Renee Simons Special Edition (47 page)

"How much have you figured out?” he asked.

She laid a hand on his forearm. The sinewy power beneath her palm traveled like a current of electricity through her finger tips, simmering her blood and jamming her breath beneath her ribs. She forced out her words.

“Someone is preparing to reactivate the Golden Eye.”

“Short and to the point.” He gave her a wry smile. “And correct.”

“Why bother with a played-out mine? After all this time?”

“The current price of gold could make exploration worthwhile. A mining engineer came down to do a feasibility study. We’re waiting for the report. If he thinks there’s gold worth going after, the valley will become a giant strip mine.

So she finally had confirmation of Elvira’s disclosure. “And you’re in favor?”

“I don’t have a choice. Mercedes’ grandfather owned the mine. Now she does.”

“What’s in it for you?”

“Mineral rights.”

Callie nodded. “She owns the mine, but your family owns the valley.”

“Some would call us ‘land poor’.”

“
El unico tesoro es nuestra tierra
,” Callie said.

“Do you know what that means?”

“‘The only treasure is our land.’ My grandmother taught me that many years ago — the sum total of my Spanish language skills.”

He chuckled. “That’s one of my father’s favorite phrases. Wonder who taught it to whom.”

“You know they were … friends?”

“More than that.”

“Yes,” Callie whispered. “Much more.”

Luc took her good hand and helped her to her feet. “Feel up to a change of scenery?”

“A quiet place, please?”

That place turned out to be a patio at the back of the house. Luc carried a candle-lit
lumineria
and set it on a low adobe wall, where its glow warmed the vest-pocket seating area and illuminated a set of floor-to-ceiling glass doors. He settled himself against the base of the wall while Callie nestled in a corner of the ledge, whose gentle curves supported her back.

“What exactly did my father and Lucinda mean to each other?” he asked.

“They were sweethearts.”

“
Los novios.”

“Doesn’t that mean ‘bride and groom’?” Callie asked.

“That also. So you know a little more of my language.”

Callie smiled. “Not enough to brag about.”

“Do you know what broke them apart?”

“Another woman. And a child.”

“How do you know that?”

“I think,” she emphasized, “that the entries in Gram’s diary point to your father and a relative of hers — a cousin, maybe. But I’ve read only one volume, so maybe the others contain more clues.”

“If you've only read one, why do you think she was writing about my father?”

Callie had the feeling Luc was digging in ground he'd already explored, but she answered. “In her diary Gram calls the man ‘Mi Amore’, which may or may not mean anything, but if it refers to your father and she felt betrayed by him, that would explain her lifelong anger toward him."

"Maybe I should bring you the rest of those books."

"I'll certainly have plenty of time to read during the next few days."

Luc rubbed the back of his neck and grimaced.

"If it isn't too much trouble."

"None at all. I'll stop by the house tomorrow and get them."

"You're not pleased," she whispered.

He wasn't ready to tell her what he knew. Better she comes to the truth on her own, he thought. Easier to swallow than hearing it from me.

"I'm finding it hard to picture my father loving anyone but my mother."

"Funny, I never thought of you as being naive."

He grinned. "Dumb. I know. Even the old man implied there was something … special between them."

"Did he say what broke them apart?"

"Irreconcilable differences."

"Like us?" she whispered.

He reached up and stroked her ankle with the tip of one finger. "Not like us."

"No?"

"We don't have to let our differences get in the way."

"Seems to me I've heard that somewhere. What's going on, Luc?"

Straddling the wall, he faced her and wrapped his arms around the knees she'd drawn to her chest to make room for him.

"
Me has robado el corazon
," he said.
"You have stolen my heart," he translated. "I didn't want to fall in love with you but I have. So now we must find a way around our differences. How did you put it once, 'agree to disagree'?" He kissed her knee. "If you can forgive the things I said about not getting involved. And the things I did to keep us apart."

"What changed your mind?"

Tell her now, his inner voice prodded, before anything gets in the way of this feeling between you. "Three days of not knowing what happened to you. Of worrying if you were all right. Of feeling like I'd failed to protect you from that piece of filth who's been dogging you." He drew her closer. "Three days of trying to fill the hole left in my gut while you were gone."

"You missed me," Callie whispered.

The wonder in her voice started a warmth flooding through him. Surprised by his reaction to such a small thing, he chuckled.

"I missed you." Callie gave him a gentle smile and touched his cheek. "That's nice."

"That's all?"

"Nice is a good first step. We'll see what happens later."

They were now so close, he pressed his forehead against hers. "Then I guess later's nice, too."

Chapter Eleven

Luc left Callie in the tender care of his mother and went to see Eddie to sort out his own problem.

"How long has your vision been giving you trouble?" his friend asked.

"About two months."

"On the phone you said you're seeing distortions in your images."

"Straight lines look wavy, curved lines look worse and there's this small gray area in the center of my field of vision."

"Any headaches?"

"Yeah, but I think they're from straining to focus."

"Does sunlight make things worse?"

"Any kind of bright light."

