Dorothy Garlock (26 page)

With the sureness of a blind man used to finding his way about in the dark, Eli led her to the rear of the barn and the hay on which Hallie made her bed. Gently, he laid her down in the straw. When his lips found hers easily, she drank of him with the intensity of a parched woman dying of thirst.

“Oh, Eli!” she said breathlessly into his ear. The heat of his mouth had sent waves of pleasure crashing over her. Her skin tingled as if it were aflame, her heart beating in a frenzy.

Eli’s fingers found her blouse and deftly undid the buttons. Then, in an instant, his rough, calloused hands roamed across the soft, pale flesh of her breasts, tracing a path one moment and giving a gentle squeeze the next. Shooting stars raced across the blackness that covered Hallie’s eyes.

Hungrily, yearning to feel his skin as he did hers, she tugged and yanked at his shirt, completely the opposite of his delicate undoing of her own clothing, desperate to feel him. He paused from his own explorations to help her, whipping his shirt off so suddenly that the nakedness of his chest rose above her, and she buried her fingers into the thick, dark hair that matted the muscle beneath.

As their passion built, words gave way to heavy, jagged breathing. Their hands seemed to have thoughts of their own; hers worked at the belt buckle of his trousers as his undid the clasp of her skirt.

When his fingers first brushed across the flower of her womanhood, she let out a gasp and bit down hard on her lower lip. In that first flush of excitement, Hallie knew that she wanted more, that she wanted him joined with her, inside her as a man with a woman.

Suddenly, her fingers found the hard, turgid flesh of his manhood and he gasped. Hallie explored every inch of him, surprised by how he could be both hard and soft to the touch. As she caressed him, his passion grew by leaps and bounds, his breath sucked in through clenched teeth, his body squirming beneath her touch. Without words, she knew that he wanted to be inside her as badly as she wanted him to be there.

“I’m yours, Eli,” she moaned into his ear.

Rising above her on his powerful arms, Eli positioned himself between her legs and, with a gentle but firm thrust, he entered her body. A sharp, sudden pain shot through Hallie but she stifled the cry before it could escape her lips and instead, buried her face into the crook of his neck.

“Are you . . . all right?” he asked breathlessly.

“I’m . . . perfect, my love!”

Her words gave him courage and he slowly began to move in and out of her, his thrusts gentle but becoming more fevered with each passing second. Heat washed over her in waves until she felt nearly suffocated. The pain of his initial entry soon began to pass and, with each bucking motion of his hips, she found herself rising to meet him, joining him in a symphony of moans, passion, and wet kisses.

As she lay in the straw beneath Eli, all the troubles that had been plaguing her ever since that fateful morning in Whiskey Bend seemed to fall away, gone forever in the face of the love she found. Even the fear she felt in the mercantile became a distant memory, little more than a nightmare forgotten at first light of day. All that she wanted was here in the now, her body joined with his, a feeling spreading across her belly that she wanted to last forever, to burn as bright as the hottest flame!

She had never known anything like the sensual enjoyment she was feeling now. She moved against him, clutching at his back while he pressed into her. She writhed upward and tensed, wanting to know and have every little bit of him. His weight pressed her into the soft hay, and her arms tightened about him as they rode out the storm.

On and on their passion built until finally Eli began to shudder, his skin quivering. Hallie’s drive raced alongside his, reaching a crescendo that trapped her breath in her chest. Eli met her at the same point and, his body spent, collapsed on top of her as her arms wound around his broad back, refusing to let him go.

Even in the darkness, Hallie turned her eyes up to his in silent answer to an unspoken question. He kissed her, slowly and gently, sharing the moment of sweet tranquillity with her. Propping himself up on one elbow, he gazed down at her tenderly, though only the faintest outline of her body was visible, as she sighed in contentment. In the soft cocoon of the bed of hay, her doubts and fears had dissolved, gone in the face of this new and wondrous sensation. Reaching up, she took yet another kiss, a gift he was more than willing to give.

“Oh, Eli,” she moaned when their lips finally parted. “My darling, Eli!”

“How I have wanted you!” he admitted.

“I feel like I am floating on air!”

