Diego was suspicious of both of them, so for the rest of the day, he never let them out of his sight. He worried that they didn’t know what kind of rage Elise’s father was in—and what he would do to the people hiding his daughter.
Elise worked doubly hard that afternoon. But every time she tried to pick up something like a heavy flat of geraniums, Alejandro’s arm would appear over her head. “Thanks,” she’d mumble, then get the next one off the truck.
Visiting her parents’ house had made her think about the past and what had happened to her. She kept thinking about what she was supposed to achieve. How could she change her life in just three weeks? She remembered what Kathy said. “Does it have to be about a man?” It was as though all three women had the same goal: Change the man; change your life.
But surely there was more than that. There had to be a different way. Absently, she watched Alejandro spray water from a hose over his head and saw his sweaty T-shirt plaster itself to his magnificent body. She wanted him, yes, but then what? What happened after sexual urges were satisfied? Not that she knew from experience, but there had to be a time when even the most beautiful of men ceased to set you on fire. There had to be nights when you just wanted to go to bed and snuggle up with a book by your favorite author.
She needed something in her life besides a man.
When Elise heard laughter, she came out of her trance. Miguel and the other men were laughing at Alejandro. They were telling him in Spanish that he had to work harder to impress the girl because she was looking at him but she wasn’t seeing him.
Elise had to turn away so Alejandro wouldn’t see her roll her eyes. “You idiots!” she said under her breath, and they laughed.
That night, Elise was sweaty, dirty, and very tired, but she knew that supper had to be made and clothes run through the washer to be hung out in the morning. “The second shift” it was called and it nearly always fell to women.
Diego nodded toward the computer. “Your boyfriend stole Carmen so you get the bookkeeping job. Tomorrow is payday.”
“My boyfriend?” she sputtered. “I was the victim in all this! You guys should—” She saw Diego’s teasing smile. Alejandro was turned away, but he too was laughing. “Very funny.”
The two men cooked while Elise sat at the kitchen table and tried to figure out the software to do the payroll. After she subtracted the wholesale price for all the materials, there wasn’t a lot of money left. It took a while to calculate the government’s cut, but when she did, the paychecks were appallingly small.
She took the cold beer Alejandro handed her and leaned back in her chair. “This is disgusting,” she said. “That little twerp Leonardo copies someone else’s design and gets paid six figures. We kill ourselves doing the actual work and we barely get a living wage.”
Alejandro said in Spanish, “Then you should make a better design.” Diego translated.
“He’s a plant expert, not me. All I’ve done in garden design is draw a circle on a piece of paper. And I only did that because I wanted—” She stopped. The men were looking at her hard. How did she know about Alejandro’s knowledge of plants? “Besides,” she said loudly, “Mrs. Bellmont wouldn’t listen to me. What do I know about gardening?”
“You know as much as that little thief does,” Alejandro said, and again Diego translated—while frowning at his brother.
“She wants some famous name to do it, so she can brag to the other women.” Elise stood up. “Maybe I should say my name is Caliente and that I have a degree from some made-up school in Italy.”
The two men were staring at her.
“What?” She looked down at herself. Her clothes were too big and she’d already pulled sticks out of her hair. “What’s wrong?”
“A rich man’s daughter,” Alejandro said. “Bryn Mawr.”
“I understood that name.” She didn’t wait for Diego to do an unnecessary translation. “Bryn Mawr isn’t exactly known for garden design. I studied a lot of art history. The closest I ever got to learning about garden design was studying Monet’s water lilies.”
The men were still staring at her.
Elise’s voice was rising as she tried to make them understand. “Mrs. Bellmont would never look at anything I proposed. She and my father can’t stand each other. He said that one time she made a pass at him, and after he turned her down, she...”
The men had their backs against the kitchen counter. They were waiting for her to see what they did.
“A woman scorned,” Elise said. “It’s quite possible that Audrey Bellmont would love to hire the daughter of a man who humiliated her.”
Alejandro and Diego smiled at her. A seed—a big one—had been planted. Elise got the drawing pad and pencils out of her suitcase. Where did she begin?
Diego put a plate of refried beans and rice beside her. “We go back to the Bellmonts’ on Friday. You have two days to come up with something to show her.”
“But I don’t know how to do this,” Elise said. “I’ve had no training. I don’t even know the size of the garden.”
Diego picked up the rolled plan off the countertop. “It’s all here. Just change it.”
“But—”
“Eat, then get to work,” Diego said.
Elise had an overwhelming sense of “I can’t” and “I don’t know how.” Alejandro said, “I hate the fishpond,” and Diego translated.
