Working the Lode (19 page)

The idea of the house with four bedrooms, the thick adobe walls, and the grand river-rock fireplace inspired Cormack. He’d specified a hand-hammered cast-iron chandelier for the dining room, such as those crafted for the Spanish missions. The lot was large enough for many fruit trees, so Quartus could have his precious juice.

“That sounds…lovely.” Zelnora gasped, pleased to be displaying her ample breasts to the forest.

Clutching her thigh between both of his, Cormack rocked his erection against her ass. “Four bedrooms…” He seduced her with his vision of a stationary future. “One for us, one for Erskine, one for Quartus…”

As he said the name “Quartus,” that worthy was heard nearby returning from the creek, marveling, ostensibly to Valenzuela, how Cormack had killed a hundred pound salmon and found specks of gold at the bottom of the cooking pot.

“You should stop,” Zelnora said unconvincingly.

“It’s all right,” Cormack whispered, leaning harder into her so that she placed her palms against the shaggy redwood tree. Quartus became terminally appalled at the sight of anyone touching another, and now he heard Valenzuela say, “Why don’t you go back to the river and look for more salmon?”

Zelnora protested no more when Cormack inched her skirts up over her hip and unbuttoned his broadfall, allowing his pantaloons to fall to his knees. There was silence in the glade around them as he took his time unsheathing his cock, stroking it lovingly. The view of Zelnora’s strong, muscular shoulders as she arched her back and offered herself to him was enough to nearly bring him to ejaculate—but it might have been the possibility that Valenzuela was watching them that excited him. And since Zelnora didn’t utter a peep of dissent, he presumed she was also titillated by such an eventuality.

Zelnora reached behind her and scrabbled his buckskin shirt up to his shoulders, letting the silvery moonlight radiate from his pale skin. As much as he wanted the bandit to admire his athletic flank and the fat trunk of his penis, when he teased Zelnora’s engorged clitoris with his fingertips, she urged him to mount her. He slid into her hot succulent pussy, embedding himself to the hilt as he realized he also wanted Valenzuela to admire Zelnora—how nimbly she arched her back like a cat on a fencepost, standing on the tips of her toes to admit his large tool.

Tossing his shirt to the dried grass at their feet, Cormack jounced her on his cock then set to long lunges of his hips as he rocked her. All the while he fingered the erection of her swollen clitoris—he’d learned the sucking clenches of her climax around his prick were enough to bring him off.

“Slow,” he gasped, yanking her off the tree and clasping her shoulders to his bare chest.

She laughed, a low, salacious bubbling that came from deep in her chest. “I’m expected to slow down…when I’m speared on your magnificent penis?”

Cormack did not see the humor in the moment. “And you’re being watched by a base, murderous ruffian?” He had slowed his thrusts till he was barely moving, his cock twitching inside of her.

Zelnora smiled like a snake, the corners of her mouth turning up. “I don’t mind. I’m sure he’s admiring your colossal testicles pounding against my ass.”

Cormack’s face became hot with shame, but his cock jumped even more eagerly at the thought Valenzuela had his sights on his glutted balls. “Colossal? I’m not built that big.”

“Larger than that Spanish debauchee.”

“What makes you think that?” he whispered against her neck.

“When you came out of my tent, after he asked you to doctor his daughter.”

“Yes.” The mere memory had him gliding into her again. That ardent, sensual kiss between the two men had been more than a genteel show of gratitude. Cormack knew there were some odd countries where men kissed to show platonic love. In the mountains he’d seen men, presumably Europeans, do it. To get his mind off Valenzuela’s supple mouth, he had been telling himself the desperado was from one of those countries. But the way he licked and sucked Cormack’s tongue went beyond a simple thanks. Cormack wished he had not shoved the Spaniard away so swiftly. It had just been a natural reaction, and it was unseemly to show affection to another when Zelnora was not present—as though he were stealing something he owed to her.

“His serape was fallen to one shoulder, and his erection stuck out like a lodge pole. Not as big as yours.”

Cormack almost protested, but this time he did hear the enormous Californio spurs jangling as Valenzuela approached him from behind. He felt the heat emanating from Valenzuela’s shirtfront as he pressed gently against Cormack’s hunched back.

“Not as big, my dear?” he chided in an uncharacteristic manner. He happily bantered, not the dead-serious assassin about to count a coup on them like so many buffalo. His fingertips played a glissando down Cormack’s back muscles, causing gooseflesh to stand out on his arms and stiffening his nipples. “Perhaps you’re right, my gorgeous gold-finder. This
pelirrojo
one is hung like a prize bull.” He walked his fingers round under Cormack’s arm to pinch his taut nipples into painfully thrilled points.

Fact, Cormack felt the ridge of Valenzuela’s cock pressed against his bare ass. Ho, boy, was he going to attempt to fuck him, squashing him like an arrow between two hump ribs? Cormack could never allow himself to be demeaned in such a way, in front of Zelnora.

This child’s no traveler
, Cormack thought
. I am a trapper, a mountain man. I’ve seen a petrified forest, as sure as my rifle’s got hindsights.

Here’s damp powder and no fire to dry it.

Reaching one limber arm up to caress the back of Cormack’s neck, Zelnora purred. “
Toro pelirrojo
, you’re right about that, Joaquin. At first I was afraid I couldn’t take him, his penis was so magnificent and—”

“—colossal,” Cormack reminded her, as Valenzuela dropped to his knees behind him, and Cormack felt the heat of his face brushing his backside. Just the snort of Valenzuela’s breath against his tight full balls was enough to send a rush of semen halfway up his cock, and he plunged into his sweetheart again. She grunted with gusto, arching her back even more energetically, and when Valenzuela tenderly bit the globe of his ass and sprinkled several more nibbles, Cormack had to still himself, gasping for air against Zelnora’s shoulder.