Silently, he agreed with her. Taking her in his arms, he nestled with her into the soft hay amid the noises of the growing night, none louder than the pounding of their hearts.

Chapter Twenty-four

“I
’LL STAND FOR
no such thing!”

Seth McCarty punctuated his words by slamming his fist down on to the top of his office desk. The glass inkwell jumped from its mooring and spilled an arc of black drops on the blotter. For a moment, the sound of his blow echoed around the cramped interior of his office before a dull ache began to race up his arm.

“I don’t really care what you won’t stand for . . . I’m going!”

Fawn stood before his big desk in a pool of early morning sun that streamed through the eastern window. In that light, her blond curls glowed like spun gold. He would have found his fiancée beautiful were it not for the scowl spread across her face.

“It’s not your place!” he insisted.

“Not my place to help care for an injured woman?”

“That’s for Eli and his to provide!” he barked, forcing his words to carry an authority he knew they did not possess. “Even if you’re not satisfied with the kind of care she’s getting, even if you believe it to be your Christian duty to tend to her, it is not right for you to have to ride day and night to provide it. She is not your mother, for God’s sake!”

“I don’t care!”

Anger bubbled in Seth’s stomach as if it were coffee burning on a stove. What irked him the most was knowing that she would never have even bothered to tell him that she was traveling to the Morgan ranch to care for Adele Morgan had he not asked her why she needed the buggy for a second day. Even then, he had to press her, to pry the truth from her.
Why can’t she just leave well enough alone?

But the rage that threatened to consume him was not meant for Fawn alone;
there was plenty left over for Eli Morgan.
Time and time again, that miserable cowboy had turned up in his life, attracting his betrothed’s attentions and making Seth look the fool. Fawn’s idiotic claim that her reason for rushing to Mrs. Morgan’s side was her concern for the woman galled him; he’d have had to be an even
bigger
fool not to be aware that she hoped to attract Eli’s attention. If Fawn had her way, she’d throw him over for Eli.

And that is something I cannot allow!

Damn Eli Morgan! Since they were young boys scrapping on the rough streets of Bison City, Eli had always foiled him. To this day, he could still feel the sting of embarrassment of being beaten behind the mercantile, his punishment for what he had done to Eli’s weakling of a brother!
Much laughter and scorn was heaped upon me that day.
All the relief Seth had felt when Eli left for the army was now nothing, less than nothing, and that was why he could not allow Fawn’s shameful deceptions to continue even one moment longer.

If only he’d managed to finish the bastard off when he’d had the chance! If only his bullets had found their mark in the fool’s belly, bleeding him slowly to death directly atop where his equally foolish brother lay. The cemetery was the perfect chance, but he failed. If only he could have another chance. If only he could torment Eli as he had Caleb. If only—

That’s it!

Taking a deep breath, Seth stared directly into Fawn’s eyes and said, “If you insist on going out there regardless of how I feel about the matter, then there’s only one thing I can do . . . I’m going with you!”

“But—but—but—” Fawn stammered.

“Quite frankly, it’s the only way that I will feel good about the whole matter, my dear,” he added, the lie coming as easily to his mouth as if it were the truth. “No self-respecting husband to be would let his intended travel alone in this day and age! Why, who knows what might happen to you if I were not along?”

“What about the bank’s business?” she asked in a feeble attempt to keep him as far away as possible from her interaction with Eli Morgan. “Surely, such an important man as yourself can’t afford to be absent for a whole day!”

“If something were to come up, your father would be more than able to deal with it. After all, he’s the man who founded this institution,” Seth said slyly. The truth of the matter was that Fawn’s father had largely withdrawn from the bank’s day-to-day business, leaving others to carry the load. Nowadays, he was more apt to find comfort in the bottom of a whiskey glass and the whore he sneaked up the back stairs than in a ledger filled with figures and finances. While Fawn was certainly aware of her father’s recent failings, she would not admit them.

“I suppose you’re right,” she reluctantly agreed.

“Let me make a few preparations and then we can be on our way,” Seth said, ending the discussion. “Together, we’ll make certain that Mrs. Morgan is well cared for. Doesn’t that idea appeal to you?”

