Slocum and the Sawtooth Sirens Read online

  “So you have been in love,” she said. “Are you married? Have you ever been married?”

  “My, you are inquisitive, Madge. No, I’m not married. I never was married.”

  “Why not?”

  He thought about her question. He had thought about it before. There was no easy or quick answer. There had been women, of course, some that he was fond of, but none that he wanted to live with to the exclusion of all others. Women fascinated him, but almost all of them wanted to put him on a leash, change him into someone he wasn’t, tame him, corral him.

  “I never found the right fit,” he said.

  “I don’t like being lonely,” she said. “All I have is Pa and the love we have only goes so far. I’m lonely here, and I’ve been lonely since my mother died a few years ago. Aren’t you lonely, too, John?”

  “I’ve been alone, that’s true,” he said. “But I seldom feel lonely. I guess I’m pretty satisfied with life, and when I ride my horse, I feel part of everything around me, take comfort in the fact that I’m just another creature on earth, making my way through time and distance.”

  She sighed.

  “That’s pretty deep,” she said.

  “Well, when you’re alone, you think about a lot of things. And if you open your eyes, you see a lot that most people don’t notice.”

  “Like what?” she asked.

  “Like the sky when it’s blue, and clouds when they are small and floating above a hot plain, a lizard sunning itself on a rock, a rabbit hiding under a sagebrush, as silent and still as the rocks around it, an eagle floating in circles high in the Rockies, a doe with her fawn, a majestic elk bugling on a ridge. Lots of things like that.”

  “Still,” she said, “you need someone to put your arms around. Someone to hold you close. That’s human nature.”

  “Yes,” he said. “I agree.”

  “But you don’t have anyone like that. And neither do I, John.”

  “No, Madge, not regular.”

  “Is that all you want, John? A sometime woman?”

  He drew in a breath, and his chest swelled with the night air.

  “It’s not always what you want, Madge. Most of the time, it’s what you get. You take what you are given. And if you’re a good person, you give more than you take.”

  “Hmmm,” she said, “I see what you mean.” She paused. “I think.”

  Slocum laughed softly. He put an arm around her shoulder and drew her close to him. She squeezed her side tight to his own.

  “I guess I need more patience,” she sighed.

  “Patience, maybe. And belief that all good things come to those who wait and believe that what they wish for will come true.”

  “You seem wiser than you look, John,” she said.

  “Ha,” he laughed. “I don’t know if wise is the right word, Madge.”

  “You’re pretty savvy,” she teased and dug a finger into his side to tickle him.

  “Maybe,” he said. “About some things.”

  “About women?” Slocum wasn’t ticklish, and she withdrew her finger, squeezed his ribs.

  “Ah, women,” he said, “the most mysterious creatures on earth. They leave no tracks for a man to read. Their natures are like sunlight and shadow. One minute a smile, the next a snarl.”

  “All women, John?” Her voice was very soft, but he could hear her.

  “Most.”

  She shifted her feet, scraped the ground with the soles of her boots. She looked over at Slocum’s face, a face rampant with shadows and tiny motes of moonlight and freckles of starlight. He looked straight ahead at the dark trees and the shadowlands that stretched out from where they sat.

  “You know,” she said, “I was saving myself for marriage, for the one man I could give my heart to and who would love me. I got that idea from my mother. But I’m twenty-two years old and I’ve been wondering if it’s worth it.”

  “Is what worth it?” Slocum asked.

  “Keeping my virginity.”

  “What is your virginity worth, Madge? Is there a price on it?”

  “I—I thought there was. But now, I don’t think it has any value. I’ve had swains come to my door, but they were boorish and crude. All they wanted to do was get me into bed. They wanted to pull my panties off and take away my virginity, as if it were some kind of holy grail.”

  “Some men look at women as trophies,” Slocum said. He wanted to light a cheroot and smoke it, but the conversation had suddenly turned interesting and he didn’t want to interrupt for too long.

