Slocum and the Bixby Battle Read online

  Bixby watched him ride out. He rubbed an itch in his upper lip. This new woman Nora was a poor replacement in bed for that traitorous bitch Edora. He’d learned when he returned, after some serious threats and torture of the house women, that when Edora overheard his plans to take the hacienda, she’d quickly slipped away, ridden over there and warned them.

  “What did that one know?” Jones asked, coming from the bunkhouse area as McKlein’s man rode out.

  “They have Slocum as a prisoner in jail.” Bixby coughed up some phlegm and spat it out, watching the deputy ride off.

  “They going to kill him when he tries to escape?”

  “Maybe. They’ve got him drugged and are going to try him.”

  “What the hell for?”

  “To cover McKlein’s ass, I think, so if the Rangers come and investigate.”

  “Crazy to me. I’ve got all the crews out rebranding all of her cattle.”

  “Good. The sooner we get that done the better. Any idea where those hacienda people went?”

  “Snake says they went into the hills and are hiding in caves.”

  “We need to get about six good men and start eliminating them.”

  “I know, but I’ve got all the hands out rebranding—”

  Bixby nodded. “I know you do, but we must do that next. Are all the windmills running?”

  “Most all. I think they’re still disconnecting some. But I have several men working to keep them pumping.”

  He used his index finger to point at Jones. “You catch any sumbitch wrecking a windmill, or even think he has, you hang him. I want to make living examples out of those bastards.”

  “I’ll do it.”

  “Good.” Maybe he should ride into town and converse with McKlein a little about what he intended to do with his prisoner. No, let that bastard come out there and talk to him. He had delivered McKlein his part of the deal. The Debaca place was his. If only they had taken her hostage—he would be screwing her fine ass instead of this loose pussy he shared his bed with—blah.

  Amanda Debaca, I am saving the best for you.

  20

  “He pleads guilty,” Sheriff McKlein said.

  “Can the defendant stand up?” the judge behind the desk asked.

  “We can hold him up,” McKlein said and motioned to the two guards to do so.

  Slocum felt them lift him by the arms out of the chair. Far off in the distance he heard the judge’s voice. “John Doe, I find you guilty of two counts of murder in the first degree. You are hereby sentenced to hang in two weeks.”

  “Why so fucking long?” McKlein shouted.

  “ ’Cause it has to be filed in Austin.”

  “Hell, morning wouldn’t be soon enough.”

  “Dammit, McKlein, it ain’t your neck on the line. It could be mine.”

  “Ain’t no one going to miss this pistolero.”

  Slocum felt his head swing sideways. He was so doped that he couldn’t speak anything understandable through his lips. Sentenced to hang. What a mess. He had to get better. But how?

  They led him back to the jail cell, off by itself. No window, no light, and it smelled like piss, but he smelled like that, too, since he couldn’t get up and relieve himself. He lay on the iron pallet and listened. About the time he would revive, the next food serving or even the water they gave him would be loaded with some kind of dope. Probably laudanum.

  A twenty-four-hour guard sat in a captain’s chair in the outer room with a shotgun across his lap. There was another solid steel door beyond him, then the sheriff’s office that bristled with armed deputies. That much he’d noted being taken from the jail to the judge’s office and back.

  He worried about Amanda’s situation and what was happening at the ranch. If only he had the strength to do something.

  “I’m getting a couple of Mexican women to come in here to wash his ass up,” McKlein said to his guard in the hall. “He’s stinking up the whole goddamn office out here, and they can wash down the cell, too. Make sure he don’t try anything. Son of a bitch, I ought to hang him right now.”

  “Be good enough for him.”

  “He still out from the last dose?” McKlein asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Thought it would kill him—”

  “Naw. He’s tough as rawhide.”

  “You’re right, Earl. Just watch them bitches good that are coming to clean him and this piss pot up.”

  “He ain’t getting out of here.”

  “Just be goddamn sure he don’t, or I’ll hang your ass.” McKlein laughed aloud.

