A Mating of Hawks (3 page)

“Where are we going?” she demanded.

Shea slanted her a frown. “Didn't you know?”

“Know what?”

He let out an explosive breath. “Vashti never liked the old house. As Patrick got blinder, she kept yammering about how selfish he was to make her stay in a place she hated when he couldn't see it anyway. For peace's sake, he let her pick what she wanted and where, just so she'd drop nagging him to move to Tucson.”

“Oh.” Tracy, with a queer sense of bereavement, glanced over her shoulder at the compound with the family graveyard on the slope behind it, the corrals and barns and bunkhouses. “No one lives there?”

“My uncle does,” comforted Geronimo. “He's foreman, though Judd's the overall manager.”

Tracy frowned at the name, though she couldn't have said why. She scarcely knew Judd, Patrick's eldest son. Six years older than Shea, he'd been at college when she came to live at the ranch, and he'd never paid any attention to her on his visits home.

“It's so strange that Patrick never mentioned it,” she murmured.

“Guess he didn't like to think about it,” Geronimo offered. “Since he can't see, maybe now it's done, he doesn't mind too much.”

Trying to imagine darkness, Tracy shivered and thought it would make it all the more important to be in familiar surroundings, using rooms and furniture intimately known.

“Patrick wouldn't pave the road, though,” Shea chuckled. “Not that it bothers Vashti much. She's learned to fly, and her friends mostly come in their own planes.”

Patrick had mentioned an airstrip and that Judd used a plane to patrol the ranch and attend to business in and out of the state. Shea swerved to avoid a snake and Tracy bumped against Geronimo.

“Sorry,” she apologized.

“Anytime,
chica
.”

“Watch him,” Shea warned. When he smiled, it changed his whole face, making it young, warming his stern masculine beauty—and he was beautiful, though it was not a word she'd ever before applied to a man. “The main reason we don't have a phone is so his women can't track him down.”

“You don't live at the main ranch?”

He shook his head. “I've moved to El Charco.”

That, she knew, was the part of the ranch inherited through his mother. There was something unspoken, something mysterious, about the dead Elena, Patrick's second wife. El Charco's southern boundary was the Mexico border.

“You'll have to come see us,” Geronimo invited. “I make the best Margarita you'll ever drink.”

Shea frowned at him. “Sanchez, you know damn well our place isn't set up for entertaining ladies.”

“Yeah?” Sanchez scowled. “Then how about—”

“Never mind,” cut in Shea. “Tracy's here to see Patrick.”

What's wrong with you—or is it me?
Tracy wondered, hurt and a little angry.
Lord above, cousin, you act as if you were the one who'd been raped!

The pickup cornered the side of a hill, opening up a far vista of Mexican mountains. Across a broad sandy wash, dominating a hilltop, a massive modern adobe two stories high was surrounded by adobe walls. A pool glinted in the rear courtyard. From this vantage point, Tracy saw the airstrip and hangar on a cleared expanse that covered the far end of the long flat hill beyond a tennis court.

She'd done a feature on similar airstrips in the Texas hills, and couldn't repress a nervous laugh. “What a setup for smuggling drugs!”

Shea's gray eyes flicked her with scornful rebuke. “Sensationalism may sell papers, but I hope you won't worry Patrick with your melodramas.”

“Do you take scorpion juice in your coffee?” she retorted, giving him an edge of derisive smile, though inside she was smarting.

“Don't fight, kiddies,” said Geronimo, getting out to open the gate. “Here comes the lady of the manor.”

II

Vashti had the slim, disciplined, rather hard body of a woman successfully fighting weight and years. Skin pulled snugly over her cheekbones and a slight upward tilt of carefully tweezed eyebrows suggested a skillful face lift. Her eyes were such a dark green that only sunlight kept them from looking black and her silver-blonde hair was pulled sleekly back in a French knot secured with jade pins. She wore slim black trousers and a black silk blouse that molded a high, youthful bosom.

“Tracy, love!” Taking her shoulders, Vashti bestowed a light, brushed kiss on her cheek. “You're looking marvelous, but a bit frazzled. Come see Patrick and then you must freshen up.” She ran her hand over Shea's arm. “So good of you to fetch Tracy. Bring her things in, won't you, and stay for lunch? We've held it for you.”

