The Abducted Heart (Sweetly Contemporary Collection) (5 page)

An expression on her face of the same stolid endurance as a man going before the firing squad, María indicated fluffy pink towels and washcloths, bath salts, soap, and a drawer containing toothbrushes still in their wrappers, and small tubes of paste. A hairbrush of pristine cleanliness was brought out, then the woman went to the wardrobe to remove a nightgown of palest flesh-pink silk. A faint perfume of potpourri was wafted into the air as María laid it across the bed. Under the spell of such an old-fashioned scent, it was a moment before Anne realized that though the skirt of the gown was long and flowing, the bodice was composed of nothing more than a cobweb of lace. It didn’t matter, of course. There would be no one to see her in it. Still, that vague sense of mistrust she had felt earlier assailed her once more.

“Buenas noches, señorita,” María said from the doorway.

Collecting herself with an effort, Anne told the woman goodnight and, when she had gone, carefully locked the door behind her.

A warm, lingering bath made a great improvement to her jangled nerves. By the time she had padded around in her bare feet, folding her cream drill skirt and jacket, and her orange shell over a chair, rinsing out her underclothing and hanging them to drip-dry, some of the strangeness of her surroundings had worn away. She could never really get used to such luxury, she mused as she caught sight of herself in the oval mirror with its candle sidelights over the dressing table. She was not meant for such things. She had to admit, however, that nothing she had ever owned had become her like the graceful wisp of the gown she was wearing. The color seemed to lend a pearl-like sheen to her skin and to bring a richer gleam to the gold highlights in her tawny blond hair. A faint color bloomed in the paleness of her face, and in the depths of her brown eyes a secret excitement glowed.

Abruptly she turned away. Tomorrow she would be gone from here. This incident would soon be over and forgotten. That was all it was, an incident. An accident — stupid, but not harmful. Annoying, but not harmful...

Sleep seemed impossible. The small nagging headache behind her eyes had grown steadily more persistent. She had hoped it would go away, but it had not.

Señor Castillo had said his bedroom was nearby, and it should be a simple thing to go and ask for something to relieve the pain; still, she did not dare. If she appeared at the door of his room now, when they should both be settling down for the night, he could hardly be blamed for jumping to the wrong conclusion. He had done so once already, and she did not, just now, feel equal to making the situation clear to him if he should react in the same manner. The imprint of his kiss seemed to linger on her mouth, an indelible reminder of the contemptuous regard in which he held the women who forced themselves on him.

She might have mentioned her headache to María, of course, though at the time it had not seemed worth the effort of overcoming both the woman’s hostility and the language barrier. She had no one but herself to blame for the restless night she saw stretching before her.

And yet, the moment she closed her eyes, she felt herself floating in a gray void that grew gradually darker. She slept.

Pain, throbbing with the beat of her heart, pulsing like a current through her head, awakened her. The dim light of early morning sifting through the curtains revealed the furnishings of the french bedroom standing in ghostly splendor around her. Anne stared at them blankly, without recognition.

Then she remembered. She was in the house of Señor Ramón Carlos Castillo, an unwilling, and unwelcome, guest. She must get up, put on her clothes, and get ready to leave. The flight to Dallas might be an early one.

She started to raise herself on one elbow, then stopped as her head exploded with pain. Her vision blurred. Nausea rose in her throat, subsiding as she remained completely still. She closed her eyes tightly, opening them only when the throbbing had faded to a steady ache.

She could not stay here in bed doing nothing. It might be hours before someone came. She had to get up. Perhaps if she had some kind of medication she would be able to move about enough to dress herself and be ready to leave on time. In her pain-filled mind, that seemed more important than anything else. It was a goal to fasten her will and her strength upon.

By slow degrees she got out of bed and made her way, holding to the furniture, to the door. Surely, she reasoned as she paused after each movement, her appearance at the señor’s door this morning could not be misunderstood. In any case, if he touched her, she would scream, she would not be able to help herself.

