Merline Lovelace (9 page)

“Drunk they might forget you’re a lady,” Mother Featherlegs finished, strolling over to join them. “You’d best hightail it out of here, missy.”

“I will, as soon as I speak with you.”

“What about?”

“Ying Li.”

Exasperation put an edge to the older woman’s voice. “I gave the girl a real chawin’ on for dropping your supper and breakin’ the dishes like she did. She was supposed to fetch you another plate. Don’t tell me she dropped that, too?”

“This isn’t about my supper.”

“Well, what’s it about, then?”

Suzanne drew in a deep breath. She would have preferred to conduct this business without a roomful of avid listeners and Sloan practically breathing down her neck.

“I should like to reimburse you whatever amount you paid for her.”

“You want to buy her?”

“I want to pay off her debt to you,” she corrected scrupulously. It wouldn’t do to point out that the War Between the States, which had convulsed the entire country less than fifteen years ago, had made the abomination of dealing in human flesh illegal. “Actually, it’s Matt who wants to see the debt paid, but I…”

She broke off, startled, as Mother Featherlegs gave a whoop of laughter. “Ying Li must have diddled him some good to make him want to buy her!”

Even Sloan snickered. When Suzanne turned a fulminating eye his way, he shrugged. “I didn’t think the kid had it in him.”

“Mathias Butts has a kind and generous heart,” she said loftily. “He simply wishes to release the girl from her bondage.”

“That’s not all he wishes,” the saloon owner said with a leer before the businesswoman in her took over. “How are you proposin’ to pay for the girl? I thought Big Nose and his gang took your purse and left you hard up for cash.”

“They did. If you would be so kind as to accept a written promise of payment, I guarantee it’ll be honored.”

The older woman hooted again. “Lord aw-mighty, I’ve collected so many worthless promises of payment, I use ’em in the outhouse to wipe my arse. No, I can’t take nothing but cash or gold dust.”

“How much cash or gold dust?”

“Two and a half ounces in dust, three hundred in cash.”

“Good heavens!”

“It’s what I paid for the girl.”

“I seem to recall you mentioning that you also got the bed as part of the deal!”

“All right. Two hundred. But not a penny less.”

Suzanne folded her arms. The toe of an oversize boot tapped the floor. Once. Twice. Lips pursed, she turned to Jack. The answer to her unspoken question was quick, flat and nonnegotiable.

“No.”

“It would merely be a loan.”

“No.”

“Really, you must know Matt will repay you, and if he doesn’t, I will.”

“I don’t know anything of the kind,” he retorted. “Chances are, I won’t see hide nor hair of either of you again after we part company.”

“Jack, please.” She forced a conciliatory smile. “Perhaps I’ve tried your patience a bit, but…”

His snort raised a flush in her cheeks.

“…but we should set aside our personal feelings for Ying Li’s sake.”

“No.”

It was the whiskey talking. Jack was mean with it. Even meaner with the itch to grab this woman, sling her over his shoulder and haul her back to the sod hut to finish what they’d started. Jaw tight, he hooked his thumbs on his gun belt to keep from doing just that.

Her toe tapped again. She studied him in silence for a few moments.

“Are you a betting man, Mr. Sloan?”

“That depends on the stakes.”

“I propose we settle this matter with a hand of five-card stud. You put up the two hundred dollars and I’ll put up a note for the same amount.”

“Not good enough.”

It was the whiskey. It had to be the whiskey that made him rock back on his heels. “Seeing as how we don’t know when, if ever, I’ll collect on that IOU, I think you should tack on some interest.”

A wary look came into her eyes. “How much interest?”

“Oh, I’d say the payment we talked about back at Ten Mile Station should about cover it.”

She knew at once the payment he referred to. Her head jerked up. Her eyes flashed. Jack rocked back on his heels again, figuring Miss Suzanne Bonneaux was about to tell him to take himself and his salacious, audacious proposal straight to hell.

“One hand of five-card stud,” she snapped. “We’ll draw for the deal.”

M
ore of her real father’s blood ran in Suzanne’s veins than she’d realized. Only from the dashing, handsome riverboat gambler could she have inherited this simmering sense of excitement, this reckless willingness to stake so much on a turn of the cards.

