One Bright Morning

by Duncan, Alice

  Mulrooney raised the piece of paper in one ham-like fist and shook it at the two men.

  “Do you know what this wire says, you miserable, slimy pip-squeaks?” His voice was clogged with malevolence.

  “N-no, sir,” whispered Ferrett.

  Pelch could only shake his head.

  “They’ve gone!”

  Their boss’s bellow made both men jump.

  Mulrooney slammed the paper onto the table in front of him. His entire body vibrated with anger.

  “They’ve gone,” he repeated.

  “G-gone, sir?” ventured Ferrett. He didn’t know whether it would be better to talk or not to talk. He was eyeing Mulrooney with fear and caution, ready to duck should his boss decide to throw something.

  “Gone,” Mulrooney affirmed. “They aren’t in New Mexico anymore.” His furious voice then assumed a sing-song quality, as though he were mocking Jubal Green and his band who were trying to escape his wrath. “No. They’re not there any longer. They’ve gone to Texas. Back to El Paso.”

  Ferrett and Pelch looked at one another. Pelch appeared to be almost relieved, as though he were glad his arrangements hadn’t managed to get anybody else killed yet.

  Mulrooney stood up then, and Ferrett and Pelch shrank further back against the door.

  “But they won’t get away from me,” said Mulrooney, staking his two employees to the door with his vicious gaze. “No, they can’t escape my revenge. I’ll get them.”

  Then he turned and glared around his carriage as though looking for somebody to murder. Ferrett shut his eyes in an agony of suspense.

  Suddenly Mulrooney whirled around again. His sausage-shaped arm swept out and tore across the table top in front of him like a hurricane ripping through a Florida key. Everything on the table—papers, pens, books, teacup, teapot, and tray—went flying through the air and crashed up against the wall. China shattered and tea splattered everywhere, coating wall, furniture, and papers with warm, sweet, poisoned brown liquid.

  Ferrett and Pelch looked at each other with blank dismay.

  Mulrooney eyed the mess he had created with fury, then slammed his porky hands down on the table.

  “Well?” he roared. “What are you two blithering fools waiting for? Clean this mess up!”

  When the two men finally left Mulrooney’s carriage and carried the shattered remains of their failure away from the scene of their attempted crime, Ferrett looked very depressed. So did Pelch.

  “I’ll never have the nerve to try again, I’m afraid, Mr. Pelch,” mumbled Ferrett, as though his inability to commit murder lightly were a miserable failing.

  Pelch shook his head sadly. “Nor I, Mr. Ferrett, I’m afraid. Nor I.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Jubal, Dan, and Four Toes ultimately decided that it would be better to travel during the late afternoon and night as long as the weather was this hot. They had a lot of desert to cover on the way to their destination, and it was going to be rough going, no matter when they did it. But they all three agreed that crossing those arid miles would be easier on all of them, including the cattle, if they did it at night. Maggie approved of their idea.

  “Oh, I think that would be much better,” she declared, happy at the thought. “Annie gets so hot, and there’s no way to cool her off. Poor baby.”

  Annie was, at the moment, asleep in her mother’s arms. They were all gathered under some cottonwoods that graced the banks of Turkey Creek and afforded the little glen a modicum of cool shade. They had eaten a light lunch of hard bread sticks and dried beef. Maggie had also handed out slices of dried apples that she’d brought with them. The apple slices were tasty, and the men appreciated the fruit, which was a rare treat for them. It felt good to relax and listen to the gurgling of the little river as it tumbled over rocks on its way to wherever it was headed.

  Four Toes stretched and yawned. “Well, I guess we’d better try to get some sleep now, then, since we’re going to be traveling tonight.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Jubal.

  “Well, my goodness, Mr. Smith and Mr. Green, the two of you were up most of the night, too, weren’t you?” Maggie asked, remembering how they had guarded the camp so assiduously the night before.

  Four Toes grinned at her. “Actually, Mrs. Bright, we all took turns. Dan here took the watch after us.”

