Page 51 of The Promise of Jenny Jones

Even if the train ran late, which was likely, they would arrive at the rail terminal in El Paso Del Norte before supper.

“We’ll cross the Rio Grande and find a hotel in El Paso on the American side,” Ty explained to Graciela.

“Tomorrow morning, we’ll board the Southern Pacific bound for San Francisco. And we’ll be home in about a week.”

While he answered the next hundred questions from his niece, he gazed at Jenny, who sat across from him and Graciela.

Her head rested against the window, and she dozed despite the heat and noise inside the car.

Pride and amusement softened the look he swept over her molded traveling jacket.

He liked seeing evidence that he’d plumb worn her out last night.

Except she’d worn him out too. He wouldn’t say no when it was his turn to catch an hour or two of shut-eye.

God almighty, but she was a magnificent woman.

He enjoyed just watching her sleep. And last night she had been everything he had hoped she would be and more.

Passionate, enthusiastic, uninhibited, and eager to give back what she learned.

He’d never had a woman with a body as superb as hers, lush, curvacious, taut, well muscled, and built for endurance.

And responsive? Remembering her wild abandon made his groin tighten painfully.

He had to figure out how they could be together again tonight.

“Uncle Ty?” Frowning, Graciela tugged at the pocket of his waistcoat. “You aren’t listening.”

“You’re telling me about your friend, Cordelia.”

“Consuelo!”

He couldn’t hire just anyone to stay with his niece while he trysted with Jenny.

The problem was finding someone on short notice, then establishing reliability.

That he should be pondering such a dilemma impressed him as frustrating, exasperating, amusing, and there was another feeling he couldn’t quite identify.

Something warm and protective, something that touched him inside whenever he observed the trust in Graciela’s gaze.

Oddly, he suddenly recalled a saying of his mother’s. “A boy becomes a man the day he holds his first child in his arms.” It took a child to make a man, he thought, frowning down at Graciela. And a woman, a very special woman.

Strange new ideas were still prodding his emotions two hours later when all hell broke loose.

He felt the explosion beneath his feet a second before the blast of dynamite roared through his ears.

The train wheels locked, the cars clashed together, and Jenny was flung from her seat to his, coming awake with panic in her eyes.

Screams sounded around them. People, animals, boxes, and baskets flew through the inside of the car.

Trying to hold Jenny and Graciela as the car shuddered and rocked up on one set of wheels, Ty ground his teeth and swore viciously.

Clouds of grey-and-white steam billowed up past the window, but not before he spotted horses and riders.

When Jenny’s fingers dug into his thighs, he knew she, too, had spotted Luis Barrancas through the glass and steam.

Up ahead, the engine ran off the ruined track and plunged down the track bed, plowing into sand and cacti before crashing on its side.

The following car twisted and toppled, forcing the next car to the opposite side of the track bed.

When the hellish din diminished and the cars lurched to a stop, Ty thanked happenstance that they had boarded toward the rear.

The car they were in tilted high on one side, but it hadn’t fallen.

Pushing Jenny aside, he found his saddlebags and ripped open the pocket. “Here.” He thrust a pistol into her hands and a pouch full of cartridges. She shoved her hat out of her eyes and loaded the gun with steady hands, her mouth grim.

“We need horses,” she snapped.

He nodded. It didn’t surprise him that she tracked his thoughts as if he’d spoken aloud. “Stay here,” he said to Graciela, who pushed up her hat brim, then stared around them with frightened eyes and a white face.

“Wait until we come for you,” Jenny finished. She struggled to stand, kicked a terrified chicken out of her way. “Let’s go.”

As if they’d discussed it, she turned toward the back door of the car, leaving him to run through the debris-laden aisle toward the front.

As he burst onto the crazily canted platform between twisted cars, he heard her first shots and saw a rider go down.

Rolling steam made his eyes water, but offered some cover.

Unfortunately it obscured the Barrancas cousins as well.

Jumping to the ground, he ran through hissing white billows, firing at forms looming out of the steam. Three men on this side. He winged one, sent one to hell, and the other wheeled, then spurred toward the back of the train.

Spinning, Ty climbed back onto the platform, crossed to the other side, and vaulted down.

In the midst of spiraling dust and gusts of steam, he spotted Jenny, fighting to hold the reins of a dun and a black horse while firing at a rider bearing down on her.