She could almost hear Philip Bonneaux’s teasing laughter as he held her in his lap and taught her how to fan the cards so only she could see what she held. Almost feel his fingers guiding hers along the side of a deck, showing her how to feel out cut or shaved cards. Almost see the flash of the sapphire ring he’d always worn on his left hand, until he had staked it on three kings and lost to an inside straight.

Philip Bonneaux had died just weeks after Suzanne turned seven, but she’d practiced the skills he’d taught her with a variety of partners over the
years, including Bright Water and any of her stepfather’s troops she could talk into a game. They’d always played for pebbles, though. Or matchsticks. Never for money. The colonel made sure of that. And certainly never for stakes like this.

If she won, Jack would lend her the two hundred dollars, without interest. If he won, he’d not only charge her a very personal, private interest, he’d collect payment in advance. Tonight. In Mother Featherlegs’s bed. Suzanne sensed it in the way he watched her, felt it in the mad fluttering of her pulse.

Every nerve in her body tingled with anticipation, with nervousness, with the exhilarating and altogether terrifying realization of how much she’d wagered on the turn of a card. Yet she refused to allow her wildly swinging emotions to show on her face. Chin high, spine every bit as straight as the Misses Merriweather could have wished, she seated herself at the drink-stained table hastily cleared for the game.

Sloan took the chair opposite hers. Leaning back, he stretched out his long legs and crossed his ankles. His comfortable slouch seemed to indicate a complete indifference to the outcome of the game. Only the glint in his gray eyes suggested otherwise.

“Here.” Mother Featherlegs dropped a deck on
the table. “These are a bit greasy and worn, but they’re the best the house has to offer.”

Her customers crowded around. Caught up in the excitement, they called out side wagers that were met, doubled, snatched up eagerly. Their jostling and avid, intent stares didn’t cause Suzanne any hint of unease now. Interest had shifted from her to the game.

Her
interest was concentrated on the man seated across the table. With a polite lift of her brows, she reached for the cards.

“Shall I shuffle?”

“Be my guest.”

To her relief, her hands were steady. She pushed the cards into a pile, gathered them up and divided them into two stacks. Mother Featherlegs was right. The pasteboard had worn thin. The surfaces felt greasy.

Calmly, Suzanne shuffled the two stacks into one. Sliding her fingers along the edges to straighten the cards, she divided the deck again and shuffled a second time, then a third. When she fanned the cards facedown on the table, she knew which one she would pick. Folding her hands, she waited for Sloan to make his choice.

He turned up a seven.

Suzanne flipped her card over. It was, as she’d suspected it would be, an ace. If someone went to
the risk of shaving cards, he wouldn’t mark the low ones.

“Looks like you’ve won the deal,” Sloan drawled.

Her blood singing, she allowed herself a small, bland smile. “Looks like I have.”

Her insipid smile stayed in place as she divided the deck again, shuffled and placed the stack in front of Sloan. His long, lean gunfighter’s fingers meticulously straightened the edges. Too meticulously.

Her gaze flew up to meet his. Was he, too, getting a feel for the deck? Would he note the hair-thin differences? They were so imperceptible and the cards so well used that Suzanne had been forced to shuffle several times before she knew for sure their edges had been shaved.

Jack didn’t alter his expression by so much as a flicker of an eyelid, damn him! One-handed, he cut the deck.

Her heart hammering, Suzanne gathered it into her left hand and prepared to deal. “First card down or up?”

“Let’s keep it interesting. First card up, last card down.”

“Whatever you wish.”

Slowly, she dealt the cards. The audience crowded closer, cheering or groaning with the turn of each card. The ripe scents of tobacco, whiskey
and old sweat battled fiercely with Mother Featherlegs’s toilet water. Smoke from the sputtering oil lamps and the saloon owner’s malodorous cigar stung Suzanne’s eyes.

After the second card, her initial exhilaration was fraying at the edges. After the third, she began to suspect she didn’t really have whatever it took to be a gambler. By the fourth, her nerves had rolled up into a tight ball.

