The Promise of Jenny Jones

by Maggie Osborne

  Graciela was still pressed to the wall, but she was listening, not paying any attention to Jenny's rolling eyes or the noises she made behind the napkin.

  "You know my daddy?" Graciela asked shyly.

  "I've known your daddy all of my life." The cowboy wasn't cold to Graciela, but he wasn't particularly warm either. "I knew your mother, too, years ago. And I know your grandfather, Don Antonio."

  Jenny stopped her futile struggle against the ropes to listen. Either the cowboy had done some research, or he was who he said he was. In either case, intuition told her that he was here reluctantly. He might indeed be Graciela's uncle, but he had no feeling for the kid.

  "My mama is dead," Graciela confided in a whisper, tears brimming in her eyes.

  "I heard about it when I went to fetch you at Dona Theodora's."

  Graciela wiped away the tears and continued to stare at the cowboy. To Jenny's horror, she spied the beginnings of trust. Jenny renewed a furious struggle against the ropes that bound her to the chair. The minute Sanders had mentioned going to the no-name village to fetch Graciela, she understood his intention.

  "You know my aunt Tete too?"

  The cowboy smiled. "I met your aunt Tete years ago when she was visiting your grandpa Antonio. She and your mother were riding in their carriage and a wheel came off. I stopped to help, and your aunt Tete found fault with everything I did. She had a big fan, you know?" Graciela didn't move her eyes from the cowboy's face. "And she kept hitting me with it on the shoulder, right here. And she'd say, 'Con permisso, Señor, but you are doing that all wrong.'"

  Nodding and smiling, Graciela slid down the wall and sat on the bed, staring at the cowboy in fascination.

  Realizing how easily the cowboy had charmed the kid made Jenny choke.

  "Here's what we're going to do," he said to Graciela. "I'm going to take you to your daddy and your grandmother Ellen."

  "I want to go home to Aunt Tete," Graciela said in a whisper. Singing the same tune she'd sung for Jenny.

  "Your home is inCalifornianow." He studied the kid's expression. "But maybe you and your daddy can visit your aunt Tete or she can visit you. Going toCaliforniadoesn't mean that you won't see your aunt again."

  Jenny couldn't believe how easily he swept aside the kid's protest. Why hadn't she thought of that? She had only to glance at the kid's face to know Sanders had given her the perfect reassurance. The kid's face told her something else. With a sinking heart she realized that Graciela was going to go with the cowboy without a peep of a struggle, without a shred of regret, or a twinge of gratitude for what Jenny had gone through so far. The snot.

  "All right, here's what I want you to do. You get dressed, all right? I need to talk to—" He jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

  "Her name is Jenny Jones. She killed my mama."

  Jenny squeezed her eyes shut and let her head drop forward. Damn it. She should have belted the kid when she had the chance.

  "That's what I need to find out. As soon as Jenny and I have finished talking, we'll leave."

  Graciela didn't hesitate. The disloyal, ungrateful little brat jumped off the bed and scampered to the bureau, removing the change of clothing Maria had packed for her. As modest as a full-gown lady, she stepped behind the dressing screen, and in a minute her nightgown flew past the side of the screen.

  The cowboy removed the napkin from Jenny's mouth and sat down at the table, shoving Graciela's supper plate away from him. "Who the hell are you? And how did you get my niece?"

  Jenny told him the whole story, starting with killing the bastard who had attacked her and ending with leaving Marguarita standing in her cell and Jenny hightailing it away from the compound dressed as a priest. She didn't spare any details.

  Ty Sanders didn'tinterrupt, he listened quietly and watched her with cool eyes. "If you agreed to take my niece to her father, then what the hell are you doing inDurango?"

  Jenny's lip curled in exasperation. "My primary concern was to get away from the cousins. How long did you hang around the Verde Flores depot waiting for them to wake up?"

  "There are a lot of stops between here and Verde Flores. Why didn't you turn around and head north?"

  "And risk having Chulo and Luis jump me again in Verde Flores?" Jenny snapped. "Untie me."

  "Not a chance." The cowboy looked toward the bed, where Graciela had returned after getting dressed. The instant her head touched the pillow, she had fallen asleep. He was silent for several minutes. "I'm inclined to believe your story."

