Page 45 of The Promise of Jenny Jones

“Sometimes I do,” she conceded in a strange, thick voice. “Not too often, but sometimes.”

That’s how Ty found them, snuggled together on the bed, sound asleep.

Graciela woke when he entered the room and he placed a finger over his lips, tipping his hat brim toward Jenny. Graciela nodded, then carefully eased away and slid off the bed.

“How is she feeling?” Ty asked quietly.

“Tired,” Graciela whispered. “I think the wound still hurts her.”

He stepped to the bed and gently placed the back of his hand against her forehead.

Her skin felt hot but dry, feverish. Careful not to wake her, he raised her bloody blouse and inspected the wound.

He’d seen worse. The edges were a little red, but his niece had placed the stitches as well or better than he could have.

He thought a minute, then motioned Graciela toward the door.

She hesitated, looking back at Jenny. “Where are we going?”

“I never met two females who lost as many clothes as you two. We’re going to go buy you both a new rig.” Immediately Graciela brightened and placed her hand in his, ready to go.

She led him from shop to shop, spending his money as happily as a full-grown woman, buying so much for herself and Jenny that he had to purchase a trunk to pack it in.

Then she imperiously announced that he needed new clothing, too, and they embarked on another round of shops and leather stores.

By the end of the afternoon, Ty decided that a day in the saddle rounding up strays was less exhausting than shopping with a female, even a six-year-old.

After he threw up his hands and announced that he’d had enough, he took her to a café for orange juice and a slice of sweet Mexican pastry.

A dazed feeling stole over him as he watched her daintily pick the frosting off the pastry and eat it a crumb at a time.

When he’d come through Chihuahua on his way to Verde Flores and the no-name village, he hadn’t noticed any family places like this one.

He’d stayed the night in a low-ticket dive, and he had passed the evening drinking beer in a rowdy cantina on the rough side of town off the far end of the plaza.

That night seemed a lifetime ago, his thoughts so different from his attitude now, that he might have been a different man.

Since then, he’d covered a lot of ground.

He’d bought four horses, killed two men, and—this amazed him—he’d purchased women’s undergarments and outerwear, and he was sitting in a café with a child instead of tossing back beers in a cantina, and—this also amazed him—he no longer saw only a Barrancas mistake when he gazed at his niece.

When he looked at her now, he saw a beautiful child with eyes as blue-green as his own.

He saw her spirit and her smile and the absolute trust when she placed her hand in his.

And there was Jenny. The stranger who had earlier ridden through Chihuahua hadn’t known women like Jenny Jones existed.

That man had seen women as soft vacuous creatures whom a male courted to satisfy a physical need.

That man would have laughed at the idea of respecting a woman for qualities such as courage, loyalty, or integrity.

He would have sneered in disdain if someone had suggested that he’d ache for a woman who could outcuss and outfight him, and who could hold her liquor like a man.

He sensed that this trip, which had begun as a grudging favor to his brother, would end by changing his life.

Frowning, he realized he was never again going to see things the same as he had before he undertook this journey.

Something was happening to his perspective.

Long-held ideas and opinions were sloughing off like flecks of rust.

“Uncle Ty?” She had finished the juice and pastry and impatiently waited for him to emerge from his reverie. “We should check on Jenny now. We’ve been gone a long time. She might need us.”

What worried him was the suspicion that he was beginning to need them.

* * *

Jenny slept until the first delivery boy pounded on the door.

After that, deliveries arrived every few minutes and she gave up trying to sleep.

During a lull, she ordered a bath and something to eat.

After bathing, she opened packages and let her mouth drop in amazement at the array of clothing she found, holding up petticoats and shimmys and stockings and nightgowns and skirts and blouses and two traveling ensembles complete with matching hats and string bags.

She had never owned such fine clothing in her life.

Graciela had made the selections, of course. Jenny doubted Ty knew anything more about women’s clothing than she did herself. Her guess was confirmed a minute later when she began unwrapping the parcels containing Graciela’s new apparel.

She sat hard on the side of the bed clutching a miniature version of the same traveling ensemble she’d just held against herself to check for size. The small ensemble was the same cut and color as the adult version.

She had seen matching outfits like these in catalogs. When she and Graciela boarded the train wearing their smart new traveling ensembles, they would look like mother and daughter.

