Desperado

“It’s the way you do it. There’s always a sexual message in every reference you make to me.”

  “Well, it’s like this, Prissy. A lot of sexual bells go off in my body every time I look at you.”

  “See. You’re always teasing me.”

  “Who’s teasing? Hey, even with only our backsides touching, I gotta tell you, my chimes are ringing.”

  “Oh, give me a break! I think you just get a kick out of being politically incorrect.”

  “Maybe. I’m a product of my environment, you’re a product of yours. I don’t know why you think it’s mean of me, though. Don’t you like knowing you’re attractive to men . . . to me?”

  Actually, she was liking it way too much. Despite the inappropriateness of some of his remarks. Despite his pushing the envelope of suggestiveness. But she’d never tell him that. “Ours is a professional relationship. There should be respect and distance and—”

  “Distance? Hell, I can feel the seam of your panties with my butt. And you’re talking distance?”

  “It’s impossible to talk to you. Let’s change the subject.”

  He laughed. “To what?”

  “Well, tell me what you’ve been doing all these years. You obviously went to law school. Where?”

  “UCLA.”

  “And after that?”

  “Public defenders’ office for two years.”

  “Really?” She wasn’t sure why that surprised her. Yes, she was. “You don’t make much money there.”

  “Right. That’s why I left.”

  A sudden thought occurred to her. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t asked before. “Are you married?”

  He gave a short laugh. “No.”

  An unexplainable rush of pleasure washed over her. “Ever?”

  “Never.”

  “Why?”

  She felt his shoulders shrug. “I couldn’t afford marriage.”

  “Oh.” All kinds of possibilities arose in her mind. “Does that mean there was someone you would have liked to marry?”

  He didn’t answer right away. Eventually, he admitted, “There was a girl once, a long time ago, but it never would have worked.”

  She wanted to know more. Was it a Mexican girl? Someone from his old neighborhood, or perhaps a fellow law student? And had he loved her? More important, did he still? She shouldn’t care. She really shouldn’t. But she did.

  “Enough about me. When are you and Colonel Sanders gonna bite the bullet?”

  Helen bristled at his deliberately misspeaking her fiancé’s name, but this time she didn’t rise to the bait. “Elliott and I will likely get married at Christmas,” she said. Even Helen heard the lack of enthusiasm in her voice. Why did the image of her marriage to Elliott loom in the distance like a dark cloud, not the special bright event it should be? And had it always been so? Was that why she’d put off the date so many times?

  Do I make Elliott’s bells chime? Helen wondered. I don’t know. She bit her bottom lip pensively. Isn’t that sad? I really don’t know.

  “Will you stay in the military?” Rafe interrupted her disturbing reflections.

  “Until I get pregnant, yes. I want to have lots of kids.”

  Rafe’s body stiffened behind her.

  “Being an only child, I’ve always dreamed of . . . Well, anyhow, Elliott and I plan on having at least three children. I’ll quit the service then.”

  She expected Rafe to make a smart response, but he didn’t. Instead, he informed her flatly, “I don’t intend to ever have any kids.”

  “You don’t? Never?”

  “Never.”

  “You’ll probably change your mind later . . . when you meet the right woman.”

  “I’ll never change my mind—for any woman. And I’ve had a vasectomy to make sure.”

  “Oh, Rafe.”

  “Don’t plan a pity party for me. It was my choice. Not everyone feels the need to overpopulate the world, or clone themselves all over the planet.”

  “And that’s the reason why you don’t want children? Somehow, I don’t see you being that altruistic.”

  “There you go again. Prissy, making judgments about me.”

  “You’re right,” she admitted meekly. Geez, when had she turned into such a judgmental prig?

  Rafe chuckled softly, as if reading her thoughts. “Now, now, Prissy, don’t be gettin’ out the guitar and love beads. I never was much good at singing ‘Kumbayah.’”

  Even she had to laugh at that picture.

  “Nah, it’s a lot simpler than that. I grew up the oldest of nine kids with a single parent—my mother. I know firsthand what it’s really like to raise babies, and I’ve had enough of it.”

