Hot and Bothered (3 page)

She shut the door of the trailer and within minutes realized that a sauna didn’t have nearly the humidity she had in her new home. She thought about taking off her clothes, but one look at the old mattress made her think again. She lowered herself gingerly onto it and waited for little visitors. None arrived. Thank goodness. The thing was lumpy, but not so bad.

Who was she kidding? Everything was awful. She was hiding in a foreign country in primitive conditions. All she wanted to do was to go home. But she couldn’t.

All kinds of images crowded in on her. Ones from home mixed with thoughts of needed supplies. She had nothing to eat, not even a cracker. When the shock of what she’d done wore off, she’d be hungry. But the Mercedes would be noticed on the main highway. She’d have to do something about that.

Her thoughts mixed with ones about a very
disturbing man. She wondered again what had happened to him, this Paulo. He was almost a kindred spirit with her. No, he was a sexy spirit, not at all the kind she needed. If she wasn’t careful, she could easily be in more trouble here than anything produced back home thus far. And that was saying something.

She could still see him rising godlike out of the sea. She could still feel that fathomless gaze raking over her with its mixture of virile assessment and disdain.

The remembered sensations kept her awake most of the night.

Paul was just getting into his truck when the newest resident of Sunset Cove came into view. She was hurrying over the rocky ground, her low-heeled shoes no support for the job. She’ll break an ankle, he thought. She was waving her hands at him.

“Hello!” she called out, smiling. “It’s Paulo, isn’t it?”

Paul stared at her, surprised she’d gone to the trouble of finding out his name. It pleased him too. He noticed she had made use of the community shower, because her skin was clean and her hair was damp. She was still wearing the same clothes as the day before, only they were in even worse condition. They couldn’t hide her shape, however. He unwillingly smiled back. “It’s Paul, actually. Hello.”

She glanced around at the rusted chain-link
fence surrounding half-stripped refrigerators and their parts. A tangle of honeysuckle insisted on spreading over the fencing, although the sweet-scented flowers couldn’t hide the dilapidation. Two of the dogs he kept as watchers for the yard rose on their skinny haunches and came sniffing. He was there, so they didn’t raise too much of a ruckus.

From the look of aversion that crossed her face, it was obvious she thought she was looking at a junkyard. He decided not to disabuse her of the notion. Besides, he’d be damned before he defended himself to anyone again.

Last night he had dreamed things he’d thought he’d buried long ago. And he’d dreamed things about her. Why should this woman affect him so?

“Pedro says you’re going into town this morning,” she said. “Could you give me a lift? I need some things.”

“I thought your car was okay,” he said, frowning.

“Oh.” Her eyes widened. “Well, yes, it is … but I don’t know where I’m going.”

“Just get out on the main road and go either north or south. One way you’ll hit Rosario, and the other way Ensenada. They’re big tourist towns—”

“Oh, no! I couldn’t.” She ran a hand through her damp hair. Though it was thick, Paul knew it would be dry in no time with the day’s heat. He
wished he could run his hands through it and feel the fine strands sifting through his fingers like silk. Damp or dry didn’t matter. No, it did. Damp from the sea, he thought. Both of them in it, waist-high and naked, her hands small and warm on his cool back …

“I’d get lost. Really. So, could you?”

Paul blinked, astonished at where his thoughts had been drifting. The urge to drag her off into the cove and put image to reality was overwhelming. He drew in a deep breath. “Could I what?”

“Give me a lift?”

He shouldn’t, he thought. He ought to be encouraging her to see the authorities about her problem, whatever it was. They could help her best. Besides, he’d just be asking for trouble, what with the responses she already provoked within him. And he didn’t want to be a babysitter for some helpless American. He had things to do.…

No. He had things to protect. Pride and bitterness, for example. He couldn’t afford to care again. Care about this woman … or about his daughter’s Communion.

Looking into Judith’s open, hopeful face, though, he couldn’t say no. “Get in.”

She grinned. “Thanks. I’ll pay your gas—”

“No. Just get in.”

