“Such as?” she responded.
“Why are you really doing all of this? We’ve never met before the other day. You don’t have any reason to help me like this,” he said, and she stayed quiet for a time. She was thinking of what she should tell him and if she should tell him anything. She finally sighed and nodded. She would be honest.
“Years ago, I was working a case with the Pinkerton’s in Philadelphia, and we made an arrest. A man was accused of murdering his wife. I had some reservations, but being new and a woman, I didn’t speak up. The agent in charge named O’Connell was sure that he had the right man. So, the defendant was quickly convicted and sentenced to die. I couldn’t let it go, and I kept digging, trying to find more evidence on the case. It just felt wrong and I was becoming more and more sure he hadn’t done it. I finally discovered that the woman had been murdered by another woman. This other woman had become obsessed with the man, even though he had no interest in her. When I had the proof, I raced back with it only to find they had moved up the execution time, and I was too late. He was dead. I swore I would never take part in sending an innocent man to prison or death again,” She explained softly.
“Besides, I have a good eye for people and I could tell you were a straightforward man, a good man. I was sure you were innocent and I will help you regardless of any risks to myself. I take risks all the time on much less to go on,” she finished and smiled slightly for him. The story hadn’t been as hard to tell as she had thought. Of course, sitting on a blanket with a good-looking man, alone, it was easy to open up. She felt a tingling go through her as she continued to gaze into his eyes. Her body was reacting to her physical need and his maleness was strong and enticing despite her recent loss.
“Well, all I can say is you are a fine example of what a good person should be, and I hope my sister will continue to grow into as fine a person as you are,” he complimented her. He leaned in towards her, not releasing her eyes and went for a kiss. She hesitated for just a moment. She did not want to dishonor the man she had come to care for but she hoped such a purely physical act could block out the pain she felt. Still unsure, she accepted his kiss and closed her eyes. It was a good kiss and one of his hands caressed her shoulder. She smiled against his lips, liking his rather subtle forwardness. His hand trailed down her arm when suddenly she seized his with hers and stopped its journey.
Should she do this? Cassandra knew she desperately just wanted to feel something, anything, again besides the ache Chris’s murderer had left her with. Again, she thought maybe, maybe just for a few minutes of bliss she could bury that pain. As for Brent, she could imagine his needs and desires after a year in Claymore, with that she could help she knew. Saying nothing she released her grip on his hand.
Brent slowly slid his hand down her shoulder to her waist, gently squeezing it before cupping her ass. With that single move from him, Cassandra felt excitement coursing through the veins of her arms before finally settling on those of her breasts. She reached up for him too, trailing the smooth edges of his chin with her fingers before moving them downwards, against his hard-muscled chest. Tiny hairs greeted her palm on his chest, exciting her more. He even smelled good, like honeysuckle, she realized in surprise as his lips suckled hers, telling her how much he wanted her.
She continued to kiss him back for a while, their hands already exploring inches of each other’s body. Cassandra could feel a release of tension that had been building within her. Again, she thought of how she knew that for him, having been in prison for so long, meant he had his own tension he needed to get out of his system too. Luckily, with their arousal, they would both feel better even if it was for a short time, she told herself as she let Brent push her gently back onto the blanket.
She pushed her hand into his trousers as he worked on his shirt to get himself naked before undoing the buttons on her blouse. He groaned when she found his hard cock and pulled it out just to continuously jerk it. He was hard. Strike that; he was frigging aroused and nothing could satisfy him unless he pushed his manhood deep into her throat or into her wet hole.
In her palm, his dick was growing larger and harder. Cassandra lowered her body, jerking it hard before pressing the tip into her mouth.
“I… I….”
She would be surprised if he didn’t stutter. She suckled the tip of his dick hard, nibbling on it before resuming a long drag of his hard flesh. When she knew that he had had enough of that, she pushed everything into her mouth, swallowing him whole and making his body reverberate with pleasure.