“Me too,” Elise said. “Her dogs would eat the poor fish. One time my mother said that Audrey Bellmont wanted to be a professional dancer but she got married instead so she gave it up.”
Again, the men were looking at her.
“A dance pavilion,” Elise said. “A concrete form. Round. Then a building of lattice where she can sit. In the back, it has mirrors and a ballet barre.” She picked up the pad and began to sketch. She knew just where it could be built in the garden.
Hours later, when she fell asleep over her sketch pad, it was Alejandro who carried her to bed.
“I’m dirty,” she murmured, half-asleep.
“You can shower in the morning.”
She was too sleepy to notice that he spoke in English. “Pink astilbe. No! Red firecracker plants. What are those funny-looking ones that curve? They’re thick and fuzzy.”
“Coxcomb.”
“Right.” She yawned. “You have to choose the plants. What grows on Long Island? Isn’t there some kind of wild orchid around here?”
Her eyes were closed and Alejandro kissed her forehead—then wiped his mouth. She was indeed quite dirty. She was barefoot but otherwise fully clothed, but he didn’t dare remove anything. Smiling, he went to his own bed. He was glad to see that the scared look was beginning to leave her eyes. Maybe it was on its way to being permanently gone.
The next morning, Elise was at the kitchen table when the men came in to breakfast.
She still hadn’t showered.
Alejandro leaned against the counter, drinking coffee and smiling at her. He looked at Diego. “Tell her I’ll come by for her at noon and take her to get whatever she needs.”
“You tell her,” Diego said, and went outside to begin loading the truck.
But Alejandro said nothing as Elise was engrossed with the drawings, and the men left her there. At noon, Alejandro returned to the house. Elise had showered and put on some of her own clothes. As she got into the truck with him, she started talking. “I have no idea if my plan is any good or not. I’ve not seen anything else like it. Worse is that I can’t remember exactly what my mother said about Mrs. Bellmont. Maybe it was sarcasm and she never was a dancer. I’m planning what I call a Dancer’s Garden, but she may hate it.”
Elise sighed. “Anyway, I think the cabana should be wired so there can be music. I found some sculptures online for copies of Degas’s ballerinas. I like coming around a corner and seeing something beautiful. Mrs. Bellmont has over two acres so I could do a lot with that.”
She put her head back against the seat. “The truth is that I don’t know what I’m doing.” Alejandro just smiled at her as he pulled into a parking lot in front of a used bookstore.
It was one of those places that had lots of old hardbacks on shelves, on the floor, stacked on chairs. Nothing in the store had been cleaned in years.
“Perfect!” Elise said as she got out of the truck.
Inside, he held the books as she picked out ones on garden design and a few on dancing.
“It’s a good thing you can’t understand me because I want to tell you that you are the most beautiful pack mule ever put on this earth.”
Alejandro did his best to look blank, but she saw his smile.
After he paid for it all—and the books were wonderfully cheap—he drove her to an office supply store and she got paper, pencils, and a scale ruler.
* * *
When Elise awoke on Friday morning, she lay quietly in the twin bed and listened to Alejandro breathing. Usually, she woke thinking of pouncing on him, but today she wanted to slip in beside him so he’d hold her and say encouraging things—in his choice of language. In Swahili for all she cared. She just needed someone to tell her she could do this. Could push herself onto Mrs. Bellmont, who she remembered as a rather bad-tempered woman—like her mother.
Elise closed her eyes for a moment, thinking about how she was the product of two very aggressive parents. Win at all costs! had been their motto. And that included their daughter.
They’d never seen a reason for Elise to make any decisions of her own, from her clothes to her friends, her education, even to her husband. As a child, Elise had realized that the easiest way to deal with them was to just give in. They loved her, didn’t they? They had her best interests in mind, didn’t they?
It was only after she found out that her parents had always known about Carmen that she doubted everything.
When Alejandro turned in the bed, she looked at him. Sleepy-eyed, whiskery cheeks, he was one fabulous-looking man. He raised his eyebrows in question.
“I’m scared,” she said. “If I reveal myself to Mrs. Bellmont, what if she calls my father? He hired security guards. What if he shows up with them?”
Alejandro shook his head, then threw back the sheet and went to her. He took her shoulders and pulled her out of the bed to stand in front of him. For a moment, he put his forehead to hers, his hands tight on her shoulders.
She took a few deep breaths. “Okay, I get it,” she whispered. “Be strong. Have courage. Believe.”
He put his hand under her chin and lifted her face to look into his eyes. For a moment, she thought he was going to kiss her. But he didn’t. He spun her around and pushed her toward the bathroom.
