The Bronzed Hawk (14 page)

“That will be terrific,” she said enthusiastically, her eyes on the glittering smoked glass and white stone of the hotel. “The Star is really lovely, but there’s nothing very Latin about it, is there? Why did you choose this for your stay?”

“For the most pragmatic of reasons, I’m afraid. O’Brien Computers owns a large percentage of the Star, and the manager knows me. Since we have neither cash nor credit cards and absolutely no papers or identification, we’re going to need all the help we can get to straighten out the mess we’re in.”

The mess, being marriage to one Kelly McKenna, she thought despondently. Well, she had known Nick felt that way. She must guard against having it hurt her so deeply when he put it into words. “How long do you think it will take?” she asked quietly, her eyes fixed on the
red and white canopy at the front entrance of the hotel.

She could feel Nick’s shoulders move against her own as he shrugged. “Who knows?” he said tersely. “I’ll put a lawyer on it as soon as we get settled in at the hotel, but the fact that we have no papers isn’t going to help things. We’ll just have to be patient and wait it out. Our first priority will be to pull enough strings with the embassy to get us back in the States without proof of citizenship. It may be a very friendly border, but immigration has tightened up considerably since the wetback situation has received so much publicity lately. I’m afraid if you have a deadline for your story, you’re going to have to call it in by phone. It will probably take at least a couple of weeks to cut through the red tape and get us out of here.”

Kelly didn’t dare look at him for fear that he would see the happiness radiating from her face. “I don’t have a deadline,” she said lightly. “I don’t think Mac really even expected me to get the story. He was positively jubilant when I called him the evening we left and told him that
you’d agreed to take me with you.” Suddenly her eyes widened as a thought occurred to her, and she swiveled to face him. “Good heavens, you don’t suppose they’ve called out the marines or anything because we’re a little late in arriving?”

Nick shook his head. “Not yet,” he said dryly. “A hot air balloon can’t be called reliable transportation by the wildest stretch of the imagination. I’m sure they’ll have assumed that we’ve just been delayed by adverse weather.” Then he raised a dark brow inquiringly. “Unless you think your editor may have become alarmed that he hasn’t heard from you?” There was a trace of hardness in O’Brien’s tone that Kelly failed to detect as she considered the possibility.

Mac Devlin had been a good friend of her father’s, and he still sometimes regarded her with maddening paternalism despite the tough, hardboiled facade he presented. “I’d better call him as soon as possible,” Kelly said, frowning. “Mac will probably be foaming at the mouth by this time. He gets uptight if I don’t check in when I say I will.”

“Then by all means we must let Mr. Devlin know at once,” Nick said sarcastically. “We wouldn’t want him to become upset, would we?” His face was granite hard as he continued harshly. “You never did tell me what your wager with Devlin entailed. Considering the fact of your inexperience, I doubt that the stakes were quite what I thought, but I’d be interested to know just what your editor would have received if you’d lost that bet.”

She had no opportunity to reply, for Father Miguel pulled to a stop before the front entrance, and the passenger door was opened by a smiling, white-jacketed young Mexican. Kelly was helped from the car with a courtesy that spoke well for the service standards of the hotel. By the warmth of their greeting, it might have been a shiny new Rolls-Royce that they’d arrived in rather than Father Miguel’s rackety 1952 Buick.

She was about to follow the boy into the hotel when Nick put a detaining hand on her arm to stop her. “You’d better say your goodbyes to Father Miguel now,” he said, turning her toward the priest, who had gotten out of the car and was
standing beside it. “He’s returning to Matzalea tonight, and he wants to visit a friend this afternoon before he sets out.”

“But I thought surely he’d stay the night and have dinner with us,” Kelly protested, as the priest turned his merry eyes on her disappointed face. Language barrier or not, she had grown to like the plump little priest very much on the long, uncomfortable journey. “Can’t you persuade him to stay?”

Nick shook his head. “He has a baptism to perform day after tomorrow, and he says he must get back.”

