Ignacio’s mean eyes narrowed. “I ain’t never heard of El Ángel Bandido gettin’ hitched.”
“Well, the little woman and I got married this morning,” Rafe lied baldly. “In fact, this trek to the mountains was supposed to be our honeymoon. No, no, don’t feel the need to rush out and buy us a wedding gift.” Beaming at her like a besotted dope, Rafe waded over and put a wet sleeve around her equally wet shoulder. Meanwhile, she still clutched her slacks to the front of her body. “Isn’t that true, cupcake?”
She tried to wriggle out of his embrace.
“No, I do not believe you are married,” Ignacio asserted, scratching his head with the barrel of one gun while trying to get a closer view of Helen’s fanny.
“Just play along with me,” Rafe whispered in her ear. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Hah!”
“Really. Mexicans are almost always Roman Catholic,” Rafe explained rapidly, shielding her surreptitiously with his body. “Very religious, and superstitious. Adultery is one of the biggest no-no’s in the Church.”
“Are you Catholic?”
“Sometimes. Put your pants on and stop arguing.”
“Who’s a Catholic? What adultery?” Ignacio looked dazed by the whole conversation.
“How can you be a sometimes Catholic?” Helen asked as she struggled to get into the wet pant legs.
Rafe waved her question aside as unimportant.
“Were you religious when you were a gang member?”
“No, I was more like a lost lamb. Get back on the subject!”
“And now you’re not lost anymore?” She was truly perplexed by this apparent dichotomy in his character.
“Well, sometimes I still get lost,” he said with a grin.
“Stop whispering,” Ignacio ordered. “What were you saying to Elena?” he demanded to know of Rafe.
“Nothin’,” Rafe lied. “I was just sticking my tongue in her ear. She likes that. A lot.” He gave Ignacio one of those man-to-man looks.
Helen gasped with indignation.
Ignacio practically salivated.
“Ain’t that true, sweetheart?” Rafe asked, daring her to disagree. She’d only got her one leg in the pants so far. He slapped one palm familiarly over her mostly bare right cheek.
She nodded, meanwhile grinding her heel into his instep.
He dropped his hand with a groan.
“Get out of the water,” Ignacio ordered, waving his gun.
“They are married?” Sancho asked dolefully. “I knew it! Just my luck, there weel be no corkscrew today.”
“No corkscrew! No corkscrew!” Pablo wailed. “You promised, Ignacio. You said, if I stopped bellyaching, I would get my turn tonight. You said—”
“Shut the hell up!” Ignacio roared, then turned angrily on Rafe. “Show me the marriage certificate.”
“Sure thing,” Rafe said. “It’s in my backpack.” Then he gave Ignacio a considering scrutiny. “You did remember to bring my backpack, didn’t you? It was lying on the ground back where Sancho wrestled me in the dirt and tied my wrists.”
When all three bandits looked at each other and realized that no one had picked up a pack, Rafe shrugged as if to say, hey, it wasn’t his fault.
“You do not have proof of thees marriage?” Ignacio asked, clearly not buying Rafe’s story. “Then Elena will do the corkscrew with us till you give us that proof.”
“Oh, but I can give you proof,” Rafe inserted glibly, “when we get to Sacramento tomorrow. The padre at the mission can verify the marriage. You know Father Fernando, don’t you?”
Rafe’s quickness with fabrication impressed Helen. It was probably taught in freshman law classes, “Lying Through Your Teeth 101.”
But she wasn’t complaining. Anything to keep those grubby bandits away from her.
“And, besides, you wouldn’t deny a bride and groom their wedding night together, would you?”
Little tingles of suspicion rippled through Helen. She looked closer at Rafe, whose roguish eyes gleamed with triumph. “What are you suggesting?”
“Now, precious, don’t be shy. You and I are going to consummate our marriage tonight. You know that, darling.” He put an arm around her shoulders again and squeezed her close.
Ignacio’s beady eyes swept them both. “Consummation? Elena has not corkscrewed you yet? I know at least two dozen men who have dipped their wicks in her honey, and you are saying she denies you?”