“Thanks, but we'll just say hi to Dad and get along.”

He distanced himself from his stepmother so obviously that color mounted to her face, though she at once recovered, taking Tracy's arm and drawing her through an atrium where an antique Mexican fountain splashed among cool greenery, into an immense living room that seemed even larger because the furnishings were few and massive. A fireplace molded in a flow of adobe curved from the ceiling to the opposite side of the wall in sculptured gradations. Tracy thought it resembled a cave but she sensuously enjoyed the smell of burning juniper.

Vashti indicated stairs on the other side of the room, polished tile, spiraling upward. “Can Patrick get up and down?” Tracy asked, ascending.

“Of course not, dear! He's paralyzed.”

“Yes, but before—”

Vashti shrugged. “I had the house designed so that he wouldn't have to leave the second floor. It's simpler, and much more convenient.”

For whom?
Tracy wanted to ask, but swallowed her criticisms. Vashti was going out of her way to be pleasant. Sniping between family members wouldn't ease Patrick's troubles.

Hesitating at the top of the stairs, she followed Vashti's lead into a huge room that gave a breathtaking view of the Santa Ritas. Apart from that irony, Tracy saw nothing else but ran with a soft cry toward the great poster bed.

“Patrick!”

She embraced him as best she could, kissing his weathered cheek, trying not to cry. He lay like a felled oak, covered with a sheet up to where a plaid western shirt was unbuttoned down the throat. Many times she had gone to sleep against that broad chest, comforted and quieted by the steady pound of his heart.

Straightening, she looked down at him, relieved that apart from the sightless blue eyes, he didn't seem much changed. Then he tried to smile. One side of his mouth moved but the other lay slack and the eyelid drooped. That half of his face was like a dead man's. Yet there was something curiously young and vulnerable about it, too, an erasing of tensions and expressions shaped by the years.

“Tracy.” The word was slightly muffled. With his good hand, he stroked her face. “You're
feelin
' mighty pretty!”

He gave a muted chuckle and she remembered from her last visit that joking and profanity were his ways to deal with blindness. But how would he handle this?

His face changed at the sound of steps on the stairs. “That you, boy?” he demanded as Shea and Geronimo came in.

“How you doing, Dad?” Shea bent over his father. Tracy felt an oddly jealous twinge at the unmasked tenderness in his gaze.

“Hell, you can see if I can't!” snapped Patrick. “You know dang well how I'm doing!” He glared at Geronimo with one sightless eye. “Hey, Ronnie, make me a drink, will you? You're the only one puts in enough tequila.”

“It's time for your lunch, dear,” Vashti protested.

“It's time for a drink,” Patrick grunted. “Anyone else want one?”

“There'll be wine at lunch,” Vashti said with a pained frown.

“We'll drink with you, Dad,” said Shea, and moved over to the bar opposite the beehive fireplace, which was faced by several heavy leather chairs and a massive couch. Christina's piano faced the window.

Patrick reached out. Quickly, Tracy took his hand. “You back for good, honey? Got enough breathing those exhaust fumes?”

“I can stay till you're up and rambunctious again. I sublet my apartment and quit the paper, though they'll buy some features.”

“I never could fathom why you wanted to take such a job anyway,” Vashti grimaced with a shake of her head that made jade earrings swing. “Poking into grubby places, meeting weird people—”

“Yes,” agreed Tracy. “Some of those society weddings and benefit galas were pretty weird. I like doing an occasional article, but I've decided to concentrate on children's books. Mostly photos with a little text.”

“I can't think what you'll find to photograph around here,” said Vashti with a lift of dark eyebrows.

“Why, there's horses and cows!” roared Patrick. “Nothing on God's earth prettier than a little foal. And vaqueros mounted up, cattle in good graze, mesquites greening after a hard winter, a full water tank after a rain—where you going to find things better than that?”

“Now, darling, don't get all worked up,” soothed Vashti. “Most children live in cities, you know. I should expect them to be more interested in sports, moon flights, things like that.”

“I did some market research at libraries in Houston, seeing what kids actually read, rather than what adults thought they should.” Tracy laughed, squeezing Patrick's hand. “The age I'm thinking of was very big on dinosaurs.”

