By the time she got her horses put up and the dogs fed, the promised rain was pouring down, accompanied by enough wind to make it impossible to stay dry outside, even with rain gear.  She made sure enough water was heating up for a long luxurious bath and decided not to stay around to watch for it to boil.    The housekeeper had come in when she saw RJ ride up.  Angela protested to no avail when RJ put on her slicker and hat and headed out.  She was anxious to get her letter.  And to see Dan.

        On her way to the Marshal’s office with her head down against the wind, she intersected the path of another person headed that way.  She looked up to see a man who looked so much like Chad that it had to be Johnny.  Same height, similar face but leaner, younger -- more innocent.  She decided not to let on that she recognized him.  She just said, "Sorry" and hurried up to the door of the office where they almost collided again as they both went inside.

        Dan looked up from the paperwork on his desk as RJ and Johnny came in.  He looked at her curiously but didn’t seem to recognize her in all her rain gear.  But as he stood up, she shouted, "Uncle Dan" and threw her arms around him.  When she let go, he held her at arm’s length and just shook his head.  Johnny looked on with interest.  Finally Dan turned to him.

        "Johnny, I want you to meet Ro . . .  I mean RJ"

        Impulsively, RJ reached out to hug Johnny also.  She felt like she knew him.  He backed up a few steps and put out his hand.

        RJ grinned,  "What’s the matter with your deputy Uncle Dan.  Afraid of girls?"

        Dan smiled, "Maybe he didn’t know you were a girl."

        She looked at Johnny,  "Well, which is it?  You scared or blind?"

        Johnny took his cue from Dan.  "Well, how was I to know?  You don’t look much like a girl right now."

        RJ smiled a wicked smile.  "Oh, you’re going to be sorry for that pretty boy.  I’m going back to the house to get cleaned up.  When I join you two for supper you’re going to want to kiss me so bad you’re going to beg to pay for my meal."

        "Watch out Johnny.  She’s probably right."  Dan interjected.

        Johnny looked a little disconcerted after he realized who she was.  It was technically her house he'd been living in for the last few months even though she'd never lived in it.   "Would you like me to sleep in the room next to the office until while you’re here?  Or were you planning to live here permanently?"

        RJ tried to reassure him.  "All Aaron’s houses are for his special friends to use as a home on the road.  And friends of special friends.  I’m sure if you’re caretakin' it now on Uncle Dan’s say so, it’s what Aaron would want."

        Just then the office door opened and a man walked in looking more bedraggled than RJ did.  He saw Johnny first where he stood closest to the door.  "Could you direct me to the stage office?  The stage broke down a couple of miles out of town and the driver asked me to send out some help.  He needs a new back wheel."

        RJ recognized his voice at once and turned to give him a hug as well.  "Bret, what are you doing in Laramie?  I thought you were headed to Denver."

        Bret was surprised to see her but recovered quickly.  "Right now, I’m looking for a bath, a meal, a soft bed and maybe then a decent game.  And you’re not trying to tell me you can’t get to Denver from here."  He stopped and really looked at her.  "You know Rose, last time I saw you, you looked a little more like a girl."

        Johnny chortled at this.  Dan just said dryly.  "She says she cleans up good."   Then he put his hand out, "Glad to see you Bret.  It’s been a good number of years."

        Bret was clearly pleased to see Dan.  "Dan Troop.  What are you doing in Laramie?  Last time I saw you, you were cleaning up Abilene.  What was that, five, six years ago?"

        Dan nodded, "At least.  I needed a little vacation.  So I took this job almost four years ago.  Laramie is lively enough at times, but nothing like Abilene.  You won’t be leaving for Denver tonight in this weather.  Get yourself cleaned up and join us for supper over at the Birdcage.  You might even find yourself a game there later."

        Then to Johnny  "Johnny, see if you can find someone from the stage line to send out a couple of men to repair the stage."  Turning to Bret again, "Are there any other passengers?"

        Bret responded, "A couple of ladies and a puny, unhelpful dry goods salesman."

        RJ interrupted, "You left odds like that to ride a stage horse two miles in the rain?"

        "Well, both ladies were old enough to be my mother’s older sister and neither approved of gambling.  And if I’m lucky, I’ll be the first of the passengers to get a hot bath."

        "Johnny, better let them know there are passengers who’ll need a ride in if the repairs look like they’ll take awhile."  Johnny left, taking a last look toward RJ.  "Nice to meet you . . . " he paused, "Miss.  You’d better introduce yourself at supper.  I don’t suppose I’ll recognize you by then."

