Fiesta Moon (11 page)

“A compost bin,” Corinne translated.

“Sí, como no?
I can put the leetle creature in that.”

Mark rose and shook the bewildered José's hand. “Gracias, José.”

“
De nada
, Señor Madison.
Me costó solo mi viaje largo y el precio del puerco,”
the peasant said with a heavy sigh.

“It cost him only the cost of the pig and his long journey,” Corinne translated at Mark's bemused expression. “It's only six dollars, Mark. That's a lot of money to someone like him.”

With a skyward roll of his eyes, Mark dug into his pocket and pulled out a money clip, flipping a modest wad of bills. “I don't have anything smaller than a ten,” he said.

“I'm sure that would delight José. After all, he had a long journey.”

With a cutting glance, Mark tugged the bill loose from the clip and handed it to the peasant. “I just bought a pig I don't want when I don't even have a decent bed. This place is getting to me.”

Oblivious to Mark's grousing, José took the money and pocketed it before the jefe changed his mind.
“Muchas gracias,
Señor Madison.
Muchas gracias,
señorita
. Adiós.”
He repeated himself as he backed through the courtyard gate.

“Come to Soledad,” the cook cooed, trying to coax her future fortune pig from under the table.

“Did you buy a boy or a girl?” Corinne teased.

“How should I know? . . . and I don't dare look, or you'll accuse me of some other decadence.”

Breathless and red faced, Soledad rose and leaned on the table for support. “Señor Mark, he will not leave from your feet.”

“I think I'll leave you to put those pheromones to good use,” Corinne said, getting up.

Mark grimaced at her as he followed suit. “Come on, Toto. Kansas isn't anywhere near these parts.”

Corinne headed for the gate.

“Wait,” he called after her. “Where are you going?”

“To check on a munchkin,” she said, taking up the theme.

“
Toto
.” Soledad reflected on the name and, after a second, nodded. “Toto is fitting for such a creature. But Señor Mark, perhaps if you walk to the . . .” She paused to retrieve her version of the new word. “The
composta,
I think the way will be easier. Our pig is strange to this place, and you are all our little Toto knows, no?”

“No . . .
yes,
” he stammered, the thought on his face turning to confusion. He waved Corinne on. “I'll catch you later.”

Not if I can help it.
Caught off guard once was enough. She still felt the heady effects of his kiss when she thought about it.

Which she wouldn't.

“Sure,” she answered as Mark led the contented Toto out of the house with an excited Soledad bringing up the rear. Now, there was a partnership she'd never envisioned.

Stay tuned for the next episode of the continuing prodigal saga.
Chuckling, Corinne started out of the hacienda. She couldn't wait to tell her friend Pam about Toto. As for Mark Madison . . .
Pues
, as Soledad would say . . . maybe he wasn't quite as self-absorbed as she'd deemed him after all.

CHAPTER 8

The following morning, Soledad insisted that Mark check on how well she was caring for their new investment. The plank pen was closed everywhere except for a wheelbarrow's width opening, so they'd used a damaged door to close it off. Afterward, the housekeeper mopped and scrubbed the salon, while Mark hauled the trash cans of plaster he'd swept up to a pile of debris next to the pigpen. Each time he went near the pen, Toto went wild, trying to get out.

Pigs
. Mark rubbed his temples as if to push the distraction from his mind and then zeroed in on a room labeled
Ballroom
-
Gym
on the renovation blueprints. Blaine's plan to leave the support walls intact and make the best of the space they had for the dormitory rooms was the cheapest way to go. The ballroom, with its two-story cathedral ceiling, was big enough for a gymnasium, but there would be no room for bleachers. But after all, it wasn't as if the orphans had family lining up to watch them play.

Mark found himself thinking of Antonio and wondered how the little guy was doing. Instead of coming back to the hacienda, Corinne had gone straight to the bed-and-breakfast before Mark could find out anything or make amends as he'd promised Soledad.

When he was Antonio's age, he'd practically worshipped his big brother. If he was honest, he still did, but in a grudging way. Still, the thought of losing Blaine—well, Mark just didn't want to go there.

