She fooled him. Her lips barely touched the end of his staff. Her tongue flicked out like a snake’s, teasing and tormenting with tiny wet touches from the tip all the way down the sensitive underside to the hairy sac beneath. This time Slocum did gasp as she enmouthed him. Her tongue pressed outward as she worked her way back up his manhood to the arrowhead-shaped end. Her lips parted, and this time he slid deep into her mouth. Her tongue cradled him and then began rubbing sensuously until he trembled.

  When she began applying a soft suction, he thought his guts were going to be pulled out the end of his iron-hard rod.

  “No more,” he said. Sweat beaded his brow now in reaction to the way her mouth worked all over him. “You’re too good doing that.”

  “Am I now?” she asked coyly. “It’s your turn to show me how good you are.” Laurel flopped back onto a grassy patch, her knees lifted up so her skirts fluttered in the night breeze. Slocum caught sight of bare flesh beneath those skirts, white skin that vanished into the most delightful blond thatch he could imagine between her legs.

  He slipped off the log, lowered his head and then lifted it so he caught the hem of her skirt behind his head. She rocked back, supporting herself on her elbows as she lifted her knees even higher. Slocum dived down between those luscious thighs and found the tangled blond mat already dotted with tiny dewdrops showing her arousal.

  Like a man dying of thirst, he sucked and licked and lapped at that moisture, until Laurel collapsed backward flat on the ground. Her knees rose up even more, to afford him complete access to her privates. His tongue drove out hard and fast and entered her. By duplicating the tongue flicking motion that she had used on him, he felt her body tensing and her rear end rising off the ground. She tried to grind herself into his face, but Slocum continued to tease her the way she had him.

  Backing away slightly, head still hidden under her skirt, he turned his head and kissed first her left inner thigh and then her right. The soft, wet kisses drove her passions past the breaking point. Laurel let out a tiny sob that demanded that Slocum tend her immediately. He dived back to his deliciously delightful task of kissing her nether lips and driving his questing tongue in and out of her with increasing speed. Laurel thrashed about around him, and her thighs clamped fiercely on either side of his head.

  Blind and deaf, Slocum continued to use his mouth in the ways that drove Laurel wild with lust. She arched her back again and almost broke his neck with her passions.

  As she collapsed, after the ecstasy had begun to fade within her lush young body, Slocum pushed away her skirt and rose up to stare at her. She was utterly gorgeous. A flush colored her cheeks and throat. He reached down and unbuttoned her blouse. The blush went down all the way to her breasts. He reached out and caught the nubs atop her breasts and rolled them around slowly, building her sexual tensions once more.

  Laurel closed her eyes and moaned softly. The sight of her being aroused again caused Slocum to become even harder. He hadn’t thought it was possible after feeling her mouth all over his manhood, but now he was so stiff he was almost in pain.

  There was only one cure for such exquisite torment.

  He shoved her skirt up around her waist, leaving her legs bare to the night. Slocum finished the job of opening the last of his pants buttons and dropped them down.

  “Oh, John,” Laurel said softly, staring not at his face but at his manhood. She strained upward and took him in hand, gently pulling him down toward her nether lips. “I want you so!”

  He brushed across those heavenly gates, then pushed forward just a tad. A new ripple of desire passed through Laurel as she reached out and grabbed his strong arms. Gazing down at her, Slocum wasn’t sure he had ever seen a more desirable woman. Laurel’s hair was spread out on the grass in a blond fan, making her appear to be an angel come to earth. But no angel had ever been so lusty, so wanton, so demanding of what he had to give.

  What he wanted to give.

  His hips slid another inch forward, and a bit more of his manhood slipped into the tight wetness of her center. The tremors that passed through the woman now communicated to Slocum. The tightness around him clamped down even more. A jolt of carnal fire shot down his length into his groin. He fought back the white-hot tide threatening to rise too soon and gush forth. This had to last, be special, be memorable for both of them.