        When Johnny left, RJ gestured after him.  "A little young isn’t he?  He can’t have much experience as a lawman."

        Dan smiled slightly.  "He’s older than he looks.  He’s been my deputy since my first week here.  He was green, but he learned quick.  He’s got young reflexes, good instincts and a strong character.  He needed some tempering in the job.  He’ll do."

        RJ protested,  "Dan, in Abilene you had three experienced deputies.  When you need someone to back you, you should have more than some kid you’re making do with until he learns how to handle himself."

        "I didn’t say I was making do.  I said he’ll do.  He backed me up a many a time when I tried to keep him out of harm’s way.   In four years, he's never let me down.  You're not second guessing my ability to judge a man's worth are you?"

        RJ shook her head, realizing he was right.  Her protest had been an automatic reaction to Johnny's youth and her strong feelings for Dan.  She gave him a quick smile.  "Sorry, Uncle Dan.  You're about the best judge of character I know - and you don't suffer fools, 'cept for me maybe."

        Dan gave her a reassuring smile in return.  Maybe should should start on that clean up job you were bragging to Johnny about.  I'd say you have you're work cut out for you.  Johnny doesn't exactly have trouble finding girls to kiss in Laramie."

        "Not without my letter.  That’s what I came to Laramie for."  She quickly added, "Course, I would have come here pretty soon anyway to see how you were getting on."

        Dan opened the little office safe and got out a fat letter.  "I could have sent this to you in Laredo you know.  I almost forwarded it to Virginia City, but they wired you'd gone to Laredo."

        "I figured me getting here from there was more a sure thing than getting this there from here.  Once it was safe in your hands, I wouldn’t risk anything chancier."

        She sat down at Johnny’s desk and opened the letter.  While she was reading, Dan gave Bret a cup of hot coffee which he cupped his hands around gratefully.  "Important letter?"  he asked Dan.

        "Appears to be from her sister Gena.  All those newspaper ads finally paid off I guess.  That letter’s all the way from England.  Hope it’s good news.  The return address has her sister’s name."

        They both watched RJ anxiously as she read the letter.  Looked like she read it through at least twice.  Finally, she looked up.  "She’s alive.  She’s well.  She’s married to a science professor at Oxford.  She thought I was dead.  She wants me to come visit."

        Both her watching friends knew her well enough to realize she had a lot more emotion inside than she was letting on.

        RJ took Bret back to the house where they drew high card for the bath water.  Bret won.  She didn’t mind.  She wanted to read her letter a couple more times and then start writing an answer.  She put on a couple more pots of water to boil and took her saddle bags into the bedroom that had been hers for years even though she'd never been in it.  Aaron was eccentric that way.  He kept some kind of house in any number of places.  His friends were welcome in all of them.  And since the people he paid as house keepers  were paid extra when there was a guest, all guests were well taken care of.  A friend of Aarons had been living here but had returned to England a few months earlier.  Apparently Dan had arranged to for Johnny to move in.  Why Dan hadn't moved in himself she didn't know although she suspected he thought it might look like he had more money than he ought to be making if he lived in a fine house like this.  Maybe no one would suspect Johnny of being more than a caretaker.

        Half an hour later she was stretched out in a hot bath wondering if she should just take a nap in the tub.  But hunger made up her mind.  Another half hour and she was dressed and ready for supper.  Bret, fresh from a short nap himself, held out his arm with a mocking smile.  "When’s the last time you wore skirts?  You trying to impress me or that young deputy?"

        RJ leaned up and kissed him on the cheek.  "Any chance I could impress you?   That deputy is off limits for me."

        "Oh, Dan trying to keep his deputy’s mind on his job?

        RJ shrugged, "Something like that."

        The rain let up as RJ sauntered out the door leaving Bret shaking his head.

        Lily came over and joined them.  The Marshal introduced them.  RJ had a powerful curiousity about Lily Merrill.  Dan had said very little about her in his letters, but the fact that Dan had mentioned her at all suggested volumes.

        "RJ, Dan tells me he knew you in Texas."  Lily said.  "In fact, he said it was Aaron who recommended him to the Town Council when our local man was killed.   Did you live in Abilene?"

        RJ nodded, her mouth full of beef stew.   She swallowed and said,  "We had a home in Abilene we stayed in some.  But I didn’t just meet Uncle Dan in Texas.  He saved my life when was a kid."  RJ could tell that Dan hadn’t mentioned this to either Johnny or Lily.

