Page 65 of Native Hawk
Her mind drifted back to the last night. It was horrifying to think that at the very moment Catalina had been enjoying divine pleasure at Drew’s hands, Jenny may have been suffering under the bruising blows of her ruthless client.
It wasn’t right. Jenny deserved better. Catalina had to get her out of this hopeless predicament…before the brute returned, before Miss Hattie saw her, before anyone suspected a thing.
As she tied off the knot and snipped the ends of thread, Catalina came to a decision. She knew she was going to soundprepotente,as bossy as her father, but it was for Jenny’s own good.
While Jenny slipped her dress back on, Catalina went to her trunk and pulled out the little velvet bag of coins, emptying them into her palm. There was forty dollars there—twenty dollars from Drew for the past two nights and twenty more she’d saved up from housekeeping.
It meant she’d have to do without her sewing machine that much longer. But giving Jenny this money could save the girl’s life.
“I want you to take this,” she said, pressing the coins into Jenny’s palm.
“What? I can’t—”
“Take it,” she insisted, closing the girl’s fingers over the coins. “It is not much, but it will take you as far as Sacramento. And there, you can make yourself a new life.”
Jenny’s eyes filled with fresh tears. “It’s too much. I could never pay you back and—”
“You do not need to pay me back. But if I give you this money, you must make me a promise.”
Jenny’s chin trembled as she nodded.
“Promise me you will not look for work in a place like this. Even if you have to scrub shirts or wash dishes, find a good job where you are treated with respect.”
“But I have no skills,” she argued. “I’m…worthless.”
“No,” Catalina snapped. “You arenotworthless. The man who did this to you—heis worthless. You deserve better than this. And now you will go find it. Go someplace where he will never find you. Promise me.”
Jenny’s eyes brimmed again, and she nodded.
But at the abrupt knock on the door, the girl jumped up with a wheeze of panic.
Catalina frowned and clenched her fists. If that was Jenny’s client looking for her, he’d be sorry he came knocking at Catalina’s door.
She stormed to the door and flung it open, primed for a fight.
It was Drew. He looked startled.
“Oh.” In the space of an instant, she went from agitation to surprise to relief. And then her heart melted. Drew hadn’t left her after all.
“What did I miss?” he asked.
She ushered him in, noting briefly that he’d changed into dark blue trousers with a blue brocade vest. She closed the door behind him.
The instant he laid eyes on Jenny’s battered face, his brows came together in a scowl.“Ling-miwhxiy!”he cursed. “Who did this?”
Catalina tried to hush him. She didn’t want to wake the whole Parlor. But he ignored her. And she had to admit there was something attractive about his righteous indignation. She liked the way he thrust out his chest and towered over them like a menacing storm cloud.
“Where is he?” he demanded. “Whereishe?”
“Gone,” Catalina told him.
He spit out a curse in English that made her blink.
“And I am going to get Jenny away from here,” she told him with pride.
“How?”
She didn’t want to tell him. She was afraid he’d be disappointed, that he would think she was wasting her sewing machine money on a girl she hardly knew.
But Jenny told him. “Miss Catalina’s given me her savin’s,” she gushed, “so I can get out o’ town and find a better life.”
It was hard to tell what Drew’s scowl meant. “Is that true?”
It was pointless to deny it. So Catalina raised her chin and defended her actions. “It is only money. I will make more.”
