“No, you don’t, you little tart!” He reached out with one big paw and caught the front of her dress, tearing it and pulling her back down on the grass.
She yanked the dirty rag out of her mouth and bit his hand as hard as she could and he slapped her until she saw stars. Just relax and let him do it, her brain told her. Otherwise, he may kill you. It isn’t as if you’ve never had a man before.
No, the only man who would ever have her body again was Travis. She had vowed that and she’d go down fighting rather than be raped.
“What the hell’s going on here?” Abruptly a big shadow stood over them.
For a split second, she thought Leroy had a partner, but then she recognized Travis’s deep drawl and he reached down, grabbed Leroy by the collar, yanked him to his feet and slammed him against a tree.
She was crying with relief, hunched up in a small ball while Travis and Leroy fought. She couldn’t seem to find the strength to get up and run.
Suddenly Harold, Houston and even Kessie, Bonnie and Growler were there.
“Bite him!” Little Bonnie yelled and the spotted dog charged in barking, attacking Leroy’s legs as Travis hit him hard in the jaw with his left hand. Leroy fell backward and then stumbled to his feet and fled.
“I didn’t mean nothin’!” he yelled back. “I wasn’t gonna hurt her!”
Travis yelled after him. “You get the hell out of town or I’ll kill you!”
Violet scrambled to her feet as Travis leaned against a tree, breathing heavily. “Thank God you came!”
“Are you all right?” Travis asked. “Harold saw him dragging you away and came for me.”
She couldn’t stop the tears. “I—I’m fine. My dress is torn a little, is all.”
He bent over and picked her up in his strong arms. “I can buy you another dress.”
She leaned her face against his wide shoulder. He swayed a little as he started walking in long strides. He was a little drunk, she thought, but oh, she was so glad to be safe in his arms.
“You kids gather up the picnic stuff and keep your mouths shut about all this, you hear?” Travis commanded. “If it got out, it might ruin Violet’s reputation; people are funny about stuff like this.”
She had no reputation to save, but of course he didn’t know that. Violet felt guilty as she closed her eyes and relaxed, just happy to be in his embrace.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” His warm breath smelled of liquor, but she didn’t care.
“As long as you’ve got me, I’m fine,” she whispered.
“Let’s go, kids,” he ordered.
They started away from the picnic area, Travis carrying her easily. From here she could see that the party had broken up except for a few men still hanging around the beer booth singing and talking.
He carried her through the shadows of the trees so that no one could see them as they returned to the house. Travis took her inside and stood a moment. “Houston, light a lamp and you kids get ready for bed.”
Houston lit a lamp and in that small glow, Travis carried her in and laid her on her bed. He stood there in the semidarkness looking down at her and she realized that her dress was torn so that it revealed a little of one of her breasts. She hurried to cover it up.
His craggy face looked troubled and confused as he stared and she felt the tension in that gaze. He looked hungry, hungry like a man who has gone without food a long, long time. Would he now make love to her? She looked up at him expectantly, waiting, wanting him as she had never wanted a man.
Instead, he cursed and left her bedroom, slamming the door. She heard his thundering voice to the children. “You kids go to bed. I’ll be home after while.” He sounded angry.
She heard him go out the front door, slamming it behind him.
Violet got up and hurried to the window. He was a little drunk, all right. She watched him stagger back to the party and get himself another beer. Some of the drunks had gathered and were singing “Jeannie With the Light Brown Hair.” Travis joined them.
In disgust, Violet put on a nightdress, tiptoed in to check on all the children. They were all asleep. She was tired, too. It had been a long day and she’d been roughed up and terrified by Leroy. She doubted that man would stay in town; he’d be too afraid of Travis.
She went to bed, but she could not sleep. In her mind, she saw Travis as he had been just now, looming over her again, all hot, aroused male, eager to take her. She had yearned for him to reach down, grab her and pull her to him, but of course he had not.
