Desperado (6 page)

Pablo's eyes were glued to the same enticing location.

Rafe wondered if her nipples were small and hard and—

“Stop that!” Helen demanded.

“Wh-what?”
Uh oh! Caught in the act
.

“Ogling.”

“I don't ogle.”
I wonder if that's one of those Wonder Bras, or if it's all Helen
.

“Yeah, right.”

Suddenly, Helen's eyes latched onto his bound hands, then peered behind at her own restraints. “Oh, God, you wouldn't! Surely, even you wouldn't carry your depraved tastes this far.”

He rolled his eyes. “Okay, what am I being accused of now?”

“Bondage.”

“I beg your pardon,” he choked out.

“This is one of those sexual fantasy things men dream about, right?”

Taken aback, he blinked at her. “You think this is a sex game?”

“Yep, and I'm not playing, you . . . you pervert. Oh, I knew you were sex crazed when you made those remarks on the plane about wall-banging, and when you kissed me on the ground, and—”

“Sex crazed! Sex crazed!” he sputtered out. “Puhleeze!” Then laughter bubbled up from his throat. “I'm in a Stephen King nightmare with General Patton's clone. I just engaged in a two-man dive on one parachute. Every muscle in my body aches from being battered. And you think I want to jump your bones. Well, why didn't you ask, honey? Let me pull the whip and chains out of my pocket.”

“Whip?” Pablo asked breathlessly.

“Chains?” Sancho added. “You use chains on Elena?”

“SHUT UP!”

Startled, Rafe and Helen both turned toward Ignacio.

“Silencio!”
Ignacio bellowed. “
Diós mío!
You two are worse than cats in a fandango parlor.”

“Listen, guys, how about untying me now?” Rafe suggested, trying to sound reasonable. Not that he was going to forget his treatment by them. Nope. He was going to clean a few clocks before this day was out. “I'd like to get back to the base before dark and have a nice stiff Scotch on the rocks. Maybe even two.”

BAM!
The loud report from Ignacio's gun was his only response.

Rafe looked down to see a crease in his left boot matching his right. This ape was definitely cruising with his lights on dim.

“Your continual chatter ees annoying me,
Señor
Ángel
.” Ignacio blew the smoke from the end of his pistol and replaced it in its holster.

“Well, golly gee. All you had to do was ask me to be quiet.”

“The next time I weel aim higher,” Ignacio informed him coldly.

Rafe wasn't sure if he referred to his knees or his balls, but he wasn't taking any chances. He decided to shut up—for now.

Okay, I'll bide my time until the right moment. Then I'll show this bum a few dirty tricks I've learned over the years. He might think he's got the upper hand here, but only till I'm ready. Wait till he sees what a real gang member can do
.

But first things first, he decided, as Sancho began to lead the horses once again in their direction.

He was going to have to ride a horse.

Rafe tried to brave it out . . . until Mr. Ed attempted to take
a bite out of his shoulder. “No dice! I am
not
getting on that horse. I'll walk first.”

Helen shot him a glance of surprise. “Don't tell me. The hotshot L.A. lawyer is a shark in the courtroom, but he's afraid of a little ol' horse.” Then she smiled. Actually, it was more like a smirk.

Rafe decided then that Helen wasn't as attractive as he'd always thought. In fact, her hair wasn't really fiery red; it was more like orange. And those freckles that stood out on her nose made her seem ridiculous, like an innocent kid who should be wearing pigtails. And her body wasn't all that great, either. Damn it, who cared if her breasts were round and high, like one of those Vargas models? Or if her legs were long and athletically muscled and would look terrific in a pair of black silk stockings. Or—

“You weel ride,” Ignacio said, patting his holster, “even if I have to put a bullet in your ass and tie you to the saddle.”

Helen didn't like the tone of Ignacio's voice. Oh, she knew he had to be a friend of Rafe's. What other explanation could there be for this perverse joke? But Ignacio carried the prank too far. It had seemed like he'd really kicked Rafe, and he could have hurt Rafe those times when he'd fired his gun.

The arrival of the horses interrupted her thoughts. She'd been riding since she was ten years old, and both animals looked like lively mounts. She'd enjoy a short ride if it weren't for the company, or this ludicrous scheme they were playing out.

“Saddle the horses,” Ignacio ordered his cohorts as he waddled over to a shady tree. He was over six feet tall, but he had a beer belly that stood out like the prow of a ship and a huge back end that went up and down in his tight trousers as he walked.

Pablo, the youngest of the bandits, and Sancho, the older man with a head of thick, curly gray hair, glared at their leader for assigning them the dirty work.

