Rags to Rubies

by Annalisa Russo

  Patty’s expression took on a serious bent. “Much better, thank you. I’m sure she will be ‘quite herself’ in a day or two,” she said, imitating her mother’s voice. Then turning somber, she confided, “I wish my daddy would come home.”

  Grace hugged the red curls to her breast, reliving the feeling of abandonment when her father had turned to the bottle.

  Patty’s mother, Jane, had barely recovered from a difficult childbirth when her fickle husband decided the responsibility of two children and a wife was too much for him. He’d left an unsuspecting, ill woman alone and nearly destitute.

  Luckily, the neighbors Grace contacted had rallied with food and the necessities for the approaching winter. Jane had the offer of a job when she recuperated and free babysitting options from several of the older women in the area. The outpouring of help had warmed Grace’s heart and renewed her faith in everyday miracles.

  Jane would raise her children and make a life for herself without the help of that no-account flat tire, Grace thought.

  As she watched the child navigate the sidewalk, the full basket carefully balanced, Grace couldn’t help comparing Patty and Jared’s situations.

  He, too, had been abandoned and had no idea why. Had it been out of necessity or simple selfishness? How had he kept bitterness and anger from rooting in his heart?

  The magnificent portrait of his mother he had commissioned attested to his capacity for compassion and forgiveness.

  She feared she would not have been so magnanimous. Her experience with Adam had left her impatient with weak, flawed men.

  Removing her apron, Grace hung it on the peg by the door and glanced at the clock above the stove, making a mental note to call on Jane soon. Then she donned her suede turquoise hat with the feather and left for early Mass.

  ****

  Garden Way is a misnomer, Jared thought as he stood across the street from the dilapidated apartment building. The building’s poor quality was evident in the rotted wood and peeling paint. 325 Garden Way formed the corner of the three-story apartment building erected in the standard dumbbell tenement design.

  He knew from experience what the residents of a complex like this would be. He’d had to claw his way out of the bowels of many such places, and his mind and body still bore the scars.

  If Grace’s enemy had been spawned in such a place, she’d not have a chance in hell of surviving.

  He pulled the collar of his jacket up and the rim of his slouch hat down to conceal his features. Jared stepped into the deeply shadowed alley that led to the back of Quigley’s apartment. In the dim morning light, he saw a metal fence and rusted gate that opened into a postage stamp-sized backyard.

  The gate squeaked loudly. Jared glanced around to see if anyone had seen his approach. A bit of frost clung to the bare branches of a straggly bush near the gate. No one in the thief business got up very early, if he remembered right. He slipped into the littered yard and approached the back door.

  A dingy curtain covered the door’s window, obscuring a clear view of the inside, so he knocked twice and waited to hear if there was movement in the apartment. The low static of a radio not tuned in properly was annoyingly audible. He tried the worn doorknob. The door swung open to a kitchen cast in shadows.

  Cautiously, he entered the room and closed the door behind him. When a cloying, mawkish odor reached his nostrils, Jared slipped a hand into his pocket and felt the cool metal grip of his pistol.

  He crept through the darkened house. Drawers and cupboards had been left open, their contents scattered on the floor. He figured a hasty search had been made through the general disorder of the apartment.

  A few moments later he stumbled across James F. Quigley face down in the front room, his grimy white shirt blood-soaked from the insult of the bullet in his back. Checking for a pulse, Jared found none, and from the appearance of the stiffened body, Quigley had been dead for quite a while. There were no signs on the body of a struggle. James F. Quigley had known his attacker. From the looks of it, he probably let someone in the side door and had been shot in the back as the killer followed him into the front room.

  He looked around for something to connect Quigley with his murderer. The filthy apartment showed years of neglect. An acrid odor permeated and, along with the smell of death, made Jared nauseous. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief to cover his mouth and nose as he visually sifted through the debris of the small, squalid apartment.

