by Kurt Barker
Blackshot turned to Conchita. “Get some clothes on. I'm going out to round up some horses for us, and I want you ready to go when I come back.”
“No! She's not going with us!” Linda burst out.
“That's where you're wrong,” Blackshot replied. “When the boys that were at your house don't hear back from the boys at this house, they're going to figure out where we are, and I don't plan on hanging around here to have another house burned down around me.”
Linda didn't answer but folded her arms sullenly and stalked away. Blackshot went out the front door, and found that the horses the gunmen had left in the yard were no longer there; spooked into flight by the gunfire, he supposed. He jogged toward the stand of trees where he had left the other horse, and saw that the horses had gathered there on the road just beyond the trees, still pacing nervously.
The first horse Blackshot approached shied away, but he soothed it with a soft voice and took the reins. Once this was done he rounded up the other horses with very little trouble and led them back toward the house. He frowned and shook his head as he walked, thinking of that weaselly little bastard Clem Turpin. Two wives! It seemed like every time Blackshot thought he knew the game he was playing, Turpin would change the rules from beyond the grave! It was as if the little cheat's life was a test of how much trouble a man could get himself into, and now the trouble was rubbing off on Blackshot.
And the money! The damn phantom money! Where the hell did the fool hide it? Somewhere it wouldn't burn, apparently, so that just left every non-flammable place in the world to check. Blackshot chuckled humorlessly as he guided the horses into the front yard; maybe he would get lucky and it would all be stuffed in the bottom of that ugly vase.
As if on cue, the beaded vase flew out the window and shattered on the ground among the flowers by the road. Blackshot could hear angry voices and a loud crash as he ran to the house. When he reached the door he found Linda and Conchita locked in a furious struggle on the floor. Conchita was naked, the tablecloth cast aside in the corner, and swiping at Linda's face with one hand while the other held a fistful of blonde hair. Linda's shirt was torn open and her plump bare breasts shook as she bit at the other woman's fingers and sunk her nails into the flesh of Conchita's big brown melons.
Blackshot swore as he jumped in and dragged the two hellcats apart, still kicking and clawing at each other as he separated them. “What the hell are you two doing?!” he shouted. “Don't you understand that we gotta get away from here?!”
“That slut! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna rip her face off!!” Linda fumed, fighting against the strong hand that held her at bay. “Do you know what that whore said?”
Conchita grinned maliciously. “I just told her the truth and the little trash couldn't handle it!” she sneered. “The truth is, I was his favorite!”
“Shut up, you filthy piece of shit!” Linda lunged forward, but Blackshot held her away from the other girl.
“That's enough of that!” Blackshot barked.
“But it's true!” Conchita shot back. “Papi married her first; she told me so herself. Obviously the girl couldn't satisfy him, so he found himself a woman!”
Before Linda could reply Blackshot cut her off. “I said that's enough! I'm not going to put up with any more of this fighting, so cut it out!” he commanded.
“Fine by me,” Conchita sniffed. “I was only defending myself from this little-”
“I told you to get dressed! Now move!”
Conchita said nothing but stood up and smoothed her hair, her chin set defiantly. She brushed past Blackshot without so much as a glance at Linda, her broad bare ass moving seductively as she sauntered toward the bedroom. The sight seemed to cause Linda to recall her own state of undress, and she hurriedly pulled her shirtfront over her naked breasts and tied the tails across her stomach as they had been before.
“Leave her alone,” Blackshot said. “I've had all I'm going to take of this nonsense!”
Linda folded her arms sullenly. “I've got nothing else to say to the bitch. If she keeps her dirty mouth shut, there won't be a problem.”
Blackshot pulled her to her feet and led her toward the door. “Come on, you can choose which horse you'll ride,” he said.
Just then a rifle barked from outside, and a bullet splintered the door frame right in front of them. Blackshot dove away from the door and pulled Linda to the ground.
As the echoes from the shot died away, a voice called from trees by the road; the same thin, nasal voice they had heard the night before. “Hey fella! Looks like we're back where we started!”
