She readied herself, calling upon the close combat lessons she and her sisters had taken from their sister Lijuan who had learned mysterious fighting skills from the land of her birth. Though none of them could hold a candle to the petite Asian beauty, they still were able to employ some of what they had learned. Tio let fly a swing, and she blocked it and sidestepped, kicking out and hitting his thigh. Four-letter words flew out of his mouth, and he swung again. Wiry, she ducked, and his fist bounced off the top of her head, but she just shrugged off the blow.
“My sister Lijuan always says I got a hard head,” she told him, taking a swing at him as she stepped closer. This time it was Tio who did the blocking and caught her other fist that she swung. He attempted to swing her towards him, but she used her momentum to swing herself further away. Use the other guy's energy against him, Lijuan always said, and she’d be damned if her hotheaded older sister wasn’t right, Catalina thought to herself. She turned her head and bit the man’s arm, getting him to let go of her fist dancing back from him as he shook his arm.
“Damn you, bitch. You’re gonna die for that. Too bad for you because first I thought I would just use you and those big tits of yours good. Now you’re dead, though,” he told her straightening up confidently. Catalina launched herself forward, slamming into him with her shoulder hitting him square in the chest, knocking him back five feet. She grinned seeing her whip at her feet and scooped it up cracking it at him, causing him to fall back further.
“I sure never thought bein’ dead would feel so lively,” she jeered, cracking the whip at his face. He cried out while he dodged to the side. Pleased, she could see she had caught his cheek as blood ran down his face. Still mocking him, she called out, “Darn it, I was aimin’ for your eyes. Oh well, next time!” and she brandished the whip again.
Catalina's whip cracked forward, wrapping around his raised arm and she yanked when it did. It was briefly a tug of war, but he was bigger, and she felt her feet sliding towards him for a second time. She gave a massive tug, causing him to dig in more, leaning back, then she let go, and he fell backward to the sound of her laughter.
Giving another war cry, she dove on top of him, swinging her fist down, connecting with his face. She hit him twice before Tio got both hands on her upper arms and shoved, throwing her lighter body off him. She rolled sideways again. Catalina dove to the side just in time to avoid getting hit with her own whip he was suddenly wielding. Fortunately, it was clear he was not an expert. That made her smile as Catalina flashed back to Honor Elizabeth trying to learn how to use it with no success.
Her full-sized custom bullwhip was not as easy to use as one would think at first glance. When yanking it back before swinging it forward, one had to be careful of how they held the thick leather wrapped around the specially-made iron handle. Honor had managed to duck out of the way and keep herself from getting injured. She never did get it right and decided she was happy with her monster Bowie knife. Considering how good she was with that, she didn’t really need pursuing any skills with the whip leaving that as Catalina’s province, and Cattie had readily agreed.
Her opponent flipped it towards her teasingly, taunting her, and she kept circling him. Then with sudden inspiration she crouched and came back up swiftly, throwing a rock at his head she had scooped up. He ducked, and she threw the second one, that one connecting with his shoulder.
"You bitch!" Tio shouted and in a rage swung the whip full force. She almost laughed as it cracked backward and dug into his other cheek, marking himself as Catalina had marked him minutes before. He cursed and kept moving so she wouldn't have a good opening, shaking the whip out, confused as to why it didn't work.
“Come on, chico, my older sister did better than that,” she said scooping up another two rocks, “and she was durn terrible!”
He cracked the whip underhanded, and it snapped next to her head before flipping back toward him. He managed to avoid getting hit with the weapon at that time. So, she threw another rock at him, and it missed as he ducked, bouncing off the tall rock behind him, rolling to hit the woman laying tied up nearby.
“Sorry, sister!” she called out as the man brought the whip up in both his hands, holding it like a rope.
