Read The Promise of Jenny Jones Online

Authors: Maggie Osborne

Tags: #Romance, #Historical, #Fiction, #Guardian and ward, #Overland journeys to the Pacific

The Promise of Jenny Jones (25 page)

BOOK: The Promise of Jenny Jones
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She jutted her chin. "Yeah, well suppose it doesn't work out that way. Suppose that pretty world goes to hell and she has to survive on her own." A sound of disgust rattled the back of Jenny's throat. "What chance would she have? A kid who can't even cut her own meat."

Leaning forward, Ty placed a hand on each of her shoulders and gazed into her eyes. "Listen to me. What happened to you is never going to happen to Graciela. She's never going to be abandoned and alone."

"If I have to raise her—"

He placed a finger over her lips, then tilted his head and considered the sky for a moment. "All right. That's not going to happen, but let's say that it did." Impatience sharpened his tone. "You've got Graciela, and you're going to raise her. Where do you start? Where would the two of you go?"

"Is this a serious question?" Suspicion narrowed her eyes. When she realized she couldn't think straight with his large, warm hands resting on her shoulders, she shrugged away from him.

"Where would you take her, Jenny?"

"I don't know." Frowning, she tried to focus on the question. "I suppose I'd go toSan Franciscosince it would be the nearest town of any size. I'd find work there."

"And what would you do with Graciela while you worked?" Withdrawing a thin cigar from his waistcoat pocket, he lit it and waved out the match, exhaling slowly.

Jenny had considered this problem a hundred times already but had found no satisfactory answer. The kid was not street-tough enough to leave alone, but Jenny couldn't think of any job where an employer would permit a child on the site unless the child was also working. "I'll figure out something," she snapped.

"Where would the two of you live?" He glanced at the glowing end of the cigar,then studied the sagging lines of the shack they had rented for the night.

"If you have something to say, just say it." Anger boiled in her chest. She didn't like the dismal situation he was trying to make her admit.

He lowered his eyes to her face. "Do you really believe that Marguarita wanted you to take Graciela away from a life of comfort and ease? Do you think she would have chosen deprivation and hardship for her daughter?"

Silence rang in Jenny's head. Swinging around, she searched the sky for Marguarita's star, needing reassurance.

"She said if Robert couldn't or wouldn't take the kid, I was to raise her. That's what she made me promise."

For the first time since this whole thing began with the kid, her voice didn't ring with confidence. "Damn it." He was trying to confuse her.

"Marguarita was dying, Jenny. She was frightened for her child and for herself. Is it surprising that she wasn't thinking as clearly as she might have? Plus, if you're right, and she didn't receive Robert's letters, then she didn't know that my father was dead. If she'd known Cal Sanders was dead, I doubt she would have experienced a single qualm about trusting Graciela to my mother's care. It was my father she feared and worried about, and with good reason.

"My mother is prepared to welcome her granddaughter and love her. She would have done the same for Marguarita, because that's the kind of person she is. Ellen Sanders was my champion when I was growing up, and she'll be Graciela's champion, too. She stood up for me more times than I can count. To help her boys, she fought my father, the elements,the world at large. Robert would have told Marguarita about Ma. He would have told her that our father would never welcome her, but she would find support and a fair, clear mind in our mother.

"Had Marguarita known the true situation as it is now, she would have asked you to take Graciela to Robert and that's all, confident that my mother would raise the child if for some reason Robert could not. I'll never believe that Marguarita wanted her daughter to grow up as a street urchin roaming the back alleys ofSan Francisco." His gaze hardened. "Would you do that to Graciela, Jenny? Would you deprive her of safety and comfort? Of an education? Would you deny Graciela her birthright and condemn her to hardship? Simply to honor a promise that was asked and given based on incomplete information."

Jenny stared. "This conversation has strayed a far distance from whether or not you should cut the kid's meat for her," she whispered.

"What you're trying to do would be laudable in different circumstances," he continued, speaking in a quiet voice. "Your independence and resourcefulness helped you survive. But Graciela isn't you. Once we take her home, Jenny, she'll never be alone again or forced to fend for herself. She'll never behungry, will never have to work for bed and board."

"That's if Robert wants her," Jenny whispered stubbornly. But her words lacked force. Deep inside, Jenny was beginning to accept that Robert would be a father to Graciela.

