15

Fargo let Martha tell him the whole story before he spoke. When she was finished, he had only one question.

“Who’s Custis Kane?”

“He’s a bully and a gunman. He works for a logging company from time to time, but he’s often out of work. He goads men into fights, and sometimes he kills them. He’s been tried for murder more than once, but he’s never been sent to jail.”

Fargo had met too many men like Kane. They were everywhere in the West, and they believed that because they were bigger than others or faster with a gun, they had a right to do whatever they pleased. And all too often they got away with it.

And he was planning to find out where the Bryans were by getting it out of Stink Dugan.

There was one serious flaw in Kane’s plan: Stink was down the hall with Kansas Kate. He’d been in a saloon that evening when a man who owed him for a job had paid him. So he’d decided to use his money to have some more fun with Kate. Now that he’d cleaned up, he didn’t want to waste the bath.

“I’ll be right back,” Fargo said, leaving Martha sitting on the bed.

Fargo went out of the room and down to the parlor. He asked Sally if Stink was still with Kate.

“Yes, and it’s about time he finished. I don’t like having my girls spend too much time with one man, and he’s been here once today already.”

“Don’t let him leave,” Fargo said. “I need to talk to him. When he comes down, send him to the kitchen. He can talk to Vangie.”

“She’s already gone to bed,” Sally said.

“He can talk to himself, then. Just don’t let him leave.”

“You’re mighty uppity for a new employee,” Belle said.

“I don’t mean to be,” Fargo said. “But I found out somebody’s going to hurt Stink if he leaves. I don’t want that to happen.”

“Neither do we,” Sally said. “I’ll have him stay.”

Fargo thanked her and went back upstairs to his room. Martha was still sitting on the bed.

Fargo went to sit beside her.

“You know that your father was involved in the bank robbery,” he said. “So were Orcutt and Tomlin. Will you testify against them in court?”

“I’ll tell what I overheard. My father has always seemed to me to be an upright man, but now I know that he’s not. It’s a disappointment, but not a surprise, I suppose. He and Mr. Orcutt lost a great deal of money in a mining venture, and I believe they didn’t think life would be possible without it. Albert lost his money gambling. The three of them must have thrown in together to get the Bryans to rob the bank and take the blame when they were caught. Hob Bryan tried to tell people that at the trial, but no one believed him. With my father as the judge, he and Sam didn’t have a chance.”

“What about the guard who was murdered? Do you know who killed him?”

“I thought the Bryans did.”

“They say not. They say they weren’t even armed that night.”

“Surely you don’t think that my father or the others would kill anyone!”

Fargo did think so. One of them might have been there to be sure the guard didn’t come back. And when he had, the watcher had decided to get rid of him. It was the only explanation that made sense. The trouble was that Fargo didn’t know which of the three was the killer.

He didn’t want to tell Martha his thoughts because the judge was, after all, her father. She might be able to accept that he was a party to bank robbery, but for her to think of him as a killer would be much more difficult.

As he was mulling all this over, Fargo noticed that the sagging bed had caused Martha to slide closer to him, so that again their shoulders and upper arms were touching. He also noticed that her skin was quite warm, so warm that he could feel the heat through his shirt.

He turned his head to look at her. She had curling brown hair, large blue eyes, and a wide mouth. Some people might have considered her plain, but she looked fine to Fargo. He could tell that under her dress, she was well proportioned, with large breasts, a narrow waist, and accommodating hips.

She looked back at him boldly. He wondered if she had been excited by the fact that she was in a whorehouse, by the sounds coming from behind the doors, by the fact that she was alone in a room with a strange man she’d met only about an hour earlier.

“I feel very . . . odd,” she said, fanning herself with her hand. “It’s a bit like . . . vertigo.”

“Do you need to lie down?” Fargo asked.

“Perhaps that would help.”

Martha lay back on the bed. Her breathing quickened as she gazed up at Fargo.

“I . . . might need to loosen my clothing,” she said.

Fargo asked if he could help.

“If you think it would not be . . . indelicate.”

“I’ll be as delicate as anybody could be,” Fargo said.

But he didn’t really need delicacy. As soon as his fingers touched Martha’s clothing, she started to help him. Lying on the bed made things awkward, however, so she stood up.

Fargo knew exactly where things were heading now, and in only a few seconds both of them had shucked their clothing. They stood facing each other, completely naked.

“You’ve been hurt,” Martha said, seeing where the bear had scored his shoulder.

“That was a while ago,” Fargo said. “I’m fine now.”

He looked at Martha with appreciation. Her breasts were high and firm, tipped with rock-hard nipples. Her legs were long and smooth and tapered to fine ankles.

His erection stood out like a tent pole, and Martha couldn’t keep her eyes off it.

“Do you find me shameless?” she said.

“I find you just about perfect,” Fargo said.

Martha blushed in the lamplight and ducked her head.

“I’m thought to be plain,” she said.

“Only by idiots,” Fargo said. “You’re sure not plain-looking to me.”

She continued to stare at his erection with fascination. “Would it be all right if I touched it?” she said.

Fargo told her he couldn’t think of anything he’d like better.

“Well,” he said after thinking about it for a second, “I can think of a couple of things to tell the truth. But you can touch it first.”

