afraid for Tonatiuh. If he intervened on her behalf, it would cause him serious trouble.
So she kept to herself the fact that each Friday evening she was required to spend an hour alone with the twenty-nine-year-old Tyler Parnell. It would be temporary. She would purposely behave so coldly toward Parnell he would soon lose interest.
In each other’s arms every afternoon at the Puesta del Sol hideaway, it was easy for the young lovers to forget that anyone else existed. For them, no one did. After their first total intimacy, the healthy young pair made love every day. They were wildly in love and gloriously happy and never dreamed that as the hot, hot days of an Indian summer gave way to the clear, beautiful ones of autumn, their innocence was not all that was slipping away.
Youth and trust and happiness was dying as well.
The beginning of the end came one cool October night after the most wonderful day they had ever had. Luiz, lying awake in his bed that night, thinking of Amy, grew restless. Rising, he pulled on his pants and went for a walk.
Circling the big hacienda, he strolled toward the west patio. The Sullivans’ patio. And there he saw Amy in the moonlight with Tyler Parnell. Heartsick, he turned numbly away, returned to his room, and paced the floor in agony.
Still, all would have been made right had the pair been allowed one more afternoon together. Amy would have told him the truth, that Baron was blackmailing her. That she cared nothing for Tyler Parnell.
But she never got the chance.
Eleven
“D OMINO!”
Pedrico Valdez, his one eye twinkling, grinned at the surprised man across the pine desk. “Domino, patrón ,” he said again, and triumphantly crossed his arms over his chest.
Shaking his graying head, Walter Sullivan couldn’t believe it. Each night for over a decade, he and Pedrico Valdez had played a two-handed game of dominos. In all those years he had never been caught with this many bones left in his hand.
“You finally got me, Pedrico,” he said, smiling broadly, two unplayed ivory dominos held loosely in his cupped palm.
“Yes!” said the pleased houseboat. “How much, patrón ? Lots of count, I hope.”
He lifted the pen from its inkwell and leaned over the white tally sheet, eager to write down the score. He waited. Walter Sullivan said nothing. Pedrico looked up questioningly and saw an expression of horror on the big rancher’s florid face.
“ Dios , patrón !” He dropped the pen. “What is it?”
Pedrico jumped up from his chair so quickly it toppled over backward. Terrified, he circled the desk, anxiously asking what was wrong. But Walter Sullivan could not speak. He clutched frantically at his chest and his face contorted with pain.
Making gasping, wheezing sounds of agony, the big rancher’s eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped forward in his chair, dead of a heart attack. Clutched tightly in his big fist were the two unplayed ivories.
The 6-6 and the 5-6.
While a punishing Texas sun beat down with a vengeance, Amy stood between her brothers in Orilla’s small, well-tended graveyard. Directly before her was the heavy bronze coffin bearing the body of her father.
A black-robed padre conducted the service in Latin while vaqueros and cowboys and the townsfolk of Sundown tearfully paid their last respects.
Feeling strangely cold in the midmorning heat, Amy was in a daze of grief. She couldn’t believe that a man as vigorous and alive as her daddy could be gone so suddenly.
The brief service ended.
Amy stepped forward.
She stooped, picked up a handful of the dry Texas soil her father had loved so dearly, and slowly sprinkled it over the bronze coffin. She lifted the black veil from her face, leaned down, pressed her lips to the casket, and said soundlessly, “Rest well, Daddy. Orilla is in good hands.”
Throughout that long, hot afternoon callers filled the many downstairs rooms of the salmon-colored hacienda. Magdelena and Rosa and Pedrico passed
So she kept to herself the fact that each Friday evening she was required to spend an hour alone with the twenty-nine-year-old Tyler Parnell. It would be temporary. She would purposely behave so coldly toward Parnell he would soon lose interest.
In each other’s arms every afternoon at the Puesta del Sol hideaway, it was easy for the young lovers to forget that anyone else existed. For them, no one did. After their first total intimacy, the healthy young pair made love every day. They were wildly in love and gloriously happy and never dreamed that as the hot, hot days of an Indian summer gave way to the clear, beautiful ones of autumn, their innocence was not all that was slipping away.
Youth and trust and happiness was dying as well.
The beginning of the end came one cool October night after the most wonderful day they had ever had. Luiz, lying awake in his bed that night, thinking of Amy, grew restless. Rising, he pulled on his pants and went for a walk.
Circling the big hacienda, he strolled toward the west patio. The Sullivans’ patio. And there he saw Amy in the moonlight with Tyler Parnell. Heartsick, he turned numbly away, returned to his room, and paced the floor in agony.
Still, all would have been made right had the pair been allowed one more afternoon together. Amy would have told him the truth, that Baron was blackmailing her. That she cared nothing for Tyler Parnell.
But she never got the chance.
Eleven
“D OMINO!”
Pedrico Valdez, his one eye twinkling, grinned at the surprised man across the pine desk. “Domino, patrón ,” he said again, and triumphantly crossed his arms over his chest.
Shaking his graying head, Walter Sullivan couldn’t believe it. Each night for over a decade, he and Pedrico Valdez had played a two-handed game of dominos. In all those years he had never been caught with this many bones left in his hand.
“You finally got me, Pedrico,” he said, smiling broadly, two unplayed ivory dominos held loosely in his cupped palm.
“Yes!” said the pleased houseboat. “How much, patrón ? Lots of count, I hope.”
He lifted the pen from its inkwell and leaned over the white tally sheet, eager to write down the score. He waited. Walter Sullivan said nothing. Pedrico looked up questioningly and saw an expression of horror on the big rancher’s florid face.
“ Dios , patrón !” He dropped the pen. “What is it?”
Pedrico jumped up from his chair so quickly it toppled over backward. Terrified, he circled the desk, anxiously asking what was wrong. But Walter Sullivan could not speak. He clutched frantically at his chest and his face contorted with pain.
Making gasping, wheezing sounds of agony, the big rancher’s eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped forward in his chair, dead of a heart attack. Clutched tightly in his big fist were the two unplayed ivories.
The 6-6 and the 5-6.
While a punishing Texas sun beat down with a vengeance, Amy stood between her brothers in Orilla’s small, well-tended graveyard. Directly before her was the heavy bronze coffin bearing the body of her father.
A black-robed padre conducted the service in Latin while vaqueros and cowboys and the townsfolk of Sundown tearfully paid their last respects.
Feeling strangely cold in the midmorning heat, Amy was in a daze of grief. She couldn’t believe that a man as vigorous and alive as her daddy could be gone so suddenly.
The brief service ended.
Amy stepped forward.
She stooped, picked up a handful of the dry Texas soil her father had loved so dearly, and slowly sprinkled it over the bronze coffin. She lifted the black veil from her face, leaned down, pressed her lips to the casket, and said soundlessly, “Rest well, Daddy. Orilla is in good hands.”
Throughout that long, hot afternoon callers filled the many downstairs rooms of the salmon-colored hacienda. Magdelena and Rosa and Pedrico passed
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