Fawn could only nod.

Chester Remnick spat, swore, and swallowed a large gulp of whiskey from the bottle that rode in his saddle. From where he sat upon his gray mount, high atop a hill at the edge of the valley, the bright early-morning sun blazing behind him, Bison City sure didn’t look like much. Without the sign at the train depot, it would be hard to tell it was any different from Whiskey Bend, Mansard, or any of the other shit-hole towns he’d passed through over the years.

But this place is indeed different.

Somewhere down there, among the people scurrying about like mindless ants, was
Mary
. A fresh pang of pain at his separation from her washed over him, but rather than trying to tamp it down, he reveled in it, ingesting its poison and letting it course through his veins. With it came the hatred, the fury at those two bitches for coming into his life and destroying it, stealing the only thing that had ever mattered!

“Goddamn whores are gonna pay,” he muttered to himself.

From the moment he’d received the telegram telling him where he’d find his wayward love, he’d done nothing but imagine the horrible retribution he’d commit upon those who had stolen her from him. He’d ridden for countless miles on his horse, the wound in his leg throbbing and aching with nearly every step, but the thought of exacting his vengeance was a salve that soothed his ache, pushing him ever forward in his quest to regain what he had lost.

Now, as he looked down on the rat’s nest that those tramps had hidden in, all his sacrifice, all the agony and embarrassment that he’d had to endure seemed well worth the cost. He’d hardly slept a wink in anticipation of the carnage he would soon cause.

While the telegram had told him
where
his quarry had hidden, it didn’t give any specifics. As he silently watched, the great train rolled into the station belching black smoke and splitting the air with its shrill whistle. Moments later, more people were disgorged into the already teeming streets, a difficult situation for a man trying to find one of three faces in the midst of hundreds.

He’d have to do what he always did; keep his head low and both his eyes and ears open for any sign, any glimpse, or any rotten sniff of them. As to methods, he would have little choice; he couldn’t travel door-to-door, asking for assistance as if he were in search of a lost puppy. Thankfully, he was not a vain man prone to dressing the dandy, showing off in the latest styles from Denver or San Francisco. In his nondescript clothes, he wouldn’t attract attention but would blend in with all the other riffraff—smelling of booze, dirty, and not worth another glance. All he could do was fade into the background and wait until what he wanted happened to come his way.

Chester took another long, hard drag from the bottle, emptying the last dregs, saliva and all, before wiping his whiskered mouth with the back of a filthy hand. He hurled the bottle to the ground, where it shattered.

With a hard dig at his horse’s ribs, he set off for Bison City, to regain the property that rightfully belonged to him and him alone, and for the purpose of extracting a little revenge while doing it.

Walking briskly beside Fawn as she strode along one of the busy boardwalks that lined both sides of Bison City’s main street, Seth McCarty couldn’t have suppressed his smile if his life had depended upon it. With every step, he could feel the revolver resting snug inside his vest, lying in wait for its more sinister duty: to rid him of his nemesis
once and for all
. Not even the insufferable summer heat that pressed down on him nor the sour expression that Fawn wore could put a crimp in his assurance.

“I’m beginning to think this is a splendid idea,” he crowed.

Fawn refused to make a sound in answer, but her silence didn’t offend Seth in the least. On the contrary, her refusal to respond made him all the more sure that what he was about to do was righteous.

I am going to kill Eli Morgan!

That son of a bitch threatened everything that he had worked for, everything that he had cultivated. His attempt at assassination had been just the opening salvo, and that it had failed was but a lone setback. He was destined to succeed in the end. All he had to do was seize the opportunity presented to him, grab the bull by the balls, and he’d be back with Fawn on his arm and her father’s wealth in his pocket.

But his plan was not without difficulty. To travel to Eli’s home, to set foot on the Morgan family ranch was dangerous to say the least. He would have to be insane not to think of the many repercussions. He’d have to make it look as if there had been a struggle, as if he had defended himself from Eli’s attack, and then have to hope for the best. Still, as life-threatening a chance as he was taking, it would be worth it when Eli Morgan was finally dead and Fawn Billings was his.