  “Oh,” said Maggie thoughtfully. “I guess I didn’t realize traveling in these parts required so much vigilance.”

  “Well, it normally doesn’t, ma’am,” said Dan. “We just want to make sure Mulrooney’s hired guns don’t take us unawares.”

  “Oh,” said Maggie again. She’d almost forgot about Mulrooney.

  They all lay down under the cottonwoods. Maggie spread a quilt for herself and Annie to share because she didn’t want to get any more dirty than she already was. The men disdained such luxury, but laid down with their heads upon their saddles. Maggie only looked at them and shook her head and pondered the oddities of men. They were such strange creatures.

  She woke up an hour or so later and wondered where she was and why she felt so content. When her eyes blinked open and she remembered her circumstances, she smiled. It didn’t seem quite right, to be so happy when somebody wanted to kill her, but Maggie decided she wouldn’t worry about the inconsistencies of life right at the moment.

  She sat up, peered around under the trees at her traveling companions, and almost laughed when she noticed that Annie had got up while her mama slept and wandered over to where Four Toes lay. He had shaken out a saddle blanket for her to lie upon, and she was curled up next to him now, asleep, with one of the toys he had carved for her tucked up under her chin.

  Maggie felt really sticky and dirty. She’d been sweating all morning, and the wagon had churned up clouds of dust that now clung to the dried sweat on her body and made her itch. It was a very uncomfortable feeling for Maggie, who was used to being clean, and she didn’t like it. She eyed Turkey Creek speculatively.

  I bet I could take a bath while the men sleep, she mused.

  Very quietly, she got up and tiptoed to the wagon where she dug out a cake of the lye soap she had made earlier in the winter, a towel, clean linen, and a clean shirtwaist. Then she tiptoed away from the camp through the cottonwoods, searching out a spot where she could bathe in private but which would still be close enough to the camp so that she could hear if the men began to stir.

  When she finally found a spot that was secluded enough, it was a little further away from the camp than Maggie liked. But the thought of being clean again was so appealing that she decided she just couldn’t bear being dirty any longer. She stripped off her dusty clothes until she wore only her drawers and camisole, then waded into the stream.

  “Shoot, it’s cold,” she muttered through chattering teeth. But she resolutely walked into the river up to her knees. Up to her knees was as deep as the creek got in these parts. Shivering in the cold water, Maggie began to wash herself.

  Jubal didn’t know what prompted him to crick his eyes open when he did. All he knew was that some strange feeling suddenly came over him, and he woke up. It was a feeling of loneliness mushed up with an odd sense of danger, and it jerked him wide awake all of a sudden. He blinked a couple of times and sat up, trying to keep the groans of pain that always accompanied that activity to himself.

  Damn, maybe I’m just getting old, was his first sour thought. Then he decided he was probably only dismayed because healing up was taking longer than he wanted it to. That thought cheered him momentarily, until he glanced over to Maggie’s quilt and saw that she was gone.

  Then he was on his feet so fast, he didn’t have time to hurt. He quickly glanced around their little resting spot, taking in the sight of Annie nestled next to Four Toes, Dan and Four Toes snoring soundly under the trees, and their cattle relaxing near the creek, munching weeds and dozing.

  Jubal swore silently as he yanked on his boots and picked up his Winchester. He tried to be quiet when he scanned the area for tr
acks. He had no trouble picking up Maggie’s, and he followed them out of the camp and down the stream, muttering foul oaths to himself the whole time.

  # # #

  “Maybe it wouldn’t be so cold if I sat in it. Then I’d probably get used to it,” Maggie said to herself.

  So she sat down in the middle of the stream. Sure enough, after the first shock of cold, her body seemed to adjust better that way, when it was nearly submerged, than it had when she had merely been throwing frigid water over herself.

  “I’m probably getting numb and freezing to death,” she muttered as she began to wash her hair. “Still,” she said with a grin for herself and the hot spring day, “it feels good to be clean.”

  Jubal came upon her bathing place just as Maggie stood up and flung the wet mane of hair out of her face. His breath caught and he felt all at once as though somebody had just punched him, hard, in the gut.

