Twenty-Six

IT wasn’t a long ride.
He didn't even make the horse run.
Instead, they plodded along as if they were strolling in the countryside, which in retrospect was exactly what it seemed like if you take away all the mess of the last weeks, especially the one that just happened.
If it's all taken away, then there would be nothing, Arianna was thinking. He wouldn't even know her, would not try to look for her, and she wouldn't be riding with him on this horse.
So what were they doing?
She closed her eyes as she arrived at the most obvious thing.
He still wanted her.
There was no mistaking that after what happened in his house, he wanted things to continue. Her cheeks felt like it was getting more and more inflamed as she remembered again.
There was no question, too, that she had no willpower to fight him after her reaction to his touch. Even now, as he held her, she still felt her body reacting to him.
She caught herself leaning back on him a few times then get rigid at the inclination. It was annoying him... or maybe 'annoy' was the wrong word. He disliked it, she could tell. And she couldn't understand why.
Why he was doing this.
Why he was acting possessive.
Why he didn't seem to mind if they were seen by other people.
This part of the hacienda was remote, neighbors far in between with woody spots separating their house from sight. But it wasn't like nobody goes here. There wasn't a day they didn't see anyone passing on the road in front of their home going to or from where they worked near here.
She cringed at the thought of being seen riding on a horse with him, of all people. She feared what they would think.
That she was the young daughter of a sickly widow of a late tenant, and very poorly.
He, meanwhile, was the son of their wealthy landowner whose lineage was purportedly traced to the royal blood of Spain in the line of his father, an aristocrat.
She shouldn't even dare dream about him. She didn't have any right to assume he would even notice her before... and now cook for her and feed her or want her in his bed!
And if he was planning on continuing this, and others would see, it would be fast for them to assume she was being paid for his pleasure.
There was no way a man would hold a woman like he was doing now if nothing was going on.
Okay, so might be she was being paranoid.
But if they ever get to that conclusion, wouldn’t they be?
She had no plans to ask anything from him—that was despicable now. But between the two of us, who could forget that night?
How could he not think she was a woman only after what financial gain she could get from him for her family? He knew what situation they were in. It wasn’t like he could just become part of their lives and not see how disadvantageous it was for him to be with needy people.
The quiet ride continued as her thoughts about her situation got uglier and uglier.
She was afraid to open her mouth and ask questions or say anything, worried about what he was going to say or propose.
They finally reached the spot where she'd left the tri-bike, and it wasn't there.
"Where's my bike?"
"It's been taken care of,” he said in a lazy voice. “I sent someone to bring the vegetables to the mansion while the bike was returned to your house."
She swallowed a nervous cry. "Why would you do that? My mother will wonder where I am. You… she would worry—"
"She's not there now. Don’t worry about it," he replied in a softer voice.
Confused, she turned her upper body to the side to address him. "Huh?"
He smiled and, as if unable to resist, sealed her open mouth with a kiss. And it wasn't even a short kiss. He took his time, and her cheeks had become very hot when he finally raised his head to steer the horse who had started to veer off the road back on the path.
She wanted to reprimand him for kissing her here in the open, but how when she couldn't even pull away? She responded to the kiss before she could think not to. And he clearly liked that.
There was happy contentment on his face when he straightened, and she took her eyes off him to face front.
And see?
She forgot what she was to ask until he explained himself. Again, he’d turned her brain to mush. "Your mother was taken by the health workers to the hospital for—"
"What?! What happened to my mother?!" she blurted out, alarmed, and was about to jump from the horse to run the short distance now to their house.
His hold tightened and he laughed softly. "Calm down, my Yna. I ordered it so she could be thoroughly examined by a specialist and given new prescriptions for her health. Her medical checkups the past few weeks were taken to a doctor I know, and they wanted to try another way to help her. Seems like the old prescriptions were not working so well."
"Why? How could they take her without telling me?" She remembered she was indisposed. "Why didn’t they wait to ask me about it?" she corrected, warmth suffusing her face.