  “But, Rafe, babies are God’s gift to mankind. Little miracles.” Helen couldn’t imagine a life without children—her children. All her life, she’d dreamed of settling down in one place, surrounded by the love of a husband and family. Never lonely.

  “Boy, are you in for a rude awakening. Once you get past the miracle, there’s just a whole lot of piss and puke. To this day, I can recognize the smell of baby shit at fifty paces.”

  “You are—”

  “So crude,” he finished for her. “Anyhow, the bottom line is, kids always have problems. And they’re a constant money drain. I want to enjoy life sometime before I need a walker and dentures. Champagne, caviar, a Jacuzzi . . . Yeah, a Jacuzzi. A Rolex watch, a Lamborghini.”

  “So, we’re back to money again.”

  “Yeah, I guess we are.”

  “I know it’s a cliché, but money can’t buy happiness.”

  “Bull! I never bought that crock. And I’d sure like to test the theory. Did you ever notice that the people denigrating the good life are usually the ones living high on the hog? Like you.”

  “Me? It’s true I never had to worry about money, but I wouldn’t categorize the way I’ve lived as the good life.”

  “Helen, I saw the fancy cars your father drove when he visited you at college. BMW one time, Mercedes another. You went on vacations to exotic places like St. Thomas or Italy. I vacationed at McDonald’s in the L.A. barrio.”

  “I don’t ever remember noticing my father’s cars, or caring what kind of vehicles they were.” She frowned. Wasn’t it odd that something Rafe considered so important was totally irrelevant to her?

  Rafe exhaled with disbelief.

  “And the vacations always seemed so boring to me. My father usually combined them with military business, and I’d be left in a hotel room with room service and a book.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  “Oh, Rafe! My mother died of cancer when I was eight. My only memories of her involve a sick bed.” She coughed to clear her tight throat. “Dad was career military. He tried to be a good single parent, keeping me with him, but we moved from base to base, never more than two years in one place. Although we had a home in San Clemente, we rarely lived there. I was always so . . . alone.”

  “Alone? Since when is being alone a bad thing? When I was a kid, I yearned for quiet—one little tiny space to call my own. Hah! My family was—is—like an octopus. Tendrils everywhere. Pushing, pulling, screaming, crying, laughing, singing, talking. Not a minute’s peace.”

  She bit her lip, trying to understand. “Don’t you care for your family?”

  “Of course. But they crush me. Suck all the life out of me. Everyone wants a piece of Rafe. And I’m damn tired of being responsible for everyone.”

  “And you think money will be the panacea?”

  “I know it will.”

  A heavy sadness enveloped Helen. She wished she could see Rafe’s face. “We’re worlds apart,” she concluded sadly. “We have nothing in common, nothing that connects us, at all.”

  A long, telling silence hung in the air before Rafe spoke again. “Well, that’s not quite true,” he said playfully. “Could you move your hands up higher? Either that, or finish me off, because right now I’m feeling real connected to you.”

  To her horror, Helen
realized that her bound wrists were resting on Rafe’s crotch.

  She yanked her hands upward, as best she could. “I didn’t . . . Oh, God. You don’t think I did that deliberately?”

  “Hardly. Not Prissy Prescott.”

  His words hurt.

  Then she discovered that his bound hands were lying familiarly over her upper stomach. She looked down, and through the light of the campfire, Helen could see the dark skin of his hands and the long fingers resting intimately where only a lover’s should. For some reason, tears filled her eyes, and she wished . . . She wasn’t sure what she wished.

  But she didn’t ask him to move his hands.

  There was a fine line between attraction and detestation . . .

  Needles of pain shot through Rafe’s bound wrists, up to his numb shoulders. Day-old whiskers made his face itch. He licked his dry lips, and his tongue felt fuzzy and thick. He should have made himself a twig toothbrush last night, too.

  Slowly, awareness crept over his aching bones. Something had awakened him in the predawn haze.

  “Ooohm, ooohm, ooohm, ooohm. . . .”

  “Damn! It’s not even daylight yet. What the hell are you doing now?”

  “Meditating. Ooohm. I told you I meditate every morning and evening. Ooohm. It’s a ritual. Ooohm.”

  “Even when you’re hog-tied, cheek-to-cheek, with a man?”

