A Hope Undaunted (2 page)

“Sure thing,” Luke said, his eyes taking in the intimate gesture with cool disregard. His gaze met and held hers for several seconds, unnerving her with his apparent disapproval. He turned away.

Her ire soared. “Extra whipped cream and sprinkles,” she said in a clipped tone.

He turned and nodded, full lips pressed tight. “You bet.” He started toward the counter.

“And don’t skimp on the cherries,” she called after him.

He kept walking, but the stiff muscles cording his neck and back told her he’d more than heard. She forced a smile to deflect her embarrassment and took a deep breath. “Well, he’s a sunny individual, isn’t he? Night help must be hard to come by.”

“At least he’s nice to look at,” Lilly said with a sigh.

“He’s a two-bit soda jerk, Lil, with more attitude than brains.” Roger Hampton glanced at the soda counter with disdain. “We oughta complain to Robinson.”

“Humph . . . he’s not that special,” Katie said. Her eyes narrowed while she watched him scoop ice cream into the mixer.

“Come on, Katie, you’re just miffed because you didn’t get your hamburger. The man is a real sheik and you know it.” Gen shot a look of longing across the room, then gloated with a grin. “But it is nice to know all men don’t wrap around your finger as easily as Jack.”

Jack honed in for a kiss. “Mmm . . . that’s not all I’d like to be wrapped around,” he said in a husky tone.

Katie squirmed and pushed him away. “Behave, Jack, or I’ll make your life miserable.”

He chuckled. “You already do, doll, but I love every minute.”

Ignoring Jack’s comment, Katie observed the soda jerk laboring over six chocolate shakes and wrinkled her nose. “Get your specs out, Gen,” she said, her temper still inflamed, “he’s more of a hick than a sheik from where I’m sitting. I mean, who has hair that color anyway? Blond straw, almost bleached white. Old men and hicks, that’s who. And he doesn’t even have the good sense or style to comb it back with Brilliantine, for pity’s sake. I’ll bet under that shirt, he’s even got a farmer’s tan. Let’s face it – the man’s a hayseed.”

Lilly and Gen sighed as they watched Luke work behind the counter. “I believe I’d like a glimpse of that farmer’s tan, wouldn’t you, Gen?” Lilly whispered with a giggle.

The frown stayed on Katie’s face until the soda jerk finally returned, toting a tray of milkshakes. “Six Robinson’s specials.” He deposited tall, frosty glasses to each at the table, along with six glasses of water. He set Katie’s down last with a considerable thud. One maraschino from the mountain of cherries obscuring her milkshake rolled off, landing on the table with a plop. “Enjoy,” he said with a stiff smile. “And let me know if you need more. I wouldn’t want you to go hungry.”

She swallowed hard, completely unsettled by his direct gaze. “I will. Thank you.” He laid the ticket in front of Jack, then returned to the back to finish cleaning up. She stared at her shake and sighed, her appetite suddenly gone flat. With another frown puckering her brow, she pretended to sip, all the while watching Farm Boy wipe down the counter out of the corner of her eye. Okay, all right – she’d give him “good-looking,” but she’d bet he was dumb as a post. Her eyes thinned as she took a token sip of her shake. And she would lay money on the table that good looks was the only box that character would fill on anyone’s checklist.

Her mood darkened. He was probably just the type of man who was poison to women – strong, handsome, cocky . . .
controlling
. How many times had she seen it? A man like that, sweeping a woman off her feet only to pin her beneath his thumb for the rest of her life. Katie tore her gaze from the soda jerk to stare out the window, her jaw suddenly tight. A man like her father, whose iron rule dictated her every move.

Katie blinked to dispel her sudden onslaught of guilt. Not that she didn’t love her father. No, Patrick O’Connor was the one man who Katie truly did respect and love, the one man whose approval she longed to win with every fiber of her being. A knot of hurt shifted in her throat. But it seemed her father’s approval was something she’d never been able to achieve, no matter how she’d excelled in school. Total submission seemed to be all Patrick O’Connor wanted and the one thing Katie couldn’t give, at least willingly. She sighed, his words haunting her as she stared out the window.
“You’re a
handful, Katie Rose, and God knows if I don’t keep you in
line now, some poor man will shoot me later.”