  Slocum slid another inch into her. Laurel’s legs came up and circled his waist to hold him firmly in place—as if he intended to go anywhere. He sank forward and slid the rest of the way into her clinging, moist, hot core. His face was only inches from hers. Laurel’s face was contorted with the desire racking her. He kissed her lips hungrily, passion mounting even more inside him. When her legs tightened around his waist he knew he could no longer hold back. Everything conspired to rob him of his control. The warmth around his buried shaft. The look on Laurel’s face. The way her breasts rocked to and fro. The tightness. Always the tension around his manhood.

  He pulled back just a little, fighting the force of her legs to withdraw.

  “No, no, don’t go,” she sobbed out. “You fill me so. You’re what I want, what I need!”

  Sweat beaded Slocum’s face and chest now. He felt like a racehorse at the starting gate, but the race wouldn’t be long. She began rolling her hips and crushing herself down firmly into his groin. He arched his back and tried to jam himself all the way into her, until she split in two. This brought her rump off the ground and caused the blonde to writhe about. Slocum drew back a few inches and then began a slow, methodical movement that quickly deteriorated into wild motion beyond his ability to restrain.

  He lifted her up as friction mounted, and then he spilled his seed into her yearning cavity. Seconds later, a new earthquake of desire passed through Laurel’s trim body. Slocum thought she would crush him with her legs, and then even this pressure died as her legs dropped to either side of his body. He sank forward and lay atop her so he could kiss her again.

  “We ought to do this more often. You always take me by surprise with how good it is,” he told her.

  “I’m all for doing it again.” She reached down between then as she sought out his slowly deflating organ. He swatted away her hand.

  “I’m not made of steel.”

  “You just fooled me, then,” she said, smiling. “If I work a bit to persuade you, maybe—”

  An explosion from the direction of town brought them both up, heads moving around like prairie dogs’ popping from their burrows.

  “What was that?” Laurel asked. She struggled to get out from under Slocum. He didn’t try to stop her. He was already pulling up his pants and reaching for his gun belt and the six-shooter still in its holster.

  “I don’t know, but there’s a cloud of smoke rising.”

  “It might have come from the bank. It’s over there, John. What’s going on?”

  Slocum got to his feet and settled his gunbelt.

  “Stay here.”

  “I will not! If the bank’s on fire, somebody might be hurt. I work there, John. I like those people.”

  “Who’d be working at this time of night?” he pointed out. It had to be past midnight. Slocum had heard sounds like this before. Dynamite. Quite a few sticks of dynamite had detonated.

  Slocum took a few minutes to put hobbles on his horse so it wouldn’t see flames from town and run toward them, then set out at a brisk pace into town. Alarm bells now filled the night air with their strident tones. The rush of men and the clatter of wagons told him the fire was being taken seriously.

  “Oh, John, it’s horrible. What happened?” Laurel clung to his arm as they stared at the bank totally swallowed in bright orange, lapping tongues of flame.

  A burning piece of paper slowly floated in front of Slocum. He reached out, snared it, then dropped it to the ground to stamp out the fire. He had saved more than half of a twenty-dollar greenback.

  “The vault’s been blown open,” he said. “Somebody who didn’t know what he was doing blew up the bank trying to get into the vault.”

  “A robbery? In Newsome? But this is such a law-abiding town.”

  Slocum pulled free of the woman’s grip and walked around the edge of the men struggling to put enough water on the fire to stifle it. More flaming greenbacks fluttered down all around, but Slocum ignored these. Whoever had blown up the vault might have died in the resulting fire. Another thought occurred to Slocum. The dynamite might have been detonated to hide the robbery.

  Making a wide circle around the fire, Slocum got behind the bank. The fire was already dying down, allowing him to approach where the rear door had been. In the dust he saw drag marks, as if someone was pulling something heavy behind him as he left. Heavy like a sack filled with gold coins. If the robber had left the greenbacks, which were mostly worthless anyway, having been issued by this very bank, as diversion, it might be some time before anyone noticed the missing gold.