        Dan interrupted.  "I was just along as an extra gun.  Bret here was part of it too.  And a friend who’s now a Ranger captain and a few of his best men."

        Lily looked up expectantly, waiting for the story.  Dan just shrugged.  "It was just something that had to be done."  Lily looked to Bret who just said,  "It was  seven years ago."

        RJ interrupted.  "They don’t want to talk about it because they’re protecting me.  But they don’t need to.  I owe them both everything.  They put their lives on the line.  And it wasn’t even legal.  They were on the wrong side of the Mexican border."

        Lily made it clear she wouldn’t pry further but RJ reassured her.  "They did a lot of good that day.  The story should be told."  Dan started to interrupt.  RJ put a hand on his arm across the table.  "You worried your deputy is too innocent to know just how evil men can be."

        Dan leaned back, "It’s your story."

        "Lily, the short of it is a man down there had a whore house.  In front it was just a regular place.  A little bigger, a little more prosperous than most maybe.  Women, whiskey, gambling.  But the back half . . . .  That’s where men could get their darkest desires satisfied if they had the money.  Prices were a lot higher there.  Men came from long distances to do things they could never do anywhere that anyone knew them.  He kept kids back there.  The youngest were only five or six.  I was one of the oldest, just shy of thirteen to start.  Boys and girls.  And not just kids.  If a man wanted to pay enough he could have a woman to play with.  If she died because of the things he did to her, no one ever found out.  The place was well guarded.  He had a private army and the best trackers around.  I ran off twice.  Once I even managed to get a horse.  I didn’t last half a day.  I was there for a year."

        Lily was looking sorry she had asked, although in fact it had been RJ who had brought it up.  "A priest in the village got an idea of what was going on.  He never said, but I’ll bet he heard some confessions that opened his eyes.  He found Aaron.  Aaron enlisted Uncle Dan and a Ranger friend who got his captain to look the other way.  With the help of four other Rangers and Bret here they carried out a plan that brought the place down and put them all in danger."

        Bret interrupted, "They let me out of the Laredo jail to help.  They needed someone who could get inside.  I guess I was the most corrupt looking person they could find.  I got hired on as a dealer.  Aaron posed as a customer and got enough information from Rose here, I mean RJ, to figure out how to take the place down."

        "What happened to the guy who ran it?"  Johnny wanted to know.

        "Cut in half by a shotgun at close range."  RJ said shortly.

        Johnny looked at the marshal.  His eyes flickered toward RJ as he gave the briefest of nods that let Johnny know he had correctly read RJ’s meaning.  And she hadn’t even turned fourteen.

        The conversation turned to RJ’s letter as they finished their meal. She gave them every detail about her sister’s life that she had gleaned from the letter.  As they had coffee, Bret excused himself and joined one of the poker tables.   Then Dan got up.  "Time for rounds I guess."

        Johnny got up too.  "My turn Marshal."

        Lily got a mischievous smile on her face.  "Johnny, I heard that you were buying RJ’s supper in exchange for a kiss."

        Johnny blushed slightly.  He looked quickly at RJ and just as quickly looked away.  "It was just a joke.  I’m not going to hold her to it."

        RJ had the same mischief in her smile as she winked at Lily.  "I didn’t say I’d kiss anyone.  I just said I’d make him want to kiss me.  Guess I did.  He bought my supper."

        Johnny acknowledged being bested with a tip of his hat in her direction as he walked out to make the rounds.  Dan sat down for another cup of coffee.  As he left, RJ asked,  "Uncle Dan, any problem if I make the rounds with him?"

        Dan answered with what sounded like affectionate reproach, "Now Rose, don’t you be flirting with my deputy.  He’s not up to resisting a girl as strong-minded as you."

        RJ caught up with Johnny outside the dry goods store.  She linked her arm through his.  "Uncle Dan said you might need some help."

        "He’s right.  It can be a mighty lonely business checking these doors."  Johnny was in good spirits.

        They walked in silence for a minute.  RJ broke it.  "I guess I do owe you a kiss."

         "No, you were right.  You just said I’d want to kiss you."

        "Oh, I’m not going to hide behind some lawyerly weasel words.  What kind of kiss you want?"

        Johnny stopped and leaned with feigned casualness against a post.  "You got some kind of menu?"