Laughing, she shut the door behind her.
By the time she got out, showered and cleanly dressed, Alejandro and Diego were at the breakfast table. Her drawings and notes had been stacked up neatly, all ready to go.
“I was thinking,” Diego said in Spanish as he looked at his younger brother. “Since Carmen seems to be staying away, you should move into the room with me. Give our guest some privacy.”
Elise’s hands froze on her drawings.
“No,” Alejandro said mildly but with all the firmness of a rock talking.
She looked away so they wouldn’t see her smile. She was becoming used to waking to the sound of his breathing, to seeing him smile at her. To sharing thoughts and feelings—and adventures—with him.
Friendship, she thought. It was completely undervalued as an aphrodisiac.
Diego got them in the truck and he was silent as he drove toward Mrs. Bellmont’s house. Alejandro sat with his arm behind the seat, sort of around Elise, but not.
Elise suddenly realized that all her fears were for herself. What might happen to her. But it dawned on her that the success or failure of this venture would also affect them. It must be in their minds that she could, well, dump them. She could get the design job, then hire one of the more glamorous landscape companies, the ones with the green vans with gold lettering on the sides. Their workmen wore nice uniforms.
“You’re not going to let me down, are you?” Elise asked.
“What?” Diego asked.
“If I get this job, you aren’t going to tell me it’s too big for you, that you don’t have enough men or tools or whatever, are you? I’m not going to be alone in this, am I?”
Alejandro seemed to know what she was doing, but then he knew his brother well. Diego always worried that everything good was going to turn bad.
One of Elise’s hands was on the truck seat and Alejandro squeezed it.
“I have thousands of cousins at home,” Diego said, “and I’ll bring as many as I need to help. And I know men who do concrete. You want handmade tiles for your little house? I can get them.”
“Yeah?” Elise said. “What else can you get for us?”
The silence in the truck was broken as Diego began to talk. He hadn’t let on that he was seeing this as his big break, but it all came out as he talked nonstop on the way to the house.
When they got there, Alejandro got out, put his hands on Elise’s waist, and swung her down. “Gracias,” he said.
“Too early for that! I haven’t yet done anything to earn thanks.”
Alejandro just smiled, and they went to the back to get tools out of the truck.
Elise wanted time to go over her sales pitch, but Mrs. Bellmont was waiting for them—and she seemed to be in a bad mood. She was telling Diego to take out some flowers that she didn’t like.
“When Leonardo gets here, all this will have to go. Just clean it up now and he’ll oversee everything later. Whenever he bothers to get here,” she added.
When she started back toward the house, Alejandro gave Elise a push, then a glare. “Okay, okay!” she said, and took her drawings from him.
All the workmen were watching her. Miguel’s usual laughter was gone.
“How did I get the job of savior?” Elise muttered, and Alejandro grinned. When she started toward Mrs. Bellmont, he pulled her baseball cap off to let her blonde hair fall to her shoulders. She shook her head to loosen her hair, put her shoulders back, and strode forward.
“Mrs. Bellmont?”
“Yes?” She sounded angry. “What is it?” Turning, she saw Elise and her eyes widened. “You’re—Oh good heavens! Everyone is looking for you.” She glanced at the men behind her. “You haven’t been with them, have you?”
Elise didn’t answer that. “Is it true that you used to be a dancer?”
Mrs. Bellmont blinked a few times, then smiled. “Why, yes, I was.”
“I thought so. It’s in the way you move. I wonder if I could show you—”
“Why did you run away from your wedding?” Mrs. Bellmont demanded. “The rumor is that you have mental problems.”
The memory of that ride in the trunk of Dr. Hightower’s car came back to Elise. And how Kent had lied about the pills he gave her. But as she looked at Mrs. Bellmont, she knew she couldn’t tell the truth. To tell on Carmen would hurt her brothers.
“I found out that Kent is gay.”
“No!” Mrs. Bellmont said. “That gorgeous young man? But then, that should have been a giveaway. You poor thing. How did you stand it?”
“I couldn’t, so I had to run.”
“And this?” She waved at the men behind her, who were only vaguely pretending to work, and her eyes fixed on Alejandro.
“Sex,” Elise said. “Wild, never-ending sex. Alejandro doesn’t speak a word of English and I love that about him. He’s the perfect antidote to Kent and his...well, his nothing.”
Mrs. Bellmont gave Elise a speculative look. “You’re not at all how your mother describes you, are you?”
“If you mean bland, with no personality, no, I’m not like that.”
For a moment they looked at each other, then Mrs. Bellmont nodded at the big drawing pad Elise was holding. “I take it you have something you’d like to show me?”