Thank the Lord for her father and the Misses Merriweather! Philip Bonneaux had taught her to maintain a poker face, the sisters to keep a ladylike composure under all circumstances. Suzanne suspected her teachers had probably never envisioned circumstances quite like these, however.

“Last card down,
Miss
Bonneaux.”

“I believe that’s what we agreed to,
Mr.
Sloan.”

Smoke curled around Jack’s face, obscuring his gaze. Suzanne felt it, though. On her face. Her throat. Her hands.

“Think you can beat the pair of nines I have showing?”

His whisky-roughened drawl scratched her nerves.

“I certainly hope so.”

The sleeves of the red silk robe fanned the table as she leaned forward to deal his last card facedown. Outwardly calm, inwardly a mass of quiv
ering jelly, she dealt her own card and set the deck aside.

The silence grew as thick and heavy as the smoke. Suzanne thought she would choke on one or the other before Sloan reached out and flipped over his last card. Ironically, it was the jack of spades.

So all he had was a pair of nines! That’s all she had to beat. A pair of nines. If she turned up another queen or ace to match those she already had showing, she’d win.

Her blood pulsed. Her breath stuck halfway down her throat. She fingered the corner of her last card, met Jack’s heavy-lidded gaze across the table. If the feral light in his eyes was any indication, he was already anticipating victory.

Her belly clenching, she reached out to shield her last card with her palm and lifted its corner. Just an inch. Just high enough for her to see the markings. She stared at the yellowed bit of cardboard for what felt like two lifetimes before she looked across the table at Jack again.

Tonight. In Mother Featherlegs’s huge bed.

The message was so loud he might have been shouting it for the whole saloon to hear. Slowly, so slowly, Suzanne let the corner of the card feather down.

“Your nines are high, Mr. Sloan.”

Hoots, groans and curses filled the air around
her. Suzanne could barely hear the outburst over the buzzing in her ears. Stiffly, she gathered her cards and buried them in the middle of the deck. Pushing away from the table, she rose.

The crowd stumbled back. With a polite goodnight, she made her way to the door.

Jack sat unmoving, staring at the deck for some moments after Suzanne left the saloon. She’d folded a winning pair. He knew it as sure as he knew his own name. But why? What did she have to gain by offering herself as a stake in a poker game, then deliberately losing the hand? She had to have known that he intended to collect the debt she now owed him. He’d put it as plain as he could without saying the words outright. He wanted the payment they talked about back at Ten Mile Station. He wanted her.

What the devil was the woman up to?

The mere fact that he couldn’t figure her out made him loco. And the fact that he’d been trying for three days now made him even crazier.

He’d boarded the Deadwood stage with one purpose, and one purpose only. To act as judge, jury and executioner for the man he’d been hunting the past three years. How in hell’s name had he ended up as escort for a contrary female and an overgrown farm boy? What had come over him that
he’d agree to fork over a good chunk of his roll to buy a Chinese whore, for God’s sake?

He knew the answer to that one. Suzanne Bonneaux had come over him. All over him. He couldn’t breathe without craving her so bad he hurt. Couldn’t close his eyes without seeing her sprawled at his feet, her hair spilling down her back and her legs spread wide. Just thinking about the way she’d feel under him made sweat pop out on his palms.

She knew. She had to have known what she was wagering. She had to know what she’d just lost.

Abruptly, he shoved his chair back. He was done with trying to figure out the woman. Done with wondering just what crazy ideas were swirling around under that mass of silky brown hair. For whatever reason, she’d played her hand the way she’d wanted to, and Jack was going to claim his winnings.

He’d take it slow. Take
her
slow. He intended to savor every inch of her skin, every taste of her mouth and tongue, every nervous flutter of her pulse.

He didn’t want her nervous, he decided. He wanted her eager. And hot. And panting.

Christ!

“Looks like you done bought you a whore, Sloan.”

He jerked around, fists balling. A red haze rose
behind his eyes before he realized Mother Featherlegs was referring to the Chinese girl.

“Two hundred,” she reminded him, her hand outstretched. “Cash.”

Scowling, Jack dug into his pocket for his roll. It grew smaller each day he spent in Suzanne Bonneaux’s company. He’d have to hire on somewhere to earn more cash after he tracked down Charlie Dawes.