        "Sure.  I got lots I’ve never used.  The kind of kiss a girl gives her big brother when he gets married or the kind a shy girl gives her first beau when he brings her home from a dance.  Or maybe the kind a woman gives her husband when he comes back safe from the war."

        Johnny responded apparently without thinking, "How about the kind a woman gives a handsome and charming man she barely knows but finds strangely irresistible?"

Damn, she thought.  They might not have spent any time together but he and Chad sure were related.   That sounded just like Chad.

        RJ laughed.  Still laughing, she put clasped her hands around his neck and put her lips to his.  She kissed him firmly, sweetly, tenderly just shy of passion and promise.  He followed her lead and didn’t ask for anything more than she gave.

        They continued making the rounds.  "How’d you get to be Uncle Dan’s deputy, Johnny?"

        "Well, I've been in Laramie since I was ten, from just after my mother died.  The man who looked after me wasn't even a blood relative and I felt bound to be as little burden as possible so I was always working at something.  I was working part time at Dru Lemp's cafe and part time at whatever ranches had some work.  When Mr. Troop came in after Dave Lemp got killed, he set out to find find who killed Marshal Lemp.  Most everyone in town knew one of the Hawks brothers had done it but everyone was scared.  He put up a sign advertising for a deputy.  I was the only one applied for the job but he wouldn't have me.  I wasn't even nineteen yet and didn't have any experience.  He turned me down cold, but before I left the office I told him about the Hawks boys.  Ended up he arrested the youngest, knowing he'd draw in the other two.  I wanted to back him up, there bein' two of them but he was downright scornful.  Sent me out the back door."

        "But you didn’t go?"

        "I couldn’t."

        "And he took you on."

        Johnny nodded.

        Then she asked a question that clearly surprised him.  "You know Jess Harper?"

        "Sure, we've been friends practically since he came to Laramie.  I worked sometimes for the Sherman ranch when they had money to pay an extra hand.  I was seventeen when Jess showed up.  He kept thinkin' he was going to move on, but he hasn't now going on five years.  After Slim's brother kid brother went off to school, Slim made Jess a partner.  How do you know Jess?"

         "It was a long time ago and only for a short time.  I always wondered what happened to him.  Dan told me he'd ended up here.  How about you Johnny?  You ever think about moving on?"

        "When I was a kid, I guess I thought I'd take off some day.  I just didn’t know what I wanted to do.  I don’t take to ranching like Jess seems to.  Ranch jobs were just something to get by.  It wasn't until I saw Mr. Troop's sign advertising that deputy job that things just fell into place and I knew what I wanted.  Funny thing is my cousin Chad took up Rangering in Texas about the same time.  Guess it's in the blood.  He asked me a couple of times to come down to Texas and join up."

        "Why didn’t you?"

        "I needed to get some experience first.  I couldn’t have Chad thinking he had to look out for me.   And now, I guess this job suits me.  I lost the urge to pick up and go to Texas even though I would like to get to know Chad.  I don't have much family and those I have I mostly know through occasional letters.  Mr. Troop, well he's someone real I can count on."

        RJ could see from the look on his face that Dan was more than just an employer to this boy who'd never known his family.

                "I have to hope you and your cousin are both men to be counted on.  You both have the back of a man I love a lot.  Two men I owe my life to."

        Johnny was astounded.  "You know Chad too."

        "You heard the name Joe Riley?"

        "Sure, he’s Chad’s partner in the Rangers."

        "And Joe was one of the men who was with Uncle Dan and Aaron.  His captain for the past five years was another.  You can feel easy about Chad with Joe as a partner."

        "Damn, I heard you talking about the Rangers down there on the border.  But Chad’s only been there a few years, never thought you knew him."

        "I just came from visiting Joe and the Captain.  From what Joe says, there isn’t a women under forty within 500 miles of Laredo  doesn’t know Chad."

        Johnny shook his head.  "Yeah, I only know Chad from letters but that comes through.  He's always in love but never with the same woman, and hardly ever with only one woman.  To hear him tell it, he's been charming women since he was not quite a man.  Almost got him killed a few times."

        They'd made a full circle and were back at the Birdcage.   "Johnny, I think I’m going to get into the poker game with Bret.  I could use a distraction.  I'm too excited about finding my sister to settle."

