Rio Grande Wedding Part 9

Then he settled on a stool close by the stove and waited for the boiling, for the steps that would make coffee the way he needed it this morning. He gazed out the window and hoped his saint would come back in time to share a little with him. He hoped she would bring news of Josefina.

Staring out at the blue and dun landscape, he imagined he could see her, his bright, smart niece. He chose to imagine her in a sunny place, calm and thoughtful. A little lonely, but not afraid. He willed her to remember all the things they had practiced for

just such an emergency, and he suddenly realized what a foolish, foolish chance he had taken.

It had to end. It was becoming too dangerous, and would grow worse as she took on the contours of a woman's body and not only when there were raids. The camps were full of young men, away from their homes and the people who knew them. They were lonely.

Josefina would tempt them and then there would be real trouble.

With a breathy exclamation, he shook his head. This was no life for a child. No life for him. He ached with homesickness, ached to go back to the simple farmer's life he'd known before his sister's death. And yet, when he spoke to his uncle rarely, it was plain that life in Mexico was no better. The big farms were eating up the little ones, making it harder and harder to make a living from the land. And there were so many people displaced from that land now that the cities were overcrowded, wages were poor, the neighborhoods where a man could afford to house a family too dangerous. Though everyone said it was different in America, he saw some of the same things here. It was just easier to be poor with three dollars an hour, rather than the three dollars a day he could get for the same work at home.

He did not know what the answer was. It weighed on him every day, thinking of it.

His head ached with the questions, and he put them aside for today. Today, he had to let himself heal. Today, he hoped to find Josefina. When she was found, then he could decide what to do.

Chapter 4.

Molly made a few more stops before she returned home, avoiding her usual haunts in hopes of sidestepping anyone who'd ask about her "sore throat." She was lucky. The market was not busy, and she nabbed a few items to tide them over till morning,then got to her car without having to speak to hardly anyone.

When she unlocked the door at her house, an aroma of freshly brewed coffee filled her nose, so rich it made her nearly light-headed. Carrying the bag of groceries into the kitchen, she made a show of inhaling deeply.

"Oh, I must need that coffee! It smells glorious."

Her patient sat on a kitchen stool by the stove, one hand stirring a pot, the other clasped protectively around his ribs. He lifted his head. "I hoped you would not mind me taking this liberty, if the coffee was good enough."

"Not at all. As it happens, I had a yen for some doughnuts, so I stopped at the store."

She brought out a bag of tender, newly fried doughnuts. "Do you like them?"

"Yes, I do." He attempted a smile, and only then did Molly see the white lines of strain around his mouth, the faint sheen of sweat on his forehead. "The coffee will be ready in-" he glanced at the clock "-three minutes."

Concerned, she crossed the room and with the familiarity of a nurse to her patient, touched his shoulder, bending to look into his eyes. "Are you all right?"

He ignored her. "Did you find her?"

Molly sighed. Shook her head. "Wiley is going to keep an eye out. He said he'll send some men to look for her." Automatically, she put her hand on his face to check for fever.

She regretted it immediately. Her thumb against his cheekbone was very white, very alien, did not belong anywhere near him. And beneath her fingertips, she felt a delicacy and strength of bone that was powerfully intimate. His eyes, sober and large and still, regarded her steadily.

She took her hand away. "The fever is back a little. You should have some more medicine and go back to bed."

"In a little while. First coffee, huh?" He lifted his chin to the bag on the counter.

"And a doughnut or two." A faint smile edged the wide mouth. "Or three."

"Ah, so you're like me a weakness for doughnuts."

"My mother cooked them. I think of her."

From the cupboard behind her, Molly took two mugs and set them on the counter. "I've never seen coffee made this way."

"You will like it." Very carefully, he stood up. "I need a..." He scowled, his hand describing a shape in the air. "Youknow, something to pour it through."

"Ah." She ducked below the cabinet and pulled out a large wire-mesh strainer. "This?"

"Si."

"Strainer," she said.

He gave a single nod, took it from her and pointed to the stove. "It is too heavy to lift now." His wry smile. "Will you do it?"

Together they strained the coffee into the cups. The scented aroma made Molly's mouth water. "Do we need sugar?"

He shook his head, and there was pleasure maybe antic.i.p.ation on his face. "You will like this," he promised again.

Molly carried the mugs, leaving the bag of pastries to her guest. Patient. Whatever.

She sensed his need to contribute whatever he could, and gave him the dignity of shuffling to the table with the doughnuts in his long, slim hand. He gave an audible sigh of relief when he sat down, and Molly smiled. "You really do need to take it easy for a few days."

"Take it easy." He smiled. "You say that a lot."

"Because I'm so sure you won't." Molly bent her head to the steam and inhaled it, then lifted the cup and took an experimental sip. Cinnamon and coffee and dark sugar burst on her tongue. "Oh! That's wonderful!" She took another taste closing her eyes this time. "Mmm." She looked at him with a smile. "Thank you."

She surprised an expression of something she couldn't quite name on his face. Something oddly alert, intense. Then it was gone. She pushed the doughnuts toward him. "Eat, so I can give you medicine."

He picked out, a glazed one, lifted his eyebrows at her and dug in. Molly said, "Tell me,senor, how it is that you came to be working the fields."

He raised his eyes, and she saw that he was about to make light of it. But suddenly something in his face shifted, and that intense expression came back and he said softly, "Senora, you have beautiful eyes."

Startled, Molly looked away, strangely pierced. Then she lifted her head again. "Thank you," she said in a calm voice. "So do you."

He grinned. "But very different, huh?"

"Yes." She picked up her doughnut and urged him to do the same. "Now tell me your story,senor ."

"Please," he said. "Call me Alejandro."

She nodded, but didn't say the word. Not yet. It would roll on her tongue, lilt in her mouth, and she wasn't ready to taste it. It would have been much better, she thought,if he'd been named Hector orPorfino .

"My father was a businessman. We, my sisters and I, had everything." He caught her skeptical expression. "Ah, you don't believe me."

She inclined her head. "Maybe. Go on."

"I went to very good schools, in Mexico City, and so did my sisters, off to boarding school, you know?" He eyed his doughnut and took a bite, chewed it slowly, then asked, "That was after they found oil, and everybody thought Mexico would be a rich, rich country."

"Oil?" She a.s.sociated oil with the Middle East.

"Much oil and it could have been the thing that turned the country around." He started to sigh, then cut offmidbreath and reflexively put a hand to his ribs. "But

there was poor management, too many loans. The government crashed." He carefully wiped his fingers on a napkin. "My father went down with it. Lost everything."