an inch from his broad shoulder.
Ritz wanted to shout, “She’s mine! Mine!”
But what he’d done was so fantastic, she didn’t want to break the spell.
When Roque turned and walked away from Ritz, Buttercup followed. They walked in a circle before returning. Finally Roque faced the horse and lifted his hand, stroking Buttercup between the eyes. Then he stared at Ritz and grinned.
Ritz was stunned.
“He can talk to horses.” Caleb’s eyes shone.
Ritz had forgotten Caleb was even there. “How?”
“Not in words, but Roque says horses talk just the same. He’s going to teach me their language.”
“Their language?”
“Horse. He read about it in a book and taught it to himself, and he can hardly read.”
It was obvious the younger Blackstone was much in awe of his older brother. Even though she didn’t want to admit it, he wasn’t stupid like people said he was. He was smart and different—special.
“I can, too, read!” Roque blurted, stung.
“I want to learn horse, too!” The words just popped out of her mouth.
“Do you want to start now?”
She scowled at Roque when he flung himself to the ground and began yanking his scuffed black boots off. He pulled off his socks, too, and wiggled his long, naked toes.
Why was watching him do the most ordinary things so fascinating? The keen sweetness of hay being cut somewhere made her heart ache. Or was it just him, balling his dirty socks and stuffing them into his boots that made her feel so strange?
If Ritz had thought more about boys before last night and this afternoon than she’d ever admit, she felt possessed now. Roque’s dark sensual male beauty made her long to be older and prettier—desirable.
“There’s sticker burrs,” she said lamely when he finally stood up.
“So?”
She tried not to look at his gorgeous black head when he turned. But his bold green eyes claimed her somehow, holding her with that same, mysterious force she hadn’t understood last night.
“I’m not going to walk,” he said. “I’m going to fly. Do you want to learn to fly, princesa?”
He extended his brown hand just as he had last night, inviting her to put hers inside it. She stared at those long, tapered fingers and then at the purple-black grasses that curled away from them in endless waves. With a shiver, she shook her head.
“Scaredy-cat.” He laughed. As she gasped, he sprang up on Buttercup’s back, urging the mare forward with his toes into a springing trot.
“Get off her,” she whispered.
“I won, remember.”
Soon he had Buttercup cantering round and round in a perfect circle. They were so beautiful, Roque with his black hair and Buttercup with her black mane streaming in the wind as they danced in that sea of tall grasses.
Even before Roque stood up and went dangerously faster, Ritz was trembling with a mixture of fright and wonder.
“Don’t,” she pleaded silently.
But he stretched both his arms out like wings.
“No…no…” Even as she begged, her heart thrummed, and her spirit sang along with those thudding hoofs.
“Yes,” she breathed. “Yes.”
Roque’s wickedness and wildness made him seem like a god, who was connected by spirit and blood to the mare he rode, connected to the endless sea of purple grasses, to the darkening sky itself, to the whole universe—connected even to her. She’d felt the same thing last night, only now her feelings were stronger.
Buttercup galloped so fast, Roque did indeed seem to fly. When Caleb spread his own arms like wings and ran after his brother, she did the same thing. The three of them soared on their make-believe wings, running round and round, both flying and dancing.
Caleb and she ran after him until they collapsed in laughter, breathing hard. Ritz put her hand over her heart as the galloping horse and the bad Blackstone boy flew away. She began to laugh, forgetting all sense of ownership when Roque turned, and she realized he was galloping back to her.
“He’s magical,” she whispered. “He’s like a centaur.”
Buttercup slowed and Roque sat down again and smiled down. A stillness descended upon her when he came close and held out his hand to his brother.
“Do you want to fly?”
Caleb shook his head.
“I do!” she cried in an eager voice that did not belong to her.
Roque gave her a long look. Then he leaned down. This time when he extended his hand toward her, she grabbed it.
Sweet heat flicked through her veins like summer lightning. Oh, what had gotten into her? Was it his wildness? His badness?
Caleb shrieked with joy and ran up to them. Kneeling, he cupped his dirt-encrusted hands. As bravely as Jet, Ritz put her foot in his fingers and sprang up in front of Roque. His warm hands circled her waist, burning her skin through her thin blouse.
When he urged Buttercup into a trot, she forgot all about hating him.
Never had cantering been such a glorious experience. It was like dancing. A chemistry flowed between the three of them. They weren’t just a boy and a girl and a horse. They belonged to an ancient world and a primitive time that was truer than anything modern, a paradisiacal time before man had been expelled from the kingdom of nature.
He stood up and then helped her to stand, too. When she teetered, crying out to him, he steadied her until she got her balance. Soon she was holding her arms out just as he had. Slowly his thrilling hands at her waist fell away. Then he extended his arms behind hers, and they were flying together, racing in that endless magical pasture, the thudding rhythmic hooves singing in her blood.
For a few brief moments there was no high game fence, no feud. It was just Roque and her and the magic between them. Then a black pickup sped toward them on the caliche road, belching angry white fantails of dust.
For a few brief moments longer, horse and riders were free, and the range was as wild and open as their hearts. Ritz’s hair blew against Roque’s dark face, so that she felt herself part of him as well as part of the sky.
Then the truck braked. Benny Blackstone hopped out, shaking his fists and cursing when he saw Caleb running toward the galloping riders with his arms outstretched. Not that Ritz really heard Ben.
Buttercup’s hoofs were thudding, and she felt too wonderful. Even when Roque turned Buttercup, so that they seemed to charge the truck and Caleb, she was only vaguely aware of his father.
Everything seemed to happen in slow motion. Ben leaned inside the cab and pull his Winchester off the gun rack behind the driver’s seat.
“Caleb—” Ben shouted. “Sunny—”
Caleb stopped, but Buttercup kept galloping at him, Benny raised the rifle to his chest.
Caleb yelled when his father aimed at Roque, “No! Daddy! No!”
Roque let out an Indian war whoop and charged faster.
The Winchester cracked. And still Roque charged.
Almost carelessly Benny ejected the empty shell and raised the rifle again. The gun popped a second time, bouncing rocks in front of Buttercup. The mare reeled. With a scream, Ritz tumbled backward into Roque.
He grabbed her, rocking precariously, grabbing wildly at the air. Buttercup reared.
“Dios,” he muttered