Wicked Temptations (16 page)

Priscilla knotted her fingers together to still their nervous trembling and held her clasped hands against her chest. "He found out Trudy was staying with me and they met on the back porch during
the Town Tattler
meeting. I found them there a few minutes ago."

"Bloody hell!"
Adam barked. "If the young bloke had his hands on her I'll—"

"Nothing happened!" Priscilla cut in. "When I found them, Trudy was in the midst of telling him that things were over with them. She was quite angry with him, so I have no reason to believe she'll be seeing him again. In fact, she's so caught up in the women's suffrage movement and the
Miss Manners
column that it may be a long time before she notices any young men at all, so you can rest easy."

"Good," Adam said, "because I have other things on my mind tonight."

"So do I." Priscilla's gaze dropped, and she noted that Adam's breeches were stretched yet tighter. Looking up, she saw the feral gleam in his eyes and knew he'd caught the focus of her attention, which troubled her. He would not be getting what he'd come for. There were too many things that needed to be sorted through before that would change. Forcing herself to put aside all wanton thoughts, she said, "Can we go outside where we can talk, without Trudy hearing us?"

Adam held her gaze as he said, "I'd rather talk in the storage room. It's been a week since you bared your breasts and I'm about to go mad with wanting to pleasure you again."

Priscilla patted her chest, disturbed that his words were making her breasts tingle and her nipples pucker. But this time she would not let her passionate nature overrule her better judgment. "We need to talk about that as well," she said.

"I wasn't planning on talking at all this time, love," he countered. "When I return from taking Trudy to her grandmother's I want to find your bathtub filled, and you in it. Tonight's going to be our night. But before we divest you of your maidenhead, I'll want you to settle back in the water and close your eyes and turn your body over to me so I can minister to the places that bring you the greatest pleasure, and while I stroke and tease and explore those private places, I'll watch the ecstasy on your face, and hear the little moans and sighs you make that drive me—"

"Stop!"
Priscilla said, raising her palms toward him to hold him where he was. She drew in a long ragged breath to steady the irregular beating of her heart and focus on the issue, which was not about the sexual pleasure Adam intended to give to her. "Tom Rafferty had his arm in a sling," she said in a firm voice.

Adam looked at her, annoyed. "I didn't come to talk about Tom Rafferty either," he said, his voice no longer playful. "Get Trudy down here so I can take her to my mother's or it will be too late for her to arrive there."

Ignoring Adam's request, Priscilla said, in an irritated voice, "You don't understand, Adam. At the meeting tonight, a woman said that two nights ago two men came riding in to her neighbor's place and tore down their wire fence, and that her neighbor recognized the younger of the men as someone working for you. She said her neighbor shot at the man and hit him in the arm, and a few minutes ago Tom Rafferty was here with his arm in a sling."

"He got shot when he was cleaning his gun," Adam said, without question.

"But he told Trudy that someone named Tanner accidentally shot him. She corrected him when he told me he shot himself, and he became angry and defensive when Trudy questioned him about changing his story."

The expression on Adam's face hardened. "What difference does it make?"

Feeling her anger mount, that Adam could be a party to it, she said in an sharp voice, "It makes a difference between you hearing a lie or hearing the truth. I believe that Tom Rafferty was shot when he tore down a man's fence."

"My men are not going around tearing down fences," Adam said in a gruff voice. "You're only hearing one side of the story. Cattle rustling's rampant, and the homesteaders and small ranchers are right in there with the outlaws and cattle rustlers, carrying out nightly raids, where afterwards, cattle with altered brands mysteriously appear behind their fences, and when they're accused of stealing, the sheriffs they've appointed do nothing."

"That's not the way I heard it," Priscilla contested. "The women at the meeting claim that the cattlemen appoint sheriffs who turn their backs on homesteaders when they report incidents. They also believe you're behind the attacks on the homesteaders, sending your men out to carry out your orders."

Adam's jaws tightened and his eyes narrowed. "And you believe them."

"I don't know what to believe," Priscilla said, "because I don't know you. We shared a picnic lunch at the church social, we had a few dinners together when I was staying at your house, and we had an evening together at the theater. And the few times when we've managed to be alone whether here or in the buggy, we never talked about anything except my desire to give up my virginity, and your desire to take it. Our entire focus has been on sexual gratification. You've never asked about my family, or my philosophical views on life, or what I like to do when I'm not running a paper. All you know about me is that when you kiss me, my passionate nature takes over and I lose all sense of modesty and virtue, and that I'm willing to open my bodice to you and bare all so you can give me pleasure. And I know almost nothing about you, except that for some odd reason, you seem to find me attractive."

Adam looked at her thoughtfully. "You're right on both counts," he said. "From the start I found you attractive, but I also took advantage of your lack of experience with men. I've been self-absorbed, and my focus
has
been on sexual gratification with you, when I should have been more conscious of the things women like. Hugging, holding hands."

Priscilla pursed her lips in disgust. "You are entirely wrong! I'm not asking you to hold my hand or give me little hugs and kisses. Until just before you came here tonight, all I wanted was for you to release yourself from your britches and get under my skirt and finish what we started in the buggy. But that's changed now. I don't want to give up my virginity to someone I don't love. And Tom Rafferty was shot in the arm while he was dragging off a homesteader's fence. And homesteaders are being attacked and intimidated. And every last one of you cattleman want to see the homesteaders go."

"And you believe I'm right in there among them," Adam said, eyes narrowed on her, the expression on his face challenging.

"I don't know what to believe," Priscilla said.

Adam grabbed his hat off the printer lever and shoved it on his head. "Well, when you finally figure it out, let me know. Until then, I won't be bothering you." He stormed out of the building, slamming the door behind.

