The Lady Takes A Gunslinger (Wild Western Rogues Series, Book 1) (39 page)

"Señor Donovan, Señorita Turner," Magdalena said, gesturing to the man beside her. "Pablo Dominguez. My father,
el jefe de los guerrilleros."

Reese stood.
Dominguez.
So this man was their leader. He held out his hand. The man hesitated only momentarily before taking it in a firm handshake, then nodded politely to Grace.

"You are fortunate, Señor Donovan, that you are still breathing," he said. "Had not Scully stayed our guns, you would be lying beside him now."

"I am grateful for your restraint, but it wouldn't have altered my intent. If Jake Scully hadn't died on his own, I would've helped him along."

"What was between you is over,
Señor
.
Dios
and the guns of Maximilian have seen to that. He was a friend to us and our brother in the struggle. We will miss him. But you and I will speak of it no more."

Reese regarded him warily. "Your English is good. Very good."

Dominguez smiled with equal wariness at the compliment. "I was educated in your country, Señor. As was my daughter. She tells me
la señorita
is the sister of Luke Turner. This is true?"

"Yes." Grace spoke for him. "He is my brother. Do you know him?"

"Sí.
Very well. He is one of us, as well. He spoke of his sister many times."

"He's alive?"

Magdalena lowered her eyes. "For today."

"What's that mean?" Reese demanded.

Magdalena and Dominguez exchanged looks. "It means," Magdalena explained, "that time runs short for him. And for the others who are imprisoned beside him."

"How short?" Reese asked.

"One day. Two at the most."

Grace sent Reese a frantic look. "Two days!"

"Miramon and Mejia have decided to make examples of the
guerrilleros
they hold prisoner."

"Guerillas? As in bushfighters? That's not Luke. He's a diplomat, sent here by the U.S. government to... to—"

"To what, señorita?" Dominguez asked pointedly.

"To negotiate... well, I don't know exactly. No one would tell me."

Magdalena answered her. "He was sent to walk the thin edge of a razor, Señorita Turner. To be two men and yet, only one."

Grace shook her head. "I don't understand."

"You must forgive Magdalena. She lets her heart rule her mouth."

The woman stared at the ground, silent.

"Your brother was sent to learn what he could of our chances," Dominguez explained. "To help us overcome the oppression of Napoleon's troops. At the same time, he was to make Maximilian believe he was negotiating secretly for
Los Estados Unidos
on the chance that things fell that way. But in fact, it was a ploy to learn of his strategy."

Grace was dumbfounded. "You mean he
was
spying?"

Dominguez nodded. "He saved the lives of many of our men."

She sat down hard on the large rock Reese had been using. "Oh, my."

"It's all well and good that he's saved your men's lives," Reese accused. "Why have you not tried to save his?"

"As if we have not!" Magdalena exploded. "We have tried a dozen times with no success! We are all known to the Imperialist pigs. The minute we show our faces, they shoot us down like dogs. It is what happened tonight. Three of our men dead or full of French lead."

"This is why you have come, Donovan?" Dominguez inquired. "To save him?"

Reese nodded.

"Then perhaps we can work together toward that end."

Grace looked up, her eyes glazed with shock. "How is he? Have you seen him?"

Magdalena's face went pale as she gripped the bandoliers on her chest. "He is not well. When they took him, they beat him. It was bad. Luke is a strong man, but if we do not free him soon, he will not need an executioner's bullet to kill him."

Grace stood and pressed her face against Reese's chest. Through his shirt, he felt the dampness of her tears. Curling his arms around her, he realized their odds had just narrowed considerably. If Luke couldn't walk out of the prison under his own power, it would make escape that much harder.

He looked at Pablo Dominguez. "How many men do you have, and how many are behind bars?"

"We are still twenty strong. Seven of our number lie under Maximilian's guard. And there are many others. There is word that the Imperialists plan to attack in the next forty-eight hours, but no one knows where or how." He shook his head. "Maximilian tilts at windmills, but with the vigor of a fool who does not know the game is ended. Our
generals,
Escobedo and Corona, wait. For what," he added with disgust,
"Quien sabe?
Who knows? Our brothers do not have time for them to find their nerve, señor. Nor do I have the patience."

"Then tomorrow, we go. We'll get them out. Or die trying," Reese swore. With his arm still around Grace, he started back toward camp with Pablo and Magdalena at his side. "Tell me what you know. Tell me everything."

Chapter 20

Naturally, Reese argued against her coming.

Naturally, she won.

His arguments were overcome rather easily, she thought, by the mere fact that she remained one of the few unknowns in Querétaro and as such, unrecognizable as a rebel sympathizer. Her second, and even more convincing, argument was that she knew Luke on sight and Reese didn't. But the last nail in the coffin was drilled after they'd discussed and rejected a dozen ways to get them in the front door. Grace's idea had been ridiculously simple and seemingly foolproof despite the obvious risks.

Even so, Magdalena had argued that she should be the one to accompany Reese, knowing the floor plans of both the sprawling aqueduct and the Church of San Francisco on the Plaza de Santa Cruz. True as that was, as the plan coalesced, it became clear that Magdalena's obvious talents would be required elsewhere if Reese's scheme was to work.

A space of less than twenty-four hours existed within which they must accomplish the rescue. Possibly less if Mejia made good on his threat to execute the prisoners tomorrow. That was a possibility Grace refused to consider. The plan had to work. It simply had to.

While Reese, Pablo, and his men wrapped bundles of dynamite into neat and concealable explosive packages, Magdalena put the finishing touches on the disguise Grace would be forced to use tomorrow.

