"Your hair looks nice," he said uncertainly, but it was the truth. Sheets of gleaming brown silk tumbled nearly to her waist. "I'd swear I've seen little girls with loose hair."
Her eyes flashed reproach. "Proper young ladies do not wear loose hair in public." She sounded as if this were so glaringly elementary that only a dolt could have failed to recognize the truth of it.
"If it's that important to you," he said, deciding to capitulate, "we'll buy some hairpins." He had to assume she knew where a person purchased hairpins. That thought led to another. "What else do you need?" He had carried her out of Jenny Jones's hotel with only the clothing on her back. "There's some paper in my saddlebags. Make a list. Can you write?"
"Sí."
It was then that he realized she was staring at him with an uncomfortably urgent expression and had been for several minutes. "What is it?"
"I, uh…"she cut a desperate glance toward the chamber pot. Bright crimson flooded her cheeks and suddenly his own.
"Oh." There was no privacy screen in hotels like this one. Positive that his face was on fire, he stood so abruptly that his chair crashed over behind him. "I'll just … I'll step into the hallway for a minute or two." Abruptly he became aware of his own urgency. "Don't leave the room until I return. Don't open the door to anyone but me."
Escaping, he rushed down the stairs, took care of business, then ran back up the staircase and halted outside the door. How long did it take a child to pee? He couldn't just barge inside thinking enough time had passed. Maybe it hadn't Cursing beneath his breath, he knocked on the door.
"Come in," called a prim little voice.
"I told you not to open the door to anyone but me," he snapped.
"It is you," she said reasonably, looking up from the list she was composing at the table. "How do you spell pantaloons?"
"You didn't know it was me. You should have asked." He thought about locating a women's apparel shop, walking inside, and asking to buy a pair of small pantaloons. Never in his life had he set foot inside a woman's apparel shop. He'd never imagined that he would.
"I can spell corset," she said, chewing on the end of the pencil, "but I can't spell pantaloons."
"Corset?" Blinking, he sat down across from her. By effort of will he kept his gaze above her flat little chest. "How old are you?"
"Don't you know?" she asked, looking hurt.
"Six? Six is too young for a corset. You won't need a corset for several years." He could not believe he was having this conversation. Discussing undergarments with a six-year-old. He had never wondered when women began wearing corsets, but surely they waited until breasts had begun to form. He couldn't be exact as to when this happy miracle occurred, but he thought it happened well beyond the age of six. Feeling the heat scalding his throat, he tugged his collar away from his neck before it choked him.
Betrayal filled Graciela's eyes, eyes solike his own . "Jenny said the same thing," she said accusingly, as if she'd expected better from him.
"Jenny is right." Now assured of being correct in his judgment, he repeated with confidence, "no corset. What else is on your list?"
She sighed deeply,then read out the other items. When she finished, Ty studied her in silence. To accommodate her requirements, he'd have to buy two trunks. He wouldn't have believed one small child could need so many things. And he didn't have the faintest idea what some of those things were. What in hell was a crimping iron?
"I'm sorry, but you can only take what will fit in the saddlebags." He'd pare his own things to the bare necessities and create as much space for her as he could, but it would be limited.
Interest gleamed in her eyes. "We're going to ride horses? We don't have to go on the train? Good. I didn't like the train."
"You can ride, can't you?"
She tossed her head. "Of course I can ride."
This information cast a new and encouraging light on the matter. If she had her own horse, it would be more comfortable than carrying her on the saddle behind him. But he'd need to find a horse that was well broken and gentle. Another positive was being able to accommodate an extra pair of saddlebags. This reminded him that he needed to buy an additional bedroll and provisions.
"I'll need a riding skirt," she commented, bending over the table to add another item to the list.
"We have a long way to go. Wouldn't trousers be more comfortable? Easier to ride in?"
She glared at him. "She wanted me to dress like a boy. I wouldn't do it. Young ladies do not wear trousers."
"I see." She was starting to sound like a very sensible woman.
