Frank burrowed his face the curve of her fragrant neck, covering it with soft kisses as he pulled her legs around his hips. She was as sweet and ripe as a peach.
“Maybe I should check on Bobby first,” she whispered.
“Mmhm,” he agreed, though the last thing he wanted was to let go of her.
She slid off his lap and headed for the stairs. His body felt cold suddenly without her, but he was warmed by the sight of her going to make sure Bobby was all right. He was proud of her, and it made him feel important to be the one to expose the compassion she possessed but hid so carefully from others.
When she returned, she straddled his lap once more. “He’s sleeping peacefully,” she reported, leaning up against him. “The time is right, Frank,” she whispered. “I want to make love to you.”
“Your wish is my command, princess.” Her robe hung loosely around her body, requiring only a tug to render her naked. A full moon streamed light into the room and allowed him full view of her womanly features, from the exquisite slope of her shoulders and the fullness of her breasts to the soft flesh of her belly and tuft of hair between her legs. Her lips looked full and swollen from his kiss.
He shifted and unbuttoned his trousers. She looked down at his hardening member with eyes that conveyed both trepidation and hunger. To his surprise, she wrapped her fingers around his cock in an exquisitely shy, gentle touch that turned it to granite.
Licking her lips, she said, “It feels hard and soft at the same time, like a pole wrapped in velvet.”
He groaned as blood surged to his manhood. “That’s the first time my cock’s been compared to fabric.”
She smiled cheekily. “I’m a seamstress. It’s what I know.”
He grinned back and returned the touch, fingering between the split of her sex, coating his fingers in her honey. “I’ll tell you what I know. You’re a very bad girl, sopping wet from your spanking.”
“Oh, Frank.”
“Oh, Frank, what?” he growled. “Oh, Frank, fuck me hard like the naughty princess I am?” He fondled her little bud of nerves with his thumb and drove two fingers into her slick vagina.
“Yes!” she cried, her head falling back as he stroked her.
He circled her waist to take hold of her and shifted so that his cock touched the entrance of her channel.
“Unnnghhhhh,” she moaned as the tip broached her entrance. Her swollen mouth parted and her eyes closed as he pulled her sex over him like a glove, sliding into her, inch by inch.
The pleasure he experienced plunging into her depths caused him to grit his teeth. “Fuck. You’re tight, princess.” He could feel his cock stretching her apart, and it caused his arousal to roar to life. He needed to take her, to claim her in a raw act of possession, and he couldn’t delay it for another second. He pulled her down so that he was fully seated inside of her.
She cried out and dug her nails into the flesh of his shoulders. Her breasts heaved with every giant gulp of air she inhaled.
Frank held fast to her hips, keeping her fastened to him as she adjusted to the sensation of his cock plundering her body. His voice was strained with need when he said, “Are you alright, darlin’?”
“Yes,” she exclaimed. “I never knew it would be like this…”
“Like what?” He lifted her slightly, causing half his cock to stroke her channel, and repeated the motion.
She gasped as her pussy squeezed around his cock. “So… intense.”
“It’s about to get much more intense, princess.”
She wound her arms around his neck and clung to him as though she was preparing to experience the ride of her life.
That was all the encouragement he needed. His appetite for her was ravenous, and he pounded her pussy, grasping her hips and pulling her down while he drove into her with hard thrusts. He thought perhaps he should be gentler, since it was her first time, but when she made no protest and instead met each thrust with enthusiasm, he gave way to his desires and continued to fuck her deeply with powerful surges.
His hands explored the hollows of her back as she did the same to his. They became a mass of limbs and sensations. When her body shuddered against him and her moans turned into cries, he came along with her, filling her with his seed.
They clung to each other as their orgasms receded, and neither spoke. He wove his hands through her silky tendrils and combed his fingers through, grateful for all that she had given him. Not only had she given him her submission and her body, she had also helped him feel needed and strong after sustaining a lifelong injury. He needed her every bit as much as she needed him.