  Slocum drifted off into la-la land again.

  He felt them washing him and whispering to each other when he began to awaken. They rolled him over and the water felt cold as they scrubbed his privates and then dried them.

  “He’s about dead,” one whispered.

  “His dick is, too,” the other hissed and about laughed.

  “Just clean him up. You want to suck on something, come suck on mine,” the deputy said.

  “Oh, really?”

  “Yeah, really.”

  “Oh, could I?”

  “Damn right. Get over here, honey.”

  Slocum’s vision was foggy, but he could see the big-gutted guard set the shotgun across the chair, stand up and undo his pants, spilling his privates out. The woman bent down and Slocum suspected she took his dick in her hand.

  Then the guard sucked in his breath. “Oh Jesus, be easy with that knife.”

  “Slocum, Slocum, wake up,” someone said in his ear. But he couldn’t answer.

  Their rescue of him from the jail was all fading in and out. He was taken by strong arms, and he saw several of the guards bound and gagged in chairs as they sprinted him through the outer office. Then he was put on a pallet in a wagon bed, and the thing rumbled away. All the time he could hear in the distance some woman’s voice saying, “You’ve got to live.”

  21

  Bixby sat half-asleep in his desk chair. Slocum had escaped from the jail. That bitch Edora had warned them at the ranch. He had his men on the lookout for her. When he got through with her—a smile came to the corner of his mouth—he would have every man on the ranch screw her in one night. She’d learn what giving aid to the enemy earned her. Ha ha.

  Some riders had ridden up from the direction of town. He could make them out though the lace curtains. Maybe McKlein was with them. About time that he came by and thanked Bixby for the Debaca place. Bixby rose and stretched. What the hell—in a week or so, when this all settled down, he’d go to San Anton and find him a new plaything. That dreadful whore he slept with was driving him crazy—she talked all the time. All the time.

  He stood in the open front doorway and studied the three men. One was a prisoner.

  “Who the hell is he?” he asked the deputy about the man bound up on the center horse.

  “A Ranger. McKlein wants him kept on ice until he figures what to do with him.”

  “Shoot him and bury his carcass.”

  “No, McKlein wants him held until he says what to do with him.”

  “You boys let Slocum get away. Guess it would be a good idea to have him out here.”

  “Them bitches—”

  “Did those bitches really castrate that guard?”

  The stern-faced deputy, doing all the talking, nodded. “It wasn’t funny either.”

  Bixby shrugged. “If he’d been doing his job, it would never have happened.”

  “All the same we know who that bitch is. We’ll get her one of these days.”

  “Jones,” Bixby shouted, seeing his man by the horses. “You’ve got a prisoner to guard. McKlein can’t keep them in his jail.”

  “Yes sir, Boss. We can handle him.”

  “What’s his name?” Bixby asked.

  “Troy Graham.”

  “Well, Graham, welcome to the Bixby Ranch.”

  The prisoner glared back at him, Jones leading him by the shoulder. “Bixby, you and the rest of these b
astards better go to saying your prayers. Texas Rangers get through with you, you’ll all need new assholes or coffins.”

  “Mighty tough talk for a man awaiting his own execution. You better start praying.” Bixby waved Jones on. He had no desire to hear all that crap. “Tell McKlein we need to talk,” he said to the sheriff’s deputy.

  The man nodded that he’d heard him and they turned their horses back toward town. Good riddance, Bixby decided. Those stupid deputies had no idea he was the one who paid their salaries. Maybe he’d take a nap.

  The Ranger was locked up in the shed, guards posted. Slocum might be out of jail, but he would find this place bristled this time with security. There would be no raids on Bixby’s ranch that were not fended off. Bring your damn dumb Messikins to die.

  He met with Jones the next morning over breakfast. “How’s the prisoner?”

  “Tough acting as ever. What do you want out of him?”

  “We’ll let McKlein decide that. We’re only holding him for the sheriff.”

  “My two scouts, Vester and McKillvin, think they may have found the cave that she’s hid in.”