He had had enough. A wide grin spread across her face as he suddenly dragged her up, his eyes glistering with lust. He reached for her buttons quickly, jerking her blouse off her body shamelessly. Her large breasts were bared and he stared briefly before lowering his head to pay homage to them.
Cassandra arched her back instantly, pushing more of her tits into his lips and earning a sultry groan of desire. She helped him to completely pull down his pants as he fed hungrily on her breasts, smiling whenever he groaned in complaint at her sudden movement. She slid her hands over his soft skin afterwards, enjoying every touch – every movement of her fingers across his skin and that of his over her supple skin. When she felt his hand move down over her bare waist and slid under her waistband to finger her soft womanhood, she found herself muttering every word she had thought she wouldn’t say.
“Oh Brent, yes,” she cried, “that is what I need!” she managed to cry out again, in her desire for him.
“You are beautiful, Cassandra Wilde.” He responded too, his middle and index fingers already filling her hole and caressing every wall within it.
“Every inch of you is a thing of beauty and I want you, all of you!” He cried out afterwards, his pleased groan rhyming with hers.
None of them said anything anymore. The man’s hands on her skin lit a fire that that nothing could kindle but his hard cock – deep within her walls. She pulled him down on top of her with inexplicable energy, their now naked bodies pressed together like cloth on skin. It felt so wonderful and freeing having his weight on top of her that she cried out her joy and desire for more of him.
“Take me now, Brent.” She begged him, “Dig deep into me.”
He understood what she meant. His lips went from her breasts up to her throat first before smashing against her lips with promises of the satisfaction that was to come.
She felt the tip of his cock between her thighs a second later, sealing his promise. Cassandra widened her thighs to tell him that she was prepared for him. His weight came then immediately, his cock digging deep into her and riding her of any strength to breath.
“Oh Brent. Brent.”
She wished there was more to say apart from his name, but nothing else came to mind. He wasn’t Chris and that wasn’t his fault. As her heart raced she found herself drifting away from her place of pain she had dwelled in since Leland Gulch as his cock big and wide left no space in her; he filled it whole. He was moving now and widening her thighs just to ram in deeper. She held him tighter, writhing under his strong body, against his body, to feel all there was of him inside her. She needed to encourage him. She wanted what he wanted too.
He rolled with her suddenly so she was on top. She continued to let her hands touch and possess all of him, just as she began to writhe on top of him, twisting her waist so she could dance on his cock. She began to bump high and low too, riding his dick, taking him and out and driving her own orgasm. For as long as their union would last, she wanted all of him. She wanted to block out all her pain and take all the pleasure she could; every single one he could give.
She encouraged him to give her more by suddenly sliding his cock out of her and putting back into her mouth. Before he could groan in complaint again, she knelt in front of him, with her ass shooting out towards his ready cock. He took the hint and raised himself behind her. He held her waist first before hurriedly ramming his cock deep within once more.
When his rod entered her deep hole,
Cassandra cried out again with the rush of feelings that roared in her head. He gasped too and cried out as each thrust seemed to bring him closer to her center of need. When he reached out with his hand to harshly squeeze her breasts, she cried out again, and again as their hips moved in a dance that was unconscious and necessary.
They were back to their initial position before Cassandra felt her climax becoming irresistible. Brent wouldn’t be done without a final hard thrust though. He cried out with absolute pleasure as he gave his final thrust, before pulling his seed spilling all over the blanket and on the small of Cassandra’s back while she welcomed it with a thrust of her own, her entire body reverberating with endless orgasm.
Soon, they lay side by side, catching their breath in each other’s arms. Cassandra felt relaxed and quite glad she had given into his kiss. For the first time since the tragedy she had felt her spirits soar. As they lay there in comfortable silence, she noticed that the sun had moved quite a bit, and they had been busy for longer than she had thought. She reached for her pocket watch to be sure. When she checked it, she nodded to herself and looked over at him with a smile. Brent had his hands behind his head and his naked skin sparkled in the sunlight and his sweat.