A handful. That’s all she had ever been while her older sisters had always been “his girls.” A distinction that had neatly separated her, not only from her father’s approval, but from sisters almost seven to fourteen years older than she, sisters she’d never related to. Women who had sought – and found – a relationship like her parents – deep, loving, passionate.
And controlling.
Resolve furrowed her brow. Well, she loved her family, she did, but she wanted more than blind submission to a man. She wanted a career and independence. A chance to pry the thumb of male dominance off the heads of a generation of women who were finally coming into their own. Women who had won the right to vote, to have a career and enjoy equal standing in a world where, up until now, they’d only been second-class citizens.

“Hey, Katydid, wake up! You haven’t even touched your shake.”

She jolted back. The others were staring and half done. She gave him a feeble smile. “Sorry, Jack. Guess I’m not as hungry as I thought.”

“That bozo didn’t upset you, did he? Because if he did, I can tell Pop he needs new help.”

“No, no, please. I’m fine, really.” She watched as Farm Boy disappeared into the kitchen and ignored the warm shiver that traveled her spine. “Just a little tired, I guess.”

Jack shot a glance at the empty counter and grinned. “Well, we got something that just might wake you up, don’t we, boys?” He reached and tugged the menu card out of its glass holder on the wall and set it on top of his untouched glass of water, then gave her a wink. With a quick flick of his wrist, he reversed it on the table and slowly eased the card out from beneath the upside-down glass. The water sealed perfectly, a flood waiting to gush as soon as the “kid” picked it up.

Lilly and Gen gasped in unison. “Wow, how did you do that?” Gen sputtered. “Ol’ Luke’ll be madder than a wet hen when he cleans this table.”

“Jack!” Katie’s whisper was harsh. “Stop it . . . that’s a juvenile thing to do – ”

“Are you kidding? It’s brilliant.” Warren grinned and stretched over the seat to steal the menu card from the next booth. With a devious smile, he upended his own water glass while Jack kept watch.

“Stop it, Jack, now – I mean it.” Katie’s gaze shot to the counter, then back to Jack, Roger, and Warren. “I swear that sometimes you three act like children. I don’t care how obnoxious that soda jerk was, nobody deserves a prank like this.” She butted Jack out of the way in a huff and swung out of the booth. “Now, I’m going to the restroom for a towel to clean this mess up before he sees it, and so help me, if I find another upturned glass, Jack Worthington, you and I won’t be on speaking terms.”

She spun on her heel and marched toward the restroom, an odd mix of compassion and fury rising in her chest as her eyes flicked to the empty counter. Nobody deserved this humiliation and disrespect, no matter how bullheaded they were. Her lips flattened in a twinge of conscience. Even Farm Boy.

The thought took her back to Sister Cecilia’s first-grade class, and the memory dampened her mood as thoroughly as Jack had dampened the surface of their table. How she wished she could forget the crotchety nun whose tight-lipped disapproval represented the first real pain Katie had ever encountered in her life. A time when she’d been torn from the warm acceptance of a home where she was her mother’s cherished baby . . . to a cold, hateful classroom where she quickly became the outcast. The trauma of it all resulted in a pitiful little girl suddenly inflicted with red, scaly patches on her arms and legs. “Are you sure it’s not leprosy?” the old nun had asked in front of the class, and the memory heated Katie’s cheeks all over again.

It may as well have been. Overnight she’d become a leper, the “odd” little girl compelled to wear sweaters and knee socks during the warm weather while other girls wore ankle socks and short-sleeved shirts with their jumpers.

Katie absently rubbed her elbow where the psoriasis had once been, and her throat thickened at the cruelty of children – especially the boys.
Leper. Monster. Freak.
Her anger swelled at the names they’d called her, bullies who picked and prodded and pushed with their superior air. Moisture threatened beneath her closed lids, and she blinked to ward it off. Always the last to be picked on teams, always the butt of practical jokes, and always the target for comments so cruel, they’d left a lasting mark.

“Just so you know, freak, I only invited you for the present,” Robert Shaw had announced when she’d arrived at his second-grade birthday party.

The pain had cut deep – separating her not only from the children who mocked her . . . but from a family whose affectionate teasing caused her to push them away.

