I liked it here too.
‘Electra? Which way?’
‘Sorry, I zoned out there for a while.’ I looked down at the little map Hank had drawn for me. ‘Keep heading for Tucson and then we hang a right at the signpost for the mountain park.’
A few minutes later, the sign appeared in front of us and we turned off the main highway, heading for the mountains. Eventually, we saw a small sign for the Hacienda Orchídea and bumped down a narrow dusty track, which looked as though it was leading nowhere.
‘Goodness, this really isn’t the right vehicle to be in,’ joked Lizzie as the low-slung car scraped through the potholes. ‘Are you sure this is the right way?’
‘Yes, look.’ I pointed between a couple of huge cacti at a horse grazing in a fenced-off field. A little further along, a low-roofed building came into view.
Lizzie pulled up in front of it and we both got out of the Mercedes.
‘I hope the horses are fit, because I’m not sure this set of tyres is going to get me back to LA and I might have to ride back home,’ she giggled.
There were no signs telling us where to go, so we walked up the steps onto a wide veranda, shielded from the sun by an oversized roof and filled with huge turquoise planters of oleander. A long rustic wooden table and chairs sat on the deck and as I looked at the desert plain that led up to the mountains, I found myself imagining balmy nights sitting out here, eating in perfect solitude.
‘Hi there!’ A man opened the door before Lizzie had raised her hand to knock. ‘You two the friends of Hank?’
I looked up at him, wondering if all men in Arizona were built tall and handsome – this one looked Latino, with his dark skin, brown eyes and head of shiny blue-black hair. ‘Yup, that’s us.’
‘Welcome to the Hacienda Orchídea,’ he said, extending an arm. ‘I’m Manuel. Can I get you a cool drink before I take you around to the stables?’ he asked as he led us both inside. The temperature dropped by several degrees, due to the air conditioning.
‘Thanks,’ Lizzie answered as I looked around.
If I had been expecting a rancher’s shack that smelt of horses and dogs, I could not have been more wrong. I was standing in a huge square room with two walls made entirely of glass, which gave glorious views of the mountains at the back of the house. Colourful indigenous plants and flowers wrapped around the house, and I could see more horses grazing in a paddock in the distance.
The floor was made of shiny red wood and in the centre of the space there was a huge stone chimneybreast, with big comfortable couches on either side of it. There was a kitchen area as well, filled with sleek, shiny units, which reminded me of my apartment in New York.
‘Wow! What an amazing place you have here,’ I said as he poured water and ice from the refrigerator into two glasses.
‘Glad you like it,’ Manuel smiled. ‘My wife, she design all this. She is talented, sí?’
‘Very,’ said Lizzie, joining us as we gazed out of the back window onto the mountains. There was another large veranda beyond the kitchen and Manuel opened the glass door, indicating that we should follow him. Again, the space was covered by an oversized roof and I could hear water playing in the background as we sat down at a curved wooden table that looked as if it had been carved whole from an ancient tree trunk.
‘Is there a stream round here?’ I asked him.
‘No, but my wife, she says hearing water makes one feel cool, so we had that piped from the house.’ Manuel pointed to a rectangular stone-clad pond in which large koi carp were meandering. It was surrounded by blooms of hibiscus and oleander and I thought it was one of the prettiest things I had ever seen.
As I lifted the glass of water to my lips, the clink of the ice made every inch of me long for the burn of alcohol. But I told myself that I was in my first social situation outside The Ranch, and it was going to be tough.
I took a deep breath and grabbed a handful of the chips Manuel had put on the table. At least they had a slightly spicy taste to them – for some reason spice helped stem the cravings – and I swallowed a