The Last Honorable Man (7 page)

He wasn't. God help him, but if it took the sharp point of hatred out of her eyes when she looked at him, if it allowed her to touch him like that, light and stirring, he wasn't sorry a bit. The pulse in other places besides his jugular leaped.

Realizing he was reading more into her touch than she'd meant by it, he took a step back—right into the rosebush.

“Ouch! Sh—” He bit back the rest of the curse, grabbing the thorny branch before it attached itself to any more of his anatomy. By the time he'd detached the bush from the seat of his jeans and turned back to Elisa, she had her lower lip pulled between her teeth. One giggle escaped as he stood gaping at her, then another.

He rubbed his backside, and she laughed outright. The sound was like champagne—full of sparkles and bubbles and potent enough to get a man drunk just listening to it.

Then the nine-o'clock bells called the faithful to service at St. Thomas, and the moment ended as unexpectedly as it had begun.

A new wall of guilt crashed down on Del. He felt as if God spoke to him through the bells. He had no right enjoying Elisa's laugh, much less her touch or the way she looked in his old clothes. She was another man's woman.

At least she had been.

Elisa cocked her head, listening to the deep, chiming melody with her fingertips pressed to her pursed lips. When the bells quieted she asked, her eyes hopeful, “There is a church near here?”

He nodded, regret burning the back of his throat. “Half mile down the road.”

“I would like to go.”

He angled his head in capitulation. “Sure.”

He couldn't sit with her, couldn't risk being seen with her, but he could drop her off, circle around and sneak into a back pew where he could keep an eye on her.

It had been a long time since he'd bent a knee in prayer. Maybe it would do him good.

He had a lot to ask forgiveness for.

 

“This does not look like a bank,” Elisa said, twisting in her seat to peer at the four-story white granite building Del had pulled up to.

“Isn't.”

She frowned. “Then why have we stopped here?” Yesterday, after church, he'd taken her shopping and bought more than she needed—more than she had ever owned—to take with her when she left. At his insistence, she had picked out two summer shirts, matching shorts with soft elastic waists and a shift dress that would accommodate her expanding midsection for some time. To her surprise he'd added a bathrobe, a baggy sweatsuit, a pair of knit pants, two blouses and sneakers along with a wide assortment of toiletries and underwear.

Surely she couldn't need anything else.

He wiped his palm over his left thigh, a sign she'd learned meant she wouldn't like what came next. “I made you a doctor's appointment. Figured you'd want to make sure everything's all right with the baby before you took off.”

Her palm immediately covered her abdomen. Her face tensed. “‘All…all right'?”

“Relax, it's just routine. She'll check you out, maybe even let you listen to the little one's heartbeat.”

“You don't think anything is wrong?”

“I'm sure it's not. You're just a little…thin, is all. She'll probably give you some vitamins or something.” His smile was wide, bright, reassuring and totally false.

Thin? She tried to remember how many full meals—much less healthy ones—she had eaten before she took up with the ranger. Other than the mango and bananas that grew plentifully in San Ynez, fruits and vegetables were hard to come by, fresh meat almost nonexistent. Mostly she lived off dried beans and canned meat. Food that could be packed quickly and carried easily from camp to camp.

Inside the office building, Del spoke quietly to the nurse at the front desk. The woman's hair was bleached white, and she wore pink scrubs with teddy bears floating in clouds and looked at Elisa sympathetically.

Elisa stared at her feet self-consciously. She sat in a chair in the waiting area and picked up a magazine. Seconds later she had forgotten about the nurse and was engrossed in an article titled The Healthy Pregnancy. The article was illustrated, and the women's swollen bodies fascinated her. Would she really look like that soon? For all her education, she was woefully ignorant about what was happening to her own body. That ignorance made her uncertain, vulnerable, and she was too much the survivor to accept vulnerability. She devoured that article, then another, on breast-feeding, but the more she read, the more she realized she needed to learn.

She started when the ranger touched her on the shoulder.

“Sorry,” he said, handing her a clipboard. “But they need some information from you.”

She scanned the form, her stomach twisting.

“I explained that you, uh…might not know some of the information. That you haven't had much medical care lately.”

She filled in the blanks she knew—childhood illnesses, vaccination history and hereditary conditions in her family—and left the rest blank, except for the date of conception. Her cheeks heating, she scribbled in a date and handed the clipboard to Del just as a second nurse, this one in surgical greens, pushed open a door and called her name.

Bracing herself with a breath, she straightened her back and walked toward the nurse. Del followed.

Elisa stopped, shaking her head. “No.”

He glanced toward the exam room door where the nurse waited, then back to Elisa. “You sure?”

