Читать книгу Tracker's Sin - Sarah McCarty - Страница 8

Tracker was a drinking man. Ari didn’t know why she was surprised. Men like him who wore that aura of death around them played hard and drank hard. At least that’s what she’d heard from Josefina. It was why Ari never went to town. Because drinking men couldn’t be trusted. But even though she stood there watching Tracker prepare to saddle his horse, she didn’t believe it. It didn’t mesh with what her instincts said were the truth. It didn’t mesh with her own experience.

She touched her cheek where she could still feel the warmth of Tracker’s hand. He’d been angry with her and hurt, but his touch had been anything but angry. If she didn’t know better, she would have called it seductive, maybe even tender. He was a very strange and confusing man. And he was her only hope.

Tracker hefted the saddle onto his horse’s back. Despite the anger and frustration she could feel coming from him, he was gentle with the animal, too. She admired the maturity that allowed him to control his emotions. She admired his physique. He was truly beautiful from behind. His broad shoulders tapered to lean hips and tight buttocks that flexed as he turned. A mature man in his prime, he was beautiful in a very masculine way. Her gaze dropped to his buttocks again. Very beautiful.

“Don’t you have a baby to attend to?”

Dear heavens. How had he known she was looking? Heat flooded her cheeks.

Ari had two choices: apologize or brazen it out. She chose the latter. Tracker wasn’t the type to admire cowardice. And there was something about him that made her want his admiration. Of course, the fact that she’d lapsed into an episode likely would always color how he saw her, but she could try. She was more than that scared woman she couldn’t control. She lifted her chin. A perceptive man would figure that out. “Josefina will call me when he wakes from his nap.”

Tracker’s response to that was a grunt. He tied off the girth strap. His hands were large yet deft, going through the process with a certain grace that held her gaze. He handled a horse well. How would he be with a woman?

“Then why don’t you find something else to do besides stare at me?”

Because staring at him made her feel alive for the first time since she’d awoken after her husband’s murder. Vital. More than just a crazy woman with no past. “This suits me fine.”

The truth was, she liked having his hands against her skin. That brief touch still lingered in her senses like a brand. It had been…arousing in a way she couldn’t remember ever feeling before. She frowned, closed her eyes and studied the sensation, trying to follow it back into the black void that used to be her past. As she had every other time she tried to remember, she hit a wall of nothing. She sighed and opened her eyes. Her gaze collided with Tracker’s.

“Anybody ever tell you that staring at a strange man will get you into trouble?”

“But I’m not staring at you.”

The look he shot her was hot enough to make her toes curl. Hate her or resent her, Tracker Ochoa desired her. That was an exciting thought. She was a widow, but she was almost at the end of her mourning. And he was a very virile individual.

“I warn you, sweets, I’m not a nice man.”

She tried to remember all that she’d ever heard of him, and he was right, no one had ever said he was nice. She nodded. “I understand.”

He flipped the stirrup down off the saddle horn. The light of the barn slashed across his face, highlighting the set of his chin, the fullness of his lower lip, the hint of muscle she could see through the open neck of his shirt. His skin, the color of cinnamon coffee with just a touch of cream, stretched tight over his collarbone. There was a scar just to the right of his throat. Rather than detracting, it emphasized the sheer virility of the man. Beneath the brim of his hat, his eyes watched her admire him. Narrowed as they were, he should have looked scary, but beneath the hooded lids, she could see heat simmering. Desire. For her.

“Do you?”

She nodded again.

“What do you think you understand?”

There was something so…alive about flirting with Tracker. Even when it was a bluff. It made her feel so far away from that void, so far away from her troubles. It was stimulating. “That you want me.”

The swear word he uttered was vile and not one she was used to hearing. But instead of being repulsed, she was intrigued. It was the first break in Tracker’s control, and she’d caused it. She couldn’t help a small, proud smile.

“You’re playing with fire.” He gathered up the reins and hooked them over the saddle horn. “I’m a dangerous man.”

She’d be more afraid if his voice wasn’t so softly enticing, with dark notes that stroked along her nerves in a provocative lure. “I’m a crazy woman.”

“You’re a mother.”

What did that have to do with anything? “You’re a lawman.”

“I was an outlaw before that.”

Interesting. But not as scary as it should be. Excitement hummed in her veins. She should be afraid. She wasn’t. She was actually a bit exhilarated. “You couldn’t have been much of one if you ended up a Ranger.”