“No, no, no,” Rafe announced in a loud stage whisper, “Elena wants to pretend she’s a virgin. It’s a game we like to play.” He winked at her.
“Aaaargh!” she snarled.
“Aaaahhh!” the bandits sighed in manly understanding.
“Can we watch?” Pablo asked.
“Sure,” Rafe agreed.
Helen pulled out of his embrace and stuttered incoherently.
“Now, honey, he’s just looking for a little ménage à trois.” Rafe smiled broadly at the bandits then. “Don’tcha just love it when you stun the little woman speechless?”
Chapter Five
Every good soldier needs a plan . . .
Rafe tried sending silent signals to Helen, hoping she would play along with his plan. He had told her they would make their move to escape after nightfall, but he was thinking now that he might be able to tackle Ignacio and wrest his pistols away from him since the three men had relaxed their vigilance.
He might not be able to ride a horse worth a damn, but one thing Rafe did know from his years in L.A. gangs was guns. If he could get a revolver, the rest would be easy street.
But first, Helen would have to cooperate.
And he saw immediately that cooperation was the last thing on her mind. In fact, as she jerked on her pants and zipped the fly, her brown eyes threw off sparks of fury. And a hint of hurt at his betrayal.
Guilt pricked his conscience.
He wanted to tell her that he hadn’t meant to offend or embarrass her, but their captors stood nearby. He yearned to pull her into her arms and assure her that he’d never deliberately hurt her. And, hell, didn’t she see how much he wanted to make love with her—had wanted to all these years—and that having an audience would be the last thing he’d countenance?
But there was no time for all those explanations now. He had to get her immediate cooperation in his plan. Maybe he could pretend he’d been joking, without the men hearing. Then, later, he’d explain to Helen what his intent had been all along.
“Gotcha!” he said through the side of his mouth, knowing the bandits wouldn’t understand the word even if they did overhear.
“Gotcha? Gotcha? Is that all you can say?”
“Now, Helen, lighten up. Don’t you have a sense of humor? Hah, hah, hah. Now’s no time for a Prissy-hissy fit.”
“Don’t even talk to me. One more word and, I swear, I’ll put a knot in your tongue.”
“A kung fu knot?” he jibed.
“Drop dead.”
Good Lord, she was so steamed she practically had smoke coming out of her ears. He cringed at the daunting task of smoothing her ruffled feathers.
Keeping an eye on the three bandits, who were watching them intently, Rafe reached out an arm for Helen. If he could get her closer, he would whisper a quick explanation in her ear.
She eyed his outstretched arm with loathing, then smiled enigmatically, seeming to change her mind.
He relaxed.
A big mistake.
In a mere instant, she took his hand, twisted around so her back pressed against his chest, bent, and flipped Rafe’s body over her shoulder—all 200 pounds of him. He landed ignominiously with a huge splash on his back in the water. A sharp rock dug into his sore blister.
As he came up, shaking his hair back, he saw Helen swagger out of the water and do a flying side kick, yelling, “Hee-yah!” He figured “hee-yah” must mean something like, “Take that, bozo.” Meanwhile, her foot connected with Pablo’s poor battered groin, knocking the screeching you
ng man to the ground.
About a million sparrows flew out of the trees at her shout and Pablo’s scream. But Helen wasn’t done yet.
“Eeeh!” she snarled out, real loud, spinning in a circle, and dealt a hand chop with the heel of her palm to Sancho’s gaping jaw. Like a domino, he fell on the ground next to Pablo.
Then, she made some other grunting noises, like, “Uuut!” and “Oooot!” and “Hah!” while she danced around in a series of dramatic karate poses. Rafe was almost certain those noises translated roughly to, “Who’s next?”
She was either a martial arts expert, or nuts.
Ignacio eyeballed her lethal antics with disbelief, but not fear. He just raised his pistol, pressing lightly on the trigger. “One step and I shoot, puta,” he warned.
Panting from her exertions, Helen faced him, knees bent and hands raised in an attack position, as if she was actually considering another move.
“Don’t, Helen,” Rafe shouted behind her.
