Page 81 of The Rancher Who Swore Off Love
She crossed the yard. Miriam stayed on her blanket in the grass, visible from the stable door, happy with her rattle. Grace’s jaw ached—she’d been clenching it since the bunkhouse without realizing—and her hands gripped the basket hard enough to turn her knuckles white.
Twelve years. Twelve years he’s been lyin’ to me. No. Stop. Ask him first. Maybe there’s a—
‘The take from the harbor job. Your cut is 12.’
Explain that, Jonah. Go ahead.
The stable doors hung open. Inside, Jonah crouched by the far stall with one of the big Percherons, the gray one called Captain, propping the horse’s front hoof between his knees. He had a rasp in one hand and worked the hoof.
He looked up when her shadow fell across the stall door. Grinned. “Hey, Gracie. You bring food? ‘cause I could eat a—”
“Who’s Ace?”
The grin died. “What?”
“Ace. A. The man who writes you letters aboutjobsandtakesand keepin’ your head down in the Fourth Ward.” She set the basket on the ground. Hard. “Who is he, Jonah?”
Jonah lowered the hoof. “Where’d you find that?”
“Your trouser pocket. I do your laundry, remember? I check pockets because Mason ruined a whole wash load last week, and I ain’t…” She glowered at him. “Don’t youdaremake this about where I found it.”
Jonah leaned the rasp against the stall door. “Gracie—”
“No. NoGracie. You talk to me straight, or I swear, Jonah David Linton, I will—”
“He’s a gang boss.” Jonah’s hands dropped. “In New York. Runs a crew outta the Fourth Ward. Pickpockets, mostly. Small-time stuff. He took me on after Ma and Pa died.”
The stable spun. Just for a second. Just enough that she grabbed the stall door to keep her balance, and the wood bit her palm.
Fourteen. He’d been fourteen, and she’d been ten, and their parents had just died of smallpox, and she’d thought… she’d believed…
“You told me you worked construction.” Her breathing sped up. “You told me you hauled lumber. You told me the odd jobs paid enough to—”
“I know what I told you.”
“So, all of it? Every penny? The food on the table, the rent on that rat-infested hut, the… thechicken breast, Jonah, the one we split that night before I left for Colorado?” Her throat locked up. “That money come from stealin’?”
“Not all of it.”
“How much?”
“Grace—”
“How much of it?!”
Captain tossed his head. Jonah stepped out of the stall and pulled the door shut behind him.
“Most of it.” He barely made a sound. “The honest work paid pennies, Gracie. You know that. You lived—”
“Don’t you tell me how I damn well lived!”
“I tried the docks, the factories, every damn thing a man—”
“Ain’t no doggone way no factory would take you!”
“I ain’t got papers, Gracie! I was fourteen! No schoolin’. I could try, and none of it…” He swallowed. “We were starvin’. You remember? You remember the winter you turned twelve? When the stove broke, and we ate flour paste for—”
“Don’t.”