“I do.”
“Will it enrage your father?”
“Beyond all understanding.” Elise was beginning to smile. “And my mother too.” She lowered her voice. “And it will get rid of that annoying little Leonardo and his silly little fishpond. You go with my design for your garden and you can invite students from Juilliard up for the weekend and dance with them.”
“OMG as the kids say, but you sound just like your father trying to sell something.”
“Take that back!” Elise snapped without a smile.
Mrs. Bellmont laughed. “Come inside and let’s talk.” Turning, she walked to the house.
Behind her, Elise gave a double thumbs-up to the workmen. Diego and Alejandro were smiling hugely at her.
* * *
It was two hours later that Elise left Mrs. Bellmont’s house. As she went back toward the men, she nodded with every step. “We got the job,” she whispered. They were all standing in front of her in silence, waiting for her to elaborate. “She liked all of it. The building, the dance floor, the sculptures, everything. It’s a six-figure contract and we’re going to need—”
Elise took a breath. “How the hell do I know what we need?” She looked at Alejandro. “I BS’d my way through all of it. I told her that what I didn’t know, you guys do. Have any of you ever built a twenty-foot-long dance pavilion?”
For a moment, they looked at her blankly. They weren’t builders! Then Alejandro jumped up on the flat top of a low wall and went into the stance of a flamenco dancer. He stamped his left heel a few times.
“We don’t need a dancer, we need a builder!” Elise said. Alejandro looked so puzzled that they all burst into laughter.
“Down!” Diego yelled at his brother. “There’s work to be done.” He stopped for a moment, then turned and put his hands on Elise’s shoulders and kissed her cheek. “Thank you.”
It was the first time in her life that Elise had been congratulated on something she’d done. Like all the other kids in school, she’d been given trophies no matter what they achieved, but this was real. So okay, her position as her parents’ daughter got her inside the door, but it was her ideas that had won the job.
“Hold on!” she said, then stuck out her cheek and tapped it. “All of you. Now!” Grinning, one by one, the men kissed her cheek—except Alejandro.
Miguel said he didn’t think it would be good to set the garden on fire before they even began, so Alejandro better not touch her.
At that, Alejandro grabbed Elise, bent her over his arm and... And kissed her cheek. “Damn!” she said when he released her, and everyone laughed some more.
All day, as they worked, there was a sense of excitement in the air. For years, Diego and his men had put up with bad designers and inept homeowners who told them what to do and how to do it. But in just one morning they had changed status. This was going to be their job!
That night everyone piled into Diego’s rented house. Someone brought a little barbecue grill and others showed up with beer and tequila. Diego called his wife at home in Mexico and told her he was going to be hiring more people—and maybe in the fall she could come here to live.
All in all, it was a glorious party and Elise didn’t fall into bed until midnight. Alejandro stood over her smiling. “You’ve done a lot for all of us,” he said softly, his Spanish sounding beautiful in the moonlight that came through the window. He started to turn away, but looked back at her. “About that promise to just be friends... I’m ready to go back on it.”
A very sleepy, not fully sober Elise put her hands up in invitation.
Alejandro took them and kissed her palms, but then put them down and stepped away. “Only when you’re fully sober and know exactly what you’re doing. I’m concerned that once you and I start, it may never end, so you need to be really sure of what you’re doing. As for me, I know exactly what—who—I want. Good night.” He left the room.
* * *
The next morning, as Diego was driving to the job, he couldn’t stop grinning. All morning he’d talked endlessly about their new business. Elise sat in the middle, Alejandro beside her, both of them so sleepy they could hardly sit up—or maybe they wanted an excuse for her to lean against him.
The ride was long since Diego had a job in the country. He’d been trying to branch out from just lawn care so they were repairing a stone wall today. Earlier, he’d told Elise that she was to talk to the owner’s wife.
“And say what?” Elise asked, yawning. Diego glared at her.
“I liked it better when I was an honored guest,” she mumbled.
Diego threw all her drawing supplies into a beat-up old shopping bag and put it in the front of the truck, where it was now between Alejandro’s boots.
When they pulled off the road onto a long driveway, Elise sat up. She needed to look about the place, see what she could suggest adding, or taking away. Besides the planning, if she was going to do this, she needed to learn to sell things. Like Ray, she thought. Ray who she’d never met but actually had. The confusing idea made her smile.
It looked to be a ranch. To the right was a barn next to a pasture with a few horses. In the distance was a long, low house nearly hidden in the trees. The whole place reeked of wealth.