Uh oh, she thought as he rushed her. Catalina ducked and punched him in the gut, and she heard his breath whoosh out of him, but he got a hand on her shoulder and pulled her in, trying to wrap the whip around her throat. She got one arm up between the whip and her throat as he tried to tighten it against her windpipe He was behind her and lifted her up, her feet leaving the ground, tugging hard to strangle her. The pressure on her forearm was intense, and she put her feet against one of the tall, thin stones and shoved as hard as she could.
Propelled backward by Catalina’s body, the man staggered, and she brought her elbow down and back, connecting with his ribs sharply. His grip loosened, and she dropped free from his grasp, scrambling away. Catalina regained her balance, shaking her bruised arm and catching her breath. Damn, that was close, she thought, shaking her head and focusing on the bandit. She was angry now and ready to end this. She launched a kick towards him, connecting with his stomach. He swung the whip up, hitting her leg with the thick handle causing a sharp feeling of pain to run up her leg, and she hopped back out of range. Both of them were breathing heavily, but blood was running down both of his cheeks giving her a great deal of satisfaction.
She sensed that Tio had obviously realized his size was his greatest advantage and he rushed her again. She attempted a move Lijuan had taught her, trying to remember how it went. Something about women having a lower center of gravity, she thought as he reached for her with the whip and both hands again. She ducked, grabbing his arms and turning, using her hip to lever him over and down. It wasn’t the neatest maneuver, not like Lijuan would have performed it, but it mostly worked as he flipped down onto his back. Unfortunately, she lost her balance and toppled on top of him. He let go of the whip, reaching up and grasping Tio grabbed her throat before she could stop him. He punched her in the side at the same time causing the air to expel from her lungs just before his grip tightened on her throat. Catalina reached down and grabbed his hair lifting his head up as she began to feel dizzy from lack of oxygen. A fleeting thought danced through her mind that this was like a nightmarish version of the new experience she had shared with Natalia Vega hours ago.
Fighting to stay alert she saw two things — Luciana, lying tied and curled up against the far wall of the enclosure. Her eyes were wide as she watched the fight. Second, Catalina also saw, below the bandit's head, two rocks. One had a sharp jagged point, and the other was flat and smooth. Taking a final glance at Luciana, she made her decision.
She slammed the man's head down on the smooth rock, to knock him out instead of impaling his head on the sharp one. His body went limp, and his grip fell away from her throat. She rolled off him and scrambled away, coughing and gasping for breath. He didn't move but was still breathing and quite alive.
Sucking in air as if it were going out of style, Catalina sat on the ground her hands resting on her knees with her legs folded under her for several long moments. Pulling herself together she rose and hurried over to Luciana and began to work her bonds.
“Don’t you worry, sister. I’ll have you free in two shakes of a lamb’s tail!”
“I thank you, but I am not a sister. Not yet, I still study to take my vows.”
“Well, you’re sure more of a sister than I will ever be, let me tell you! Damn, whoops sorry, darn this here knot is tighter than I thought, but I’m fixin to get it.”
Luciana looked back over her shoulder. “I thought you were going to kill Tio. What stopped you?”
“You did, and not because you’re a woman of God now, but at the last second I knew we best be able to produce one of the bandits along with the money. Just to make sure they still honor the deal Lyle Pike struck with them.”
Finally, the knot came free, and Catalina was able to snake the ropes away from
Luciana's wrists. Gingerly she helped the reformed bandit's woman to her feet.
“Part of me wonders if I shouldn’t meet justice. I had every intention of spending that money side by side with the gang. I didn’t know they were going to kill those people during the robbery, but I should have. I knew what kind of men I was running with. I knew what kind of a man my Orrin was. Yet I loved him anyway.”
Catalina looked at the remorse on the woman's face and did not doubt the depth of it and the sincerity. It was something she rarely ever saw with the criminals that they ran up against time and time again. She gripped the woman's shoulder for support.
"If you truly feel that way then there is no point in sittin' in some dirty jail or gettin' your neck stretched. You do what you're intendin' to do. Take them vows, and you spend the rest of your life makin' this world a better place and makin' up for what you done. Seems to me that will rightly clear your slate, Luciana!"
