Touch a Wild Heart

  Chapter One

  Beto Sanchez was the first to notice the lean, distant man watching the five men and one woman from under lids lowered to hold the sun at bay. “He was here yesterday,” the nineteen-year-old said in a voice that tripped over his newly acquired English.

  Chela Reola waited perhaps the space of three breaths before unwrapping her legs and swinging lightly to her feet. She wore tennis shoes to protect her feet from the punishment of decaying twigs littering the orchard ground, but her long, browned legs were accustomed to the elements and needed no covering on the hot July afternoon. She turned boldly in the direction of the man standing beside his big, powerfully built pickup at the edge of the orchard. He wasn’t wearing clothes that belonged in an orchard. The four-wheel-drive pickup bore no government license plates or anything else that would identify him as an immigration officer.

  “He isn’t a foreman?” Chela asked, her easy English a contrast to that of the Mexicans’ around her. “You haven’t seen him in any of the other orchards?”

  Beto shook his head. His denial was seconded by Edwardo Burriaga, a man who had subjected his face to the elements for so many years that his age was known only to himself. “He asked questions yesterday. In Spanish. He wanted to know who the best workers were, if there were any children in the orchard. But I think he was asking other questions inside.”

  Chela stiffened, instantly alert. The questions the man asked raised even more questions about him. Even from here she could see that he was an Anglo. Whites coming to the orchards could only mean trouble. He couldn’t be from the schools since it was summer and the authorities were no longer concerned with truant children. But if he was asking about the best workers, he might be looking to lure some of the men and women working for Rogue Orchards to another job, one that paid no more but promised much more than it delivered. Jackson County in southern Oregon had been famous for its pear crop since before the turn of the century. In their attempts to keep up with competition, the orchardists vied with each other for the most productive workforce.

  “Nuez is illegal,” Beto continued. “But he isn’t working here today.”

  Chela nodded. She was so much a part of the migrants that there was no question of whether she would turn in an illegal. “Not all Anglos work for immigration,” she said softly.

  “Maybe he wants a woman.”

  The slim woman who proudly carried the heritage of the mother she barely remembered placed her hands on her hips and returned the man’s bold stare. He was too far away for her to make out his features in the heavy shadows cast by the pear trees. All her ebony eyes knew for sure was that he was in superb physical condition, of average height, with hair cut by a barber and not styled by a hairdresser. She both resented and admired his direct gaze. He wanted something, and that Chela didn’t like, but at least he was open about his presence. Either he would approach the small group or get back into his truck.

  That was his problem. Chela had only a half hour before the sprinklers had to be reset, putting an end to the workers’ English lesson. After that, she would, jump into her own Jeep and drive to one of the barrios, the migrant housing, where a dozen children waited for the writing class she was giving on her own time. “If he wants a woman, he shouldn’t be here,” she said disdainfully and turned her back on the interruption. “There aren’t any women in the orchards.”

  “Except you,” Beto pointed out, dropping back into Spanish as he wrestled with a complex thought. “You carry yourself like a young horse. You don’t eat frijoles and tortillas and get fat. Maybe it’s you he wants.”

  Never! Chela Reola had had twenty-seven years to learn what local men thought of migrants, of anyone whose skin was darker than theirs. Although she was an American citizen, she’d long ago made her alliance with her mother’s people. She had reasons no one knew of for distrusting and even hating bold-eyed men who thought all they needed was money to get their way. “He’ll have to have me dead,” she breathed before returning her attention to the day’s lesson. The stranger was of no interest to her. Ignoring him should make that clear.

  Being ignored didn’t concern the man. He continued his penetrating surveillance for another five minutes, content to watch without being watched in return. He was sweating down the middle of his back and along his forehead under thick coarse hair the color of a grizzly bear, but physical discomfort was something he’d become accustomed to years ago. He was fully aware that the five men and the woman had seen him, but he’d never intended his presence to be a secret. Soon he’d approach the woman, start the relationship that was essential for his purpose. The Last thing he wanted was to take her completely by surprise. It would ruin everything. As he continued to watch the slender, athletic figure among the men, he admitted that the county sheriff had been right. Chela Reola didn’t come out of any mold.

  Now that he’d seen her, he understood what Sheriff Duff had been getting at the other day. “She won’t be what you expect,” Kenneth had said when the two men were meeting in the sheriff’s office. “She’s a migrant teacher, but she’s about as far from the teacher stereotype as you’ll ever get. Besides, this is summer. She’s on her own now, not working for anyone but herself. Getting close to her won’t be easy. She’s kind of a wild animal in a lot of ways is the best I can put it. She isn’t going to bolt and run, but she isn’t going to trust you either.”

  Joe Magadan would have to be content with that explanation. Kenneth Duff didn’t have time for a more detailed description, and other things the two men had to discuss that day were more important. “I’ll work out something,” Magadan said as the sheriff was seeing him out. “She’s a woman. I’ve had more than a little experience with women in my life. She’ll understand how important it is for her to work with me. I can bring her around.”

