Slocum and the Tonto Basin War Read online

  “You good with that rope?” She pointed to the lariat curled up and dangling from his bunk.

  “Usually catch what I try to rope,” he said.

  “There’s a lake not a mile from here where you might be able to rope something really fine in an hour or so.”

  “You show me?” he asked.

  Lydia laughed. “Oh, yeah, Slocum, I’ll show you. If you can find me, I’ll show you anything you want.” With that promise, the woman disappeared. It took all of Slocum’s willpower not to follow her.

  He slowly finished getting the scuffs out of his boots and looked at them critically. It had been a spell since he had tended them—or had a reason to. He smiled slowly. As good as it was having decently polished boots, he didn’t think that was what would impress Lydia most. Slocum tended his gunbelt, then slung it around his waist, settled it and thrust in the Colt Navy. The weight reassured him.

  Slocum took his sweet time fetching his mare, saddling the horse and riding out slowly to the west. A stand of juniper some distance off hinted that there might be a pool of water nearby, and he headed directly for it. When he was almost there, he saw hoofprints in the mud. Slocum knew they were fresh from the sharpness of the impression—and he suspected that Star had made the prints, since the horse hadn’t been in the corral when he left.

  He walked his horse into a draw and down a ravine to a grassy area running down to the edge of a lake. A tumble of rocks thrust out into the water, cutting off the view around the water. Slocum dismounted and studied the tracks. Lydia had headed for the rocks. That suited Slocum just fine. He hobbled his mare to let her graze on the grass, then started hiking into the rocks.

  He emerged on the top of the hill overlooking the lake. Slocum went to the edge and peered down twenty feet into the water, hunting for Lydia. He didn’t see her. He turned and stopped dead. She had come up silently behind him and stood buck naked in the warm afternoon sunlight.

  “You’re overdressed,” she said.

  “You don’t waste any time, do you?” Slocum said. He felt himself growing hard just looking at her. The woman had a perfect body, marred only here and there with dark moles obvious against her white skin. She reached up and cupped her breasts, letting her fingers slowly move to her nipples. She squeezed lightly on those taut buds, duplicating the hardness Slocum had seen earlier thrusting upward against her blouse.

  “There’s a time to be patient and a time to take what you want. I’m tired of being patient. I want you, John.” Lydia moved forward with liquid grace. He saw the play of her muscles as she came to him, the slight jiggle of her high, firm breasts, the way her auburn hair caught the sunlight and turned into red gold. But he stared at her face, those entrancing eyes and the slightly parted lips. She came into his arms and he kissed her. Or did she kiss him? Slocum couldn’t figure it out. Either way, it was what they both wanted.

  She pressed warmly against him, and he began to feel overdressed. Her lips opened and her tongue slipped out to race around his lips before plunging boldly inward to duel with his tongue. Their breathing became more strained as their pulses raced in unison. He pulled her closer. His hands stroked up and down her bare back, tracing out the bones in her spine, then moving lower to cup her firm buttocks.

  He pulled her against his body even harder.

  Her own hands knocked off his hat and stroked through his lank black hair before slipping around to the back of his head to hold him firmly in place as they kissed. Breaking apart after a long kiss, she pulled back enough to look up at him with half-closed eyes.

  “Nice,” she said. “For a start.”

  “You started ahead of me,” Slocum said. His fingers lightly stroked over her bare ass and then around to her belly. Slipping down a few inches brought him to a tangled auburn nest already moist with her inner juices.

  “You took forever getting here,” she said accusingly. “What happened? You have to clean your gun?” Lydia reached down between them, unbuckled his gunbelt and let it fall to the ground. Slocum didn’t notice. The woman’s nimble fingers worked on the buttons holding his jeans closed. When she popped the last of the buttons on his fly, he sprang out, hard and proud and ready.

  “My, my, look at this tasty morsel,” she said. Sinuous as a snake, she slithered down his body to her knees, her lips brushing against the tip of his quivering manhood. She kissed lightly, then let her tongue flick out quicker than any snake’s. Tremors passed through Slocum’s body, and he felt weak in the legs. He reached down and ran his fingers through the lustrous strands of her hair, moving so that he could guide her in a rhythm that excited him more and more.