“I was a damn good outlaw.”

He stopped fussing with the saddle and turned his full attention on her. His mouth quirked up in a smile that, twisted by the scar, seemed to give his expression a cruel edge. Until she looked into his eyes, and then she saw the sensuality waiting to be unleashed.

A shiver went down her spine. “And now you’re a damn good Ranger.”

“Don’t curse.”

She didn’t recognize the woman who retorted, “Then don’t talk nonsense,” but she liked her.

So did Tracker, if the softening of his lips was to be believed.

“I told you I’d help you.” He gave the saddle a tug, testing the girth. “You don’t need to seal the deal with your body.”

All right, that was embarrassing. She took a breath as heat seared her cheeks. But she didn’t retreat and didn’t back down. She’d sworn when she’d woken up to nothing that she’d face her new life with courage. Courageous people didn’t run from the truth.

“I’m sorry about that.”

Tracker swung up into the saddle. “It doesn’t matter.”

But it did. She’d insulted him. He was a lawman. He lived his life doing right, and she’d taken in his size, the vicious scar cutting his cheek, the darkness of his skin, and judged him to be amoral. “It does.”

She took a step forward. He watched. She took another. His eyes narrowed. She took a third. She couldn’t take the fourth. The sleeping demon coiled behind the blank wall of her memory stirred. There was something wrong with the way he sat the horse. Something familiar and horrible in his long hair, flowing from beneath the hat. Something wrong with the illusion of power when she had none. She took a breath, desperate for the memory to continue, but terrified that it would. The horse shifted, leaving Tracker backlit by the sun pouring in the doorway. The sense of danger increased. Dear God, she didn’t want to know.

“Please.” Please make it go away. Please make it go away. Make it go away.

She blinked and Tracker was there, studying her with that intentness she didn’t like. As if he could see what she couldn’t. As if he knew what she didn’t. Suddenly, flirting with him wasn’t fun anymore.

“You really don’t remember anything, do you?”

“No.”

“And you’ve asked?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure you got the right answers?”

No. “Yes.” She motioned with her hand, hurrying him along. “I thought you were going to get a drink?”

“I thought you were trying to seduce me.”

She blinked, the last of the darkness fleeing before the outrageousness of the statement. All she had to defend herself with was a bluff. She wasn’t a confident woman. She didn’t think she ever had been, but she wanted to be, and with the birth of her son, she’d decided she would be. Vincente and Josefina were wonderful, but they were old and they had lives of their own to live. She’d heard them talking at night about wanting to move back to Mexico and live with Josefina’s sister and her family. They just couldn’t take her with them. She was too white to be safe, and they were too old to protect her. They’d saved her life, and never made her think they begrudged her, but she was their son’s responsibility, not theirs. She had to learn to make her own way and find a place where she and her own son would be safe.

“Was I?” she asked.

“Might have been my mistake.”

No, the mistake had been all hers. “I’m sorry. I’m not usually so…” She waved her hand. “It’s just been so long.”

“Since you’ve been with a man?”

She blinked at the bluntness. She hadn’t even thought of that. “No.” She looked at him and answered with dawning comprehension, “I think it’s just been a long time since I felt alive.”

“Son of a bitch.” He walked his horse forward the two steps it took to tower over her. “Screwing me won’t keep you alive. In case you haven’t noticed, you’re white and I’m Indian.”

He was doing it on purpose, trying to intimidate her. Using crudity to push her away. Was this the real man? Did it even matter? He was right: she was a mother. She was right: she was crazy. Whatever she did to feel alive, it couldn’t involve using this man. He wore the pain of his life on his person and in his eyes. It wasn’t her place to add to it.

“I’m sorry,” Ari said, hearing Josefina call to her from the house. “Miguel is awake. I have to go.”

Tracker backed up the horse. “So do I.”

Her stomach dropped to her toes. Was he leaving? Panic must have shown in her face because he swore and the horse shifted.

“Don’t worry. I’ll be back. I haven’t forgotten what I promised.”

She felt guilty at the relief that flooded her. Helping her meant putting his life on the line. It was wrong to ask someone to do that, but she had no choice. She needed him. Without him she had no way to protect those she loved. And to save those she loved, she needed this man to risk his life. It wasn’t right. It just wasn’t. She pushed back the curl that fell over her eye. With an annoying stubbornness, it bounced back. She inhaled a breath.

