed tall and forbidd
ing. His soft laughter reached across the yards of sand and rock to stroke her.

For a long minute she held back on the reins of her prancing mount. She still had time to turn back. A war raged inside her. Her brain sent out signals to her hands, and yet th
ose appendages remained lifeless, unresponsive. And she sat there helplessly watching as Law kneed his sorrel and slowly moved across the distance that separated them.

When he drew near, so that she saw the golden heat coloring his eyes, she at last bestir
red herself. “You know, I don’t even like you.”

He hooked a smile. His slight uneven teeth gleamed white below the tawny mustache. “
That doesn’t have anything to do with your gut feelings . . . with what your body wants, does it?”

He slung his leg over the
saddle and slid off the horse. His gaze held her immobile as his hands took the reins from her unresisting fingers. And still she could not move when his hands encircled her waist and lifted her from the sidesaddle as easily as if she were Abigail's size.

She did not even struggle as he carried her to the tree but gave into the mouth that claimed hers. The kiss that seared her, reaching down to relieve the torment twisting inside her
—this was what she had been waiting for, wanting.

Law withdrew his mouth.
A wry smile curved his lips as he set her on her feet. He shrugged out of the duster he wore and spread it beneath the Joshua’s scant shade. “You never asked me my wish, Cate.”

Run, get away, a voice inside her cried out. Yet she stood rigidly before the k
neeling man. "I don't want to hear anything you have to say.”

He rose to stand over her with that quiet, knowing smile. “
You just want to kiss?”

She ground her eyes shut. “
Yes.” Was that her voice that sounded like a croak?

He took her shoulders and shook
her lightly. “Then let me hear you say it. Say it—say that you want me, that you couldn’t forget my kisses.”

Her eyes blazed open. “
Yes! But I don’t love you!” Her nose wrinkled with distaste. “Your kind—”

He l
aughed, loud and full. "Did I say anything about love? I know, I know—your kind is my fastidious stepbrother. But he’s already taken, isn’t he? So the proper Miss Catherine Howard will have to quench her desire with the loathsome greaser.”

His hands settle
d on her shoulders, and he pressed her down until her knees gave way and she collapsed on the spread duster. Her top hat fell away. She lay there, half reclining, supported by her forearms, as she watched him crouch over her on all fours like some predatory cat.

"You
’d think I’d have too much pride to take second place, but, damm it, Cate, I don’t care. I want you. Lying out under the stars I’ve pictured you a hundred times. Those haughty eyes and your mouth—do you know you're a damned beautiful woman when you smile? Then I’d get to thinking about what you must look like—without all that fooferaw, not all gussied up as you are now. And I decided that’d have to be half the fun.” His fingers touched the ruffled stock at her neck. “Taking off all these ladylike frills. Like unwrapping a Christmas present.”

The indolent voice held a hypnotic quality. The sensuous steady tempo of the words drummed into Catherine so that she was at first only vaguely aware of the thunder that reverberated through the canyon walls w
ith dark Wagnerian intensity. Wind-whipped clouds boiled over the mountains and raced down to shadow the land. White-hot lightning snaked across the heavens, unleashing its fury over the couple below.

She felt a sense of foreboding, that by giving herself
to Law, she was dooming her soul forever; yet she could no more alter her decision than she could alter the long, too-slim legs that he revealed as he hitched her skirt up past her riding boots.

She squeezed shut her eyes when she felt his long body stretc
h out half over hers. Her knuckles went white as her fingers dug into the duster’s rough cloth. “Just get it over with,’’ she gritted. So my wanting will be over with. So I'll be at peace with myself.

“
Oh, no, my girl. This isn’t something that we go about like two rutting animals. There’s more to it than that.”

His forefinger traced the high curvature of her cheekbone, slipped down into its hollow, and came to rest at the comer of her lips. “
When it’s all over, I mean to have known you, Cate ... all of you. From that widow’s peak—a sign of stubbornness, my momma used to say about hers-—to the fine light hairs on your legs.”

She gasped, horrified. To even hear her limbs spoken of in such a crude term was almost as shocking as actually feeling his fingers mov
ing along the inside curve of one thigh. She tried to push her skirt down, but Law was adamant, as his fingers worked at the snaps of her riding boots.

And just as surely, as deftly, he removed her black jacket, then her corsage habit-shirt that buttoned d
own the front. She lay there, looking up at the man who labored over her. His face was intense with desire yet tempered by a patient, almost gentle look, and she wondered both how she could go through with it and how she could wait what seemed interminable moments until she felt those demanding lips over hers and the heat and weight of his body atop her.

She lay clad now only in her riding skirt and the fine lace camisole over the whalebone corset. "
Dios mio
," Law swore softly, “whatever are you about, Cate—wearing this contraption when you’re so slim I could break you between my two hands?”

Her hands clutched at his, stopping the fingers that worked at the corset
’s laces. Soon her full breasts would be free of their restriction, free for Law’s taking, and whatever hope she had left would be vanquished. She forced her lids to rise to meet his fierce gaze. Her voice was almost inaudible under the crackling of the lightning about them. “You’ll break me, if you take me, Law.”

He rocked back on his heels. “
Dammit, dammit, dammit! This makes twice now, Cate. It’s enough to make a man impotent! Get out of here! Get!

“
And if you come near me again,” he grated as she rapidly gathered up her clothing, “I will take you and break you! I’ll make a loving whore out of you, Cate Howard!” He came to his feet with a swearing grunt and stalked off, leaving her to ride back alone to the Stronghold, inviolate with the droplets of rain prophesizing the storm to come.