What seemed like only a moment later, she was shaking him gently. “You fell asleep in the chair,” she said. “I hate to wake you, but it’s getting late.”
He yawned and stood. “I better get home and get some shut-eye, and you should do the same.”
“Yes,” she agreed.
He kissed her. “Thank you for tonight, for everything… caring for Bobby and all,” he said, sleepiness causing his words to be awkward and slow. “I’ll come by before school and check on you.”
“Good night, Frank,” she said with a smile, and closed the door behind him.
Chapter Ten
Victoria climbed the steps to her room feeling like she was in a dream. She’d just experienced the most intense pleasure of her life and felt possessed by a man for the first time, and it was strange to walk into her old room as a new woman. It was only when she saw Bobby that she came back to reality.
Though she still felt a shadow of fear to be responsible for a sick child, it paled in comparison to her longing to do right by him and see him nursed to health. She dipped the washcloth in cool water and pressed it to his forehead. His breath was heavy with sleep, and he looked uncomfortable. Wedged against the back of the sofa, one of his arms was pressed tight to his side, while the other hung over the edge.
“I’m going to move you to my bed, and I’ll sleep on the sofa,” she said to him softly. “You’ll be able to stretch out better.” She didn’t think he could hear her, but it felt only natural to explain what she was doing as she lifted him. It took very little strength. He felt no heavier than a baby, and her heart flooded with remorse. This was the starving child she had berated instead of helped when he’d appeared in front of her shop. Why hadn’t she noticed or cared back then?
She was too closed off toward people before becoming involved with Frank. She’d viewed the townsfolk with aloofness while also longing to belong to someone. With her heart so cold, she hadn’t had the capacity to care that other people might need her assistance, since it had never occurred to her to ask others for help.
She tucked Bobby into her bed. Only a short time ago, she had nearly refused to care for him at all. Now she was not only caring for him but also doing everything in her power to make him comfortable.
He stretched out his arms and legs, confirming to Victoria that he indeed needed more space to feel comfortable. He said, “Mama” softly with his eyes closed, shifted his body to lie on his side, and settled into quiet again.
She stared at him. Sudden tears rushed to her eyes. It dawned on her that she and this boy were both missing parents. But she was nineteen with a livelihood, and this boy was six and unable to access food or basic life necessities. How much harder was life for him than for her? How could she not have seen this before? She thought about someday having a child with Frank. If something happened to them both, she would want someone in the community to care for their child and not turn a blind eye like she had done. She would want her child to meet someone with unreserved compassion, like Frank. She wiped her eyes and walked to the sofa.
She didn’t get much sleep that night. The sofa was uncomfortable, she thought often of her relations with Frank, and she kept checking the boy to make sure his fever wasn’t worsening.
Birds tweeting from a tree branch near her window alerted her to dawn. She climbed up from the sofa feeling groggy, but she was not concerned
about sleep deprivation. When she felt Bobby’s forehead, it was cool and dry. She silently rejoiced. That was worth every minute of wasted sleep.
She hummed as she lit the stove and retrieved eggs, cheese, and grits from the cupboard. With Bobby’s fever broken, he would no doubt be hungry, and she looked forward to getting some meat on his bones.
Bobby opened his eyes, and Victoria smiled at him. “Are you feeling better, dear?”
He blinked and sat upright in bed, looking at her with an expression that conveyed confusion and fear, and Victoria realized her previous interaction with him while he’d been conscious had been in front of her store, where she had berated him for digging through the trash.
“It’s alright, Bobby,” she said in as soothing of a voice as she could muster. “I’ve been taking care of you while you’re sick. Don’t worry about anything.”