Eddie leaned back in his chair. "This isn't my area of expertise, but I'll take a case history and check you over. We'll do some tests to make sure there's nothing else going on. Then we'll find you a specialist."

Luc nodded. He knew Eddie's capabilities. If there was an answer, he would find it. Or send him to someone who could.

Two hours later, Eddie had analyzed whatever test results he could read immediately. "I'm going to give you a referral to a guy over at
University
Hospital
. He's head of Ophthalmology there. A good man." Eddie checked his watch and picked up the phone. "He might not have left for the day," he said, hitting the speaker button.

Dr. Gerrold answered on the first ring and agreed to see Luc in the morning.

"I can put you up for the night if you want," Eddie said.

"Thanks, but I'd better drive down to
Albuquerque
today. Sleep there and head over to the hospital first thing in the morning."

After leaving Eddie's office, Luc made a detour and brought Callie her grandmother's diaries. "These will give you something to do while I'm gone."

"Why are you going away?"

He'd found her in a lounge chair on the back patio, a shawl across her legs and a battered copy of one of Lucinda’s journals on her lap. He set the box on the ground within her reach.

"Why?" she repeated.

"Not away. Just to
Albuquerque
for a day or two."

"To do what?"

He lifted her hand to his lips and placed a soft kiss on the inside of her wrist. Her pulse jumped and his kept time. "Can you wait for an answer until I get back?"

Her gaze narrowed for an instant, then relaxed as if she'd decided not to question his evasiveness. Her acceptance seemed to warrant a response of some kind.

"It's hard for me to answer because I don't know what's going on."

Her free hand covered his with a warm touch. "Then tell me what you think."

"Look, this doesn't have anything to do with the situation in Blue Sky or what happened to you." He paused as the knot that had been building in his gut ballooned to twice its former size. "It's personal … a problem … I'd rather wait until I know something concrete."

"I've known something's wrong." She pointed to his eyes. "With those."

He mirrored her gesture. "Those don't miss much."

"So why
Albuquerque
?"

"I'm going to see an eye guy Eddie Vega set me up with."

"That's good." She swept aside the afghan. "I'm going with you."

"There's nothing you can do. And you need your rest."

"I'm not planning to do anything. I just want to be there."

He stared at her for several minutes, trying to gauge how determined she was so he'd know how to sidetrack her. She returned his gaze with a wide-eyed, unflinching steadiness that told him she would not be swayed.

"You've helped me," she said softly, "now let me help you. If only by being close … just in case you need … someone."

"I need you to be safe."

"Where would I be safer than with you? Let me come along."

He wanted her with him. He could kid himself into thinking it was because he'd be able to watch over her, but the truth was, he needed her — her sense of humor, her warmth, her ability to see beyond the next stumbling block, the next jog in the road. And if tomorrow went badly, he might need to borrow from whatever had kept her going underground.

"Okay," he said with a nod. He caught her smile of triumph. "Don't look so pleased at my discomfort."

"Never that, Luc." She touched his cheek. "Only because you're letting me come close. Letting me be where I want to be."

He covered her hand with his. "Let's pack a bag for you and get on the road."

"I can handle that," she said. "Take care of yourself."

"I'd better give my mother some explanation for dragging you away." He smiled sheepishly. "She isn't going to like my kidnaping her prize patient."

"Are you going to tell her the truth?"

Her question was almost a challenge. He helped her to her feet and put an arm around her shoulder. "I'll tell her what I know."

"Then she'll like that you won't be alone."

She touched the corner of his mouth with her lips. He wanted more and turned her soft peck into a lingering kiss that left them clinging to each other as desire and conflicting emotions buffeted them and finally subsided to a slow, manageable tremor.

"Still want to come along?"

She grinned at him. "More than ever."

"Don't forget — you're sort of incapacitated."

She nudged him in the ribs with her good arm. "With emphasis on the 'sort of'."

* * *

They passed through Blue Sky on their way south. Callie shook her head. "I can't believe how far off course I ended up on my way out of that place."

"You were below ground with no reference points. And you were hurt."

They passed the ruins and the general store in silence. Callie glanced down the slope to The Mansion, but they were going too fast to see much. Luc's situation kept her from asking him to stop.

"If everything is okay," he said, "we'll visit the house on the way back.
Est
á
bien
? Is that okay?"

"Of course. Nothing is more important than getting to the hospital."

"Thank you."

"Just returning the favor."

"Have you remembered any details of where you were?"

"A few, but they don't make much sense." Thinking about the inevitable made her shiver. "I'll have to go back down."

Luc glanced at her, then turned back to the road. He knew that revisiting the scene would trigger memories that might lead them to her attacker, but it wouldn't be fun.

"You’ll be putting yourself through a terrifying experience again,” he said.

"The only way I'm going to get over it is to go down there again on my terms and under my own steam."

"Then I'm going with you."

Callie chuckled.

"What?"

"I go with you. You go with me. This could be habit forming."

"Is that bad?"

Suddenly serious, she shrugged. "Not bad, just strange. I've been on my own a long time. And you and I have been keeping a safe distance between us."