He offered no courteous assistance as she got in the passenger side, and prided himself on his
lack of manners. He wasn’t going out of his way on
anything
. Once settled in the driver’s seat, he concentrated on getting the truck up the dirt road without a mishap, passing a small
ranchita
on the right.

“What do they farm here?” Judith asked over the jouncing of the vehicle.

“They don’t
farm
,” he said. “Mexicans own
ranchitas
and they
plant
. They also fish for lobster and abalone as well as grouper and more.”

“The fishing I can understand,” she said. “But what in God’s name would grow here?”

“Mostly corn, if you can get it to grow in the salt air, and eucalyptus trees and nopal cactus. Mexicans love it cooked or in a salad.”

“Is that like yucca? That’s a popular ingredient in moisturizers.”

He glanced over at her a bit cynically. “Not everybody can afford a moisturizer.”

She looked back at him. “This is the source for it, isn’t it? I would think everyone would be able to just pick it and use it.”

“Nopal and yucca are two different types of species.” Paul couldn’t help smiling at her concerned expression. She smiled back. He was all too aware of her body, just an arm’s length away, her curvy bottom against the same beat-up leather as his was. An interesting notion … a kinky notion.

The truck jolted into a huge pothole, then bottomed out.

Paul cursed and fought the wheel to bring the truck under control.

“I feel like I’m in a New York taxi,” Judith commented, righting herself in the seat.

Since she seemed knowledgeable about New York, Paul wondered if she was a recent transplant to California. Out loud he said, “Anywhere off Baja One is like this.”

He turned the truck onto the nearly deserted main road and depressed the gas pedal. They shot south along the good road like a bullet, a pleasure as far as Paul was concerned.

“You
could
drive a New York taxi,” she said in a loud voice over the wind rushing in the windows.

“Is that where you’re from?”

“No. Are you?”

“No.”

“Are you visiting out here or do you live in that house?”

“I live in it.” He glanced over at her. She was staring out the windshield.

Paul looked to see what had her attention. A car, a big luxury one, was approaching from the opposite direction. Judith shrank down in her seat while trying to stretch her neck so she could at least keep her gaze above the dash. The car passed. She sat up and turned to look out the back window.

The action was telling. Paul refused to acknowledge it.

Finally she faced front again and asked, “Do you farm … I mean plant?”

“No.”

“What do you do? Fish?”

“No.”

“You just bought a house in the middle of nowhere, to do nothing?”

Paul set his jaw against a nasty outburst. He should have gotten past them by now. “I did not buy a house in the middle of nowhere to do nothing. I don’t own the house. I can’t own the house. Americans can’t own land in Mexico less than thirty miles from the ocean or the border, so I lease it from my uncle. And I fix refrigerators.”

“
Out here?
”

He sensed her gaping in amazement and smiled wryly. “Yes, out here. Propane and portable fridges, mostly for the campers and fishermen, but I do the electric ones too. I make enough to live on and I don’t ask for more.”

She was silent for the longest time. He hoped his tidbits had finally stopped the curiosity. He didn’t want to be rude, but he wasn’t prying into her reasons for dropping out into a remote
ejido
. The only people who lived there were poor, but they were enterprising, ambitious people who wanted to make something out of nothing. Literally. She hardly fit that bill. She was an American and not even eligible to claim common land.

“I’m here on vacation,” she finally said as if
she could see his thoughts. Probably she felt politeness required information in kind.

“So you told me last night.” He wanted to ask more, but she wasn’t his business. He didn’t want to know her background, or so he told himself. And if she was in trouble, as she seemed to be, it was up to her to ask for help.

“Well, that’s why I’m here,” she went on. “I want a vacation from life, and this seemed like the best place.”

Nothing sounded so lame. He couldn’t stand being treated like an idiot. “This place is harsh and barren,” he said, “with no amenities and people eking out a living from nothing. It’s life at its hardest.”

The awkwardness in the truck turned to frozen tension. Paul cursed himself. He shouldn’t have slapped her with the truth. After all, if this was how she needed to handle whatever troubles she had, then far be it from him to burst her fantasies.