He sank back against her embroidered pillow and gazed around the room. He looked dirty and out of place in her neat space. Victoria had a moment of disbelief that this was even happening. When malaria had struck the town, many children were left orphaned, and wealthier townsfolk had taken some of them in. But of course Victoria hadn’t been one of them. She hadn’t been able to fathom sharing her home and life with a needy child. And seeing Bobby lying there like a dark, awkward shadow in the morning light, she still couldn’t.
“Where’s Mr. Bassett?” Bobby asked in a small voice.
Victoria stirred the scrambled eggs in the pan. “He said he would be here before school to check on you. How about we get you some breakfast before he arrives? Are you hungry?”
“Yes’m,” he answered.
“Can you come to the table, or are you too weak?” She hoped he would not require food in bed, though it seemed silly to care about that. She would have to boil her sheets regardless.
Bobby pushed aside the pink blanket and walked toward the dining table. She noticed for the first time the sad state of his clothing. He wore rags much too large for him. She guessed they had been his father’s clothes at some point. The boy stunk, too, and she decided it was imperative to draw him a bath, even if it meant opening the store later than usual.
She steered him in the direction of a stool at her table, where she had eaten every meal alone since her parents had died. While the eggs finished cooking, she poured him a glass of milk. He sipped from it immediately, and she was cheered by his appetite.
She was aware of his eyes on her as she prepared the grits, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. It felt nice to be doing something for someone other than herself. She envisioned sometime in the future having a morning like this with Frank and a child of their own. The three of them could talk and laugh and share stories. Her heart filled with joy at that prospect.
She set the breakfast on the table and handed Bobby a fork. After they’d both taken a few bites, Victoria said, “Tell me, Bobby, do you know where your ma is? Why wasn’t she at home to care for you when Mr. Bassett went to check on you?”
She watched with regret as the boy’s eyes filled with tears. Blazes. She should have waited for Frank to ask the tough questions. She didn’t know how to comfort the poor creature, and that kind of thing seemed to come naturally to Frank.
Bobby shook his head, and in a voice only a notch above a whisper said, “The chickens stopped laying eggs. After we ate them, Mama left to find work. That was a long time ago.”
The water for the coffee whistled on the stove. Victoria stood and removed the kettle from the burner. With her back turned, she said, “I’m sorry, Bobby. I lost my ma too, and it’s just terrible not having a mother.” It seemed like the right thing to say, and it was true, though the circumstances behind them losing their mothers was different. It wasn’t clear to her that Susan had actually died, but regardless, Bobby had certainly lost her. Victoria poured herself some coffee and returned to the table.
Bobby stirred his grits. “She told me not to tell anyone she left. She said she’d be back before the potatoes and beans ran out and if I told anyone she was gone the marshal would take me away because I’m too young to be living on my own. But the food’s been gone for ages and she’s not back.”
That explained what Frank had told her—that Bobby didn’t have anything to eat except for what Frank gave him. Victoria wondered what would happen to the boy. Susan had likely been right that the marshal would send him away, probably to an orphanage.
Victoria blew on her brew, causing steam to rise and dance over the mug. Where was Frank? She looked at the clock and saw that it was nearly half past eight, the time when he started classes at the schoolhouse. She frowned, but she couldn’t think long on Frank’s absence because Bobby started coughing and couldn’t seem to stop for some time. Victoria placed a glass of water in front of him and told him to drink after the coughing died down. She searched for the remainder of the linseed oil as a sense of helplessness passed over her. That cough didn’t sound good at all, and perhaps he wasn’t out of the woods yet.
By the time she and Bobby finished eating, it was nearly nine o’clock. Frank hadn’t arrived. She wondered if perhaps he’d overslept and had to go straight to the schoolhouse to get there in time.
“Bobby, I need to go out. Will you be alright here on your own?”
When he said he would be, Victoria left, promising him a warm bath on her return.
The schoolhouse was less than a mile away, but it seemed much farther. With every step in its direction, her thoughts grew darker. The more she thought about Frank’s failure to check on her and Bobby, the less it made sense to her. If he had indeed overslept, surely he would have sent a child as a courier to deliver that message to her.