Tracker’s anger struck her like a blow.

She took a step forward. His hands tightened on the reins. If he turned away now he’d never know how she felt, because she’d never get the courage to say it and he would always think her a coward. Formless memories howled behind the wall as she took that step. He scared her and he drew her.

But she owed him. That was all that mattered.

The horse tossed his head as she placed her hand on his rider’s thigh. Tracker controlled the nervous prancing with tension on the reins and the pressure of his knees. Muscle flexed against her palm. He was a very strong man with a reputation that made the worst outlaws cower. They said he was lethal with a knife, deadly with a gun and brutal with his fists. But looking up at him, all she saw was a man with the same haunted look in his eyes that she saw when she looked in the mirror. She wore a calm facade to hide her turmoil. He wore anger. But beneath both facades was pain. Common ground.

“I’m not afraid of you.”

He snorted and backed the horse up. “Who are you trying to convince, me or yourself?”

She closed her fingers around the lingering warmth from his skin. Both. She couldn’t meet his gaze. “I’m not afraid of you.”

He gave a curse she couldn’t understand, then muttered, “I’m going to get that drink.”

She didn’t have anything to say to stop him. Ari watched as Tracker walked the horse out of the barn, ducking his head to avoid hitting the lintel. Not for the first time, she missed the freedom to vent her frustrations that men had. Since her husband’s death she’d often wanted to pound on something or someone. And failing that, drink away the pain of memory she couldn’t recall.

Josefina called again. Before she left the barn, Ari grabbed Tracker’s untouched plate of food. Because of her, he was going hungry. Why did life have to be so complicated?

When she got to the yard, she could just make out rider and horse in the distance. Blowing errant curls off her forehead, she sighed and muttered, “Have one for me, too.”

Miguel was his normal cheery self. After tying his nappy, Ari blew on his plump little belly before tugging his shirt down. His toothless smile and happy giggle were as familiar as the routine. If it hadn’t been for him in those bleak months following her husband’s death she wasn’t sure she would’ve survived. Until his birth, her nights had been plagued by nightmares and her days with the struggle to remember.

But the day Miguel was born, she found an anchor for all the emotion inside, a reason to live that had nothing to do with needing to remember. Miguel was her future. She followed it. Josefina had been worried about her getting up to nurse the baby. She’d felt that maybe it would be too much for Ari to handle, and had suggested they put him on a bottle. But Miguel’s frequent need to feed had been a blessing, breaking the pattern of nightmares and allowing Ari to start a new, healthier pattern.

She touched Miguel’s button nose now and smiled into his deep brown eyes. She loved him so much. He gave her so much. She slid her hand down his cheek, marveling at the perfection of his much darker skin, searching as she always did for some familiarity in his features, checking the shape of his eyes, the sound of his laughter for some reminder of the man she had married. As always, there was nothing.

She picked him up, not finding her usual peace in his presence. “Your daddy would’ve loved you very much, cutie pie.”

“Sí, he would have been a very proud father.”

Settling Miguel against her shoulder, Ari turned to Josefina. “I wish I could remember him. It would be good to be able to tell Miguel something of his father.”

The woman smiled. “Vincente and I will tell him what he needs to know.”

There was that possessiveness in Josefina’s voice again that had been showing up more and more of late. Combined with the wording that eliminated Ari’s importance, it made her uneasy.

Josefina held out her hands. “I will take the little one.”

Ari turned away, not missing a flash of displeasure beneath the other woman’s smile. She refused to feel guilty. Miguel was her son. “Thank you, but I thought I’d take him outside to play.”

“It is dirty outside.”

“I’ll put a blanket down.”

“You are still unsettled from this morning.”

No, she wasn’t. She was actually doing quite well. Better than she had in a long time. And that was because of Tracker. The man had blown into her life like a tornado. All she knew of him was from legend and their brief interaction, but she felt she’d known him forever. Felt as if she needed to know more.

Are you sure you’re getting the right answers?

The Moraleses had given her a safe haven in which to heal and to have her child. She hadn’t questioned anything in those early months, just accepted the past as it was painted for her by Josefina. But with the rising tension in the household during the last few weeks, she’d begun to do some thinking on her own, because something was wrong and no one was talking. Josefina had become snappish and possessive of Miguel. And as a result, Ari had begun to notice how much of her life was controlled by the Moraleses.

And now they were going to send Tracker away under the pretext that he had upset her. Why? When he was the best protection they had?