  Her tongue and lips touched him wetly, but her teeth lightly scoring the sides of his shaft caused the tremor to turn into an earthquake. He had to push her away. Otherwise, he would have seemed like a young buck with a woman for the first time.

  “That’s some mouth you have on you,” he said.

  “You noticed.” Lydia started to dive back, but Slocum kept her away. Staring down at her caused him to tighten even more. The sunlight shone on her bare breasts and the hard red nubs capping them cast little shadows. His mouth watered at the thought of tasting them.

  “My turn,” he said. Slocum stripped off his shirt while Lydia worked to get his jeans down his legs. He sat heavily on the ground while she pulled at his boots and then finally got him free of his pants.

  “Stay down,” she said, pushing him onto his back. She bent again, her hot breath like a forest fire on his belly. She licked and kissed and worked back to the throbbing pillar between his legs. Slocum swallowed and worked to enjoy her oral touches even while fighting to hold back the fiery torrents mounting within him.

  “Don’t you want more than that?” he asked.

  “Are you the one who can give it to me?”

  He grinned from ear to ear. That was a question he could answer mighty fast. Reaching down, he took her shoulders and pushed her back onto the grass. Lydia flopped and her legs opened wantonly for him.

  “Come on in,” she said. “It’s a nice warm, wet day.”

  “Yeah, it is,” he said, moving into the vee of her strong legs and pressing his mouth firmly against her. She let out a tiny yelp of pleasure as his tongue invaded her inner fastness. Like a cat lapping up cream, he tended every spot thoroughly, pressing and sucking, tonguing and batting about the tiny spires of pink flesh poking up. Lydia lifted her hips and arched her back. He moved in closer, his hands gripping her buttocks and kneading them like giant lumps of firm dough. Adding the action of his mouth against her most tender flesh caused her to gasp, moan and then tense as ecstasy ran throughout her slender body.

  “Oh, yes, John, that was what I needed,” she said.

  “That was what you needed,” he said. “Now I’ll get what I need.”

  “Promises, promises,” she said.

  “And you’re going to deliver,” he said.

  “My word’s my bond.”

  “No bonds this time,” he said, moving up her body the way she had worked down his. He felt the tip of his engorged manhood brush where his mouth had been a moment earlier. She rocked back and lifted her knees. Then he sank easily full-length into her. For a moment, neither moved. Then they both gasped with the tightness of the fit and the heat boiling from their bodies.

  He withdrew an inch, two, more, until only the thick head of his shaft remained within her. Then he smoothly stroked forward, again filling her. He relished the silken feel of her inner flesh and the moistness and the way she sobbed and moaned and begged for more.

  He gave her more. Lots more. He began moving like a human piston until his arousal broke free of his control. He lost all sense of rhythm and began wildly moving, thrusting hard and giving her what she was pleading for. Slocum felt himself explode as she clamped her legs around his waist and tensed, keeping him buried deeply within her. They rolled over and over in the grass, hips moving the barest amount but giving both of them the ultimate in human pleasure.

>   All too soon the tension left their bodies and they lay side by side in the grass, letting the sun warm them and erase their sweat. Lydia idly dragged her fingertips over his chest, playing with the hair. Slocum began stroking over her chest.

  “Yours is nicer,” he said.

  “No hair,” Lydia said. “Not like this. I love the feel of it against my fingers and lips.” She bent over and kissed him.

  “But not as much as I like doing this.” He caught one nipple between thumb and forefinger and rolled the fleshy nip about until it began to harden.

  “More,” she said hoarsely. “I want more.”

  “Greedy, aren’t you?”

  “Yes!”

  Slocum got to his knees to reposition himself. He wasn’t sure he could perform again so soon, but Lydia was determined. Somehow they moved closer and closer to the edge of the cliff above the lake.

  “It’s a long way down,” he said, looking over the edge. “At least fifteen feet.”

  “There’s something I always wanted to try,” Lydia said. “Stand up.”

  “I am.”

