The Bronzed Hawk (8 page)

Kelly felt a twinge of resentment at his words. He was doing it again. Pushing her under his protective wing as if she were completely ineffectual in a crisis. Then, as the sleep cleared from her eyes and she got a better look at the visitors, she let her breath out in a soundless whistle. Perhaps she’d let Nick have his way after all.

There were about twenty Mexican men in the clearing. Their hair was long and unkempt, several were bearded, and their sombreros, worn jeans, and colorful shirts were dusty and food stained. Each man carried a holstered pistol at his hip and a rifle in his hands. Altogether, they were as dangerous a looking lot as she’d ever seen. Several yards from the clearing, she could see four additional men standing guard over a number of dusty, wild-looking horses.

“Who are they?” Kelly whispered, leaning back against O’Brien’s solid body.

“I was just about to find out.” Tossing aside
their nylon cover, he stood up. “And I don’t think we’ll be pleased with the answer.”

As she hastily scrambled to her feet, she heard Nick speaking quickly in Spanish. Why had she not learned Spanish? she wondered desperately, looking anxiously from O’Brien’s face to the blank, impassive faces of the Mexicans confronting them. Evidently he had asked to speak to their leader, for a slight, almost delicate-appearing man in a brilliant red shirt strolled forward to stand before O’Brien. The man had a wolfish grin on his bearded face. His answer was as terse and businesslike as O’Brien’s question, but it evoked several chuckles from his men.

Kelly grabbed Nick’s arm and whispered, “What did he say?”

To her annoyance he shrugged off her hand and deliberately stepped in front of her and spoke again. His reply elicited an even bigger laugh than the Mexican’s, and for the next five minutes there was a verbal interchange that sounded maddeningly casual to Kelly. When he turned to face her, she was steaming with impatience.

“It appears you attract trouble like a magnet, Goldilocks,” he said softly. “These charming fellows seem to want to hold us for ransom.”

“Ransom!” Kelly exclaimed, her mouth falling open. “You mean they’re some kind of criminals?”

“Bandidos,” he corrected. “It seems it’s an old and honorable profession in these hills. Pedro Garcia, here, tells me that they’re sure we’re very fine birds to be plucked because no one but a rich, crazy gringo would think of sailing across Mexico in a balloon.”

“Well, he’s half right,” Kelly muttered. “How did they know about the balloon?”

“They saw it fall ‘like a flaming star from heaven,’ ” he quoted mockingly. “They rode out and located the wreckage and then started looking for us. They spotted our campfire about an hour ago.”

“Well, what are we going to do?” she asked, running her hand through her curls. “We can’t let them get away with this.”

“
You
are going to do absolutely nothing,” Nick said crisply. “I am going to negotiate and
see what I can do about getting us out of this. I want you to stay out of this and keep a low profile. Have you got that, Goldilocks?”

She drew herself up indignantly, her jade eyes flashing. “Did it ever occur to you that I might be able to help? I’m not completely useless, you know. Perhaps I can persuade him to let us go.”

He frowned. “You don’t even speak the language. Stay out of it, Kelly.”

“Then you can interpret,” Kelly said stubbornly. “I’m going to talk to him.” Before he could stop her, she stepped quickly around him and strode swiftly up to the bandit leader. Her heart was beating like a trip-hammer, and she could feel the familiar surge of excitement as she stopped before him and looked up into his narrow, dark face. She gave him an appealing smile, and to her relief, he returned the smile, though his was a trifle feral, she thought.

“Tell him that I’m a reporter for an important American magazine,” she told O’Brien over her shoulder. “Tell him that I can make him as famous as Pancho Villa.” As she spoke, she continued to smile up at Pedro Garcia entrancingly.

“Kelly.” O’Brien’s voice was menacing. “Get the hell away from him. Now!”

“Tell him,” she insisted, fluttering her long lashes and increasing the voltage of the smile. “Everyone wants to see his name in print, particularly crooks. Look at all the books written by criminals in prison.”

“Kelly, you idiot,” O’Brien said tersely. “Do what I say!”

The bandit’s smile widened to a beaming grin, and Kelly said excitedly, “I think we’re making progress. Will you just—” She broke off, her eyes wide with shock, as the bandit’s hand reached out and cupped her breast in his palm. Uttering a little cry, she stepped back. She heard the rest of the bandits break out in guffaws and O’Brien swear.

