Spanish Serenade (6 page)

He watched her for a long instant. When he spoke, his words were edged with feathery quiet. “Perhaps there's something I can do.”

Isabel took a step forward. “Refugio,” she whispered, “don't.”

The leader of the brigands did not even look at the other girl. “I wonder,” he said to Pilar, “what your aunt would pay to have you delivered to her, healthy, happy, and, oh yes, untouched?”

Pilar could feel her heart jarring inside her chest. “You mean to hold me for ransom? How sordid.”

“Isn't it? And ignoble. But I never pretended to be otherwise. It's you who took me for a figure of tragedy, a righter of wrongs.”

Isabel's face turned red and tears rose to shimmer in her eyes. “Oh, Refugio, don't say such things,” she cried in dismay. “Why are you doing this? Why?”

Pilar, distracted by the other girl's distress, spoke baldly to the man in front of her. “Apparently I made a mistake. As for my aunt, I have no idea what she will or will not do for my sake. You will have to ask her.”

“My next objective, I assure you.”

He broke off as Isabel moved closer to clutch his arm with white-tipped fingers, drawing his attention. The girl spoke on a quick, indrawn breath. “You're doing this because you want this woman here. You want her, instead of me.”

Refugio looked at the other girl and not a muscle moved in his face, nor was there a trace of emotion on the silvery surface of his eyes. Holding her piteous, beseeching gaze, he spoke a single word over his shoulder. “Baltasar?”

The older man was already moving to Isabel, putting his arm around her. “Come away, my love,” he murmured. “It will be all right.”

“Oh, Baltasar,” Isabel said as she spun around and caught the big man's shoulders in a convulsive grip. “Make him stop. Refugio doesn't care about the gold; he'll only give it away. It's her, I know it is. He'll do something terrible because of her.”

“Hush,” was the only reply as the burly outlaw turned her and walked her back toward the fire. “Hush now.”

Refugio, swung with deliberation back toward Pilar. She met his gaze without flinching, but could see nothing except her own reflection in its wintry surface.

He said, “You were, I believe, anxious to be united with your aunt. That is now my dearest desire. Isn't it wonderful how these things work themselves out?”

She had not realized she was holding her breath until she heard his brisk tone. It was an effort to control the rise and fall of her chest without being obvious. Her voice was tight as she agreed, “Yes, isn't it?”

“I would tell you it's my sole desire — but that would be to assume you are concerned. You are not, of course.” There was a grating edge of mockery in his voice.

“No,” Pilar said.

He pushed away from the table. “I thought not. You had better eat something and try to sleep. We ride for Cordoba at mid-morning.”

“Morning! But I thought—”

He swung back on her so quickly that the hem of his wet cloak made a pattern of water droplets on the floor. “Yes? You thought?”

“Haven't things changed? Aren't you . . . anxious to see my aunt, to arrange matters?”

“It will wait.”

His attitude of barely contained impatience shaded with menace grated on her nerves, but she refused to be cowed. “I couldn't sleep. I would as soon ride on.”

“Into possible danger from your stepfather's hirelings?”

“It seems no less dangerous here to me.”

Light seeped into his eyes, making them shine with cool amusement. “You are concerned, then.”

“It seems to me that that's what you want,” she said tightly. “I don't know you well, hardly at all in fact, but I'm beginning to think that you usually have a reason for what you do. That being so, I have a right to be wary until I discover what you intend toward me.”

“In light of what Isabel just said?”

She lifted her chin, her eyes steady on his. “And your own threats, yes.”

“And do you think,” he said pleasantly as he rounded the end of the table and moved toward her, “that your wariness would stop me if I decided to approach you?”

It was a test of nerve, that slow advance. She would not move, Pilar thought, as he came nearer and nearer, walking with the long-limbed grace of perfect physical condition and muscles oiled with constant effort. She didn't care if he walked over her, she would not move. Her mind sought here and there for an answer to the question he had asked. She could not find one, but no matter, she would not move. Behind her, the clink of dishes stopped. Isabel's soft murmurs of distress died away. The only sounds were the crackle of the fire and the light drumming of the rain overhead.

Pilar had little defense against the bandit leader. She could fight, but given his superior strength, he would overpower her in short order. She was surrounded by his friends and companions, men trained to do his bidding without question and who, equally without question, would stand aside while he took his chosen pleasures. Of her own free will she had placed herself in the power of El Leon. It would take an extraordinary combination of wit and luck to escape from the lair of this lion, unless he chose to let her go.

He stopped in front of her, standing so close that the ragged edges of his cloak swung against her damp skirts. He reached out his hand to cup the tender curve of her check in his strong, long-fingered hand. She flinched, a movement instantly stilled as she felt the heat of his touch, the hard ridges of the calluses that lined his palm and toughened his fingertips, and the jolting sensation of that deliberate contact. She drew a quick breath, her lips parting with the intake. His gaze narrowed upon their smooth surfaces and delicate curves, and he brushed his thumb across them in a movement of gentle and absorbed exploration that left them tingling. She shivered, her jaw trembling a little under his hold, while she lowered her lashes to hide her startled confusion.

He released her with an abrupt gesture, lowering his hand to his side. When he spoke, his voice was low and derisive. “Vigilant and valiant, and wet to the skin — what makes you think I'm so desperate for a bedmate that I would take one who is wild-eyed with aversion and has chattering teeth? Or that I have so little acumen as to lower the value of a hostage by a quick tumble?”

She swallowed hard, so chilled inside herself that she felt the ripple of gooseflesh at the removal of his warm caress. “Then the things you said were merely to frighten me.”

“To encourage quick and clear answers to pertinent questions. I admit it was crude.”