Chapter 10
Blackshot did not bother to answer; he got to his feet and pulled Linda behind him as he ran to the bedroom, staying crouched below window height. He knew that quick action was their only hope; he had only just come inside a minute ago, and the men probably couldn't have surrounded the house that fast.
At the bedroom door, Blackshot pushed Linda inside and slipped a Colt from its holster. He let off a flurry of shots through the front windows and the open door, then ducked into the bedroom. A ragged volley erupted in immediate response from outside, tearing through the front timbers and slamming into the inside wall, filling the room with splinters and dust.
Conchita was huddled behind the bed, wide eyed. She wore a thin white blouse which left her shoulders and a considerable swath of cleavage bare, and a loose colorful skirt. Blackshot held a finger to his lips as he moved past her to the window, thumbing cartridges into the empty chambers of his gun. Outside the reedy voice was calling again, but Blackshot couldn't make out the words.
With a sudden lunge, he vaulted over the sill and landed silently in the tall grass outside. Behind the house a narrow strip of lawn separated the back wall from the woods that covered the gently ascending slope of the hills. There was no one in sight, so Blackshot beckoned the girls to follow him outside.
As they scrambled out of the window, the sound of running feet came to his ears from the side of the house. Blackshot stole quietly along the back wall, reaching the edge just as a mustachioed man with a red sunburned nose rounded the corner, shotgun in hand. Blackshot's hard fist drove into the man's jaw like an iron hammer, stopping him in his tracks and toppling him into the underbrush by the side of the house. He lay still in the brush, motionless but for the twitching of one leg, blood burbling from his lips.
Blackshot sprinted back to the window and leaned through it to where he could just see one of the windows at the front of the house through the bedroom door. He fired a couple of quick shots through that window, then slid back onto the grass. A grin crossed his lips as he heard the muffled thunder of the returning fire from the front of the house; as far as the men out front knew, he was still inside and they had a man covering the back!
Blackshot grabbed the girls by their arms and pulled them toward the woods; he knew the ruse would not fool the gunmen for long, and he intended to make the best of what time they had. He plunged through the brush, leading the women up the hill and across its face toward the right hand side, making a wide arc that he figured would lead them back to the outskirts of town. He chose a path where the trees were the most dense, too dense for men on horseback to follow, he hoped.
As he reached the crest of the hill, Blackshot turned and saw that the girls were lagging behind; both were barefoot and they stumbled and limped over the rough terrain. There were no more shots coming from the house, and he new that the pursuit would be coming fast. Swearing under his breath, he ran back to the girls.
“Stand still!” he hissed, and as they stared at him with puzzled eyes, he slid between them, and looping one arm around Linda's waist and the other around Conchita's, he lifted them off the ground. With a woman under each arm like that, Blackshot took off running across the ridge of the hill.
“Cover your faces with your arms,” he panted, “I'm not slowing down for branches or thorns or anything!”
And so they crossed the woods that way like a comical buske
r act, Blackshot running as fast as his long legs would carry him, Conchita keening and Linda cursing each time they passed through thick underbrush, their tits slapping his thighs and their bellies sliding against his sweaty fingers with every stride. The ground began to slope gradually downward beneath his feet as he ran, and soon he caught glimpses of the rotten roofs of the miners' shacks through the thinning trees.
As he scrambled down the hill toward the clearing below, Blackshot felt Conchita's body squirm against his side, causing his hand to slide down her stomach and into the front of her skirt. He felt the warm, wet hair of her bush run between his fingers, and he thought he heard a little moan escape her lips. Blackshot could not see Conchita's face through the unruly mass of chocolate hair that obscured it, but he knew that her movement was no accident. It looks like she's taking her bereavement well, he thought wryly.
When they reached the clearing at the base of the hill, Blackshot swore under his breath; they were not at the edge of town as he thought, but at the jagged mouth of an abandoned mine. The shacks he had seen were only sheds built to hold the mining gear, now rotted almost to the point of collapse.