  The spot Maggie had chosen was just past a bend in the creek where the river widened into a little pool, and it was overhung by cottonwood branches. A couple of big rocks baked in the sun beside the stream, and she had placed her clean clothes neatly on one of the warm rocks. She had slung her towel over a cottonwood branch, and she reached for it now as Jubal watched, too stunned to turn away as a gentleman should.

  Rays of sunshine streamed through the tree branches, sort of like they did in religious pictures Jubal had seen in churches. They splayed out like a fan over Maggie, bathing her in rich amber light and dancing on the rippling water like diamonds.

  Unlike Maggie, Jubal’s eyesight was perfect, and he could see every sweet curve of her shapely body as her camisole and drawers clung wetly to her skin. Her legs were works of art, Jubal noticed, and he swallowed hard. Her belly was just barely rounded—enough to show that she was a woman. Her hips were firm and round and curved like ripe fruit. And her breasts—Jubal had to close his eyes hard for a second.

  When he reopened them, those breasts were still there and still just as beautiful as he had thought they were. They weren’t large, but they were perfect, firm, round globes that sat high and perky. The cold, wet fabric of Maggie’s thin camisole molded over them like a second skin, and her nipples had puckered and hardened and rode the tips of her breasts like two succulent cherries. Jubal had an almost overwhelming longing to taste them.

  “Oh, great God,” he whispered to himself. His body’s reaction to this visual feast was instant. Almost immediately, his denim trousers were nearly too tight to hold his swelling, hardening flesh.

  “Damn,” he murmured.

  He was torn by many emotions just then. He was furious with Maggie for wandering away from their camp by herself. He was angry with himself at his reaction to her. And, more than anything else, he wanted to stomp down there, right into the river, pick Maggie Bright up, carry her over to the grassy riverbank, and have his way with her.

  He had just decided that anger was the safest emotion to act upon at the moment and was bracing himself for a good holler, when a sudden furious crashing erupted from the trees opposite the creek bank where he stood.

  Maggie heard it, too, and stopped, frozen, in the act of pulling her wet camisole over her head.

  Jubal had torn down the bank, raced through the river, grabbed Maggie up in his arms, and flattened them both out on the ground before either one of them knew what the noise was that had frightened them. As they lay on the bank, stunned by fear and Jubal’s sudden action, they turned their eyes toward where the sound had come from. The white flash of a deer’s tail could be discerned as the animal, alarmed when it came to the water to drink and found Maggie bathing, raced off through the trees.

  Jubal’s rifle was primed and ready for use the second he knew that Maggie was safely covered by his body. His heart was knocking a hole through his chest by the time he saw the deer, realized the animal had made the noise, lowered the gun, and looked down at Maggie.

  She was staring up at him in stark terror. “Mr. Green!” she squeaked.

  Jubal shut his eyes tight and took a deep breath to keep himself from throttling her. Then he looked down at her once more and had to shut his eyes again when he realized he was lying on her in a very intimate way, and that those breasts of hers that he had so admired were naked and pressing against his chest. Her body was cool under his, and his reaction to the feel of her was even more violent than his reaction to the sight of her had been.

  “Why the hell did you leave camp alone?”

  Maggie wanted to cover herself, but her arms were squashed under Jubal’s body. She was still pretty scared. She hadn’t had a chance to calm down yet and her heart was racing so fast she thought she might swoon. It was difficult to draw sufficient breath with which to speak.

  “I wanted to take a bath. I was dirty,” she stammered.

  “It’s not safe,” Jubal growled.

  “I’m not that far from camp,” Maggie offered in an attempt to justify herself.

  Even as she said it, she knew she had probably been at fault. With a heavy heart, she decided that she was always at fault, just as her aunt used to tell her. She didn’t want to cause these nice men, who had sworn they would protect her, any worry on her behalf. Nor did she want to make the job of protecting her any more difficult than it already was. And her rustic little bathtub was pretty far away from camp.

