Wild to the Bone (26 page)

Lust? Jealousy?

“What're you stopping for?” Dulcy gave Raven a hard shove.

As Raven stumbled into the room, again straining at the ropes tying her wrists behind her back, Dulcy stepped into the room behind her. Ana stepped in then, too, and closed the door.

The two young women stood side-by-side, feet spread, as Raven turned to face them.

“Get on the bed,” Dulcy said tonelessly. She thrust the coiled rope at Ana. “Tie the bitch up.”

30

T
he wind had picked up
again in the afternoon. Now it was sweeping dust around like a mad old lady with a broom.

That was all right with Haskell. The darkness that had closed down over the Pumpkin Buttes would render him invisible, and the wind's howling would cover the sound of his approach to the cabin.

He was hunkered down now behind a shelf of cracked limestone about a quarter-mile off the ranch yard's northwest corner. The outlaw's horse was tied to a cedar behind him. It had been a good horse, a sound, sure-footed horse throughout the day, when Haskell had circled the ranch several times from a great distance, getting a good lay of the land and making sure the outlaws were holding their position inside Dulcy's cabin.

Now the horse was nickering as it stared toward the north, where it knew the ranch yard lay along with the barn that housed its equine partners and hay and water. It wanted to go see its friends, and Haskell didn't blame it. And in due time, he was going to send it on its way.

He thought he'd hit the outlaws around midnight or shortly thereafter.

He hunkered lower and pulled his hat brim down to help keep the dirt from his eyes as he continued to hold his vigil, gazing toward the cabin. Several times throughout the day, one or two of the stage robbers at a time circled the house cautiously, cradling a carbine in their arms. Haskell was relatively sure that at least one man was outside now, keeping an eye on the yard's perimeter, but he was no longer sure where.

The man hadn't shown himself in more than an hour.

Suddenly, the wind switched direction slightly, blowing something out from behind a rock ahead and to the right of him. The object rolled and bounced along the ground and came to rest about four feet away.

Haskell stared at the object, trying to make it out in the moonless darkness, the wan lamplight in the windows beyond offering the only illumination. It appeared to be a hat.

Haskell looked at the cabin. Then he looked at the object on the ground before him. Curiosity got the better of him. He muttered a curse and then crabbed out and over the lip of the shelf he was on, grabbed the hat off the prickly pear it had gotten hung up on, and dragged it back behind the shelf.

He inspected it, immediately recognizing it.

Haskell's heart hammered. He fingered the hat, blinked as he stared at it.

No, it couldn't be. But sure enough, it was.

It was Raven York's tan Stetson with the leather band trimmed with a single square ornament of hammered silver. He'd recognize it anywhere.

Hang-jawed, Haskell looked toward the cabin again. The shack, lit by a few dim lamps, suddenly took on a new, brighter significance.

How in the hell had she gotten out here?

Or . . . maybe they'd brought her.

However it was she'd come to be out here, Raven was out here. Her hat hadn't blown here all the way from town.

Holding the hat in both hands, Haskell stared at the cabin, incredulous. She'd been out here all day. In the hands of those savages.

Haskell weighed the hat down with a rock and then rose and ran down the slope toward where the outlaws' horse stood, staring in the direction of the ranch yard. Bear untied the reins from the cedar, saying, “You wanna join your pards, old son? All right. You got it.”

Quickly, he tied the reins around the horse's saddle horn. And then he swatted the mount's rump with his rifle stock and rasped against the wind, “Go on, then, join your pards! I'll be along shortly!”

U
pstairs in the Stoveville house,
Raven lay spread-eagle on the bed in which Bear and Dulcy had cavorted hours before. She could still smell the man, and she wished like hell he were here with her now.

She was getting scared. She was beginning to wonder if he'd been wounded when Swede had fired on him. Was he lying out in the buttes somewhere, slowly dying?

Or maybe he already was dead.

That meant Raven wouldn't be alive much longer, either. She'd overheard the outlaws' plans last night and all day today as she lay up here on the bed, her breasts exposed, her wrists and ankles tied to the bed's brass frame. She'd heard about their operation. At least, enough of it to be able to put all the parts together, to know exactly how they'd worked and who all was involved.

They'd been in town yesterday to find out from Verlaine Couchigan, the young woman Duke Shirley had been fucking in the woodshed, the exact time that the gold shipment was due to pull through the butte country tomorrow. Apparently, Miss Couchigan, also part of the gang, had left a note somewhere in the stage station.

There was no way in hell the gang was going to let Raven live. Not after she'd stopped being useful as a hostage.

Raven winced as she continued trying to loosen the spool of the headboard to which her left wrist had been tied. If she could work that hand loose, she could untie the other one. She wasn't sure what she'd do once that had happened, but she had a stiletto sheathed in her right boot, which the outlaws hadn't found. If she could arm herself with that stiletto, she might be able to disarm the next person who walked into the room.

Either Dulcy or Ana was checking on her every hour or so. Dulcy had given her a few spoonfuls of stew and a couple of shots of whiskey. The last time she'd visited the room, the pretty blonde had kissed Raven's left breast before she'd left, chuckling, telling her she'd be requiring more of that later.

Raven gritted her teeth as she continued to work on the spool. She could hear it turning in its hole, and if she could only turn it just a little more while pulling down, she thought she could pull the spool right out of its socket.

She stopped, drew a breath. She was exhausting herself with the effort. She drew a few more deep breaths and then gritted her teeth again and began pulling down and turning the spool once more.

