by Jake Logan
Slocum found escape in an unlikely place. Shotgun Larsen’s horse ambled back, nudged at its dead rider and then started pawing the ground as if it wanted to bury him on the spot. Slocum made his way to the horse, glad that most of Tewksbury’s men had already retreated. This caused Cooper’s gunmen to eye the horizon and not look down at their feet. He swung into the saddle and stayed low, urging the horse to walk up the ravine, away from the gunfire. This proved easy enough, although the horse shied occasionally because of the stench of blood. Slocum tried to press his bandanna into first one and then the other of his new wounds, but he couldn’t apply enough pressure on either to stanch the flow.
The horse kept moving, and this suited Slocum as he got a little dizzy. He found himself grabbing onto the pommel to keep from toppling to the ground. For a few minutes, Slocum rode without knowing what he did. Then he snapped alert when he realized there was nothing but rolling grassy meadow around him. He sat upright, groaned at the pain and then looked around. It took several seconds for him to realize the ravine that had flowed red with the blood of Tewksbury’s supporters lay far behind.
“Antietam,” Slocum muttered. The fight between Tewksbury and Cooper had turned into a new Antietam with the streams running with blood. The difference this time was that Cooper had not taken the casualties Tewksbury had. There was a clear victor—and it wasn’t going to be good for Slocum to stay in the Tonto Basin much longer.
But he almost fell off the horse as weakness hit him again. He had lost more blood than he thought. Both wounds left by the pellets from Larsen’s deadly shotgun continued to ooze, and nothing he did stopped the flow.
“Take me outta here. Larsen shot me up good,” Slocum said to the horse, “but you can make it all good by getting me the hell out of here.”
The horse let out a moist snort, and Slocum couldn’t tell if the animal was agreeing or telling him there wasn’t any way it would cooperate with the man who had killed its owner.
The ruckus behind him died down as he rode farther away, but Slocum wasn’t sure where he was going. He jerked upright when it occurred to him the only place this horse might know in the Basin was the Blevins barn. Being carried to the heart of Cooper’s stronghold would get him killed as sure as rain.
“There,” Slocum said, tugging on the reins. “Let’s go in that direction.” He wasn’t too sure where he was going, but north lay danger. With the sun hot on his back, he knew he was riding east. When he came to the road running from the Tewksbury spread to Tom Graham’s, he would go south. Might be Tewksbury was still alive and could patch him up. If not, Cooper would take his time burning out Tewksbury and give Slocum that much more time to head to the Sierra Anchas and a hope of safety.
A faint hope, if the Apaches still roamed, but better than any he had if he remained in the Tonto Basin much longer.
The sun was setting, making the shadows in front him stretch forever. Slocum kept his directly in front, but when the sun set, he had to figure some other way to know which direction east lay. In his condition he knew he would likely start riding in a circle. As weak as he was, he would fall off and die. Or ride into some of Cooper’s men.
“Road, there’s the road,” he said. The sight of the double-rutted dirt path sent a thrill through him that kept him going. “To the right. Turn right and go to Tewksbury’s.” He spoke aloud to keep it all straight in his jumbled mind. A mistake now because his lost concentration would be fatal.
Deep down inside Slocum wondered if it wasn’t already too late for him. Then he hardened and resolve set in. He wasn’t going to die. He was going to live and make sure Andy Cooper was planted out in some meadow far from his murdered father’s grave.
“Lydia.” The woman’s name and flashes of how he had last seen her with Cooper galvanized him. He sat straighter and was firmer with the horse as he set it trotting southward.
Slocum had ridden only a mile when he heard hoofbeats on the road behind him. He doubted anyone sympathetic to him was likely to be out after sundown, and he tried to turn the horse off the road. The horse bolted and sent Slocum flying. He crashed to the ground and lay stunned. Through blurred eyes he saw the silhouettes of three riders approaching him rapidly.
“You see that horse, Andy?” called one rider. “That was Larsen’s horse. I’d know it anywhere.”
“That sure as hell wasn’t Shotgun riding it. I found his body in the ravine.”
“Who stole his horse?”
