Paxton Pride (24 page)

The door opened behind them and the women glanced back. Ed Carter entered and went to the cupboard, reached into the coffee box and pulled out a handful, dropping the whole beans into the grinder. While he ground the coffee Cathy took a cup from one of the hooks and filled it with sugar. “This'll please 'em,” she said. “They been ridin' an' workin' hard.” The man nodded, took grounds and sugar and went to the door, pausing to look at his wife, the trace of a smile turning up the corners of his mouth. Karen watched the exchange silently.

“Law, they'll sit an' yarn until ten o'clock, likely. Men are always talkin' about how women gab, but I noticed they do their share, sittin' around an' tellin' tales when they should be asleep.”

The dishes done and the front room ready for the men to sleep, Karen asked where she could bathe. Cathy called out the front door. “Ed, we're goin' down to take a bath. You keep them rowdies away, now.”

Karen gratefully stripped out of the sweat- and dust-caked dress and pulled on her dressing gown. Cathy was waiting by the back door, a shotgun casually tucked under her arm. Karen started at the sight, but said nothing. They crossed some fifty yards of open ground and plunged into a twisting, overgrown path—more nearly a tunnel—which led to the muted roar of the river.

The water was cool and invigorating and she luxuriated in scrubbing away the dust and grime of the past two days. Cathy bathed quickly, in and out of the water within scant moments. Toweling rapidly, she dressed and picked up the shotgun again, retreating to the shadows to stand watch over the pale form splashing in the moonlight. By the time Karen climbed out of the water, hair and body scrubbed clean and glowing, she could contain her curiosity no longer. “Why do you carry the gun?”

“Ed wouldn't let me come down here if I didn't. You never can tell, especially at night. We'd best get back. He'll worry.” Karen quickly pulled on her dressing gown and followed the hosteler's wife back to the cabin.

Inside, the two women talked, mostly of the east and the life they had known. Karen let her hair hang free, toweled each section briskly until her scalp tingled and then brushed vigorously over and over again until the golden waves flowed with a life of their own. Cathy carefully wrapped the comb in a piece of silk cloth and stored it with the few simple treasures she had gathered in a box kept under her bed. A hosteler's wife had little finery, and Karen's generous gift would be well cared for, cherished deeply. Guiltily, she recalled all the pieces of jewelry she had forgotten, lost or given away as useless over the years. And what wouldn't this woman, whom a simple gift had moved to tears, have given for even a tenth of them?

The hour was late. Outside the door in the front room the men came in, rustled about and fell silent again. The faint sound of a snore carried through the wall. Karen cleaned the oil from her face and fiddled with her hair, trying to arrive at some semblance of a coiffure. Nothing would work. She sighed in exasperation and started to say something to Cathy, then realized the older woman was sound asleep. Settling for a simple bun she could wrap with a kerchief in the morning, she blew out the lantern, stripped off her dressing gown and tried to lie down to sleep.

But sleep wouldn't come. Quietly she rose and crossed to the window to look out. Behind the cabin the dark thicket masked the river sound until only a soft whisper reached her. Three Rivers … Cathy had named them for her. The Nueces, the Leona and the Aransas, all converging within a few hundred yards of each other and running cold and pure, excellent for bathing, especially during the warm summer months. Above, the stars.…

A form moved in the moonlight. Someone was walking across the clearing. The moon cast a pale light upon the figure, outlining him for a moment before he disappeared into the river path. She recognized Vance and started to call his name, instead, hurried from the window to the door. Silently she lifted the bar and impetuously stepped out into the night. The evening was warm and alive with the raucous music of cicadas and crickets, and in the dark shadows left by the pale moonlight, fireflies flickered, dancing all aglow like tiny, tremulous dryads beckoning her.

Vance was nowhere to be seen. The brush was thickly choked with prickly scrub trees and the trail, more mysterious and frightening now she traveled alone, swerved and twisted through the fastness. The only path Vance could have taken, she knew it must eventually lead her to him. She toyed with the notion of turning back to the house, then dismissed the idea. If Vance became upset when he found she had ventured outside her stuffy room, that was just too bad. She was not a child to be scolded nor a servant to be chided and ordered about. Deftly she picked her way along the trail, the noise of her passing blotted out by the insect songs and the muted roar of the churning river ahead.