Yet she continued to worry about a future that might include the kid. Lowering her head, she rubbed her temples. Everything Ty said made sense. And yet…

"Let Graciela be a child, Jenny. Stop flogging her because she isn't a six-year-old adult."

Her head snapped up, and she leaned into him, flashing eyes catching what remained of the dying light. "What the hell makes you such an expert on kids?"

"I don't know crap about kids. But I know this," he said, matching her glare for glare. "I grew up too fast, and so did you. Neither one of us had much of a childhood. I was doing a man's work by the time I was eight; you were fending for yourself at an age when most girls are still playing with dolls. That's not how it's going to be for Graciela. So ease up on her. Let her have her childhood."

Narrowing their eyes, they studied each other in the deepening shadows.

"I wish you'd never found us," Jenny snarled in a low, harsh voice. "I wish it was just me and the kid. Things were simpler then."

Needing to get away from him and the confusion he planted in her head, she returned to the shack, stopping abruptly just inside the door.

The first thing she noticed was the table. The meat she and Ty had left on their plates was now cut into ragged bite-sized pieces. A grim smile thinned her lips. Either the kid had known how to use a knife, or she'd learned in a hell of a hurry.

Reaching for the table lantern, she carried it past the washtub and looked into the hammock at Graciela's sleeping form. The kid had climbed onto a stool and then into the hammock. The light from the lantern outlined a faint milk mustache tracing her upper lip.

When Jenny heard Ty enter the shack, she said softly, "Looks like she can manage just fine when she doesn't have someone to do for her." Calling his attention to the cut meat and the fact that Graciela had climbed into the hammock unassisted should have given her a glow of smug pleasure, but it didn't.

Instead, she gazed down at Graciela and wondered how it would feel to know with absolute certainty that you would never again go to bed hungry. That you would always have a pillow under your head and clean sheets. To know you would never be alone. How would it feel not to fear tomorrow?

"I could use some light over here," Ty called from the table.

Lowering a finger, Jenny touched the gold locket pinned to Graciela's shift. Then she carried the lantern back to the table and sat in front of her steak. The first bite was cold and stringy.

"Senora Armijo brought a jug of pulque. Do you want some?"

She nodded,then pushed the bite-sized pieces of meat around her plate. Whatever appetite she'd had was gone. Giving it up, she shoved her plate away,then swallowed a generous swig of the pulque. The liquid scalded down her throat and brought a shine of moisture to her eyes.

"So what are you going to do when this journey is over?" she asked, watching Tyeat .

"I'll help Robert operate the ranch … run some cattle on my own place."

"Ranching is a demanding life," she commented, "but a good one. Don't have to worry where the next beefsteak is coming from."

When he finished eating, he leaned back in his chair and crossed an ankle over his knee. "Cigar?"

"Don't mind if I do." To her surprise, he leaned forward and lit it for her. It was pleasant sitting at the table, smoking, listening to the village quiet down for the night. She had feared it might feel awkward to sit without talking, but it didn't. That, she thought, was the measure of true companionship. Not that two people could talk, but that they could be comfortable just sitting together in silence.

"You look pretty in the lamplight."

Jenny choked and burst into a fit of coughing. "Damn it, Sanders. I've asked you a dozen times not to say that kind of crap to me."

"Why not? It's true." Squinting, he watched her through a curl of smoke. "You've got strong good features. You're the kind of woman who's going to get more handsome as the years go by. Long after more conventional beauties have faded, you'll still be turning men's heads."

She stared at him,then laughed with genuine amusement. "Funny how you're the only man who's noticed how all-fired pretty I am."

"Oh I doubt that. I might have the distinction of being one of the few who's mentioned it, but I'm sure as hell not the only man who's noticed."

Her cheeks turned scarlet, and her ribs suddenly ached. This kind of talk embarrassed her, made her deeply suspicious, and she didn't know how to respond. "Shut up," she said finally, focusing intently on the end of her cigar.

"Have you ever been kissed? I mean, really kissed?"

The question and the husky timbre of his voice made her twitch and feel strange inside. Her skin suddenly felt hot and itchy. "I've been kissed," she said defensively, scowling at him.

