The two-seater carriage allowed them to bring extra blankets and even a pillow for their impromptu picnic. The big dappled gray bore a striking resemblance, in both looks and demeanor, to Buck Wilmington's sweet Clyde. Henrietta had, according to the liveryman Tiny, never taken to a saddle but seemed more than happy to be hitched up to the buggy, by herself. It was a nice change of pace from pairing up with another of the stronger horses for the more strenuous team work of hauling large wagons. At least that was how Tiny translated her behavior when he placed her in the different rigging. Presently, she grazed happily on the early spring grass at the edge of the brook, detached from the carriage and tied loosely enough to allow her a comfortable lead to water and the sweet, lighter-green blades of new grass on the ground.
"Would you like some more wine?"
"No, gracias." Ezra Standish wasn't sure that he hadn't heard a cat-like purr come from the beautiful woman he held in his arms.
"Would you like more to eat?"
Inez Rocios had thrown together quite a feast, and there was plenty of food left on the plates and small baskets scattered about them. It would not go to waste. Whatever they did not finish they would be dropping off at the Armijos. Juan and Maria Armijo were recent immigrants from Mexico. They and their three children lived just outside town along with a small menagerie of farm animals in the old Sullivan homestead. Maria cleaned the rooms in the two hotels in town. Juan took care of the farm, with help from the children, except for on Wednesdays and Thursdays, when the two boys and one girl joined in on Ezra's classes. The family was one of several who provide fresh cow's and sheep's milk, as well as excess vegetables during the summer months. This time of year was especially hard for them to provide enough nourishment to the children, let alone themselves.
Inez laughed. "Goodness no," she said as she rubbed her full belly. "Certainly you can feel that?" The gambler had one hand laying lightly on her stomach.
He turned his head to hers, pulled her face gently closer and kissed her cheek. "Mah dear lady, even if Ah could feel that, Ah would nevah say so. Mah mothah has many failings, but she did raise me to be a gentleman, and a gentleman would nevah say such of a thing about a woman. Evah." The pretty Mexican turned and kissed him, a long, deep, passionate kiss, and then rested heavily back into his embrace. The sky was a brilliant blue, the birds flitted above them through tree branches just barely starting to bud. They sat in each other's arms for a good while when Inez felt a distinct change in her lover.
"What is wrong?" she asked.
Ezra squeezed her tight and then whispered a series of kisses along her neck, ending with a warm, extended kiss at her ear. He rubbed her belly and asked, "Do you ever wonder … about being with child? I know we've made brief reference to your desires in the past."
Now it was her turn to tense up.
"Inez?"
"I … I do not."
"Darlin', Ah know that cannot be true. You have said to me that you want children."
"No. That is not what I said." She turned her head away as she spoke.
Ezra pulled away and reached out his hand to her chin. He moved her face so they looked at one another. The card sharp knew how to read a face. On this beautiful one, at that moment, he saw both sadness and defiance.
"We have spoken of this. You said that you wanted a family." Ezra didn't understand why now she would deny what she had told him before.
"No."
"Inez … "
"No. What I said was that I would like to have children. What woman does not?" Her eyes were huge, a stunning brown, especially in this mid-afternoon light under the yellow budding of the cottonwood trees, but seemed close to tears.
"Ah do not understand. Are we not sayin' the same thing?"
"Ezra. I would like to have children. But I cannot."
Ezra Standish looked at the woman with whom he had reluctantly fallen in love. He had thought it the wrong thing, considering his dual occupations of lawman and gambler were risky and held dangers for his own life and any life he might wish with a woman, or the lives of any he brought into the world. But he had fallen, finally, and fallen hard for the fiery beauty from south of the border. In those beautiful eyes, where he had just seen sadness and defiance, he now witnessed utter anguish. Looking at her now, he understood: her choice of words had been deliberate and would fool most anyone. He had been fooled by the careful phrasing.
Inez realized the moment her lover understood what she had meant. She scurried from his arms, crawled briefly on the ground and rose to her feet, quickly running toward the creek. He stood up fast and followed her.
"Inez! Wait!"
"No. Por favor, déjame ser."
"No haré," he countered as he reached her and then ran past her. She was forced to stop.
"Mi amor, entiendo," she said, her voice full of despair.
"Ah do not believe you do."
"I know that you would not want me now. No man would, after … "
"Did Don Paulo hurt you?" He didn't need her to speak to know the answer, he could see it in her face, in the trembling of her body. "He made you unable to … ." He didn't want to say what so obviously still pained her to talk about.
"He beat me. He kicked me." Inez held Ezra's eyes with her own. The southerner felt only love for her, and saw through his eyes one of the bravest people he had ever known, without compare the bravest woman.
"You understand that this was not your fault," he told her.
"I made him angry," she said, her recollection making her sound unsure. "I disobeyed … "
"There is nothing you could have done," Ezra said to her as she turned her face away from him, biting her lip. He took her face gently and turned it back toward him. He held the beautiful, sad face as though it were the most precious and delicate porcelain. He continued, "He was insane. Nothing you did or said caused this or could have prevented it. And no command from the likes of him would warrant a beating. He had no right to take something so precious from you."
Inez looked down, her face still held in Ezra's hands. "No man will want … "
"Ah want," Ezra said as he took one hand and raised her chin so that she had to look into his eyes. "Ah want you."
Inez blinked, shedding several tears, and then shook her head. "No. It is not right. You should have children. There is no man I have ever known who was meant to have a child more than you."