***

Adam walked past the lineup of polo ponies tied to the hitching rail outside the Cheyenne Club, mounted the stairs leading to the wrap-around porch of the impressive, two-story brick building, and knocked on the heavily-embellished front door. A tall, stately man dressed in black trousers and a black cutaway coat opened the door. "Good evening, Lord Whittington," the man said, then stepped aside for Adam to pass.

Adam nodded to the man and walked into a room illuminated by elegant chandeliers that hung like so many upside-down spiders with gas-lit flames emerging from their pointy feet. The sweet pungency of cigar smoke, mingled with the muskiness of spilled whiskey and oak paneled walls, teased his nostrils, and as he walked past the massive stairway that curved upward to the second floor, he heard the muffled sound of a woman's laughter. Not a night bird—the Cheyenne Club was not a brothel—but one of the many beautiful women available to club members and their guests. What went on behind the closed doors was not questioned.

Adam had spent many evenings in the company of such women. While she sipped wines of the finest vintage, and he enjoyed Scotch whiskey served in crystal shot glasses, they both feasted on fresh oysters and imported cheeses and Swiss chocolates and other fine delicacies from far off regions of the world. Or, if it was to be an extended evening, the steward would roll in a butler's tray with a full-course meal served on the finest English bone china and set off by sterling flatware and lead crystal goblets.

The evening would invariably include a romp in bed. Afterwards, the woman would take a foil-wrapped cigar from an ornate box and make an art of peeling off the foil, rolling the cigar between her fingers, placing it between his lips, and lighting it. And while he'd puff on the cigar, sending perfect rings of smoke drifting upward, she'd go about the business of putting herself together. That alone was an art these women had perfected. When she was done, she'd bend down so he could tuck a sizeable bill between her ample breasts, and she'd leave. Although the women always took care of his need, when the evening was over, he never felt quite satisfied. But tonight he had no need for a woman. His disturbing encounter with Priscilla earlier alleviated his problem. He also had the feeling that if a beautiful woman stripped naked in front of him, that part of him would remain unchanged. How one woman could make him impotent with merely words was both troubling and baffling.

Hearing a lively exchange behind the closed double doors to a smoking room, he entered the room and found several members of the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, smartly dressed in white tails and ties, sitting around a large table, debating the latest issues, while sucking on imported cigars. The men tipped goblets and snifters and shot glasses toward him in acknowledgement. But instead of joining them at the table, he sank into the thick cushions of a large chair, elaborately upholstered in soft brown steer hide. A steward offered champagne, which Adam rejected for brandy. After Priscilla all but accused him of being the brains behind the attacks on the homesteaders, he'd been so mad he headed straight for the Club, wanting something strong and warm to take the edge off his anger.

Cupping his palm around the bowl of the snifter, he held the brandy beneath his nose to allow the aromatic bouquet to fill his nostrils, then took a sip, held it in his mouth for a moment, and swallowed. By the time he'd downed a second glass, his anger began to wane, and he could settle back in his chair and focus on what the men were discussing...

"...then I say here's to them—" Albert Bothwell, a cattleman with a huge spread in the
Sweetwater
Valley
raised his shot glass in a toast. "That's one less fence to contend with." He looked at Adam. "They were your boys, weren't they?"

Adam was only just beginning to absorb the conversation. "Who?"

"The two men who tore down the nester's fence north of the city. One of them got shot in the arm. Someone said it was one of your boys. Sorry to hear about that. But we'll cover for him if there's trouble. Rustlers seem to be multiplying around here faster than jack rabbits, and the rustling's got to be stopped."

After thinking it over, and taking into consideration what Priscilla said, Adam was fairly certain Tom Rafferty had taken the bullet when pulling down the fence. And Tanner would also be part of it since he had been with Rafferty the night he got shot. He didn't like his men going off on their own, even if it was to tear down a fence and release a heard of stolen cattle, and he'd have words with them. He eyed the men at the table, who were waiting for his reply.

"If my men did it, they did it on their own and won't be doing it again," he said. "That's not the way I handle things."

"It's the way the WSGA does," Bothwell said. "Last I heard you were one of us."

Moreton
Frewan
, an Englishman with a large spread on the
Powder River
said, "Cowboys like those two, who spend their days branding strays for us, are the ones who break off and start their own herds. That's where the trouble begins. Half the small ranchers around here got their start stealing our stock. It's our duty to blacklist any man suspected of branding mavericks for themselves, and to bar them from employment with members. Mark my word, Whittington. If your men tore down the fence on their own, they will eventually break away from you and start building up their herds from your stock."

"I'll keep an eye on them," Adam assured
Frewan
.

Bothwell thumped his knotted fist against the table, and said, "The small ranchers are also turning their stock into our herds as a reason to go in and brand our mavericks and claim them as theirs. I say we blacklist every cowboy who's branded mavericks or bought or sold orphans."

John Durbin, another large rancher on the Sweetwater, who also had interests in a meatpacking plant in Chicago, puffed on his cigar, flicked ashes into an ornate silver ash container, and said, "We have the Maverick Law on our side now, so anyone taking mavericks or unbranded strays will be arrested for rustling."

"They're being arrested now," Bothwell said, "but juries let them walk free. They say the law is unconstitutional and they plan to challenge it."

Frank Canton, a stock detective hired by the stock grower's association, said in a metered voice, "
Montana
handled the problem in one night. Stock growers gave the names of rustlers and where they had their ranches and campsites, to hired guns, who went in and took them all out. We should do the same. I say we offer five-hundred-dollars for names of anyone branding cattle on open range and add them to our dead list."

While a barrage of heated voices debated that idea, Adam eyed Frank Canton with misgiving. Although
Canton
had been sheriff of
Johnson
County
, rumor was circulating that he was a killer and an outlaw. Adam made a mental note to watch the man carefully.