“This baby is my responsibility.” She watched him hook his big hands in his belt and remembered those big hands tending his yellow roses with such loving care. “I take care of what's mine,” she mimicked his words, turned them to her own meaning to keep him in the waiting room where he belonged. This was a private matter.

Dr. Marsala was Indonesian. She had a large nose, soft voice and gentle hands. The pelvic exam was completed efficiently and painlessly, and Elisa was prepped for the big moment, the sonogram where she would first see her baby.

“Are you frightened,” the doctor asked as she spread warm gel on Elisa's abdomen.

“Yes.”

Dr. Marsala smiled. “Good. If you had said no, I would have known you were lying.”

A computer blinked next to the examination table, and
the doctor tapped a series of commands on the attached keyboard. The gray display on the monitor wavered, then stabilized. Elisa's name and the date appeared at the bottom of the picture.

“What you're going to see is live video of your child. Or at least live video of sound waves bouncing off your child's mass.”

“Will you be able to tell if it's healthy?”

“We can detect some conditions at this stage, but mostly we're just looking at the fetus's size and shape to give us an idea how it's developing.”

The doctor pressed a flat wand lightly into the goo covering Elisa's stomach. Compared to the warm gel, the plastic was cold. The muscles in her abdomen rippled in reaction. Undeterred, the doctor concentrated on the computer monitor, studying gray and black masses as she moved the wand over Elisa.

“There,” Dr. Marsala declared, smiling and pointing at a blob on the screen. “There's the sac.”

Elisa couldn't make anything of the picture, but she smiled, too. Her heart accelerated.

Slowly Dr. Marsala moved the wand down and to Elisa's left, then back. Then again. “There we are. I can't tell if it's a girl or boy in this position, but there's the head, the chest.” She outlined a vaguely human shape on the screen with her free hand. “See the little legs and arms forming?”

Elisa's breath stalled as she stared at the tiny being growing inside her. This baby is her responsibility, she'd told Del, and for the first time she was beginning to understand what that meant. To understand the commitment. The joy and the grief, the love and the fierce protectiveness this child brought out in her.

“Is it okay?” she asked, choking back the emotion. “Is the baby healthy?”

The doctor moved the wand to the right a fraction. Her smile remained frozen in place, but she drew her brows together.

Elisa's fingers dug into the sides of the bed. “What is it? What's wrong with my baby?”

D
el had seen Elisa in noble-jungle-princess mode, cool, aloof and wearing her pride like a crown jewel. And he'd seen her as the warrior queen, full of passionate fury and righteous indignation at the injustices done her.

The Elisa who'd walked out of the women's center with him fifteen minutes ago clutching a grainy black-and-white printout from her sonogram and a pack of vitamins was neither.

This was the vulnerable Elisa. The one he'd caught a glimpse of in the cemetery chapel before she'd realized he was there, and again on her knees on the side of the road, purging her stomach over a steel guardrail.

This was the Elisa who haunted his sleep. Who shredded his gut to bloody ribbons with a single look and left his soul in tatters every time she referred to him as “Ranger” instead of by his given name.

This was the Elisa he couldn't let walk away. Despite her insistence she could take care of herself, sending her
off alone would be like throwing a kitten into a junkyard full of rabid dogs.

The problem was he didn't have any choice. Even if she wasn't an American citizen, she still had rights. He couldn't hold her against her will. They were almost at the bank, and he couldn't think of any way to keep her from leaving him once they were done there, other than driving his Land Rover into a tree, which didn't seem like a smart plan, given her pregnancy.

He clutched the steering wheel until his fingers cramped, then flexed the digits, glancing at Elisa from behind his aviator sunglasses. She was still staring at the sonogram picture as if it was the key to the mystery of life.

In a way it was, he supposed. The first look at a new life. He couldn't tell butt-from-backside in the picture, and still a flutter of emotion rippled through his chest at the sight of it. He couldn't begin to imagine how Elisa must feel, seeing her baby for the first time. Knowing that little being was growing inside her.

Judging by her rounded shoulders and the pinched lines at the corners of her mouth, it must be overwhelming.

“You look wiped out,” he said, noting how thin and colorless her lips looked. “Maybe we should put off this bank thing for a few hours. Go home and have lunch, get some rest first.”

She didn't look up, just mumbled, “Yes, you are probably right.”

Del damn near did run his Rover into a tree. Jerking the vehicle to a stop on the side of the road, he gave her a long look. More than just her lips had lost their color. The flesh beneath her fingernails was white, and the picture she held trembled in her unsteady hand.

“What's wrong?” he asked more gruffly than he'd intended.

When she finally looked up at him, her eyes as bleak as a picture of a nature preserve after a forest fire. “You were correct the other night. I cannot take your money. It would not be right.”