Kelly’s hand was enfolded in the priest’s warm clasp, and he began one of those long, rambling speeches that he seemed to favor. Darn it, the first thing she was going to do when she got back to San Francisco was to enroll at Berlitz for a crash course in Spanish. She couldn’t even tell this warm, friendly man how much she appreciated his help. However, he seemed to be more than satisfied with the profound sincerity of her,
“muchas gracias.”
He patted her cheek kindly and kissed her forehead. Then he shook Nick’s
hand, spoke rapidly to him, and got back into the car. Kelly felt Nick’s arm slide casually around her waist while they stood watching Father Miguel turn the ancient car and with a final wave of his hand start down the hill.

“He seems like such a nice little man,” Kelly said wistfully. “I wish I could have understood what he was saying to me.”

Nick turned and propelled her toward the glass door being held open for them by the Mexican boy. “That’s very generous of you, considering the problems his actions have caused you,” he said expressionlessly. “Let’s hope you still feel as kindly toward him by the time we finish with the lawyers.” They had arrived at the reception desk, and she had no opportunity to answer, for Nick was demanding to speak to John Sykes, the manager.

Twenty minutes later she was gazing admiringly around the strikingly luxurious lounge of the penthouse suite to which she’d been shown by a porter. It had taken O’Brien only a short time to be admitted to the hotel manager’s office and to arrange for accommodations. He’d told
her to go on up to the suite while he and Sykes contacted the embassy and saw what could be done about a reentry permit.

The accommodations that they’d been given were quite spectacular, and she wondered just how big a percentage O’Brien Computers owned to rate quarters like these. The lounge was carpeted in a lush hunter green that contrasted beautifully with the long white velvet couches and occasional chairs. There was a bar at one end of the room with a beautifully carved Aztec calendar on its rich mahogany surface. The sliding glass doors that led to the flower-bordered balcony were also hung with white velvet. There were three bedrooms opening off the lounge with adjoining baths, and the suite even contained a tiny, well-equipped kitchen.

At least she blended well with the color scheme despite the dusty, rumpled condition of her olive jeans and shirt, she thought wryly. This elegant apartment had probably never been graced with such a scruffily garbed resident before. Well, she couldn’t do anything about her clothes, but she
could at least get rid of some of the dust that had accumulated on her person.

She made a quick tour of the available bedrooms before reluctantly deciding against occupying the largest and most luxurious of the three. It was obviously the master bedroom, for it contained a huge king-sized bed and a bathroom that was almost sinfully luxurious. Since Nick had seen fit to quarter them in a suite with three bedrooms, perhaps he had no intention of their occupying the same bed now that they had returned to civilization. She would not court rejection by taking anything for granted.

No, she would take the pretty little guest room two doors down. A few minutes later she was reclining lazily in a white marble tub while the jetting spray of hot water turned the bubble bath that she’d sprinkled generously into the water into lovely pink bubbles. She lifted a large irridescent bubble carefully on one finger and admired its delicate beauty idly. There was something deliciously feminine about pink bubbles, she thought contentedly, and after days spent in jeans and a rather mannishly tailored shirt,
she was ready to indulge in a little feminine pampering.

After turning off the water, she leaned back against the back of the tub, resting her head on the bath pillow and letting the tension and weariness gradually flow out of her. It was so wonderfully relaxing just to let everything go and not think about anything, that she felt almost drugged with pleasure. She would close her eyes just for a moment, she thought.

The gentle manipulation of the soft sponge against her shoulders was beautifully soothing, and she could have purred with contentment. Perhaps she did, for she heard Nick chuckle with amusement. Nick? She opened her eyes drowsily and met Nick’s mischievous gaze. Somehow it seemed surprisingly natural to see him on his knees by the tub, the sleeves of his black shirt rolled up past the elbow, while he wielded the sponge with gentle strokes.

For a moment she stared at him sleepily, enjoying the treasured feeling that this intimate service gave her. Then she protested faintly, her jade
green eyes bemused. “You shouldn’t be here, Nick.”

“Shhh, little love,” he said almost caressingly. “You’re tired. Let me take care of you, Kelly.” The sponge brushed her throat gently. “Just relax and let me do it all.”

Well, why not? She couldn’t deny that she was enjoying his ministrations, and she was so lethargic that moving even one finger seemed to require a herculean effort. Nick’s movements were curiously sexless as he carefully washed her from her shoulders to the sole of each small foot and then had her sit up away from the tub so that he could attend to her back. The sponge moved lazily up and down her spine while she sat dreamily enjoying the attention like a small child at her evening bath.