“Do you ride?” Elise asked Alejandro in English. She was still hoping to catch him in his lie of not speaking her language.
Diego answered. “He’s played polo.”
“Really?” She leaned back to look at him as though appraising his body—which she was doing. “For some team owned by a rich woman? What else did he do for her? Manicures? Hairdressing?” She was batting her lashes at him innocently.
Alejandro’s lips twitched as he repressed a grin and he turned away to look out the window.
“Picks out her clothes for her,” Diego said. “He likes to buy shoes.”
“For him or her?”
“They share them.” Laughing, Diego stopped the truck and got out. His smile showed how happy he was. “Come on, you two. Let’s get to work.”
“Tell her I’m good at riding things other than horses,” Alejandro said in Spanish.
“Tell her yourself,” Diego said. “Better yet, don’t talk, just work.” He took the bag of drawing supplies out of the truck and handed them to Elise. “Here she comes. Sell yourself.”
“I’m not sure—” Elise began, but Alejandro put his hands on her shoulders, straightened them, then gave her a shove forward.
The woman was tall, with lots of dark hair and her face was so perfectly cared for that it was hard to guess her age. But she wasn’t young. She had on tight jeans and a cotton shirt that fit her trim body well. She walked past the two men to Elise. “You must be the designer I’ve heard so much about.”
“Me?” Elise said, then caught herself. “I mean, how nice. From which of my clients?”
Diego and Alejandro were standing over her like guardians of a temple.
“Audrey Bellmont couldn’t say enough good things about you. A dance pavilion. What a clever idea! She can invite gorgeous half-naked men and call it dancing.” She looked at Alejandro. “You might get an invitation.”
The smile left Elise’s face and she took a step toward him.
The woman looked at Elise and nodded in understanding. This man was taken. “I’m Eva Foster, and as soon as I get the men settled, we’ll go inside and talk about something I’d like to do in the back. My husband’s going to hate it, but he’ll get used to it.”
Elise stood to the side as Mrs. Foster spoke to Diego in Spanish, and unless Elise missed her guess, that was her native language. Cuban, maybe?
Mrs. Foster told Diego about the wall and clearing away some brush toward the back.
Then she looked at Alejandro and asked if he knew which end of a horse to saddle.
Elise watched as he gave Mrs. Foster a slow, easy smile that made her take a step toward him.
“If I get too close, your girlfriend will tear my hair out,” Mrs. Foster said softly in Spanish.
“She’s not mine,” he replied. “I dream of it, but she says no. I think maybe she’s afraid of me. I’m too much for her.”
Elise couldn’t help it as she narrowed her eyes at him.
Alejandro smiled back at her innocently. Supposedly, Elise had no idea what he’d said.
“One of my stable hands is out today, so saddle the black for me. As soon as I’m done with young Elise here, I have to go across the river.” She spoke in Spanish to Alejandro. “Want to go with me?”
Elise was unabashedly watching him. While it was true that there was nothing between them, at the same time, it was far from true.
“I apologize, but my heart is with someone else,” Alejandro said. “I’m just waiting for her to gather her courage and accept what I offer.”
Mrs. Foster laughed. “Ah... I’ve been there. But alas, it’s your loss.” She turned to Elise and said in English, “Shall we go? I have a guest who is dying to meet you. He says he owns a huge garden and needs a designer for it. Think you can handle a big job?”
Elise was still hearing Alejandro’s words in her mind. His heart? How could that be?
To him, they’d known each other a very short time. They’d never had so much as a conversation. How could he talk of hearts when they didn’t know each other?
On the other hand, she’d known Kent since she was a child and look how that had turned out.
When Mrs. Foster walked ahead, Elise stayed where she was, standing close to Alejandro. She wanted to say something to him. Spanish, English, she didn’t care which. But no words came to her mind.
Instead, with her eyes straight ahead, she reached out and entwined her fingers with his. It wasn’t a full handhold, just fingertips.
Like her, he kept looking forward, but there was promise in their hands. It was time for them to be together.
When Mrs. Foster started to turn back, Elise dropped Alejandro’s hand and hurried forward, the shopping bag held tightly.
This is it, she thought. She was really and truly starting a new career. She’d never thought about being a garden designer, but she liked the idea. And she’d have Alejandro, Diego, and Miguel and the men. Maybe even Carmen would help.
Mrs. Foster opened the door to her house and stepped back to let Elise go in first.
On the threshold, Elise paused to look at Alejandro. He was standing exactly where she’d left him. There was an expression on his beautiful face that she’d never seen on a man before—or at least not directed at her. True, there was a look of lust, of sexual excitement, but also of... Elise took a breath. Love? Was that what she was seeing in Alejandro’s dark eyes? Was it possibly how she was looking at him too?
