Authors: Phoebe Conn
“I gave Magdalena two copies of you two dancing, so there’s one for you. There’s an extra one of her with you, Fox, and another for Santos with her. There are also extra copies of you and Santos walking into the arena last Sunday.” She opened her purse for her car keys and withdrew a business card. “Call me if you ever need a photographer.”
Fox got up and walked her to the entrance and came back with a card of his own.
“Have you ever been in love?” he asked.
“Just once,” Rafael replied, and he ate the last bite of his chocolate cake.
Santos waited until they’d pulled up in front of the ranch to speak. “My leg’s too sore to fight this Sunday. There are men lined up to take my place, but I thought the crowd might rather see you, Rafael. Would you like to talk to my agent?”
Rafael set the brake, withdrew the keys from the ignition and turned to hand them to Santos. “If I take your place, I should receive what you would have been paid.” He neglected to glance toward Maggie for her opinion.
“No, if I’m giving the fights to you, we split 50-50,” Santos argued. “That’s more than you were paid last Sunday.”
“Yes, but not enough,” Rafael argued. “If I can take your place, then I’m worth what you’re worth.”
“Not even close, but maybe my leg will be better by Sunday.”
“No, it won’t,” Maggie argued, “and you know it. Don’t let Rafael goad you into fighting when you’re not fit to do so.”
“I’m not goading,” Rafael denied, but his lazy grin gave him away.
“I can’t listen to this.” Maggie left the men in the SUV with Fox. She sat down on the front porch and pulled her father’s letter from her purse. The flap was unsealed, and she opened it slowly and took a deep breath before unfolding the single sheet.
I’m so proud of you and wish I’d been a better father
.
May your
life always be blessed with love.
She felt too numb to appreciate the touching thoughts and refolded the letter and returned it to its envelope. She’d save it with the photos. The small collection would be a time capsule, like her mother’s cherished box. Appalled by the odd pairing of sentiment and guilt, she looked up just as Rafael stepped onto the porch. Santos and Fox remained talking together by the SUV.
“I imagine you struck a tough bargain,” she said.
He took the chair beside hers. “Of course. I don’t trust agents to look out for anyone but themselves.”
“Is there anyone you do trust?”
He reached over to catch her hand. “Other than you, no.”
“That’s probably wise.” Her hand nearly disappeared into his. “Mr. Calderon wants me to study the family portfolio tonight and meet again tomorrow with Santos. Will you be able to stay here another day?”
“Yes. Let’s ask Refugio to make some sandwiches and go out to the tree to eat.”
“I’d much rather do that than study columns of figures. I do balance my checkbook each month when I receive my bank statement, but I don’t know anything about investments.”
“I doubt Mr. Calderon expects you to do any of the actual work yourself.”
“No, he doesn’t, but I should be able to recognize what’s a wise investment and what isn’t.”
Rafael stood and pulled her to her feet. “If profits on stocks were easily predictable, then everyone would be wealthy.”
“I suppose, but I’m way out of my depth here.”
He swept her with an appreciative glance. “You look fine to me.”
She smiled and took a step toward the door. “Thank you. I need to change my clothes while Refugio makes our lunch.”
He shook his head. “No, the path isn’t difficult. Stay in your skirt.”
The sly look in his eye made it plain what he was thinking, and it would be easier to hike up her skirt and climb onto his lap than to have to shimmy out of her jeans first.
“I’d no idea you’d be so interested in exploring the countryside.”
He looked off toward Santos and Fox. “I’m into the environment. There’s a lot about me you don’t know.”
That was an understatement, and there was an enormous amount he didn’t know about her. “I’m sure that’s true. What’s your blood type?”
“What?”
“You heard me.”
He frowned at the unexpected question. “A positive, like most people in Spain, so there were plenty of us to donate blood if the prison hospital needed it.”
A chill of horror shot clear to her toes. She’d grasped for the hope he’d had some rare Gypsy blood type that would have protected him from being a heart donor for her father. She walked on into the house thinking she really needed to talk to Dr. Moreno. Santos had his telephone number, but even if Moreno had discussed a transplant with her father, she doubted the physician would know, or admit, what her father had really wanted. Right now, she needed to stop thinking and let a simple picnic brighten her dangerously dark mood while she could still hide it.
Rafael carried the basket and a folded blanket as they walked along the trail. “I’ve never been on a picnic, unless you count foraging out of trash cans.”
“No, that’s a survival technique. Picnics are pleasure outings.” She bit her lip rather than ask how his mother could have left her children in such dire straits while she’d occupied herself as a serial mistress to the rich.
“I’d not thought of it as survival training, maybe part of military special ops. I was just born desperately poor.”
He didn’t speak of other women, thank God, but she wondered how old he’d been when he’d lost his virginity and who the woman had been. An older woman, she thought, someone who’d tucked a hundred dollar bill in his jeans. “I’m sorry you had such a difficult childhood.”
“It was all we knew, so it didn’t seem difficult to us then. Now I’m surprised I lived through it without being run over by a truck in some narrow alley.”
With his height and build, it was difficult to imagine anything getting the better of him. Maybe with what he’d already survived, a bull didn’t strike him as a deadly threat.
When they reached the majestic oak, he handed her the basket, spread out the blanket and pulled her down beside him. He unpacked the basket and handed her a roast beef sandwich on freshly baked bread and a can of soda. He’d brought beer for himself.
She opened the soda and took a long drink. Refugio had chilled the soda for her. The can was icy cold, and she rolled it against her cheek. “This is such a peaceful spot.”
“Indeed it is.” He leaned back on an elbow and regarded her with a lazy smile. “I wish I could have talked you into spending the night on the beach.”