  “Go on,” he said.

  “It got so that I had those visits from men. I guess I went into a kind of shell. As time went on, I just got lonelier and lonelier. I cried at night when I went to bed. I wanted a man, but not just any man. And then, I began to think that maybe I wasn’t meant to be married. Ever. And if I wasn’t meant for marriage, then why hold on to my virginity? Why not seek pleasure for myself, wedding ring or no wedding ring?”

  “I can’t give you answers,” Slocum said when she paused as if waiting for him to jump into her monologue.

  “No, I think it’s something I must find out for myself. What it’s like to lie in bed with a man and lose my virginity. It’s like entering into an unknown world for me.”

  Slocum said nothing. His face did not change expression. He knew that she was looking at him, looking for some sign that he understood, or that he was ready to offer himself to fulfill all her fantasies.

  “I think it’s a big step for me,” she said. “Or would be if I took it. What do you think?”

  “It might be a big step if you’re afraid,” he said. “If you’re not, it’s not such a big step. You might like where that step takes you.”

  “Yes, I might. With the right man.”

  “That’s a decision you’ll have to make for yourself, Madge.”

  “I know, John.”

  They were silent for a time. Slocum knew she was thinking, but he did not know what she was thinking.

  Bullbats whirred through the air, the silver dollars on their wings flashing dull in the dim light of evening. They made little sound until they came close and then their wings just whispered soft as they parted the invisible waves of air.

  After another silence, Madge leaned close to Slocum and breathed into his ear.

  “John,” she whispered, “would you be the man to take away my virginity? Tonight, if you want.”

  Slocum turned to look at her. He could not see her eyes, but her attitude told him she was both willing and eager. He put a hand behind her head and pulled it tight against his cheek. She smelled faintly of perfume, as if she had waded through wildflowers or rolled in a bed of lilacs. And beneath the perfume, she smelled like a woman. Like a woman in season.

  “It would not be for that reason,” he said.

  He tilted his head up and kissed her on the lips.

  She shuddered as he wrapped an arm around her. He held the kiss for a long time. She did not draw back or push away.

  “Ummmm,” she murmured through closed, pliable lips.

  They broke the kiss and looked at each other, their eyes inches apart.

  “Thank you for saying that, John. You are different from most men I’ve met.”

  He said nothing. He reached out one hand and touched a breast. He swirled his finger around over the nipple, felt it harden and grow.

  Then, he took his hand away and pulled her close with both arms so that her soft breasts pressed against his chest.

  “That felt good,” she breathed.

  “It was meant to feel good,” he said.

  “I want more, John.”

  “You will go places where you’ve never gone before,” he husked. He was aroused. Her body was soft under her clothing and her scent was now overpowering in his nostrils. He wanted her, and now, he kn
ew, she wanted him.

  “Take me where you want me to go,” she said, her voice soft and whispery.

  “Sure?” he asked.

  “Dead sure,” she said.

  She squeezed him with both her arms and tilted her head up. Her kiss was moist and warm and he felt the surge of her desire course through him like an electric current.

  He held her tight and then broke the kiss. He stood up and took her hand in his.

  They walked toward the lean-to, hand in hand like first-time lovers at a tryst.

  Stars winked in the dark sky like the lights of distant prairie towns, and the moon seemed to pulsate in some cosmic anticipation.

  7

  Madge sat down under the lean-to. She patted the comforter atop her bedroll, then looked up at Slocum, who still stood outside.

  He took off his hat, sailed it to a corner of the shelter, then unbuckled his gun belt and wrapped the cartridge belt around the holster and set it on the far edge of her father’s bedroll. He stooped and entered the lean-to, then sat beside Madge.

  She watched as he pulled off his boots and set them near his pistol.

  “What do we do next?” she asked.

  “It’s easier if we both take our clothes off,” he said.

  Madge tittered and folded her arms across her chest to show her shyness at such a suggestion.