"I ran away because she wanted me to cut my hair like a boy's." The story of yesterday's adventure poured forth. Ty listened and felt his chest grow tighter and tighter. Christ. His niece was lucky to be alive. But he finally understood the scene he had witnessed at the train station, why she had been so ragged and filthy, and why Jenny had appeared so furious. "You must have worried Miss Jones."
"I don't care," she said with a dismissive shrug. "I hate her. She killed my mama."
Ty felt he ought to say something, but he didn't know what. Anything he offered would sound as if hewere defending Jenny, and he'd already figured how the wind blew on that issue. But her comment troubled him. If he understood correctly, Graciela was aware that Marguarita had chosen to take Jenny's place on the firing wall, she hadn't been forced. It was a long stretch to blame Jenny for her mother's death.
He cleared his throat and sidestepped the remark. "As soon as you're ready to leave, we'll find the corrals and buy two horses. We'll pick up the things you need, then we'll head north."
Her eyebrows lifted in dismay. "I wanted to buy my new things first. And when are we going to eat?"
"Can you wait to eat? We're getting a late start." Swiftly he ran some calculations in his mind. Any man who bought a horse in less than a day was taking his chances. A man who bought a horse based on only a few hours' observation was a fool. A man who bought a horse as Ty intended to, in about two hours, was desperate. It couldn't be helped. The most he could spare for the purchase was two hours. Then, say, another hour at the apparelshop . Considering how late they were starting, they wouldn't ride out of town beforenoon, which meant they'd depart in the worst heat of the day. And that was stupid and dangerous. On his own he would have risked it, but not with his brother's daughter.
"Never mind," he snapped, annoyed. "We'll have breakfast right away, and lunch before we leave. We'll figure on riding out about three."
Then she did something that paralyzed him. She studied his frown for a minute before she leaned forward, patted his hand, and gave him a dazzling smile. "Gracias, Uncle Ty."
"Oh hell, I'm hungry too," he said gruffly, irritated that the word "uncle" had struck with such impact. He'd been thinking of her as his niece, why should it surprise him that she would call him uncle?
He didn't figure it out until they were midway through breakfast. Referring to her as his niece was something of a cheat; in his mind he struggled with a lifetime habit of hating the Barrancas family, and of having let his father's intolerance of Mexicans sink barbs in his mind. But her "uncle" was honest and heartfelt; she unquestioningly accepted him as part of her family.
Ty hadn't often experienced shame, so he didn't immediately identify the discomfiting pressure pushing at the inside of his chest.
* * *
Jenny was wild with frustration.
She heard the nearest church bells peal nine times before a maid finally appeared to tidy the room and empty the chamber pot and discovered Jenny tied to the chair. The maid screamed and ran out of the room. Before the manager arrived to cut Jenny free the bells had soundedten o'clock, and she lost more precious time while she persuaded the anxious manager that she didn't want trouble any more than he did; they didn't need to report the incident to anyone. All she wanted was to get the hell out of here and find Sanders and the kid.
By the time she burst out of the hotel doors and rushed into the street, the s
un blazed hot overhead and she was sweating profusely and approaching panic. She didn't think Sanders had taken the northbound train, but the northbound had departed an hour ago, and now she couldn't be certain.
She had to pin her hopes on her belief that Sanders would go to the corrals. If she was too late and had missed him, she didn't know what she would do next.
As she trotted toward the edge of town, she reviewed her reasoning. Sanders had indicated that he would take Graciela on the train, so that meant he planned to leave by horse. Except, he didn't have a horse.
She had watched every passenger emerging from the train last evening, looking for Luis or Chulo, and she knew the cowboy had not been among them. He must have jumped off at the last minute.
But he must have had a horse in Verde Flores as horseback was the only way to reach the no-name village from the depot. Considering how a man felt about a good horse, he would have brought his horse with him on the train. But he wouldn't have had time to fetch it from the boxcars and still follow her and the kid back to the hotel.
