Rebecca Hagan Lee (10 page)

Julie sighed. The red hair that had been the bane of her existence since childhood was of great value in Chinatown? Zhing had given her another reason to despise it—and one more thing to worry about in her search for Su Mi. . . .

Chapter Eleven

“I am contented with the violence of my own character; it draws a line for me between friends and enemies.”

—LADY HESTER STANHOPE, 1776–1839

S
owing in the morning, sowing seeds of kindness. Sowing in the noontime and the dewy eve . . .’”
The words of the hymn announced her arrival moments before Julie stepped onto the boardwalk outside the Silken Angel Saloon.

Seated on a chair in the main salon, Will Keegan looked up from his breakfast of steak and eggs and coffee and saw Julia Jane Parham in all her tambourine-banging, psalm-singing glory through the newly cleaned gold-lettered plate-glass window. Will was so relieved to see her he was willing to overlook the fact that her visit was premature. There was a week left in the month. Miss Parham had violated their agreement.

He smiled to let her know there were no hard feelings on his part.

She smiled back. Right before she began the refrain of that infernal song: “‘Bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves, we shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves. . . .’” Right before she dropped her tambourine on the boardwalk and raised a parasol with a silver knob handle.

“No!” Will shouted, jumping to his feet, overturning the table and his breakfast in the process.

The sound of the table and his breakfast dishes and cutlery crashing to the floor was drowned out by the sound of the plate-glass window in the main salon shattering. Glass flew everywhere. Shards of it littered the floor and covered the tables and chairs nearest the window. Will watched as Julia Jane Parham raked her battered parasol along the bottom edge of the windowframe, dislodging the remaining bits of glass. Retrieving her tambourine from the boardwalk, she hitched up her skirts, flashing shapely ankles and calves in the process, and climbed through the open storefront. Glass fragments crunched beneath her boots as she made a beeline for the bar.

“Are you crazy?” Will roared, grabbing her around the waist and lifting her off her feet as she swung her parasol at his head. He ducked, narrowly avoiding being bashed in the face. She missed his head, but she connected with the crystals dangling from one of the wall sconces and a bottle of whiskey sitting on the bar. She sent the whiskey bottle skidding down the polished mahogany bar and into three glasses. The whiskey and the glasses sailed off the end of the bar and crashed to the floor in a spray of spirits and broken glass. “You could have been sliced to ribbons! What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“As much damage as possible!” she shouted back, wriggling in his grasp, trying with all her might to smash the rows of liquor bottles lining the shelf in front of the mirror behind the bar.

The saloon was empty at this time of morning, but it wouldn’t stay that way for long. Not with Julia Jane wreaking havoc on the place. They were sure to draw a crowd of onlookers and a constable or two. An angry red-haired Salvationist wielding a parasol was hard to miss. The last thing they needed was to provide the residents of Chinatown with fodder for the gossip and rumor mills. He didn’t want Li Toy or members of the Kip Yee tong or any other tong nosing around, or for the police to come calling. Until he learned whom he could and whom he couldn’t trust, Will didn’t want members of the San Francisco Police Department anywhere near the Silken Angel.

Not with Julia Jane Parham on the premises.

Holding her in a viselike grip with one arm, Will wrested the parasol from her grasp with his other arm and tossed it aside before she could do any more damage to the saloon or to him. “I can see that,” he replied. “What I want to know is why?”

“I should think you would know why!”

“If I knew why, I wouldn’t be asking.”

She kicked at him, and her booted foot connected with his shinbone.

“Ouch! Dammit! That hurt!” He yelped.

“Let me go!” she ordered. “Or I’ll do worse!”

She smelled like peaches. Peaches and good Irish whiskey. The combination was surprisingly complementary and highly intoxicating. Will found it hard to keep from dropping her, with all her thrashing about, and it was difficult to protect himself from her boot heels when all he could think about was how good she felt and how good she smelled. He resorted to threats. “If you don’t stop wiggling, I’m going to drop you.”

“Drop me onto my feet and I’ll stop wiggling,” she told him, kicking out once again, hoping to connect with more bone and sinew.

Will managed to avoid her kick, but several chairs and a table were overturned in the process. “You kick me again and I’ll turn you over my knee and give you the paddling you deserve.”

“You wouldn’t dare!” Julie sputtered, more incensed at being held so easily than she was at his threat.

“Try me.”

She was spoiling for a fight and rebelled against being thwarted, but Julie recognized the steel in his voice. She’d met her match in Will Keegan. He was serious, and she didn’t doubt for a minute that he would do exactly what he’d threatened. “Put me down at once!”

“I’ll be happy to,” he told her. “If you agree to live up to your promise not to smash the place and behave.”

She continued to struggle against him. “That promise is no longer valid.”

“Oh?” He grunted when she elbowed him in the ribs. “Why not?”

“I made that promise because I thought you were a
gentleman
,” Julie informed him.

“I accepted it because I thought you were a
lady
,” Will retorted.

“I
am
a lady.”

“Prove it by behaving like one,” he challenged.

Instead of meeting his challenge, Julie offered one of her own: “When you prove that you live alone above your place of business.”

Will remained silent.

Julie was triumphant. “I was a fool to believe you were a gentleman. I should have trusted my instincts. I knew I was right. I knew you were lying about living alone upstairs. I knew that wasn’t the case at all.”

“It was very much the case,” he retorted. “At the time. And I’m as much a gentleman now as I was then.”

“I wouldn’t boast about it,” she told him. “It doesn’t speak well of your character.”

“And going back on your word and wrecking my saloon speaks well of yours?”

“My motives are pure,” she argued. “Yours are not.”

“I doubt that,” Will shot back, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Are you going to keep your promise and behave or not?”

She declined to answer.