  If the sparse furnishings were any indication, JFQ hadn’t prospered from his choice of occupation. Just the sort of employee to be expendable. No family mementos or evidence of a mate. Though he didn’t know what to look for, nothing appeared out of the ordinary.

  Except for Quigley’s dead body sprawled in the front room.

  Logic fought with his intuition. How could a woman like Grace be mixed up in this fiasco? The demons of his past had been relentless teachers. Now he rarely misjudged the nature of an individual.

  As he let himself out the back door, he wiped the doorknob with his handkerchief. A cursory glance over the dark brick buildings lining the alley told him no one was about.

  He glanced down for the step and noticed a crushed pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes and several cigarette stubs under the window to his left. Someone had waited a long while for Quigley to come home.

  Crouching, he put a few of the stubs in his handkerchief and then noticed a familiar matchbox on the windowsill. Whoever Quigley’s late night visitor had been, he also frequented The Peacock Club.

  ****

  Sunday afternoon proved cool and crisp, just the right kind of day for pulling out and putting up the geraniums for next year. Grace shook the dirt from a geranium’s roots, flipped the plant upside down, and hung it on a wire stretched across the width of the small greenhouse that filled a corner of her narrow back yard.

  She brushed absently at her cheek with her gardening gloves and let the earthy scents of the greenhouse permeate her nostrils. She’d thought busying herself at one of her favorite tasks would take her mind off a certain dangerously attractive gentleman, but it hadn’t.

  She was curious, of course, of how an abandoned boy, orphaned before he could articulate his own name, had overcome so many obstacles to become a man of wealth and power.

  Jared’s reputation had him linked with beautiful women, his name on the society page with socialites and starlets. If she remembered correctly, the last one had been an up-and-coming raven-haired beauty called Loretta Young, slated to appear with Colleen Moore in Naughty but Nice.

  So what in the world could Jared possibly want with her?

  She dug her trowel deep into the moist black silt, turning it over and over. Last night had been magical, she thought glumly. Kissing Adam paled in comparison. The memory of that kiss would warm her bed for a long time after he left.

  And he would leave. Because he would want more than she’d be able to give him. She hadn’t been enough for Adam. Her former fiancé’s fair, angelic features danced in her memory. He’d been beautiful and glib and so attentive. She’d craved every crumb of affection he gave, holding every smile, every kindness to her heart. What a fool she’d been.

  In comparison, Jared should have frightened her with his dark, foreboding countenance and serious nature, but somehow she felt reassuringly safe with him.

  Maybe she’d talk to Jane. The poor woman had been through it all, and right now Grace didn’t have much confidence in her own intuition.

  ****

  Jared gazed down at the mossy greenhouse from the top of the stone steps at the back of Grace’s house. She hadn’t answered his knock at the front door, so he thought he’d try the back door. The glass in the greenhouse was misted over from a surprisingly warm morning, though the chilly evening had brought a light frost to the area. He could make out Grace’s form through the fogged glass as she tended the plants. His eyes narrowed, picturing every detail—her startling blue eyes glinting in the sunlight, her unruly hair
escaping from its clasp to frame her face, her supple body, lithe and youthful.

  He’d had no idea the one kiss they had shared would arouse such an insatiable hunger. She was attractive but certainly not as attractive as countless other females he had been with over the years. Was it her vulnerability, her innocence? Thoughts of her were deeply pleasurable in a way he couldn’t explain.

  Finding Quigley’s body had changed everything. Jared’s chest tightened with the premonition of danger. He tried to decide how to handle Grace in light of the new developments. He had considered all the possibilities as he drove to her home.

  She had to go away with him, get away from Chicago, maybe go to his home in New York for a while, but she was independent and headstrong. Not accustomed to anyone caring for her. She’d be safe at Ravenhall until he could figure this out.

  And she was holding something back. Afraid of him in some way. What could he say to convince her? Her life was in danger, and until he knew why, she would just have to accept his protection. Yet this need to protect her fought with his need to possess her.

  He descended the steps. She’d go if he had to carry her.

