It was almost six by the time Dell turned the SUV into the drive and slowed down as three white-tailed deer bounded across in front of the car. Seeing the graceful animals always gave her an unexpected dart of pleasure. They were so exquisitely formed, so much a part of this dry ranch country that still hadn’t surrendered completely to Laredo’s encroaching sprawl. Dell smiled in spite of her weariness. The slight bump as they crossed the cattle guard, put in years ago by her father and never paved over, made Michelle stir and sit up. She wiped a hand across her eyes and looked out. “We’re home,” she said, surprised.
She’d fallen asleep after the tiring day, and Dell wondered if she even knew she’d used the word “home.” She thought back to the most awkward moment of the day, when the judge had spoken to Michelle’s mother alone in her chambers. Apparently, the woman had accused Dell of trying to steal her daughter’s affection, before being confronted by the judge, who reminded the woman sternly that she had thrown Michelle out because the girl had spent the night with her boyfriend — after doing nothing to prevent that situation in the first place. The woman had dissolved in tears and pleas for another chance. She explained she was taking parenting classes from her church, and she was trying to cope with her husband’s abandonment after so many years. Michelle, she sobbed, was all she had, and she needed her back.
The judge had spoken separately to Michelle, who asked to stay with Dell. But, reluctantly, the judge insisted that, if Michelle’s mother continued to take classes and try to overcome her own problems, the sixteen-year-old would have to return to her mother. Meanwhile, she asked Dell to allow weekly visits for Michelle and her mother at the ranch. After the court appearance, Dell took Michelle out to eat and then to the mall, thinking it best that the girl have some time alone before she had to face Amy, Selina, and especially Maribel. Together, they walked the long corridors, not crowded on a weekday afternoon. Michelle refused to look for bargains at first, then shyly stepped closer to a window to browse the costume jewelry beckoning shoppers. Dell smiled when Michelle suddenly grabbed her wrist and urged her in to look at a T-shirt featuring the newest teen idol.
“You’re sure you don’t mind?” Michelle asked a second time as Dell paid for the shirt. She looked excited and a little abashed all at once. “Mom hated when I needed new clothes.”
“I don’t mind,” Dell assured, letting the remark about the girl’s mother slide.
“Thanks!” They headed back out, and Michelle glanced up at her. “I don’t get it.”
“Get what?” Dell paused to let a group of teens in saggy pants saunter past, and Michelle looked after them a minute, then remembered what she’d been saying.
“Why do you let us stay, Dell? Maribel says it’s about money — ”
Dell shook her head, stopping to peer through the window at a brightly colored sheath. “Not about money.”
“Nah.” Michelle looked at the dress Dell was looking at and wrinkled her nose. “Ugly. No, not the money, I can tell. But why?” She urged Dell away from the pricey store, heading toward the two-story merry-go-round nearby, with its benches and soda machines.
“Our own moms didn’t want us,” she pointed out after a moment. “And you’re nobody — I mean, not to us. Yeah, we like you and stuff, but … ” Another, pronounced shrug.
“You don’t get it.” Dell pursed her lips and ran a hand over her head. “Guess it’s a little to do with what Maribel said,” she answered finally.
“About?” Michelle colored. “All I could think about this morning was me,” she admitted.
Dell grinned at her. “I think you’re entitled to worry a little about yourself now and then.” She walked over to the drink machine and peered in. “Thirsty?”
“Yeah. Water’s good.”
Dell retrieved two bottles and they sauntered on, Michelle quiet as she finished half the bottle in a gulp and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
“Your mom?” she said finally.
“Yeah.” Dell thought for a moment. “Judge Ovalle-Martinez filled me in on some of your problems, Michelle. Your mother didn’t pay enough attention to you, she said. She thought that was your main problem.”
“Yeah,” Michelle agreed. “No news there, though. Your mother — ”
“My mother … dressed me up. Showed me off. And pretty much ignored me if there wasn’t some special occasion. Some function, preferably with photographers in attendance. After she and my father divorced, I sort of pretended there was only my dad.” Dell smiled at the memory of her father. “He loved me.”