A long moment passed, and the two stared at each other, and Luciana finally smiled and shook her head. Beyond the rock pillars, Catalina heard footsteps approaching. It would be Cassandra returning, and that would leave only one thing left to do.
***
At the final moment, before the sun dipped beyond the rim of the Verde Abundante Valley, the shadow of the tree reached its zenith. It was just another unremarkable spot in the bleak landscape, showing no signs of having been disturbed a year prior thanks to the continual onslaught of the elements. Down on her haunches, Cassandra drove the hatchet into the ground, and rose and faced her sister and Luciana who stood off to one side.
“Please bring him down here, ladies!”
Using a canteen, she found lying around in the area where the men had been waiting for sunset, Catalina handed it to Luciana who used its contents to pour over the face of Tio Sanchez bringing him back to consciousness. Catalina kept her gun trained on him and forced him down from the enclave to the tree. The trio arrived at the same time that Cassandra returned from retrieving one of the shovels that had been tied behind the saddle of one of the dead bandits’ horses.
By the time they had all reassembled, the shadow had evaporated into nothingness, but the hatchet remained to mark the spot. Cassandra quickly untied the wrists of the man that Catalina had bound earlier using the same rope that had held Luciana tight. She gave a nod to Catalina who jabbed her pistol in one of the man’s kidneys.
“Dig.”
The outlaw gave a final look of defiance before all the fire went out of him, and his eyes glazed over. Luciana picked up the shovel and handed it to him, and he snatched it without eye contact from the woman he so desperately wanted to rape not that long ago. Saying nothing, he began to toil.
Cassandra’s cool eyes watched as the man sweated and strained with every shovelful of Mexican earth he overturned. Her mind reeled off all the people this man’s gang had hurt. Not even counting the initial robbery victims of a year ago, they were legion. There was Sheriff Santiago, the deputies, Lyle Pike, who had at least tried to do one worthwhile thing in his life, Desoto, the terrorized nuns and of course the murders of Pasqual and the Mother Superior. All that mayhem in the span of a single day. This lone surviving bandit was damn lucky she devoted her life to law and order because it would have been so easy to drop his bullet-riddled body in the hole that would be left behind after the earth surrendered its treasure.
CHAPTER 11
It was well after midnight as Cassandra Wilde sat on the edge of Santiago's bed, just after dropping the several canvas bags filled to the brim with Mexican currency at the foot of the bed. With a smile, she still clutched one, opened it, pulled out a sheaf of bills, and waved them at Santiago. The man sat up, resting against the headboard with a broad smile on his face. His head was bandaged, but he looked none the worse for wear.
At his invitation, she relayed the day's events from the moment that she and Cattie had left Natchez. She left nothing out including returning Luciana to the welcoming arms of the nuns at Saint Inez and locking Tio up in Santiago's own jail. Cassandra told the sheriff she was thankful that Catalina had left the man alive. Santiago agreed with her that with any luck perhaps the man's testimony might help bring down the corrupt politician Señor Villenchez who had tipped off the Sanchez gang.
Laughing, she also had told him that after all their searching, by accident when the pair had returned to Natchez, they had stumbled onto the bullet-riddled wagon with its draft horse they had been looking for sitting in front of a saloon! A quick visit inside found an inebriated peon who told a tale of finding the horse and wagon abandoned in his field. Only now had he brought it to town this night hoping to sell it to someone to keep him in his supply of spirits. The pair had slipped him some money they called a reward and told him they would be taking the wagon back to Los Lunas where it belonged.
Their conversation had ended with her saying that her sister had returned to visit her friend. A moment of silence passed, and slowly she began to run her finger across his hand that gripped the blanket he had pulled up to his waist. The man’s chest was bare, muscular, and featured hair as thick as a rug. She liked what she was looking at, and she liked it even better when she saw the interest raising in his eyes.
“So, you’re recovering well, yes?”
“Si.”
“Then one could assume that you might be up for many things?”
“You have something in mind, Señorita Cassandra?”
