tonight.
Not when his father had just beat the shit out of him at the corral.
For nothing.
Not for nothing. ’Cause he was a Mexican. ’Cause he was scared he’d hurt his precious Caleb.
As if he’d ever hurt Caleb.
The only reason Roque had started coming to Texas a few years back was that when Caleb had found out he had an older brother, he’d begged to meet him. Their father couldn’t deny Caleb anything.
Roque had felt so angry and out of place on that first visit, he hadn’t known what to do with himself. One afternoon when Pablo and his men had been working cattle, Roque had gotten so bored, he’d set off a string of firecrackers and thrown them into the pen. When the livestock stampeded, he’d dived into the pen with them. What a thrill that had been—whooping and yelling and running with those bulls while their hooves pounded the earth. He hadn’t cared whether he’d lived or died. Then Caleb’s thin, fearful cry had rent the air.
Through a blur of horn and red flank, he’d watched Caleb’s bright head bob and then disappear. Roque had grabbed onto the biggest bull’s horns and hung while the beast pushed through the others. Miraculously Roque had reached Caleb before he was trampled. All Caleb suffered was a broken wrist and a bad case of hero worship, but to this day, their father still believed Roque had deliberately stampeded the bulls because he was so jealous of Caleb that he wanted to kill him.
All of a sudden Roque wanted to be as bad as his father always told everybody he was. He wanted to screw and drink and get wasted with a pretty, wild girl—to forget, to go dead on the inside, to lose the hate, or at least some of its edge…just for a little while. He was too Mexican to ever fit in up here.
Where the hell was she?
Suddenly the hair on the back of Roque Moya’s neck stood on end. Good, he wasn’t wrong about her. He stared at the woods and felt her eyes on his fly. He was about to call her bluff and go after her when he heard flying footsteps and shouts right behind him.
“Roque—”
His father? Roque felt a surge of panic and despised himself. His daddy’s eyes had gone colder than a rattler’s right before he’d lifted that chain a while ago. Roque leaned down, his hand closing around a rock. If his father so much as raised a hand to him ever again…
Whirling, staring over his shoulder, he caught a whiff of cow dung and fresh grass. Then he saw that familiar, beloved, bright head bobbing against the pink sky.
Caleb. His slim, lithe form dashed through the waist-high grasses toward him. Caleb, who followed him everywhere.
Fury mingled with jealousy. Then his heart swelled with love. Damn, you Caleb! Damn you for being so smart and sweet…and brave…and perfect. For being the easy kind of kid fathers were proud of. He made straight A’s. He liked books. He could read better than most college kids, which was galling to Roque, who practiced reading secretly every night.
Roque was good at math like his Moya uncles, who were engineers, but math bored him. He preferred liberal arts. Not that he did well in them. Whenever he tried to read, words got all mixed up on the page. Spelling was even harder, but at night before they went to bed, Caleb often tried to teach him. If alone, Roque would struggle over the words for hours.
When Caleb saw him look his way, his warm white grin spread from ear to ear the way it always did. Involuntarily Roque smiled back. Caleb, not the money his rich daddy bribed Mamacita with, was the only reason Roque ever came to Texas.
Roque dropped the rock and stared from his little brother to the green line of oaks where he knew she was waiting for him. Since last night he’d hoped she was a real puta in heat. Not that he’d ever had a puta. Still, he told himself he hoped she wanted a bellyful as much as she’d wanted an eyeful.
Gringas. He hoped his macho tíos were right when they said that gringas were even hornier than most men. Even the pretty, young ones. His uncles were always telling him that a real man screwed every pretty girl he could. Once, anyway. This girl had black curls and big boobs and the whitest, softest skin he’d ever seen on any girl, even a guera.
He had to ditch Caleb—and fast.
With seeming casualness, Roque began unbuttoning his loose white shirt. When Caleb was within earshot, Roque said, “Didn’t I tell you not to follow me unless I invited you along?”
“Can I…”
“Daddy said I wasn’t supposed to go near you! So—no!”
The sparkle went out of Caleb’s face and he looked down. “It’s a free country,” he said sullenly, kicking rocks. “Since when do you care what Daddy says?”
“Since this!”
Roque peeled his bloodstained cotton shirt off, and Caleb winced at the blood-crusted wounds crisscrossing Roque’s already scarred brown back.
His little brother loved him…so much. In his own way, every bit as much as Mamacita did.
Caleb—the favorite son. The perfect son. The white white son.
“Why don’t you ever just tell him you’re sorry, Roque, so he’ll stop?” Caleb demanded in a soft, worried voice.
“’Cause I’m not. ’Cause I hate him for always thinking I want to hurt you.”
Caleb gasped. “You’re dumb. If—”
“Don’t say that!”
“So dumb, your dumb zipper’s half open! If you hadn’t mouthed off, I could’ve explained and your back wouldn’t look like hamburger meat.”
Roque fumbled with his fly until he got the zipper up.
His father had grown angrier at each stroke. Caleb was the one who had run forward and risked the chain himself by grabbing their father’s hand. Not the cowboys. Not even Pablo, the ranch manager…Pablo, his friend. They’d just stood there, their boots planted in the thick dirt, their black heads hung low, some of them snickering nervously.
“I told you to get lost. I came here to be by myself so I can think.”
“I won’t say anything. Think away.” Caleb circled him, his green eyes almost popping out of his freckled face as he edged closer to get a better look at his brother’s bloody back.
Roque wadded his shirt into a ball and pitched it angrily into the pond. Nothing was working out. He glanced toward the trees. No sign of the brazen girl, who had stolen his clothes yesterday.
Caleb squatted down and rocked back on his heels. “He beat you even worse than last time….”
“I said scram.”
“You didn’t have to smart off.”
“Git—Daddy’s pet.”
Caleb, who was fourteen, rubbed his glistening eyes in shame. Then he shook his head proudly making his blond bangs fly.
Suddenly hoofbeats rumbled. Both boys swiveled when the strange,