Abruptly the foliage parted. From where Karen stood a stretch of clear ground cut a sandy swath some ten feet in width, forming a pleasant little beach. To her right, upstream, large rocks protruded from the water and on the western bank a twenty-foot bluff reared darkly into the night, forming a sequestered cove screened by the tangle of willows and junipers skirting the bank. A pile of clothes lay sprawled at the edge of the water, barely visible as a cloud touched the moon.

She took a wary step out of the covering foliage, then drew back as a pale shape rose ghostlike from the water. The wayward cloud, passing on, released the captive moon and a shimmering curtain of silver dappled the surface of the river with twinkling diamonds. The sand at her feet glowed in the pale light.

The form was of a man. Without even seeing his face Karen knew he was Vance, could only be him. The water level dropped from his chest to his waist, to his thighs, calves and ankles … she wanted to run yet did not, held in place by the sight of the primeval, glistening form, naked and powerful.

Her eyes roved down past the ridged muscles of his chest and flat stomach, lingered spellbound at the patch of dark curls and length of flesh and muscle protruding there. Karen blushed yet could not draw her eyes away. She had never seen a man. Not … like this … all of him. Vance had stopped, stood motionless. Karen realized he was watching her and she stepped out onto the sand, drawn by the magnetism of his eyes. She stepped closer, past the pile of clothes, her breath ragged and the sound of her heart beating wildly in her ears.

And then she was within reach. Vance shook his head and drops of water flew into the night His eyes bored into her, drove deeply to force open her heart of hearts. She lowered her eyes, not wanting nor able to stare into his, only to find her attention drawn again to the forbidden place where his manhood, prompted by virile hunger, swelled and rose as she watched.

She gasped sharply.
So big … I didn't know, So big … in me …
The very air bristled with the energy sparking between them. Her hand reached out to touch the quivering organ and her fingertips traced along his length that grew harder and more erect, rigid with expectancy. Vance shuddered as her hand explored him, as his own hands caressed her tear-streaked cheeks then floated gently down to the ribbons that fastened her dressing gown.

For the first time she realized how tight her nipples had grown. Her breasts felt full and eager, ripe for his teasing lips. He slid the gown over her shoulders, letting the fabric drop until it caught at her waist where a last bow held firmly. His hands cupped each breast, his fingers provoking their taunt pink crowns and forcing a shameless moan from her throat before they slid down her sides, stopping at the swell of her hips where the gown still clung and moving across her stomach to tug briefly at the ribbon. Karen started to protest but the gown instantly dropped free. She stifled a second, more abrupt exclamation. No man had ever seen her like this, naked and in the voluptuous bloom of womanhood. She drew her hands away from him and tried to cover herself, but Vance caught her wrists and held them gently but firmly away from her body.

She was beautiful. Utterly so. A woman of classic mold. He kissed her lightly along the cheek, neck and shoulders, down between the luscious swells of her naked breasts, twin mounds of perfection swollen with the ache of desire. His knees struck sand as his lips journeyed randomly across her stomach and lower abdomen, lower still to tease the triangle of tight honeygold ringlets. Then lower still. He released her wrists which promptly fell and tried to push him from her.

“No, Vance.…” she said, her voice breaking. Her legs felt weak and she feared she might faint. The palms of his hands slid up the backs of her thighs, spreading and kneading her buttocks, forcing her forward into his kisses. His fingers stroking from behind brought an ecstasy never before experienced, never even imagined in her wildest dreams. Her mind awhirl, she felt her maidenhood flush warm and moist with a desire that drove her hands away and parted her thighs to let his tongue flit across that most secret kernel of her mounting passion, gently, deeply probe the soft membranous confirmation of her virginity and travel back to tease the swollen bud of her desire.

He can't … I can't let him …!
Her fingers clawed at the tangled brown mane below and the breath whistled in her throat. Deep within her the pain of ecstasy built, throbbing blindly, overwhelmingly as his tongue brought her to a shuddering climax. Sobbing and openly moaning, her legs buckled and she sagged to the moist sand, her back arched, caught in the uncontrollable waves of the slow, rolling explosion.