She unlocked the door with difficulty. The hall outside stretched dark except for a single pool of light cast by a hanging lantern onto the crimson, Arabesque hall runner. There did not appear to be another soul stirring in the house.

An instant later, Anne realized her mistake. A thin line of light was coming from beneath one of the doors just up the hall from her own. Taking a deep breath, she moved toward it.

A woman’s voice answered her knock. Anne’s relief was short-lived however, for the woman who opened the panel was not María. She was tall and slim, with aquiline features plus the self-possessed air and telltale lines of a woman in her late twenties or early thirties. Her black hair was pared in the center and drawn back into a knot of uncompromising severity on the nape of her neck. She wore a plain robe of fawn velvet that did nothing to relieve the sallowness of her complexion, and her thin-lipped mouth looked as though it had never relaxed into a smile. Her shallow brown eyes widened in shock at the sight of Anne, then an unbecoming flush of anger surged to her hairline.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“I’m Anne Matthews. I came with Señor Castillo,” Anne answered the questions painstakingly. “Do you have an aspirin — anything for pain? I have a terrible headache.”

“What do you mean, you came with Señor Castillo? I demand an explanation!”

Anne put her hand to her head. The shrill timbre of the woman’s voice seemed to slice into her brain. “On the plane — from Dallas,” she replied in a low murmur.

“From Dallas!” The woman bit her lip. “You — you are perhaps a new secretary Ramón has hired for his American operations?”

Anne shook her head. “Please...”

“Then I am waiting for you to explain what you are doing here, and why you are wearing the night gown of Ramón’s sister, Estela?” the woman exclaimed, holding her hands together at her waist, her mouth tight with disapproval as she surveyed the soft curves of Anne’s breasts just visible through the lace bodice of the gown in the light falling from inside the room.

Anne’s patience and endurance was wearing thin. “I am here because Señor Castillo insisted that I stay with him. As for the gown, I had nothing to wear.”

“So Señor Castillo insisted, did he?” the woman sneered. “I should think you might call him by his given name then, considering...”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Anne began.

“You should be very proud,” the other woman rushed on. “Yes, proud that you have caused Ramón to alter the principles of a lifetime for your sake.”

From the corner of her eye, Anne was aware of the approach of a black-garbed figure. It was the housekeeper, María, hastening in their direction, making futile quieting motions with her hands. Inside the door, the other woman was not aware of her advance, or of the appearance in the hall from another room of a frail older woman wrapped in a lace-edged dressing gown.

“I only hope,” the black-haired woman continued in her tirade, “that you do not live to regret dragging Ramón down to your level, or see the day when he will despise you for it.”

“It isn’t like that,” Anne tried to say, though her voice was so weak she doubted the other woman heard her.

She did however. “Isn’t it? Isn’t it indeed? You needn’t deny it. If you were not his woman, his traveling companion, why would Ramón allow you to invade the privacy of his plane, off-limits to his own relatives? Why would he bring you into his home and dress you in his sister’s wardrobe? Tell me that! Explain it to me. I am waiting.”

“Why, indeed, Irene?” The question came in the faintly querulous voice of an elderly woman in a temper. “It may be,” she went on, “that I have more faith in my grandson than you, but it appears to me there is another explanation.”

“Tía Isabel!” the thin woman identified as Irene cried, stepping forward into the hall, brushing both Anne and the nurse aside. “What are you doing out of bed?”

“You know I seldom sleep this time of morning. I came to see what the disturbance was, and here I find you abusing a guest. What kind of conduct is this, I ask you? You take too much on yourself.”

Irene picked up one of the small hands of the elderly woman, caressing the fine, parchment-colored skin. “This woman has come with Ramón,” she explained in a soothing tone. “In my hurt and anger that he should bring such disgrace to this house I may have let my temper have too free a rein. Forgive me.”