She wasn’t only starting a career. This was a new life!
Reluctantly, she turned away and went into the cool darkness of the interior. It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust—and when they did, she didn’t believe what she saw.
Her father was standing at the end of the big living room—and coming swiftly toward her were two of his hired guards.
“Elise, I’d like you to meet—” Mrs. Foster began. But Elise was already headed for the door.
She wasn’t fast enough. The guards grabbed her, one on each arm, and pulled her back into the room.
“What the hell is this?” Mrs. Foster yelled. “I’m calling the sheriff.”
One of the guards, still holding on to Elise, took the phone from Mrs. Foster’s hand.
“Get out of here!” Elise said to Mrs. Foster in Spanish. “Get Alejandro to go after the sheriff.”
“Really, Elise,” her father said, his voice sounding long-suffering. “Such dramatics. Where did you pick up that awful language? You sound like the cleaning woman. We just want to get you some help.” He turned to Mrs. Foster. “I apologize for the subterfuge, but this is my daughter and she has some serious mental problems. I need to get her to a doctor. Immediately!”
“Oh my goodness!” Mrs. Foster said. “I had no idea. The poor thing.” She looked at Elise with sympathy. “I’ll get the bastard for you,” she said in Spanish, then turned back to the men. “Do you need a car?”
“No,” Elise’s father said. “We brought one.” In the distance they could hear sirens. “What did you do?” he yelled.
Mrs. Foster seemed genuinely puzzled.
Elise’s father looked at his daughter with a sneer. “If you think those illegals you’ve latched onto can get you out of your family duty, you’d better think again. Take her to the car!” he ordered the men.
As soon as they were outside, Mrs. Foster ran to the landline phone in the kitchen and called 911, but she was told that the sheriff was already on the way.
Outside, Elise was trying to keep her dignity. The two guards were holding tightly onto her arms and leading her toward a big van with a third man as a driver. Even though she could hear the sirens, they were still too far away to reach her before she was taken away by her father.
She knew that what her father was doing was illegal, but how was she going to get away? She knew from experience that telling people she wasn’t insane got her nowhere. People tended to believe the calm, well-dressed, successful man, and not the girl who was hysterical with fear, her hair, clothes, and face a mess from days of tears.
When they got within a few feet of the car, she saw Diego. He looked worse than she felt. It was as though he was watching all the hope of his life being taken away from him.
Without Elise’s planning, there would be no big, new jobs. His family wouldn’t come to live with him. And there was sadness for her, that she was being put through this ordeal.
Elise looked away from him, her eyes searching for Alejandro, but he was nowhere to be seen. With his disappearance, all hope left Elise. Like a great whoosh, the belief that all this would somehow repair itself fled. She’d been sent back in time, but her stay had accomplished nothing. She’d have to spend the two weeks she had left battling her father—and he’d win. Like he always won. This time, there’d be no Dr. Hightower or Arrieta to save her. This time—
At the sound of a horse’s hooves, Elise halted. She looked up to see Alejandro—beautiful, dark-haired Alejandro—riding an even darker horse.
In an instant, she knew what he was planning to do. She’d told him of learning how to jump onto the back of a galloping horse and he was using it.
“What the hell is that crazy bastard doing?” one of the guards yelled.
The other guard clamped down on Elise’s upper arm and tried to pull her out of the way of the animal coming toward them. He was much stronger than she was and she knew she couldn’t stand up against him. She bit his hand. She twisted and clamped down with all her might.
The man jerked his hand away. “He can have you!”
Both men jumped away as Alejandro came at them on the huge horse. He didn’t slow down but leaned far over to one side and held his arm down to Elise.
As she’d trained to do, she grabbed his arm and leaped upward.
Alejandro pulled so hard that she went sailing through the air and landed in the saddle behind him.
She flung her arms around him and buried her face in his back.
He never so much as slowed down as he urged the horse forward. They went around the side of the house, past chickens and dogs and a couple of workmen. He didn’t begin to slow down until they were on the side of a hill that looked down over the ranch.
As he halted the horse and leaned forward to stroke its sweaty neck, Elise stayed with him. She didn’t loosen her grip around his chest, or remove her face from his back, or even open her eyes.
“You can look,” he said softly in Spanish, his hands on hers. They were so tight on his stomach they were sure to leave a bruise.
“Sorry, but I can’t speak Spanish,” she murmured in Spanish.
“And I can’t speak English,” he said in English. “Look!”