Therefore, he now needed to buy another horse. And, therefore, sometime today he would show up at the corrals, probably sooner rather than later. As he'd want to leaveDurangoas quickly as possible, she figured buying a horse would be his first order of the day. The inevitable conclusion? Sanders had boughta horse hours ago, and she had missed him.
Damn. Biting her lips, she increased her pace to a run. By the time she reached the corrals her throat burned for air and daggers pierced her side. Already street traffic was thinning for siesta. Cursing, she fell against a tree trunk to rest and catch her breath, grateful for a spot of shade. When she could breathe without pain, she lifted her eyes toward the dust swirling above the animal pens.
She didn't immediately spot the cowboy and didn't expect to, but her gaze few like a magnet to a splash of deep maroon. Relief sagged through her body, turning her muscles to straw. Thank heaven for whatever had delayed them.
Narrowing her eyes and peering through a haze of dust, she focused on Graciela. The kid was wearing a new riding outfit. And her hair was pinned up all proper and ladylike. She waited beside a pair of stuffed saddlebags, little gloved hands patiently clasped at her waist.
A humorless grin thinned Jenny's lips. Now she knew why the cowboy was late getting to the corrals, and she knew how he had spent his morning. Shopping. Hisaggravation, and she knew the kid well enough to guess the shopping excursion had not gone smoothly, was her gain. Good, and thank God.
After tugging her hat down to conceal her eyes and pulling the poncho away from her breasts, she slouched toward the enclosure farthest from the cowboy and Graciela.
She, too, needed to buy a horse.
* * *
They didn't ride out ofDurangountil almostfour o'clock, by which time Ty was as restless as a herd before a storm. Everything had taken longer than he'd figured. She'd had to try things on at the apparel store, a seemingly endless process, and then a seamstress had been summoned, which ate up more time. Nextcame footwear, an item he hadn't considered, and the trying on and taking off and switching of tassels and discussion of colors. Through it all, he'd shifted from boot to boot, glaring pointedly at his pocket watch, which didn't expedite the shopping excursion by a single minute.
Following the purchase of undergarments, an experience he never wanted to repeat, they stopped to eat again although he wasn't sure why since Graciela mostly played with her food, sampling tiny bites between chatting happily about her new clothing. The food she had begged for stayed on her plate.
The time lost at the corrals was his fault. He'd insisted that she ride the horse he selected for her before he put down the purchase money. Then he'd had to buy saddles and wait while her stirrups were cut to size. This after a long discussion wherein Graciela insisted on a lady's sidesaddle, and he insisted on a regular. He had eventually prevailed, but she hadn't spoken to him since. Her silence irritated the bejesus out of him.
Grinding his teeth, he turned his head to glare at her. Immediately a long sigh emptied the air from his lungs. She looked so tiny and fragile seated atop the large mare that visions of disaster spun through his mind. She could fall off and break an arm or a leg. The horse might throw her, and she could break her neck and die. The mare could stumble and fall and crush her. He didn't know if the mare was easily spooked, but he could imagine it running off with the child and…
Well, damn it. Ty gave his head an irritated shake. He wasn't a man to borrow trouble, so why was he doing it now?
In fact, he didn't need to borrow, he had trouble enough already. She'd claimed that she knew how to ride, but that was only partially true. She knew how to stay on top of a horse as long as the horse walked. The one time the horse had broken into a trot, she had screamed and clamped onto the pommel, utterly terrified.
"Graciela," he said, moving his gelding up beside the mare, "we need to pick up the pace or it's going to take about twenty years for us to reach the border." At the present rate, she'd need that corset before they rode intoCalifornia, and he'd be an old man.
She looked at him,then deigned to answer. "I've never been on a horse all by myself. Well, I have, but one of my cousins led it or walked along beside me."
Even though he'd quickly realized that her idea of being able to ride differed vastly from his thoughts on the subject, hearing her admission soured his disposition. He considered the problem for the next mile.
"Here's what we'll do. We'll sell your horse, and you'll ride behind me."
"You said this was my horse! You said I could ride her all by myself. That's what you promised!" Tears swam in her eyes.
