He said, "I know that."
He snaked an arm around her trim waist. Drew his wife to him with a suddenness that took her breath away. Their lips met. A torrid kiss. Passionate dueling tongues. But it had to end.
Kate drew away. She turned and commenced the walkdown that would take her face to face with Rosa, maintaining a slow, even pace.
J.D. blocked emotion from his mind. It would only distract him.
He swung his attention in the direction of the livery stable down the street where they had left their horses. They had also entrusted their rifles to the locked box kept there as a convenience for customers. If Paco was as slow-witted as he seemed to be, a brute who had risen to prominence in his world through savagery rather than smarts, it may have taken him a few minutes to think of that locked box.
J.D. ran toward the stable. A few yards short of it, he heard a cry of alarm and pain, cut off as quickly as it began. He brought up his twin Colts, pressed his back to the stable door and peered around with one eye.
Paco was in there, all right.
But he was occupied with unlocking the oblong case where rifles were stored.
The body of the stable hand lay face down in the hay, unmoving. His neck was twisted at a peculiar angle.
Paco rose from the case holding a Winchester that J.D. recognized as his own.
J.D. left his cover.
"Stop right there, Paco. Lose the piece."
As soon as he spoke those words, J.D. knew he’d made a mistake. Despite the death of Belton and the looming showdown between Kate and Rosa that he hoped like hell would end with Rosa biting the dust, there still remained that slim chance of collecting a reward by turning over an alive Paco.
Paco pivoted to face him, the Winchester spitting lead. The rifle blast filled the stable. Horses whinnied. J.D. saw the move coming, fast as it was. He flung himself into a sideways dive and hit the ground while Paco chambered another round. Paco fired again, cursing passionately in Spanish. This bullet struck a post inches from J.D.’s head.
J.D. returned fire, hugging the unclean floor of the stable.
Paco ducked behind a door that led to where the horses were kept. J.D. and Kate had stabled Paco’s horse alongside their own. J.D.’s bullets struck the wooden door. The outlaw’s horse had received the same care from the deceased stable hand and would now be waiting for Paco to mount and ride away on. But Paco reappeared. Laughing. Having the time of his life. He fired another two rounds.
J.D. sought cover. The bullets missed him.
"Paco, why all the hostility? I thought we were amigos."
Paco cursed, still laughing.
"You will not catch me this time, gringo. I will escape this time. And my woman will kill your woman."
He vanished from sight again behind the wooden door. The jangle of spurs. He raced for his horse.
J.D. leapt to his feet. He charged in that direction.
From just beyond his line of vision there erupted an unnatural scramble of frenetic activity. Wild, ferocious whinnying of horses. Then Paco screamed a single, short high-pitched scream, sounding like a frightened woman. Then nothing except for a calming of the beasts and a dull, wet thud!-thud!-thud!
J.D. found Paco sprawled on the floor of the stable.
Paco had made it halfway to his horse but he’d had to pass J.D.’s stallion first. Apparently the stallion remembered Paco. Remembered the attempted flight and the chase at the river. Recognized Paco as an armed enemy and did not intend to allow J.D.’s armed enemy to pass. The stallion had taken Paco down, rearing back on its hind legs. Coming down hard, downing Paco with a hoof to the head. At this point it was hard to tell and did not much matter. The thud!-thud!-thud! was the stallion’s front hooves repeatedly tromping Paco’s head into the floor, rendering the head into nothing more than a mixture of raw ground meat and strawberry jelly. The wet sound was Paco’s blood splattering over everything in sight.
When J.D. appeared, the stallion calmed down. Stepping around Paco’s remains, J.D. paused just long enough to speak to his stallion in a soothing voice.
"All right, stop horsing around. You did good."
The stallion whinnied a short and low acknowledgement of the praise.
J.D. retrieved the Winchester from where it had fallen. He chambered a fresh round and ran toward the street.
Chapter 26
A few seconds earlier...