Suddenly, the absurdity of the whole situation struck Helen. “The Three Stooges of the Wild West!” she murmured. Her eyes connected with Rafe's, and they shared a smile.

Lord, he is gorgeous
. What was it about Rafe that a mere smile could set butterflies fluttering in her stomach?

“What does that make us?” he asked drolly. “The Two Stooges of the Tame West?” He winked at her.

And the butterflies targeted another part of her body, much lower down. She was in big, big trouble if she didn't pull herself together right away. Forcing the wobble out of her voice, she said, “Really, Rafe, it's time to give up the joke. Couldn't you get any better actors than these?”

“You think I staged this comedy? Why?”

“Because you're brain dead. Because you enjoy teasing me. Because—”

“You don't suppose . . .” he proffered hesitantly “. . . you don't think we could have possibly landed in another time? 1850? I mean, look at those ancient Colt revolvers. And the saddles.”

“What? Did you land on your head? Don't be ridiculous.”

Time travel!
It was an outlandish notion. Anyone could buy an ancient firearm if they had the money, she concluded. And the animals and the fine-tooled leather saddles were, no doubt, borrowed from some rancher or movie set in the area, one of Rafe's friends. Nope, Helen wasn't buying the time travel nonsense. No way!

A
short time later, Rafe put on a false front of bravado, letting Sancho and Pablo help him onto the back of the black horse. He was, unfortunately, too unnerved by the skittering horse under him to try to escape when they released the ropes
around his wrists and retied them in front so he could hold onto the reins.

As if I know what to do with reins!
He clutched the saddle horn and eyed the rearing beast. Well, maybe not rearing, but definitely shifting.

Helen, on the other hand, looked perfectly calm and capable, sitting on the pinto. Not that he knew what a pinto was. The only pinto he'd ever heard of was a car.

Ignacio began to move out, followed by Helen and Rafe, then Sancho and Pablo in the rear, then a string of five other stolen horses they planned to sell in Sacramento City.

The only problem was that Rafe's horse didn't move.

“Giddyap,” he urged his horse, and Helen giggled.

He was beginning to hate her.

“Giddyap? Why not yippee-kay-aye?”

“I was gonna try that next,” he grumbled, meanwhile shaking his reins, using his knees to nudge the sides of the heaving horse—Mr. Ed was probably laughing, too—bouncing up and down on the saddle, then finally yelling, “Move, you son of a bitch!”

The horse glanced back at him over its shoulder, and he could have sworn it snickered. God, it looked just like F. Lee Bailey. The legendary barrister had spoken to his law school class once and he'd worn a condescending expression the entire time, just like this horse with an attitude.

“I think I should get some spurs,” he concluded, “like Ignacio and the others. What F. Lee Horse here needs is a good swift spur in the ass.”

“No, no, no,” Helen said, moving her horse closer. “You have to be gentle. Whatever you do, don't kick the horse. Just nudge his flanks gently with your heels. Like this.”

“And how do I make him stop?”

“Pull on the reins.”

“Oh, yeah. I get it now.”

The horse started to move, and Rafe was feeling really good . . . until Helen warned him to stop shaking the reins.

“That really riles a horse. Makes them bolt.”

He immediately stilled his bound wrists.

At one point, he decided to play along, as if this really was 1850, and asked Ignacio why they wasted time stealing horses when they could make a fortune prospecting for gold.

“It ees easier to rob those who do the work,” he answered with a smug smile. “Besides, thees foolish
Americanos
waste their time searching for the mother lode. It does not exist. Soon, they will leave these hills, and only smart men, like me, will remain holding all the riches.”

Oh, yeah. You're one of the Einsteins of the Old West
.

After that scintillating conversation, Rafe concentrated on his riding. Along the way, Helen constantly called his attention to the wild beauty of the shallow ravines and gullies, which merged into glorious fields of chaparral and wildflowers. They passed only a few people in the distance—shy foothill Indians at work in the fields, scruffy men in miners' duds riding mules, pioneers on the occasional wagon, moving slowly in the searing heat.

Sightseeing was not a top priority for Rafe; he was too busy holding on tight to F. Lee Horse.

“You're doing just great,” Helen encouraged, “but try moving the horse with your inner thighs.”

“Oh, I get it. Like riding a woman,” he observed with wide-eyed innocence. She looked too damn competent on her horse, while he stumbled along like the fourth stooge. “Sometimes you gotta let a woman know who's in the
saddle
.”

She honored him with one of those all-men-are-scum scowls, but didn't comment on his tasteless remark. Instead, she continued to offer advice. “Avoid bouncing up and down in the saddle, or else you'll end up with a sore bottom. And blisters.”