Smiling, relieved that the charade of language was over, she opened her eyes and looked down the hill. There were four cars with SHERIFF printed on them, and her father was being put into the back seat of one of them. The three guards were in the other cars.
Standing to the side, angrily talking to a man in uniform, was Mrs. Foster. “You called the sheriff?” Elise asked Alejandro.
“No, I didn’t. It’s my guess that he did.”
Elise looked where he was pointing. Standing to the side, leaning against a silver car, was Kent. The sun glinted off his blond hair.
Just as her father got into the sheriff’s car, she saw him say something to Kent. Elise had an idea that her father was ordering Kent to find her.
“That’s not possible,” Elise said. “Kent would never call in the law. He worships my father. He’ll do anything for him. Marry me, give me sleeping pills, have me committed to a mental institution, chase me all over the country, threaten to—”
Alejandro turned in the saddle to look at her. The things she was saying hadn’t happened.
The cars, with their prisoners, began to slowly move down the long driveway. Mrs. Foster went to talk to Kent, then she turned and pointed up the hill to where Alejandro and Elise were sitting on the horse.
“I have to talk to him, don’t I?” Elise said.
“Yes.”
There was determination in Alejandro’s voice, but she also heard fear. She hadn’t seen Kent since she escaped their wedding. The first time around, she hadn’t known that you can’t force someone to love you. You can’t do enough good deeds or virtuous tasks to inspire love. At least not the kind of all-consuming, passionate love that was needed in a marriage.
Alejandro held her arm and helped her get down from the horse. When she looked up at him, he wouldn’t meet her eyes. He’s worried that I’ll go back to Kent, she thought—and couldn’t help smiling.
He dismounted, but gave his attention to the horse.
“I guess I better ride down,” she said, and he nodded. “I’ll talk to him and...and tell him that I’m so sorry for running away and would he please, please take me back. I’ll do anything—”
In one quick move, Alejandro whipped about, pulled her into his arms, and kissed her.
She’d spent a lot of time imagining kissing him, but the reality was much better than her fantasy. His lips on hers sent feelings that she didn’t know existed through her body.
His strong arms pulled her close and she could feel his muscles against the softness of her.
But as good as the kiss was physically, there was something else. There was an emotion that was flowing between them. It was something deeper than just touching. It was as though their inner spirits—their souls?—were speaking to each other.
His lips left hers and he held her, her cheek against the cloth of his shirt over the dip just under his collarbone. It was as though the space had been created to fit her head.
Is this what love feels like? she wondered. This union? This merging?
She couldn’t help but think of Kent. She had wailed and whined and gnashed her teeth over the question of WHY. Why had Kent chosen Carmen over her? What was wrong with her? What did Carmen have that she didn’t?
The answer was, Nothing.
Love wasn’t scientific. It was... This, she thought. It was this union between two people. This bond.
When she looked at it from a distance, she knew Kent was a better match for her than Alejandro was. He’d grown up in a different country, spoke a foreign language. His experiences had been very different from hers. Nothing was the same between her and this man. Logically, a union between them made no sense at all.
Elise pulled away to look at Alejandro. They’d never been this close before and she touched his cheek. His eyes were worried, and she knew that what happened after today was her decision. “The woman does the choosing,” she’d heard said. “The man can ask but it’s the woman who chooses.”
Part of her wanted to tease him and laugh, but the larger part didn’t want him to suffer. “I want a baby,” she said. “I’ve waited long enough to have my own family. I know the fashion is to live together first but I want—”
She broke off as he again kissed her. This time it was a kiss of sweetness, of promise.
When he broke away she thought she saw tears glistening in his eyes.
“Okay,” she said, “help me up. I have to go straighten Kent out, then I’ll be back and we can start baby making.”
The tears left Alejandro’s eyes and that invincible attitude that made a man what he was came back to him. Now that he was sure she wasn’t going to leave him, he took charge. “Like hell!” he said. “Babies yes, but you’re not going to be alone with him.” He clasped his hands to give her a leg up into the saddle.
“Kent? You think he might harm me?”
Alejandro mounted behind her. “Carmen said—”
“Don’t talk to me about your sister! She—” Alejandro was kissing her neck. “Are you doing that so Kent sees you?”
“Why else would I do it? Certainly not for my own pleasure! Oof!”
Elise had gouged him in the ribs with her elbow. They were down the hill now and she could see Kent waiting for her. Unbidden, all the old feelings of being intimidated by him came back to her. How hard she’d tried to please him! And how completely she’d failed!
“You’ll do all right,” Alejandro whispered as he nibbled her ear. “You need this for you, not him.” She nodded because she knew he was right. “I will be close by. You’re safe.”
