The Promise of Jenny Jones (6 page)

"Cousin Luis!"

Ty looked toward the mother and daughter. The daughter's face lit as if a candle glowed behind her cheeks, and she started to run forward, but the mother grabbed her arm and dragged her back. The mother's eyes narrowed into slits as she studied the thug, and her lips moved. She might have been praying, but Ty didn't think so from her expression. He flipped his cigar off the platform and straightened in the doorway. He opened his fingers wide,then curled his hands into fists.

Cousin Luis spun, and the spurs chinked across the platform, moving toward the steps. The daughter was struggling to break free from the mother. Ty could see that the mother had her hands full, trying to subdue the daughter, and shouting at Cousin Luis, who advanced with the single-minded purpose of a bullet.

What happened next caused an abrupt silence so profound that the insects in the trees sounded as loud as buzzards, and Ty heard the slap of clothing against the rocks in the stream, a sound too distance to he audible until now.

The thug swaggered up to the mother and daughter, and he backhanded the mother, knocking her to her knees. For a minute it looked as if he would strike her with his fist, but he hesitated, glanced at the people silently watching from the platform. Then he tossed the daughter up on his shoulder and started toward his horse. No one moved.

"You fricking bastard!"

The mother launched herself from the ground as if she'd been hurled from a catapult. Flying forward, she caught Cousin Luis around the knees, and he went down with a surprised and furious shout. The daughter flew out of his arms, hit her head on a rock, and went limp on the ground, dazed.

Neither the mother nor Cousin Luis noticed the daughter. The mother sprang on top of him, and started hammering away, doing her damnedest to break his nose with her fists. It was the most astonishing thing Ty had ever seen. Cousin Luis tried to buck her off of his chest, but she was stuck like a burr to his vest until he flipped on his side. Then they rolled in the dirt, slugging and kicking like two men, except the mother was hampered by her skirts and petticoats.

Ty was so thunderstruck that he didn't move until he heard the women on the platform sucking in their breath. The hissing sound galvanized him. He wasted one second looking around,then accepted that no one was going to interfere. No one was going to help the woman.

He spit on his hands with a curse of disgust. What kind of yellow-belly stood by while some puffed-up son of a bitch beat the hell out of a mother? He didn't care if Cousin Luis was a relative or not. If someone didn't stop him, he was going to kill the red-haired woman.

By the time Ty reached them, they were both on their feet. The woman threw a right, missed the thug, and her fist glanced off Ty's jaw. Jesus. He staggered backward a step. If she'd connected squarely, she would have laid him out in the dirt. This wasn't quite the mismatch he had initially supposed.

"Behind you," she shouted,then returned to hammering at Cousin Luis.

Ty whirled in time to deflect the fist of another man, who was gut ugly and determined. He had half a second to note the man's resemblance to Cousin Luis,then they were into it.

Twenty minutes later, he pushed wearily to his feet and stood swaying over the sprawled figure of his opponent. Hoping he had enough energy left to finish Cousin Luis, he lifted his head to find the man.

The mother didn't need Ty's help. She was standing over Cousin Luis, panting and gulping air, staring hate down at his unconscious form. She had a bloody rock in her hand.

Ty stumbled toward her, sucking mouthfuls of searingmiddayair into his aching lungs. He prodded Cousin Luis with the toe of his boot. The man was going to sleep for a long time and wake up with the worst headache of his brutish life.

"What the hell was that all about?" he asked when he could speak. "Who are you?"

She'd lost her hat in the fight, and short red hair was sweat-plastered to her head. Her cape had disappeared, and her shirtwaist was dirty and pasted tight to her skin by perspiration. Ty stared. Good God. She'd been hiding an awesome figure under that cape. She wasn't small, but God had arranged her in absolutely perfect proportion. He dragged his eyes up from breathtaking breasts and studied her face. He found himself wishing he'd taken a closer look at her when she wasn't dirty and sweating and cherry-faced from fury and exertion.

"You've got a cut on your cheek," he said, staring at her. And she was going to have a black eye to remind her of Cousin Luis. "Ma'am, I have to say this. You are one hell of a fighter."

She put a hand on his chest and pushed him backward, sudden panic flaring in her blue eyes. "Graciela!"