Kate faced Rosa Diablo from twenty feet away.
The bandida’s red hair glowed an unnatural, unholy burnished hue in the moonlight.
Revolvers remained holstered, though gun hands lingered mere inches from the grips of their guns. Although Kate wore two low-slung Colts, she intended to draw only one of them when the moment came. A life-and-death showdown, yes, Rosa wore only one sidearm this night and something within Kate would not let herself best this bitch by outgunning her. In gambling, loving and fighting, the best odds favored playing fair.
Of course, J.D. had always told her that was the sort of b.s. that got a person killed.
She tried not to flinch at a crack of gunfire from the direction of the livery stable.
Rosa caught her reaction, though, even in the moonlight, She sneered.
"You worry about your man, eh, gringa?"
Kate said, "If Paco put up a fight, he’s the one to worry about."
Rosa said, "Ah, but that is the point. Don’t you see, you silly woman? It does not matter to Rosa Diablo if that sorry excuse for a bandit lives or dies. A woman needs a man to front for her. I will find another if Paco is dead. But it is woman who rules. It is a lesson you should have learned, and now it is too late because I am going to kill you and your man."
Kate said, "Sounds like you’re fixing to talk me to death. Why the hell don’t you shut your yap and draw?"
Rosa hissed like an enraged lioness and went for her gun. She was lightning fast.
But Kate felt a surge of victory when her Colt cleared leather an instant faster. Kate brought up her Colt in a practiced fast draw. She pulled the trigger.
Her gun jammed!
Rosa cleared leather, laughing. Her revolver became a blur, tracking up on Kate.
J.D. emerged from the livery stable. The first thing he saw registered like a frozen tableau even though each moment lapsed into the next with the swiftness of a beating heart.
Rosa Diablo’s pistola tracking up on his wife!
Kate standing there in that split second, staring down at her pistol that must have jammed!
J.D. raised his rifle. He hardly took aim. He squeezed the trigger before Rosa could bring her gun to bear on Kate. The Winchester’s report barked sharply in the night.
The bullet spun Rosa around, but not because it struck her. J.D.’s bullet knocked the gun out of Rosa’s hand. Ordinarily, J.D. would have been damn proud of a shot like that on a moonlit night, except that he’d been aiming at Rosa’s head! Rosa regained her balance. She drew a knife from the scabbard at her waist. She rushed at Kate.
By the time J.D. had chambered another round, the women were grappling. He held his fire for fear of hitting Kate. He started running in their direction.
Kate saw the dull gleam of the knife in the moonlight. She was in big trouble! Rosa had recovered unbelievably fast from the life-saving shot that could only have come from J.D.
Rosa held the knife high for a downward thrust. Kate brought the useless revolver up in a blocking maneuver that knocked aside the descending knife. But Rosa’s other hand came up simultaneously, without interference, to grip Kate by the throat. Rosa started tightening her grip. Kate dropped the pistol so she could use both of her hands to grasp the wrist of the hand trying to plunge the knife.
J.D. held back when he reached them, ready to take a shot at the first opportunity.
The women were going at it toe-to-toe, circling as they struggled, their expressions twisted with the exertion of mortal combat, each trying to summon the strength to slay the other. Kate’s hands were fending off the knif
e thrust but Rosa’s other hand was tightening its grip of iron on her larynx. Crushing fingers cut off Kate’s air supply. She was gasping.
Rosa saw this. She threw back her head with a lusty laugh.
"So I will carve your dead body! How does it feel to die, puta?"
Kate straightened her right leg. Braced her boot heel to the ground. Leaned in with an unexpected shift of body weight that caught Rosa by surprise.
They both went down hard with Kate on top in such a way that they hit the ground nose-to-nose. Kate twisted Rosa’s wrist in the fall so that Rosa plunged the knife to the hilt into her own heart. Rosa’s eyes flared wide. Kate felt her final hot exhalation of breath.