“Butt out,” she replied without looking at him.
He decided not to persist, fearful that his advice would prod her to do the opposite. But, luckily, she appeared to recognize her weak position with Ignacio and dropped her hands.
Ignacio made a threatening growl but didn’t move as Helen proceeded to glide by the numbskull, her chin raised with disdain. She seemed unafraid, except for the slight trembling of her hands, which she clasped together.
Rafe exhaled, never realizing he’d been holding his breath.
She stopped halfway back to the campfire and assumed another one of her karate poses. With one quick chop of her hand, she cut through a three-inch dead branch propped against a boulder. Then she made eye contact with each of them. “If any of you dares to try that corkscrew thing on me, this is what’s going to happen to your precious private parts.”
With those ominous words and several gasps in response from the bandits, Helen stomped off.
Rafe, for one, got the message. He was pretty sure the three bandidos did, too.
This is one ballsy babe. Rafe shook his head in admiration, unable to take his eyes off her departing back.
Helen’s wet hair hugged her head, and her soggy clothes outlined her fine body as she stormed away from them all. Barefooted, she continued toward their blankets near the horses, her hips swaying with her wide strides. She sank down cross-legged on the ground and pulled a comb out of a saddlebag. While they all gawked at her, she idly combed out the long, red strands, as if she hadn’t just felled three grown men.
God, she was like some Celtic warrior princess.
I think I’m in love.
But then Rafe glanced at the other men, and realized Pablo and Sancho were regarding her in the same way. Ignacio, though, glanced back and forth speculatively between Rafe and Helen.
“That woman ees big trouble,” the ruffian proclaimed, turning to Rafe. “How do you stop from killing her?”
“Self-control,” Rafe answered, unclenching his fists. He’d been apprehensive that the bandit might go after Helen, and he was prepared to fight for her. But it would have been a losing battle with Ignacio holding the firearms, and his two pals placed between him and Helen. No, the time wasn’t right yet.
“The puta ees too fearless.” Ignacio shrugged then. “Ah, well, after she corkscrews me five or six times, I weel sell her to a brothel in San Francisco. The cribs in the bay city weel take the fight out of her soon enough.”
“How about me?” Pablo whined.
“And me?” Sancho added. “Don’t we get corkscrewed, too?”
Ignacio nodded. “We all get our turns.”
“You’re not screwing Hel . . . my wife,” Rafe lashed out. It was a rather foolish assertion in the face of Ignacio’s revolvers, but they would touch her over his dead body.
“I weel do whatever I want with the whore,” Ignacio declared icily. “Perhaps it weel be tonight. Then again, maybe I weel wait till after your death mañana. We shall see.”
On that happy note, he forced Rafe to walk in front of him back to the campsite, where he hurriedly donned his damp clothing. Ignacio headed back to his tree, where he plopped to the ground, his gun in his lap, eying his captives with evil intent the entire time.
It took a long time for Rafe to get Helen to talk to him again. Throughout a meal of the most abominable, stringy rabbit stew and thick black coffee, she ignored him.
Throughout his detailed explanation of his motives in telling the bandits that he planned to make love with her and let them watch, she stared ahead stonily.
Throughout his clumsy efforts to reapply the bandage and ointment to his own aching ass, she tuned him out.
Even when he grudgingly praised her karate skills, she refused to budge.
The orange sunset gradually gave it up for another day. Flickering shadows began to blanket the secluded campsite.
Leaving their two captives alone for a brief moment, the three bandits began to lay out their bedrolls, but they kept a close eye on Rafe and Helen. Whispering furtively, they argued amongst themselves, presumably over which one got the first jab at Helen.
Rafe used that opportunity to approach Helen once again. His hands remained untied and, if he was going to make his move to escape, he wanted it to be tonight, after their captors fell asleep. But, first, he’d have to inform Helen of the plan. Timing was everything, as he’d told her before. And teamwork. So, he muttered an apology . . . sort of. “I’m sorry if you thought I really meant what I said,” he blurted out ungraciously.