  "Listen, you son of a bitch. I don't ever lie. That's why Marguarita trusted me, a stranger, to take her daughter toCalifornia. That's why she asked me to raise the kid if your weak-spined brother couldn't or wouldn't."

  The cowboy narrowed his eyes. "Looks like you bought your life cheap, Jenny Jones, because you don't have to take Graciela toCaliforniaafter all, and there's no chance that you'll be raising her."

  "Yeah, well that isn't how Marguarita saw it." She yanked on the ropes,then gave it up. "Marguarita didn't say hand the kid to an uncle if one shows up. And she didn't say that you or any other family member could raise the kid if Robert couldn't or wouldn't. She told me to take the kid toCalifornia, and she told me to raise her if it was necessary." Leaning forward, she stared into his eyes, meeting glare for glare. "And that's how it's going to be. I promised. So, I'm not handing her over to you. I'm the one who's taking her toCalifornia."

  He leaned forward, too, until their noses almost bumped. "No, you aren't. As of right now, you have no claim on my niece. Tomorrow you can go back to wherever you came from."

  "Believeme, I'd love to do that. You can't even guess how much I'd love to dump that snotty kid in your lap and forget about her. But I gave my word. And I don't give a fricking spit if you're Graciela's uncle. It doesn't matter, not even a little bit. Because I promised Marguarita that I would take the kid to her father. We made a deal, mister, and I mean to honor my half of it."

  The cowboy's gaze slid pointedly over the ropes binding her to the chair, and a faint smile touched his lips. "It doesn't look like you're in any position to keep that promise."

  Jenny decided that she hated his guts. "I'll admit I'm experiencing some unforeseen difficulties … but I will keep my promise. The kid is my responsibility."

  "You're wrong. Marguarita didn't know it when she spoke to you, but circumstances have changed. She didn't know I was on my way to fetch her and her daughter."

  "Yeah, well why didn't she know? Couldn't your lily-livered brother write a letter?" A sneer pulled at Jenny's lips.

  "He did write. He wrote a hundred letters to Marguarita, letters she never bothered to answer."

  "So you say. I happen to know Marguarita didn't get any letters from good old Robert. She sure as hell didn't know that Robert had sent for her. Do you think I'd be involved if she'd known you were on the way to fetch her?"

  The cowboy stared at her with a thoughtful expression. "Dona Theodora," he said finally. "That's the only explanation. Dona Theodora intercepted the letters and kept them from Marguarita."

  "Untie me, damn it!"

  The cowboy stood and glanced toward the bed, where Graciela slept in a fashionable little traveling outfit. "I don't know why I'm bothering to say this," he stated, looking back at Jenny. "But what you said was correct. If Marguarita had known I was coming for her, you'd be shot full of holes. You would not be involved in a matter that doesn't concern you. The point I'm making is that you're out of this now. Graciela has family."

  "Yeah, well Cousin Luis and Cousin Chulo are family, too, and if they get their hands on Graciela, she's as good as dead," Jenny snapped, scowling up at him. "That's what family does for you."

  "I've been thinking about this. You're right about Luis and Chulo being family. I don't think the cousins would kill a member of their own family. I think they'll go for ransom."

  Jenny made a snorting sound. "Don't kid yourself, Uncle Ty. Graciela is the only thing standing between the cousins and the Ba
rrancas fortune. You saw Luis and Chulo. Hell yes, they'd kill her. Why settle for ransom when they can inherit everything?"

  "If they go for ransom, they can hit Barrancas and my brother. If they kill her, the only target is Don Antonio's fortune. That's too shortsighted."

  "The cousins don't know your brother from a plate of beans," Jenny snapped. "I'll bet my mules and my rig that—" No, her mules and her rig were long gone. "But they do know about Don Antonio's wealth, and they know they're next in line once the kid dies. Count on it. If the cousins get Graciela, she's dead."

  "You're a surprising woman," he said suddenly. "This conversation isn't at all what I expected."

  "Untie me!" She jerked and yanked at the ropes.

  Pulling her head back, he inserted the napkin into her mouth,then inspected his blackened fingers. "What the hell did you put on your hair?"