        Johnny watched as she made her way back to the Birdcage.   He'd started to say something to her, but had bitten it back.  A girl who could cut a man in half with a shotgun when she was thirteen could probably handle herself in a Laramie poker game.  And Bret was there to look out for her.  Bret wasn’t normally the kind of man Johnny would put a lot of trust in, but the Marshal seemed sure of him.  That was enough for Johnny.

        Four hours later, Johnny heard RJ and Bret come in.  He’d been asleep but he tended to sleep light.   He got up, intending to ask how the game had gone. He stopped short at his bedroom door when he heard RJ whispering to Bret.  She must have made some kind of intimate proposition because Johnny heard Bret answer softly,  "Rose, I’m too old for you and we have too much of the wrong kind of history.  If you’re looking for that kind of fun I’m sure that young deputy would be more than willing to oblige.  You seemed to like him."

        "No, that boy’s not for me."  To Johnny's ears, she sounded almost scornful.

        Johnny felt a little stab of jealousy even as he recognized that all those things his mother told him about the perils of eavesdropping were true.   And Bret must have changed his mind.  As he walked toward his bed, Johnny heard two sets of footsteps going upstairs.  And her bedroom was in the back on the first floor.

        Johnny was in the office early the next morning.  He hadn't wanted to run into Bret and RJ when they came downstairs.  But RJ had already had breakfast with the Marshal by the time he made his way over to the Birdcage.  She was on her way out.  She greeted Johnny as she passed, then stopped.  "Johnny, you reckon your friend Jess will be out at the stage stop today?"

        Johnny wondered why she wanted to know about Jess but didn’t ask.  "No, Jess is delivering some horses to a couple of relay stations up Montana.  He won’t be back for a few weeks most likely."

        "Maybe, I'll ride out there anyway.  It's too nice a day to stay inside."

        As Johnny sat down, Jake put some coffee in front of him.  "The usual Johnny?"

        Johnny nodded.  While waiting for his breakfast, he tried to figure out how to ask the Marshal about RJ without acting too curious. The Marshal seemed to read his mind.  "She got you confused, boy?"

        "She sure is different," was all Johnny could think of to say.   He had a hundred questions to ask but didn’t want to pry into anything too personal.  "Marshal, can a girl ever get over the kinds of things that happened to her?"

         The Marshal looked thoughtful.  "Can’t say.  She seems to have gotten beyond it.  She handled it by learning to protect herself.  There aren’t many men who handle a gun – revolver or rifle better than she can.  And knives.  Joe taught her to throw knives and use one in a fight too.  and that was when she was a girl.  I haven't seen her since I took this job but I doubt if she abandoned any of it."

        "Joe Riley?"

        "Your cousin wrote you about him?"

        "Joe’s his best friend.  Chad thinks the world of him."

        "Small world.  If he’s Joe Riley’s best friend, I’d say you got a cousin to look up to."  The Marshal smiled.  "Aaron stayed a few years in Laredo when he first took on Rose.  It was never a legal adoption.  The law never would have let a single man adopt a fourteen-year-old girl.  And she never would have allowed herself to placed with some family.  She was too restless for a regular family life.  Besides she thought she still had family, at least a sister, still alive.  Turns out she was right.  Rose is her real name and that’s what we called her.  There’s only a few of us who can get away with it now.  I suppose she thinks it sounds too vulnerable or something.   Aaron said she was real sweet on Joe.  She was only a kid then of course.  Too young.  Joe’s not the kind of man to take advantage.  But their age difference doesn’t seem so big now.   Don’t think she could do better than Joe."   He stopped, and looked at Johnny.  "Unless you’re of a mind to give it a try."

        Johnny shook his head.  He recognized the compliment but didn’t acknowledge it.  "She’d be too much for me.  I think I’ll set my sights on a girl that ain't so likely to be after my job."  Johnny ate in silence for a minute.  "Mr. Troop, do you think it affected her, killing a man like she did?"

        "Can’t really say Johnny.  That one was evil clean through.  She couldn’t have regrets.   Maybe she’s like you.  I thought you wouldn’t be able to handle it.  That’s one of the reasons I didn’t want to take you on at first.  I didn’t want to be the one that made you either like or get sick at killing.  But you handled killing Hawks like you should have.  Knowing you done right but not bragging on it."

        "But I don’t always handle it well."  Johnny was thinking of how his first reaction after he killed young Jed Watts was to quit his job.

