Chapter 2

"No!" Victoria screamed as she saw her childhood friend jerk away from the bandit holding the pistol. "Diego!"

The two bandits stared in momentary shock as the tall caballero fell to the ground, crimson spreading across his chest and instantly staining his crisp, silk shirt. They pushed past Victoria and ran out of the kitchen, nearly toppling over a concerned Alejandro who had come to check on his wayward son.

"Diego, where-"

Then he'd heard Victoria scream. He called back for the Sergeant but he didn't know if the man had heard him. And he didn't stop to wait. The old don froze in the doorway to the storeroom, eyes wide with shock and disbelief.

Victoria was cradling his son's head in her lap, tears sliding down her pretty cheeks. She frantically searched for the source of his wound and shrieked when Alejandro stepped into the room. "They tried to rob me. Wanted to hurt me! He-"

Alejandro called loudly again for Mendoza and the soldier nearly barreled into him as he rushed through the door. The tavern was quiet now, having heard the pistol discharge and seen the two bandits rush out.

Felipe rushed in as well, having arrived moments before to join his adopted family for dinner. The sight of his friend and the father of his heart lying so still in Victoria's arms frightened him like nothing ever had before.

"Mendoza, get help. Those two men that ran out of here tried to rob Victoria, and," He glanced at his unmoving son, covered in his own bright crimson blood. "And they shot my son!"

Felipe gestured dramatically, cursing that he could not speak. Alejandro nodded quickly, seeming to understand the boy's wild gestures. "Yes, get Doctor Hernandez, quickly!"

"Diego," Victoria whispered his name over and over as she applied pressure to the wound. Warm blood spread over her fingers and she sobbed into his hair, pressing a kiss into the soft dark locks. "Ai, dios, please." She rocked his body as she would a baby, trying in vain to wake him, keep him conscious.

Clouded blue eyes opened momentarily to regard her with a confused gaze. But she was too torn, too upset to see the apologetic love that radiated in that simple look.

Victoria squeezed his shoulders reassuringly, encouraged that he'd opened his eyes, "Yes, you need to stay awake. Please, Diego." She begged, putting more pressure on the wound.

He coughed suddenly and his body trembled. She held him tightly as Alejandro knelt beside them. "Hold on, son. The Doctor is coming."

A small crowd had gathered outside the room and when Felipe returned with the Doctor, they had to push their way through the crush of people. Soldiers soon cleared the room and closed the tavern, pushing closed the doors and locking them securely.

Diego tried to speak but no words would come out. The pain was nearly unbearable and he closed his eyes in an effort to drown it out. He could barely hear Victoria, her sweet voice begging him to stay conscious. It was necessary and he knew it. If he had any chance to live through this injury, he needed to stay awake. But, the pain was so great, and it was getting harder to breathe.

He felt the Doctor kneel beside him, felt the man frantically dab at the nasty wound. The voice sounded a million miles away and he tried to focus on it, to drown out the pain and focus only on the voice of the woman he secretly loved begging him to stay awake.

He tried to speak, but his breath was stolen away as the Doctor poured alcohol over the wound to clean it.

"No," Victoria pressed a slim finger to his lips. She was still holding him. "Don't speak. It will sap your strength. Just stay awake. Please."

"Keep talking to him Victoria,' Hernandez encouraged the distraught woman. "He seems to respond to your voice."

"It seems to have gone right through him," Hernandez observed. Searching the wound had produced no pistol ball and he was encouraged. At least he wouldn't need to injure his patient further by digging around inside him. "This is good, but I need to cauterize this before he-"

"He's lost so much blood." Alejandro whispered from behind Victoria. She was covered in his son's blood, and the floor beneath them ran red with it.

Felipe, anticipating what the Doctor would need, returned with a metal rod, its tip already heated.

A moment of clarity washed over Diego as he watched the Doctor approach him with the hot poker. Through his pain, he struggled to put together the fragmented words he so desperately wanted to voice. Victoria held his hand, absently rubbing it, whispering words of encouragement. His eyes finally locked with hers and the world fell away, the pain and the anguish, the waiting for the day he could safely declare his love. He could feel his life slipping away with every labored breath and he could not let that happen without telling her how he felt.

"Shh," her hand slid into his hair again, rubbing soothingly. "Save your strength."

If they were the last words he said in this life, he wanted them to be what he hadn't the courage to say before now. As the Doctor pressed the hot rod against his torn flesh, Diego grimaced and squeezed his eyes tightly shut. Tears escaped from between them but he forced them open as a nauseating wave of pain wracked his body.