Oh, yeah, blisters!
Rafe thought four hours later when they
dismounted and prepared to make camp for the night. He felt like his backside had been paddled with a wooden mallet, every muscle in his body screamed with pain, and he could swear he had a blister on his right cheek, just below his tattoo.

They released Helen's bindings, but not his. “She ees just a harmless woman, after all,” Ignacio explained.

Idiot! There isn't a woman alive who's harmless
.

Now would probably be a good time to escape, Rafe thought. Helen could untie his hands, and they'd be out of here. But he hesitated, still intrigued by the puzzling events. Maybe he'd wait a little longer to make his move. See what the hell was going on. Crack a few skulls.

Helen was expertly helping to unsaddle her horse—and his, as well. Her competence was beginning to rankle. She put a blade of grass in her mouth and startling whistling contentedly.

He hated whistling.

“Helen?”

“Hmmm?”

“Ah . . . Helen . . . honey . . . ?”

She looked up suspiciously.

“How would you feel about—?”

“Spit it out, Rafe. You were never shy before.”

Yep, she is really starting to yank my chain
. “How'd you like to look at my ass?”

H
e was a pain in the ass . . .

H
elen stopped whistling and almost swallowed her blade of grass. “I beg your pardon,” she choked out. Surely—
surely
—she'd heard wrong. Rafe couldn't possibly have asked her to look at his behind!

Even with his dark skin, Helen could see a slight pink tone of embarrassment flush Rafe's neck and face. But he lifted his chin arrogantly and demanded, “Look at my ass, damn it.”

“No, thank you.” She hoped her voice sounded cool and disinterested, not hot and very interested, like she was, unfortunately. With forced casualness, she put a new blade of grass in her mouth and began whistling again.

“Aaaaarrgh! Do it!” The pink flush on his face turned purple.

“No.”

“Undo my zipper and pull my pants down,” he said in a steely voice that, no doubt, caused his courtroom adversaries to quake in their Gucci boots. But not Helen. She just kept
on whistling. No, she wouldn't let him intimidate her. She whistled louder.

“Quick. Before those yo-yo's come back and decide to mark another part of my body for a kick-boxing target.”

Helen raised her eyes to see the three bandits making a campsite, keeping a watchful eye on them the entire time.

“C'mon.”

Geez, talk about a lack of finesse
. Helen felt somewhat disappointed. She'd expected Rafe to be a smoother, more persuasive lover. Heck, he probably didn't consider her worth the effort. Or else, he figured she was easy. Trying to remain calm, she stuck another blade of grass in her mouth and resumed whistling.

“I swear, the minute I get free, I'm gonna shake you till you swallow that weed. Then I'm gonna twist your tongue so you can't ever whistle again.”

“Don't be so cranky.”

“Cranky? Cranky?” he sputtered. “I'm dying here. Pull down my pants.”

So that was it. “Do you have to pee?”

He said a really foul word.

“Well,
excuse
me!” He didn't have to relieve himself; so, it must be what she'd thought originally. The ape! As if he would die from unrequited lust!

“Helen,” he warned.

“Shhh. I'm trying to think of a plan for us to escape. Should I untie you?”

“Later. It's too dangerous now while they hold all the weapons. First things first.” He sucked in a huge breath, then hissed, “Look at my ass.”

“Did aliens steal your brains? What in the world would make you think I want to engage in a quickie with you?”

He made a tsking noise of frustration. “Babe, when—rather
if
—I ever decide to make love with you, it's not going to be a quickie. It's going to be long and hard and noisy and—”

“Stop it! Stop it right now.” Rafe had a knack for creating the most vivid, tantalizing, erotic fantasies in her head, and she wouldn't have it. She stamped her foot for emphasis, and her pinto shied away nervously.

“I have a blister,” he blurted out.

“You have a . . . Oh!” Now it was her turn to blush. He hadn't been putting the make on her. He just needed her help with a blister. She wished the earth would open up and swallow her. “Why didn't you say so before?”

“Hurry! It's throbbing like hell, and Ignacio will probably find some way to make it hurt more if he finds out.”

Acting hastily, Helen moved him behind the horse and knelt. She feigned nonchalance as she undid the button of his fly and pulled down the zipper, but her fumbling fingers gave her away. That, and her barely quashed gasp as he grew hard at the slight brush of her fingertips.

“Oh . . . my . . . God!” Rafe gritted out. “Did you have to touch me?”

“Did you have to get
it
aroused?”