Katie blinked in the restroom mirror, and her spine stiffened with the action. An unlikely deliverance had come in the form of a new school in the fifth grade, birthing a resolve so deep, it still ached in her chest. To prove to everyone – Sister Cecilia, the bullies, her father – that she was special. Somebody to be respected and loved. Somebody who would make a difference in the world. She’d made a promise to herself then that no amount of ridicule or bullying would stand in her way. With the fuel of her anger, she’d discarded sweaters and knee socks midway through that summer, embracing the warmth of the sun for the first time in years. And when school started in September and the psoriasis had mysteriously disappeared, Katie was left with the glow of new skin, a new start, and something even more astounding. She became popular . . . a feeling forever fused with a passion for those who were not.

“Katie!” Jack met her at the restroom door and plucked the towel from her hand. He tossed it on a nearby booth and tugged her toward the door where the others were waiting. “We don’t have time for cleanup, doll – we gotta leave.”

She skidded to a stop, her Mary Jane heels digging in. “Wait a minute, Jack – did you pay for the check?”

“Nope, let
Soda Jerk
pay for it,” Jack said with a sneer that made it sound like a curse. “That’ll teach him to be rude to my girl. Come on, guys, hurry.” He opened the door and pulled her through, tripping over a scruffy-looking terrier sprawled across the side of the stoop.

The dog yelped, and Katie twisted free with a cry. “You big bully – you hurt the poor thing.” She dropped to her knees and reached for his paw. “Hey, little guy, you okay?”

“Sorry, Katie,” Jack said with a nervous glance at the counter, “didn’t mean to step on the little mutt, but we gotta go –
now
!” Without waiting for her reply, he hoisted her up in his arms and sprinted to his Franklin Sports Coupe parked down the street.

“Jack Worthington, you stop this very instant!” Her voice rose to a shriek and her limbs flapped as she kicked and clawed to break his hold. Her irritation surged at the shock of Jack manhandling her.
Jack . . .
of all people! The man who catered to her every whim. In a wild lunge, she tried to gouge him, but he only clamped tighter, chuckling while he huffed to the car.

“Calm down, Katydid, we gotta get out of here.”

Oh, she’d calm down all right – with a well-placed clip to his jaw! She gritted her teeth. As . . . soon . . . as . . . she . . . could . . . break . . . free. Her pulse pounded in her ears over the laughter of the group as they bolted for the Franklin and jumped in. Katie’s temper boiled. Men were nothing but bullies – the whole sorry lot of them. Bloodthirsty for control over what they saw as the “weaker sex.” Ignoring her screams, Jack opened the passenger door and tossed her in.

I’ll show ’em weak.
She landed with a bounce and scrambled back up. Jack blocked her with a broad grin. “Come on, doll, it’s no big deal. We’re just having a little fun. Look, I even got you a souvenir.” He pulled her empty Coca-Cola glass out of his pocket.

Her jaw dropped. She snatched the glass and shook it in his face. “Jack Worthington, you are nothing more than a brazen thief, and I will not be a party to this! Now, I am marching back there right now and – ”

“Jack, hurry!” Roger’s voice held a warning.

Katie ignored them both and darted from the car, but Jack was too fast. He picked her up with a chuckle and silenced her with a sound kiss, tightening his grip when she started to kick. “Aw, come on, Katydid, don’t be such a bearcat. Soda Jerk had it coming, and you know it. Now get in the car like a good girl – we gotta scram.”

“How about you scram
after
you pay the bill?” An icy tone confirmed that Soda Jerk was in the vicinity. His voice, deadly calm from several yards away, packed as much heat as a whispered threat from the lips of Al Capone.

Katie froze in Jack’s arms, which went as stiff as his pale face. With a slow turn, they faced an apron-clad Colossus of Rhodes, legs straddled and face chiseled in stone.

“
Put her down
,” he whispered, his words as hard and tight as the muscle twitching in his face.

Jack lowered her to the ground with a scowl and eased Katie behind. “Says who?”

The soda jerk moved in close, towering over Jack by more than half a head. A rock-hard jaw, barely inches from Jack’s, sported a full day’s growth of blond bristle. His wide lips curved into a smile, but the blue eyes were pure slits of ice. “Says me, you little piker.”

Jack leaned forward and jabbed a finger into the soda jerk’s chest. “Piker? Who you calling a coward, Soda Jerk? I’m not paying for anything, especially shoddy service.”

The wide smile broadened to a cocky grin. “My service may be shoddy, rich boy, but I guarantee my thrashing won’t be. Trust me, your little girlfriend won’t like it if I mess with your face, so I suggest you pay the bill . . .” He fisted Jack’s pin-stripe shirt and jerked him up.
“Now.”