She felt a light kiss brush against her left shoulder blade and then the sponge was thrown into the water in front of her. “All right, sweetheart, that’s almost all my willpower can withstand at the moment. It’s time we got you out of here before I decide to join you.”

He stood up and reached for a huge pink
velour bath towel on the warmed rack above the tub. “Come on, angel, upsy-daisy!”

Kelly obediently stood up, and he wrapped her in the soft, fleecy towel before lifting her out of the white marble tub. He proceeded to pat her dry through the folds of velour. She stood quite still as he leaned forward to kiss her tenderly on the lips. “I could become addicted to this, you know,” he said huskily.

“Me, too,” she replied softly, her gaze fixed lovingly on his face. She wondered why she had felt not even a trace of embarrassment as he bathed her. She felt so close to him that it was as if he were an extension of her own body. She had heard that couples who had been married for decades sometimes had that rapport, but she had never expected to experience it herself.

“Come on, love,” Nick said. “I’ve ordered us some lunch, and it should be arriving any minute.” He kissed her again, this time on the tip of her nose, and drew her swiftly from the bathroom.

“I’m not exactly dressed to receive room service,” Kelly said ruefully, looking down at her
towel-draped figure. “And I absolutely refuse to put those jeans back on until they’re laundered.”

“No problem.” Nick walked over to a built-in closet and opened the sliding doors. “The Star follows the custom of some of the better European hotels.” He reached on the overhead shelf above the rack and pulled down a freshly laundered white terry robe. He grinned as he tossed it to her. “It’s a shame to replace that fetching pink towel with anything so plebian. The only reason that I’m doing it is that I’m too damn jealous to let the waiter enjoy the same privileges that I’m accorded. Now while you slip that on, I think I’ll take a quick shower. Let the waiter in when he rings, will you?” He strode swiftly toward the door of the bedroom and turned before going through it to say coolly, “I’m sorry if you have a particular fondness for this room, Kelly, but you’ll have to move. We’ll find the king-sized bed in the master bedroom much more comfortable.” Without waiting for her reply, he was gone and didn’t notice the expression of happiness on her face.

————

When he joined her for lunch in the living room twenty minutes later, he, too, was dressed in a calf-length white terry cloth robe, and his raven hair was damp and glossy from the shower.

Kelly looked down at her own white-robed figure and grimaced. “We look like Barbie and Ken dolls,” she said. “Though, at the moment, I couldn’t care less as long as I can dig into that scrumptious meal.” She nodded to the white damask-draped table that the waiter had wheeled before the glass terrace doors. “Vegetable soup, salad, and red snapper.” She sighed blissfully as Nick politely seated her and went around to his own chair. “Not even a hint of beans.”

“I imagined that you’d had enough of the local cuisine.” Nick grinned as he shook out his napkin and placed it on his lap. “They appear to have an extremely talented chef judging by the raves from the clientele. We just might be able to get through our entire stay with nary a bean.”

“Super,” she said, closing her eyes ecstatically after the first delicious spoonful of the soup.
Then her eyes flicked open, and she started to eat in earnest. “And how long is that stay likely to be?” she asked casually. “Did you get in touch with the embassy?”

He nodded, a frown creasing his forehead. “There may be a few problems that we hadn’t counted on,” he said slowly. “For one thing, until we substantiate whether the marriage is actually legal, any immigration documents that they might arrange to have issued would quite possibly be incorrect.” He shrugged. “They prefer that we let the lawyers sort out the legalities before they get to work on our papers. It shouldn’t take more than a week or two.”

“Well, I guess there’s nothing we can do but go along with what they suggest,” Kelly said lightly, trying not to show that she was happy at the delay. “I found out a long time ago that you can’t argue with bureaucracy. A few weeks in Acapulco might be quite bearable when you think about it.” She grinned. “Providing that I don’t have to spend them in olive green jeans and shirt. Any chance of you using your clout with the manager to get a few charge accounts
approved for me? I noticed some really smart boutiques in the lobby.”