  Slocum saw that she was shy and hesitant. He had seen similar reactions in other girls over the years. Since he had been on the run from Georgia for a crime he didn’t commit, the murder of a scoundrel judge, he had encountered many shy and reluctant virgins. So now he smiled, and touched Madge on the shoulders.

  “It might help,” he said, “if I kissed you first. A kiss is the kindling, usually, that starts the fires of passion between a man and a woman.”

  She looked up at him as if relieved.

  “Yes,” she sighed, “a kiss. A long and tender kiss maybe. I am more than a little scared.”

  Slocum smiled. In the darkness she could not see his smile, but the flexing muscles in his face told her that he was being kind to her. Kind and understanding.

  Slocum took Madge in his arms. She tilted her head up and pooched out her lips in surrender. He bowed his head and brushed his lips against hers.

  He felt her melt against him, her breasts mashing against his chest, her arms gripping him tight.

  He kissed her again, this time pressing his lips harder against hers. He could feel the fire in her, the desire rising like a feeble flame from the depths of her being.

  It was sweet, that long kiss, and he felt a stirring in his loins. His cock began to harden and push against the fly of his trousers like some burrowing animal pushing its way to the surface of the earth.

  He could sense the change in her. Her hand slipped down to his crotch and felt the bulge there. She stroked it as if it were a kitten, and the blood rushed through his cock and grew it to a coiled mass that pressed hard against the fabric of his pants.

  She began to breathe hard as one of his hands stroked her breast. He felt the nipple harden into a nubbin as perky and solid as a grain of corn.

  “Oh yes,” she breathed onto his mouth. “I feel it. I’m ready, John. I want you. I want you so much I can’t stand it.”

  “Now is the time to take off your clothes, Madge. And I’ll slip out of mine.”

  He listened to the rustle of cloth as she slipped off her blouse and slid her skirt down her legs. She unbuckled her boots and kicked them off her feet. He pulled off his pants first and then bared his chest as he slid his unbuttoned shirt back over his arms.

  She lay back, wearing only her thin cotton slip and panties, which made her look pale white in the moonlight.

  Slowly she pulled her slip up and over her head, tossing it to one side, then she tugged on her panties and pulled them down and over her small feet. She kicked them away, and Slocum fell down beside her.

  “Oh, John,” she cooed, “I’m so excited. Thrilled. Truly.”

  He kissed her and she spread her legs as he stroked a hand down over her tummy and cupped the thatch of hair that grew over her pussy. She squirmed and her back arched as he stroked her labia. They puffed up and swelled with a tumescence of their own.

  His index finger plied her pubic lips apart and slipped into her cunt. She cried out and her fingernails dug into his back. A cry, or a sob, lodged in her throat as her body shuddered with a sudden rippling spasm.

  His fingertip brushed against her hymen, and he withdrew it. But he stroked her clitoris gently and she bucked with a sudden paroxysm that coursed through her body. She clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle the scream threatening to erupt from within.

  Slocum withdrew his finger and slid atop her. He could feel her eyes on him, although he could not see them. Her legs were spread wide, and when he dipped his loins toward the portal to her pussy, she grabbed his stalk and guided it to her lips. The crown of his cock parted the labia and he slid inside her.

  She was wet and warm. He held back for a moment, then plunged downward and inward. He felt her maidenhead rip open and the splash of fresh blood oozed over the length of his member.

  Madge cried out and gripped his back with both hands.

  “Oh, oh, what was that?” she sighed. “It hurt.”

  “You just lost your virginity,” he said, his voice soft and soothing.

  “Oh. You busted my cherry.”

  Slocum suppressed a laugh, but he smiled.

  “That’s what the boys call it,” he said.

  “Ahhh,” she moaned, and her buttocks rose from the blanketed bed and buried his throbbing prick to the hilt.

  He plumbed her warm depths with slow, steady strokes, and she cried out with each climax, the orgasms erupting like miniature earthquakes that jolted her body.

