Moon Flower (Gone-to-Texas Trilogy) (53 page)

      
Rafe groaned but could not look away. She quickened the rhythm of her hips. Once again, the muscles and tendons of his body tightened. His eyes glazed but never turned from hers. Continuing her movements, Deborah leaned down, her face close to his. “Now, love, now!”

      
The dark body bucked with such force that she was almost thrown off. She felt his eruption deep within her, and cried out in wonder. Rafe collapsed back on the bed, totally drained.

      
Deborah leaned forward, pressing her weight down upon her spent lover. She kissed his cheek and asked, “Rafael?”

      
There was a long pause before Rafe, staring up into her waiting eyes, responded in a ragged whisper, “Yes, Moon Flower, I love you.”

      
Again she gently kissed his cheek, her own face aglow with a tender smile—a smile of love and a smile of triumph.

      
They lay silently for several moments, bodies still joined, sweat-soaked and spent, yet at peace. Finally, Rafe rolled her to her side. “What was that supposed to prove?” he asked as he traced a soft pattern on her collarbone.

      
“Oh, you didn't like it?” she asked innocently.

      
“You could see damn well how I liked it,” he growled. “But you never did that before, took over so completely.” He looked rather abashed.

      
“Rafael, ever since we met, you've been in control of our lives,” she began hesitantly.

      
He let out a low, ragged rumble of laughter. “You have a short memory, my spitfire abolitionist! You always managed to thwart me.”

      
“Except for one place—oh, Rafael,” she cried, feeling him stiffen in anger, “I don't mean I want to thwart you when we make love—you know how much I desire you. I love you and I need you...” Her voice trailed off.

      
Almost afraid to ask, he said, “And you resent it?”

      
“Yes, sometimes I do,” she answered truthfully. “We have something very special, I know that, but...sometimes it seems...”

      
Realizing her anguish, he pulled her closer and kissed her neck softly, whispering, “That I've used lovemaking to chain you?” He paused to search his own feelings and confessed, “Sometimes I have...out of fear of losing you. I love you so much, Deborah, can you doubt that?”

      
“I believe you always loved me, Rafael, even when you had Lily, too.” There, it was out! She had finally said what had been gnawing at her subconscious ever since he walked back into her life.

      
Rafe sighed. “I guess I knew sooner or later we would have to deal with this. When I left New Orleans, I pensioned Lily off, Deborah. I've not had a mistress since, nor will I ever have one again.” He took her chin in his hand and forced her to meet his eyes. “Melanie is in St. Louis with her grandmother and aunt. I have a responsibility to support her and I'll never shirk that. Would you want me to?”

      
“No, of course not,” she whispered painfully. “But I guess it still hurts, knowing she gave you children, shared that with you.”

      
“Lily and I shared nothing but the bedroom, Deborah. We were both sixteen-year-old children when my father made our arrangement. It's taken me a long time to grow up. As for Lily”—he shrugged painfully—“she never even loved our daughter. She was ill, I guess, unstable mentally, desperately afraid of having another child after our son died.

      
“As I look back I can see better now the reasons for her fearfulness and unnatural actions. But then, she was forced into an unnatural life. I pity Lily, Deborah. I cared for her, but I never loved her.”

      
Thinking of his daughter growing up so far away, Deborah said, “Do you miss Melanie?”

      
He stroked her arm softly. “Yes. And I do love her, but she's grown up with her mother's family in St. Louis, not with me or Lily in New Orleans. It's for the best that she not be with her mother.” He paused, then said slowly, “Deborah, we can have a daughter, another son, lots of children—if you want to build a life with me. Do you? Can you forgive the past?” He held his breath.

      
Deborah looked into his anguished face. “Oh yes, Rafael, I do want to build a life with you, a life with our children here. I need you so much. I guess that's why I wanted some control, too, when we were making love.”

      
“Some control?” he echoed incredulously. “Lady, you nearly drove me out of my mind!”

      
Snuggling against his side, she pressed her lips to his neck and chuckled. “I know. I loved it.”

      
Rafe was a bit taken aback, but smiled indulgently. “Then I guess that makes us even, Moon Flower.”

      
He felt her warm breath as she murmured against his skin, softly, languidly, “Oh no, my arrogant darling...not quite yet...not for years and years...”

Chapter Twenty Eight

      
“Why now? Why after all these years, did this have to happen just when we've been reunited?” Rafe asked in an anguished whisper. The silent library gave him no answers. Once more, his eyes returned to the terse message on the expensive vellum paper.

Dearest Rafael:

      
I know we agreed never to communicate again, but circumstances make it imperative that I do so. I have sustained a double loss this month. My mother and Therese have been killed in a carriage accident. Fortunately, Melanie was not with them. The authorities in St. Louis sent her to New Orleans at once.

      
But there is a grave complication in having her make her home with me. I have taken your advice and married a Free Man of Color, Charles Bertin, a dueling master of some renown. Charles does not want any reminders of my past.

      
You promised to care for Melanie when we parted, Rafael. I have found a fine school in Virginia, but it is, of course, for whites only. Melanie betrays no black blood, Rafael, and if you would make the arrangements, I am certain they would accept her as your legal daughter. I have enclosed the address. I trust you to do what is best for Melanie.

In fond remembrance,

Lily

      
Rafe scoffed, realizing that Lily would reject Melanie regardless of what any husband of hers might say.
I trust you to do what is best for Melanie.
The words accused him from the page. Yes, it would be up to him, for Lily had never loved her daughter. She had provided him with a neat, simple solution, too. He could afford the tuition charges and farm the girl off to a fancy boarding school where she would easily pass for white.