The ground was at least level and reasonably smooth here, and Blackshot eased the girls down onto their feet. He shook his arms which, strong though they were, were burning now. Linda was squatting with her head in her hands, looking pale and sick; Conchita stood bent over with her hands on her knees, the sunlight glaring on her sweaty back.
“We can hide in there,” Conchita panted, waving toward the mine.
“We could get trapped in there,” Blackshot replied. “Let's keep moving. We're almost to town.”
“I can't run that far,” Conchita pouted. “Come on, the miners used to tell me about the mines. I know my way around them!”
“Oh, that's great!” Linda cut in. “Getting plowed by hundreds of miners has given her great knowledge of the mines! What luck!”
“Don't start that again!” Blackshot snapped.
Conchita laughed. “We should get the little princess out of this sun; she's starting to burn!”
Before Linda could answer, the clatter of horse hooves sounded across the clearing. To Blackshot's dismay, they were coming from the direction of the town.
“Get into the mine! Hurry!” he barked, drawing his Colts as he urged the girls onward.
As they reached the gaping mouth of the mine with Blackshot close behind, a horse emerged from the brush. The rider let out a shout as he spied them and grabbed for the pistol at his side. Blackshot cut loose with the Colts, carrying the man off the horse's back with a bullet slamming into his chest and another smacking into his side.
“Well, now they know where we are!” Blackshot muttered, and the sound of more approaching horses confirmed his words. He ran into the gloom of the old mine shaft as he heard the riders emerging into the clearing. The girls were further down the tunnel and he could only make out their shapes dimly ahead of him.
“This way! Follow me!” Conchita cried, waving an arm to him. The tunnel split in two directions where she stood and she motioned him toward the right hand fork.
“Go! Get around the corner where stray bullets won't hit you!” Blackshot shouted, flattening himself against the wall behind a wooden beam. “I'll catch up to you once I've made them think twice out following us in!”
“Shit! He's dead!” came a voice from outside.
The nasal voice responded, now full of anger, “Hey fella! I'm getting' tired of you! You killed a hell of a lot of my boys!”
“I'll have my secretary send you a written apology when I return to my office,” Blackshot retorted.
“Hell, it don't truly make me no particular nevermind,” the man continued, “I got plenty left; plenty enough to finish you and them bitches.”
“You're welcome to try.”
“You got no stake in this, fella!” the voice cried sharply. “Clem stole from me! Stole from me like a lyin', cheatin' dog! And after all I done for him as a good friend! Look, I know'd he was a rascal, and when he took from me the first time I cut him slack! When he did it again I still let it go, 'cause I figured he was a good fella underneath and he'd come 'round; but what did he do??”
The thin voice was quivering with fury now. “He looked me right in the eye, the bastard! He looked me right in the eye and shook my hand and promised to make it right! Promised to pay me back, and I forgave him! Then he swindled me for as much as he could get, the low down rat! Took away the biggest haul that me and the boys ever scored! Well, I ain't cuttin' any slack no more! I want what's mine and I'll bury anyone that tries to keep it from me! That means you, fella!!”
“I haven't got your damn money!” Blackshot shot back. “You can go look for it hell, as far as I care!”
“You're a liar!!” the man raged. “Clem didn't have it on him, and it weren't in his one bitch's house, and it weren't in his other bitch's house, so I know you got it with you! You ain't got no claim to keep it, fella! It ain't right!”
“If you're appealing to my better nature, that might have worked better before you tried burn a house down around me!” Blackshot retorted.
“I ain't ashamed of that,” the voice replied, calmer now but still menacing, “I ain't even given up on the idea yet.”
Suddenly a bottle flew into the mouth of the tunnel and shattered against a wooden beam at the entrance. A storm of flame burst from the beam and roared into an inferno that filled the shaft.