Kate had only a second before talking to a corpse but she got it in.
"You tell me."
She leaned on the knife with both hands until Rosa Diablo stopped twitching.
J.D. approached. He said, "That was close. Too close."
Kate got to her feet.
"Thanks for lending a hand."
"You can always return the favor next time we’re feeling frisky."
"What about Paco?"
"His frisky days are over."
Kate retrieved the jammed gun and returned it to its holster for later repair.
"J.D., I reckon we cleaned out the whole blamed gang."
"Reckon we did."
"You figure we’ll get that reward?"
J.D. scratched the back of his neck, having wondered the same thing.
"Well, if that fella Belton was their representative, wouldn’t surprise me if the whole bunch of 'em was tightwad thieves. They just do it with a fountain pen instead of a gun. Naw, I don’t reckon we’ll ever see a penny out of this."
Kate spat upon the corpse of Rosa Diablo.
"Seeing this one dead and gone is reward enough. I hope the souls of those two murdered cavalry men will forgive me."
"Kate—"
"I know, we’ve already discussed it." She kicked the dead woman at her feet. "It’s just that now I feel a score has been settled." A pause. Then, "Know what, J.D?"
J.D. thought, Uh-oh.
"What, darlin’?"
"I want to ride out of this town."
"Can’t say as I blame you. Come first light and we’ll—"
"First light hell. We’re riding out tonight."
"But there’s Apaches out there, and—"
"Husband, I need to travel. I need to get Whiskey Bend and what happened here out of my system and the only way to do that is to light a shuck. Now are you riding with me or not?"
They started walking toward the livery stable.
"Well, since you put it that way...Mind if I ask where we’re heading?"
"Anywhere but Arizona," said Kate. "I hear Dakota Territory is nice this time of year."
Ten minutes later they were on the trail, riding north.
BLAZE!
THE DEADLY GUNS
Robert J. Randisi
Chapter 1
J.D. Blaze looked over at his lovely, naked wife, Kate. It was rare that he could look at her and not immediately think of taking her to bed. Luckily, at the moment, they were already in bed.
“I need more champagne,” Kate said.
“I don’t,” he said, reaching for her breasts.
She slapped his groping hands away and said, “Stop that!” She grabbed a fluted glass from the table next to the bed and held it out to him. “Pour.”
“You need to get liquored up to have sex with your husband?” he asked, reaching to the table on his side of the bed for the bottle.
“You need some time to rest and recuperate,” she said, watching as the golden liquid flowed into her glass. He stopped pouring before it reached the top.
“I’m rested.”
Using the hand holding the glass she gestured toward his flaccid penis and said, “Tell him that.”
“Oh, that?” he asked, looking down. “That just needs a little...encouragement.”
“Well, okay,” she said, “let me drink the rest of this down and then I’ll see what I can do in the encouragement department.”
While she tilted the glass back and drank he enjoyed the way her blond moved over her shoulders. Usually, when they were working, she wore it in a ponytail tucked up under her hat. In bed, it was wild and free. As she drank she deliberately allowed some of the champagne to dribble from her mouth, down off her chin and onto her breasts. He felt himself stir. His wife was already beginning her encouragement.
He leaned forward to catch the champagne that was dripping from the tips of her hard nipples. Kate set aside the empty glass then glanced down to watch her husband clean her breasts with his tongue. She reached down between his legs to stroke him.
“Ooh, my goodness,” she said, “I see you’ve had enough rest.”
He looked up at her and said, “Thanks to you. How could any man rest when he’s in bed with you?”
She continued to stroke his hardening penis and said, “No more men for me, darling. Remember? It’s just you and me, for the rest of our lives.”
“That was the promise we made to each other when we got married,” he said.
They had gotten married just two days after they met, but there hadn’t been a moment for either of them since when they thought they’d made a mistake.
She tightened her hand on his hard, smooth cock, tugged on it and said, “And you’ll always remember that promise, right, darlin’?”