  He followed the tracks away until he came to a small rise. From the other side came grunts and curses and the neighing of an aggrieved horse.

  Hurrying to the crest of the hill, Slocum saw three men struggling with a horse laden with two obviously heavy packs. He couldn’t imagine how much gold would weigh down a horse like that. He lifted his six-shooter and had started to shoot when one of the robbers saw him.

  Their bullets crossed paths in midair. Slocum’s went wide, but the outlaw’s grazed Slocum’s leg, knocking him from his feet. It wasn’t a serious wound, but it hurt like hell and made movement difficult. He swung around to a sitting position and began firing, The three robbers had mounted and were leading the pack horse away.

  Slocum’s last shot caused one outlaw to whirl around, swearing up a blue streak at being winged. The three had not worn masks, but Slocum had not been able to identify them until this moment. He couldn’t vouch for the other two men, but the one who hurled curses in his direction was one of the privates who followed Sergeant Davies around like a puppy dog.

  Talmidge.

  He got to his feet and retraced his steps to town. Slocum was interested in finding how much gold the fraudulent soldiers had stolen.

  12

  “We got to do something now,” the owner of the general store said, slamming his fist into his left palm. “We’ve been without a marshal long enough.”

  “He might come back. You know how Marshal Almquist is. Always headin’ off on a bender.” The man speaking might have been the town undertaker from the look of his black coat. Slocum guessed he was otherwise employed and had only been too close to the sooty fire that had claimed the last of the bank sometime after dawn.

  “Not a bender, not him. He was a pious man,” the storekeeper said.

  “Don’t matter much what he was. Where he is counts more,” declared the banker. “And wherever that is, it’s not here!”

  “Mr. Weiss is right,” the storekeeper said. “Marshal Almquist might have prevented the bank from burning down.”

  “It wasn’t just burned to the ground,” Weiss said loud enough for his voice to carry all over Newsome. “It was robbed! If we don’t get ourselves another marshal right away, then I want to form a posse and go after them. They can’t travel fast with so much gold.”

  “What was you doin’ with so many pounds of gold in your vault, Weiss?” The man asking idly whittled at a length of pinewood. “We’ve been in the middle of some hard times, people comin’ and goin’ from town, but mostly goin’. Who knows but that Almquist might have left ’cuz he wasn’t bein’ paid regular.”

  “That’s a damned lie!” raged the banker. He doubled his fist and took a step toward the man with the knife, who looked up and smiled. Weiss waited for someone in the crowd to hold him back. When it was obvious they all wished the banker to try to fight it out with the whittler, Weiss subsided and tried to look composed.

  Slocum took in the byplay and shook his head. The argument served no purpose other than to give the trio of bank robbers a chance to put that many more miles between themselves and the scene of their crime.

  “You said you spotted them, John. Can you do anything?” Laurel Atkins clung to his arm as if he might vanish into thin air if she let go.

  “I need to talk to you about what I saw,” Slocum said to Laurel.

  “You’d be perfect to lead the posse, John,” she said. “Or you could ask to be marshal. You’re a good tracker and—”

  “No.”

  Slocum’s curt answer stopped her dead in her tracks. Laurel looked at him, blue eyes wide.

  “But—”

  “No. I don’t pin on a badge. Besides, it looks like they’ve found somebody to step forward.”

  “I know you gents don’t cotton much to me or my drinking emporium, but I worked as sheriff down in Texas for almost six months. That makes me the one with the most experience, I reckon.”

  “I’d sooner go ask Crosby to be marshal than you, Mendelsohn,” the storekeeper said. “You . . . you’re a bartender!”

  “That’s an honorable enough profession,” Slocum said, stepping forward. “Would you rather have Crosby as marshal?” He looked around and read the answer on the smoke-smudged, tired faces. The townspeople were getting to the end of their rope.

  “I’m right good with a gun, and I’ve never been in no trouble since comin’ to town,” Mendelsohn said. A few heads nodded agreement, and a whispered argument began to rage. It all came to an end when the stagecoach station master cleared his throat.