Miguel grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled. She winced as she gently pried his fingers free before holding his hand in hers and bringing his fingers to her lips.

“He is getting muy fuerte,” Josefina praised, stroking his little arm.

Ari smiled. “Yes, thank goodness.” He was precious. The most precious thing there was. It didn’t make sense that Vincente would send away a Texas Ranger. And not just any Texas Ranger, but the legendary Tracker Ochoa, a man they said had once ridden into a blind canyon filled with outlaws lying in wait, and came out unharmed, with ten bodies draped over saddles. Men like that didn’t ride into their tiny town every day. They should be thinking of ways of keeping him there, not sending him away.

“I think we need to ask Tracker to stay.”

Josefina’s expression snapped closed. “No. He is a bad man. He will bring trouble.”

“We already have trouble.”

“Vincente will handle it.”

“Vincente is only one man.” And not a young one.

“It will work out.” Josefina patted Ari’s hand. “You will see. Vincente will talk to these men. We do not need the likes of that one.”

“That one is a respected Texas Ranger.” Ari didn’t know why she felt the need to defend Tracker, but she did.

“He has bad blood.” Josefina made a sign to ward off evil. “He attracts evil to him. You can see it in his eyes.”

The only things Ari had seen in Tracker’s eyes were pain and loneliness. And desire.

Josefina squeezed her hand before taking Miguel from her. “Your illness affects your judgment. You must trust me in this.”

Must she? The inner discontent that had been growing this last month flared. Ari wanted to reach out and grab Miguel out of the woman’s arms. Lord in heaven, was she really so crazy that she would turn on her family?

Are you sure you’re getting the right answers?

The skepticism in Tracker’s question bled into her beliefs. What did she really know about the Moraleses beyond what they told her? And if she was their daughter-in-law, why was there nothing of hers in the house? She and her husband had lived elsewhere, but couldn’t someone have brought her things? If for no other reason than to stimulate her memory?

“I want to go home,” she told Josefina. There was the slightest hesitation before the older woman set Miguel down on the blanket on the floor of the main room.

“You are home.”

Ari licked her lips and tried again. It was so painful for the Moraleses when she brought up their son. She couldn’t blame them for always changing the subject. “I know this is difficult for you, but I need to go to the home that I shared with Miguel’s father. I know you think it’s only going to…upset me again, but it’s something I need to do. I need to touch something from Antonio’s and my life together.”

So it would feel real.

“You have proof of your life together in your son.”

Ari had tried before and never succeeded in convincing Josefina that Miguel had nothing to do with his father in her mind. He somehow seemed more connected with her survival than her past. Of course, she hadn’t tried very hard. But Tracker’s arrival had done more than stir feelings of being a woman. It had also stirred her need to find some part of herself that had been lost on that bloody day when her husband had been killed.

“When I look at Miguel, I see nothing of Antonio. When I look at my baby, I see Miguel’s eyes, Miguel’s nose, Miguel’s face. It’s almost like Antonio never existed.”

Josephine stumbled and bumped into the small table beside the horsehair sofa. The lamp on top rocked. Ari hurried over to catch it before oil spilled over the floor.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

Josefina straightened and smoothed her hair with a hand that shook. The shaking might have been from the small fright, but that sick feeling in Ari’s stomach grew worse.

“Antonio did exist, didn’t he?”

Josefina made the sign of the cross. “How dare you ask me such a thing? My son was very much a man.”

Ari immediately felt guilty. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I keep trying to explain that he’s just not real to me. I need him to be real. I need to go home to touch that part of me that I lost.”

Josefina was shaking her head before Ari even finished. “No. It is not wise.”

“I wasn’t asking permission.”

For the first time in the eleven months since Ari had been here, Josefina looked angry. “You are ungrateful.”

“I just need to know.”

The older woman slashed the air with her hand. “You would open old wounds for everyone. Bring back the grief that we have just buried. For nothing.” She slashed the air again. “And your memory will not come back.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know the Lord shields you from what you cannot bear. My son is dead. Your life with him, it is also gone as if it never existed, but you have a future here. We are your family now. Vincente and I will share memories of Antonio with you. You will share them with Miguel. It is enough.”

“No, it’s not.” Ari had never been more sure of anything in her life. She picked Miguel up off the floor and turned on her heel and headed for the door. “I need my life back.”

“You do not know what you do,” Josefina called.