  “Wonderful. Let’s saddle up and go get her.”

  Jones shook his head. “They think they can nab her without a fight and then those stupid greasers of hers will give up.”

  “You forget about Slocum?” Bixby considered his china cup of coffee.

  “He tries to come after her, he’s a dead duck. I ain’t pulling no fancy things like McKlein tried and get screwed up.”

  “If they get Debaca here to me unharmed, I’ll pay both of them two hundred in gold. You, too.” Bixby didn’t want that filthy breed Vester sticking his dick in her, or the redheaded scotsman likewise.

  “I mean I’ll only pay it if she’s unharmed.”

  Jones smiled at the mention of the money. His mouth did anyway; his eyes held the harsh coldness of a wolf. Never mind his disposition, Jones was the best commander in the field Bixby had had since the war.

  When Jones left, Bixby drank some fine whiskey. To celebrate, for soon he was going to have that dark-eyed bitch in his clutches at last. Looking out the window at the yard, he saw Jones talking to the two scouts. Amanda Debaca, your ass will be in my bed soon. Ha ha.

  The two delivered her to him the next afternoon. Vester wore a bandanna bandage around his head. The redheaded Scotsman was hatless, too, and looked the worse from wear. She sat straight-backed in the saddle with her mussed hair full of grass and sticks. She tossed it aside to glare at him. Prayer-like, her hands were bound tight before her by rope.

  “You got our money?” Vester asked, jerking her off the horse and dragging her toward the house.

  “How about double or nothing?” Bixby asked, looking with excitement at the filthy woman standing not twenty feet from him with the sullen glare in her eyes.

  “How’s that?” McKillvin asked with a frown.

  “I’ll pay you each five hundred dollars for Slocum’s scalp and her.”

  “What if we don’t get him?”

  “Then I don’t owe you for her.”

  “I’ll take my money now.” The redhead stuck out his hand. Vester agreed and did the same.

  He paid them. “Get Slocum now.”

  They nodded. Bixby stepped forward for his purchase, took her by the arm and dragged her toward the house. Despite her efforts to resist, he brought her inside and closed the door with a slam that rattled the glass.

  “At last, you fucking bitch, you are going to be mine.”

  She bared her teeth and tried to kick him with her bare foot. He slapped her backhanded and forward, dazing her.

  “I like breaking in mean bitches. I’ll really like breaking you.”

  “Go to hell—” His cuff to her face silenced her words. Then he jerked her up close and forced his mouth to hers. She tasted of horse and sweat, but that only fueled the fire inside him. He wanted her and he would have her.

  He dragged her into the bedroom and closed the door, locking it with the key. After a bath, she would be elegant, but he liked the notion of this wildcat. Dirt, horse smell and rebellion—he could hardly wait. Better leave her hands tied the first time.

  Better yet, tie them over her head to the bed’s headboard. First he would rip the clothes off her body—that would make her embarrassed, and he knew she’d then be easier to handle. The realization that they had no clothes on, and that anyone could see all of them, made them suddenly less able to fend him off. He had done it many times to virgins and inexperienced women.

  He began to shred her clothing. He tore the blouse open and fondled her pendulous breasts. She tried to fight him, but he soon held her hands with one and felt them with the other for his own pleasure.

  “Ah, such fine tits you have.”

  “You bastard—you will pay for this . . .”

  He had to use his pocketknife to shred the clothes, so soon she was naked and downcast-looking on the bed. He unbuckled his belt and stripped it out, then grasped her wrists, forcing her onto her back, and bound her hands over her head to the headboard.

  She tried to kick him with her dirty feet, but it did no good—he only laughed at her. Undressing, he looked at her curled in a fetal ball with her arms outstretched. For so long he had imagined this moment. Undressed at last, he spread her strong legs apart so he was soon between them.

  Seething with rage, she twisted and cursed him, but he held her legs apart and drove his great dick inside her. Then he began to smile with the success of his efforts to pump deeper and deeper into her. Now struggle, you bitch. He knew that before long her own body would deceive her, and she would be in his power then.