Michelle put out a hand, stopping her, and stared up at her. Suddenly she seemed to realize she was gripping Dell’s wrist and dropped it.
“So you lied?” she asked, in a small, but determined voice. “About home being best? About mothers loving their kids.”
“No,” Dell said with conviction, and reached out to touch Michelle’s cheek. “I meant it. I believe, mostly, home is best. Mothers love their little girls. Just not always, honey.”
“Not always.” Michelle nodded in agreement and pointed. “I think we parked out that way.”
Together they started toward the exit, and Michelle moved close beside Dell as they neared the door. “So … what’s up with Jovi?” she asked with a quick glance up at Dell.
Dell shook her head. “Oh, no. Just as you said — nobody’s business.”
“I didn’t say that,” Michelle pointed out with a quick smile. “Selly did.”
Dell laughed. “So if you were only thinking about yourself, how can you quote Selina?”
Michelle giggled. “Selina’s always got the good gossip — los chismes,” she retorted. “She’s how we know stuff.”
“Aha! So I go to Selina next time I need a report on you girls?”
“That depends,” Michelle said primly, clambering into the SUV. “Selina for good stuff, or girl stuff.” She pulled the door shut and waited until Dell was in her seat. “But for the nasty stuff, stuff no one should know, ask Maribel.” She flopped back against the seat, the conversation over.
Dell frowned as she turned the key. She didn’t doubt Maribel would poison the waters whenever she could. And again, that nagging wonder — how had Maribel found out about her mother? And how had she known she could use it to hurt?
• • •
“Girls must be upstairs with the TVs on,” Dell concluded when no one rushed out the door to meet them as they pulled into the garage. “I thought they’d be waiting at the door, as long as we’ve been gone.” She smiled at Michelle and switched the ignition off. “They’ll be happy to see you, though.”
Michelle nodded and slid out. “Yeah.”
Thinking about how hard it would be when Michelle returned home to her mother sent a shiver of apprehension through Dell. Could she even imagine losing Becky? The agency had been clear that there were no guarantees in Becky staying with her, and that they tried to return children to their homes if there were any way at all.
Surely in Becky’s case that wouldn’t be possible. Her mother had been in and out of jail, and, according to the case worker, hadn’t even expressed a desire to know where or how Becky was last time the worker had spoken to her. Still, Dell was in a genuinely down mood by the time she got out. She waved Michelle to the rear of the vehicle with a half-smile as she stretched. She dug under the driver’s seat for the low-heeled walking shoes she always kept there. Kicking off her heels with relief, she slid her feet into the loafers and walked back to peer in at the cluster of bags.
“I’ll be in shortly,” she told the girl. “Get everyone to help, will you? Tell them I just needed some air. And give Becky a kiss for me, okay?”
“Got it,” Michelle called, already half way to the door with her bags. Dell left the car doors open so the girls could finish unloading and walked slowly down the drive toward the stable, letting the sun hammer away at her tense shoulders.
The stable door was open wide, and she could hear an excited commotion inside — hooves striking stall doors, Pete’s shouts at the horses to quiet down and for Danny to hurry up. Feeding time — how long had it been since she’d carted food along that aisle? The three men must have it under better control than she and Pete and her father had before, though; she hadn’t heard a single cuss word color the afternoon air. Grinning, she skirted the barn, then the riding arena, and took a path through the nearest pasture, relishing the feel of soft, spongy grass under her feet instead of the ungiving feel of asphalt or tile. This pasture was irrigated and had withstood the summer’s heat well, but other pastures without a steady source of water were already burning and turning brown and dry. Off along the far fence line, three of the mares grazed peacefully, but she ignored them, walking instead in the general direction of the river pasture with its tangle of mesquite trees and tall reeds.