  “On your feet,” she said. She grabbed him in such a way that he had to obey. When they were standing, she pressed into him, lifted her leg and wrapped it around his waist so their crotches were intimately close.

  “What now?” Slocum asked.

  “Hang on. This is going to be one hell of a ride!” Lydia exclaimed. With a sudden turn that caught Slocum off-balance, they fell through the air and splashed loudly into the lake. Sputtering and thrashing about, Slocum found they were still entwined when he got to the surface.

  “That wasn’t anything I’ve ever done before,” he said.

  “Me, either, but I have done this.”

  And she showed him. Slocum wondered if there was any better place in the world than the Tonto Basin.

  5

  Slocum stretched out naked in the grass, letting the sun dry the water from his body. Lydia lay with her head resting on his chest. There might have been a more perfect way to spend the afternoon, but Slocum couldn’t think what it was.

  Yet, in spite of the lovely woman and the warm reception he had received from her father, Slocum’s mind wandered as he thought of moving on. The Tonto Basin was appealing territory, but he had a wanderlust that couldn’t be sated by acres of pastureland and lakes of sweet water. Even a frisky filly like Lydia wasn’t likely to tie him down long. There wasn’t anything ahead of him but the horizon, and that was good enough.

  “What started the feud with Graham?”

  “What?” Lydia stirred. She had been half-asleep. Her hand pressed down in the middle of his chest as she pushed herself upright. The sight of her nakedness caused Slocum to lose his train of thought for a moment.

  “Graham didn’t barge in on your pa and get so hot under the collar for the first time. Something’s riled him. Your pa hinted that he might have rustled some of Graham’s cattle.”

  “Pa’s not above that,” Lydia said, surprising him with her honesty. She swung her legs around, crossed them and sat facing him. “Truth is, before we came here to the Basin, we moved a lot because of the law. Badges and Tewksburys never got along too well.”

  “You’re mighty free with that information.”

  Lydia shrugged. “No reason to fib about it. Nothing to be proud of, but nothing to hide, either. Since we drifted into Arizona, things have gone well for us. Ma died down in Texas before we came here. That might have been part of the problem. She was always nagging Pa about wanting more. We had a run of bad luck. Drought, disease, splenic fever in the herd—it all came crashing down on our heads.”

  “So you moved here,” Slocum said. “You didn’t bring any cattle with you?”

  Lydia laughed and said, “Don’t worry about the fever. We got here with little more than the clothes on our backs. That and our horses. That’s one reason I’m so attached to Star. Reminds me of back home in Texas.”

  “So you didn’t bring Texas fever with you?”

  “John, really. What cattle we have were all born and bred right here in Arizona.”

  Or stolen here, Slocum thought, but he didn’t put that into words.

  “What about you? What brings you this way?”

  Slocum hesitated. He didn’t like talking about himself much, but Lydia had been honest with him. He should be with her, too.

  “I rode with Quantrill during the war,” he said, seeing the shock on her face. The Tewksburys might be from Texas and might even have supported the rebel cause, but few condoned Quantrill’s viciousness. It had always amused Slocum to think that Quantrill was Ohio born and bred and had turned on other Yankees with a brutality that still festered, even this long after the war.

  “You liked riding with him?”

  Slocum touched a pair of round scars on his belly, hardly knowing he did so.

  “I complained about what he did in Lawrence, and he had Bill Anderson gut-shoot me. It took months to recover.

  When I did, I went home to Georgia and found a carpet-bagger judge had taken a fancy to the family farm.”

  “That’s why you drifted west?” Lydia knew him well enough to know he wasn’t the kind to abide by such thievery. He had shot and killed the judge and his hired gunman and ridden out, a federal warrant on his head. A man could do a powerful lot of evil things, but somehow killing a crooked judge who needed it was worse than most in the eyes of the law.

  “Been laying back in meadows with beautiful, naked woman and watching the clouds fly by ever since.”

  Her fingers traced the lines of his jaw, down lower and across his shoulders and biceps.

  “A real lackadaisical life,” she said. “Doing nothing’s made you strong and hard. From the worn look of that six-gun of yours, it does about the same nothing.”

