What if you are wrong?He should never have let the thought seep into his mind, for now that he had, it festered like an open wound. He wasn’t wrong. He had seen them together. Angel was like a brother, had been since they were children. He was a de la Guerra. De la Guerras did not lie.
What if you are wrong?The axe handle slipped, nearly flew from his hands. It hit the heavy length of wood sideways, sent the piece of oak careening into a nearby tree.Santo de Christo—he wasn’t wrong. Carly knew it and so did he. But the words she’d said that day at the pool would not leave him.You’re exactly like my uncle. Your hatred is the same, your prejudice.… It blinds you as surely as it does the Anglos you despise.
The heavy axe rang as it severed the last piece of oak in the pile, and Ramon sank the blade deep into the top of the tree stump he had been using to position the wood. Still thinking of Carly, he looked back toward the house and was surprised to see Pedro Sanchez riding through the gate on his big dapple gray stallion.
Blotting the sweat from his neck and shoulders with a coarse linen towel, Ramon grabbed his white lawn shirt and started walking toward him.
“It is good to see you, my friend,” Ramon called out. Pedro had not yet returned from his trip to the valley when Ramon and the others had made their last raid. It had been almost two months since Ramon had seen him.
“It is good to see you, too, Don Ramon.” The old vaquero reined up, then dismounted with casual ease from the saddle. “I am sorry to be so late in returning to the stronghold, but I heard the raid went well.”
“Si,very well. But winter is near. We may need to strike one more time while the pickings are so plentiful.”
Pedro mulled that over as they walked side by side to the corral and he began to unsaddle his horse. “Now that Andreas is gone, each time you ride, the threat of discovery is greater.”
“Si,that is so. Mariano says Sheriff Layton was here while I was in Monterey. Mariano believes he grows suspicious.”
“And still you mean to continue?”
“Only as long as I have to.”
Pedro said nothing, just loosened the cinch and lifted the heavy vaquero saddle off of the stallion’s back. Steam rose up from the damp patch of hair beneath the brightly woven blanket.
“How was your journey?” Ramon asked.
“I would have been back sooner, but Miranda’s visit with her in-laws did not go exactly as planned. She decided to return to the stronghold. By then she was resigned to the loss of your attentions… now I learn that she may not have lost you after all.”
Ramon just shrugged, but a subtle tension crept into his shoulders. “My wife is no longer here, if that is what you mean. Things did not work out between us.”
“So I heard.” He loosened the bridle, slid a halter on over the stallion’s soft muzzle, and fastened it behind the animal’s ears.
“It is hardly a secret. Caralee has returned to her uncle.”
“Because you found your cousin in her bed.”
Surprise flared inside him. His jaw clamped so hard he had to force himself to relax it in order to speak. “How did you learn of this? I have told no one.”
“How do you think I learned? Your cousin Angel was bragging about it… until Ignacio split his lip like a ripe piece of melon. He has not mentioned it since.”
“I cannot believe he would do such a thing.”
“No?” Pedro rounded the horse and came to stand in front of him. “You did not find it difficult to believe the tale he told about your wife.”
“Even if he should have kept silent, he did not lie. I found him in her bed.”
“That he was there does not mean your wife betrayed you. How can you be so sure your cousin was telling the truth?”
“Angel is a de la Guerra. He is my own flesh and blood. Why should I not believe him?”
“Angel swears your wife wanted him to come to her—so of course it must be true. I have known him as many years as you have. Has there ever been a woman who did not throw herself at Angel’s feet?”
Ramon grunted at the memory conjured by Pedro’s words, images of Angel bragging about the whores who waited for him in every town between San Juan and the border. “Not according to Angel.”
“Whores are not ladies, my friend, and I do not believe there were even so many of those.”
Ramon mulled that over. “Perhaps not.”
“And what of the woman in Santa Fe?”