  “Ooohm. Meditating soothes me. Ooohm. My body is out of synch. Ooohm. Don’t break my concentration. Ooohm. You’re upsetting my rhythm. Ooohm, ooohm, ooohm . . .”

  He gritted his teeth. Really, she was going to drive him bonkers if he didn’t set a few ground rules. “I’ll give you some rhythm, honey.” He undulated his hips, back and forth, against her ass.

  She gasped. “Ooohm, ooohm, ooohm . . .” Her chants resumed, but her voice wobbled.

  Good! “Helen, sweetheart, how about concentrating on this.”

  “Ooohm, ooohm, ooohm . . .”

  “Picture my tattoo pressed against your tattoo . . .”

  “Ooohm, ooohm, ooohm.”

  “. . . and we’re naked.”

  “Oh-oohm.” Her voice faltered again.

  This was fun. Shaking up Prissy Prescott was a piece of cake. “My hands are suddenly free. I’m reaching behind me to touch your—”

  “Well, I’m done meditating for today,” she interrupted matter-of-factly.

  He smiled to himself, then yelled out, “Hey, Sancho, time to get up and water some trees. How ’bout untying my hands?”

  Helen ground her teeth at his indelicacy.

  Dawn was creeping over the hill now, casting bright orange streamers of light through the misty sky. It was going to be another scorcher.

  “Yo, Sancho! My teeth are floating here.”

  Sancho rolled over and opened his bleary eyes. Groaning, Sancho favored him with an ancient Mexican hand gesture.

  “You know, Helen,” Rafe remarked as Sancho took his good old time coming over to untie them, “I’m usually in a bad mood in the morning, before I have my first cup of coffee. But I’m feeling real good. Today, we’re gonna get free from these bozos. And we’re gonna become gold prospectors and find tons and tons of gold nuggets. You can be my señorita, and I’ll be your desperado. Don’tcha just love it?”

  Helen didn’t say a word. She was probably giving him an ancient Mexican hand gesture in her head.

  Yep, this day was starting out real good. He’d shown Helen who called the shots here. From now on, she’d better think twice about annoying him. Life was good.

  But a short time later, as he and Sancho emerged from the woods, Rafe wasn’t too sure. His hands were still bound, and he’d been forced to suffer the ignominy of Sancho undoing his pants so he could relieve himself.

  “Glug, glug, glug, glug, glug . . .”

  He closed his eyes wearily.

  “Glug, glug, glug, glug, glug . . .”

  Opening his eyes, Rafe glanced disgustedly toward the stream where Helen was gargling like a fountain. Pablo stood guard over her with a raised revolver after having apparently released her ropes. A temporary reprieve, he suspected.

  “Glug, glug, glug, glug, glug . . .”

  Pablo was watching her with a rapt expression of ecstasy. “Oh, I can’t wait till she gargles me,” the dope kept muttering.

  “How soon till the hanging, do you think, Ignacio?” Sancho asked as he packed up the camping gear, obviously willing the hours away until Rafe’s demise so he could get his turn at being corkscrewed and gargled by Elena.

  “Take off the Angel’s pants,” Ignacio ordered Sancho suddenly.

  “Wha-at?” Rafe cried out.

  “Your trousers, señor. I have decided I like them. We weel trade, for now. After the hanging, I weel take mine back, too.”

  Rafe sneered with distaste at Ignacio’s filthy leather pants with their heavy embroidery and fancy fringe and bell-bottom legs that fit over the boots. “No, thanks.”

  “Elena says I would look good—mucho macho—in your trousers,” Ignacio enlightened him coldly.

  Rafe narrowed his eyes accusingly at Helen. “Mucho macho?” he mouthed.

  She smirked. “Did you tell Pablo that gargling was a sexual trick?”

  “Take off his damn trousers,” Ignacio roared, pulling out his blasted pistol and aiming it at Sancho, who was balking at his order.

  “Listen, Ignacio, your pants look about a size forty-four. I have a thirty-four-inch waist. Besides, I’m more a jeans kind of guy.”

  Ignacio raised his gun.

