Slocum #395 : Slocum and the Trail to Yellowstone (9781101553640)

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Slocum's steady hand drew his .44 from the sheath of leather beside the bedroll. Wilma lay on her stomach, still breathing hard. Her face blanched as she looked at him with an unspoken question. Lying on his belly behind the willows with the hammer cocked on his .44, he could not see the two men who, obviously from the sounds, were searching for their camp.

“They can't be far.”

“His horse is hobbled. I see it out there with the others.”

“Where are they?”

Silently, Wilma frowned at him as Slocum held out his free hand for her to be still. He wanted to surprise the hell out of them.

“I thought you said this getting him would be easy—”

“Shut up.”

They must have missed Slocum and Wilma. After shaking his head at her offer of his pants, Slocum eased his way through the willows. He could see the pair standing in front of the tent, their backs to him.

“Hands in the air or die,” Slocum shouted.

“What the hell—” The older one cocked his hammer, but when he jerked around, Slocum shot him in the chest and he spilled over on his back. His loaded gun went off in the air. The second man raised the muzzle of his pistol—obviously shaken by the surprise attack of a naked man.

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

 

SLOCUM AND THE TRAIL TO YELLOWSTONE

 

A Jove Book / published by arrangement with the author

 

PRINTING HISTORY

Jove edition / January 2012

Copyright © 2012 by Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

 

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ISBN : 978-1-101-55364-0

 

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Slocum's heart beating under his breastbone while he caught his breath sounded like a large Indian tom-tom. Changing hands with his Colt Army model .44, he swallowed, then dried his sweaty right palm on the side of his britches. The sharp traces of spent gunpowder filled his nose. His shoulder pressed hard against the wall of the saddle maker's building; his ears turned to hear the sounds in the night, and he listened hard. A dog barked out on the street—somewhere some men were shouting, “Where in the hell did he go?”

I'm in the alley, stupid
. His horse was half a block away, hitched beside the Valley Tribune Newspaper building. By being careful, he hoped to slip down the alley and get to his mount. They didn't know the animal, nor, in all likelihood, had they seen Slocum ride in on him a few hours earlier.

On his move from the saddle maker's building to the rear of the mercantile, he crossed the dark back dock, smelling the sweet molasses feed and feed grain's thick aroma. His eyes adjusted to the starlight even under the porch roof as he slipped across to the far side with some ease. Then the sounds of someone's footsteps moving between the store and the next building came to his ear. In response, he moved to the wall between some crates to conceal himself, his .44 cocked and ready.

“You see him?” someone asked his companion, out of breath and standing in the starlight not six feet away from the porch.

“Hell, no, I wouldn't know him if I saw him.”

“Who in the hell is he?”

“Slocum's his name is all I know.”

“What did he do?”

“Shot someone over a card game in Gertmeir's Saloon.”

“Probably some tinhorn who deserved it. I'd bet he's long gone.”

“Let's get out of here. He'd probably shoot us if we did jump him in this damn dark alley.”

“Yeah.” They hurried back toward the street.

Slocum listened to them shout when they were out front. “He ain't back there.”

He moved off the porch. In a short while, he made his way like an Apache through the alley until he was looking at the silhouette of his horse standing hipshot under the cottonwood branches. Inching his way close to the whitewashed pine siding, he stepped out, undid the reins wrapped on the worn-smooth rail, and put them over the horse's head.

“Easy,” he said to the animal out of habit. The gelding snorted in reply. Slocum about laughed. That horse didn't understand anything except that they would soon be moving. His foot in the stirrup, he threw his leg over and, seated, turned the animal north. The bay gelding set into a jog and drew a few dog barks after him. The skin on Slocum's shoulders felt taut as his horse clopped past some dark homes, and he half expected a bullet or a shout to challenge him at any moment. Soon they traveled between the small, fenced, irrigated fields, and a milk cow's bawling broke the night crickets' orchestra sounds.

He smiled, looked back, and saw no pursuit. Satisfied there was no one coming after him at the moment, he sent the bay off in a long lope. The horizon began pinking in the east over a towering range as it moved closer to sunup. When he came off the mountain and knew he had only a short distance to go before he reached Marla's place, the tight tension in his back muscles eased.

The corrals and Marla's low-sided log house blazed in the first bright light of the sun as he reined up. Marla came to the doorway in a dress unbuttoned down the front. The dim light in the shadows showed flashes of her flesh as she appraised him from inside the house. As she swept her hair back, one of her pointed breasts became exposed, and so did the half-dollar-sized nipple on the right.

“Didn't expect you to come home this soon,” she said in a dry, smoky voice. Then she hunched her shoulders and gripped the dress closed about midway down. He could still see her cleavage. He dropped from the saddle and held on to the saddle horn until his sea legs were firm under him. Then he stepped out and she came over to kiss him.

Finished kissing, he held her and rocked her against him. “I wasn't coming back this soon.”

“What happened?”

“That Townsend kid drew a gun on me in a card game.”

“Oh, no.” She squeezed him harder and pressed her firm boobs into him. “His father has all kinds of power. What now?”

“I better get on my horse and ride. I can't beat him in a prejudiced court of law.”

Her green eyes narrowed and she looked upset at his words. “But if he drew a gun on you, how can it be a crime to shoot him?”

“Money and power, like you said, would get me railroaded.”

“What now?”

He smiled at her, then with his hands, he gently moved the dress apart to expose her shapely body for him to look at. With a mischievous grin, her green eyes sparkling, she stepped back inside the open doorway and undid the buttons on her dress. Then she gave a shimmy, and the dress fell to her feet. She swept the garment up and turned to show him her shapely rump. “Come on, big man, the bed is this way.”

In no time, he shed his clothing and boots. The morning temperature chilled his bare skin, and he stepped over to the bed to get under the patchwork quilts. She hid beneath them, holding the covers up to her chin.

He slipped under the bedcovers and soon began to feel her smooth skin and firm flesh under his hands as he slid against her. He sought her left nipple and rolled his tongue around the stiffening point. She rose off the bed for his attention, her mouth formed an O, and she inhaled. “Gawd, Slocum. That's wild.”

He moved over her leg and nested between them, his rising erection bumping into her. Quick as a cat, she gripped his prod to push it down and then inside her wet gates. She raised her butt to accept him, and he plunged deep inside her.

“What will I do—” Her words were cut off by his strength, which sent her flying away in a thunderstorm of lovemaking, fired by his regrets—today he must part with this passionate female who was rubbing her smooth belly against his corded one. He drove into her with even more fierce effort than usual, and she responded by crying out to encourage him. Lost in each other, they soared higher than a bank of thunderheads and fought through the updrafts to ride the tops of the sky. Then, at last, he came inside of her and she strained to join him. Like colorful hardwood leaves in the fall, they glided back and forth from one side, then the other, until they landed on earth like a feather.