She raised her brown eyes, blinking with surprise. Although her hair was red, her eyelashes were dark brown and thick and incredibly sexy. Her full, sensuous lips opened, as if to speak, then clamped shut.
He hit his head with the heel of one hand to rid it of the unwelcome, consuming attraction.
Helen wasn’t really mad at Rafe anymore. She’d accepted his explanation about the Mexicans’ obsession with religion. For one thing, she’d had lots of experience in the military with recruits who harbored ridiculous, but deep-seated, superstitions, many of them grounded in religion. Some wouldn’t go into combat without a certain blessed crucifix. There were pilots who were convinced they had to say three Hail Marys in a row—no more, no less—or their flight would be doomed.
Yes, these three nitwits might actually stay clear of her if they believed she was married to Rafe. But Rafe should have told her ahead of time about his plan. And he didn’t have to be so crude when talking about their so-called marriage.
Marriage? A clear, erotic picture flashed in her mind of what marriage to a man like Rafe would be like. She recalled his words to her back on the plane; “I’d wrap your legs around my waist and bury myself inside you. And I’d be kissing you the entire time to muffle your screams. . . .”
Oh, my God! What’s happening to me?
Rafe sank down beside her on the horse blanket that would serve as her bedroll, and she shifted away from his alluring body heat.
“Helen, I admire your bravery and your expertise in defending yourself, but don’t you ever trust anyone besides yourself?”
“Huh? You mean, I should lean on a man, like some helpless little bimbo?” She batted her eyelashes at him, and he watched their fluttering with an odd fascination.
“No,” he said, glancing away, then back again. “I meant that you seem to consider yourself the only one capable of taking charge or making intelligent decisions. Where’s your Army team spirit? Not once today have you honestly considered me capable of handling this situation. You have a way of making a man feel, well, less than a man.”
That criticism stopped Helen cold. She tried to think back. Had she really acted so superior? So condescending?
“You treat me like an imbecile,” he continued. “I know I can’t ride a horse—yet—but I can defend both of us. Timing is everything in a fight. Give me some credit for waiting until the right moment to take care of these jerks. Hell, I spent the better part of my life on the L.A. streets with a knif
e in one hand and a gun in the other.”
His face was bleak for a split second before it closed over into an unreadable mask. “And that’s another thing. You never—not today, or anytime during the four years we were together at Stonewall—you never once asked me anything about my life. You made, and continue to make, judgments about me without knowing me. Oh, what’s the use!” He threw out his hands hopelessly.
“You are amazing. In the midst of the trouble we face now, you bring up ancient grievances. I can’t believe you even remember me and the little contact we had twelve years ago.”
“Oh, I remember all right, babe. I remember every little thing.” His blue eyes held hers . . . beautiful eyes with long, ebony lashes. Unconsciously, he licked his firm upper lip, slowly, and she wished . . . Oh, the things she wished didn’t bear examination!
Rafe was a gorgeous, gorgeous man, and she was going to have to work very hard to stamp out her impossible attraction to the brute. “And you’ve thought about these things all these years?” she asked in astonishment.
He nodded. “What was it that poet Langston Hughes said one time? Something about a dream deferred. It doesn’t just wither up and blow away. Instead, like a raisin in the sun, it just festers and eventually explodes.”
A dream deferred? Oh, surely, he can’t be referring to me as his dream. She immediately stifled that enticing thought. “Rafael Santiago quoting poetry? Wonders never cease.”
He cast her a sheepish grin. “Don’t look so stunned. I’m amazed myself. One day in your company and I go off the deep end.” He raked his fingers through his thick hair, no longer wet from his dunking in the stream. She had an unexpected, outrageous desire to touch the strands herself to test the texture.
“You’re right, Helen,” Rafe said, jarring her back to attention, “this isn’t the time for this discussion. We have to talk about today’s problems. I’ve been thinking—do you suppose that the Army gave us some kind of hallucinogenic drugs?”
“Would you get off your Army-bashing kick?”
“Hey, it wouldn’t be the first time the military has done that kind of experiment.”
“This nightmare we’ve landed in has absolutely nothing to do with the Army.”