Laughter wafted in through the open windows from the meadow beyond the open patio gate, drawing Mark's attention to the cute little copper- and mocha-toned kids with shining black hair that cast off the same shades of blue and purple as a raven's wing. They danced and frolicked behind a tall, lithesome young woman. He recognized Corinne as she led them in what appeared to be a game of follow-the-leader.

Like Mother Goose with her goslings trailing after her,
Mark observed, kicking back in the folding chair he'd pilfered from the parsonage with Father Menasco's permission. Of course, the prickly young woman bore no resemblance to the nursery rhyme figure, clad as she was in Capri pants and a tank top that hugged her figure. If Mark had to personify her in Mother Goose context, she was Little Miss Muffet, perched on her high little tuffet, purse strings tight in her fists and a smile that, when she was in good humor, was to die for.

Something about that dark hair pulled up into a ponytail with a bright red scarf, bold and perky, and that petulant pursing of her lips—even when he was the source of the peeve—turned Mark into a cross between Jack Horner, caught with his finger in the financial pie, and the girl kissing Georgy Porgy.

“Caray
, look at you,” Soledad chided, bursting into the room with a plate of sandwiches and a bowl of fresh sliced watermelon.

Nursery rhymes.
Mark gave himself a mental smack. This place was getting to him. That morning, after the rooster's crow and the starving burro's woeful bray for food, he could have sworn he'd heard the sound of a cow being pushed over the moon. Upon looking out the window, he'd seen a farmer driving his reluctant livestock to pasture. And now he, Mark Madison, had a pig—or at least half of a pig. His money, Soledad's care.

“Whoa, Soledad,” he exclaimed as she put the tray of fruit and sandwiches in front of him. “That's enough for two people.”

“I will feed the pig on the rind. That is good business, no?” she said, her head moving with a proud sway. “The same shopping for the hacienda and our livestock.”

“Excellent thinking.” Mark checked out the scored cucumber slices on the chicken sandwiches. The bowl beside it was filled with caterer-perfect melon balls. When had the housekeeper had time to do this? She'd just taken her mop and bucket out a few moments ago. “And this is too fancy for me, Soledad. These are fit for a king—and his court.”

“You make such silliness, Señor Mark,” the housekeeper tittered. “And for now, you are the king of the hacienda, no?”

She'd better take that up with the queen.
Mark kept his acerbic reflection to himself. He knew when to hold them and when to fold them, and he'd best hold on to Soledad's goodwill. Not that it was hard to do. Now that they were business partners, he had the feeling she was completely on his side.

“Who am I to argue?” He forked a melon ball and popped it into his mouth. It helped offset the dryness of the plaster dust he'd swallowed that still made his tongue stick to the side of his mouth. “Delicious.”

“Howsoever,” she said, looking past him through the open window to where Corinne and children played. “You must make up for your disgust with Corina.”

In addition to the ears of a bat, the woman had a memory like an elephant.

“You know I haven't seen her since she left here yesterday.”

Soledad kept busy morning to dusk, setting up her kitchen and working in and around the hacienda to make it habitable. Some of her labors were a waste of time, given the construction planned, but she'd not hear of letting workmen come into such a filthy house. Besides, her salary came out of Corinne's budget. He might as well get some benefit from this project.

“Bueno,
she will come for lunch soon. That will be the time, no?”

“Absolutely. If she's still talking to me.”

“Oh, Señor Mark, do not try to fool Soledad. A man so
guapo
as yourself knows his women.”

“Corinne isn't taken in—” The cell phone on his belt cut him off, playing an electronic version of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony that would send the master spinning in his grave. Mark took it from the sling and flipped it open.

“Mark Madison here.”

Satisfied with the result of her efforts, Soledad gave a broad smile of approval and exited, humming, “Da, da, da-dah . . .” in an operatic effort.

“So how are things south of the border?”

Blaine. Talk about timing.

“I've had saner times.” Since Blaine's family was out when Mark had checked in on arrival, he'd yet to tell his brother of the eventful journey and arrival at Mexicalli. Mark wasn't inclined to share recent events either.