It was now Ezra's turn to shake his head as his conversation with Vin replayed in his head. To finally realize that he might be able to have something that he never thought he could? It had been quite the revelation. The thought of having babies with this woman, however briefly the time was that he'd been able to consider such a thing? He'd convinced himself that he could do it, with this woman. With only this woman. At this moment, though, Ezra was convinced of a more important truth: he loved Inez Rocios. No. Matter. What.
"Inez," he said as he smiled at her, a warm, loving smile. He leaned in and kissed her lips lightly. "As mah wise friend Vin Tanner said to me recently, Ah have a hand in raisin' quite a few children around town. It is satisfyin' and drainin' at the same time."
"It is not the same."
"No it's not." He pulled her into a hug, one hand around her back, the other carefully forcing her head into his chest. "But there are also orphans in need of a mothah and a fathah." He combed his fingers through her hair. "You have seen how the Mertons have adopted Tom's children. There is no possible way for those who don't already know their history to know that they have not always been a family."
"Sí," Inez said softly into Ezra's vest.
"Ah will not leave you because of this, mah darlin' Inez. Ah hope that we will grow old together. If we are as lucky as Robert and Abigail and have adopted children of our own, that would be wonderful. But if it is only the two of us holding hands in our rocking chairs together, then Ah will have been the luckiest man who evah lived."
Ezra felt her sigh more than hearing it, and then found her arms pulled from between them to envelope him in a hug. She leaned away and looked up at him. She had a smile on her face. Maybe not a happy smile, the conversation had been too serious to expect such a sudden change. It was more a smile of recognition, of understanding that she was not to blame for what had happened to her, and that she was safe and loved in Ezra's arms.
"Are you all right?" he asked her.
"Yes." He leaned down and kissed her again. This was no mere peck, however. They both felt the need to prove their love for one another through this kiss. They were both breathless by the time they broke apart, and then Ezra saw it, that hint of mischief in her eyes, in the uptick of her lips.
He was in trouble.
"So," she said.
"Sí," he replied.
"When you said that you hoped that we would grow old together?"
"Ah meant it," he assured her.
"Well, was that a proposal of marriage?"
"Uh," he said, and then Inez heard an unmistakable gulp from the man she loved. And on this perfect weather day, she was pretty sure that he had broken out in a cold sweat. She laughed and then set him straight.
"I was kidding. Breathe!" He did. "What we have is more than I ever thought I would have with a man. After Don Paulo … "
"Ah don't want you to say his name ever again," the gambler said as he placed his fingers to her lips. "Ah would ask you not to think of him, but Ah know that what he did to you cannot be easily forgotten." He looked at her carefully to see how she felt about what he said. He did not see anything to preclude what he needed to say next. "Ah love you, Inez Rocios. Ah nevah thought Ah would say that, to anyone. Ah am the most grateful man alive."
"Y yo soy la mujer más agradecidos."
Ezra took her hand and walked them back to their blanket.
"You know, Ah selected this location for a reason," he said.
"Yes, it is quite beautiful."
"That is not the reason," he replied with a wry grin.
"It is surprisingly lush."
"Neither is that the reason," he said as he brought them both down to their knees on the thick layers of blanket atop the soft spring grass.
"No?" the Mexican beauty said as she undid one button of Ezra's vest, and then the next, and finally the last, never taking her eyes from his.
"No," he answered as he removed her belt and then put his arms around her and deftly unbuttoned her skirt.
"You know, Señor, now that you know … everything," she said as she lowered her eyes, but then raised them confidently back up to the man she loved, "there is something that has changed," she said seductively. She now had his shirt off of his shoulders and then worked carefully on his pants as he removed the shirt the rest of the way. She ghosted her fingers over the prize that awaited beneath the pinstriped trousers.
"Mmm," Ezra moaned, followed by, "we will get there, mah dear," as he grasped her hand and pulled it away. She laughed, knowing what the teasing was doing to her partner. Ezra added, "There is nothing that has changed about how Ah feel for you." Inez reached up for a kiss, fiery and quick.
"Nor I you. Te adoro, Ezra."
"Te adoro, Inez." They kissed again. He helped Inez out of her blouse. There was still one layer to go. He asked, "What has changed?"
"Well," she began as she hastily removed Ezra's soft silk undershirt, and immediately placed her mouth on his chest, rolling her tongue over one nipple, and then licking her way slowly to the next. "Since I cannot get pregnant," she continued, obviously relieved of the burden of keeping her secret, her free spirit seemed ready to soar, as it had when the two first met three years before. She stopped to play with one nub intensely, taking it between her teeth and biting down just to the line of pain, "we can … ." She stopped talking and kept working.
"We can?" he asked, his eyes now closed as he used all of the self-restraint that he owned to not throw the mischievous and far-too-sexy woman, at least for Ezra's sanity, to the ground and work her into the near frenzy that she was attempting with him.
"We," she spoke again, her lips vibrating over his over-sensitized nipple.
"Can," he gulped.
"Have more sex," she finally said as she reached down and pushed both his trousers and his underpants over his hips, forcing them over her ever-hardening prize.
"More sex?" He looked down and watched as Inez licked her way across his chest, her eyes seductive and filled with love … and a little lust. He reached for her breasts through the fine chemise and watched, mesmerized, as her eyes darkened to a rich, dark brown.
Inez licked her way up, kissing his throat, then his neck, then his right ear lobe. Then she spoke softly, the air blowing into his ear as enticing as the words she spoke.
"Mucho, mucho más sexo."
Ezra breathed in heavily and let out a shuddering gasp as he somehow kept himself under control, even as a particular part of his anatomy had other ideas.
"Magnífico." He could only manage a whisper as he took her mouth and took Inez at her word.
The End.