With a soft mutter of distress, the housekeeper moved closer to the old woman, but her mistress waved her to one side.

“And what,” Doña Isabel asked, “has led you to believe that Ramón would disgrace his home? Have you proof of this extraordinary statement?”

Flinging out her hand in Anne’s direction, Irene declared, “There is your proof.”

The elderly woman lifted fine old eyes to Anne’s pale face. Her aristocratic features were lined with age, but there could be no doubt this was Señor Castillo’s grandmother. Anne, holding to her composure by sheer willpower, returned the searching regard of the older woman for long moments. She thought, as the wise old eyes turned away, that something like warmth had risen in their depths.

“I see only an attractive young woman who looks far from well,” Doña Isabel announced in firm tones.

“Por favor, señora,” the housekeeper pleaded, adding what had the sound of a warning admonition in her native tongue. When no one paid the slightest attention to her, she eased away down the hall.

“Tía Isabel, must I put into words what I suspect?” Irene asked.

“I am afraid you must,” the old woman told her without the least sign of understanding.

“This woman, I fear she is the — the mistress, the kept woman, of Ramón.”

“That is a vicious thing to say of a young woman who is my grandson’s guest. I would not have thought it of you. There is a much more likely explanation that occurs to me.”

Irene stiffened as at the expectation of a blow. “And that is?"‘

“That she is the novia, the — how do you say? — fiancée of Ramón, whom he has brought to me so that I might come to know her, and to bless their union.” Lifting her voice, she went on, “Is that not right, Ramón?”

Señor Castillo, with María trotting at his heels, came striding down the hall, tying the belt of his robe as he walked. That he was in a rage was plain from the frown between his eyes, and yet he checked at his grandmother’s words, his dark gaze holding hers as he came on more slowly. He took her hand in a casual gesture of support.

“Should you be out of bed, Abuelita?” he asked quietly.

“I was awake early, as usual, and heard Irene browbeating this young woman. How could I not intervene?”

“Browbeating?” Irene exclaimed. She would have said more had Ramón Castillo not raised his hand in an imperious command for silence.

“Browbeating,” the old woman repeated with great firmness. “She was being unspeakably rude to her, hinting at a clandestine relationship carried on brazenly beneath this roof. I felt compelled to tell her such was not, could not be, the case. That I was certain, in fact, that your explanation for the presence of so attractive a young woman must be quite otherwise.”

Ramón Castillo made no reply. A furrow of concentration between his brows, he stared at his grandmother.

Irene broke the silence. “Is it true? Is she your fiancée?”

“This is neither the time nor the place to discuss such things,” he said abruptly, flicking a quick glance in Anne’s direction. As they talked, Anne had moved back slightly to lean against the wall. Noticing her wan appearance, Señor Castillo’s frown deepened.

“I see,” Irene breathed. “You do not deny it. How dare you? How dare you? We had an understanding.”

It was the old woman who answered. “Dare, Irene? Why should he not? Don’t, please, carry on like a — like a Victorian novel. This is the twentieth century. Your father and my son, Ramón’s father, may have spoken of a marriage between you when you were both in your cradles, but the only understanding was in your own mind.”

María, hovering anxiously, put her hand on the elderly woman’s arm. “Doña Isabel,” she pleaded.

Irene threw up her head. “Ramón, will you let your grandmother speak for you?”

The señor lifted a brow. “I doubt that I could better what she has said.”

An angry spot of color appeared on the woman’s cheekbones as she turned to Doña Isabel. “I knew that you resented me. I did not know that you had poisoned Ramón’s mind against me as well. All right. I will not stay here and be insulted. I will go, now, at once! Perhaps then you will be happy. But when this weak American with her pale face and her headaches in the middle of the night has taken from both of you all you have to give and then gone on her way, I hope that you will think of me, and know what you threw away.”

Spitting the last words at them, she whirled back into her bedroom and slammed the door.