The river pasture was a long strip of sparse pasture hemmed in by the Rio Grande. Stock was seldom allowed to roam here, because no fence prevented animals from coming or going across the river to Mexico. When she had been a child, back when her mother and father had first started creating this south Texas showplace, the riverbank had been a virtual park. The native underbrush had been cleared, although the mesquites and stunted live oaks were left along the banks. Now vines, carrizo cane, and tangling grass were all over again, almost obscuring the picnic tables and grill that had been built near the bank. Nearby, a simple cabaña had provided shelter from the weather and housed party supplies; it was unpainted and relatively unchanged, although she couldn’t remember the last time she’d actually looked for the key to the padlocked door and gone inside. The windows were boarded up; she had given Danny and Pete strict instructions to be sure no one could get inside the abandoned structure. She wouldn’t have minded so much if the Mexican or Central American aliens swimming the river seeking work had used the cabaña for protection from a sudden storm or cold front, but the entire border was facing an onslaught from alien and drug smugglers.
She looked around carefully, but everything seemed much the same as it had when she was a teenager, riding down here almost daily to hide out from the world.
She had heard entirely too many tales of ranchers who had serious problems when their deserted riverbanks were used as staging areas by smugglers bringing marijuana and cocaine across the river. Although she suspected some of the property owners might not be as innocent as they claimed, she knew of one couple who had given up their ranch after being unable to keep traffickers away.
Relieved to find such calm, she walked down to the very edge of the river. Most of the bank here was steep, falling off with outcroppings of rock and dotted with cactus, but her father had leveled this one section out enough to allow easy entry into the waters. Her eyes stung with memories of her father, working in the sun to build this playground for her. Now the river’s waters were so polluted that swimming was unsafe; factories here and upriver, as well as the maquiladoras, or factories, in Nuevo Laredo, had contaminated the Rio Grande and its banks with commercial toxins, while the area’s burgeoning population had contributed to its pollution as well.
She drew a deep breath, then let it out slowly. Her father would have had trouble dealing with the loss of his river, she knew. On the heels of that thought, the fleeting image of her mother, uncaring that Samuel Rosales would have given his life for her or that he’d lived a life of loss and heartache without the woman he’d been married to briefly but had loved always. She squeezed her eyes shut, almost seeing her mother, lean and blonde, frowning and brushing imaginary grime from her arm. Her father, kneeling on the blanket there on the riverbank, holding out a strawberry. The smell of strawberry … she’d never forget that picture when strawberries teased her senses. And her mother pushing his hand away, pushing herself up, and slamming into the cabana. She’d been young then, but she could still see the pain in her father’s eyes at yet another rejection.
She sighed and opened her eyes to gaze at the river again. At least he’d been saved the heartache of the river’s demise, of the incomprehensible violence now confronting this one place that had given him peace.
Stepping back, she went back up into the shade of the trees, finding the conveniently bent tree trunk that had once been her throne, and boosted herself up. She felt material snag and belatedly realized she was still in her courtroom attire. Frowning, she extended a leg; the sheer nylon was shredded, and she’d probably just ruined her skirt. Oh, well. She shrugged the damage aside. It had been too long since she’d freed herself from walls and headaches and the daily business of problem solving. She stretched lazily, reclining more comfortably on the trunk, basking in the heated air washing over her body, soaking into her weary muscles. Small animals rustled and birds chirped; she closed her eyes, abandoning conscious thought completely.
She was blissfully near sleep when there was a sudden, heavy thrashing in the undergrowth, as if someone unfamiliar with the woods had stumbled through brush. Startled, she sat up, her heart beating heavily as she slid her feet to the ground, debating whether she should stand her ground or leave. Talk about hindsight. She hadn’t even thought to bring the cell phone with her on this impromptu hike. She licked her lips to moisten them, then stood up cautiously, taking a step or two away from the trunk. The rustling continued, but not as loudly, and she paused, listening. Maybe her drowsiness had frightened her without cause, and the noise was simply a deer or a cow that had come across the river — some large animal, moving toward the water to drink. Hopefully it wasn’t a javelina — that could be bad news. Her face screwed up at the prospect of facing a wild boar who didn’t appreciate having his territory invaded.