“Wait, wait…” Zelnora now exhorted.

Funny she should be the one to still him.

So Cormack eased his prick out of the woman about halfway and stood poised, his leg muscles trembling with anticipation.

“Mmmm.”

He felt as much as heard Joaquin utter this satisfied sound of appreciation. And then he was lapping, the tip of his tongue flickering like a butterfly against the hairs of Cormack’s erupting balls.

Such a tender, dainty little mouth! Cormack heard ox-like grunts coming from somewhere in the redwood bower. Zelnora certainly could cut loose a spree! What a rambunctious, rollicking woman! She—ho, boy, it was
he
who sounded like rutting cattle, he who shivered the ground beneath his feet with his orgasmic trembling!

The Spaniard accelerated his lapping, opening his hot mouth to nip and slurp at Cormack’s balls. Cormack arched his back to allow better access, and the greedy smacking sounded loudly in the enclosed redwood glen. The reverberation of Joaquin’s groans shivered through his balls and up the underside of his distended prick.

He shot center into Zelnora’s scalding, tight pussy.

Not until much later did he realize that his butt was pressed into the face of a wicked Spanish bandit, and when he eventually withdrew from Zel’s flaming pussy, from behind Joaquin lathed his prick clean of jism, smacking his lips pruriently. He squiggled his nimble fingers up and down the length of Cormack’s prick, milking the last drops, fervently supping his seed. Cormack wrapped his fingers around Joaquin’s skull, cradling him to his crotch as he shuddered into the blistering, talented mouth.

Chapter Twenty

After hungrily bathing the sperm from the mountain man’s prick, Joaquin fell back onto his ass and pondered. The two white men were shamefully silent, and no one looked anyone in the face. Joaquin propped his wrists on his knees and looked at Cormack’s boots. He should get back to Sonoran Camp and find out what nefarious destruction his cohorts had wreaked for the evening.

His tongue darted out and licked the last smoky residue from his bottom lip. He dared to look up at Cormack’s sinewy back, the delectable curve of his hip where it sloped down to his stupendous ass. What was wrong, really, in what they had done? Pleasure was a means to its own end—in the past two years he had advocated that. Didn’t he pride himself on being wicked and depraved? If anyone discovered what he’d done, he would say it was a new form of depravity. Besides, who cared what those idiots thought? Lately it had been more fuss and bother than it was worth, keeping them in line. It seemed he’d been forbidding more and more of their fatheaded schemes. It was far more pleasant to kneel here licking the plump prick of a hale American, one with immaculate skin as white as calcite, no less. It was a delicious feeling of power, to make this impressive mountain man come with his mouth. And with the apparent blessing of his sweetheart.

But he should leave. He was about to get to his feet when other hands assisted by lifting his elbows. Cormack looked a bit sheepish and couldn’t hold his gaze, but Zelnora’s face shone with the effulgence of satisfaction, and she told him, “Come into the cabin. We have some claret you might enjoy.”

Joaquin merely nodded, and the three strode through the still, hot moonlight. Joaquin had stayed in this cabin a couple of years ago when câching after his first few murders. He had felt so righteous then, avenging the deaths of his brother and wife, but it was getting a bit tiresome. And the more Americans that came to California, the more futile his revenge seemed. Fewer folks remembered the wrong done to him, so it just made him seem like a heartless killer with no lofty goal. That had been fine for awhile, too, but he was growing weary, sleeping in the open, often snow-packed ground, eating the same dull venison for every meal, or tinned oysters that tasted like rancid boot soles. It was time for the gentle touch of a woman again.

He was pleased with how Zelnora had tidied up the cabin. A twenty foot square of redwood logs, she had hung the sides with calico printed with every variety of rose. The fireplace, Joaquin recalled commanding someone to build from stones and mud, and Zelnora had fashioned a mantle nailed fast to the wall with strips from the ubiquitous oyster cans. Someone had even sawed a window and filled the opening with clear glass jars filled with clay. A handsome carpet was tossed before the hearth, and since there were only two rough rocking chairs, Joaquin perched on a stool while Zelnora handed him a cup of claret.

She sat on the edge of the rocking chair, cup between her fingertips. As if noting his admiration for her decorating skills, she said, “This new claim…Will we be able to easily return back to this cabin at night? I’m growing sore from sleeping on pine branches, although Cormack, of course, spreads a nice bed.”

Cormack sat down in the rocking chair and gazed evenly at Joaquin. “Yes…it’s a mighty shame for such a hardworking woman to have to toil all night on a bed of rocks after working in the same all day long.”

“Yes,” Joaquin agreed. “The spot I’m thinking is well within five miles from here. I can send some men around this cabin to build you a porch, add a cooking area, a pantry. I just saw a very fine stove you can have.” Yes, Thaddeus Martin from down near Tuttletown had a fine stove—before they’d looted his cabin. Joaquin wondered if the stove was still there. It was awful heavy, and bandits didn’t have much call for stoves.

“Oh, that’s all right,” Zelnora said dismissively. “We don’t plan on staying here for long. If the mines are as rich as you say, we should be able to leave by first snowfall.”

Joaquin felt a momentary stab of panic at the thought his newfound friends would leave after they made their fortune. Well, of course. That was the nature of the frontier. But now he’d found such a virile, strapping companion and a ravishing woman who knew as much about mining as he did. He had to discover if he could induce them to stay. “Where will you go?”

Zelnora looked to Cormack, and he indicated it was all right for her to tell him. “Cormack bought a lot in San Francisco near the bay.”