  ****

  A large shadow flowed over her. “Nerts!” Grace complained. The sun had retreated behind the clouds again. She’d been hoping for a few more sunny days for the annuals before the winter chill set in. Soon she would have to clean up the yard, stow away her terra cotta pots, and shut the greenhouse down for winter.

  Then the shadow moved in an odd, jerky way. When Grace glanced over her shoulder, Jared was descending the stone steps. “Oh, Lord! Do you always sneak up on a person like that?” Jared’s face was grim, his lips in a straight line. She took in his working class clothes, tweed wool jacket, suspenders, and scuffed boots.

  “What is it, Jared?” She searched his face for an answer. “What’s wrong?”

  He drew in a tight breath. “Grace, I want you to accompany me to New York tomorrow.”

  “You must be joking,” Grace said incredulously. She plopped down on a wooden bench nearby and studied the hard-set features of his expression.

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?” And why was he dressed in those clothes?

  “I’m afraid you’re in danger,” he said. She saw a muscle in his jaw tighten.

  In the doorway, with the sun behind him, all his edges seemed fuzzy. He didn’t seem as harsh, as pirate-like. Oh, he was formidable. She knew why men had followed him into battle. He wielded authority, but this wasn’t the battlefield, and she would run her own life. And cavorting off to New York wasn’t an option, even though the thought of it left her with the same exquisite feeling his kisses did.

  Shoving the trowel into a basket, she allowed her irritation to show. “In danger of what? A pickpocket? Really, Jared, don’t be silly. The Betrothal Gems are safe in the vault at work. I can’t just go off without a by-your-leave. What about my job? What about Zia Bruna? Just because you think I need protecting...”

  Suddenly Jared moved, advancing on her like a large feral beast, and she was the prey. He grabbed her shoulders and pulled her to her feet. She sensed the power in the coiled tension just below the surface. He was in control, but just barely. Then he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The temperature in the greenhouse went up a few degrees. His spicy scent wafted over her as she waited for the explosion.

  Chapter Ten

  “You must, Grace,” Jared said as he brushed a smudge of dirt from her cheek. Touching her had been a huge mistake.

  “I don’t have to do anything of the sort,” Grace began as he pulled her into his arms. Now wasn’t the time to kiss her, but he did, one hand sliding into her hair while the other pressed her against his lower body.

  Grace hesitated for a moment, a moment that seemed like forever to him, and then she entwined her arms around his neck, winding her fingers in his hair and giving herself up to the kiss.

  “You little fool,” he murmured raining hot tiny kisses down her throat. “You’re not safe here. Why are you fighting me on this?”

  Grace emitted a tiny sigh and melted against him. With her sweet surrender, feverish sensations swept through him like a tide, sensations that were just barely controllable.

  As Jared moved his lips over hers, Grace ran her hands over his shirt, down his arms, then around to his back, leaning in, crushing her soft breasts against his chest. The heat that followed her fingertips felt like a branding iron. His whole body reacted with a surge of passion.

  Another soft moan escaped her lips as she parted them. He murmured her name as his tongue explored deeper into her mouth. He couldn’t seem to get enough, couldn’t pull her close enough. With alarming clarity, he knew he wanted her more than he had ever wanted any woman.

  “Do you want me to stop?” he asked, knowing she couldn’t have answered him even if she wanted to, for he couldn’t seem to let go of her lips as he probed more deeply.

  The kiss was an epiphany. Every cell in his body awoke suddenly from a deep sleep. Many years had passed since he’d felt these heated feelings, but those memories were pale in comparison to the volcanic tremors coursing through his body now.

  He was a starving man presented with a sweet ripe peach. One bite would never be enough, so he drew back and looked into Grace’s glazed eyes. He saw desire there and ran his thumb tenderly along her lower lip, plump and dewy wet from his eager tongue. His hand trembled slightly.