Chapter 11
Blackshot retreated down the tunnel which was now lit brightly by the flickering blaze, and turned to the right at the fork in the path. The tunnel ahead descended into blackness again, and he had to proceed cautiously, touching the wall as he went to guide himself. He shouted for the girls and Conchita's echoing voice came back to him from around a bend up ahead.
As he rounded the corner, Blackshot saw Conchita and Linda before him illuminated by a faint pale light. The tunnel widened out into a small cavern where they stood, and a little vent hole above their heads let in a meager light and some welcome fresh air.
“The bitch is lost,” Linda said flatly as he joined them in the cavern.
“No, the bitch is not lost, child,” Conchita shot back. “I wanted to wait here for Senor Blackshot instead of running away like a little crybaby.”
“Tell me there's another way out of here,” Blackshot said. “The bastard out there has given in to his pyromaniac tendencies again.”
“Yes, of course, I'm sure of it,” Conchita replied, uncertainty creeping into her voice.
“She's got no fucking clue!” Linda snapped.
“Oh, shut up! It's dark in these tunnels, or haven't you noticed?! I just need to see where I'm going to find the right one!”
Blackshot fished in the pocket of his jeans and found a few matches. “Let's have some light then,” he said. “I'll get one of these boards lying around and make a torch.”
“You'll need some cloth, too,” Conchita said, and whipped her top off over her head and held it out to him with an impish wink, making no attempt to conceal her sweaty bare breasts.
Linda scowled at her, well aware of her intentions. “Use mine. It'll burn better,” she muttered, and tore off her own shirt, offering it to Blackshot while displaying her own naked torso next to Conchita's. Even in the dim light he could see her cheeks turning red, but jealousy had modesty thoroughly on the run at this point, and she left her breasts exposed to him.
“He doesn't need the second best one when he could take the best one any time he wants,” Conchita sneered, seductively running her hand across her slender stomach and down the generous curve of her hip.
Blackshot felt a stirring in his belly at the sight of the four plump, glistening tits in front of him, and but this was no time for fooling around, so despite a sharp pang of regret he said, “Put those back on. I have what I need.”
He found a suitable board among the detritus in the cavern, then stripped off his own shirt. It was well soaked in sweat,
but he found the sleeves to be dry enough to use, and soon he had effected a usable torch. In the improved light, Blackshot saw that the women were finding his bare torso as impressive as he had found theirs; Linda was half-pretending not to look, but Conchita was making no secret of her admiration as her eyes traveled up and down his thick, hard chest and sculpted abdomen.
“Well, lead the way,” Blackshot said to her.
Across from the opening they had come through, the mouths of two tunnels gaped from the cavern wall. After considering for a moment, Conchita pointed to the one on the right hand side. “This one. Yes, this is way,” she said.
“You'd better be right,” Linda grumbled.
“Let's get moving,” Blackshot said.
As they entered the narrow tunnel, Conchita slipped under Blackshot's arm and pressed her body against his, running her hand along the ridges of his muscular midsection. “Let's stay close together so we don't get lost in the dark,” she cooed.
Before Blackshot could respond, Linda had attached herself to his other side. “Let's all stay close together,” she said firmly.
“Yes, it would be such a shame if you were separated from us and we never saw you again,” Conchita sniffed.
The progress through the tunnels was slow, and more than once they came to dead ends and had to turn back to another path, but after some time the ground underfoot began to grade slowly upward, and Conchita seemed more confident with her decisions. At last a faint glow of daylight appeared in front of them at the end of the tunnel.
“I knew it! I was right!” Conchita cried and tugged on Blackshot's wrist to urge him forward. Blackshot didn't need any encouragement to get out of the tight, musty underground maze, and led the girls toward the light as fast as they could go.
They burst out into bright afternoon sunshine and stood for a while blinking in the light and sucking in the welcome fresh air as the cool breeze tickled their sweat-drenched bodies. The mine had let out onto a grassy, tree-lined slope, and straight ahead about fifty yards from the mouth of the shaft was a large pond, shimmering in the sunlight, and beyond it an old house with a wide front porch.