“But successful. Or should I worry that what you're saying now is yet another effort, one to make me biddable while you and your men rest?”

“Would you prefer it that way?”

“I would prefer that you abide by our agreement without detours and threats.” She had begun to tremble in every muscle from purest reaction, and hid her knotted fists among the folds of her skirts in the attempt to hide it.

“There was nothing in our agreement that said I had to die for you, señorita. That's leaving aside the question of the vanished gold. You keep your bargains, and you'll find that I keep mine.”

“There are some things we can't control.”

He stood looking down at her for a long moment before he swung away. “Or escape,” he said in tight acceptance. “I believe we are in agreement on that. But come to the fire. If you mean to count these uncontrollable and inescapable things, let us at least do it in comfort.”

His tone did not encourage either refusal or delay. If he were resigned to taking no more than the silver for the service he had performed for her, he gave no outward sign. He had himself arranged their close quarters of the next few hours, and had also proposed that he face her aunt. What else was there?

There was the accusation Isabel had made, that Refugio had brought her to the stone hut for his own purpose. But no, Pilar could not believe it. There had been little in his manner to suggest he was attracted to her, much less that he meant to keep her against her will. She was no more than a means to an end to him, a way of striking at Don Esteban while gaining the wherewithal to keep his band of men alive. If there was some plan in which she played a part, forming behind the opaque gray of his eyes, it had nothing to do with her as a woman. The girl Isabel had upset herself for no reason, none whatever.

Pilar told herself these things, and yet it almost seemed that Refugio intended to prove her wrong. He drew up a chair for her next to his own and, going to one knee, ladled out a bowl of soup for her and passed it to her with his own hands. The smile he gave her, as her hands brushed his upon the crude earthenware bowl, held a sudden concentrated warmth that was disturbing. Before she began to eat, he reached out and unfastened her cape, drawing it from her shoulders. Then taking off his own cloak, which had begun to steam in the heat of the fire, he hung them both side by side on pegs set into the stones of the great chimney.

Isabel choked on her soup. Baltasar thumped her on the back, but she thrust her bowl into his rough hands and jumped to her feet. Her eyes filled with hurt tears, she whirled from them all to plunge behind the curtain of one of the alcoves.

The men looked at one another, then away again. Refugio, for all the attention he paid, might not have noticed. He ladled soup into a bowl for himself with apparent unconcern. Still, as a stifled sob was heard, he checked. The knuckles of his hand tightened to whiteness, then relaxed once more. Face impassive, he finished filling his bowl and sat down to eat.

Pilars' appetite had fled. She swallowed a few mouthfuls of the savory concoction in her bowl, but used the piece of earthenware mainly to warm her hands. She was still shaken now and then by a shiver of combined chill and tension, but suppressed each one with valiant effort. Rainwater oozed slowly from the hem of her skirt, soaking into the earthen floor around her feet.

She felt Refugio's gaze on her from time to time but refused to look at him, staring instead either into her soup or else at the pulsing red heart of the fire. Her nerves leaped when he got suddenly to his feet, but he only swung away and disappeared into the alcove on the opposite side of the fireplace from the one where Isabel had disappeared. He returned a moment later, however, and in his hand was a man's dressing gown of quilted velvet.

“Here,” he said abruptly, holding it out to her. “Take off your wet things and put this on.”

She looked at the dressing gown in his hand, then slowly lifted her gaze to his face.

His expression did not alter, and yet soft weariness crept into his voice. “Not publicly, unless that's your whim.”

“No,” she said, her voice husky. “I . . . thank you.”

“We'll leave you while you change.” He sent a look toward his men that brought them hastily to their feet.

“There's no need; I can go in there.” She gestured toward the alcove he had just left.

“You'll find it warmer before the fire. But I make you free of the bed you'll find behind the curtain. I'll have no need of it, since it will be late when we return.”

Pilar stared at him, heeding the unspoken reassurance he was extending even as he gave her other news. Finally, she said, “I thought you were going to rest.”

“I have rested. We have rested.”

“But surely—”

“Don Esteban's recovery interests me greatly. Don't fret. I'll leave Baltasar to watch over you. And if you are disturbed by my return, I will forfeit the silver.”

Did he mean that he intended to disturb her so little he had no fear of having to give up his hard-won payment? Or was it that, if he decided to join her in his bed later, he would renounce his claim to the contents of the chest in return for her favors? By the time she had, with great irritability for the effort, concluded he meant the first, he was gone.

Baltasar left the hut with the others, muttering something about checking outside. Pilar waited until the sound of hoofbeats had died away, then got stiffly to her feet. The cold, combined with her tense, overstrained muscles, made movement an effort as she struggled out of her damp clothes. She hung her things on the drying pegs then picked up the dressing gown. The velvet was of fine quality in a rich maroon worked around the lapels with gold thread. It was hardly worn at all, as if it had been kept as a memento of another, better time, perhaps when Refugio's father had been alive. It smelled faintly of the tobacco leaves used to preserve it from moths, with also a whiff of chocolate, as if it had once been favored breakfast attire.

It was soft and warm against her skin. The sleeves were far too long, and the hem dragged the floor; still, its enveloping folds carried an odd sense of security. It was only as she wrapped the velvet around her, hugging it close, that she realized how cold she was, both on the surface and deep inside.

There was a movement of the curtain across the other alcove. Isabel pushed it aside and stepped into the room. She hesitated as her gaze fell on Pilar in her enveloping dressing gown, and a spasm of grieved recognition crossed her features. A moment later she dropped the alcove curtain behind her and came forward.

“Have they all gone?”

“All except Baltasar,” Pilar answered the other girl, though she was certain Isabel could not have helped hearing every word that had been spoken in the room.

“I wish they had stayed. I don't like it.”