“Honey, I think you're taking this motherhood thing a little too seriously. This is no time for you to develop a conscience.” He laced the words with sarcasm. Meant them as a joke.

Only, Elisa wasn't laughing. To Del's horror her eyes swelled with tears.

“Aw, God damn it. Don't cry.”

She flinched at his expletive, made the sign of the cross, and he cursed himself again silently. He knew she had a thing about using the Lord's name. Hell, he respected her for it.

She held her tears in check, though Del didn't know how, her eyes were so full. “I won't take your money,” she said, her hands twining in her lap. “It would be wrong.”

When she looked up, she seemed calmer, but still devastated. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “But if your other offer still stands…”

Del's jaw fell slack. “You want to marry me?”

“Yes.” She met his eyes levelly. God, she was incredible. Her pride. Her strength.

Too bad he knew she was lying. “What the hell happened in the doctor's office?”

No way was he buying this change of heart without a reason. A cold knot of fear settled where his heart ought to be while he waited for her answer. An answer he was very much afraid he wouldn't like.

Elisa's shoulders shuddered. She bit her lip until they steadied, then answered. “She said that I am anemic.”

Del blew out a breath. “Anemic. That's not so bad. Pretty normal during pregnancy. She gave you vitamins, right? And an iron supplement?”

Elisa nodded. “Except she said I am very anemic. Probably due to stress and a poor diet. She said it was so bad that it might be affecting the baby.”

Her tears returned. The knot in Del's chest expanded into a beach ball, inflated past its capacity and ready to blow.

“She said my baby is too small for its gestational age.” Elisa's face hardened, then cracked, and the tears spilled over onto her cheeks. “She said it might not be growing enough to survive.”

“Aw, 'Lis.” He took her shoulders and pulled her head to his chest, even more deeply disturbed by the fact that she let him.

She felt cold and stiff in his arms, her emotions all closed off, pent-up inside her, but he knew she couldn't stave off her emotions forever. No one could.

The first tremor broke through with an audible rattling of her teeth. Her control splintered rapid-fire from there, releasing her shudders in a series of jagged convulsions that speared Del's heart.

He held on to her so tightly he was afraid he might hurt her. “It's all right. Gonna be okay.”

She quivered against him, and he planted a kiss in her hair as her shoulders shook. God, she was killing him. She tied his lungs in bow knots. He couldn't stand to see her hurt so much.

She gulped down a choking breath, burrowed her nose against his collarbone. “It is my fault the baby is in danger. I…I thought I could take care of myself.”

“You can. But you don't have to. Not now.”

“I do not like being dependent on others.”

He smiled into her hair. “Yeah, I figured that out.”

“I would—” Her body shook again. He rubbed her back to warm her. “Would never have come here if Eduardo had not insisted it was the best thing for the baby.”

“It still is.” He eased back and tipped her head up to where he could see her, framing her face with both hands. “Honey, I'm sorry about Eduardo. I would give anything to bring him back if I could. But I can't. You've got to let me help you now.”

The last of her tremors fading, she nodded reluctantly. “The doctor said I must rest and eat well.”

“I have a big bed,” he said, pushing away the image of her lying in it all alone. “And plenty of food.”

She studied the dome light above his head, then brought her gaze down to his. “If I lose the baby, there is no reason for me to stay in the United States.”

He knew what she was doing. Letting him off the hook. Giving him an excuse to take back his offer. To say, “Let's wait and see.”

Like hell.

He clamped her head back on his shoulder. “Don't you worry. You're going to be in Texas a long, long time.”

She'd already lost too much because of him, he thought fiercely. She wouldn't lose her child, too. Not without one hell of a fight.

 

Elisa stretched her arms over her head, rolled to her side and pressed her cheek deeper into the pillow. The Ranger's pillow. As if he instinctively understood that her fledgling trust did not extend yet to his friend, the
politician, he had not brought her back to the big house, but to his own small apartment. His bed. She could smell him there, in the sheets. Sandalwood aftershave and cocoa butter soap. The sensation was so real she thought if she reached out—without opening her eyes—she could touch his short brown hair. She could trace the crescent furrows that bracketed his mouth when he smiled.

A rap on the door roused her from her twilight sleep musings in time to see Del shoulder his way into the room, a tray laden with food and smelling scrumptious balanced in his hands. She sat bolt upright, smoothing the ruffled covers as if afraid he would see what she had been imagining.

The guilt hit her a second later. Shame raked her cheeks. What was wrong with her, thinking of the ranger in that way? She had come to this country to be with Eduardo. It was to him she owed her loyalty still.

Even if it was the ranger's ring she would one day wear.

Squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin, she propped herself up on a pillow.