“Then Gila monsters and chuckwallas ought to go over real big,” chortled Patrick. Tracy stepped back so Geronimo could put a glass in his hand and the old rancher peered uselessly toward the young men. “You lads got your drinks?”

“You bet,” said Geronimo, taking an iced beer from Shea, who held its twin.

“You, Tracy?”

“I'll just have a sip of yours, Patrick.”

He lifted the amber Mexican glass, iceless since he claimed that was the only way to drink tequila. “Happy days!”

“Happy days,” echoed the young men.

Tracy bent to drink from her great-uncle's glass. “Happy days,” she told him.

He moved his thumb against her cheek. “I've missed you, honey. Glad you're back.”

She kissed him in answer. He looked exhausted. Vashti took charge, straightening the coverlet. “I'll send up a tray, dear, after you've had a little rest. If the rest of you will come down, Henri should have lunch ready.”

“No offense to Henry,” muttered Patrick. “But tell Concha to rustle me up some steak and biscuits. And a bowl of chili or posole if she's got some made.”

“Oh, she'll have some,” predicted Vashti irritably. “The only reason we keep her is to cook for you.”

“Best reason there is,” Shea remarked. He clasped his father's hand. “See you later, Dad.”

“Listen, boy, we need to have a talk.” The old man almost clung to his son's scarred hand. “Judd tells me you're not running a single head of cattle on El Charco. Or on the grazing lease!”

“Sounds like for once Judd's got the straight of things.”

Patrick dropped Shea's hand. “God a'mighty!” he rumbled weakly. “Ten thousand acres at El Charco gone to waste, and thirty thousand leased! While this has been such a tough winter we've been feeding hay! Listen, boy—”

“Dad,” cut in Shea. “I'm not wasting that land. I'm trying to keep it from going desert like that Judd's overgrazing.”

A vein swelled in Patrick's temple. “You'd rather see us sell cattle at a loss than run a few on ground you're not using?” His voice quavered with weakness and anger.

Shea swallowed. Muscles tautened in his lean jaws. When he spoke, his tone was under tight control. “Dad, Judd's your manager. Let us try to work this out.”

“You damn well better!” Patrick seemed ready to choke and Tracy moved anxiously back to him, casting Shea a look of reproachful pleading. “I'm going to have to study hard as it is to leave part of Socorro to someone with ideas as crazy as yours.”

Shea's hands clenched. Lightning seemed to flash deep in his gray eyes. He wore a stunned look, as if he couldn't believe what his father had said. Then he shrugged.

“I've tried to explain what I'm doing, Dad, but you don't want to hear it. Look, let's not talk about it. I promise you this. If Judd'll be reasonable, so will I.”

“Do come along!” hissed Vashti.

Tracy cradled Patrick against her and kissed his forehead. “Finish that tequila and have a nice snooze. I'll be back later.”

He didn't speak, but the frustrated grief distorting the mobile side of his face was so great that she cursed Shea for causing it, whatever the merits of his case. But Patrick rallied and patted her cheek before he reached for his glass.

“Run along, honey, and tuck in enough of Henry's food to make him feel good. It's fine if you go for kee-chays and sou-flays, but I'd rather have meat and beans and handmade tortillas.” He squinted approvingly at her. “You're a mite thin but otherwise I'll bet you're just as pretty as a speckled pup!” He gestured toward the portrait above a carved chest at the far end of the room. “Always thought you were the spittin' image of my mother. Hope you'll have as good a life.”

Tracy looked at her great-grandmother, painted as Santiago's bride. With child by the murdered Johnny Chance, haunted by the slaughters in Cananea and Tomochic, which had twice in her life made her hysterically blind, the young woman in the painting was indeed beginning the happy, productive years she'd have with Sant. Her dark bronze hair fell over one shoulder, rich against her creamy skin. It was a triangular face, broad at forehead and cheekbones, narrowing to a cleft chin. The deep-set amber eyes seemed even larger because of dark eyelashes and determined eyebrows that winged slightly at the ends. The mouth was fully curved, and though Christina's expression was sweetly grave, there was a hint of tough, earthy humor.