“Do you have to be a member to eat here?” he asked as they were being shown to a table.
“No,” she assured him, “it’s just a name.”
The waiter held her chair for her and asked if he could get them drinks before they ordered.
“We would like a bottle of your best champagne,” she said.
“Of course, madam.”
As the waiter walked away, Clint asked, “Have you been here before?”
“Never,” she said, dropping her shawl so that it fell behind her on her chair, “but I’ve always wanted to eat here.”
Clint decided that it would be Sam Clemens’s money they spent, which meant he was going to eat as well as she did. When the waiter returned with the champagne and poured, they both ordered Beef Wellington.
“You know you almost got your brother fired today,” he said then.
“Oh? How?”
“If he hadn’t stood up to you at LuLu Belle’s, Sam would have fired him and got someone else.”
“You’re saying Mr. Clemens would not have considered Clark a man if he hadn’t stood up to me?”
“He would not have considered him his own man.”
“Mr. Clemens knows nothing about my relationship with my brother,” she said. “Our parents are gone and we are all we have. We’re close.”
“That’s fine,” Clint said. “You can be as close as you like, but I don’t think you should be interfering with your brother’s work.”
“He’s just starting out,” she said. “He needs help.”
“So bring him his lunch and decorate his office,” he said. “Don’t go to court. That’s not going to help him any.”
“Not in this instance anyway,” she admitted, grudgingly.
“No,” he said, “definitely not in this instance.”
They drank their champagne and he asked her what she did. She explained that she was a dressmaker, working out of their home—the home she and her brother grew up in, which they now shared.
“And now I suppose you’re going to tell me that my brother and I should not be living together?”
“I was going to ask you if there was a man in your life,” he said. “A gentleman friend?”
“I haven’t had time for anything like that,” she said. Then she turned coy. “Although it’s not that I have never . . . um, been with a man.” Her face got red and she covered her mouth with her hand. “No, I didn’t mean—I meant to say that I have been courted before, not that I’ve actually been with—”
“It’s okay,” he said. “If you’re inexperienced with men, I understand that.”
“Well . . .” She lowered her hand, leaned forward, and said, “I didn’t exactly say that, either, did I?”
“No, you didn’t.”
The waiter came with their dinners then. They both leaned back to allow him to set down the large plates he was carrying.
“That looks and smells wonderful,” she said.
“Enjoy your dinner, folks,” the waiter said, “Let me know if you need anything else.”
“We will,” Clint promised.
“My God,” she said, picking up her knife and fork, “there’s so much.”
“Why don’t we pick up where we left off after we’ve sampled this great dinner?” he said.
“All right.”
“You will remember where we left off, won’t you?” he asked.
“Oh, yes,” she said. “Don’t worry. I won’t forget that.”
After Clint and Melanie left LuLu Belle’s, Clark Orwell said, “I’m very worried about Melanie, Mr. Clemens. She means well. She raised me after our parents died. It’s only because of her hard work that I got to go to college and to law school. She’s just very—”
“Son,” Clemens said, “let me cut you off right there. I understand loyalty. In fact, I applaud it. But you’re a grown man now, a lawyer, and you’ve got to assume your rightful position.”
“Uh, which is?”
“You have to be in charge of your own life,” Clemens said, “and your own career.”
“I can’t just forget what she’s done,” he said. “And we live in my parents’ house together—”
“I understand all that,” Clemens said. “All I’m sayin’ is that it’s time for you to assert yourself, like you did here a little while ago. Believe me, your sister will respect you for it.”
“I suppose you’re right, sir.”
“I think you’ll find I am,” Clemens said. “Now, why don’t we order dinner, and then we can get down to talkin’ about strategy.”
“Yes, sir,” Orwell said. “I have several ideas about what we can do in court, starting tomorrow—”
“It’s what you and John Taylor will do in court, Mr. Orwell,” Clemens said. “I just want to know what I’m paying for. It’s time for you to impress me with your knowledge of the law.”
EIGHTEEN
When Melanie Orwell was not being a royal pain in the ass trying to tell all the men what to do, she did turn out to be a lovely and charming dinner companion. And with more champagne she became flirtatious, as well—and unapologetically so. No more blushing or covering her mouth with her hand.
After dessert she told Clint she did not live far from there. He told her he would walk her home. They both knew what was going to happen when they got there.
The house was a large, wooden, two-story building that had been built about forty years before.
“It’s the only home my brother and I have ever lived in,” she said. “It needs some work, but it’s our home. We think it has character.”
He walked her to the door, and they stood on the porch for a few moments. While it did need some work, the house was by no means run-down.
“Thank you for dinner,” she said. “It was delicious, even though it was a bribe.”
“A bribe?”
“Well,” she said, “part of a bribe.”
“Part?” he asked. “What’s the other part?”
She smiled and said, “I think you know what the other part is.”
He stepped close to her and kissed her then, gently. If this was not the part of the bribe she was talking about, and he had read her wrong, he wanted to go slow.