Will heaved a sigh. She didn’t weigh that much, but he was beginning to tire, holding her off the ground while she struggled to free herself. She was testing his strength as well as his patience. “I’ll take that as a no. And since you don’t appear inclined to honor your promise, I guess we’ll stay as we are awhile longer.”

“Since you don’t appear inclined to release me,” Julie pitched his words right back at him, “I’m going to scream bloody murder, and I promise I’ll have every constable in the district swarming around you in minutes.”

“Scream away, my lady,” he invited, calling her bluff, praying she didn’t call his. “And when the constables get here, I promise to let you explain why you broke my window, vandalized the grand parlor, and attacked my person without provocation.”

“Without
provocation
?” She huffed. “I assure you, Mr. Keegan, that I had plenty of
provocation
. Seven thousand dollars’ worth of
provocation . . .”

He looked down at her. Her ugly gray bonnet was askew, the bow beneath her chin partially untied, and the brim shielding her face covered with slivers of glass. There were more splinters clinging to her cape and dress. And although it didn’t show on the dark gray wool, Will knew her garments were stained with whiskey. A line of tiny blood droplets beaded along a small scratch on her cheek. Her blue eyes shot sparks at him, nearly singeing him with the heat of her wrath. “That was you last night? Behind the barrels?”

“Of course it was me,” she informed him.

Will was as alarmed as he was stunned by her admission—so alarmed the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. “Have you lost your mind? Do you know what might have happened to you if you had been found out?”

“The same as those poor unfortunate girls, I suppose.”

“You should be so lucky.” He snorted. “I brought seven of those girls home with me.”

“You
bought
seven of those girls,” she reminded him. “You purchased them like cattle.”

“That’s what has your dander up this morning? That’s what sparked this display of missionary zeal . . . ?”

“Of course.” Julie smirked at him. “I’m a missionary. Missionary
zeal
, as you call it, is one of the requirements.”

Will glanced at the damage in the main salon. “I call it wanton destruction, and I’m heartily sick of it.”

“I could say the same of you,” she told him. “After three weeks in San Francisco, I’m heartily sick of men like you. . . .”

“Men like me?” He arched an eyebrow in an elegant gesture made up of equal parts query and haughtiness.

“Gentlemen who become
pimps
.”

Surprised that she knew the word and stung by her use of it, Will nearly made good on his threat to drop her amid the liquor and the broken glass. “Is that what you think of me?”

“What else should I think? You purchased women at an auction. You brought them to your saloon.” She paused to gather her thoughts before continuing. “I can only assume that like so many other men in San Francisco, you intend to profit from their misery, to prey upon poor ignorant Chinese peasant girls and use them to . . . to . . .”

“To what, Miss Parham?”

“To . . . to slake
your
passions.” Julie gasped for breath as she felt the muscles in his arm tighten involuntarily. Her face flaming with indignation and embarrassment, she snapped, “And I’ll thank you to remember that as far as you’re concerned, it’s not
Miss
Parham; it’s
Lady
Julia
.”

Her sudden disdain for him sparked his temper. “I’ll thank you to remember that this is the United States of America. We put an end to British rule. We’re a democratic republic with little use for aristocratic titles. Here in my saloon, it’s Miss Parham or Miss Julia.
No ladies allowed
.” His words were a reminder of her earlier visit to the Silken Angel, when he’d refused to risk her reputation by allowing her inside the main parlor.

“Yes, of course,” Julia replied in her most proper, aristocratic English. “But I seem to recall hearing that the United States of America had
abolished
slavery.” She gave him another of her proper little British smirks. “How wonderfully
democratic
of you to find a way to circumvent that law in order to purchase Chinese females as chattel for your personal pleasure.” She glared at him. “And how dare you preach American civics to me when, judging by your accent, you are as British as I am!”

“Not anymore,” he informed her. “I became an American citizen when I immigrated to this country.” Will bit the inside of his cheek to keep the muscle there from twitching. He was annoyed as hell, but he couldn’t ignore the fact that he found her incredibly alluring. He was drawn to the little spitfire like a moth to a flame. And like the moth, he’d have his wings singed if he wasn’t careful. There was no doubt about it: Julia Jane was maddening. Intelligent, courageous, daring, beautiful, and absolutely maddening. She was different, and that intrigued him. She wasn’t coy and she didn’t resort to feminine wiles to get her way. She didn’t cry or plead or cajole. She stood her ground like a bare-knuckled prizefighter and gave measure for measure every bit as good as she got. After years spent in the company of docile Chinese women—after years spent mooning over Mei Ling—Will found that refreshing and stimulating. “You seem awfully interested in my personal pleasure, Miss Parham,” he drawled, to see how she’d react. To see whether he affected her as much as she affected him.

“I am not!” she exclaimed. “My interest in you is purely professional.”

“Liar,” he whispered close to her ear. “Methinks the lady doth protest too much. Your interest in me is completely personal. It’s neither pure nor professional.”

Julie’s heart began a rapid tattoo. He was too close. She could smell the citrus-and-sandalwood scent of his shaving soap. It mingled with the smell of the liquor, tickling her nose, imploring her to investigate. He was holding her too closely. She could feel his breath on her neck and the shell of her ear, feel the heat of his body as he gripped her below her bosom. Having him pressed against her, having him surround her, made it hard to breathe and impossible to think of anything but pleasure. It took all the concentration she could muster to keep up with the conversation and be able to form coherent sentences. “You are the liar. I don’t care a morsel about your personal . . .”

“Passion?” he suggested. “Pleasure?
Desires?
”

Julie shivered in his arms as warmth spread through her. “Nature,” she squeaked in a voice that sounded nothing like hers. “My sole concern is for those poor unfortunate girls you purchased and installed on the second floor of your establishment.”