  Slocum began to feel a little uneasy. Lydia saw him a little too clearly. He was no gunfighter, but he was faster than most and wasn’t reluctant about using the Colt Navy. During the war he had been a sniper and hadn’t balked any at squinting down a barrel, waiting most of a day and then taking one shot that killed a Yankee officer before he even knew there was a Johnny Reb within a mile.

  “I told your pa I’d ride around and hunt for strays. He said to check the fence, too.”

  Lydia laughed and shook her head. Auburn hair floated in the light breeze and formed a mahogany mist around her head, lit by the sun and making her about the loveliest thing Slocum could remember seeing.

  “Don’t strain too much hunting for fences. The other ranchers put them up. Pa and Caleb never quite get around to it. The rest of the cowboys don’t cotton much to hard work like that, either.”

  “The Circle T sounds like a good place not to work,” Slocum said. “Is the pay any good?”

  “About the same as the work. Nobody gets rich working for the Tewksburys, but nobody has much to complain about, otherwise.”

  Slocum understood. John Tewksbury wasn’t—quite—a rustler, but most of his beeves had probably carried another ranch’s brand at one time.

  “If this afternoon is any indication of the pay, I’d say it’s about as fine as anything in all Arizona Territory,” Slocum said. He sat up and kissed Lydia’s breast. Or tried to. She leaned back so he missed by inches.

  “None of that,” she said.

  “That wasn’t what you said a while ago,” Slocum pointed out.

  “You got work to do, and Pa will be all antsy if I don’t show up soon.” There was a serious note to Lydia’s words that made Slocum think there was something darker going on in the Basin. Before he could ask, she lithely swung around, got to her feet and vanished behind some bushes. In a few minutes, she emerged, working to get her clothing into order.

  “You ride around naked?” she asked. Lydia kicked his shirt and pants toward him. “See you back at the house. Dinner’s served around six. You got a watch?”

  Slocum fumbled in his vest pocket and showed her his watch. It had been his brother Robert’s and was his only legacy. Rob
ert had died during Pickett’s Charge. The watch was a constant reminder of what had been lost to stupidity.

  “Six,” Lydia said. She blew him a kiss as she hurried down the slope. He had never seen where she had tied her horse. Within a minute, receding hoofbeats told him she had returned to the ranch.

  He finished dressing, made sure his six-gun rested easy in its cross-draw holster, then followed the slope down to where he had left his horse. The mare was content, having grazed most of the afternoon.

  “We’re both about as happy as we can be, aren’t we?” Slocum patted the mare’s neck, mounted and headed southwest, riding slowly, taking in the hills and treed ravines, and mentally staking out paths to watering holes. The rest of Arizona might be dry as a bone, but the Tonto Basin had water aplenty for both man and beast. As he rode past one deep, clear pond, he saw several deer and a cougar. Hunting would be good here. He took in the beauty and bounty of the land and found himself mentally wrestling with his urge to move on. What gear he had left in the bunkhouse wouldn’t be missed, but the Circle T had everything a man could want. Why leave?

  Slocum hadn’t quite come up with an answer to that when he spotted three riders on a ridge ahead. He slowed his mare and watched as the trio made their way over the ridgeline and vanished from sight. He wiped his forehead and considered the three riders. He had yet to meet any of the cowboys working for Tewksbury. This might be a good time to see what they thought of riding for the Circle T. Slocum turned his horse’s face and headed up the steep slope.

  When he got to the ridge, he saw where the riders had gone. The three were down in a hollow working a few head of cattle. Something about the way they whooped and hollered as they circled the cattle put Slocum on guard. He had seen men who enjoyed their work, but not as much as these three. Rounding up strays ought to be dull work and not an occasion to act as these men were.

  Slocum had started down the slope toward the cattle when one of the cowboys spotted him. The three rode together and exchanged hasty words. This struck Slocum as out of the ordinary. Without being too obvious, he reached across and pulled away the leather thong over the hammer of his six-shooter. If the need arose, he could let lead fly in a hurry.