Violet lay there, restless and listening for him to return. Judging from the off-key singing out on the street, he’d be even more drunk when he got home. She turned over and fluffed her pillow, trying in vain to stop thinking of him, yet imagining what it would be like to have him naked and virile next to her, making passionate love to her on this hot June night. However, as a Texan, he was not about to despoil what he thought was an innocent, underage virgin.
“What a mess you have made of things and now there’s no way out,” she scolded herself.
Finally she could stand the waiting no longer. She got up, went to the window and peered out into the darkness. The wooden dance floor area and the picnic tables were shadowy and forlorn, but down the street, the saloon was brightly lit and music and women’s laughter drifted through its swinging doors. The men who had been on the street were gone. Some of them would have gone home; others might be continuing their celebration in the saloon.
Had Travis gone in there? Was he even now upstairs, venting his hot desire on one of those scantily dressed whores? The thought made her grit her teeth. He was hers and she knew he wanted her, knew it from the way he had stared down at her as she lay in her bed looking up at him.
Jealousy began like a sharp-toothed coyote chewing on her insides. She had to know. Violet got up and dressed in her plain yellow dress and combed her hair into two pigtails. She tiptoed through the house, checking on the children.
Growler, asleep on Bonnie’s little bed, raised his grizzled head and snarled, then recognized her and his stubby tail thumped.
“Be quiet, Growler,” she whispered. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
Carrying her shoes to the door, she went outside before she put them on. The noise and music from the saloon was even louder now. Evidently, the beer and liquor were flowing freely. Well, the party was going to continue with one less man. She intended to bring Travis home.
Inside the saloon, Travis leaned on the bar and stared down at the voluptuous, red-haired woman looking up at him. “And what’s your name, sugar?”
She looked up at him, rubbing her full breasts against his arm. “Sugar will do for now, big man, but my name is Kate.”
God, he needed a woman. He managed to focus his eyes and take a good look at the whore. She was past her prime and deep wrinkles were only slightly hidden under the heavy makeup. Her hennaed hair had a few gray strands showing under the bright green feathered plume. What did he care? He could close his eyes and imagine it was . . . You sick bastard, don’t you even think of Violet that way.
He put out his hand and stroked Kate’s bare shoulder and then trailed his finger down her collarbone to the rise of big breasts in the gaudy green satin dress. “Can I buy you a drink, sugar?”
“You sure can and then let’s go upstairs to my room.”
He was having a hard time keeping his gaze straight. The room tried to spin a little when he closed his eyes. “What’s that gonna cost me?”
“I hear you used to be a Texas Ranger, big man.” She took his hand and put it on her waist.
He nodded. “I did, but I got hurt.”
She leaned against him. “I hope it wasn’t your pistol that got injured.”
He laughed. “No, my arm. My pistol is loaded and ready to fire.”
She reached up and kissed his cheek. “For a man like you, the first one is free. I’ll wager you’re good for a dozen times a night?”
“Maybe only a half dozen, before I h
ave to rest and reload,” he confessed. He took a deep breath of her perfume. It was cheap, but earthy, like a bitch in heat. That made him think of Violet, who always smelled like soap and water, and the sweet scent of her long brown hair.
Violet. He remembered standing there, half drunk, looking down at her as she lay on her bed. He had never wanted a woman as much as he had wanted that girl.
You rotten bum, he scolded himself. It took everything in you to walk out of that bedroom when what you wanted to do was take her quick and deep and fast, making her yours in the most intimate way a man can know a woman. And she was just a kid. His want for her had begun to occupy his every waking moment and this evening, he had almost given in to temptation. Well, he was a Texan and a gentleman. He wasn’t about to force himself on an innocent, underage girl.
Even as he looked down into Kate’s painted face, he knew what the answer had to be: take out his lust on a whore or marry the pretty Mrs. Van Mayes. He couldn’t live with his desire much longer. Thinking that, he reached down and kissed the whore’s painted lips. The tip of her tongue reached into his mouth and he put his hand on her breasts and she only leaned closer, breathing hard.