“Believe me,
it
has a mind of its own.”

“But I didn't do anything.”

“Helen, Helen, Helen. All you have to do is breathe, and I get turned on.”

“You jerk. Undoing your pants wasn't my idea. Why do you twist every little thing into something sexual?”

“Sweetheart, your hand on my cock isn't any ‘little thing.' Believe me, it's a great big thing.”

“God, you are such a horny toad. You're hot for anything in skirts, aren't you?”

“You're not wearing skirts,” he reminded her. “And I'll have you know, a woman opened my button-fly jeans with her teeth one time, and I wasn't half as turned on as I am now.”

“Oh.” His crude words pleased Helen in a cockeyed sort of way. Could a woman actually do that with her teeth? Giving herself a mental shake, she said, “Stop teasing me, and
turn around. Or else I'll use my teeth to open that blister instead of your buttons, you randy goat. And I'll take a chunk of flesh with it, too.” She gave his cheek a soft whack.

“Promises, promises.” Chuckling, he did as she ordered, and Helen pulled the waistbands of both his slacks and his black silk boxer shorts down to his thighs.
Black silk? Oh, my heavens!
Yep, he had a blister the size of a silver dollar on the crease where his right buttock joined his thigh, directly below his butterfly tattoo.

She had to admit, it looked mighty good. The tattoo, not his well-delineated, hard-muscled tush. Lawyering must be a lot more strenuous than she'd thought, she concluded irrelevantly. He probably worked out chasing ambulances.

Without thinking, she placed a fingertip on the swollen center of the blister, and he flinched with pain.

“Damn, that hurts.”

“Sorry,” she murmured. “It'll have to be lanced and covered with an antiseptic ointment.”

“Yeah, I'll bet these ding-a-lings carry medical supplies. Just break it and cover it with a Kleenex or something.”

“I can't do that. It could get infected, especially in this heat. Besides, there's a tube of Neosporin in the first-aid kit I rescued. Although, during World War I, maggots were considered an accepted treatment for infected wounds—”

“You . . . are . . . not . . . putting . . . maggots . . . on . . . my . . . butt,” he ground out, enunciating each word very cleary.

“
Ay, mierda!
I do not believe my eyes.” Ignacio had crept up on them, and his eyes almost bugged out at the sight of her kneeling in front of Rafe's naked backside. “By all the saints! You two could not even wait till dark to do the corkscrew.”

Sancho and Pablo scurried up to see what all the commotion was about.

“Can we watch?” Sancho asked in an overeager voice.

“I don't understand,” Pablo interjected, tilting his head in several convoluted positions. “How do they do
it
with her—”

“That's about enough! You've all got your minds in the gutter.” Helen stood and put both hands on her hips, glowering at the bandits. “Rafe has a blister, and I need to take care of it. Otherwise, he'll never be able to ride tomorrow. Untie him.”

Ignacio started to protest, but she added, “Listen, there's no way Rafe could be this Angel Bandit guy. Did you see the way he rides a horse?”

Ignacio pondered her words, then nodded vigorously. “
Sí
, he rides like a
niña
. Heh, heh, heh.”

“Do you people mind,” Rafe protested. “I'm standing here with my bare butt to the wind.”

The gang leader scowled contemptuously at Rafe.

“Are you going to untie him?” Helen persisted. “Even an imbecile can see he's no bandit.”

“Is someone gonna pull up my freakin' pants?”

Ignoring Rafe, Ignacio told Helen, “But,
señorita
, he looks like
El
Ángel Bandido
. And, if he escapes, we will lose the reward.”

“My ass is gettin' a chill here, guys.”

“Ah, what harm can he do?” Ignacio shrugged. “I have the gun. And he ees a weakling.”

“That's what I've been trying to tell you.”

“
Sí
, he ees as useless as a spare prick at a wedding. Heh, heh, heh,” Ignacio quipped.

Helen glared at the vulgarity.

Rafe snarled at the insult.

Sancho chomped uninterestedly on a piece of jerky.

Pablo gaped with undue interest at Rafe's exposed buttocks.

“If I get pneumonia, someone's gonna pay.” Rafe threw the words out flippantly, but Helen could see the spark of anger in his blue eyes at Ignacio's assessment of his prowess, not to mention his vulnerable nudity.

“
¡Maldito!
He ees a pain in the arse,” Ignacio opined.

“Yeah, isn't he?” Helen replied sweetly.

Rafe shot her a look that said, “You'll pay, too.”

Ignacio stepped to her side, about to untie Rafe's wrists, when he jumped back suddenly, shouting, “
¡Miré!
Look! Look there!” He pointed at Rafe's behind.