        The Marshal must have known what he was thinking.   "You had the right instincts  about Jed too.  Both Hawks deserved to die and killing them probably saved a lot of lives.  We let the courts decides who dies when we can, but it doesn’t always work out that way.   Now Jed, he wasn’t bad like his brother Bill  But he would have killed you; he was trying to.  You had no way to make him see reason when he was emptying his gun at you.  But you were right to regret how it turned out.  And right to finally realize it wasn’t your fault.  I think RJ may be a lot like you.  If she ever kills someone who didn’t deserve to die, she might handle it like you."

        "Maybe she won’t ever have to use a gun on a man again."

        "That isn’t likely.   And that wasn’t the last time she used her gun.  All her ability with a gun isn’t just theoretical."

        "What is she, some kind of girl gunfighter?"

        "Not exactly, but I guess she could be.  Did she tell you where she was before she came here?"

        "She was visiting Joe and your Captain friend in Laredo."

        Troop smiled, "Visiting my eye.  Remember the news about half dozen Rangers who took out the Brady gang down there in south Texas by the border and rescued that state senator’s son.   Actually there were only five Rangers.  She was the sixth.  She was just telling me about it before she left."

        "You telling me she killed Brady?"  Johnny didn’t know what to think now.

        "She didn’t say who killed him.  Or the others in his gang.  I expect it’s a good sign that she doesn’t think killing’s something to brag on.  But she was there.  She had information from a marshal who’d been trailing Brady for over three years.  He got himself wracked up in Virginia City when they went after Brady there.  He knew of a hideout down Laredo way that he might use if he went south.  RJ followed him in that direction.  Joined up with Joe.  I expect if your brother’s Joe’s usual partner, he was one of the five.  You could ask her.  Or maybe he’ll write you with details, she wouldn’t bother with.  He writes you pretty regular doesn’t he?"

        "He’s better than I am about it.  I owe him a letter.  Maybe I’ll write and ask him about it."

        Dan stood up.  "I’m going to the office, get some paperwork done. When you finish up here, Drucker’s got a complaint about kids vandalizing his store again.  Would you check it out?"

        "Sure, Mr. Troop.  I’ll see to it.    I guess it’s good thing its so dull around here right now or RJ. would be out after my job."

        "She’d give you competition too.  But don’t worry boy.  Wyoming may have given women the vote but I don’t think Laramie’s ready for a female deputy."

         Around midnight on the fifth night, a bunch of men passed on the road.  Five she thought and riding hard.  It bothered her.  She took a shortcut up the ridge, running hard and could just hear them veer east off the main road to the ridge road.

        Slim was asleep of course.  She woke him long enough to tell him what she’d seen and to let him know she was going into town to see if something was going on.

        Leaving Devil behind with Bandit, she took the 12 miles into Laramie riding Angel as hard as the passing men had ridden in the other direction, Briar running along beside.  Dan was asleep in his quarters next to the office.  He had no answer for what she’d seen, but it nagged at him also.  He decided to make rounds.  RJ insisted on going with him, but it was Briar who found the trouble.  She whined and scratched at back door of the bank.  It was locked but Dan had a key.  Inside they found the manager unconscious on the floor and his wife dead.  They’d both been clubbed on the head.  The safe was open.

        Getting a posse together at 2 a.m. would be no easy task.  But if he waited until morning, the five would have a big head start.  Dan sent her to the house to wake Johnny while he rounded up a few others.  She called out to Johnny as she entered the house.  "Johnny, trouble in town.  Dan sent me to get you."

        He was up fast and came out tucking his shirt into his pants, then buckling on his gunbelt.  He looked at her expectantly.

        "Bank was robbed.  Manager’s wife killed.  Five men riding hard passed by the Sherman place around midnight.  Dan’s getting a posse together.  He wants you to meet him at the office.  Get some supplies and then get the rifles loaded for whoever shows up.  I’m going back out to the Sherman place to let him know what’s going on in case they circle back for any reason."

        "The Marshal  know you’re headed that way?"

        "You can tell him.  He won’t want me mixing with the posse."  Johnny looked skeptical but was in too much of a hurry to question her.

        RJ rode hard back to the Sherman place.  She knew she had a better chance of slipping into the posse when they passed that way than if she had to argue with Dan here in town.  Seeing that woman dead just because someone decided it was easier to bash her head in than tie her up was more than RJ could take.

        She braided her hair and pinned it up so it couldn’t be seen under her hat.   By the time she bound her breasts under her shirt, no one would know she was female.  Everyone but Uncle Dan and Johnny might even think she was Jess when she joined them.