Dulcy's voice sounded from the first story, where Raven could tell from the sounds that the others were playing poker at the kitchen table. Boots pounded slowly up the stairs. Raven looked up over her left shoulder at the spool in the flickering light of a single lamp on the nearby dresser. She thought she almost had it.

Dulcy's boots continued pounding up the steps.

Raven grunted as she pulled at the spool.

Dulcy's boots drummed along the hall. The door stood halfway open, so by now, Raven knew, Dulcy could see into the room. Raven cursed under her breath, stopped tugging on the spool, and relaxed her body.

Dulcy appeared in the doorway. She kicked the door wide open and leaned a shoulder against the frame. She had a pistol on her hip. She held up a bottle. “Another snort?” Her eyes were shiny. She was mildly drunk.

Raven glanced at the Schofield riding the holster on Dulcy's round hip. She had an idea. “Yeah, I could use another snort,” she said.

Dulcy moved into the room. She smiled obliquely as she kicked the door closed. She sat on the edge of the bed, and as Raven lifted her head from the pillow that smelled like Haskell, Dulcy pressed the lip of the bottle to Raven's mouth. Raven closed her lips over the mouth of the bottle, and Dulcy tipped it up.

The fiery liquor filled Raven's mouth, ran down her throat, built a low fire in her belly.

“More?” Dulcy said.

Raven shook her head.

Dulcy stared down at her, let her gaze wander down to Raven's torn blouse and chemise. “You like girls?”

Raven drew a deep breath, swallowed. “I've never tried girls.”

Dulcy arched a speculative brow as she continued to stare at Raven, her mouth corners raised a little. Finally, her mouth corners rose a little more, her eyes flashed deviously, and then she lowered her head to Raven's chest. Her lips were warm and moist on Raven's left nipple. Dulcy closed her hand around the other breast, squeezed it gently.

Raven looked down at the girl's locks of gold-blond hair spilling across her chest. Through the locks, she could see the girl's pink lips working Raven's left nipple, her pale hand massaging the other breast. Her throat went dry. She'd thought she'd have to pretend to enjoy it, but she found the ministrations not as unpleasant as she'd expected.

In fact, Dulcy's pliant lips making soft, wet crackling sounds as she suckled set up a warm heaviness in Raven's belly.

Dulcy looked up, grinning. She pinched Raven's left nipple between her fingers and said with playful accusing, “You like that.”

Raven swallowed, parted her lips as she stared down at Dulcy. The blonde went back to work, suckling, and then, apparently getting more of the same positive response as before, she lifted her head, grinned, took a pull from the bottle, and offered it again to Raven.

Raven shook her head. She had to keep her mind clear.

Dulcy chuckled and set the bottle on the floor, and then she went to work unbuttoning Raven's denim trousers. Dulcy continued to grin lasciviously up at Raven from below her swollen breasts, as she pulled Raven's pants and underwear down her long legs to her ankles.

Dulcy lowered her head to Raven's crotch. Raven heard herself groan softly when she felt the girl's tongue slide inside her.

“Yeah, you like it,” Dulcy said. She flicked her tongue in and out of Raven's snatch and then lapped her clitoris. “Huh?” she said. “Feel good?”

Raven had to admit that it did. But she had a job to do, and she had to stay alive to do it.

Back to the plan.

“It might be more fun if you untied me,” Raven said.

“More fun for who?” Dulcy said, then continued sliding her tongue in and out of Raven's cunt.

As she did, Raven resumed pulling and twisting the spool above her head. She had to be careful and not use much force, or Dulcy would detect the tension in her straining muscles and get savvy about what she was up to. Raven found it hard to concentrate with the girl's tongue lapping her and stabbing in and out of her.

She paused in her work when Dulcy, keeping her face in Raven's snatch, reached up to massage Raven's breasts as she fucked her with her tongue. Somehow the mental and physical strain of trying to work the spool loose coupled with Dulcy's tongue and hands caused Raven's blood to boil. Desire shot up from her pussy to spread like spokes throughout her body, causing every nerve ending to spark and sputter.

“Oh, Christ,” she heard herself say, pulling on the spool and spreading her thighs wider as Dulcy mashed her face up tighter against Raven's cunt, continuing to slide her tongue in and out.

In and out . . .

The pressure built up inside Raven. She cursed and writhed, pulling on the spool. Just as she felt her dam break and her juices ooze down the walls of her snatch to coat the insides of her thighs, the spool broke loose of the bed frame. Dulcy pulled her face away from Raven's snatch and stopped kneading her breasts as she looked up, frowning.

From downstairs, one of the men called, “Dulcy!”

Dulcy stared at Raven, suspicious. Raven used her head to block Dulcy's view of her hand and the spool she'd broken loose. Apparently, Dulcy hadn't seen it yet. Still frowning, she turned toward the door and yelled, “What?”

Albert shouted up the stairwell, “Swede's horse just showed up at the barn!”

“Well, check it out!” Dulcy returned, irritated.

One of the other men yelled angrily, nervously, “Griggs is out there now. Why don't you get your tongue out of that detective's cunt and haul your ass down here!”

Ana chimed in with, “Get down here, Dulcy!”

Dulcy turned to Raven, narrowed one eye, and said, “What do you suppose that big ol' Bear is up to?” Her eyes shifted focus. She raised her head slightly to look at the headboard. “And what the hell are you . . . ?”

“Sorry about this,” Raven said, grabbing the spool in her fist and sitting up as she swung it back behind her left shoulder.

She slung it forward, the spool connecting with Dulcy's right temple just as the pretty blonde had opened her mouth to scream. Dulcy grunted and rolled off of Raven to lie beside her, flat on her back, body slack.