“
Sí!
It ees the angel's mark.” Sancho and Pablo made exaggerated signs of the cross over their chests.

“Angel wings! He truly ees
El
Ángel Bandido
,” Ignacio said in awe. Then, “Thank you, sweet Jesus! The reward ees as good as ours.”

“Those aren't angel wings,” Helen corrected. “It's a butterfly.” She traced the outline of the tattoo with her fingertips.

Rafe jerked and growled out to her in a low mutter, “Do you think you could stop touching me, Helen?”

“Oops,” she said.

Rafe's eyes rolled in his head.

“So, you really are Elena,” Ignacio whooped, directing his attention back to her.
“Muy bueno!”
He made an obscene gesture with his fat tongue.

Helen barely stopped herself from slugging him a good one. She restrained herself—for Rafe's benefit, of course. “Mr. Ignacio, are—”

“Villejo,” he interrupted. “My name ees Ignacio Juan Rico Hector Villejo.” His chest puffed out with pride.

“Yeah, well, Mr. Villejo, are you going to let me care for Rafe's injury, or not? The international rules of combat say that rudimentary medical treatment must be—”

“Chill out, Helen,” Rafe said ungraciously.

Ignacio twirled his mustache speculatively for several moments, then agreed. “We weel untie The Angel for a short time so that you may minister to him.” He laughed, as if at a private jest, adding, “Later, you may
minister
to me, too.”

Pablo held the front waistband out from his loose trousers and glanced inside. “My balls are turnin' blue from all the
kicks I got today. Do you think you could put some ointment on me, too?” he asked Helen.

“Get a life!”

“Huh?” Pablo blinked with confusion and squinted quizzically at Rafe.

“I think that means, ‘Not now,'” Rafe translated. “Maybe later.”

Pablo's doleful face brightened.

Helen's eyes sent icy daggers at Rafe.

“Maybe not,” he added wisely.

“One wrong move and I weel take care of your blister,
Señor
Ángel
,” Ignacio threatened. “With a bullet in its center. Do you understand?”

Rafe nodded.

“Try to escape, and I weel shoot off your balls.”

“Enough already!” Rafe grumbled as Sancho finally released his bindings. “I got the message. Loud and clear.”

H
elen was getting increasingly nervous about this whole outlaw scenario. At first, she had viewed them as bumbling idiots. Now, she was starting to get scared.

“Rafe, we have to talk,” she whispered as soon as the bandits stepped away. She'd just put a gauze bandage over his blister after treating it. “Something weird is going on. I think . . . I think we really have traveled back in time.”

“Huh?” Rafe said, assessing her like an escapee from an asylum. “You swallow that blade of grass? Maybe it was loco weed.” He paused in the process of tucking in his shirt and zipping up his pants.

“Listen, this trail we followed today is very familiar to me. I hike in these hills all the time. This is
not
2015.”

“You hike?”

She made a clucking sound of disgust at his irrelevant question. “Focus, will you? We're heading toward Sacramento, but we should have passed several towns by now. And the area is entirely too thick with trees and wildlife. It hasn't looked this way in . . . well, over one hundred fifty years.”

Rafe's brow wrinkled, and he bit his bottom lip thoughtfully. “Actually, I've had some weird feelings, too.” His eyes met hers and held. “Let's be honest here, Helen. Do you or do you not know these yahoos? Is this a military setup?”

“Of course not,” she said indignantly. Then she asked, “As long as we're being honest, do you swear these men aren't friends of yours? Or someone you hired to play a prank?”

“You're obviously not playing with a full deck if you could think that. Why would I hire someone to shoot at me, kick me, tie me up, and force me to ride a monster horse till I get a blister on my butt? I mean, do you really think I'm having fun here?” Rafe braced his fists on his hips and glowered at her with exasperation.

“Then that must mean . . . Oh, Lord! Do you really think time travel is possible?”

“Maybe it's just a dream,” he suggested.

“Would we both be having the same dream?”

“How the hell do I know? Nah, it's not a dream. If it were a dream, I know exactly
what
I'd be doing, and
who
would be doing it with me.” He gave her a swift, smoldering once-over that needed no explanation.

“You are certifiable.”

“Bet you wish you had your clipboard, don'tcha, babe?” He favored her with one of his devastating grins.

She inhaled to gather patience. “Could we concentrate on the subject here, Captain? Time travel, remember?”

“Are we back to this military rank crap again?” When she refused to answer, he forced a somber expression on his face.
“Okay, if it's not a military maneuver, and it's not a dream, we must be dead.”