"Tommy went with her. Last time I checked, they're going to make her stay for the night for observation after her first treatments, so he's probably gone back home or on his way."
"How do you know all these?" I demanded.
"I talked to him and told him to put away your belongings so your family can be moved to a new house," he replied in a bland voice. "Right before you woke up."
She was stunned and speechless for a few moments. She could hear the clatter of the horse's hooves, the faint rustle of the leaves in the wind, as she frantically went over what he'd said.
*New house? What new house? What is going on?*
"Why is my family moving to another house?"
"Because it's hard living where you're at.” His tone this time said she shouldn’t even have to ask. “You always have to fetch water from a well or the spring when you could be doing something else. The structure is very old and there's a lot to repair. If a storm passes by, everything will fall. And you are too far from neighbors and from help if you need it. How long have you been living there? My father must have forgotten-"
"He didn't. Neighbors check on us. The tanod checks on us. We're more than grateful that we still have a place to stay and to sustain us—we're not complaining." She felt nervous. “Now, if you’re father hears about this he might—"
"You should have said something. I remember your family now. My father liked your father, he was a good and smart worker and was determined for his wife and kids to stay and be taken care of. My father would have made things better for you. It is clear he hadn’t visited for a long time."
"We are being taken care of, and he is a good man. We're fine where we're at," she protested. “We didn’t need to change anything!”
"Well, *I* want you, your mother, and your brother to live in a better house."
His bratty tone dared her to disobey so he could make it more difficult for her.
In her heart, she felt mutinous. She firmly closed her mouth, but her body had become very, very rigid and her back ramrod straight.
"Now why do I feel like I did something you didn't particularly like?" he asked, amused.
"I thought you understood what I said in your house. I'm not a wh—"
"Don't even say it," he ordered in a voice suddenly cold.
That scared her a little that she didn’t speak for a moment. "What's the house for?" she asked because she couldn't help herself. "What will people say when they find out?"
"I don't care a fig about what they'd say. But if they're good people they'd be happy for your mother."
"I care. It's going to kill my mother if she finds out—"
"Why are you so ashamed of me?"
She was too shocked she wasn’t even sure she had heard that right.
But she knew she did. Was he daft?
"We're not going to see each other again," she said instead. "Let's stop. I'm not... I... it was just one time. I didn't want Tommy to be taken away. I don't want a new house. I—"
"I don't plan to make you my mistress, dammit!"
"Well, it's what everybody's going to think!"
Under them, the horse was getting tensed because of the angry voices. The clip-clopping sound had become fidgety and out of rhythm. He had neighed twice now. But she couldn’t stop.
"Why did you even say that?"
"You're not going to be my mistress. This isn't like that."
It was very hard talking to someone who seemed to believe his world was her world, too. "It's still what the hacienda people will think. It's what my family will think. My brother—"
"Oh, yeah. Your baby brother is the reason why you sold yourself in the first place," he said sarcastically. "I could beat that prick to a pulp. How can he still live with himself?"
She'd turned to hit his chest with an angry fist.
"You don't know what you're saying! That kid only wanted to save my mother when he took that money! It was for the hospital! He didn't know the consequences and when he found out what I did he couldn't forgive himself! I barely managed to get the weight off his small shoulders, he's still so young!"
She hit him again.
"Don't you dare judge my brother! You don't know what he's going through and between the two of us, he still carries the weight of that night more than I do. So just stop! Stop this!"
He grabbed her hand. She struggled against him.
But he hugged her with both arms that were way stronger than she was to fight him off.
But, because of the commotion, the horse suddenly bolted.
The next thing she knew, they were falling. But he turned as they fell and she landed on top of him.
She heard the oomph that came out of him as her weight slammed at his chest when they hit the ground.
When she twisted to look at him, he was stunned. Then his eyes closed on irises rolling up.
Then, he stopped moving.