  “No—no,” she cried and he knew his efforts had begun to move her. He grasped the cheeks of her ass and drove himself farther and farther into her, feeling the hardness of her swollen clit on his rod. Her back began to arch toward him and her eyes began to look glazed. Then he felt the contractions in her vagina. Ah, now, bitch, you are mine.

  He came, and she collapsed in a pile. He rose up and turned her over. He reached between her legs, underneath her, and filled his hand with the slick fluids seeping from her. He spread her legs apart as she lay facedown and applied the goo to her crack. Then before she could coil up, he stuck his hard-on in her ass.

  His hand muffled her screams as he forcefully drove the head painfully home. The small aperture finally gave to his stone erection and the force of his muscular butt driving the spike home. At last, he was inside her, pumping harder and harder. She fainted. His teeth clenched, and he strained hard until at last he came again, then collapsed on top of her. Oh, he was going to have fun with her body.

  He went to the washbasin and cleaned up. He better put her in the shed with the Ranger for the rest of the day. He lathered the blood and mess on his privates, looking at the black hair on his broad chest in the mirror on the dresser. He rinsed out the rag, took off the soap and remains and then dried himself. There was a robe in the closet that would fit her. He’d untie her hands, put the robe on her and then retie them. She couldn’t be trusted for a while—but eventually he’d break her will.

  After dressing her and retying her hands, he dragged her to the front door and shouted for a guard to come get her.

  “Yes sir, Mr. Bixby.”

  A new boy they’d just hired. He didn’t even know Bixby was “Colonel” to his hired help.

  “Put her in the shed, with that Ranger. Anyone screws her, I’ll cut their dick off with an ax. Savvy?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Tell all the other guards that, too.”

  “I will, sir.”

  He watched the boy jerk her along. About dark he’d be ready for another dose of her. Much better than that last bitch. Ha ha.

  22

  Slocum opened his dry eyes. It was dark wherever he was at. Then he made out a nearby fire and saw how it lighted the cavern roof over him. Where in the hell was he at? Why couldn’t he shake the grogginess in his brain?

  �
�Ah, you finally awake?” a woman asked.

  “Yeah,” he managed in a voice that shocked him.

  “I am Tia. They have been drugging you.”

  “I know. They had a trial and I never even spoke a word.”

  “Kangaroo court. Bixby has taken the ranch.”

  “Where are all the ranch people?” he asked.

  “A girl named Edora from Bixby’s ranch warned us he was bringing many men to take the ranch the next day. Montez decided we should let them have it, so that they did not kill the women and children.”

  “Good idea. Where are the others at?”

  “They are hiding in caves. The men are trying to stop them from rebranding all her cattle.”

  “The Rangers?” he managed to ask.

  “The Rangers are up their ass, I guess. We finally got word to them and still no one has come.”

  “Where’s Amanda?”

  “That is the bad news. Two of his men kidnapped her yesterday from another cave while we were getting you up here.” She chewed on her lower lip.

  “Do you know where she is?”

  “We think they have her at Bixby’s ranch.”

  “How many men can ride?”

  “Perhaps a dozen, counting boys. Many of them are out there trying to stop the rebranding of her cattle.”

  “I know . . . I know you all must have had hell.” Exhausted from his exertion to sit up on the pallet, he tried to open his mind to thinking what to do next about Amanda.

  “Here is some coffee, maybe that will help you.”

  He agreed with a nod and accepted the cup. Whatever they used on him had been powerful and he needed to sober up. He blew on the steam to cool it.

  “Where is Montez?”

  “The ones who kidnapped her—they killed him.” The woman began to sob.

  Slocum wanted to comfort her, but he could hardly sit up, let alone get up and hug the woman. He sprawled back on his hands and stiff arms to brace himself. “They will pay for this. What’s your name?”

  “Tia,” she managed between her tears.

  “Yes, I should have remembered that. Tia, call a meeting. Is it night now?”