“But of course I will, my love,” he said, “why would I not?”
“I saw the way that girl at the desk was looking at you when we checked in,” she told him. “She’s very pretty.”
“She was pretty,” he agreed, but before she could yank his penis off he added, “but nothing compared to you, Kate. No woman can compare to you.”
“You remember that, J.D.,” she said. She released her hold on him and dropped down onto her back, opening her legs. “Now put that monster of yours where it’ll do the most good.”
Not just yet,” he said with a smile.
Instead he snuggled up next to her, kissed her mouth, her neck, her shoulders, moved down to her breasts. He nuzzled her nipples until they were good and hard, then straddled her and continued to kiss his way down her body, pausing at her adorable belly button, then moving down over her smooth, flat belly. Finally, when he was nose deep in her tangled pubic hair, he stroked her with his tongue, long and lovingly, until she was writhing and moaning, growing wetter and wetter until the sheet beneath her was soaked with her juices. Her orgasm crashed through her body, leaving her weak and breathless. Only then did he crawl up on top of her and position the bulging head of his cock against her wet pussy.
“Now...” he said.
* * *
The Denver House had all the most modern amenities of Eastern hotels, including indoor plumbing and room service. While Kate had her bath, J.D. went down to the front desk to arrange for dinner to be brought to their rooms. They still had two unopened bottles of champagne with which to wash it down. When he returned his wife was still soaking, He brought a chair into the room so he could sit by the tub and watch her. Her luminous skin was even more lovely when it was soaking wet.
“When are we supposed to meet our prospective employers?” she asked.
“Tomorrow morning for breakfast, here in the hotel dining room.”
“Then why did we come a day early?”
“Why?” he asked. “So I could spend a night in a first class hotel suite with my beautiful wife.”
“And they’re paying or it?”
“They are,” he said, “which is why I ordered two steak dinners with all the trimmings to be brought up here to the room.”
“When?”
“Very soon,” he said, “so you better finish cleaning that glorious body of yours.”
“But J.D.!” she moaned. “You know I wanted a long, slow soak.”
“You’ve had a long soak,” he told her. “Any longer and you’ll turn into a prune. Co
me on, out you go. I’ll dry you off.”
“Oh no,” she said, brushing his hands away, “we both know where that will lead.”
“And is that bad?”
“Not at all,” she said, “but as you just told me, somebody’s coming up with food. If we go back to bed, I want no interruptions.”
“I don’t blame you for that,” he said, standing. “All right, I’ll wait outside—but hurry.”
“Go,” she said. “Go!”
Chapter 2
Over steaks—and very good steaks, at that—J.D. once again went over the details of their meeting with their prospective clients. In point of fact, there weren’t really many details at all, except...
“...the promise of a first class hotel,” he said, “and payment in advance.”
“One thousand dollars.”
“Just to show up.”
“And we have,” she said, “but no indication as to what the job really is?”
“No.”
“You’re not usually as cavalier as that, dear,” she told him.
“Might have something to do with the fact that our bank accounts are not as healthy as they once were.”
“That’s temporary,” she said. “For people like us there’s always money, isn’t there? As long as people need to solve their problems with our guns?”
“Yes, but how much longer can that last?” he asked. “I mean, look where we are now? All the comforts of an Eastern hotel, but we’re in the West. The lines are starting to blur, my love.”
“I thought we were the kind of people who took things a day at a time. Now suddenly you’re worried about the future?”
“Well,” he said, “I’m slightly older than you. Maybe that has something to do with it.”
“Neither of us is even near forty,” she reminded him. “We have long lives ahead of us, dear, as long as our bullets hold out.”
He poured them each a glass of wine from the bottle he’d ordered with the steaks, then held his glass up.
“As long as the bullets last.”
She raised her glass as well, and they drank.
Blaze! Western Series: Six Adult Western Novels Page 10