My God, he had made her cry. Horrified, Ty watched the late-afternoon sun glisten in the water welling behind her lashes. The shock of it stunned him. He had made this tiny creature cry.
"Jenny wouldn't break a promise!" A tear ran down her cheek. "Jenny says a person isn't worth a fricking spit if he breaks a promise!" Another tear dropped on the bodice of her maroon riding outfit.
"Look, don't cry. All right?" A man was neverso helpless as when faced with a woman's tears. A child's tears were even worse. "We won't decide anything right now," he heard himself say. "We'll talk about it later when you're calmer." Right now, he wasn't too calm himself. "Maybe you should wipe your nose."
To his great relief she managed to remove a snowy handkerchief from her cuff without dropping the reins.
"Jenny says a promise is sacred." Her voice muffled inside the handkerchief. "Jenny says anyone who breaks a fricking promise might as well put a gun to his head."
A little of "Jenny says" went a long way, he decided irritably. "Don't swear."
"I'm only telling you what Jenny said."
"I get the point, all right? Jenny Jones does not break her promises." Thin-lipped, he stared toward the sinking sun. In the future, he would be damned careful what he said and how he said it. Apparently children accepted every word as gospel.
Meanwhile, he didn't know how he was going to get around this obstacle, only that he had to.
He was still pondering the problem when they stopped to set up camp for the night, still thinking about how to pick up the pace while he tethered the horses, watered them, then dug a fire pit and unpacked provisions.
"I can fill your coffeepot."
"I'll do it," he said absently. She might fall in the small stream that ran near the campsite. When he returned from the stream, he noticed that she had unrolled the bedrolls.
"I can hang the coffeepot over the fire."
"I've already got it."
She pursed her lips, then sat down on her saddle and folded her hands in her lap. "I don't know how to cook," she informed him, watching as he set down the skillet. As if there was any way in hell that he would have allowed her to get that close to the flames. "Will you teach me how?"
"Aren't you kind of young to be cooking?" He shredded some boiled beef with his knife, added dried onion, and rolled the bits inside a tortilla before he plac
ed them in the iron skillet and set the skillet on the fire to heat. He cut some more beef, more onions.
"Jenny says I should know how to cook by now."
He gazed at her above the flames licking the bottom of the coffeepot. "For someone who professes to hate Jenny Jones, you sure quote her a lot."
"No, I don't. She's not a lady. Did you know that she has hair between her legs?" Graciela shuddered. "Don't you think that's disgusting?"
Ty froze, and the tortilla dropped from boneless fingers into the dirt. Heat scalded his throat and jaw. Ducking his head, he stared at the tortilla, took his time picking it up and brushing off the sandy dirt. "Ah … well…"He cleared his throat with a strange-sounding cough.
And he wished like hell that he was anywhere on earth but here with this child. Silently he cursed Robert for asking him to undertake this errand. He cursed Marguarita for getting pregnant in the first place. He cursed himself for discovering a modest streak that he hadn't even suspected.
"Jenny says all grown-up women have hair between their legs." Her raised eyebrow conveyed enormous skepticism. "That's not true, is it?"
Oh God. Agony twitched his muscles, pulled down the corners of his mouth. The last time he'd squirmed like this, he'd been a schoolboy. Raising his knife to within an inch of his eyes, he inspected the blade with intense scrutiny.
"Ah … didn't you say that Jenny Jones never lies?" There was a nick that he hadn't noticed before. He'd have to fix that.
Graciela heaved a huge sigh, her shoulders dropped, and she directed a sad stare toward her toes. "So it's true," she said mournfully. "Well, I'm not going to grow hair between my legs."
He was dying, absolutely dying. When he could trust himself to speak, he cleared his throat with a choking sound and said, "A couple of these are hot. Fetch one of those plates." His voice sounded like it belonged to someone else.
And his treacherous mind flung visions of a naked Jenny in front of his eyes. Damn it, he could see a triangular patch as coppery as the flames blurring in front of his gaze.
The Promise of Jenny Jones Page 11