Martha took the necessary two steps to reach him and curled her fingers around his thick shaft.

“It’s so stiff,” she said.

“That’s all your fault,” Fargo told her.

He reached out a hand and gently took one of her nipples between his thumb and first finger. She shuddered, and he caressed her engorged breast.

“Oh, my,” she said, “that feels very nice.”

Fargo removed his hand and Martha pressed herself against him. Her nipples burned him as she wriggled her stomach to better feel the length of his erection slide along her feverish skin.

Fargo bent his head to kiss her. It was a bit clumsy at first, as Martha lacked practice, but she was an apt pupil, and soon their tongues met and tangled.

Fargo found it hard to quell his mounting excitement, and it wasn’t necessary. Martha was as eager as he was for the next step. She turned to the bed and lay down, keeping her legs pressed modestly together.

Fargo lay down by her and began to touch her breasts, letting his fingers glide over the silky skin.

“Oh, oh, oh,” Martha said.

Fargo let his fingers rove lower, down her flat stomach, over her taut abdomen, and into the crisp hairs at the V of her legs.

“Ah, ah, ah,” Martha said.

As his fingers slipped even lower, down among the curls and over the edges of her dark and secret places, Martha began to quiver, and her legs relaxed and separated. Fargo felt sudden, slick moisture, and his finger slid up and down the slippery surface and over the pleasure ridge. Martha raised her hips to thrust against his hand.

“AH, AH, AH,” she said.

As her hips thrust and rotated, Fargo’s finger slithered inside her.

“Ahhhhhhhhhh,” Martha said, her body convulsing as she climaxed.

When it was over, she lay quietly for a while, her eyes closed as if she were thinking about what had just happened. Fargo waited without speaking. Finally she said, “Is it always like that?”

“Sometimes it’s better,” Fargo said. “It lasts longer. You were in kind of a rush.”

“Yes. Can . . . we do it again?”

“We might try something a little different if you’re ready for it.”

“Oh, yes! I’m ready! Please!”

Fargo spread her legs and positioned himself between them. Then he told Martha to raise her knees. When she’d done that, he said, “Now take hold of me.”

Martha reached down and gripped his shaft.

“Rub it where it will feel the best,” Fargo said.

Martha was hesitant, so Fargo pushed a little closer, so close that the damp, tangled curls of her sex brushed the tip of his pole.

Getting the idea, Martha pulled him even closer and rubbed the tip against the center of her delight.

“Oh, oh, oh!” she said. “Ah, ah, ah!”

She started rubbing slowly at first, but in only seconds she was rubbing the tip faster and faster, her hips moving up and down and side to side as her excitement grew. Soon she lost her grip on Fargo and threw her arms back over her head. She no longer tried to contain the gasps of pleasure that burst from her.

“I want you inside me!” she said. “Please, Fargo! Now, please, now!”

Fargo was excited himself, and he put his hands on Martha’s hips to steady her momentarily so that he could push into her. He expected it to be difficult because of her obvious lack of experience, but she was so excited and slick that he plunged in with almost no resistance.

When he did, Martha arched her back and said, “Oh God, oh God, oh God!” Spasms of pleasure racked her and rippled from her toes to her neck. As they did, Fargo kept moving with longer and longer strokes, prolonging his own pleasure for as long as he possibly could.

Martha thrashed on the bed beneath him, as if in the throes of some terrible fit. Her mouth opened wide, but the only thing that came out was a prolonged “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”

Fargo was reaching his limit. He was determined to wait until Martha reached the absolute peak of desire, but things were getting beyond his control.

Then Martha was ready. She wrapped her legs around him and pulled him to her, forcing him so deeply inside her that their pubic hairs tangled.

“Now, Fargo!” she said. “Let me have it now!”

And Fargo did, exploding like a geyser, time after time until he was completely drained.

Afterward they lay side by side. Martha was the first to speak. “I knew I was missing something, not having a man for so many years. But I don’t think Albert could ever do what you just did for me.”

“You’d best find somebody else,” Fargo told her. “Even if he could do that, Albert’s a party to the bank robbery, and he might be the one who killed the guard.”

“I don’t think Albert could kill anyone, either.”

“Maybe not, but he’s involved. I’d advise you to break off with him.”

Martha turned on her side and looked at Fargo. “I don’t suppose you’d be interested in settling down with a wife and family in Portland.”

“That’s not for me,” Fargo said. “It might be fine for some men, but not for me. I don’t much like towns. My life’s on the prairies and in the woods.”

Martha smiled and lay back down. “I know that. And I know now that I’m not as plain as people think. Not in the ways that count.”

“You’re sure right about that,” Fargo said. “Anybody that thinks you’re plain is just pure crazy. You can find somebody a lot better than that Tomlin fella.”

“Yes, I can. And I will. But right now I’d better get dressed. What must those women think of me!”

Fargo laughed. “They’ll think you’re having a lot more fun than they ever do. They do it for money, not for the pleasure of it.” He thought of Sally and added, “Well, most of the time, anyway.”

Martha got up from the bed and started to dress. “You sound as if you know what you’re talking about,” she said.

Fargo smiled. “Let’s just say I’ve had a pretty good day.”