Caine's Reckoning by Sarah McCarty

wrist and brought her hand to his mouth. He pressed a chaste kiss on the edge of her palm. Chocolate spread to his lips. He backed off, licking his lips. “It’s still good.”
    He brought her hand to her mouth. “Eat it while I get supper.”
    She glanced toward the jerky. It didn’t take a genius to interpret what she was thinking. No, not jerky.
    “Oh, we can do a lot better than jerky.” Sam disappeared into the darkness and came back carrying two large oval tins with handles. “The padre’s housekeeper sent a bunch of tamales and pork stew along with tortillas and—” he lifted a square basket “—wedding cakes.”
    Desi stopped licking at her hand. “Oh.”
    Oh, indeed.
    “Maria said it wasn’t proper you didn’t have a wedding supper.”
    Caine took the basket with the cakes in it from Tracker and put it beside Desi. “Maria cooks like a dream.”
    “Learned everything she knows from Tia.”
    “Tia?” Desi asked.
    “Tia’s been taking care of us since the massacre.”
    “Massacre?”
    She was beginning to sound a bit like a parrot but Caine couldn’t begrudge her. After the day she’d had she had to feel a bit like she’d been tossed from a coach going at full speed and was now just bouncing around in the aftermath. “We all used to live in the same town. After the massacre took our families, we banded together.”
    “We didn’t know shit about surviving,” Sam interjected, opening a tin.
    “Damn near starved to death,” Tracker agreed, getting out a metal coffeepot. “Best thing we ever did was to try and steal tortillas from Tia’s windowsill.”
    Caine rubbed at the back of his neck with the memory. “That woman wields a mean broom, though.”
    “That she did,” Sam agreed, pulling out husk-wrapped bundles. “Lined us up against the wall of her home and lectured us a good hour while dinner simmered in the pot. Quoted the bible one minute and threatened our manly charms the next.”
    “Damn longest hour of my life,” Caine said, remembering the hunger that had driven him to steal, the shame at being caught by a good woman who quoted the bible, but most of all he remembered how good that damn meal had tasted after he and the others had worked another hour to earn their place at the table.
    “Does she still live with you?” Desi asked.
    “Hell, yeah.”
    “Runs Hell’s Eight with an iron fist.” Sam popped the top off the second tin. The rich scent of spicy meat stew filled the air.
    “She’s family.”
    “Yes.” Maybe not by blood but by everything that mattered, Tia was family.
    Desi’s face took up that guarded look he didn’t like. He took the package from her hands and set it aside. It wasn’t hard to see where her thoughts had wandered. “She’ll like you just fine, Desi.”
    Caine reached back for his saddlebag and fished out his tin plate and spoon. Tracker poured some stew onto the plate and tossed on a tortilla. Sam added a tamale. Caine glanced over at where Desi sat dwarfed by the coat. “Add another tamale on there.”
    Sam followed his glance. “Yeah. She could use some fattening up.”
    Shit, Caine hoped Desi hadn’t heard that. It only took a turn to see that she had. That full, totally tempting mouth was set in a flat line and those eyes were shooting daggers at him again. He sighed and handed her the plate. “He wasn’t slinging mud. Just concern.”
    She took it. “It doesn’t matter.”
    He noticed the fine tremor in her hands as he let go. Hunger, fear, anger…? Hell, there were too many reasons that could cause that shaking to pinpoint just one. She didn’t immediately grab up the spoon.
    “Maria said to tell you she didn’t make it too spicy, ma’am,” Sam offered.
    Desi appreciated that. She’d only met the woman once, early on before James had understood how determined she’d been to escape. Plump and colorful, happily married to the town’s blacksmith, she’d been a too-cheerful reminder of all Desi had lost. Desi’s