“Sometimes we need the sheer hard gut work to make us appreciate life,” he said.

She relaxed. “Yes, you’re right.”

At least her chattering stopped, Paul thought. As the kilometers wore on, though, he found himself wishing he hadn’t said anything, for a forlorn Judith was a disturbing one. Worse, he wasn’t going to La Misión, a short jaunt north from the cove, but to the more metropolitan Ensenada, which was nearly sixty kilometers south.
Twenty-five miles of only one’s thoughts was not pleasant. Judith, however, continued to watch every car on the road closely, doing her ducking routine whenever some internal caution felt it was necessary. Paul resisted the urge to stop and shake some sense into her.

When they reached the town, he stopped in front of the Calimax supermarket to drop Judith off while he went to get the refrigerator parts he’d ordered for a repair job he needed to finish.

“Maybe we should go to a bank,” she said, frowning as she gazed out the window at the huge warehouse of a store. “I don’t have any pesos, just dollars.”

“No problem. The Mexicans love dollars. They’re more stable than the peso, so everybody takes them, much to the Mexican government’s chagrin.” He added helpfully, “And the Calimax is like a Vons in California.”

She frowned. “What’s a Vons?”

He gaped at her in surprise. She lived in California and didn’t know what a Vons was? “Vons is a store that has everything in it, from frozen foods to small appliances. They’re all over the state.”

“Oh. Well, I shopped mostly along Orange Avenue and at Nordstrom’s.”

California must have a million Orange Avenues and a hundred Nordstrom stores, he thought. She had to be from Beverly Hills, and a recent resident, too, since she didn’t know a big
chain store in California. Maybe she was hiding out from some celebrity scandal … or, worse, the New York mob. Despite what she said, he still wondered if she was a local. He continued. “Calimax has everything you’ll probably want from butter to shoes.”

She smiled in relief. His head spun a little, as if he were floating on a hero’s cloud.

“Thank you.” She was out the door in a flash.

He was reluctant to leave her, because she looked so damn helpless and because his thoughts about her were becoming more troubled. But he put the truck in gear and headed to Anastasio’s. The sooner he got his errands done, the sooner he’d be back for her.

He returned in a little more than an hour. To his amazement, a new Judith awaited him. She
had
shopped from butter to shoes, because about a dozen bags sat at her feet. Not all her purchases were waiting to be loaded into the truck, either.

She was wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with Bugs Bunny and the Tasmanian Devil dressed as homeboys. She’d paired the shirt with bright blue shorts and cheap canvas sneakers. Her legs were revealed now for his inspection, and he didn’t shy from the job. They were fine ones, beautifully tanned, magnificently shaped. He could easily imagine them wrapped around his waist as he thrust into her soft depths.…

“Hi,” she said through the open window of
the truck as he pulled to a stop in front of her. “I couldn’t resist the shirt. Don’t you love it?”

He liked what was underneath a whole lot more, but bit his tongue against saying so. He wished she were biting his tongue. Damn, what was it about her? “It’s … interesting.”

“You’re an old fogey.” She picked up a bag. “Gosh, but this was fun, and I didn’t even dither over things. Normally, I can’t make up my mind, but this time I knew exactly what I needed. And I got
Fruiti Lupis!
You know, the Spanish version of Froot Loops cereal. I love it.”

She was ecstatic over buying Froot Loops. He was in big trouble on the ride home. Still, he couldn’t help grinning at her enthusiasm. Most people hated shopping, but she obviously had had a good time doing that simple task.

He picked up a large heavy box. Spanish lettering on its sides revealed what was inside. He chuckled. “A portable camp toilet? I see you’ve visited the ‘
facilidades
’ at the
ejido
.”

She made a face. “Oh, yes. God help us all. But at twenty-five cents a pop, I think this will be cheaper. And more … private.”

“You’re an amazing woman,” he said, setting the box in the truck bed.

She paused in the process of handing several bags to him. “I am?”

“Yes.”

The scary part was that he meant it.