Then the limbs of two closely placed trees parted, and Jovi stepped out into the relatively cleared space around her. She gasped — in relief or in surprise, she couldn’t have said herself.
“You!” he said, obviously startled. And then his eyes swept over her, noting her hair, full of bits of leaves and twigs, which had come undone, as well as the shredded hose and snagged suit skirt. “Are you all right?”
“Of course,” she replied coolly. “Why wouldn’t I be?” The fact she had named a number of possible health hazards just seconds ago was none of his business. Somehow, letting Jovani Treviño know anything she thought or felt seemed inadvisable. But he just stood there, looking at her with a certain amount of derision in his dark eyes, although he answered her in a normal enough tone.
“Well … you’re here.” He stepped closer, then gestured toward her. “And you look … uh … ”
“A mess?” she suggested helpfully, brushing at her hair and coming away with several pieces of debris.
“Maybe not a mess,” he said. “But at least a little bedraggled.”
She laughed, and a bird flew from its hiding place above them. “I haven’t been called bedraggled in a while,” she told him. Then she frowned, tilting her head up a little to see his face through the shadows that darkened it.
“Why wouldn’t I be here, though? And how do you know about this place? I’m surprised, with as little time as you’ve been on the ranch.”
He shrugged and walked over to where she stood. Her heart pounded more heavily than when she had considered being attacked by javelinas. His presence was unnerving, electrifying. She focused on ignoring his physical closeness and waited for him to answer.
“I’ve known about this since the afternoon you hired me,” he said easily, leaning against the tree trunk beside her and looking down and out, toward the river, squinting a little. His sleeved arm brushed her bare one, and she tucked her elbow imperceptibly against her waist, resisting the urge to withdraw to a safer distance.
“That’s surprising,” she repeated, and felt his gaze return to her.
“I don’t think so.” He shifted, and his arm pressed into hers a little more closely. “I’d say it was only right that I toured the place. How can I run things if I don’t know what I have? Pete gave me a complete ride around. I’ve already told them we need to hire a crew and clean out this brush.” He looked around, and his voice took on a more solemn note. “Which brings us to why you shouldn’t be here,” he finished slowly. “At least not alone.” He waved a bronze hand in front of her, sweeping it across her line of vision. “Do you know what drug smugglers, or even coyotes, might do to a woman they found down here by the river alone? Look at all the places someone could hide — anyone who wanted could use the cabin and the area here for — for whatever. You’d never know. Neither would Pete.” He looked around again, and the heaviness in his voice was impossible to ignore. “I seriously doubt drug traffickers don’t know about places like this anywhere along the river.”
The fact he didn’t mention Danny puzzled her, but she put that aside for a moment, turning to face him. “You sure became an expert on local matters in a hurry, Jovani. You’re all but implying … ” A frown slashed her face. “You had better not be implying drug trafficking goes on here! And as for why I’m here — it’s my property, and I don’t think women should stay inside and wring their little hands in the sanctity of their own house.”
He sighed and wiped a hand over his face, then through his hair. When he looked down at her, his face was full of irritation.
“Look, Dell, I didn’t imply anything. And, just for the information, I, like most normal, fairly well-educated men in this day and age, have no caveman perceptions of what women could or should do. But there’s such a thing as stupidity” — he ruthlessly ignored her small stutter of protest — “and being down here alone with night approaching is stupid.”
They were silent for a long moment. She didn’t argue with what he’d said. Realistically, she supposed he was right, even if she had no intention of agreeing with him out loud.
“I used to come here alone a lot when I was a kid,” she said eventually. “I suppose I forgot how much things have changed.”
He sighed, looking around. “I bet you usually came on a horse, too,” he said. “Something you could have gotten away on in a hurry if you needed to. Besides, when you were a kid, before you’re parents divorced, I’m sure just being who you were was protection enough.” His face was somber. “Now no one knows, Dell, and even if they knew, it’s not enough. Now being Lionel De Cordoba’s granddaughter might be an invitation to harm instead of protection from it.”