The daughter pulled to her feet with a dazed expression. She touched the back of her head, looked around, then wobbled forward and fell to her knees. "Cousin Chulo!" Stricken eyes darted to Cousin Luis, then back, taking in the two unconscious men. She burst into tears, flung a look at the mother, and shouted, "I hate you!"

The mother nodded grimly,then lifted on her toes to look Ty square in the eyes. The experience was a new one. Not many women could look a six-foot-three man in the eyes. Maybe she was closer to six feet tall than he'd originally guessed. He forced himself to hold his gaze on her face and not let it slide down to those magnificent breasts.

She held his eyes, seemed to consider,then admitted, "We're having a goddamned family problem here."

He laughed, liking this tough woman who refused to let a man hit her without fighting back. Ty suspected old Cousin Luis would give it a second thought before he hit another woman.

"So it appears," he said, grinning at her.

"Cousin Chulo over there messed you up some," she stated, inspecting his face. Until she mentioned it, he hadn't noticed the blood dripping down his chin. He swiped at it with the back of his hand. "I'm thanking you, mister." She thrust out her hand, and he gripped it in a hard shake. "I don't know what I'd a done when the second one showed up. I'm glad you stepped in. Much obliged."

"It was my pleasure, ma'am," Ty said, meaning it. "It's a privilege to lend a hand to a fellow American." They'd moved into English about halfway through the brief conversation.

People had begun to drift off the platform, boarding the train, looking back at them over their shoulders. The woman stepped away from Ty and moved hastily around Cousin Luis and Cousin Chulo, picking up her hat, her cape, a heavy fabric traveling bag. When she had everything, she strode toward her daughter. Curious, Ty followed at a distance.

"We're leaving now. We're taking that train."

"No!" The child threw herself across Cousin Chulo's chest. "I'm not going!"

"Yeah. You are." Grim-faced and grinding her teeth, she grabbed the daughter by the arm and dragged her to the steps leading into the train. "Where's this train going?" she demanded, glaring into the conductor's eyes.

"The next stop is Hermita, Señora." The conductor stepped backward as if he feared that she'd take him on next.

"Where's that?"

"Fifty miles south of here, Señora."

"South?" She spit a string of cusswords that made Ty grin. "Well, it will have to do." She scowled back at the unconscious cousins,then gave the conductor a shove. "Get out of my way."

She dragged the daughter on board the train. Two minutes later, Ty spotted them through the window as the train chugged away from the depot.

He watched until the train rocked into a curve and puffed out of sight,then he shook his head, found his hat, and dusted off his pant legs. It occurred to him that it wouldn't be a bad idea for him to follow her example and put some space between himself and the cousins.

Fifteen minutes later he cantered out of Verde Flores, heading west toward the village that would mark the halfway point of a journey he hadn't wanted to make. The second part would be the hardest, taking Marguarita and her child back toCalifornia.

Because thinking about Marguarita made him mad, he turned his thoughts back to the woman at the depot.

He guessed he had it figured out. The red-haired woman was married to a Mexican husband. That accounted for the half-Mex daughter and the cousins. She was leaving the husband, and the daughter was torn between her parents, not wanting to leave her father. That accounted for her delight at spotting Cousin Luis and fighting with the mother. For some reason the father couldn't chase after them, so he'd sent the cousins in pursuit.

It pleased him that the woman had escaped, even though she'd jumped on a train heading in a direction she plainly hadn't wanted to go. He hoped for her sake that she'd left her problems behind.

Touching his fingertips to his chin, he looked at the blood and frowned. His problems were ahead of him.

It was too bad that he'd never see the red-haired woman again. She had the best breasts he'd ever wanted to put his hands on. She was one hell of a woman.

* * *

Jenny smoothed herself up the best she could, and stared down the people looking at her. Now that the fight was over, her hands started to shake. If that cowboy hadn't leaped into the fray, the second cousin would have stolen Graciela. She'd come that close—that close!—to letting Graciela get captured. A shudder ran down her spine.

Well, it hadn't happened. And she'd learned something. Marguarita hadn't been whittling soft wood when she claimed the cousins were a threat. They wanted Graciela, all right. And after getting an eyeful of Luis and Chulo, Jenny didn't doubt that either of them could drown Graciela or shoot her in a ravine and stroll away without a qualm.