Now was the time. Now was the place. Beneath the night's starry vault she whispered, “Now! Oh, Vance, now. Please … please.…”

Her legs parted, the musky sweetness beckoning him. Vance tried to calm his own raging passion as her hand sought him and her small fingers enfolded the engorged, impatient member. His chest pressed against her rigid nipples and his mouth covered hers as his manhood stood poised and touching the treasured gate of her body.
Be gentle. This is her first time. Be gentle
… he repeated over-and over to himself lest he succumb to the tempest of the moment.

And then he heard the soft splash of a horse entering the water downstream. Several horses, almost inaudible save for one whose wilderness-honed hearing could pick the slightest unnatural sound from the roar of the rushing river.
What the hell!
His head lifted and his body stiffened, his ardor at once cool, the passion draining from him instantly. A second passed before Karen realized something was wrong, realized there was an unexpected and unaccountable lull in their love-making. He brought his mouth to her ear. “Take your gown and get to the bushes. Don't make a sound.”

“Vance … what? It's all right. I want to.…”

“Dammit, do like I said,” he whispered abruptly and harshly. He rolled off her and to his clothes. Karen's face went livid with anger but before she could speak he returned and dragged her by the arm into the concealing foliage.

“Of all the …”

Vance roughly clamped his hand over her mouth. “Shut up and get dressed,” he said, more out of anger at himself than her, though she could not know that.

In a moment he was into his hat and jeans, had his gun-belt around his waist and was stepping into a pair of moccasins. He slipped a knife into a sheath on his belt. Karen, embarrassed now by her nakedness, drew the dressing gown about her, fastening it haphazardly while Vance searched the river bank for signs of life. Karen sighed aloud and in return received a furious glance from the man who only a moment before had been so arduously making love to her.

She was no sooner dressed than Vance pointed toward the path leading to the house and nudged her gently. “Move. Now.” She grudgingly entered the trail, still unconvinced of danger for she had heard nothing. It was dark under the trees. Heavy shadows hung over her. Something rustled in the brush to her left. What? A footstep …? Suddenly she was filled with fear. Supposing there were Indians … or renegades, as she had heard the men discussing? Vance must have heard something, some sound to which her ears weren't attuned. If she could only reach Cathy. There she would be safe within the impregnable adobe walls.…
Oh, my God! The door to Cathy's room
…
The back door!

There had been no way to lower the bar from the outside and she could picture the door swung open and inviting, the woman inside, asleep and unsuspecting. A new and colder wave of malicious prickling fear added impetus to her movement and she found herself in headlong flight down the path. Thorny fingers reached out to pluck at her gown, catching and tearing at sleeve and skirt as she ran.…

At least three. No less. Who? Who!?
Vance checked the river bank one last time, spun about at the noise of Karen's hasty passage through the woods and quickly changed position, concealing himself behind the trunk of a cottonwood at the mouth of the path. He cursed silently. Every broken twig and stumbling step served to pinpoint her location. Downstream he heard the soft sound of a twig or branch rubbing against cloth, then the muffled pounding of hooves along the bank. Whoever they were, he could only hope they didn't know of the path. Even as the thought passed through his mind he knew himself for a fool. They would know. Of course they would know. The sound of their horses gave them away. They were heading directly for his position at the head of the path, the quickest and easiest way through the thicket.

He could hear the horses clearly now. Soberly, he considered the next few minutes. He was squatted low in the brush, partially concealed by the tree trunk. He didn't want a fight until he could be sure Karen was safely inside, yet was willing to stand and give battle should trouble come his way.

At least he could no longer hear Karen.
She must be near the cabin by this time. Unless
.… No, he dared not think so. Twenty-five yards away, and still the brush intervened. He couldn't consider shooting before he had a clear shot. A bird took flight from a willow and the men on horseback froze suddenly, looked around. A hoarse whisper of reassurance and they moved on again. Vance's aim never wavered from the spot where the first rider would clear the brush.