  “But you’re not going to tell her everything,” Kenneth pointed out. “What happens when she puts two and two together on her own? Magadan, she’s no one’s fool. She’ll bolt for sure then, if she doesn’t tear your eyes out first. If you want my advice, move slowly and lay all your cards on the table.”

  Unfortunately that was the last thing Magadan could do. Grunting, the big man pushed his frame away from the pear tree he’d been resting against and ran a broad, leathery hand across his eyes. He couldn’t see much of her face, but if it matched her frame— No. That wasn’t part of the plan. No one, as far as he’d been able to determine, knew much of anything about Chela Reola. She’d been a migrant teacher with the district for four years, but no one knew what she’d done before that, who her friends were; if she had any family, what she’ did with herself when she wasn’t going to schools throughout the district helping to mainstream children who had never spoken English before their parents acquired green cards and came to the United States from Mexico to work.

  At least now Magadan knew a little more about how she spent her summer months. She was in a pear orchard with the workers, teaching English to teenagers who would probably never finish high school, old men who no longer dreamed of anything better, and others who faded into the shadows when an Anglo approached because they were here illegally. Those men and their families trusted Chela Reola. Somehow he had to find a way to get her to trust him.

  The ebony-eyed woman with glistening black hair pushed behind her ears was his link with a man who belonged in prison. “It has to work, Chela,” he whispered into the wind. “Somehow I have to make you understand.”

  Chela was again thinking about the strange, silent man when her students hurried off to change the miles of water pipe that was essential to the growth of the valley’s pear orchards. She was used to seeing white men in the orchards, but they were usually foremen or others like immigration officers whose purpose was quickly de
termined. The immigration officers came at night during sudden raids that left the orchardists shorthanded. She had never been able to understand that. No one except migrant workers would do the jobs the orchardists needed done, and yet it was nearly impossible for most Mexicans to obtain the green card they needed to stay here legally. Deporting captured illegals accomplished nothing. They would only return. Whatever the man’s purpose, it had to have something to do with migrants and orchards. An Anglo had no other reason for being here.

  He might be a coyote, but instinct put that possibility at the bottom of the list. Coyotes were usually Mexicans. The Anglos in the business of smuggling illegals were furtive men, quick moving and nervous. This man carried himself like someone who knew who he was and wouldn’t back down from any challenge; he simply didn’t strike her as a man who made his living in the dark of night. What did she care what he did for a living? He was gone.

  Chela trotted down the deeply shadowed, rutted road that cut a single path through the dense orchard until she reached her Jeep. She swung a long leg up, grabbed the steering wheel with both hands, and lowered herself onto the sun-faded seat. As she reached for the keys in her pocket, her left hand made the automatic gesture designed to push the thick mane of hair out of her eyes. She could wear her hair like most women, cut and curl it, but she was proud of its rich black length. Her hair was one of the things her mother had given her—along with skin that looked tanned in the middle of a fog-bound winter.

  Before her heart had time to settle on thoughts of her mother, Chela pumped her Jeep into life and bucked it to the end of the rutted road until she reached the highway. She waited for a break in the traffic and then pulled out. As the Jeep picked up speed, she lifted her head, letting the hot wind blow her hair away from her face, drying her wet scalp. Chela had spent most of her life in the orchards, and yet she didn’t know how the workers stood working there when the temperatures passed one hundred degrees and humidity from the moist ground rose to sap a man’s strength.

  Chela was looking forward to reaching the sterile row of unpainted cabins where the children waited. It wouldn’t be any cooler there, but she’d draw her students around her in the shade of a tree, and one of the mothers would bring them water while she concentrated on the English nouns and verbs that paved the way to understanding and allowed her students to compete with their classmates when September rolled around. Maybe, if the women weren’t busy with babies and meals, one or two of them would join her class.

  Chela had learned that it was the women who were the most reluctant to speak English. It wasn’t that they were shy around her or unsure of their ability to learn, but most migrant women thought of themselves as Mexicans. Their men might have to work here to earn a decent living, and the law might say their children had to attend American schools, but in the women’s hearts the dream remained: Someday they would return to Mexico; they didn’t have to learn English.

  Chela knew they were wrong. True, they might someday return home, but they were in the United States now. They were not only forcing themselves to live in isolation but were placing a barrier between themselves and their school-aged children.

  If just one woman sat down in the shade with Chela and the children and learned how to ask for milk and eggs in a grocery store, her day would be a success. And if only children surrounded her—at least Chela had the evening to look forward to. Her soccer team had a game scheduled for five thirty in the city park.

  A rare smile touched her face. It parted her soft lips and revealed perfect white teeth. How she’d become labeled an expert at soccer she didn’t know. It certainly wasn’t because she could execute a dribbling feint or jackknife her body in midair to produce the body swing needed to head a ball. But Chela could translate the words of a coach into words a team of Mexican boys understood. At first she was reluctant to offer her services to the parks and recreation department because the department’s soccer program hadn’t been set up to accommodate a team consisting of Mexican players, but this year there was a college student working as a coach who didn’t care what language his players spoke as long as they were enthusiastic.