Blowing out a blue cloud, Bess Shephard folded the bills and tucked them into her bodice. “You takin’ the Chinee with you when you ride out in the morning?”

“I haven’t got around to thinking as far as morning yet.”

Hell, he couldn’t think past walking out of the saloon, across the yard and stripping Suzanne down to her skin.

“Unless you put the girl up behind the kid, you’re gonna need a horse and saddle for her.”

His mouth twisted. “Maybe I should just buy a buckboard and haul the whole damn lot of you along to Fort Meade.”

“Maybe you should,” she agreed, grinning. “It looks to be an interesting trip.”

With a grunt, Jack turned and wove his way through the crowd. Once outside, he paused beneath the stars to drag the clean night air into his lungs. Twenty yards away, an oil lamp flickered
behind the curtains of Mother Featherlegs’s sod hut. Jack caught the movement of a shadowy figure and went tight below the belt.

He started forward, only to freeze as the door opened and Matt Butts rushed out.

“Mr. Sloan! I want to talk to you.”

“Do you?”

“Suzanne just told me you put up the money for Ying Li.”

“Did she?”

Jack eyed him warily. Young and inexperienced though he was, Matt had set himself up as Suzanne’s protector. But if he was thinking to get between Jack and the woman in that sod hut, he’d best think again.

“Suzanne said something about interest. Whatever it is, I’ll pay it and gladly.”

Jack didn’t think so.

“You can work out any payments you want with Suzanne when you get your stake. In the meantime, she’s covering the debt.”

“I know.” Matt grabbed his hand and pumped it. “Thank you! You won’t regret this.”

“Not for a few hours, anyway,” he drawled, flicking a glance at the lighted window.

The kid pumped his hand again and hurried off, eager to make Ying Li understand that she was now free to decide her own future. Jack couldn’t see that her future looked to be much different
from her past, but figured both Matt and the girl would find that out soon enough. Right now, it was his own immediate future that interested him.

Suzanne took her time answering his knock, plenty long enough for Jack to wonder if she was going to answer at all. He knocked again, and didn’t realize he was holding his breath until she opened the door.

She wasn’t wearing her Miss Prim look, the one that got him all itchy and irritated, but neither did she have on anything close to a smile. With the red silk clinging to her skin beneath her little blue jacket, just looking at her doubled the ache below his belt. He’d take this slow, he reminded himself savagely, almost desperately.

The flickering light of the oil lamp must have reflected his thoughts. With a quick, hard swallow, she stepped back to allow him entry. The fire in his blood cooled a few degrees when he saw the spots of color in her cheeks. Drawing rein on his clamoring urge to tumble her down to the floor and have her then and there, Jack curled a knuckle under her chin and tipped her face to his.

“Having second thoughts?”

“Second, third and fourth.”

“You planning to renege on our bet?”

“Would you let me?”

He drew his thumb along her lower lip, testing the slick wet flesh just inside.

“Not this time, sweetheart. You knew the stakes. You gambled. You folded your hand.”

She trembled then, just the way he’d imagined she would. “Yes, I knew the stakes.”

Every inch of him was coiled tight, ready to crush her against him. But this time he didn’t plan on taking. This time he planned on getting.

“Time to settle up,
Miss
Bonneaux.”

Jack didn’t have any idea what he’d do if she balked. She’d nailed him the other night at Ten Mile Station. For all his hard talk and lethal skill with a Colt, he couldn’t hurt her if he tried. But he wanted her. Lord, he wanted her. So bad he had to hold himself stiff and straight as a new oak when she cocked her head and regarded him warily with those cinnamon-brown eyes.

“I’d like to discuss the…the method of settling up with you.”

His thumb stilled. “What’s to discuss?”

“Well, I thought perhaps I might pay the interest out in installments.”

“You want to trot that by me again?”

“You know. Like one of Mr. Greenleaf’s watches. You pay for part of it now, pay the rest the next time he comes through. Then the watch is yours.”

Alarm skittered down Jack’s spine, dousing a bit of the fire heating his blood. He was talking one night, one hot, fast tumble to satisfy the craving
she stirred in him. It sounded to him that she was talking something else altogether.