“Let’s find out,” Andy Cooper sad. “Then we kin have some fun with ’im!”
Slocum tried to draw his six-shooter to defend himself but couldn’t move. As the trio of riders neared, Slocum collapsed, helpless.
16
“You hear something?” Andy Cooper asked.
“Just a horse ahead of us. Not galloping, just walking away, no big hurry.”
“I heard something around here,” Cooper said. Slocum craned his neck up and fought to get his six-gun pointed in Cooper’s direction. His strength fled and he collapsed facedown. “There. I heard it again.”
“I didn’t hear it, Andy. Honest.”
“Might be a rabbit out there,” Cooper said. “Let’s do some scouting.”
“What about the horse?”
“If it’s not in a big hurry to leave, why bother with it? There’s a passel of riderless horses since the fight today.”
“We whupped ’em good, didn’t we?”
“What a bunch of cowards,” Cooper said. “They lit out so fast I couldn’t even see their scared faces.”
“Cowards,” his companion agreed.
“You look on the far side of the road. I’ll—”
Cooper bit off his order when Larsen’s horse suddenly burst from where it had been grazing and galloped away. Both men chased after it, giving Slocum a chance to prop himself up and watch them departing. It wasn’t going to be much of a respite because the horse was likely to be caught in a few minutes. That meant Slocum had to act fast.
He forced himself to his feet and staggered along the road leading to the Graham house. There wasn’t likely to be anyone there, unless Murphy had turned squatter and claimed it for himself. Slocum fought to put one foot in front of the other and keep moving, until he fell again. He heard Cooper and his henchman behind him, arguing over where the rider who had been on Larsen’s horse might have gotten off to.
Slocum saw the dark bulk of Tom Graham’s house ahead. He could find a place to hide in the house. If he stayed out in plain sight, Cooper would finish the job started at the battle across the ravine. In his state, Slocum knew he had scant chance of escaping Cooper’s search, but lying in the yard in front of the house for God and everyone to see wasn’t the way to stay alive.
He gritted his teeth and fought each step up to the porch. Falling hard, he threw his full weight against the front door. It didn’t budge. He reached down and caught the latch, tugging upward hard. It didn’t budge. He tried again, with no result. With the suddenness of a gallows trapdoor opening, he went sprawling onto the floor. Slocum looked up and saw a woman.
“You . . . I saw you earlier. I tried to warn you ’bout the fight,” Slocum said.
“Did you?”
“Did,” he said. Slocum fumbled to get his six-shooter out. “Cooper’s after me. Kill me if he finds me.”
“You fought on Tewksbury’s side?”
Slocum was past lying. He nodded.
Then he passed out. When he awoke, he heard angry voices. He groped for his pistol but couldn’t find it. Blinking hard, he got a good view of the Graham parlor, but from a curious angle. He finally realized he was stuffed into a cabinet, looking out through beveled glass panels in the top of its door. He didn’t remember hiding here, and he certainly didn’t remember leaving his six-gun on the table near the door, where the dark-haired woman stood, balled hands on her flaring hips and looking like she was ready to take on the world. Past her, barely visible in the dim light cast by a coal oil lamp on the table by his Colt, stood an
angry Andy Cooper.
“I don’t care who you are, sir. This is my house and you are not coming inside.”
“Outta the way,” Cooper said, shoving her to one side. Slocum saw her grab his Colt and tuck it under a fold in her voluminous skirts. She had changed clothes since she’d gone riding this afternoon.
“Watch her,” Cooper ordered his partner. “I want to be sure nobody’s hidin’ here.”
“If my husband were still alive, he would never allow this invasion!”
“He’s dead, so you shut yer mouth, woman,” Cooper said. He went rummaging around the house. Slocum caught his breath when Cooper came toward the cabinet and almost looked him in the eye, but the woman made a protest that captured Cooper’s attention again.
“I got reason to think Slocum’s around here,” Cooper said. “Some of my boys saw him gun down a good friend and steal his horse.”
“I don’t know who you mean. And look in the barn. All the horses there are Graham horses with our brand.”