For a moment she leaned back against him. He did make her feel safe. And loved, she thought. She almost turned to tell him so, but now was not the time. First, she needed to cut some old ties.
When they were in front of the house, he held her arm as she got down, then he rode away.
Kent was waiting for her. He looked younger than she remembered, but then he hadn’t had years of being married to one woman while loving another.
“Did you turn me in to my father?” she asked.
He gave a curt nod. “Carmen didn’t mean to tell me where you were, but she did. I was worried about you.”
“So you told Dad to come after me with armed guards?” She didn’t try to keep the anger out of her voice.
“I didn’t know he was going to do that.”
“Did you call the sheriff on him?”
“No. Carmen did. Your dad was so angry she was afraid her brothers would be hurt.” For a moment, he looked at his feet, then up. “I want to make sure that you understand what you’re doing. If you and I don’t marry, we’ll lose everything. There’ll be no company partnership. Your father even owns the house we’re to live in.”
“But you have Carmen. And you’re going to have a child.” She didn’t mean it to, but there was bitterness in her voice.
Kent gave a little smile—the one that used to make her dizzy with what she thought was love. “I needed to have some fun. You can’t begrudge a man that.”
This time, his smile had no effect on her. “What none of you thought of is that I want to have fun too. I need laughter in my life. I want what you have with Carmen.” She paused.
This isn’t what she wanted to say. “Kent, why don’t you tell them all to go screw themselves? You’ve been a victim of our selfish, greedy parents as much as I have. They’ve manipulated you too. Walk out. Leave them. Marry Carmen and live with her and your children and be happy. Maybe not rich, but happy.”
With every word she spoke, Kent’s eyes widened. “Are you sure you’re the kid next door? You don’t sound like her. That girl is absolutely perfect—and obedient. She’s like a porcelain doll. Unreal.”
Elise didn’t like that image of herself, but she knew it was true. But then, you can’t be a sassy, back-talking girl around people who you know don’t love you. “That’s who I tried to be, and now it’s wonderfully freeing not to have to be her.” She looked at him. “From what Carmen says, you two really love each other.”
“Yes. I can be myself around her. I don’t have to pretend to be some perfect hero.”
“If that’s supposed to transfer blame to me, it’s not working.”
He gave her a genuine smile, not one with feigned patience, as though she bored him. “You know, if you’d been like this before, I wouldn’t have needed anyone else.”
For the first time in her life, Elise saw him clearly. She had created a myth. In her mind, she’d made him into a hero and had expected him to be that person. No wonder he preferred a woman who yelled at him when she didn’t like what he did.
In that moment, she released everything. All the years of longing for something that didn’t exist, disappeared. Vanished forever.
Kent seemed to realize what had happened as the smile he gave her was tinged with a bit of regret. Everyone wanted to be a hero to someone! “So you’re going off with him?”
Not far away, in the shade of a big tree, Alejandro was still sitting on the black horse—and he was scowling at her. She’d taken quite long enough. “Yes, I am. He’s a good man and...” She wasn’t going to mention the word love to Kent.
“Carmen has nothing but good to say about both her brothers. She wanted me to help them get jobs.”
“I don’t think you have to worry about that. We’re helping ourselves.”
“So it’s ‘we’? Already?”
Elise glanced at Alejandro and he’d quit scowling. To her astonishment, he’d begun to unbutton his shirt. “I have to go,” she said quickly. “You’ll do whatever is necessary to get Dad out of jail?”
“Eventually. First, I might talk to your mother about her future grandchildren.”
“If you mean you and Carmen, are you forgetting that without me you aren’t related to my mother?”
Kent glanced at Alejandro. His shirt was now open all the way down to his washboard abs. “I predict that our kids will be first cousins.” He nodded toward Alejandro. “Think you can handle him? You haven’t had much experience and he looks serious.”
Elise remembered what Kit had said to Olivia. She gave a snort of derision, then quoted, “‘With sex, baby, no lessons are required.’” Turning, she looked at Alejandro. As he sat there with his shirt open and high up on a big black horse, all she could think about was him.
When she smiled at him and gave a nod, she knew just what he was going to do. With his head down, he urged the horse into a gallop and headed directly toward Elise and her former fiancé. Kent cried out in warning as he jumped back so far that he landed on his rear end in the dirt.
But Elise didn’t move. She just lifted her arm and as Alejandro thundered by, he grabbed it and pulled her up into the saddle behind him. She put her arms around him, her head on his back, and smiled.
“Amigos,” Alejandro said, making her laugh. Yes, friendship was an excellent aphrodisiac.