She hadn’t been sure of him then. “That seems like such a long time ago.”
“It was last week.”
A bee flew around her soda can and buzzed away. “I’ve lost track of the days, of everything, really.”
“Eat, so you can keep up with me.”
She took a bite of her sandwich. “I doubt many people are able to keep up with you.”
“You do.” He grabbed her ankle and pulled her closer. “Maybe we should eat later.”
“We need food for stamina,” she cautioned. She took another bite of sandwich and sorted through the food left in the basket. “Apple tarts! Do you want one?”
“I could call you a tart, couldn’t I?”
She laughed. “Not really. It’s an old name for a prostitute.”
“Forgive me.”
There wasn’t the slightest trace of remorse in his expression. “You’re used to charming your way out of trouble, aren’t you?”
“Of course. It’s how Gypsies survive. Save the tarts for later.”
She rewrapped her sandwich and put it back in the basket. This was too beautiful an afternoon to think past the next moment. She moved across his lap, let her skirt drift around them and wrapped her arms around his neck. “I’m afraid I’m sadly lacking in charm.”
He set his sandwich aside, slid his hands under her skirt and inched them up her thighs. When all he found was warm, bare skin, he laughed. “What happened to your lacy bikini panties?”
“I must have forgotten to put them on this morning.”
“I wish I’d known that earlier.” He pulled her into a slow, devouring kiss. “Are you often that forgetful?”
“I could be,” she breathed against his lips. “Or maybe not. I’ll let you wonder.”
“No one would know in your long flamenco dress.”
She nuzzled his ear and pulled his earlobe through her teeth. “You’d know, but I won’t do you in the alley behind the club.”
“What about on the tables inside?”
She rubbed her cheek against his. “Is it part of the show?”
“The encore?” He unhooked her bra, cupped her freed breasts and tugged her rosy nipples.
She leaned back to unbuckle his belt. “No, there’s too great a risk of fights breaking out, and we wouldn’t be invited back to the club.”
He slid his hand under her skirt to rub her with his thumb, sliding on her wetness. “It would be worth it, and we could always find another club.”
She closed her eyes and savored his loving all the way to her toes. “No, it could only happen once, so people would never be sure it really had happened.”
“We’d know.”
She rocked on his thighs to give him more room to dip into her. “We’ll have to be satisfied with this, even without an applauding audience.” His knowing touch drew her closer to bliss with every tender stroke. When she heard a man’s deep laughter, she was so badly startled she nearly leapt off his lap in a desperate move to put some space between them.
“Someone’s coming!” She fumbled with her bra but hooked it and smoothed out her top before anyone came into view.
A horse whinnied nearby, and Rafael quickly buckled his belt. He picked up his sandwich and took a swig of beer. “Try not to look so guilty,” he teased. “We have every right to be here together.”
She had no idea how to fade the bright blush from her cheeks and doubted the men would believe they’d happened upon an innocent outing. She held her breath hoping they would pass by without noticing them, but when the two riders came into view, one raised his hand to wave.
“Matador! Señorita!”
Rafael waved to them, and the pair continued on toward the stable but looked back over their shoulders with big grins.
“Well, clearly the encore on the table is definitely out,” she said. “Sitting out here, I’m too shaky to think. With a roomful of clapping people, I’d be no good at all.”
“Don’t worry. I’d handle the action.”
She hoped he was teasing her, but her hands shook as she unwrapped an apple tart. “You’re not into sex in public, are you?”
He chuckled. “You’re the one who forgot her underwear.”
“What do you mean? You never wear any.”
“I’ll admit it.” He took her hand. “Relax. I can wait until we get back to the house. Let’s just sit here and talk. I don’t want you to worry someone else will ride by.”
She pulled her hand from his. Her heart was beating too fast, racing as it had last Sunday, tumbling her fears and stealing her breath. He’d soothed her with kisses yesterday, but it had been a brief reprieve. She crumbled the apple tart into gooey bits, and he caressed her arm to catch her wrist and licked the sweet apple filling from her fingertips.
His tongue tickled. A ray of sunlight caught the trace of brown in his amused gaze. Clearly he thought she couldn’t possibly be afraid when they were together, and yet she was terrified of everything she knew and he didn’t.
She pulled away and sprang to her feet. “Just let me go this time.” She sprinted away, but the specter of death trailed her as a devoted shadow.
Chapter Twenty
Maggie couldn’t bear to be cooped up inside the ranch house and fell into one of the front porch chairs. Still shaking, she gripped the chair’s arms and held on. She’d be safe in Tucson, although her condo was as emotionally sterile as a model home. She loved teaching, but if she didn’t count Craig, none of her fellow teachers were close friends. She could analyze her life with plus and minus signs on a mental white board, but while there was nothing to draw her back to Arizona, she had to get out of Spain.
Fox walked out on the porch carrying his letter from Miguel and sat beside her. “Have you read your letter? He said he was proud of me and apologized for not being a better father. I didn’t give him much of a chance, but my mother was the one who fell in love with him, not me.”
It hadn’t occurred to her that her father might have written the same letter to everyone. That was undoubtedly why Mr. Calderon had asked them to read their letters in private. He hadn’t realized they might compare them and discover their own message had been repeated for another, even if it had been appropriate.
She swept her hair off her face with her fingers. “Being a stepchild is difficult regardless of the situation. If you have stepchildren someday, be understanding and remember how you felt about Miguel.”
“I’m taking Santos’s advice and never getting married.”
She leaned back and closed her eyes. “I’ve always assumed I’d marry someday, but now, I don’t know.”
“Hey, Rafael, we’re taking a poll. What do you think of marriage?” Fox called.