“I hope you're hungry,” the ranger said as he set the tray in her lap.

The single yellow rose in a thin vase in the corner brought a lump to her throat. “This is all for me?”

“Every bite.”

She lifted the paper plate turned upside down over the center dish. “Eggs?”

He removed the cover from a side plate. “And steak. A Texas breakfast tradition.”

“Breakfast?” Her gaze leaped to the window, where sunlight gleamed off the spotless glass. It seemed only minutes had passed since she'd lain down for a short catnap at dusk. She read the glowing numbers on the
digital clock on the nightstand to verify. It was nearly 9:00 a.m. She'd slept twelve straight hours.

“Time for your iron pill.” He nodded toward a dime-size tablet and handed her the glass of juice from her tray. While she swallowed, he picked up the knife and began cutting the steak.

“I can do it,” she said, trying to take the knife.

“Indulge me.”

She sat back uneasily. She was not accustomed to being pampered, but as she watched him skewer and chop the meat into precise centimeter cubes, she found the experience was not altogether unpleasant.

He looked up at her and smiled. He seemed at ease with the closeness. The intimacy of preparing another's food. It made her wonder…

“Have you been married before, Ranger?”

“No. And since we're going to be married soon, do you think you could call me Del?”

“Del.” It was a nice name. She just wasn't sure she could bring herself to use it. Referring to him as “Ranger” offered a comfortable measure of distance. Breathing room. “Why have you never married?”

He shrugged. “Just never found the right person, I guess.”

She took her time studying him while he was occupied with her meal. He wasn't unattractive. His broad, square features suited his strength. His character. She didn't imagine him having trouble finding a woman.

“That's not it,” she challenged, and flaked the top layer off her eggs with the tip of her fork. “What is this green stuff.”

“Spinach. Lots of iron. Eat it.”

“When you tell me why you never married.”

Setting the knife on the tray with a clank, he sighed lustily. “So that's the way it's going to be? Blackmail?”

The words were ominous, but his mercurial eyes danced.

She speared a forkful of eggs and lifted it to her mouth, circling just in front of her curved lips, waiting. Her smile fell when he pulled his face into a worried frown and shrank back to the edge of the mattress.

“I was hoping to spare you this,” he said, gazing out the window.

Her stomach lurched. Her hand sagged, and the bite of eggs fell back to the plate.

“But I guess you would've found out, anyway, sooner or later. Might as well get it out in the open from the start.”

Elisa'a heart hammered. She was both afraid to hear what he had to say and afraid not to.

“It's a medical condition,” he said fiercely, as if he dared her to deny it.

“Oye,” she breathed. “What is it?”

“I'm afraid I suffer from a chronic case of domestic commitment avoidance.”

Elisa gaped.

“Complicated by frequent bouts of foul-temperitis and cursing-habit disease.”

A laugh broke from Elisa's chest, followed by another.

“Sometimes when it's really bad, I even take the Lord's name in vain.”

“I noticed,” she said, hiding her giggles behind a fake cough.

“You see? There's not a woman in Texas who'll have me.”

“Except me.”

He took the fork from her hand, pinned a bite of steak
on the end and raised it to her mouth. His eyes turned serious. “You, I figure, are just stubborn enough to put up with me.”

She opened her mouth to argue, but he popped the meat in before she got a word out.

“Who knows, maybe you'll even cure me.”

She chewed slowly, savoring the taste of tender steak and the tender look in the ranger's eyes equally. Somehow his gaze warmed her from the inside out. Shone light on dark places inside her she had forgotten existed. Gradually the heat rose to an uncomfortable level. Blood rushed to her cheeks and she was forced to look away.

When he caught her gaze again, he was smiling.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked softly, shyly.

“Marry you?”

She nodded, unable to say the word. What he proposed was not really a marriage, after all, but more like a business arrangement. A two-year payment on a debt.

“As sure as there's gonna be mosquitoes in Texas after it rains,” he said cockily, then sobered. He put his hand over the bulge that held her baby. She sucked in a breath as the muscles in her abdomen fluttered under his touch and she felt another tiny stirring, deeper.

“As sure as I am of this healthy, beautiful baby girl you're going to have.”

“It is a boy.”

“Girl.”

“You do not know.”

“Neither do you.”

“I can feel it.”

“I can see it. I told you, my grandmother is a midwife. I've seen a lot of women before and after they've had their babies. Yours is a girl.”

“We will see,” she said stiffly. She had never considered that she carried anything other than Eduardo's son. More so since he was killed.

Not that the sex of her baby was important. Its health was what was important. But still…a girl…

She smiled.

The ranger pulled his hand away abruptly and stood. “Now eat your breakfast so we can hit the road. The car's already packed.”