  He felt her pussy tighten around his blood-engorged cock and it felt good. Good and tight, he thought, virgin territory.

  “I’m so glad,” she said, a husk in her voice.

  “Glad?”

  “Glad that you were the first. That you broke my little cherry.”

  “I’m glad, too, Madge.”

  “I’ve never felt this good in my life. Never been so happy. I had no idea.”

  “You’re a woman now, Madge. Your girlhood has gone.”

  “I thought it would never leave. I mean I’m not a girl anymore, but I felt like one until tonight. A dumb, inexperienced little girl.”

  He stroked up and down, in and out, and he felt her body respond. It rose and fell beneath him like a gentle ocean wave, warm and soft.

  Her body bucked and thrashed each time an electric orgasm splashed through the ocean of her senses. She cried out softly and clung to him like a baby possum in its mother’s pouch. Slocum had to stop himself from shooting his jism into her. He slowed his strokes and even stopped every so often to let his ardor cool down.

  “Oh, John,” she whispered, “I’ve never . . . I mean I never dreamed that loving could be this good. It’s as if you carried me to another world. Is it always this way?”

  “It’s supposed to be,” he gruffed, staving off an orgasm of his own.

  “With you, I know it would be, John.”

  He plunged to the core of her sex, and she thrust her hips upward on a tide of ecstasy.

  He felt the warmth of her steamy cavern, the clutch of her muscles on the swollen mass of his cock. She squeezed and squeezed and it took all of his willpower to stay the gush of his milky sperm.

  “There’s more,” he said, and flipped over onto his back.

  “Oh, oh, yes, yes,” Madge cooed as she found herself atop Slocum, his cock buried deep in the folds of her velvety cunt.

  “Take it where you want it,” he said, and lay still.

  She looked down at him, at his shadowy face, and began to rise up and down on his stalk in
slow steady undulations as if she were a chamber for his piston.

  She squirmed and he felt her buttocks touch his belly on the descent. She rose and fell so that his member slid across the nubbin of her clitoris. With each stroke, her back arched and she shuddered with the jolts of pleasure that shot through her entire being.

  Slocum massaged her breasts and let her pleasure herself atop him. This allowed him to stay his own rush of pleasure awhile longer.

  “Oh, John,” she murmured when he thrust his hips upward as she was descending, “it’s more than I ever expected. It—it’s beautiful. All of it. You know how to love a woman.”

  He gently rolled her off him and laid her on her back.

  “There’s more?” she rasped.

  “A little bit more, Madge.”

  She spread her legs to receive him and he lowered himself and pushed through the puffy labia until he was fully inside her.

  “Ah, ah, yes,” she murmured and her body rippled with still another shattering climax.

  He stroked her fast and deep, his cock sliding in and out of her tunnel. He felt her body respond. It seemed as if they both rose above the earth and floated somewhere in space, blinded by night and pleasure so that nothing mattered but the completion of their tryst.

  “Yes, yes, yes,” she said, and as she quivered in the grip of still another orgasm, Slocum let himself go. He felt the rush of seed from his scrotum and plunged to her depths. Then he shuddered as his sperm spewed from its sac and gushed into her womb.

  No matter how many times he had experienced such an exquisite pleasure, he knew it was fleeting and would vanish like a dream once he had spent himself.

  She screamed softly as he released his life-giving force, filling her with his seed, the warm hot lava of it splashing into her with the force of an oil gusher.

  “Oh, John,” she said as he fell onto her chest, exhausted and drained of all energy. Her arms wrapped him in a loving embrace while he pushed the last of his seed from his cock.

  Slocum lay atop Madge and let himself float back to earth with her, like two feathers dropping from a great and dizzying height.

  There was no experience or pleasure like it, Slocum thought. Madge had taken him into her like an experienced lover and given him all he could ask for, and much more. She was a delight and his senses tingled with the musk of her, the heat of her supple body and the grasping, clutching flexing of her pussy as he gradually went limp inside her.