       She rubbed down Angel and turned him out into the paddock.  She saddled up Devil.  She’d saved her in case there was a need like this.  She had more endurance in the bad country.  Slim came out and tried to persuade her to take care of things at the relay station leaving him free to join the posse.  She just looked at his wrist, still in a sling and mumbled "Right."

        "Dan is going to be so pissed."

        "Look, he can’t have gotten much of a posse together this time of the morning.  He’s going to need a steady hand with a gun."

        "A woman’s going to be a distraction."

        RJ stood in front of Slim with her hands on her hips.  "You see a woman here?"   Then, "You tell Dan the men turned up the Baxter ridge road and headed east.  And you don’t need to say anything about me one way or another."

        "Where’s RJ?"  the Marshal asked sharply.  "I know she didn’t just decide to go to bed."

        "She rode back to the relay station."

        He was not happy with that response.  "Why’d you let her do that boy?"

        Johnny shrugged and before he could say anything, the Marshal stopped him.  "Stupid question.  You couldn’t have stopped her."

        It was almost 4 am when the posse rode up to the relay station where they stopped to water their horses.  Johnny saw Slim come out and talk to Mr. Troop.  He pointed to the ridge road.  He heard the Marshal tell him not to worry but couldn’t hear the rest of the conversation.  He saw Angel in the paddock and wondered where RJ was.  He didn’t see Devil or Bandit and Briar and guessed she was waiting somewhere to join them in the dark.  He wondered if he should warn the Marshal.

        As the men remounted, the Marshal said to him quietly.  "She’s waiting out there for us.  You stick to the back and watch for her."

        "You going to send her back?"

        "She wouldn’t go.  She took seeing Martha Wells dead real hard even though they never met.  No crying or carrying on of course, but she got a look in her eye.  I was thinking of locking her in a cell if she tried to join the posse.  She anticipated me on that I guess.  Now I don’t want to worry about someone getting nervous and shooting her if she trails behind.  I hate to admit it, but with this sorry group, we could use her.  Only Granger and Waterston are worth a damn.  Just let her blend in.  Slim says she’s dressed pretty much like she was the night you met her.  They won’t know she’s a girl."

        RJ slipped in beside Johnny near the top of the ridge.  One of the men said, "Hey, Jess when did you get back?"  She just lifted a hand in salute.  Johnny stayed with her in back until it started to get light.  At that point there were several ways the men could have gone and they needed to start watching for tracks.

        The Marshal circled back and drew up facing RJ.  "You thought I wouldn’t notice?"  She didn’t answer, but Johnny saw she kept her eyes steady.  The Marshal stared back for a moment but she didn’t back down.  Johnny didn’t think he could have stood up under that look.   Finally the Marshal spoke up,  "Ed told me Joe taught you to track.  Care to give us a hand?"  He looked at Johnny.  "Come on boy, you might learn something."

        Johnny followed as RJ urged her horse up the trail ahead of the rest of the posse.   RJ knew Dan was just using the tracks as an excuse to get her up front with him.  Despite the training she'd had from her father and then Joe, it wasn't likely she could track as well as the Marshal, especially mantracking.   And she bet after four years with Dan, Johnny was probably pretty decent at it himself.  And as it turned out there wasn't much tracking for anyone to do.  Even Johnny could see that one rider had taken the rocky trail northwest toward the first box canyon while four others had taken the main trail.

         The Marshal undoubtedly had figured that out before he'd brought them up front.  "Johnny, take one man and go after the single man.  The rest of us will follow the other four.  That one may have gone off to hide the money.  He could end up meeting up with the rest down the road."

        RJ spoke quietly to the Marshal.  "I’ll go with Johnny.  That trail’s going to get hard to follow in that direction.  Bandit could come in handy.  Especially if he did hide the money."

        The Marshal looked at Johnny.   Johnny hesitated, then nodded.  The Marshal looked hard at RJ.  "He could take chances for you he shouldn’t."

        "I won’t let him.  Promise."

        RJ and Johnny followed the trail which continued to veer northwest.  Bandit helped when they ran out of track traps.  Four hours after they’d split from the posse, they were a quarter mile from the mouth of the canyon.  Johnny started to feel as though someone was watching.  He tried to ignore the feeling not wanting to seem jumpy.

        "Stop a minute Johnny."  RJ pulled up next to him.  "If you were with Jess right now, wouldn’t you be telling him you had a bad feeling about what was ahead."