“I hope you’re satisfied,” O’Brien said savagely. His arm went around her and brought her swiftly into its protective circle. “I could throttle you!”

“I just wanted to help,” she said defensively, moving closer to him. Pedro Garcia was laughing and gesturing toward her, trading comments
with his cohorts, which they were all finding vastly entertaining.

“And instead, you just about got yourself raped,” O’Brien bit out grimly. “Why do you think I wanted you to fade into the background, for God’s sake? These men have never heard of your precious women’s lib. They have only one use for a woman, and you’re beautifully equipped for that.”

“No wonder you’re getting along with them so famously,” she said tartly. “Your views are so similar.”

“You’d better hope that I can convince them of that. From the remarks they’re tossing around, you’re still not out of hot water.”

Kelly felt a shiver of fear run through her as she looked around the clearing at the men who were gazing at her in leering speculation. “I see what you mean,” she said, moistening her lips nervously. “Do you think you can discourage them?”

“I’m going to do my damndest,” he said tightly, his eyes darting warily about the clearing.

She nestled closer and turned her frightened
gaze up to his hard, taut face. “Would it help if you told them that I was a virgin?” she whispered anxiously. “No one wants an inexperienced woman these days. They’re out of fashion.”

O’Brien’s shocked gaze flew to her worried face, then he gave a mirthless laugh. “It might help at that. If they knew what an experienced little madam you are, they’d probably be standing in line for your favors.”

“Will you stop joking?” she cried desperately, her green eyes suspiciously bright. “Damn it, I
am
a virgin, and I don’t want my first experience to be a gang bang.”

His body stiffened as if he’d been struck by a bullet. He drew a deep breath. “And what about your magnificent bullfighter and that Nigerian game warden?” he asked carefully, his tone all the more menacing for its very control.

Kelly flushed, her gaze shifting away guiltily. “Well, I actually exaggerated a little last night,” she told him sheepishly. “I knew that you really wouldn’t want to become involved with me, either, once you had time to mull it over, so I did the only thing I could think of to keep us from
making a terrible mistake.” She peeped at him sidewise to see if he was as angry as she thought. He was. She continued in a rush, “Besides, you probably wouldn’t have enjoyed it, anyway. A man of your experience would find a virgin staggeringly boring.”

“Boring you’re not,” he said, enunciating each word carefully. “Your little ‘exaggeration’ almost caused me to do something we both would have regretted, and I assure you that lying beside you all night and aching to take you was far from dull.”

She bristled indignantly. “That wasn’t my fault. I did—”

“We’ll discuss it later,” he interrupted grimly. “Right now I’ve got to try to get you out of this mess.” He removed his arm from around her and started toward the bandit leader. He turned to say harshly over his shoulder, “You needn’t look so anxious. I’m not about to let any of these clowns rape you. It’s
me
you’ve got to worry about.”

The negotiations and discussions between O’Brien and the bandit leader took most of the
day. Much to Kelly’s disgust, she was left to sit by herself under a tree while Nick spent the day talking with Pedro and his cohorts. Nick seemed to be in no hurry at all and was as lazily relaxed as if he were at a bachelor stag party. By late afternoon, judging by the joking and backslapping on both sides, he appeared to be on excellent terms with all of them. To Kelly’s extreme irritation, he even spent the last few hours before sunset playing
cards
with them, for heaven’s sake!

As darkness fell, the campfire was rebuilt, and meal preparations got underway. The appetizing smell of bacon and beans wafted to her along with that most delicious scent of all, fresh-brewed coffee. Her stomach was growling as the men sat down to eat. She had been sent a water canteen earlier in the day by the bandit leader, obviously at his buddy O’Brien’s suggestion, Kelly thought crossly. But she’d been given nothing to eat, and it seemed that they had no intention of supplying her with any supper. O’Brien was certainly not so deprived, she noticed resentfully, as he took a second helping of beans and sat back down by
Pedro Garcia. He could at least have sent her some coffee.

The meal was over, and some of the bandits had started unrolling bedrolls beside the fire when Nick finally stood up and stretched lazily. He murmured something to Pedro that evoked a loud guffaw, then stooped to fill a plate with beans from the iron pot hanging above the campfire. He filled a tin cup with coffee, picked up a spoon, and strolled leisurely over to where Kelly was sitting beneath the tree on the outskirts of the clearing.