"What are you doing?" she said when she became aware of Graciela's soft murmuring.

"I'm praying that the train will wreck and kill you,then Cousin Chulo and Cousin Luis will come and take me home."

"You see this?" Jenny pointed to the scab forming on her cheek. "And this?" She leaned her eye down toward Graciela, an eye that was swelling by the second. "I got these fighting your stinking cousins so they wouldn't capture you and kill you."

Outrage and disbelief stiffened Graciela's little shoulders. "My cousins would never hurt me! They came to rescue me from you and to take me home to Aunt Tete."

Jenny's mouthdropped, and she felt her heart fall through her body and hit the wooden seat. She knew the answer, but she asked the question anyway. "Didn't your mother tell you about your cousins?"

When Graciela just stared at her, she sighed and closed her eyes. Marguarita, you fricking coward.

A more generous approach would be to remember that Marguarita had been burdened with a lot of bad news tolay on the kid. Maybe she'd felt it was enough that she had to tell her child about the firing squad and that a stranger was going to take Graciela to a daddy she'd never met. Marguarita might have figured that informing a six-year-old that her nice cousins wanted to kill her was just too much. Or maybe Marguarita doubted her own assessment of the situation. Who the hell knew?

Jenny drew a breath. "All right, here's how it is. Luis and Chulo used to like you, but they don't anymore. Now they want to hurt you. It's my job to make sure they don't get you."

Tears welled in Graciela's eyes. "You are so mean to say that," she whispered. "My cousins love me. Cousin Luis brings me presents, and Cousin Chulo rides me on his horse. They would never hurt me. You're lying."

Jenny whirled on the seat and gripped Graciela's shoulders. She shook the kid until Graciela's teeth chattered. "Listen to me! I do not lie. Not ever. When Jenny Jones says a thing, that's how it is. Now, you don't have to like me. And you can call me any name you want to. You can pray that God strikes me down. But don't you ever, not ever, call me a liar. Do you understand that?"

Graciela shrank from Jenny's blazing eyes.

"Your mama could have picked from a dozen people to take you to your daddy. But she picked me. She picked me because I never lie. She didn't pick one of your son-of-a-bitch cousins because she knew they want to harm you. She told me so. Now, you just think about that for a while."

The miles rolled past, and Jenny started to calm down.

"Why would my cousins want to hurt me?" Graciela asked in a little voice. She looked up at Jenny with eyes that seemed too large for her face.

"It has to do with money, lots of money. If you're dead, your cousins get lots of money."

"My cousins would rather have money than me?"

"Your mama thought so, and it looks like she was right."

"That's a—"

Jenny just stared, until Graciela dropped her head. Tears dripped down on the hands squeezed tightly together in her lap.

Jenny watched her for a minute, waiting for the snot. "Don't you have a handkerchief?"

"I lost it."

Reaching down, Jenny tore another piece out of her petticoat and handed it to Graciela. "Wipe your nose."

"Thank you."

"Look, kid, I know it's hard right now. You've lost your mama, your cousins want to kill you, you don't know where you're going or who's on the other end, you hate me…"When she listed it out like that, the kid's life sounded lousy even by Jenny's standards. "Well, okay. You've been dealt a rotten hand. But that's how it is. You have to play the cards you've got. There's no use crying about it. Tears and snot aren't going to change a damned thing."

The kid didn't speak. She sat there, head down, her fingers on the gold-heart locket that was pinned to her chest.

An hour later, a man came weaving down the aisle selling greasy tortillas filled with something unidentifiable that tasted like shredded fire. The first bite made Jenny's eyes water and blistered her tongue.

"Didn't you cry when your mama died?"

Jenny had forgotten that she'd told Graciela about her ma. "Oh hell, no. I wasn't around when my ma died. But even if I had been, I wouldn't have cried. My ma was mean as a snake. Looked like one, too."

Graciela's eyes widened. "She didn't!"

Jenny laughed. "Well, she looked like a snake to me. The meanest woman who ever sucked air. I'm telling you, that woman never said a soft word to anyone in her whole life."

"Why was she so mean?"