“It is time to get going, Brent. The stage will be by in an hour or so, and we had best get back,” she told him reaching for her clothes.
“I just pray that we haven’t guessed wrong because if no outlaws show up, we are both in a heap of trouble,” he said.
As they both finished dressing, he looked off into the distance and pointed to three riders charging across the open plain.
“I hope that isn’t part of a posse coming from the south looking for us, Cass or we have had it!” he said glancing over to her. Cassandra smiled and buckled her guns on her trim waist.
“I don’t think so,” she said, standing with a smile as she looked southward.
Their cavalry had arrived.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
* * *
“Here comes the stage, Cass. There isn’t any sign of outlaws around the canyon,” Melinda Novack said in a whisper from where they were hiding behind some big rocks. “I’ve been wondering…why are you so sure they are going to rob the stage in the first place and why in Cobalt Canyon?”
“I’ve been up against criminals since my days with the Pinkertons,” Cassandra said with a smile. “I know how their greedy minds work. There is never enough money in the world for them. Carrington and his gang have been dormant since framing your brother, but the lure of the gold I led them to believe is on that stage is likely enough to stoke that greed and make a play for it. The Blue Mask Bandits can easily ride again as no one ever said Brent was the leader of it.”
“Makes sense,” She said. “But why this canyon?”
“The first two stage robberies were in canyons just like this. My guess is to cut out the possibility of a stage leaping off the road trying to get away. In a canyon, it would be boxed in on two sides. Carrington may be criminal, but he’s proven to be shrewd. Now keep watching. The next few minutes will decide everything!”
She was right. Suddenly, out from behind a small hill across near the mouth of the canyon came the gang, their trademark blue masks covering their faces. The outlaws were riding fast, straight at the stagecoach, guns at the ready.
It was show time.
“Okay, Novack, mount up! We’ll ride down and take them from the front. Melinda you’ve got my shotgun. Let loose in two minutes as the signal to trap them from the rear!” Cassandra ordered her companions.
“Understood,” Novack said.
“Okay,” Melinda answered. She gingerly picked up the shotgun and held it far from her body.
Cassandra and Brent rode down the canyon side towards the south entrance and could see the gang slowing down the stage. They curved around behind a roadside stand of trees getting closer without being seen yet. Across the distance could overhear the exchange of raised voices as Quillan’s stage came to a stop.
“Throw down the gold box, boy, and hurry if you want to live!” the big man in the lead of the gang said in a hoarse voice. That spectacular acoustics in the canyon easily carried to their ears and it sounded most familiar to Cassandra.
“Move with that gold box, darkie, or I’ll turn that horsewhip you’re using on your team back on you!” another shouted.
“Gold box? Are you an idiot? I’m not carrying any gold box! I got a load of hymnbooks. See there, for the church ordered by the Prophet Prescott Bell of the Gabriel’s Horn Ministry!” Quillan Dodge said in disgust for the gang as he held up a manifest. At that point, the sound of a double barrel shot gun letting loose roared from behind the rocks on one side of the canyon.
“It’s a trap!” yelled the leader and the gang turned their horses to retreat in the direction the stage had come from. Unfortunately for them, there were now three women sitting astride horses behind them and pointing shotguns of their own. Cassandra knew the men would be shocked at the sight of a colored woman, a Chinese woman and a Mexican woman appearing suddenly out of nowhere and instantly throwing them for a loop. The sort of men who would be in a gang like this would easily be dumbfounded and confused; exactly as she wanted.
“What the hell is this?” one gang member shouted.
“Never mind them, this way!” the leader shouted and began to ride in the open direction. The others followed save for the bandit who had threatened Quillan.
“I’m gonna teach you some manners, boy,” the bandit said in a menacing voice.
Lijuan and Catalina looked at Honor and she nodded her head for them to go. The unspoken message passing between them was that she would handle this. Her two sisters slipped their rifles into their scabbards, kicked in their heels and pursued the others making sure they were heading towards the mouth of the canyon and the waiting Cassandra and her clever plan.