Hot steam scalded his eyes as he ran up beside her, fanning his pistol.

The rider veered and dropped, his boot catching in the stirrup.

The horse raced toward the desert, dragging the man.

“We told you to stay inside!”

By the time he turned, Jenny was tossing Graciela up on the dun, struggling with her skirts to mount behind the child. When she threw the reins of the black to Ty, he caught them, jumped in the saddle, and shouted, “Ride!”

They were a mile from the wreck before he noticed two significant events. Graciela had disobeyed and left the train, but she had brought his saddlebags; he recognized them hanging across the dun mare.

And he’d been shot in the side.

The first thing was to create some shade. When she spotted two tall cacti, Jenny shouted his name and pointed before she rode toward them.

“How badly is he hurt?” Graciela asked for the hundredth time, shifting to lift anxious eyes to her face.

“I don’t fricking know, all right? Please, Graciela, I’m as worried as you are, but I don’t know. We’ll find out in a few minutes.”

But it was bad, she knew that. The knowledge boiled in her brain, searing and frightening her.

Though it appeared they weren’t yet being pursued, they had ridden hard for the last two hours, heading north across arid ground that hadn’t tasted rain in months. Now it was clear they could go no farther.

Blood caked Ty’s right side. Thirty minutes ago, he had slumped in the saddle.

Jenny kept watching him, fearing that he would fall off the black at any moment.

The sound of the train wheels continued to vibrate in her head, but instead of clickity click, the sound she heard was, Oh God, oh God, oh God.

Please, please, don’t let him be dying. Please, no. I’ll do anything you want, just let him live. She repeated the litany again and again, unaware that she did so.

Swinging out of the saddle near the cacti, she lifted Graciela down and tossed her the reins.

“Give me a minute, then tether her.” Shaking fingers fumbled at the girth strap and buckle, then she had the saddle on the ground and dragged it toward the twin cacti.

Once she’d draped the horse blanket over the cacti to create a block of shade, she pulled the saddle beneath the canopy.

There was a canteen, thank God, but precious little else on the horse that would be of use to them.

The black, with Ty sagging on his back, would have walked past her if she hadn’t run to grab the bridle and one of the reins that dragged the ground. She shouted at Graciela to tether Ty’s horse, too, then caught him as he clumsily tried to dismount, falling heavily against her.

“This way.” Dropping his arm over her shoulder, she led him to the pitiful lean-to she’d constructed.

It wasn’t until she had him beneath the horse blanket and resting against the saddle that she realized her heart was slamming against her ribs and she could hardly breathe. He was badly wounded. Very badly.

“What can I do?” Graciela asked in a thin, high voice.

“See if there’s another canteen on the black. Bring everything you can reach.”

Ty opened his eyes, placed a hand against his side. “This one’s bad, Jenny.”

“I know, cowboy. Let’s have a look at you.” Pressing her lips together, she helped him out of his waistcoat, drew a deep breath, then opened his shirt and steeled herself. “It’s not a flesh wound,” she said after a minute. “Lean forward, let’s see if the bullet passed through.”

It hadn’t. And that was bad. Lowering her head, she swore steadily for a full minute, not stopping until Graciela returned and pressed a second canteen into her shaking fingers.

“Here.” Graciela curved her hand around the neck of a bottle of mescal. Mescal packed a powerful punch and she was glad to have it.

Jenny pulled the cork with her teeth and handed the bottle to Ty. He nodded gratefully, took a long pull, then wiped the back of his hand across his lips. Graciela knelt on one side of him, Jenny on the other.

“This one could get me. It won’t… but it could.”

“It will,” Jenny said flatly, “unless we get some help.”

Graciela stared at him. “I’ll sew you up!”

Jenny’s chest rose and fell before she spoke. “Honey, this is different. That bullet has to come out.”

Graciela wrung her hands, and tears and snot rolled down her face. “We’ll take it out!”

Jenny gazed into his eyes. He knew what she was going to say.

They held each other’s gaze. “We’ll talk about it, but I don’t think so.

If I make one tiny mistake, I’ll kill him.

” What she didn’t say, what made her wild and frantic inside, was knowing that even if she got the bullet out, he’d already lost too much blood to ride. Ty wasn’t going anywhere.

Graciela clawed at her arm. “You have to try! Jenny, you have to cut out the bullet! I’ll help!”