“Not right here, Kate!” the balding bartender yelled. “Take your cowboy upstairs.”
Kate broke away and laughed. “That’s just what I intend to do. You ready, Ranger?”
“I’m past ready.” He nodded and staggered away from the bar. She held on to his arm to steady him as they started toward the stairs.
Kate looked up as they started up the stairs. The other whores leaned over the upstairs balcony, watching, and one called, “You get through with him, Kate, I’d like a ride.”
“Naw, he’s mine for tonight,” Kate answered.
His vision was a little blurry, but he felt his manhood throbbing hard. He might be a little drunk, but the part he needed most was ready and willing. He looked back at the other men lounging against the bar and then up at the girls leaning on the balcony railing upstairs. Yep, there was enough of them that he could have a different one every night if he wanted. He reached down and kissed the redhead, but in his mind, the face he saw had large, almost violet eyes and was surrounded by soft brown curls. That made him angry. How dare Violet keep invading his thoughts? “Let’s quit wasting time,” he whispered. “It’s been awhile since I’ve ridden an unbroken filly.”
“Sugar, I expect you to give me quite a ride.” She steered him carefully up the stairs with the piano banging away below on “My Old Kentucky Home.”
Just as they started into Kate’s room, the piano abruptly stopped mid-chord.
“What the hell?” Kate paused in her doorway as Travis grabbed on to the door frame to keep from falling.
He stumbled to the railing and looked down, tried to focus his eyes and see where everyone else was staring. In the swinging doors stood a small, slight figure. She wore a simple yellow dress and her brown hair was in pigtails.
“Daddy,” she called. staring up at him, “I’ve come to take you home.”
Men were laughing now. “Hey, Prescott, your little girl has come for you. You better forget about gettin’ a little tonight.”
He looked down at her, thinking he had never felt so humiliated. “Go on home, kid. I’ll be home when I get damned good and ready.”
“No, you got to come home now.”
Behind him, Kate swore and stepped back in the shadows of the balcony so the girl could not see her.
Even as men laughed and Travis argued, Violet walked to the foot of the stairs and said to the astounded piano player, “There’s five of us kids and he needs to come home. He has no spare money to spend here.” Then she started up the stairs.
Kate retreated behind a pillar of the upstairs balcony, thinking she recognized the girl in the simple country dress. No, it couldn’t be. She stepped back into her room, a little shocked and thinking she must be drunk herself. This pigtailed kid couldn’t be who she thought it was.
The young girl never saw Kate as she came up the stairs, took the Ranger by the arm. “Come on, Daddy, let’s go home.”
“No,” he said and shook his head, but the girl was persistent.
“Please, Travis,” she whispered and led him to the stairs. They started down them, slowly and unsteadily.
Kate stared after them. Yes, it was Violet all right, Duke’s favorite whore. How in the hell had Violet gotten from Kansas clear down here to Texas, and what was she doing in pigtails and dressed up like a schoolgirl?
Kate went to the balcony railing, frowned as she stared after the pair, who were now walking across the saloon floor toward the swinging doors.
Kate had been Duke’s favorite, replacing a pretty blond girl named Emily, who had become a hopeless drunk and been thrown out in the street. But Duke soon tired of Kate and then she’d been replaced by the beautiful Violet and Kate had had to move on to a series of lower-class dumps like this, the old Cattle Drive Saloon.
She hated Violet for replacing her and wondered now if Duke and his hired gun, Slade, knew where Violet was. Maybe there could be a reward in it for the person who told him. Kate smiled to herself, watching the men laughing below her as Violet tried to talk the tall Texan into leaving. Kate decided she would keep this information to herself until she could use it for her own benefit.
Travis could barely stand on his feet, but he was very aware that men were laughing all around him. “Violet, this is no place for a young girl.”
“Or you either,” she said firmly and began to lead him.
He turned and looked back at the whores on the balcony. “I’ll be back, ladies.”