But this obviously was what she had on her mind, because her mouth opened beneath his eagerly. He put his arms around her and pulled her close. They kissed for several moments, then she pushed him away.
“We’re giving the neighbors a show,” she said, breathlessly. “Come inside with me.”
She unlocked the door. As soon as they stepped inside, they were in a clinch again, kissing deeply, wetly, as if they were trying to devour each other.
“Come to my room,” she said, taking his hand.
“What about Clark?”
“His room is upstairs,” she said. “Even if he’s home he won’t hear us. Come on!” Her tone was urgent now, as was her need.
Her room was in the back of the house, down a long hallway. He had the feeling it had once been her parents’ room; it was large enough for two people.
She pulled him toward the bed and started to remove her dress frantically. He wanted to help her, but she said, “No, no, take off your clothes.”
She was naked and in the bed while he was still taking off his pants, and she was reaching for him impatiently.
“Jesus, Jesus,” she said, “I’ve been thinking about this since I first saw you in Clark’s office.”
“Miss Orwell,” he said, teasingly, slapping her hands away, “you’re a very bad girl.”
“I’m wanton,” she said. “I told you I’m not so innocent.”
She pulled him onto the bed with her, on top of her, and they pressed their bodies together as they kissed. Her breasts were like ripe peaches, hard and firm against his chest. His hands roamed over her, finding her flesh smooth and hot. She reached between them to grasp his penis and guide it to her moist vagina.
“I can’t wait,” she said. “I want you in me now. Later you can take
your time, but now I want you to take me hard and fast.”
He gave her what she wanted, because it was what he wanted. He entered her and began to slam into her so hard the bedpost banged against the wall.
“Oh yes,” she implored him, “that’s it, harder . . . harder . . . faster . . . damn it, faster . . .”
He gave her what she wanted and more. The bed began to jump and actually move across the floor, but they went on. She grabbed for him, raked his back with her nails, wrapped her legs around him, drummed on his butt with her heels. She went wild beneath him, bucking and shouting, and just for a moment, he thought of Clark in another part of the house, but that thought quickly went away as his own need rose, as his own satisfaction approached.
He heard someone grunting with effort and realized it was him. He felt the rush of his orgasm but held it back as she begged him for more. He didn’t want to finish too early and disappoint her. She was not quite as wanton as she thought—certainly not like Angela, the woman he’d had for one night in Keokuk—but she was eager and sweet tasting, and she craved more and more the more he gave her.
Finally he couldn’t hold back any longer. She seemed to know, perhaps because he was swelling up inside of her, filling her with his bulk before he finally exploded into her, bellowing like a bull as she shouted, “Oh, yes, yes, yes, . . .” over and over again . . .
Later, they did take their time. He went over her body slowly with his mouth and tongue, stopping to taste every freckle he found, which was a lot. She moaned and writhed beneath him, gripping the bedsheets, and when he arrived at her hot, wet, waiting crotch and attacked it with fervor, she gasped, pushed him away, and said, “Ohmigod!”
She curled up against the bedposts and stared at him.
“I thought you said you were wanton,” he said.
“B-but, I’ve never had a man do that before.”
“Didn’t you like it?”
“It was . . . was . . . too good!” she gasped. “I mean, I think if I let you do that I’ll . . . I’ll die.”
“You won’t die,” he said. “I promise you.”
“B-but . . . you like doing that?”
“I love it,” he said. “It brings women a lot of pleasure.”
“Most of the men I’ve been with are only concerned with their own pleasure,” she said. “You’ve already proven to me you’re not that kind of man, but this—”
“Melanie,” he said, “trust me. Just lie back, relax, and enjoy it.”
“Well . . .” Slowly her body unfurled. He reached out to touch her, stroke her, bring her legs down until they were stretched out and spread apart.
“Just relax,” he said, kissing her calves, her thighs, licking them, soothing her, stroking her belly, running his palm over her pubic hair, then the other hand, then spreading her so he could lean in and use his tongue.
“Oh . . . my . . . God,” she gasped, but to her credit she didn’t pull away, and eventually he felt her body relax first, settle in to what he was doing, and then tense up for an entirely different reason . . .
NINETEEN
The following morning Police Officer Eddie Sims faced Sergeant Ben McCloud in police headquarters. He reported every move Clint Adams had made, especially going home with the lawyer’s sister, Miss Melanie Orwell.
“Never mind that,” McCloud said. “I don’t care who Adams is fuckin’. Tell me about the lawyer.”
Sims did. He told McCloud how new Orwell was, still wet behind the ears, with an office that had just opened. He also told him how he had seen Mark Twain with all of the other people involved.
“Mark Twain,” McCloud said. “What the hell is his interest in this?”
“I don’t know, sir.”
“I wasn’t askin’ you.”
“Yes, sir.”
McCloud checked the time. It was early, very early.
“Adams didn’t leave the woman’s house last night?”
“I finally gave up around two a.m., and he had not left yet.”