  Drawing her back to the weathered bench, he tugged her onto his lap and slanted his mouth over hers while running his fingers over her soft cotton blouse in search of a brassiere clasp. Momentarily stunned at the absence of undergarments and then pleased, he smiled into the dark, wispy curls at her temple. “You’re so soft and smooth. Smooth as satin.” His breathing sounded ragged and shallow even to his own ears, his heartbeat throbbing in his groin.

  Pulling back, he looked at her face. Her eyes were closed now, the thick dark lashes forming semicircles on her flushed cheeks, her passionate response was all he needed. “You’re beautiful, Grace, exquisite.”

  “Oh, Jared,” Grace’s eyes fluttered open. She cupped his face. “I feel beautiful with you.”

  Desire cut through him so intensely it was now a physical pain. “I want you, Grace,” Jared uttered hoarsely. “I want to take you to bed.”

  But the choice was not to be his.

  The words he spoke had a paralyzing effect on the woman he held. Grace stiffened in his arms. She didn’t pull away, still in the ebbing throes of passion, but everything had changed.

  Grace looked down at her wrinkled blouse and blushed. She stood up shakily. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “I’m the one who should be saying that,” Jared said quietly as he rose to his feet and looked down at her.

  Grace knew she should have been shocked by both their actions, but she wasn’t—she only wanted to know what came next, what followed these urgent tremors that threatened to bring her to her knees. She hadn’t been able to resist. She hadn’t been able to move. A shiver ran through her, then another and another. She ached and throbbed in private, hidden places.

  “You feel the same,” Jared said, “I can tell. You want me just as much as I want you.”

  “Yes,” Grace said simply; the intense emotion had exhausted her. She wanted him. Wanted this. Wanted to know everything she feared she might never have a chance to know. But how could she tell him she was afraid to give herself to him? How could she be sure this time?

  Unbelievably, it felt right. He felt right. Yet she wanted, needed, a guarantee against the pain. Grace stepped out of the greenhouse into the sunlight.

  Jared took a step toward her. “Let me explain.”

  She held up a hand and stepped back.

  “You must come with me, Grace.”

  “Why?” she asked, gaining a modicum of control.

  “You’re in danger. You must accept my protection,” he said very evenly.

  “I barely know you,” Grace admitted.

>   Impatience flitted across his features. She realized he wasn’t used to being disputed.

  “If you knew me better, you’d also know I seldom concern myself with other people’s problems. The fact that I’m involved at all is testimony that I consider this serious.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Grace whispered, remembering his heated embrace.

  Jared raked his fingers through his hair. He turned away, and then he turned back to face her. Apparently he hadn’t wanted to tell her what he was about to say.

  “I found the shadow—a petty thief. You were right, but he took his orders from someone else. You have an enemy, Grace, whether or not you want to believe it.”

  Incredible as it sounded, Jared’s resolve began to convince her. “I won’t be run off like a scared little rabbit. This is my home.” She struggled to maintain some composure. “How did you find the thief?”

  “Sallie’s men staked out your house and caught him trying to get in the back door. They brought him to me, and I questioned him.” Looking down at his shoes, he added, “During a scuffle, he managed to escape.”

  She remembered the noise she’d heard at the back door last night. Clearing her throat, she said, “The Betrothal Gems are safe at work. I felt it necessary to return the jewels to protect them, and tomorrow morning I will send them back to the owner by insured courier, as usual. My sketches and report will follow.” She straightened her shoulders. “I also had my locks changed.”

  “I don’t think he wanted the gems. He wasn’t sophisticated enough to crack your safe.”

  “What then? You don’t think he was...going to hurt me?”

  Jared murmured, “The poor bastard wouldn’t have stood a chance.”

  “What did you say?”

  He coughed. “No, I don’t think so, but I don’t know yet why he tried to break and enter. And that’s why you must come with me.”

  “Bunk,” she said. She wanted to argue the point, then stopped and mulled it over for a few seconds. If Jared was correct, it would end up being Zia Bruna’s problem, too. Perhaps it had something to do with her father or someone using her to rob Leo Hollister. There were others to think of besides herself.