“Gracias,” he said, accepting the brandy. Doña Lucia paced the room while he took his time sipping the mellow-tasting golden liquid. “So. What is wrong with Tomasita? Is she unhappy? Does she want for anything?”

“She wants only a husband to make her a wife,” Doña Lucia said, impatient with her son’s attitude toward the young woman. “Your father promised you would wed the girl when she was of age. It is past time you kept that promise.”

Cruz hadn’t changed his mind about marrying Tomasita, and his mother had to know it. “When the roundup is finished, I will find the girl a husband.”

Doña Lucia crossed to Cruz and stared down at him, her black eyes flashing. “You are the husband for her. If you do not lay claim now to what is yours, it may be too late for anyone to take her to wife.”

Cruz sat forward, suddenly all attention. “What are you saying?”

“Today a man, Luke Summers, came to the door asking for Señorita Stewart.”

“Luke is Sloan’s half-brother.” Cruz refrained from adding that Luke was also now heir to Three Oaks.

“So I learned. Tomasita answered the door to this man. She is an impressionable young woman, and Señor Summers was very charming. If I had not arrived when I did…” Doña Lucia let her voice trail off as though Tomasita’s ravishment were a foregone conclusion.

“I know Luke. Tomasita was in no danger. He would touch no woman who was not willing,” Cruz said certainly.

“Ah, but therein lies the problem,” Doña Lucia said. “Tomasita was totally in awe of the young man, no doubt a result of all those years spent among the sisters. Although that is where a young woman of good family should be kept until her husband comes to claim her.”

Doña Lucia carefully adjusted the lace ruffle on one of her elbow-length taffeta sleeves before she continued, “You must declare yourself. You must announce your engagement to Tomasita to protect her good name and yours.”

Cruz set his brandy on the delicate spool-legged table next to the sturdy rawhide chair, then languidly rose and walked to the fireplace. He pressed his palms hard against the stone mantel, arching his back to stretch out the stiffness that came from a day spent in the saddle. “I do not wish to discuss this any further.”

“You must marry Tomasita.”

“I cannot.”

“Why not?” Doña Lucia pressed, her voice sharp with anxiety. She had begun to have her suspicions, since that woman had come to Dolorosa, that her son might have fixed his attentions where he should not.

Cruz looked away toward the smooth Talavera jar, his jaw rigid. “Perhaps I should say instead that I choose not to marry her.”

Doña Lucia felt the knot growing inside her. “It is that woman. She is the reason you do not choose to make your vows to Tomasita.”

Cruz tensed, then turned slowly to confront his mother. “Who told you such a thing?”

“Then it is true?”

“My reasons for taking or not taking a wife are my own.”

“I saw you coming from that woman’s room this morning-”

“Enough!” Cruz interrupted. He asked the question that had been foremost in his mind since he had walked through the door. “Where is Señorita Sloan?”

“Who knows?” Doña Lucia said.

“Send someone to find her. I wish to speak with her,” he said, by now equally aggravated.

“She is gone.”

Cruz felt his heart skip a beat. “Gone? Gone where? When did she leave?”

Cruz’s evident concern for the woman annoyed Doña Lucia even further. “Paco came at mid-meal with a message for you about some gringo wagons broken down on Dolorosa land. That woman took it into her head to go there by herself.”

“You did not think to send word to me of this?”

Doña Lucia saw the anger blazing in her son’s eyes and, underlying it, something else very much like fear. “Why should you care-”

He was halfway to the door when he said, “Send someone to Paco’s jacal to find him and bring him to the stable. I will wait there for him.” On his way out the door, he yelled for another servant to send someone to the village for his foreman Miguel and the rest of his vaqueros.

It was clear now to Doña Lucia that her son cared for the gringa a great deal more than was proper for a man who was betrothed to someone else. Doña Lucia began planning at that moment to make certain that this impediment was removed.

If Cruz would not send that woman away, then she, his mother, would have to do what must be done. She would be first in her own home, first with her son-no matter what steps she had to take to accomplish it.

Cruz had cinched the high-cantled Spanish saddle on his golden bayo when Paco arrived breathless at the stable door.

“Patrón?” he called out anxiously. He had half expected this summons after he had left the woman by herself to find the gringo wagons. Had he done wrong? One look at El Patrón’s face convinced him that his carefully thought out excuses would not serve.

El Patrón cared for his people, much as a father cared for his children. But likewise, the pobres owed obedience and service to their master. The old don had been a fair man. His son had proved himself the same.

Yet there was a steely hardness in the son that had not been present in the father, and a fierceness that Paco had seen aroused in Don Cruz but which had heretofore always been kept under control. The vaquero shuddered to think of that ominous wrath unleashed on any man, but most especially on himself.

Cruz led his horse to the stable door, appearing like an avenging devil out of the darkness. “Today you escorted Señorita Stewart to the gringo wagons on my land?”

Paco quickly crossed himself and mumbled, “I only did as the señorita asked. No more. No less.”

“Can you take me there?”

“Sí, Patrón.”

“Let us go, then. Pronto!”

Cruz vaulted into the saddle even as his vaquero did the same. Once he had collected the other vaqueros, they rode fast, using the light of the full moon to show them the way.

Cruz knew the Comanches frequently took advantage of the full moon, often called a Comanche moon, to travel on their raids of the white settlements. He felt a prickle of unease and spurred his bayo to greater speed, trusting the stallion to make good use of the day-bright moonlight.

While they rode, Cruz questioned Paco about the gringos. How many were there? Were they well armed? How had they greeted Sloan? He jerked his bayo to a halt when the vaquero admitted that after seeing the vultures hovering over the gringo camp, he had left Señorita Sloan to go on to the wagons alone.

“You saw vultures?”

“Sí, Patrón.”

“And you left the woman to go on by herself?”

The vaquero sat stoically awaiting El Patrón’s judgment as he confessed, “Sí, Patrón.”

It was only with the greatest effort that Cruz kept himself from felling the man with his fist. Instead, he whirled his mount and brutally spurred the stallion into a gallop.

As he rode, his anger with Sloan grew out of control. She had promised she would stay at the hacienda. He grimaced. No, she had not promised anything. He should have known better than to leave her alone. He should have realized she would do exactly as she pleased.

The fluffy white covers sat like grounded clouds on the immigrants’ wagons, yet Cruz breathed no sigh of relief upon seeing them. For there was no cheery fire in the center of the small grouping of tall, swaybacked Conestogas, nor was there the acrid smell of smoke to suggest that a fire had recently been snuffed. There was no movement of any kind. It was too quiet.

Cruz pulled his bayo to an abrupt halt and signaled his vaqueros to silence. He searched the nearly flat terrain that surrounded them and noted there was a stand of brush and mesquite trees along the creek a short distance from the wagons. A perfect hideout for Comanches. Cruz felt himself go cold. He had not waited all these years for Sloan Stewart only to lose her to a Comanche lance.

He dismounted and handed his reins to the nearest vaquero. “Wait here while Miguel and I see if there is anyone in the wagons.”

Cruz’s segundo Miguel slid from the saddle, and the two of them moved in opposite directions yet in tandem toward the silent camp.

Paco watched with disbelieving eyes as his patrón and the older vaquero disappeared into the undergrowth. He knew how lucky he was to still be unpunished, but he wondered fearfully what El Patrón would do to him if he did not find the woman he sought.