“I got the horse,” Cooper said. “I want the rider.”
“Then you had better go look somewhere else for him, because he is not here.”
Slocum started when Cooper grabbed the woman by the throat and forced her back against the wall. He tried to open the cabinet door and found it locked on the outside, but the woman didn’t need his help. Cooper held her by the throat, but she held Slocum’s six-gun in such a way that she could blow off Cooper’s manhood if he pressed the issue.
“Let me go,” she said, her voice choked.
“Let her be, Andy. You looked ’round the house and he ain’t here. I figger he fell off his horse and is out along the road somewhere. You know they said he was hurt something fierce.”
Cooper released her and she moved the gun back into the folds of her skirt. Cooper never realized how close he had come to spending the rest of his life as a gelding.
“You come across John Slocum, you let me know and I’ll see that you get something good, Mrs. Graham.”
“Good night, sir,” she said. Cooper laughed and followed his henchman out onto the porch. Slocum saw Cooper order the man to scout around the house while he waited on the porch.
The woman kicked the door shut and barred it, but made no move to come to the cabinet. Slocum knew she waited for the two to ride away. He heaved a sigh of relief at her caution. And then he spilled out onto the floor of her parlor when the latch was unexpectedly opened.
“You’re Slocum?” she asked. She trained his own pistol on him, her hand steady. He thought she was probably no stranger to firearms and could hardly miss at this range even if she wasn’t.
“John Slocum, like Cooper said. We go back a ways, him and me.”
“To Texas?”
“He shot my partner in the back. From what I’ve seen, his habits haven’t improved any since then.”
“You were with Tewksbury. I heard him mention the name. He thought highly of you.”
“Glad someone does.” Slocum sat up, and dizziness hit him. He keeled over, his head resting against a love seat.
“You are shot up,” she said. Slocum couldn’t summon enough energy to speak. “Let me get you into the bedroom where I can patch you up.”
“Obliged,” he croaked out, but he found himself unable to help her by standing. His legs folded under him. To his surprise, she had no trouble supporting him. He knew then how he had gotten stuffed into the cabinet. She had wrestled him inside by herself.
“Lie down. Let me get some hot water and bandages. Heaven knows, there are enough bandages around. Tom was always getting himself shot up in one scuffle or another.”
Slocum couldn’t even roll over. Mrs. Graham returned and began tugging gently at the shirt glued onto his side. She had the strength to carry him but the gentleness to peel away the blood-soaked shirt. He gasped once and then stoically watched as she worked with grim efficiency cleaning the two buckshot wounds, then sewing them up with needle and thread.
“There,” she said. “That’ll get you back into the pink before you know it. You were lucky the lead shot didn’t go into you. I’m not good at digging it out.”
“You did just fine,” Slocum said. “I’ve got something else to thank you for.”
“Something else?”
“You didn’t turn me over to Cooper.”
“He was the kind my husband would have invited to dinner.”
“Tewksbury and Tom Graham were enemies,” Slocum said.
“They were, but that doesn’t mean John and I are.” She smiled almost wickedly and said, “We were lovers.”
Slocum didn’t know what to say. Lydia and Tom Graham had been lovers, also. Did either pair know of the other?
“John’s lost interest in me now that Tom’s dead. I thought that might be what would happen. He thought he was getting revenge on Tom by sleeping with me.”
“What were you getting out of it?”
“Satisfaction,” she said. “I never loved Tom. And he started treating me worse and worse, until he finally didn’t bother coming to my bed. That was fine with me.”
“He had another woman?” Slocum ventured this to see what Mrs. Graham knew of her husband and Lydia Tewksbury’s amorous adventures.
“I am sure he did, but all I cared was that he ignored me even more. I liked that.”
“Cooper might be back. I’d better get out of here or you’ll find yourself in big trouble.”
“Stay put, Mr. Slocum,” she said, pushing him back. “I’m not the kind to waste good work sewing up a man only to have him go get himself killed. Rest up. You need to get your strength back.”
“You don’t have to do this,” he said.
“For John, I do. One last thank-you. I don’t see him staying alive too much longer without your help.”
