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hesitation she crossed the distance to the table and sat down in the only seat next to her elegant little stepmother on the rough bench.
    Soledad pulled back with an expression of distaste, as if Maddy were a diseased bug, she thought with forced amusement.
    “I do not want this woman bothering Samuel,” she announced. “He is not strong, he does not need to be plagued with people like this … like this …” She supplied a Spanish word that Maddy was just as glad she didn’t understand.
    “Jake is giving me no choice in that matter,” Maddy said sweetly. “Don’t worry,
mi madrastra.”
She could feel real delight that part of her Spanish had included a translation of Cinderella, and the word for stepmother had lodged itself in her recalcitrant brain. The pale, furious expression on the woman’s face was almost worth the fright and aggravation of the last few hours.
    “Don’t you dare call me that,
puta,”
she snarled.
    Maddy had enough of being called a whore.
“Mamacita?”
she murmured sweetly.
    She couldn’t believe how fast Jake moved. One moment he was straddling the chair, seemingly at ease, in the next he was between the two of them. It took Maddy a moment to realize that his strong hand was clamped around Soledad’s delicate wrist and that her hand held a very nasty-looking little knife, raised in her stepdaughter’s direction. It was too small to kill without a great deal of expertise and luck, but it would have been undoubtedly painful.
    A moment later the knife dropped on the table with a clatter, and Soledad’s wrist was freed. With a strangled sob she pulled away from the table, rushing from the room.
    Jake leaned over and scooped up the knife, his arm brushing Maddy’s benumbed body. “I should warn you, lady,” he said softly, “that we have all reached the limit of our endurance. Soledad is not an unreasonable woman in the best of times, but tempers are very short indeed, and I would suggest you do your best not to goad anyone. For your own sake, as well as for the others.”
    He moved away, and Maddy let out her pent-up breath. The others at the table were looking away, the two women studiously uninvolved, Milsom bored, Richard troubled, the two soldiers amused at the trauma. But no one was surprised that Soledad had pulled a knife on her. Maddy shivered.
    “Are you hungry, Allison?” Richard said after a long, uncomfortable moment. “I could see if there’s anything left.”
    Maddy opened her mouth, then shut it again, stubbornly.
    “Allison?” Richard persisted, confused.
    Jake was leaning against the wall, an amused expression on his dark face, looking for all the world as if he hadn’t just stopped her from being stabbed. “I think she’s not going to answer to that name. Are you?”
    “My name is Maddy,” she said fiercely.
    “And what if only Allison gets fed?” he countered.
    “Then I’ll be very hungry.”
    It was a battle of wills. Her meager determination and pride up against a seemingly limitless force on his side. They stared at each other for a long moment, and the rest of the table was silent.
    Finally he moved away from the wall, heading toward the door, a wry grin on his face that didn’t quite reach his weary eyes. “See if there’s any food left for Maddy,” he said. “I’m going to see if Soledad is surviving. Ramon, Luis.” The names were tersely shot out orders.
    “Sí
, Murphy?”
    “Watch her.” And he was gone.

CHAPTER FOUR
     
    The room emptied swiftly. The two religious workers faded away with a reassuring smile and murmured words of confidence. “You can trust Jake, my dear. I know he seems harsh, but believe me, there’s no one I’d rather place my safety with.”
    Maddy hadn’t been able to answer with more than a noncommittal smile as she industriously scarfed down the plate of red beans and rice that had appeared before her. At this stage she wasn’t about to trust anyone, even the good ladies themselves. If she had to find