“What was it you called it in your message?” his older brother chuckled. “Hades with sombreros?”

“Something like that.” Forcing into his voice a brightness he was far from feeling, Mark went on. “But it's improving. The weather is pleasant, the people are loco, but friendly, and I have my work cut out for me. What more could a guy want?”

A pity party with a few drinks at the Cantina Roja
came to Mark's mind, but he wanted to prove Blaine wrong even more. His body had yet to adjust to going to bed and getting up with the chickens . . . not to mention the burros and cows and now pigs.

“Have you gone over the specs yet?”

That was Blaine, a line or two of pleasantry and to the point.

“They are on my desk as we speak.” And they were—under the melon balls. As Mark leaned back, he spotted a drawer handle on the table front that he'd not noticed before.

“Will they work, or will you have to make some adjustments?”

“Not sure yet. I imagine the usual adjustment or so will have to be made, once we get into the project.” Mark could imagine Blaine squirming at the idea that he might possibly have overlooked something. “But for now, the plan is good to go.”

“Have you contacted any contractors?”

“Just a local yokel for an immediate plumbing fix.”
Who should have been here this morning.
“I think the whole system is going to need replacing.” He eased the drawer open and found a thin book inside; some kind of Spanish novella, a romance, he presumed, from the heart on the cover. “The pipe is old and filled with sediment and rust.”

The book was just the right thickness to balance the wobbly table—probably the reason it was stored in the drawer to start with.

“I think I included that in the estimate.”

“You did,” Mark told him, trying it out. “I'm just making a few urgent repairs so that some of the staff can stay in the front rooms of the hacienda—the ones that will eventually become offices. I'm using the salon as office and quarters. Corinne Diaz and her housekeeper occupy the parlor and dining room across the hall—or they will, as soon as Juan Pablo fixes the plumbing.”

The book worked like a charm—a first, given his luck to date.

“So how is Corinne, Mark?” his sister-in-law butted in.

Mark winced.
Nothing like being pulled from the pan into the fire.

“Hi, Caroline. Are you keeping Blaine straight?”

“Not if I can help it.” A totally wicked chuckle sounded on the other end.

Caroline was the best thing that ever happened to Blaine. Her freewheeling spirit drew him out of the tight niche in which he thrived but from which he missed life.

“So how is she?” Caroline pressed.

“Fine. She stays on top of things and makes up for the Spanish I've forgotten.”

“She's really dedicated to this project.”

“Yeah, that's an understatement.”

“Did you see the ghost yet?”

A third voice had come on the line. Mark recognized it as that of his little nephew, Berto.

“Not unless you count Soledad coming in from the clothesline with a tarp draped over her.”

Berto giggled. “My sisters thought that
I
was a ghost. I was hiding under the tarp.”

Blaine cleared his throat before Berto could launch into one of his favorite, often long-winded, reminiscences. “Could I get back to business, people?”

“Uh-oh,” Caroline said. “Good-bye, Mark. Give Corinne a hug for me.”

He couldn't believe he'd kissed her.

“Adiós, Tío
Mark,” Berto chimed in.
“Adiós, Papá.”

The tenderness in Blaine's voice betrayed his no-nonsense reply.
“Adiós.
Now, get off the phone, both of you.”

“'Bye, all,” Mark put in before two hasty clicks sounded in his ear.

“I'm not so sure having an office at home is a good idea,” Blaine said, when the static from having three lines open at once quieted.

“Hey, you're off those acid-eater pills, aren't you?”

“Yeah, I guess. And it's great to be here when Caroline and the kids come sailing in every afternoon.” Blaine paused.

Mark could almost hear his thoughts being filed methodically into business, home, and miscellaneous.

“So how are you
really
making out?” he asked at last.

“
Really,
I'm fine. I mean, it's not Acapulco.” Not by a long shot. “But it's a treat to be out in the field.” And it was a far cry from the Hilton and the wining and dining of prospective customers that Mark dreamed about.