He grinned. "Must have been a brave man."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"You're an intimidating woman." His gaze traveled lazily over her face and throat. "I imagine most men would back away from a challenge like you."

"Huh!" Instead of patting her hair as she had a sudden idiotic desire to do, she blew a smoke ring toward the shadows in the corner. "Most men don't even see me.Which suits me just fine. "

"If they don't see you, it's because you don't want them to.That's why you hide yourself under that shapeless poncho and wear an old hat pulled down to your ears." He released a stream of smoke and watched it drift into the darkness. "If you'd grow out your hair and wear a pretty dress, you'd have men lined up to get at you, darlin'."

Jenny wet her lips and swallowed. "Like that's what I want." When she realized this conversation was making her hands tremble, she stubbed out her cigar in disgust and made a face. "I don't want to talk about this."

"Instead, you wear that chip on your shoulder and dare anyone to pay you a compliment. You talk and act like one of the boys, so you don't have to deal with being one of the girls."

"Just shut the hell up."

"If I were to kiss you…" He paused, dropping a lazy lingering glance to her mouth. "Do you know how I'd do it?"

Her heart lurched and knocked against her rib cage. She gripped the edge of the table and squeezed her eyes into a warning squint. "I'm telling you for the last time … shut up."

He kept his gaze on her mouth, studying her through eyes that seemed to smolder in the depths. "I'd start out slow. Realslow, so's not to spook you. I'd put my hands on your waist, low, almost on your hips. Then I'd draw you up against me. Let you feel what I was thinking." A smile touched his lips.

She understood the reference. Jenny tried to swallow, but her mouth was suddenly as dry as a desert bone. Eyes locked to his, unable to move a muscle, she held her breath and waited, wanting him to stop but helplessly wanting to hear more.

"I'd rub against you, slow like, getting the feel of you, letting you get the feel of me." His eyes narrowed, and his jaw clenched hard before he made it relax. "Then, I'd move my hands up your waist, under that poncho, right up your rib cage until I could feel the soft heat of your breasts resting on the tops of my hands."

"Shut up," Jenny whispered, staring at his mouth.

He flipped his cigar out the door of the shack and dropped his hands to his thighs. "I'd lean over you and put my mouth down next to yours, but I wouldn't kiss you yet." They stared at each other in the lamplight falling over the table. "I'd breathe you first. I'd sip your breath and hold it inside. Then I'd touch my tongue to your bottom lip."

The air ran out of Jenny and her shoulders collapsed. Her arm slid off the table, and her cigar dropped out of boneless fingers. "Oh my God," she murmured. Her heart slammed against her ribs and she heard her pulse thundering in her ears. The night gathered around he; dry and hot, and she felt as if she were strangling.

His gaze fastened on her mouth. "I'd run my tongue around those lips, tracing the shape and size. And then…" He rose to his feet, his face moving out of the light and into shadow. "Stand up, Jenny."

"I can't," she whispered, staring at him. Her knees had turned to soup. This time he hadn't even touched her. This time he'd melted her bones with words. Helpless to resist whatever would happen next, she gazed up at him with fear and confusion widening her eyes.

Ty took her hand and pulled her to her feet. Instantly, she felt the heat of his body and her own quickened response. Eyes fastened on his firm, hardmouth, she licked her lips nervously and tried to speak. "Don't." The word emerged as a croak, totally lacking conviction.

She blinked and swallowed hard. She saw the smoldering desire in his narrowed gaze, and she thought he would kiss her. Thought she would surely die if he didn't. Instead, he raised a hand and drew his fingertips along her jaw, then slowly down her throat.

Jenny gasped. Pinpoints of fire sparked on her skin, lanced deep into her body. A tremor began in her toes and swept upward, shaking her as if she had the ague. Nothing like this had ever happened before.

She could easily have repulsed crude talk or a rough direct grab. God knew she'd done so plenty of times in the past. But she had no experience with and no defense against gentleness and seductive words.

Holding her hand, not speaking, Ty led her outside into moon-washed shadows. Helplessly, Jenny followed on trembling legs, not resisting when he leaned her against the wall of the shack. Unable to utter a word, she gazed up at him with large round eyes, waiting for whatever would happen next.

BOOK: The Promise of Jenny Jones
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