She stopped at the door and looked back. The woman was completely distraught and there was a wildness in her eyes. “No, I don’t. That’s the problem, and if you won’t tell me, then I’ll have to go find the answers for myself.”

Josefina’s small brown eyes narrowed. “I won’t allow it.”

For the first time since Ari had woken up in the back of the wagon to see Vincente and Josefina’s faces looking down at her, a sense of determination dominated.

“You’re not going to have a say.”

Being outside in the sunshine didn’t help chase the blackness from Ari’s spirit. The sun on her skin was just one more aggravation. She was angry. She was resentful. She was frustrated. Why couldn’t Josefina understand how badly she needed to know what had happened?

She walked around like a cripple because nothing made sense. Getting vague answers had been all right at first, but as her body healed, so did her mind. She couldn’t go on being a mother with only eleven months of life experience. Josefina should be able to understand that. Yes, Ari had lost her husband, but she was still living. She just wasn’t alive.

Are you sure you’re getting the right answers?

Damn Tracker and his insinuations. This was all his fault. He had to go and voice her own recent doubts, giving them weight. What if there was more going on than Vincente was telling her? What if they were important things she needed to know for her son?

“We have to know, baby.” She kissed Miguel’s soft black hair as she walked down the road. “We have to know.”

Miguel grabbed a handful of her blouse and dragged his mouth to it. He was such a happy child, rarely fussing. She was lucky to have him. She freed her blouse and gave him her finger instead, closing her eyes for a heartbeat to let the tension go. She needed to relax. Tension always brought on the flashing lights behind her eyes that were the first sign of a pending episode.

The sun was bright against her eyelids and warm on her skin, reminding her that it was a beautiful day. This was the prettiest part of summer, before drought turned the grass brown. Everywhere she turned there was blue sky, green grass and colorful flowers. Everywhere except around the Morales ranch. That was dry and dusty, the vegetation eaten by the cow and trampled under her feet.

There was no sign of Vincente, so no opportunity to ask him if he would take her to her old home. Wherever that was.

Supposedly, the home she had shared with Antonio was fifty miles to the east. She’d never gotten an answer from the Moraleses as to why she and Antonio had lived so far away from his parents. It certainly wouldn’t have been Josefina’s preference. There were lots of opportunities around Esperanza, but maybe Josefina had been too much in her and Antonio’s life? Maybe Ari had needed distance between them. New wives rarely got along with their mothers-in-law. The fact that theirs was a mixed marriage could have added to the tension. Maybe Josefina hadn’t been too happy to have Ari in the family.

Ari sighed. She didn’t know. No one would give her answers. Vincente would just tell her to count her blessings and to be grateful. She was tired of being grateful.

The sound of a gunshot carried in the afternoon breeze. It came from the direction of town. Her heart skipped a beat.

I’m going to get a drink.

Tracker was in town. He wouldn’t be so foolish as to announce that he was a Texas Ranger, of that she was sure. But his looks were Indian enough that someone might easily pick a fight. Sober, he’d be a match for anyone, she didn’t doubt. The man wore his experience like a cloak of honor. But drunk he would be fair game for any troublemaker.

She bit her lip. She couldn’t afford to lose him now. He was their only hope, and he really couldn’t know how bad town had gotten lately. Vincente was always telling how the gringos delighted in flexing their power in senseless violence.

Keep him safe, Lord. I need him.

For more than just her son’s protection. Something deep within her recognized Tracker.

Ari checked the watch pinned to her blouse. A gift from her husband, Vincente said. It was a plain watch with no engraving. A simple gift. It could have belonged to anybody. Her husband must not have been a very romantic man. She wondered if she’d been happy with him. Was that what her memory was hiding? she wondered. An unhappy marriage? Did they worry that she’d remember interference on their part, and take her son away from them? She would never do that. Family was everything, but so was the memory of that family.

She couldn’t take this anymore. She couldn’t just sit around watching the days bleed, one after the other, into a senseless future because she had no past.

Ari hitched Miguel up on her hip. If she wanted to change what had always been, she needed someone strong enough to take her where she needed to go. That would be Tracker. The man she hoped would be her hero. The man getting drunk right now.

She sighed. There was nothing she could do about his drinking. Town was dangerous.

She’d just turned to go home when another gunshot sounded, followed by three more. Her heart skipped a beat. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she saw something even more terrifying: a rider was between her and the house.