  Shaking his head, he wiped his hands on his trousers, then walked to the bed and awkwardly lifted Graciela in his arms.At the door he looked back at Jenny. "By the time someone finds you, we'll be halfway to Verde Flores." Frowning, he hesitated,then spoke with reluctance. "I deeply regret that it was necessary to hit you. And I'm obliged for what you've done for my niece," he said stiffly.

  Jenny glared bullets. "Oo ona a itch!"

  Suddenly he grinned and winked at her. "You were better looking as a redhead. Wash that black stuff out of your hair." He stepped into the hallway with Graciela in his arms and closed the door behind him. Jenny heard his boots receding down the narrow hallway.

  Swearing and fighting to spit out the napkin. Jenny struggled furiously against the ropes. Twenty minutes later, she fell back in the chair, exhausted.

  Letting her head fall backward, she stared up at the ceiling. Marguarita, I heartily wish I'd never laid eyes on you. You couldn't help out a little, could you? Oh no. You've got to make this as hard as it can be. It wasn't enough to have the stinking cousins. You had to throw in an uncle. What the hell is this, a test?

  After a while her thoughts settled and it occurred to her that she had an idea whereTySanders was going, and, more importantly, she knew where he was not going. He wasn't going to Verde Flores.At least not immediately.

  It irritated the bejesus out of her that he thought she was stupid enough to fall for a cheap trick. If you're running from someone, you don't tell her where you're going. Hell, she'd learned that dodge before she was Graciela's age.

  Since there wasn't much else to do, since she was bound and gagged, she devoted the rest of the night to figuring out how she would get the kid back.

  CHAPTER 7

  T wo minutes after Ty carried Graciela out of Jenny Jones'sroom, it struck him that he faced an uncomfortable problem which he had not anticipated. Where was he going to take her? After Jenny's offensive misconception, he felt distinctly uneasy about checking into a decent hotel with a young Mexican girl in his arms. A rowdy town the size ofDurangohad hotels where no one would blink at a man taking a young girl to his room, but the thought of anyone mistaking Ty for such a man twisted his gut in knots.

  As he carried his sleeping niece down dark, deserted streets, he rejected the possibility of riding out ofDurangotonight and avoiding the hotel problem. Even if Graciela were wide-awake and alert, he didn't know where he could buy a horse at this hour. He had to find a hotel. In the end, hating it, he settled for a fleabag where no questions would be asked.

  Angry and embarrassed, he carried the child up a flight of stairs, wanting to smash a knowing smirk deep into the hotel clerk's sly face. There was a lesson here, he thought grimly. No more hotels. And his decision to avoid the train was correct. An Americano and a small Mexican girl were certain to draw attention and unpleasant speculation. The sickening roll in his stomach warned that his pride would not withstand that kind of prurient curiosity. He'd be setting himself up for a dozen fights.

  Inside a shabby room, he laid Graciela on a bed that sagged toward the center, hesitated,then removed her hat. She roused slightly when he pulled off her boots,then she sank into the pillow, sighed, and again fell asleep.

  After tossing his own hat toward a scarred bureau, he removed his gun belt, sat on a stool beside the window, flexed his shoulders, and let the enormity of tonight's business sweep over him.

  The hotel problem underscored the sobering fact that he didn't know a damned thing about children. Especially girl children. Already it was evident that traveling with a young girl was going to present unique problems. Since he had assumed that Marguarita would accompany him back toCalifornia, he had also assumed that she would take care of her child. He hadn't wasted a single thought on Marguarita's offspring, hadn't anticipated that the child would have anything to do with him.

  Lifting his head, he gazed across the room, frowning at a bar of moonlight drifting across the bed and illuminating Graciela's small features. Ty hadn't known Marguarita well; he didn't remember much about her. But he saw Marguarita in the child. Graciela's hair was soft brown and her skin was light, but no one would mistake her Mexican heritage. Aside from her eyes and mouth, she didn't resemble anyone in the Sanders family tree.

  Leaning forward, he rested his forearms on his thighs and pushed a hand through the hair falling across his forehead.