Leaning forward, she covered her eyes with a shaking hand.

Marguarita, I’m in trouble here.

It wasn’t as satisfactory to think the conversation as it was to talk to Marguarita’s star, but she couldn’t wait for evening.

Something’s happening between Graciela and me. I’m not trying to take your place, you have to know that. I didn’t mean for her to get attached to me, especially now that I know your precious Roberto is waiting for her and wants her.

She hunched over farther and pressed a hand to her waist. Her stomach hurt.

It’s not good that Graciela and I should form an attachment because I’ll have to leave her in a few weeks.

She doesn’t love me like she loves Ty, but she likes me sometimes, she said so.

And I… I like her, too, Marguarita. It didn’t start that way, and I sure never expected to like her, but I do.

It took me a while to see it, but she’s everything you said she was.

She seems awful smart for a kid her age, clever as hell when she wants to be.

She’s beautiful and well-mannered, and she knows lots of words.

And brave. My God, she’s brave. Did you see how she sewed me up?

Good Lord, she even sounded like a parent. Tossing the small ensemble aside, she walked to the window, pulled back the curtains, and stared up at the sky.

Marguarita, you have to help us. Don’t let her like me too much.

I’ve been saying good-bye to people all my life, but Graciela hasn’t.

It’s hard for her. This isn’t very admirable, but I’d like it if she felt sad to see me go.

But I don’t want her to hurt over it. She’s had enough hurt.

I don’t know what the answer is to this. I sure hope you do.

“We’re back!” Graciela ran into the room. “Uncle Ty, she’s awake! Did you see all our new clothes? Mine are the same as yours. We even have earrings. Did you find them?”

“I didn’t find any earrings,” she said in a faint voice. While Graciela tore through the remaining packages, she looked at Ty. “You had a shave, and you bought every article of women’s clothing in Chihuahua.”

He laughed and handed her a paper packet.

“This is a fever powder. The chemist said to mix a tablespoon in hot liquid and take it three times a day.” Stepping close to her, he cupped her chin in his palm and lifted her face.

“Your eyes are a little bright and your skin is flushed, but you look… beautiful. Did you wash your hair?”

She closed her eyes and swallowed, swaying toward him. “I had a bath,” she whispered.

Would she ever get used to his touch? Was it possible to imagine a time when he would touch her, and her bones didn’t melt?

When that look in his eyes didn’t pour warm honey down the inside of her skin?

Would the time ever come when she could stand this close without wanting to wrap herself around him and dissolve into his warmth and strength?

Stepping back, she touched her fingertips to her temples and shook her head. “Maybe I should take some of that powder now. I am feeling feverish.”

Graciela tugged on the wrapper Jenny had found in the packages and put on after her bath. “Look. These are our earrings. They’re real turquoise and silver!”

The kid was so pleased that Jenny didn’t mention that she had never had her ears pierced and wouldn’t be able to wear the earrings.

“The shop had earrings with blue stones that weren’t real turquoise, but Uncle Ty said, ‘not for his girls.’ Uncle Ty bought us the real ones.”

“I’ll be horn-swoggled,” Jenny said softly. Bright color infused the cowboy’s face. She would have sworn Ty Sanders was incapable of a blush. A slow grin curved her lips.

“It was a stupid comment,” he said irritably, turning away.

“Your girls, huh?”

“I’m going out for a drink. When I’m ready for supper, I’ll bring back food for us.” He jammed his hat on his head and slammed the door behind him, then opened it again and peered inside. “I’ll send someone up with hot water for the fever powder.”

“Much obliged,” Jenny said, grinning at his glare. After the door slammed the second time, she gazed at the two beds and wished she hadn’t been knifed, wondering. Maybe …

“Did you try on the hats?” Graciela called, holding up a straw heavy with silk flowers. “I like this one best.”

Jenny wrenched her gaze from the bed. What the hell was she thinking?

Even if she’d been healthy as a horse, nothing was going to happen between her and Ty.

Not in this room. Not with Graciela a few feet away.

Sighing, she sat down at a small table and watched Graciela try on the hat.

She could understand how a man and a woman made one child.

What was more difficult to grasp was how they found the privacy to make a second.