"It's awfully short, isn't it?" Grace asked, reaching up to touch her shorn head.

"You want to look like a boy, no?" Magdalena replied, stirring some concoction she'd made of mashed cattails and walnut shells. "Your own hair is like a golden flag to wave in their faces."

Grace nodded ruefully, fingering a long shock of blonde hair that lay, discarded, in her lap. "It'll grow back," she said, more to herself than the other woman. She glanced at the men, wondering what Reese would think of her without her mane of hair. She couldn't worry about that now. Luke was her first concern, and she'd do anything not to jeopardize his escape. She felt the cool weight of the mixture Magdalena had made as she plopped it on her head and spread it through what was left of her hair with a comb.

"Perhaps your brother will not recognize you this way, no?" Magdalena said with a smile in her voice.

"Luke would know me if my hair was green," Grace replied. "We're very close. At least, we were..." Her voice trailed off.

"Luke spoke of you often."

Grace swallowed hard. "He did? What did he say?"

"That he worried for you."

"Worried?" That was the last thing she'd expected to hear.

"That you would not find happiness," Magdalena explained. "That you worry for him too much and think not of yourself."

Of course, he'd been referring to Grace's interference between him and Karina, which had cost him a marriage. She bit her lip, holding back the pang of emotion that stabbed at her. If she hadn't told Luke about Karina's infidelity, none of this would be happening. Luke would never have signed up for a dangerous mission like this one, or be sitting in Maximilian's prison, awaiting execution. It was all her fault. If only she'd kept her mouth shut and let Luke and Karina work out their problems on their own.

But that was all water under the bridge and if he was worried about her, she reasoned, perhaps he didn't hate her completely.

That he'd talked to Magdalena about it at all made her curious. Luke wasn't particularly a forthcoming sort of man. Laconic might be a better description. Were he and Magdalena close? More than just friends? The look in the other woman's eyes when she spoke of Luke said they were. Her throat grew thick at the realization.

As Magdalena combed Grace's cropped, damp hair away her face, Grace decided forthrightness was the best approach.

"Are you in love with my brother, Magdalena?"

The comb stilled in her hair. Magdalena gave a small laugh. "You are very direct, Señorita Turner."

"Please, call me Grace. Forgive me for my boldness, but it seems there's little time for dillydallying around it. Like my brother said, I'm concerned about his happiness. He was very unhappy when he left the States. It would comfort me greatly to know that he'd found some solace here in Mexico before he was taken prisoner."

Magdalena rounded the rock upon which Grace sat and hunkered down before the fire. She stared into the flames, seemingly trying to sort out the answer for herself. "You ask if I'm in love with him. The answer is yes. But," she amended quietly, "it is not as simple as that. Luke... he is a complicated man."

How well she knew that. "Does Luke love you?"

Magdalena tilted up her chin and looked at Grace, her eyes overly bright. "He cares for me. Perhaps as he cares for you.
Pues...
not precisely that way. But love?" Magdalena shook her head with a self-deprecating laugh. "It would be
mas facil—
more easy—to hold the wind in my hand than to pin a man like him down to a word. His heart still bleeds for another, I think. A fool, no? One who would let him go?"

Grace reached out to touch the other woman's shoulder. "A fool, yes. I'm afraid Luke was wounded deeply. I'm glad he had you, though. I'm very glad for that."

"Manana
—tomorrow, in case something goes wrong for me, when you see him, you will tell him this for me?"

"That you love him?"

Magdelina squeezed her eyes shut, already regretting her words. "No. Do not tell him that," she begged.
"Dios! I
am the fool."

"No, you're not. Besides," Grace said gently, "I think he must already know."

Magdalena forced a smile, tossing her braid over her shoulder. "So, Grace, let us wash that mess from your hair now, before you start to look like a cattail yourself, yes?"

* * *

The hour was late by the time Reese returned to the fire. The plan with Dominguez and his men was sealed, and now they'd simply have to wait until tomorrow to execute it. Despite the knock on the head, fortune had been with them when they'd stumbled into the rebel camp. The plan had its flaws, but, he reasoned wearily, there was an element of comfort in pure numbers.

Except for the dim light of the blaze, the blackness was absolute. He found Grace already tucked between blankets, asleep. Hidden completely by the covers, she seemed so small and fragile. He was an idiot for agreeing to what she'd proposed tonight. But if there was one thing he'd learned on this trip—as crazy as Grace Turner's schemes seemed, they invariably worked. If, however, things went wrong, she'd be stood up against the same wall as him to face Maximilian's firing squad. That thought burned its way into his soul. There was only one answer to that. He'd simply have to make sure nothing went wrong.

A high-desert chill gnawed at the night air. Unfurling his own bedroll close beside hers, Reese settled beneath his blanket, listening to the frogs and the crickets serenade the night. The others were asleep, or at least making an attempt. Tension ebbed and flowed like an electric current through the
guerrilleros.
There wasn't a man among them who didn't have a personal stake in tomorrow. The men they were going to liberate were brothers, friends, sons, fathers. He was perhaps the only one who knew nothing of the men inside.

And just as well, he reasoned. No strings.

Except for Grace.

She stirred in her sleep, rolling closer to him beneath her blanket. Tucking his hands firmly beneath his head, Reese stared at the star-studded night sky, exercising the utmost restraint. He wouldn't touch her. Not here, he vowed. Their time was over. Tomorrow—whatever happened—was the end.