“Kill Cooper and the fight’s over,” Slocum said.
“Yes,” she said. “And with Tom no longer involved, that will cause the entire Tonto Basin to settle down. Frankly, I am sick of this place. Too many bad memories.”
Slocum started to answer, but the sleep of complete exhaustion overtook him. He awoke to the sunlight slanting in through the bedroom window and the smell of cornbread baking. Although still a little shaky, he sat up, got his feet over the side.
“Don’t go straining yourself,” Mrs. Graham said, coming in with a tray heaped with food, including the cornbread. Slocum’s mouth watered at the sight and smell.
“The only way I’ll strain myself is to overeat.”
“You lost a considerable amount of blood. Don’t be shy eating that calf liver.”
As Slocum ate, he studied the woman. She sat quietly in a chair, watching him. She was a little taller than average and well built. Her coal black hair was pulled back and held by a series of gold clasps, but a few strands had still contrived to escape and form a dark cloud around her head. Eyes like chips of turquoise unflinchingly looked at him. She was no shrinking violet. Slocum wondered why she had stayed with Tom Graham if she hadn’t loved him and obviously got nothing in return for her loyalty.
“Pickings are slim,” she said, as if reading his mind. “Tom was about the only man who could corral me, and when he did, he used a bit too much force.”
“You’re glad he’s dead?”
“I’d be a liar if I said different.” Mrs. Graham took the tray from him and set it on the floor beside the bed. “You’re looking more fit.”
“Feel better,” Slocum said. Something about her expression made him wonder what was eating at her. “How can I repay you?”
“Do what a real man does,” she said, dropping to her knees beside the bed in front of him. She reached out and worked to unfasten the buttons on his jeans. “You’re up to it, aren’t you?”
“Looks like I am,” Slocum said. The dark-haired woman had unfastened the last button of his fly allowing his manhood to spring out, hard and long and ready.
“Yes, it does,” she said, scooting closer. She looked up, her blue-green eyes bri
ght with desire. Then she turned her face down and he felt her hot, wet lips kiss the very tip of his rigid shaft. A shudder passed through Slocum and echoed all the way to his head. He felt dizzy again, but the sensation was different from what he had experienced before.
He sagged back, supporting himself on his elbows and looking down at the top of Mrs. Graham’s head as she worked lower on him. Her kisses became more passionate and then she took him entirely into her mouth. He felt her red lips sliding down the sides as her tongue teased the sensitive flesh. As she pulled back, she sucked hard on him and lifted his hips off the bed.
“Back,” she said.
“More,” Slocum said, reaching down with one hand and guiding her head downward again. She teased with her tongue and scored the sides of his fleshy shaft with her teeth. The suction and lips and the rest of her stimulation, including gently tapping the hairy sac dangling beneath, all threatened to cause Slocum to blow wide open.
But she slowed her pace and didn’t resist as he decreased the pressure on the back of her head. She looked up and smiled just a haunting little smile.
“More?”
“More,” he said, struggling to bend up so he could reach the buttons of her blouse. He remembered how Cooper had sent Lydia’s buttons popping all over the storage room. Slocum slowed his desires and carefully unbuttoned Mrs. Graham’s blouse and then pushed it back to reveal twin mounds of succulent flesh that made his mouth water. He reached around her body, fingers digging into her back, and pulled her forward far enough to put his lips against the taut, cherry-red buttons cresting each breast. As he licked and kissed and sucked, she seemed to soften and flow. She moved up him until she was above him, her breasts dangling down for his delectation. Slocum took one hard upturned nip into his mouth and used tongue and teeth against it as she had done with him down lower.
“More,” she said.
“More,” he agreed. Slocum reached down and tugged at the woman’s skirts, lifting them. He found immediately that she wore nothing under them. She straddled his waist and settled down, taking him in hand and guiding his hardness to her inner warmth. For a moment, she paused. Then Slocum took both her breasts in his hands and began massaging. He caught the blood-engorged nubs between his fingers and twisted them about, using these grips to steer her body lower. He sank fully into her moist, clinging interior.