“All right, go back to her house and pick him up again if he leaves there,” the sergeant ordered.
“What if he’s at the hotel?”
“Don’t worry about that,” McCloud said. “Just do like I told you.”
As Sims left, McCloud sat back in his chair. It was probably time for him to go and see what was going on at the courthouse this morning.
In the morning he removed the sheet from her naked body so he could see the hair between her legs. It had been too dark all night, and even though he’d spent a lot of time down there, he had never really seen the true color of it. Now, with the sunlight streaming through the window, it looked like glowing copper. He moved close so that he was breathing on it, watching the tendrils move as his breath touched them.
She stirred and woke, reached down and grasped his head.
“Again,” she said, in a whisper, “do it again.”
“Last night you said you thought it would kill you,” he reminded her, rubbing his face against her.
“Ooh,” she said, “now I think I’ll die if you don’t do it.”
“Well,” he said, sliding his hands beneath her so he could take her weight in his hands and lift her, “we wouldn’t want that to happen.”
He buried his face in her and she grew immediately wet. She writhed beneath him as she had last night, holding his head tightly so he couldn’t get away. He nibbled and lapped avidly, enjoying the early morning taste of her, the feel of her against his face and on his cheeks. He squeezed her buttocks in his hands so that she gasped. Then he slid one hand out from beneath her so he could insert a finger into her while he continued to lick her.
That’s when she went wild, bouncing and bucking on the bed. He stayed with her, like trying to stay on a bucking bronc, and eventually she calmed down, stopped trying to throw him, and that’s when he mounted her and drove himself into her steamy depths . . .
“Oh God!” she cried out, because her vagina was so sensitive that as soon as he entered her it started all over again . . .
They fell back to sleep after that and awoke with their legs entangled.
“Another first,” she said.
“What’s that?”
“Waking up with a man,” she said. “I’ve never done it before.”
He kissed her and said, “It’s very nice waking up together, isn’t it?”
“Mmm-hmm,” she said, kissing him back.
“Clark must’ve heard us last night.”
“I don’t think so,” she said. “And what if he did? It’s like you told me. He’s a grown man now. He can bring ladies home if he wants to.”
“I want to be around when you tell him that,” Clint said, laughing. Then he sobered. “What time is it? We have to get to court.”
“We have half an hour. I’ll never make it. I have to bathe and fix my face—you go ahead.”
Clint wouldn’t have minded changing his clothes, but he quickly dressed and hoped that nobody in court would notice that he was wearing the same clothes as yesterday.
Particularly Clark Orwell and Sam Clemens.
Clint got to court just barely in time. Clemens was sitting farther up front this time, right behind John Taylor and Clark Orwell. Clint got a seat all the way in the last row, his back to the wall, on Taylor’s side of the court.
The gallery was full today, where the day before there had been some empty seats. Apparently, the word had gotten out that Taylor was defending himself, and suddenly the trial had become more entertaining. And the fact that the judge had pointed Mark Twain out couldn’t hurt, either.
Clint sat through some attempts by the prosecution to get John Taylor thrown out as his own defense attorney, but the judge sidestepped every one. If Taylor wanted to defend himself, that was within his right. The judge also commended Taylor for having a lawyer sitting with him, second chair.
After that John Taylor made some motions in an attempt to get some of the evidence thrown out. It was evidence that he f
elt his former attorney should have objected to. Similarly, the judge sidestepped each attempt, and all of the evidence entered so far was allowed to remain.
By that time a couple of hours had gone by, and Clint knew he had some work to do if he was going to find evidence to prove that John Taylor was not guilty.
He left the court and returned to his hotel. At the front desk he picked up a folder containing duplicates of all the court papers and all of Wainwright’s notes, which Clemens had sent over to him. He took them to his room and set them aside while he arranged for a bath.
After his bath he sat in his room and went through the papers. It was true he was not a detective, but one of his best friends was. He had learned a lot working with Talbot Roper, possibly the best private detective in the country, who worked out of Denver. What he probably should have done was recommend to Clemens that he hire Roper. It wasn’t exactly too late for that, but he was already into it now, and he already had some major influence on the way this case was going. He could not back out now.
He made some notes for himself, and by the time he was ready to go and find some lunch, he had a list of things he needed to do, people he needed to talk to. He tucked the list into his pocket and left his room and his hotel.
TWENTY
Clint had the names and addresses of some of the witnesses who saw John Taylor around the house at the time of the murder. The woman, Eliza Johnson, had been murdered in her own living room. One of her neighbors had apparently come over to see her and had found Taylor standing over her body. He had tried to come after her, she said, but in Wainwright’s note J.T. said he tried to move toward the woman to tell her that he hadn’t killed Eliza. He said she became frightened and ran out of the house, screaming.
J.T. did not react the way most men would have. Instead of running, he had waited there, assuming that the woman would call for the police. She did. When they arrived, he tried to talk to them, but they assaulted him with clubs, arrested him, and took him off to jail.
Clint Adams, Detective Page 6