  Jeff Clime knew a little Spanish but not enough to get the team through practice and games without confusing everyone. That was where Chela came in. When the head of the parks and recreation department introduced her to the man in his early twenties, Chela found herself responding positively. Soccer was a sport most Mexican boys already knew how to play. Why not give them the opportunity to play under organized conditions complete with sponsors who bought their uniforms?

  After her lesson at the barrios, she went home to shower and change into the blue-and-white shirt with lettering on the back that identified her as one of the coaches. She thought briefly about eating, but the day had been so hot that all she wanted was iced tea. The game would be over around dark; maybe she’d feel like eating then. Half of the team was already at the city-owned park by the time Chela showed up.

  “These kids are really pumped. They have twice my confidence,” Jeff told her as she joined the young coach on the sidelines. “I just hope they can handle a loss.”

  Chela placed her hands on her hips and stretched her neck backward in order to ease a kink in her spine. The movement elongated her slender neck and accented the strong lines of her jaw. It also caused her firm breasts to push against the fabric of her uniform. What there was of her stomach sank between her hipbones and was lost. As the sound of chattering boys settled around her, Chela felt her body relax. This was where she wanted to be, what she wanted to be doing.

  “They aren’t going to lose,” she said confidently. “These kids were playing soccer from the time they could walk. Of course, they didn’t have real balls or grassy fields, but they have the skills. I just wish we could get the newspaper to come out and take some pictures.”

  “We can’t even get these characters to sit still long enough for me to talk to them, let alone pose for pictures.” Jeff bent over to tie his shoes. “Jose’s beside himself. I guess his dad got off work early to come to the game. The whole family’s here.”

  Chela nodded. Jose was one of the best players on the team, a fourteen-year-old who could probably pass for seventeen. She’d already had one talk with Jose’s father about how important it was that the boy stay in school next year instead of dropping out and going to work. True, with seven young boys and girls, Jose’s family needed all the money they could get to support the family. Jose felt that pressure. But he was quick to learn, with an easy familiarity around science that would lead him out of the orchards if only he could get the formal education he needed. Chela hoped to have time to ask Jeff to talk to Jose after the game. The intense teenager looked up to the college student. He’d listen to Jeff when he wouldn’t listen to a woman. Chela might find fault with the traditional Mexican view of women having more worth as mothers and cooks than the givers of wisdom, but she understood that tradition and looked for ways of making an impression despite it.

  That was another reason she had agreed to work with Jeff Cline. The young man’s enthusiasm and optimistic outlook on life was a refreshing contrast to her own constant questioning of motives. Jeff believed that as long as a person worked hard enough anything was possible. He hadn’t learned that caution, suspicion, resignation even, were part of surviving. Jeff raced through life like a yearling colt. He didn’t know about barbed-wire fences.

  Despite the heat coming on the heels of a day that had begun at six, Chela soon lost herself to the game. The continuous action combined with the rapid changes in possession of the ball by the two teams gave Chela little time to think of anything else. She was vaguely aware of the boys’ families sitting along the sidelines, but because she had to be where both Jeff and the team members could communicate with her, she had no time to see how many of the parents had come. She was aware that most of the Mexican boys wore faded tennis shoes, while their opposition had soccer shoes, shin guards inside their socks, new uniforms. That didn’t matter. It
was skill and enthusiasm and good coaching, not fancy equipment, that won games.

  “Have you noticed how surprised our guys are to see girls on the other teams?” Jeff asked as the action slowed following a field goal. “The cultural differences really show up, don’t they?”

  Chela nodded, not taking her eyes off the boys.

  “The old ways are changing, but it takes time. The problem is getting the Mexican girls’ parents to allow them to play.”

  Even as she concentrated on the action, some instinct borne from being responsible for her upbringing at an early age went on the alert, warning Chela that she was being watched. She pushed the feeling aside for several minutes, telling herself that as the only female coach on the field, it was likely she would be the object of some interest.

  But the feeling persisted. Whoever was watching her wasn’t simply doing it out of idle curiosity. The prickling feeling at the nape of her neck built in intensity, warning Chela that somewhere there were eyes that never left her. She felt exposed, vulnerable even. It wasn’t until the first half of the game was over that she took time to sweep her eyes slowly, warily, over the knots of people seated on the grass around the playing field.

  Suddenly Chela’s breath caught, flaring her nostrils, and stopping her hands in a gesture designed to pull the players around her and Jeff. The eyes that met hers from the opposite side of the field were the same ones that had been on her earlier today. The man from the orchard—what was he doing here?

  “What’s wrong?” Jeff was standing close to her. “You look like you just saw someone from the IRS.”

  “I don’t know who he is,” Chela said under cover of the sounds coming from the boys surrounding them. “Do you see the muscular man standing alone? The one in the dark slacks? This is the second time today I’ve seen him. I think maybe he followed me here.”

  “Maybe he likes you,” Jeff offered. “Come on, Chela. You’re a good-looking woman. If I were a little older—I don’t know why you think all men are going to bite.”