  Jubal knew it, too. “It’s too damned far to be safe.”

  “But it was only a deer.”

  “It might not have been only a deer.”

  “I—I guess not.”

  By now, Maggie was having a real hard time concentrating on their conversation. Jubal was staring down at her with those green cat’s eyes of his and making her feel all over hot. But it wasn’t the same kind of hot that had baked the energy out of her earlier in the day. This kind of hot was liquid and searing and it was making her want to do things with Jubal Green that she knew a proper lady would never want to do with anyone but her lawful husband.

  She could smell the sweaty, hot man of him and liked it. His weight pressed her into the grassy riverbank and she felt his male hardness rigid against her. That shocked her some.

  “You might have been killed, Mrs. Bright,” Jubal said. His voice was tight.

  “I’m sorry,” Maggie whispered.

  That was the last thing she remembered saying before Jubal’s arms tightened around her and his lips lowered to hers.

  Jubal’s kiss was hard, inspired in equal parts by anger, lust, and fear. His anger and fear slowly died the longer he drank of Maggie’s sweet lips. Desire and relief quickly drowned those other unworthy emotions.

  She tasted like sweet apples and sunshine, and he couldn’t seem to get enough of her. He dipped his tongue out to taste of her lips more deeply, and the shimmer of reaction that swept her body nearly did him in. When he felt her arms wrap around him, he had a dim thought that they’d better stop this pretty quick, but he couldn’t quite make himself let her go.

  Maggie couldn’t ever remember feeling like this before. Not even with Kenny. Not ever, even remotely, with Kenny. She knew she shouldn’t be hugging Jubal back, but she couldn’t seem to help herself. His body was hot on hers, hot with sun-heat and her-heat, and the combination was sending her down a road she’d never traveled before.

  She’d never been particularly interested in Kenny’s body, but she all at once found herself wanting to rip Jubal Green’s shirt right off his back so she could run her hands over those muscles she had seen when he’d been so sick, and feel his hot man’s skin. She wanted to caress those hard thighs that she’d admired, in spite of herself, when he’d been unconscious. She remembered they were covered with sun-colored hair. She wanted to run her fingers over those hairs and find out if they were as wiry as they looked.

  She found herself arching her hips against his swollen manhood and would have been ashamed if she’d had time to think about it. She writhed her breasts against him, glorying in the feel of her sensitive nipples rubbing against the heavy cotton of
his shirt. She had an utterly wanton desire to find out how they would feel against his hairy chest.

  When his tongue began to explore her mouth, she was surprised. She’d never experienced that particular intimacy before, and her lips parted a little in alarm. When Jubal’s hot tongue immediately pressed its advantage and plunged into her mouth, she forgot her alarm and thrust her own tongue out to meet his.

  Jubal couldn’t believe what he was feeling. He’d had enough women, God knew, in his checkered career, but he’d never felt anything akin to the way he felt now, as he lay fully clothed atop Maggie Bright on the cool banks of Turkey Creek. His sex was hot and hard as a pistol barrel, and he could feel every, single, minute inch of Maggie’s body underneath him. Her breasts were driving him crazy. He had been cupping her face with his hands, but he moved one of those hands now to feel her breasts.

  Oh, my God, thought Maggie.

  She wasn’t sure she hadn’t said the words aloud into the open mouth of Jubal Green that still slashed over hers. She had never even considered the remote possibility that a man could touch a woman’s breasts like that. She’d never felt anything so wonderful in her entire life. Kenny had never done that. She heard funny little, soft, kittenish sounds, and realized somewhere in her fuddled brain that they were coming from her own throat.

  She knew the low growls and groans of desire were coming from Jubal.

  Maggie was whimpering with unrestrained desire and Jubal was just about to rip his clothes off and finish what they had begun when they both became aware of a voice hollering in the distance.

  “Mrs. Bright! Jubal! Where are you?”

  Jubal slowly withdrew his lips from Maggie’s and heaved a gut-wrenching groan of frustration. He squeezed his eyes shut, gritted his teeth, and prayed for strength.