He handed her the plate, spoon, and coffee, then silently dropped down beside her on the chute. He leaned back against the tree and watched her as she hungrily started to eat. “Sorry I couldn’t get anything to you before,” he said quietly. “It was a bit dicey for a while, and I didn’t want to rock the boat by calling attention to you.”

Kelly found that she was feeling much more understanding now that her hunger was being assuaged. The beans weren’t bad either, a little hot perhaps. “For a while I wasn’t certain if you
were going to join their merry little band. You’ve certainly all gotten to be great chums.” She took a swallow of coffee and made a face. It was as thick as syrup, and it was almost cold. It had smelled much better than it tasted.

“It might not be such a bad life at that,” he said teasingly. “No pressures, plenty of freedom, and nothing to do but extort money from crazy, rich gringos.”

“And did he extort money from this particular crazy, rich gringo?” she asked, as she finished the beans. She set the plate and spoon down.

“We came to a mutual agreement,” he said, reaching over to wipe a bit of sauce from the corner of her mouth with his fingers. “He’s taking my wallet, including all the cash and credit cards, and tomorrow he’s taking us to the outskirts of Matzalea, a small village about fifteen miles from here.”

“But that’s wonderful!” she said excitedly. “How did you get him to agree to let us go?”

He grinned. “We played cards for it,” he said. “You’re not the only one who likes an occasional wager, Goldilocks.”

“But what did you have to bet?” she asked curiously, as she took the last swallow of that terrible coffee and put the cup on the ground beside the plate.

O’Brien chuckled, his dark face alight with mischief. “You,” he said simply. “You’ll be flattered to know that he considered you a very valuable commodity, sweetheart.”

“Me!” Kelly cried indignantly, her mouth agape. “You gambled over me?”

“Yep.”

“And what if you’d lost?” she asked, her jade eyes flaming. “Nick O’Brien, that’s the most unprincipled thing I’ve ever heard of!”

“Relax, Kelly.” He reached out and tugged at a curl. “I knew that I wouldn’t lose. I cheated.”

Her eyes widened. “That’s even worse! What if they’d caught you? There’s no telling what they’d have done to us.”

He shook his head. “There was no chance of that. I knew exactly what I was doing. About four years ago I spent a few months in Las Vegas and—”

“No,” Kelly interrupted, holding up her hand.

“I don’t even want to hear it.” She sighed resignedly. “I should have known that Pedro Garcia wouldn’t stand a chance with Superman. But if you won the game, why was it a bit dicey?”

He shrugged. “Pedro was a trifle reluctant to keep to the exact terms of the bet. He wanted you to share his bedroll tonight before he let us go tomorrow.”

“And how did you convince him to reconsider?” Kelly asked slowly. She was just beginning to realize what a debt of gratitude she owed Nick. Despite his casual air, there were tiny lines of strain about his mouth, and for the first time since she had met him, she noticed that his brilliant vitality was slightly dimmed. While she had been sitting here beneath her tree fuming and mentally castigating him, he had been using all his skill and charisma to effect their release. It had obviously been a very difficult day for him.

O’Brien closed his eyes wearily and leaned his dark head back against the trunk of the tree. “I merely told him that if he so much as laid a hand on you, I’d forcibly remove an exceptionally prized portion of his anatomy.”

She gave an amused chuckle. “And what would you have done if he’d called your bluff?”

His lids flickered open, and his eyes were glacier hard. “I would have done it,” he said simply, and Kelly knew that he meant it.

She gave a little shiver. “Well, then it’s a good thing he backed down,” she said with forced lightness. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we’re slightly outnumbered.”

“I noticed,” he said laconically. He stood up and picked up her cup, plate, and spoon. “I’ll see if I can’t trade these for another blanket. It may not be as warm here as it would be closer to the campfire, but I’d just as soon keep you out of view in case Pedro has second thoughts.”

Kelly watched him as he strode quickly over to the campfire and disposed of the plate, cup, and spoon. He spoke briefly to the bandit leader, who was almost asleep, and then picked up a gray- and black-striped blanket. He turned and strolled toward her, tossing a casual
“buenas noches”
over his shoulder.