“No, he won’t,” Violet said and led him out the door.
He stood outside taking deep breaths of the fresh air. “You just embarrassed the hell out of me back there, you know it?”
“I wouldn’t be the first kid to drag her daddy out of a saloon.”
“I’m not your daddy, damn it.”
She started leading him toward the house. “You’re drunk, Travis. Just come home and sleep it off.”
“I was just going upstairs with a lady, and—”
“I know what you were going to do.”
“No, you don’t. A kid like you don’t know anything. She just kissed me, that’s all.”
They had reached their doorway. Now they paused and she looked up at him. “A kiss? Is that what you’re complaining about? I’ll give you a kiss.”
Before he was aware of what was happening, Violet put her arms around his neck, pulled him very tight against her soft curves, and then she kissed him.
He couldn’t ever remember being kissed with such passion and expertise before. He was astounded, and for a moment, he only stood there while the girl pressed her warm body against his and kissed him, really kissed him.
Then he took a deep breath and returned the kiss as her tongue went into his mouth and he felt its wet warmth against his lips. No woman had ever kissed him with such passion and he pulled her so tightly against him that she might not be able to breathe. He wanted to pull her inside him, kiss her deeper and deeper. Their tongues met and his hand went to her breast inside her dress and his manhood came up hard and throbbing. He had never wanted a woman like he wanted this one. He could feel her heart pounding hard against his chest and he pulled back so he could swing her up into his arms. All he could think of was getting her to a bed, a hayloft, anywhere where he could lay her down and make passionate love to her.
“Travis?” she whispered, looking up at him with those wide violet-blue eyes.
Her voice brought him out of his frenzied stupor. “What—what in God’s name am I doing?”
He pushed her away from him, both of them breathing hard. “I must be very drunk or a very sick bastard to grab a kid like you and—”
“You’re just drunk.” She seemed to regain her composure and look around while adjusting her dress. “We’d better get inside before anyone sees us.”
“God, yes. This town would lynch me in
a heartbeat if they caught me fondling and kissing a thirteen-year-old girl.”
“Forget about it. In the morning, you won’t even remember this. Let’s go in.” She had him by the arm as she opened the door and they stumbled inside. “Be quiet and don’t wake the kids.”
He was drunk, there was no denying that. He stumbled along in the dark, letting her lead him to his bed, where he collapsed.
“I’ll take off your boots,” she said, “and in the morning, you’ll be fine except for a hangover.”
He closed his eyes to keep the dark room from swirling around his head. The gentle touch of her hands pulling off his boots was the last thing he remembered.
Violet stood up and looked down at him. He was already out cold. With any luck, he wouldn’t remember the kiss in the morning. If he did, she’d lie and tell him he’d imagined it.
How could she have been such a fool? She had always wanted to kiss him and she’d given in to the temptation to keep him from thinking about the saloon girl he’d been about to bed when Violet had arrived.
Shaking with jealousy, she went to her room and got ready for bed, trying to forget that he had been about to make love to another woman. Violet had never wanted a man to make love to her before; she had just endured it as the price she had to pay to survive. But now she wanted Travis, and she’d painted herself into a corner. How could she let him know she was almost twenty without explaining? He would hate her for being a whore.
So there was nothing else to do but pretend she was only thirteen years old and one of the orphans. Sooner or later, he would want a woman again and head back to the saloon . . . or maybe he would marry one of the eager respectable women in this town. There didn’t seem to be any good answer for this mess she’d created. Hot tears gathered in her eyes and ran down her cheeks. She dabbed at them awkwardly. She never cried, not since her little brother, Tommy, died at the charity hospital with her holding his small hand and begging him not to leave her.
After that, Violet had hardened her heart, knowing that to survive in this tough world, she would have to guard her soul so that no emotion ever came to the surface. Yet now here she was crying over a drunken Texas Ranger who she could never have. Tonight, she’d had just a glimpse of what love could be with a man she really loved and could never have. It hurt so much.
Travis Page 16