She picked up speed, her shoes kicking up dust along the dirt path. She passed several townsfolk along the way, but she didn’t engage with them except to offer a quick nod of greeting. A group of children were playing by the trough in front of the livery. She recognized one of them as Heath Wolfe’s boy, Jack, and from what she knew of him, he was not the type to play hooky. His presence could only mean that school wasn’t in session.
This was confirmed to her upon arriving at the empty schoolhouse. Frank had not only failed to arrive at her place, he’d also failed to arrive to work. She peered into the dim, cool room, and her heart squeezed with fear. “Frank, are you in here?”
Silence answered her, as she knew it would. “No need to panic,” she told herself out loud. “There’s got to be a perfectly reasonable explanation.” But even as she formed the words, she knew the truth. Something was terribly wrong.
She headed to the boardinghouse. Maybe he’s still sleeping, she thought. It wasn’t completely out of the realm of possibilities. People slept too long when they were tired.
Children ran past her on the sidewalk, whooping and hollering, no doubt glad to be free from a classroom for the day. As she approached the boardinghouse, she spotted Marshal Clyde Shaw and his deputy Benjamin Gray talking to the landlady on the front steps.
Victoria guessed that someone had reported Frank’s absence and the marshal was already investigating. While this knowledge might have provided her with some relief, instead it only managed to distress her further. With the law involved, there was no doubt something serious had happened. Victoria stopped behind the trio, and no one seemed to notice her or care that she was there.
“He’s not in his room. He didn’t come home at all last night, Marshal,” Mrs. Fairfax said, shaking her head. “I know all the comings and goings of my patrons, and I can’t say as I approve when a working man is out past midnight, carrying on in the saloon or whatever he might be doin’. It ain’t right, ‘specially since he’s meant to be an example to the children.”
The marshal used a carefully modulated voice, as though forcing himself to be patient. “It’s not that I don’t believe you, Mrs. Fairfax, but I’d like to see for myself whether he’s in his room.”
“Oh, that’s not a problem. But I’m telling you, he’s not there.” She turned and walked inside. The
marshal and his deputy followed, as did Victoria. That’s when the marshal took notice of her. “A little busy here, Miss Davis,” he said gruffly. “You got a complaint? Wait at my office.”
“I don’t. I want to know what happened to Frank Bassett, just like you. He was with me late last night, and he told me he would visit me early this morning, but he never showed up.”
The marshal’s eyebrows shot up, and Victoria averted her gaze. She’d just managed to give away details about her relationship with Frank that appeared anything but chaste. In any other circumstance, she might have said something to regain her pride, but she didn’t care enough to expend the effort in that moment.
Clyde shook his head. “A real mystery. I don’t know the man well, but he doesn’t seem like the type to shirk his work without cause.”
“He’s not,” Victoria confirmed.
The four of them walked up the steps to Frank’s room. Mrs. Fairfax took an infuriatingly long time rummaging through a large set of keys around her ring before she found the right one.
When she opened the door and they stepped in, no one spoke. It seemed as though everyone held their breath, trying to process the scene and draw some conclusion other than the obvious.
The room was cold and empty. The stove wasn’t lit, the curtains were drawn, and an unmade bed stood forlornly in the corner. It appeared as though even ghosts had abandoned the space.
Finally, Clyde cleared his throat. “Was he the tidy sort, Mrs. Fairfax? I mean, would he make his bed before leaving in the morning?”
“Hardly,” the landlady scoffed. “What man would?”
Clyde frowned. “That means we have no way of knowing whether he came home and slept in his bed last night, but to me it doesn’t appear he did. Not even a mug for coffee on the table or a candle taken down from the shelf.” He turned his attention to Victoria. “You say he was with you last night? What time did he leave?”
“I don’t know exactly, Marshal,” Victoria stammered, her mind racing. “I’m guessing around eleven o’clock or so.”
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