“Sí,” Carmen murmured, but it was plain that she was bewildered. Still, she dutifully tucked sheets that smelled of lavender atop the cushions of the settee, along with a plump pillow and a light coverlet.
With the drapes drawn and windows closed against the muted sound of revelry in the streets, Ginny stretched out on the comfortable cushions.
It was, she thought as a luxurious languor began to seep through her body, a relief to feel safe again, if only for a single night.
33
It was nearly dawn. Pale light streaked the eastern sky, tingeing mountain peaks a hazy gold. Steve sat in a cantina near the plaza. He’d been there most of the night, nursing a drink.
Paco found him still sober, his mood foul.
“You are about to be even more unhappy, amigo, when I tell you what has happened to your wife.” Paco didn’t bother to sit down, but stood watching Steve closely. It was no surprise, the way things stood between Steve and Ginny, but he had learned to be wary and not to get involved. It was much safer that way, for him, at least. ¡Dios! but matters got complicated quickly, and it always seemed that he was the one to have to tell Steve…
“What has she done now?” Steve drawled, sitting back in his chair to look up at Paco with a cold gaze. “Danced with veils for Díaz? It wouldn’t surprise me.”
“It seems that General Luna has taken her. Tige found Butch Casey nearly dead, his throat slit, though he is still alive. Missed the jugular, but just barely. Ginny is gone.”
“Christ!” The chair was pushed back so quickly it fell to the hard-packed dirt floor with a crash as Steve stood up and reached for his rifle. “Which way did he take her?”
“No one is certain, but it looks like they headed north toward Chihuahua. If what you told me is true about Luna and Senator Brandon, you can guess where they’re going and why.”
“Hell, yes. The Galena.”
The sun was well over the mountain ridges by the time they rode north out of Mexico City. Paco was quiet for a while, reading his partner’s mood from long experience. Ever since he’d met Ginny Brandon, Steve Morgan had changed. He’d always been a man who attracted women, but he could take them or leave them, when and how he pleased. Only with Ginny things had been different.
In a way, Paco understood. There was a fiery quality to her that matched Steve’s stubborn nature, even conquered him at times. He’d seen him do things for Ginny that once he would have sworn Steve Morgan would never do for anyone, man or woman.
But for Ginny, he had. He’d turned himself in to the French for her—and nearly died for it. Flogged to within an inch of his life, then relegated to the mines to die a slow, anonymous death, he had still survived it.
It hadn’t been easy for Ginny, either. Not in those tempestuous times when Juaristas were still fighting the French, and Mexico seethed with revolution. Betrayed and taken hostage, she had suffered terribly. It was a miracle they had both survived.
Steve reined his mount to a halt in the shadow beneath a rocky overhang that jutted beside the trail, and pulled the cork on his water pouch, squirting a stream into his mouth before he offered it to Paco. It was quiet, the only sound the wind and muted clink of curb chains and creaking saddle leather. The smell of baking rock thickened the air.
“Bishop doesn’t like this.” Paco handed him back the water pouch, his eyes thinned against the glare of the sun beating down and warming the damp earth. “He seems to think this could endanger the shaky relationship between the United States and Spain, for some reason.”
“I don’t think Luna has that kind of influence, though he’d like to pretend he does.”
“How does he figure in all this? Luna, I mean. What does he have to gain by taking Ginny?”
“Revenge. Guess you’d call it that.” Steve shrugged. “I met him a long time ago in Italy, when I was there with ’Cesca. Luna fell for her in a big way. She was mad at me, decided that I needed to be taught a lesson, but Luna took her flirtation seriously. He viewed me as a rival for her affections. When he became too insistent and a problem for her, I had to convince him she didn’t want to see him again.”
“So now he is taking your woman as revenge?”
“Ginny wouldn’t go with him willingly.”
Paco hesitated. “Bishop said she had met him before, in Ojinaga.”
“How would he know that?” Astounded, Steve swore under his breath. “Damn Bishop, if he knew all the time that Luna meant to use her to get at Brandon—Where is he?”
Paco cleared his throat. “I believe he is on his way to San Antonio. He said you would know what to do.”
Steve swore again, long and feelingly, angry that he had not been warned about Luna a month ago. “If Rafael Luna harms one hair on her head, I won’t give a damn about diplomatic relations with Spain.”
Time had not improved the road between Mexico City and Zacatecas. The beaten-down ribbon of dirt snaked through San Luis Potosí and Salinas and up to the province of Zacatecas. If Luna had gone that way, it was possible Steve could head them off. He knew the land like the back of his hand, had been exploring the arroyos and flat-topped ridges since he was a boy.
Steve let his horse set the pace. It would be a grueling ride, and he was pretty sure he knew where Luna was headed. It was unlikely he would do anything to Ginny until he reached his destination. He’d be too pressed for time, knowing that he was pursued.
Green-eyed gypsy—his love, his life. It had all been a mirage,
