Nate released Cyn immediately. She sat up on the bed and straightened her slightly rumpled blouse. Looking down, she realized that, somehow, Nate had managed to undo the top two buttons. She stood up, turned sideways and hastily refastened her blouse.
Nate sat up, groaning silently at the soreness in his left side. "Tell him to come on back."
"I'm staying," Cyn said, wanting Nate to know she had no intention of letting him and some government agent make plans for her without her consent.
J. P. Higdon was several inches shorter than Nate, at least twenty pounds heavier and a dozen years older. He wore a three-piece suit, parted his thinning hair at an awkward angle in an effort to cover a bald spot, and had perpetual wrinkles in his forehead.
"How are you doing, Hodges?"
"I'm fine. How's Romero?" Nate asked.
Higdon glanced at Cyn and raised a questioning eyebrow. "This must be Mrs. Porter."
Cyn stiffened her spine, tilted her chin and smiled. "I'm Cynthia Porter." She offered her hand, which J. P. Higdon accepted in greeting. "I have no intention of leaving Nate so the two of you can have a private talk." Her smile widened. She placed her hand on Nate's arm. "So you might as well go ahead and say whatever you came here to say."
Higdon glared at Cyn, his round blue eyes wide with wonder. "I assure you, Mrs. Porter—"
"I'm not leaving," she said.
"She's not leaving," Nate told the other man. "How's Romero?"
Higdon ran his pudgy fingers beneath the tight collar that bound his neck, inadvertently loosening his tie. "Looks like Romero is as tough as you. The doctors say he'll live, but saving the leg is still iffy."
"Damn!" Nate wanted to strike out at something, at someone. He wanted five minutes alone with Ian Ryker.
Cyn felt the coiled fury inside Nate as she tightened her hold on his arm. His muscles hardened beneath her fingers.
"The bullet severed the femoral artery. If you hadn't known what to do and acted so quickly, he would have bled to death long before the ambulance arrived," Higdon said.
"When can I see him?" Nate asked.
"He's in the trauma unit. No visitors except family."
"He has no one except his grandmother, and she must be over eighty." Nate knew that Romero's childhood and youth had been little better than his own. Where Nate had suffered from neglect and abuse, Nick Romero had grown up in abject poverty.
"I'll arrange for you to see him, soon, but for now, I think you'll want to know that I've commandeered someone to take Mrs. Porter to Senator Wellington's." Higdon turned to Cyn. "Your father has been informed that you and Agent Bedford will be leaving Sweet Haven at approximately seven tonight."
Cyn started to speak, but kept silent when Nate took her hand in his and gave her a cautioning glance.
"She'll be ready," Nate said.
"I guess you know that this whole business with Ryker has become personal with us now that he's attacked two of our people." Higdon paused, but when Nate made no comment, he continued. "We're going to stick to you like glue until this thing is over."
"I don't think it'll be that easy." Nate squeezed Cyn's hand, not wanting to speak so frankly in front of her, but knowing she left him no choice. "When the showdown comes, Ryker will find a way to make sure I have no help. He'll want it to be the two of us."
"We'll see," Higdon said. "Agent Bedford will pick Mrs. Porter up here tonight at seven. And you can stop wasting your money on Dundee's services. We've already got our people in place."
"What do you mean?" Cyn asked, wondering if there was a combat squad surrounding the house.
"He means that there are men, strategically placed, who will be keeping an eye on me." Nate knew that Cyn must feel as if she had stepped into the middle of a badly written spy drama.
"Carranza's been making inquiries," Higdon said. "It seems he's very interested in the state of your health."
"Probably wants to give Ryker an update," Nate said.
"I can't figure out why that old Cuban involved himself in this mess with Ryker, even if he is in tight with the Mar-quez family." Huffing, Higdon shook his head.
Cyn felt Nate's whole body tense at the mention of the Marquez family. "Who's the Marquez family?" she asked.
"They're the top Colombian family working out of Miami. They sort of inherited part of the action from Car-ranza. He retired without giving them any trouble, so he's been able to maintain ties with them." Higdon glanced down at his watch. "Good luck, Hodges. I'll keep you posted on Romero's condition."
J. P. Higdon gave Cyn a courteous nod before leaving. Dundee appeared in the doorway moments afterward.
"I suppose you heard," Nate asked, knowing full well that Dundee had been standing outside in the hallway listening to the entire conversation.
"I'm as good as gone," Dundee said. "I'll stop by the hospital and check on Romero before I leave town."
"Thanks for your help." Nate offered his hand to the other man, who accepted it in a hearty handshake.
"Anything for a friend of Nick Romero's."
Cyn waited until Dundee had walked away before tugging on Nate's hand as she looked up at him. "Why should it matter that Ramon Carranza has connections to a crime family in Miami? That shouldn't come as any surprise considering his background. I don't understand what it has to do with anything."
Nate took both of her hands in his and looked directly at her. "Ryker is employed by the Marquez family."
"Oh, my God!"
"Now do you understand?" he asked. "If Ryker has the Marquez family and Carranza behind him—"
"And I talked to Ramon Carranza about you, answered his questions. Told him things I shouldn't have. Oh, Nate."
"When Agent Bedford comes tonight, you'll go with him. You'll stay at your father's until this is over."
"I don't want to leave you."
"Cyn-"
"Hush. I... I don't want to leave you, but I will. I don't want to make things more difficult for you. I don't want—"
Before she could finish her sentence, Nate swallowed her words, silencing her with the heated passion of his desperate kiss.
Chapter 14
The sun, only recently visible through the haze of gray rain clouds, lay against the western horizon like an overripe peach, fat and soft and brilliantly clothed in varying shades of yellow and red. The sky, coated with an eerie golden pink glow, seemed so close. Cyn shuddered, a sense of foreboding chilling her body.
A gentle after-shower breeze stirred her hair. She had pulled it back into a large bun at the nape of her neck, but fly-away tendrils had escaped and draped her face. She ran her gaze over Nate's unkempt garden. Knee-high weeds choked the grass and overwhelmed the spring flowers which were blooming in glorious profusion. Once, years ago, Miss Carstairs had attended this garden with the passion other women would have bestowed upon a lover. Even now, the remnants of her special care showed. It saddened Cyn to think how beautiful the grounds had been only a few short years ago.
She had left Nate in his knife-filled den. Ever since Dundee's departure over an hour ago, Nate had been on the telephone. First to the hospital, then to J. P. Higdon.
Cyn knew where she was going. She'd known the minute she had left Nate to come outside. The vine-covered rooms called to her. She felt powerless to resist; indeed, she had no desire to resist. There was darkness and death and mysteries long left unsolved lurking in the shadows, but there was more. There was love and commitment and hope. The Timucuan maiden and her conquistador had been married in the mission. They had made love in those rooms. And they had died there. Cyn didn't know how she knew; she just did.
The rooms had been a part of the old mission. They had not been the chapel itself, but the priest's living quarters. He had married them, that brave man of God, and had given them his bed in which to consummate their union.