girl.” The words were soft, spoken in the same dark voice, again carrying no farther than her hearing, as if they existed in a place where no other could interfere.
“Where—” The word was whispered, then silenced by his hand against her waist, offering a compelling tightening of her diaphragm that forbade speech.
“Silence.” Again he spoke, the single word touching her ear as a whisper, and she was mute, not out of fear, but with acknowledgment that he was to be respected and obeyed. His arms around her were long, his hand lifted the reins easily from where they had been left over the saddle horn. His fingers twined in the leather in an automatic gesture, and the horse moved toward the gate at some unheard signal.
The wooden sign that designated this place as the Convent of the Sisters of Charity swung in the breeze over her head as she found herself passing beneath it. With a sidelong glance, she watched as two other men emerged from the wooded area to join the horse she rode upon, and noted the dull gleam of rifle barrels that were slung over their saddles. Her own mount, the horse she shared with the stranger, carried a leather scabbard that bore its own weapon.
Leather holsters were tied to the men’s thighs, their contents looking dangerous and worthy of her respect. Two men rode abreast, then behind them her captor, his mount elegant in black leather tack, silver gleaming from saddle and bridle.
Manuel fell in place as the rear guard, a position he apparently took pride in, for his own weapon was a mark of his role, lying across his thighs, ready for use. His hat was pulled low over his forehead as he searched the horizon and then turned his horse to check from whence they had come. His appearance was that of a trusted man, one who could be relied on to do his master’s bidding without hesitation. One who would stand at his master’s back, defending the man he served.
She watched the men who surrounded her, for the first time in years in close contact with the other half of the world. Men, the species almost unknown to her…For at fourteen, she had been but a child, almost unaware of the staff who worked and lived at her father’s hacienda, all but the cook, who treated her as a child of her own.
Now the horse beneath her moved briskly, silently, only the sound of leather creaking and the low whinny of one of the packhorses filling her ears. The woods surrounded them—ahead lay the road to the village, behind them the convent, and here, riding a black monster of a horse, she was at the mercy of a man whose instructions she had followed as a child might obey a parent.
At that thought, she almost laughed, swallowing the unexpected mirth that begged to be spilled from her lips, recognizing her position as being far from that of a child. She was a woman, perhaps not in experience, but certainly in years, for at her age many young women had wed and produced a family.
The changing of her body had been gradual over the past years, but definite. No longer a child of scrawny proportions, she bore the attributes of a female approaching adulthood. Breasts that seemed too large for her slender body, a smattering of body hair in various places that made her wonder at its appearance and the monthly cycle that the nuns told her was the proof of her fertility.
She had been taught well by the nuns, told of the use of her various body parts, and the reason for the changes she wondered at. And had sometimes thought of her father’s plan for her future. With his death she’d initially felt a sense of relief that she no longer would face marriage to a man thirty years her senior, a man who had looked at her with eyes that burned and searched out her secrets.
But now, she feared Juan Garcia’s arrival. So long as he did not know where she had gone, she was safe from him.
“Did Garcia send you?” she asked, as that unwelcome thought entered her mind.
The man behind her laughed, a harsh sound, and his firm, negative word of reply somehow reassured her.
But, she realized, she lived now with a danger that might prove even greater than that of Juan Garcia. The man who held her against his body was the present. The future was yet to come. And with a sudden burst of insight, she recognized that her future might not be set in stone…yet. Though her captor might consider her his property, she was a free woman, until such time as he delivered her to the destination he had in mind. If she could find a way to escape him, she might yet choose her own way, might even find a life that would be pleasing to her.
A life of her own. One not dictated by the strong arm that held her against her captor. Her captor? Or perhaps the man who had rescued her from the certainty of marriage to Juan Garcia, unknowingly giving her the opportunity to seek another fate.
The rider ahead of her, on her left, a man Rafael had called Jose, turned his horse to the side as they reached the center of the small village, and the other two horsemen continued on without him. She was silent, not wanting to be hushed by her captor’s stern voice, should she be so bold as to ask their destination.
As if he sensed her need, the man who called himself Rafael bent his head and whispered words against her ear. “We will stop just ahead, to eat. Jose will bring food from the general store in the village.”
She nodded. They had traveled only an hour, perhaps two, for the village was more than five miles from the convent, and she felt the need for sustenance. The breakfast porridge had been bland, almost tasteless, and the milk warm, not fit for consumption. Sister Ruth Marie had told her only a week or so ago that she must eat more, for her clothing was loose and in danger of falling from her without the aid of a braided rope about her middle. Apparently the goal of the sisters was to make her as round and rosy as they all appeared to be fashioned beneath their robes.
But no longer. Now she would eat as she pleased, as much or little as suited her, and the sound of that silent vow of independence pleased her, as she straightened in the grip of her captor.
Another mile or so found them within a grove of trees, and she looked about her at the shaded clearing where the sun did not shine. Overhead, the trees lifted heavy branches to the sky and only an occasional bit of glittering sun peeked through the leafy roof.
She lifted her chin, daring a look at the man who held her. “Who are you? How did you know where to find me?” Surely that was not her voice, that low, sultry sound that pierced the silence.
He bent his head to her and his eyes traveled over her face, past the pale skin of her forehead and cheeks to the barely exposed flesh of her throat. She felt the piercing of his dark gaze, knew a moment of fear as his mouth tightened and his jaw clenched.
“More importantly, who are you?” he returned, his tone one she could not deny. “I came to the convent seeking you out, for you are a woman I’d heard of, and I would know if you are the one whose name is Isabella Montgomery.”
“Yes, I’m Isabella,” she said, wondering as she did so how he had heard of her. And somehow, she found the courage to ask him the question that begged an answer.
He listened to her halting query and smiled, an expression that softened his features and brought a strange beauty to his face. “I’ve heard, over the past year, stories of a young girl whose beauty rivals that of the loveliest of women, a virgin who was being readied as a bride. There were travelers who had slept in cells at the convent during their journey, men who spoke of a young woman they had seen. I listened to several such men, heard their tales of a fragile girl who would be given to an old man, whose father had sold her betrothal to gain a fortune. And I could not bear that such a thing would come to pass, Isabella. I knew I must see for myself the creature described to me as a young woman of good family, a girl with beauty and grace, one fit for the task of becoming mistress of Diamond Ranch.”
Her