  Cal Sanders had refused to accept Robert's marriage becauseCalcould not bear the thought of Mexican grandchildren. That a Mexican might one day inherit thefruits of Sanders labor was an abomination too repugnant to contemplate. It was offensive enough that the Sanders ranch adjoined Barrancas lands; that the two families might intermingle was unthinkable to a man whose hatreds had been formed in his youth.

  Atage sixteen, Calvin Sanders had joined the American forces that invadedMexicoin '46. Ty's father had left his right arm in a bean field outsideMexico City, ending his brief role in the invasion and beginning a hatred of all things Mexican that until his death three months ago had burned as hot as the pitch used to cauterize his stump.

  Ty pulled a hand down his jaw,then tossed one of his boots at a rat scratching at a corner of the plank floor.

  That Robert had challenged their father's prejudice was one of life's ironies. Robert had been the amiable son, the son eager to please their father, whereas Ty had rebelled early. Long before he attained manhood, Ty had accepted that he and his father would never understand each other, could not share the same room without arguing. Each refused to bend. From childhood on, Ty's goal had been to leave the ranch and his father's dictates the minute he could support himself, and that's what he had done. His defection had wounded the old man, but he hadn't drawn blood.

  It was Robert, the favorite son, who damned near killed their father by marrying a señorita. And in the end, it was Ty who most resembled Cal Sanders.

  Troubled, he stared through the darkness at the moonlit face of his brother's daughter. Already this child was challenging assumptions Ty had picked up at his father's knee. Graciela wasn't a Mexican, asCalwould have dismissed her. This child was Ty's niece. His blood. The realization was throwing his thoughts into turmoil.

  Leaning back, he stretched and turned his mind to something he could handle right now, Jenny Jones. An unconscious smile twitched his lips as he recalled his last sight of her, straining at the ropes, eyes flashing cold fire, swearing behind the napkin he'd shoved into her mouth.

  It appalled him that he'd actually jumped into a punching match with a woman. A woman. Christ. But she'd given him no choice.

  And what a woman she was.

  Now that he didn't have to think about protecting his face and crotch from her flying fists and knees, he was free to remember the soft weight of her breasts pressing against his chest and the firm tautness of her buttocks filling his hands. Lord.

  Her breasts were the only soft parts of her anatomy. The rest of her was as tight and firm as a new whiskey barrel. And she didn't lack for muscle, he thought, gingerly touching his sore nose.

  In his time he'd met whores, workingwomen, a few rough numbers, but he'd never met anyone like Jen
ny Jones. She didn't fit into any category that he could nail down.

  If she'd killed an attacker, then she wasn't a whore. She earned her bread, but not in a manner that any woman he'd met would have chosen. Unquestionably, she was a rough number, but he sensed that circumstance had shaped her, not choice. And he'd observed flashes of vulnerability at odds with her tough manner and tongue. Unaccountably, he also sensed a core of integrity and basic decency, qualities he didn't ascribe to the crude, unfeminine women who thrust their way in to the male world.

  The fact was,he couldn't get a fix on her. Certainly he didn't understand her position regarding his niece. Her tone and words convinced him that she didn't like Graciela. Yet he'd witnessed a touch of tenderness when he followed them back to their hotel. And she should have bowed out of the picture the instant she understood who Ty was, but she hadn't.

  Everything about this strange woman fascinated him in a way few other women had. He felt a twinge of regret that he wouldn't see her again, would never learn what forces had formed her.

  When he realized he was attempting to picture Jenny Jones dressed in a decent gown and with her hair grown out, he laughed softly. Usually, he tried to imagine a certain kind of woman in a state of undress. To his amusement, this was the first time he'd ever struggled to imagine a woman decked out in full Sunday flair.

  Shaking his head and grinning, he folded his arms across his chest and leaned his back against the wall. He needed to get some shut-eye. Tomorrow was going to be a full day.

  * * *

  The first of several problems involved hairpins. Ty knew more about the outer universe than he knew about hairpins.

  Frowning, he gazed down at his niece. The top of her head only reached his lower chest, but already he'd learned that short and small did not mean shy and quiet. "Say that again?"

  "Well just look," Graciela insisted, her eyes glistening with moist frustration. "My hair keeps falling down. It isn't right. I need hairpins."