LITMIR.BIZ

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obviously alone, thinking perhaps to steal her baby as so many others had been stolen, ripped from the loving arms of their mothers and sold as if they were packages of cereal.

      “You don’t trust me, do you?” he said softly.

      “I do not trust anyone,” she said. “A lesson I should have learned earlier.”

      He studied her for a moment, and then, to her surprise, nodded. “Wise choice.”

      His voice was soft, gentle, but it held a harsh undertone that stirred something in her. Who was this man who had strode in out of the moonlight and helped her without questions? What had he been—what had he done—to sound like that? Was he truly one of them? Was her baby still in danger from him?

      “Go,” she said, her voice sharp as her fears grew in proportion to the exhaustion that was growing, threatening to overwhelm her at any moment.

      “I can’t just leave you here alone.”

      “I will not be alone for long. People will be back here soon.”

      “You don’t have to lie to get me to leave.”

      “I am not lying. The woman who runs this place, she will be back with her charges soon. They only went to town for an outing.”

      He lifted a brow at her, and she wondered what she’d said. Her English was, she knew, nearly perfect. She’d worked hard at that in college, intending to put it to use teaching in a bilingual school.

      But sometimes, she realized it was too perfect; local idioms and slang peppered the talk of others, but her collegetaught skills stood out, marked her as different. But she’d long ago decided she would rather be different that way; if she was going to be judged, as people were, by the way she spoke, better too well than not well enough. That had always been her way. She saw no reason to change it now.

      “Go. Please.”

      He hesitated a moment longer, looking down at her. He towered over the bed, so tall, long-legged and strong, she thought. His eyes were dark, piercing, and she couldn’t help feeling he saw more than she wished. His jaw was stubbled with slight beard growth, as if he hadn’t shaved since this morning. His hair was even darker than her own, and fell in a silky if shaggy sweep over his brow when he leaned forward. She wanted to run her fingers through it and push it back.

      That thought sent a stab of shock and fear through her. She needed this man gone. She obviously was not thinking clearly in the aftermath of this life-changing experience. The very last thing she should be doing at this moment was finding a man attractive. Especially a man she knew absolutely nothing about.

      Of course, she had thought she knew everything about Alberto as well.

      “Go,” she said again. “Please.”

      “You swear to me that there will be help here soon?”

      His concern moved her against her will. “I swear. And I repeat, I do not lie.”

      She meant that. Small, kind lies to avoid hurt feelings were one thing, although she preferred to avoid those as well. But big lies about things that mattered had shaped then destroyed her world. She hated them.

      For another silent moment, her rescuer, the man who had helped deliver the baby squirming in her arms, stared down at her. And then, sharply, he nodded.

      “Be well,” he said, in a tone she couldn’t describe, some combination of command, awe and benediction. She had the oddest thought that this time had been life-changing for more than just herself. But this handsome American seemed too strong to let something affect him that much.

      And then he was gone, disappearing back into the darkness as silently as he’d appeared, surprising her that a man of his size could move so quietly. It was unsettling, someone that big should make more noise, she thought. And in her exhaustion her imagination began to come up with reasons why a man like that would learn to move so stealthily—and none of them were good.

      She was relieved that he had gone. She had half expected him to grab her baby out of her arms, proving himself part of the ring she so feared and that the local authorities were so diligently searching for.

      But she could not deny he’d been a godsend. She did not want to think about what she would have done had he not appeared out of the darkness.

      But she also did not want to think about what she would have done had he refused to go back into that darkness.

      She cuddled her baby close, running through her mind all that she had studied: when to feed her, how she would know when she herself was ready for that, all the things she’d so voraciously read in preparation for this day. The pain she’d just endured was nearly forgotten already, although the gentle, encouraging touch and words of the dark stranger were not. She thought she would never forget those, or him. One day it might be a fascinating story to tell her daughter, about the unknown man who had come to their aid, and then vanished into the night.

      Perhaps in time she would wonder if he had even been real, that tall, dark man. She smiled at her own silliness, a little surprised that she was still capable of such fantasy. Perhaps she was already preparing stories to tell her child at bedtime.

      Instinctively she began to sing quietly to Maria, a sweet little lullaby her mother had sung to her.

       Duérmete mi niña,

       Duérmete mi sol…

      Not that she actually wanted her little sunshine to sleep just yet, she was still too caught up in the wonder of it all. At last, she held this miracle in her arms, and she felt she must do something motherly, something to show this tiny human being she was loved and welcomed, even if she was lacking one of her parents.

      “Better no father than an evil one, mija,” she whispered, determined that the baby would hear English as much as Spanish as she grew and learned to speak.

      Yes, it would be different for Maria. She would grow up speaking both, at home in both tongues in a way her mother would never be. But it was what she’d wanted, Ana told herself. She was alone, isolated by choice from the family she’d once been close to. The family she’d once trusted.

      You must remember who they really are, she told herself. She couldn’t help thinking some of them had to know what she had only recently learned, how vast were the criminal dealings her father was involved in. Once she herself had found out, the evidence was so obvious she could not believe she had missed it for so long. The older ones, her father’s brothers, sisters, the ones she could no longer think of as aunts and uncles, they must have known.

      Had they indeed known, and conspired to keep it from her? Or had no conspiracy been necessary? Was she such a naïve fool that they had managed to keep the truth from her with no such effort?

      The baby stilled, seemingly calmed by the sweet song. Ana held her even closer. She closed her eyes, shifting in the bed. The big man had seen to her comfort in an unexpectedly gentle manner, cleaning her, changing the bedclothes, and disposing of the mess of the birth quickly and efficiently. For a man who claimed to know nothing about the process, she thought he had handled it with remarkable aplomb. Her mother had often told her how her own father had been worse than useless. She liked the idea that her gallant stranger was much more of a man than her wicked father. She wondered what that stranger was thinking now, if he’d already put them out of his mind, if what had been a miracle to her was simply an odd occurrence to him.

      He probably thinks you’re just another illegal looking for a handout, she thought.

      She told herself it didn’t matter what he thought, not when she herself knew the truth. She was an intelligent woman, she had an education to offer, and she was going to start a new life for herself and her daughter. She would do it herself, without charity or handouts. Anything given to her, she would repay, in some form, as she was helping here at Hopechest Ranch in return for Jewel’s hospitality and kindness.

      No matter what it took, she and Maria would make their way, and have a good life.

      “I

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