Diego's eyes cleared for a fleeting moment as he stared at Victoria. Sensing he wanted to say something, she leaned closer. But she was not prepared for the weak kiss he pressed against her trembling lips and the determined admonition of, "I - love - you, " that slipped from between his lips in a strangled whisper. His voice was barely audible over the pounding of his own heart, and the hearts of everyone crammed into the little room.

He could hear Victoria's gasp and could see the fading image of his father's shocked stare. Before Diego's world went black, he could feel Victoria's warm breath as she sat stunned, could feel her warm, salty tears mingle with his own.

The Doctor hesitated not one bit, knowing the effort it took his young patient to say those words to the woman he loved. He simply continued his work until he glanced up and noticed padre Benitez standing over him, a knowing look in his concerned gaze.

"I'm afraid to move him." Hernandez said aloud, not really to anyone in particular. "But he cannot lay here on this cold floor."

"The hacienda is too far away. You cannot move him that far. He can rest and recover in the quiet surroundings of the church." Benitez turned to Alejandro, who nodded slowly, clearly still contemplating his son's words. He patted the old don's hand and turned to ask for assistance with a litter to carry the wounded man.

Prying Victoria's hands from Diego's took some doing, but the padre whispered soothing words into her ears and she finally, reluctantly, released the unconscious man's limp hand.

After they'd carried him out, she simply sat there, glancing at her blood-covered hands and her blood-soaked clothes. The padre stayed with her as Alejandro and Felipe followed the Doctor to the church.

"My dear," the padre began after many minutes of sob-littered silence.

Victoria looked up after several moments, her eyes suddenly very clear. "You knew, didn't you?"

The padre smiled slowly. What he knew and how he knew it would be a secret he kept until his dying day. "Knew what, Victoria?"

"He said he loved me." She shook her head, trying to make some sense out of what happened tonight. "He's never-" She sobbed, clutching at her bloodstained skirts.

"Never given you any indication of his feelings?" Benitez finished for her and smiled sadly when she nodded. Oh, he's told you, my dear, but not in the same form that just did today. "Diego is a very private and complicated man, I think," The padre began, hoping to lift her mood by talking about their friend. "I'm not sure many of us know the true man beneath what we see every day."

Victoria glanced curiously up at the padre. "Why do you say that?"

"Think back, Victoria. To every day you've spent with him," The padre took the chance and lifted her to her feet. "He's a kind, generous man." Benitez chuckled softly. "And probably more than a bit intimidated by Zorro."

Victoria's eyes lit momentarily at the mention of her masked love, but her solemn look returned when she thought of the friend who had saved her life tonight. Now was not the time to think about Zorro. Only Diego mattered right now.

"He saved my life." Victoria said slowly, replaying the events that had led to this moment, slowly through her mind. "He put himself between me and the pistol." Frightened eyes swept around the room before settling on the good padre. "He took that shot meant for me."

The padre nodded in understanding and continued slowly, "Diego has loved you for a very long time."

Victoria sobbed and shook her head, denying the padre's words. "No, that isn't possible. I would have seen, would have noticed."

The padre leveled a sad-eyed gaze at the distraught woman. "As obsessed with Zorro as you are, my dear. That you notice the most brazen man interested in your affections, is a surprise."

"I love him." Victoria said sharply. Defending her loyalty and love of Zorro to the padre was not something she wanted to do right now.

"Ah, yes. But do you love him or the idea of him?"

Victoria stared curiously at the padre as led her out the door. She turned and cast one last look at the blood-stained floor and swallowed a sob.

"I love everything he stands for, and everything he does, everything he is-" Why did she feel the need to defend her love to the padre?

"Everything he is." The padre nodded as they walked up the stairs to her room. "He is a man beneath that mask, my dear; A man who loves you with all of his heart. Would he not do anything and everything to protect you with, or without, that mask?"

Her eyes shot toward him as he led her into her room, "You must change. I will wait for you." He stepped out of the small room and closed the door.

She stared long and hard at the closed door unable to process clearly the events that had led her to this moment. She sank against the wood, sobbing, wondering why the padre would bring up Zorro at a time like this. When her best friend in the entire world had just taken a bullet for her. He'd saved her life and in the process may have lost his own.

Victoria cried, loudly, and for a long time. Until the implications of the good padre's words pierced her heart like the sharpest steel blade. She slumped heavily against the doorframe, breathless with the shocking realization that rushed through her tortured mind.

TBC