  With Sancho’s help, Rafe shucked his duds. Luckily, Ignacio couldn’t fit them over his fat butt. So, a short time later, they rode off toward Sacramento City, but Rafe wouldn’t forget what Helen had tried to do to him.

  He slanted a sideways glance at Helen, who was looking very pleased with herself. Then she started to whistle. It sounded like fingernails grating over a chalkboard.

  Maybe the day wasn’t going to turn out quite the way he’d expected.

  The man was crude and annoying . . . and adorable! . . .

  Helen took great pleasure in having turned the tables on Rafe. “Be careful you don’t get a sunburn,” she called out once when they stopped to water the horses. Pablo had given her his extra hat, but there was none for Rafe.

  He shot her a you’ll-get-yours look, and said sweetly, “Howard Stern was right. Women’s tongues are good for only one thing.”

  “Pig!” she chided.

  “Prude.”

  “Lech.”

  “Looney.”

  “Chauvinist.”

  “Femi-Nazi.”

  “Ambulance chaser.”

  “Nipples.”

  “Huh?” Helen looked down quickly, relieved to see that her chest was well-covered with her camouflage blouse. She raised her eyes to Rafe’s laughing ones.

  He winked. “Just wanted to see if you were paying attention.”

  By late afternoon, they were approaching Sacramento, and the closer they got, trivial personal squabbling faded in importance. The fantastic landscape convinced them both, like nothing had before, that time travel might really be possible.

  “We should have passed Blue Valley Vineyard over there,” she whispered.

  “And have you noticed, not one airplane has gone over the entire day?” Rafe added. “Hell, this has got to be a major flight pattern direct to McClellan Air Force Base. In fact, Interstate 50 should follow just about the same route we are, and we haven’t seen one single automobile.”

  He raised his face to the clear, cloudless skies. His thick, unruly hair lay sweatily against his neck and over his forehead, but he was unable to brush it back because his hands were tied in front of him to the saddle horn.

  After two days of not shaving and all the dust of their travel, he looked as much like a Mexican desperado as their captors claimed him to be. And Helen had to admit that, after this second day in the saddle, Rafe was handling his horse just fine, like a true Mexican bandido, considering
the deep pain he must be in as a new rider.

  “How’s your blister?” she asked.

  “Fine, although my ass feels like it’s growing callouses.”

  She clucked her disapproval at his language, but, even though Rafe continually ruffled her feathers, she couldn’t deny her attraction to him. If her hands were free, she’d be tempted to wipe the perspiration from his whiskered face; however, since her karate exhibition, the bandits deemed her a danger, too.

  They saw more people as they neared Sacramento—emigrants in wagons who had presumably traveled the overland trail across the plains, trappers coming down from the mountains, prospectors on horses or mules, traveling singly or in groups. Always, Ignacio kept their distance, making sure that she and Rafe couldn’t make any contact with the passersby.

  But even from that range, Helen could see that these were not actors in red flannel shirts and dusty homespun trousers. Huge beards covered their weathered faces, and they moved with the ease of men used to the saddle, not automobiles.

  “We really have traveled back in time,” Helen concluded.

  “I know,” Rafe agreed glumly. “I know.”

  Even when they passed through the primitive mining town of Placerville, Ignacio refused to allow them to stop for fear someone would come to their aid before he could collect his reward.

  They did stop to water the horses at a ranch in the Sacramento Valley that sported an incongruously modern sign, “The Last Chance Ranch.” As they rode up the lane, leading to the ranch house, several riders—presumably the owner and his hands—approached, eying them suspiciously. Ignacio and Sancho rode forward to talk to them.

  Pablo stayed behind as guard. The three of them pulled their horses to a halt near a corral fence by the house and waited. Pablo had a cocked pistol hidden under a blanket over his saddle horn. He’d been given explicit orders from Ignacio to shoot if Rafe or Helen made the slightest move to call for help or ride away. As insurance, Ignacio warned that he’d personally put a bullet through Pablo’s head if he disobeyed the command.

  Helen was tired and dirty and extremely fearful of their fate. But her attention was nonetheless captured by the lady standing on the porch of the ranch house. “Look at that woman!” Helen exclaimed. “Doesn’t she resemble that Vogue cover model, Selene?”