Coyly, she raised one of her eyebrows, “Well, I’m pretty sure that my sister is going to be sleeping over at her friend’s room. So it seems I find myself with no bed to sleep in tonight, unless, of course, I was to find someone willing to share one? What do you think the chances are of that, Sheriff?”
Santiago gave no answer besides a sly smile as he flipped his hand up and seized the one she was using to trace circles on the top of his hand. With little effort he tugged her onto the bed with him, the bag of money falling to the floor with a gentle plop. A moment later she was mounted on top of him, her tongue slipping between his lips, searching for his as her fingers roamed his hairy chest.
The room exploded into a volcanic crucible of burning desires. Santiago's touches were like lava licking up her sensitive skin. Cassie drew back the stands of her golden hair as her eyes flickered downward towards her breasts giving him a signal. The man's hands reached up and began to fumble with the top button of her blouse. Her emerald eyes flashed him another signal, and he seemed to know what it was instinctively.
Santiago tore her top apart, buttons flying off willy nilly in all directions as the liberated mounds of her breasts fell out. Quickly, his right hand slid up to grab one of her soft breasts, and he drew a hardened nipple centered in its large areola into the wetness of his mouth. Cassie knew she couldn't remain calm for any further length of time as she felt his tongue twirling around her proud and erect nipple. Then his tongue began to knead her bud while his hand squeezed her large, doughy breast.
“Son of a…” Cassie gasped as her voice trailed off while her soft hands dug into the sheets of the bed as a tingling swept over her entire body. Her new lover, it had become clear was a man well skilled in the art of making love and knew what a woman needed to be done to her. Proving this, he grabbed Cassie by her curvaceous hips and flipped her on her back such that he was now flanked between her legs.
Their lust-filled eyes made contact leaving Cassie feeling her wetness coming on. She watched as Santiago, with the muscles in his arms rippling, threw the blanket off the bed that had been covering him and freed himself of his pants and underwear leaving him completely naked. Cassandra couldn’t take her eyes off the perfection of his body. Santiago was just like the kind of man that made her moist at the sight of his body. He was burly, strong, with muscles in all the right places and his gaze was commanding. Above all of that, she had an undying appreciation for the rod between his legs. It was long, of a considerable girth and was in the running as one of the bigger ones she had seen among several of the lovers
the free-spirited Wilde sister had laid with in the past.
Springing into action, he seized the top of her jeans and dragged them down yanking them clear of her legs. She watched Santiago as he crawled on her, trailing her thighs up to her pink lips with his wet lips. His course took him through the dense tangle of her golden triangle of hair, up her taut belly and into the valley between her well-endowed breasts before finding her supple lips. As he kissed her once more, he slid the tip of his bulging member into her attention calling hole. Cassandra licked his ear and then whimpered into it as the electricity surged between her legs. His smile told her that he loved the way she moaned and the arching of her back as he rammed the length of his member entirely inside her.
"Oh Juan, hit me hard," Cassie muttered. She loved the way he filled her up, the way his shaft rattled the walls of her love tunnel as it drove deep within her place of pleasure. When the Sheriff of Natchez began to increase his pace, lust was stenciled in Cassie's eyes. The sound of their thighs clapping and their lips clicking filled the whole room.
"Show me how strong you are," Cassie growled as she slowly bit softly into her lower lip and raked her fingers on his back. The Mexican lawman, however, didn't flinch. He had no trouble absorbing the pleasure and pain of her nails but was careful to keep his bruised head with a blood-stained bandage wrapping his skull from coming in contact with Cassie's head. Catching Cassandra unaware, Santiago suddenly dwindled his thrusts until he withdrew his cock backward so that he might have a better push, then he rammed his length back into Cassie's sticky wetness that brimmed between her legs.
“Oh …” she fumbled with words and then completely lost control at that moment. Her mouth went agape as though she was begging for air to come in while her eyes rolled back in her head as she nearly passed out as streams of orgasm shook her body.
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