She laughed shortly and moved away from him, then turned to face him. “No. I’m sure anyone who knows who I am knows my grandfather wouldn’t pay a penny for me. My bridges with him are well-burned, Jovi.” She shrugged. “I suppose I should head back. I don’t want anyone at the house to worry, and I’ve been gone awhile.” She took a couple of tentative steps, then remembered Maribel and turned back.
“Wait. There’s something we should talk about first,” she said. “Jovi, why — and where — were you alone with Maribel?”
“Maribel?” His surprise seemed genuine. “What are you talking about, Dell?”
“Maribel and I had an ugly scene this morning.” She flushed. “About last night. What she saw.”
“You had to have expected something of the sort,” he said reasonably. “She’s not the kind to just politely turn around and walk out of an embarrassing situation especially not one she thinks she can manipulate to her own advantage.” He reached out and brushed at something on her shoulder without asking, his fingers warm through her blouse.
“That’s not the point,” she responded coolly, ignoring the small, burning spot where his fingers had just been. “I knew she’d have something to say. What bothers me is what she said.” She took a step away from him, looking up at him. “Apparently, the two of you have been spending time together. Alone. And no matter how innocently, that’s not smart, Jovi.”
“Alone? With Maribel? How you can possibly believe … ” He was furious, anger in his voice and in his eyes. He stepped toward her, and she could almost feel the rage coiling through him. She didn’t back away, although she tried to visualize what the footing right behind her was like, in case she was forced to flee. Then she tilted her head imperceptibly, and confronted him with her own quiet anger.
“Maribel made it a point to tell Michelle my mother abandoned me,” she told him matter-of-factly. “That Erika De Cordova abandoned me. You, Pete, and Rosa are the only three people on this ranch who know whose daughter I am, or that we don’t have anything to do with each other.”
His fierce scowl eased into an expression of puzzlement, and again he wiped a hand over his face, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. Then he sighed heavily and shook his head.
“Look, Dell, I can see why you’d assume, but I haven’t said anything to Maribel. Why would I? And when would I? You can’t honestly believe I’d be stupid enough to put myself in a compromising situation with her, can you? I’d like to think I’d made a better impression on you than that — that you were a better judge of people than that.”
Unconsciously, Dell worried her lip as she went over what he’d said. How he’d said it. Finally, she nodded reluctantly. “Okay. Let’s give you the benefit of the doubt — you weren’t alone with Maribel.” Her hand moved to her throat, and she tugged at the collar of her blouse, rearranging it absently. “Then how did she find out who I am?” She frowned. “It isn’t that it really matters — there are people who know, and anyone could find out if they had some reason. I suppose Pete might even have told Danny, just shooting bull to pass the time. But they’ve worked together for years. Why her? And how?” She shook her head, agitated. “She’s a sixteen-year-old with serious problems. She’s not allowed online without supervision, and even if she were, the last thing she’d be interested in would be me.”
Jovi shrugged. “Dell, I have no idea what the deal is.” He tilted his head to glance up at the sky then at his watch. “Are you sure no one else could have told her?”
“I don’t see who.” She, too, checked the time. “I don’t see why, either. I have to get back, though. I’ve been away from Becky too long already.”
“I’ll give you a lift — the pickup’s just back up at the head of the path down here.”
“I’d walk, but I guess for the sake of time … ” She turned toward the path leading back and was startled when he laid a hand on her arm, stopping her.
“We didn’t talk about this morning,” he said huskily, his eyes dark and unreadable.
“There’s nothing to say, is there?” She gently drew her arm from his grasp. “We made an error in judgment. One that neither one of us is likely to repeat.” Her eyes met his challengingly. “I’m not likely to find you in the kitchen in the middle of the night again, am I?”
“No.” His lips quirked, and the tiny chispitas danced in his eyes. “Unfortunately. But I can tell you where else to look, if you want.”