  “I been in and out of this here town for more than five years,” said Cassarian, hitching up his pants and trying to keep them from falling back down from his protuberant belly. “You know me and I know you. And you know how upset I git at the way them outlaws been killin’ anyone drivin’ a stage in or out of town. When’s the last wagon of supplies you got, Jethro?” Cassarian stared directly at the store owner.

  “Been a while. I’m runnin’ mighty low on flour and sugar.”

  “The whole town’s runnin’ mighty low,” Cassarian said. “Mr. Mendelsohn might serve demon whiskey in his establishment, but he has experience as a lawman.”

  “So he says,” the storekeeper said.

  “What’s the difference?” asked Slocum. “Are any of you inclined to pin on a badge? I’m not. Why not give Mendelsohn a chance?”

  “I’m for it,” piped up the banker. The sentiment carried, and after someone scrounged about in the marshal’s office for a badge, Mendelsohn was hurriedly sworn in as Newsome’s new peace officer.

  “Now go fetch my gold, Marshal,” Weiss said. “I’ll even offer a reward of one hundred dollars.”

  “That much?” scoffed Laurel.

  “Don’t go sassin’ me, young lady, or you’ll be out of a job.”

  “Looks like she is whether she sasses you or not,” observed Slocum. This brought a laugh at the banker’s expense from everyone assembled and broke the tension. Weiss stalked off, grumbling to himself, and the rest left in ones and twos until only Mendelsohn and a few others remained in the middle of the main street. The barkeep polished his badge as he would one of his shot glasses.

  “Much obliged, Slocum,” he said, “for speaking up for me the way you did. Let me tell you, these folks’d never be happy if somebody like Crosby got to be marshal.”

  “I saw one of the bank robbers,” Slocum said. His hand went to the blood-soaked leg of his pants. He flinched a little as he pulled denim away from the still oozing wound.

  “You know him? Or can you jist identify him if you spotted him again?” asked Mendelsohn.

  Slocum stared at the barkeep with some respect. The man wasn’t a fool. The question might have been asked by a real marshal.

  “I can identify him.”

  “I haven’t had a chance to root through the marshal’s files yet, but there might be a wanted poster on him.”

  Slocum considered taking the time to blow the dust off the wanted posters before getting on the trail.

  “I did more than catch sight of one robber. I followed three robbers to the edge of town. I can pick up their trail and we can see where they’re heading with the gold they took.” Slocum saw Mendelsohn swallow hard. The barkeep hadn’t expected to come this close to gunplay so fast. He rose a little more in Slocum’s estimation when he took a deep breath, settled himself and nodded.

  “I’ll fetch myself a rifle. Don’t think there’s a six-shooter in the marshal’s office.”

  “I’ll give you one,” said the storekeeper. “If you’re the new marshal, you got to be able to defend us—and yourself.”

  Slocum and Laurel walked back to her camp to get his horse. Neither said a word until Slocum got the hobbles off the horse.

  “Be careful, John. I don’t want to lose you.”

  “I manage to get out of the damnedest situations without more than a scratch,” he said. She looked significantly at the bad scratch on his leg.

  “You watch yourself.” She smiled weakly and added, “How else am I ever going to find my father?”

  He kissed her, then mounted and rode back into Newsome. He met Mendelsohn halfway.

  “You know the direction, Slocum. Let’s get a-movin’,” the new marshal said.

  “No posse?”

  “Reckon they want to see how their new civil servant handles himself ’fore they go riskin’ their precious lives in anything as foolish as chasin’ down bank robbers.”

  Slocum had to agree with the townsfolk. He had no idea why he was getting involved in this, other than that all the threads in this crazy quilt led back to Fort Crumpland, Sergeant Davies and the men closest to him. Sims was gone, but the other two were still accountable for their part in the crime spree. Hiding behind uniforms wasn’t right.

  “That’s the direction they took,” Slocum said, studying the ground and seeing the tracks.