      
But could he do that? Leave a grieving twelve-year-old child in the care of strangers? He had felt guilty enough about not seeing her these past years since he'd come to Texas, but at least he'd salved his conscience with the fact that Marie and Therese had lavished on her all the motherly love Lily was incapable of giving.

      
But if I bring her here, what will Deborah do? Melanie will be a constant reminder of all the painful things we've left behind. He stopped pacing the library and sat down, resting his head in his hands.

* * * *

      
“Whut in tarnation's eatin' thet varmint? All's I did wuz ask him ‘bout them horses Micah spotted runnin' in Spider Creek Canyon.” Joe scratched his head in bafflement.

      
“I don't know,” Lucia replied. “Rafe's been on edge all week.”

      
Deborah walked across the courtyard, heading toward them.

      
“Mornin’, Deborah,” Joe said with a warm smile.

      
“I have to talk to you…” She faltered, then resumed. “Last week Rafael received a letter from a hired courier. Do either of you know its contents?”

      
“No, he has told no one what news it contained, not me, not Joe either,” Lucia replied.

      
“Whutever, it's made him mean as a poked rattler. But it ain't got nothin' ta do with you 'n Adam,” Joe assured her.

      
“I’m not so sure, Joe,” Deborah replied, chewing on her lower lip. “I suspect it may have a great deal to do with me.”

      
“He tell you thet?” Joe cocked an eyebrow in inquiry as he lobbed a wad of tobacco near one of Lucia's basil plants.

      
“No,” Deborah replied, thinking irrelevantly that she must do something about Joe's loathsome personal habits. “He's spoken barely half a dozen words a day to me since he spent that afternoon in the library. Every time I try to get him to talk about it, he gets angry and stalks away,” she choked out helplessly. “It must have been some news from his family back in New Orleans.”

      
“Thet fancy daddy o' his'n makin' more grief—er mebbee some bad news from his sister,” Joe ventured.

      
“No, not from Lenore. He'd tell me anything about her. It might be from his father or mother.”
Or from his
other
family
, she thought with dread squeezing her heart.

* * * *

      
The biting wind and gritty dust suited his mood. Men's and horses' breaths were like white puffs of clouds in front of their frozen faces. Rafe scanned the brilliant azure horizon and watched his mustangers driving the horses toward the blind canyon. He was reminded of his winter as Horse Tamer in the Comanche camp. Life was simple then. Just survive one day at a time. Ruefully, he realized he was doing just that now.
I’m out here freezing my ass off, working ‘til I drop running wild mustangs to ground just so I don't have to face Deborah with what to do about Melanie.
Swearing, he spurred his big sorrel into a ground-devouring gallop, waving a wide, coiled length of heavy rope at the terrified wild horses to turn them toward the carefully laid trap.

* * * *

      
“How long do these hunts usually last?” Deborah asked Joe as they sat by the fire in the parlor. Rafe had been gone two days and Deborah was worried.

      
“Depends,” he replied as he poked a big oak chunk until the orange glow of the coals blazed to his satisfaction. “This time shouldn't be long since Micah already spotted th' herd.”

      
“But it's so cold to be out-of-doors,” she replied, looking at the brilliant, starry night.

      
Joe laughed. “Rafe's tough. Why, even Lucia spent years livin' out in th' open with th' Nerms. She tole me once't she rode fer two days in a blue norther clean across th' Llano Estecado.”

      
Deborah could see the warmth in his face as he described Lucia's courage and ingenuity. Suddenly, she was struck by a startling fact—Joe was in love with the pretty Mexicana! Looking back over the past weeks, she realized how obvious it was. He followed her with his eyes as she cleared off the table after meals, found excuses to hang around the kitchen, brought her slips of wild herbs and medicinal plants that he found on the range. Joe teased everyone—Micah and all the vaqueros, Rafael and Adam, even her; but he never teased Lucia.

      
Lucia, however, seemed oblivious of Joe other than as a friend. Of course, Deborah realized that Lucia had been quietly in love with Rafael all these years. That bittersweet illusion had been shattered with the arrival of his wife and child.
How painful it must be for both of them.

      
Her thoughts were interrupted as she caught sight of Lucia and Adam heading toward the library. Once they were out of earshot, Deborah said innocently, “Lucia's so good with Adam. Wouldn't it be nice for her to have children of her own?”

      
If she'd prodded him with the glowing fireplace poker, he couldn't have been taken more by surprise. “I 'spect she'd have ta find a man, first, Deborah,” he choked out sourly.

      
“How old are you, Joe?”

      
His shrewd brown eyes stared into her guileless lavender ones. “Whut's th' burr 'neath yore blanket?”

      
“Hmm, no gray in your hair to speak of. Good teeth—if you'd stop chewing that vile tobacco. You look to be in fit shape for a man of...” She let her voice trail off as she made a mock inspection of the squirming man before her.

      
“Forty-one,” he supplied uncomfortably. “Deborah, you ain't thinkin' o' me 'n Lucia?” He ended on a half whisper, half croak.

      
“Why not? You are in love with her, aren't you, Joe?”

      
He looked at her for a painful moment, then averted his gaze quickly. “It don't rightly signify what I am—I'm a half breed—part Indian 'n ya can't even begin ta imagine whut she's lived through with Indians.”

      
“Those were wild Comanches who enslaved her, Joe. She doesn't hate all Indians, certainly not a very civilized man of Cherokee ancestry.”

      
“There's other things...” He stopped, unable to voice his real objection.

      
“You mean the fact Lucia's been in love with my husband?” Deborah said softly.

      
His head jerked up and their eyes met. “They ain't never been together thet way, Deborah. You know it. Rafe loves ya too much ta even think o' her thet way 'n she never give him no reason ta consider it neither.”

      
“I know, Joe. Lucia and I had a long talk the day I arrived.”