“My mama taught me all the manners I need. That’s before she got sold off and we never saw her again,” Quillan shot back, his eyes as cold as ice.
“Why you little -little …” the bandit’s voice trailed off temporarily as he couldn’t think of a bad enough name to call the calm driver.
“You think that just because you’re not a slave anymore and you own a stagecoach and a team of nags that makes you as good as me, a white man?” the bandit growled.
“You’re right. I’m not as good a man as you. I’m a better one! I’m not out holding up stagecoaches trying to steal other people’s money. I come by mine honestly.”
“You uppity, filthy scum,” the bandit screamed at Quillan, with a vein in his temple throbbing unseen beneath his mask. “You murdered my brother, and I’m gonna kill you for it!”
“Your brother?” Quillan questioned, puzzlement covering his face. “How so? Come close a time or two, but I’ve never killed a man.”
“Well, mebbe it wasn’t you who fired the cannon, but it was because the North thought your low-life kind needed to be free!” the sarcasm in the man’s voice flowed like a river. “He was killed at Picacho Pass. Died in my arms, he did. My only brother,” the bandit said, his voice modulating from anger and hatred to repressed grief.
“I am sorry about your brother,” Quillan said graciously. “But I had nothing to do with that war or that battle. And my daddy gave his life fighting your side in the colored regiments.”
Suddenly, screaming in rage, the bandit raised his pistol and took aim at Quillan’s head, but before he could pull the trigger, a sharp pain shot through his upper back between the shoulder blades. Jerking around, he saw Honor Elizabeth’s arm dropping from its throwing position. His leather coat had prevented the blade from sinking too deeply into his flesh, but it had gone in far enough to produce exquisite pain and had distracted him from Quillan. Honor spurred her horse to move forward. When she reached the bandit, she yanked her knife from his back. He gasped from the pain of the blade withdrawing from the muscle in his back. Calmly she wiped it clean on his own duster.
“Why you blac
k hussy!” he screamed. “I’ll see you die for that!”
He moved his horse around to face his assailant, and then started to draw his pistol into position again to fire this time at Honor, but her reflexes were faster and she threw the knife again with precision at his chest. The open leather jacket offered nothing in the way of protection from the sharp blade that penetrated his evil heart. He looked in shock from Honor to the knife protruding from his chest before slumping in the saddle in death. His lifeless body fell with a thud to the desert floor. Honor dismounted and reclaimed her treasured Bowie knife, wiping his blood from it on his coat once more before re-sheathing it.
“Here is a history lesson. The war was not fought to free our people…it was about preserving the union,” She looked up from the body and locked eyes with her one-time love.
“Thank you, Miss Honor,” Quillan said with gratitude shining in his relieved eyes. “I thought I was a goner for sure that time.”
“My pleasure, Quillan,” she said with a grin. “My pleasure.” She bowed slightly toward him; the spark that had always passed between them was as alive and well as it always had been.
Further up the canyon Melinda had come to a conclusion that she was not going to sit idle when she could be helping her brother and that strange band of women that had shown up earlier, and who, to her astonishment, turned out to be Cassandra Wilde’s sisters. Her role in the plan had been to fire the signal shot but she wanted to do more. Slipping out from her hiding place she began racing down the side of the canyon. She could see the bandits charging in her direction from where they had abandoned their attempt on the stage.
Though she had no experience with firearms she knew full well accuracy wasn’t needed when firing the buckshot from a shotgun. Licking her lips, she brought the gun up preparing to pick off one of the Blue Masks when she jammed her eyes shut in despair. Only now did she remember her brother had loaded the shotgun and she had no spare ammunition. As the gravity of her mistake set in she froze along the canyon road still aiming the empty gun at them unsure of what to do.
In Danger's Shadow: Cassandra Wilde Western Adventure (Half Breed Haven Book 2) Page 10