        Johnny looked startled; she’d read his mind.  She continued, "I have that feeling too.  You shouldn’t be ignoring those feelings just because I’m here.  Could be dangerous for both of us.  What are you thinking?"

        "The man with the money could be waiting in ambush.  If he took a perch up there on the trail that winds up that canyon wall, he could be watching us with binoculars, waiting to pick us off."

        "Sounds right.  Got any ideas for drawing him out?"

        Johnny didn’t, but suspected she did.

        "There’s something the Rangers did in a similar situation when they caught the Brady gang that might work here."

        "They?"  Johnny questioned.  "I heard you were right in the thick of it."

         "Well, surrounded by those Rangers I was a safe as a baby in its cradle.  We had to draw out two men who were standing watch at a narrow canyon entrance.  So two of us rode up within binocular range . . . "

        Johnny interrupted, "Joe and Chad let you ride point?"

        "The plan did require a woman."

        "Then I bet it was your plan."  Johnny wondered who was really in charge of that group of Rangers.

        "I contributed.  Anyway, we thought we should send out two riders who looked totally harmless.  Then we enticed them down to us."

        "Was the other rider a woman too?"  Johnny was intrigued.

        "No.  Look I’ll tell you what we could do here.  We’re just out of rifle range, assuming he’s not some kind of sharpshooter with a buffalo rifle.  And we’ll assume he does have binoculars.   We dismount to give the horses some water.  I’ll take off my hat and unpin my hair.  You get playful and pour a little water on my head.  Then you grab me and start kissing me.   He’s probably seen your badge already.  He’s not going to figure a girl is part of the posse.  You’re just an errant deputy who’s decided a little dalliance with a girl is more interesting than doing your job."

        "We check the lower part of the area with binoculars, maybe casually looking for him also.  We find a spot with some cover that will take us at an angle so we’re not in good range for a shot.  Some place that looks like a good place for maybe consummating our lust.  He can’t have seen my gun under this coat.  You take your gunbelt off and hang it over the saddle horn when you tie up your horse.  I’ll get my bedroll as though we need something to lie on.  I think I can get my rifle out under cover of the bedroll.  He can’t see that side of my horse from here.  You leave your rifle on the saddle.  I’ll bet he’ll figure to sneak down and take you out.  Maybe me too, or maybe he’d be interested in something else.  Either way we surprise him."

        Johnny nodded.  "Course if we’re both just imagining things, we could be wasting a lot of time."

        "Well maybe when we get up there we can figure a way to work our way over and intersect the trail."

        Johnny felt a little awkward about the kissing part of the plan.  It should have been pleasant enough, but he was uncomfortable.  He’d bet money it was Chad who took on this duty when they used this plan on the Brady gang.  If Joe let him.  Likely Joe had an interest in this girl he wouldn't have let Chad interfere with.

    By the time they made it over to a little group of trees south of the entrance to the canyon, he was sure there was someone up on the little trail that wound up the canyon wall.   As Johnny tied up the horses and reluctantly took off his gunbelt, RJ put her arms around him and kissed him, putting on a good show for whoever might be watching.   Johnny tried to play his part better this time.  He put one arm around her waist and the other around her shoulders.  She put both arms around his neck.  When their lips met, he tried to relax, or respond or something.  But he was going through the motions.  She obviously realized it.

        "Don’t much like an audience do you Johnny?"  she said as she planted a final kiss on his cheek.

        Then she untied her bedroll and took it under the trees with the rifle folded into it.  Johnny joined her.   He hoped she was at least going to give him the rifle.

        "I feel kind of naked without my gun."  RJ unrolled the bedroll and took out her spare.  She checked to see it was loaded, returned it to the holster and held the belt out toward Johnny.  He grinned, "You don’t miss a trick."  He got the feel of the revolver.  Damn it was better than his and it was only her spare.  If she wasn’t a girl gunfighter, she had the equipment for it.

        Bandit came up and nudged RJ’s hand.  She put her hand on Johnny’s arm and pointed toward the horses.  Someone must be coming down the path.

        Johnny pointed to some boulders behind the trees in which they had taken cover and made a motion which indicated he was going to sneak back toward the rocks behind the horses and intercept the man.  She spread out the blanket, piled some debris under it.  She tossed Johnny the rifle but took his hat and coat.  She pulled her revolver and got under the blanket.   When she started talking like a woman in the middle of the throes of passion, Johnny almost busted out laughing.  She motioned for him to say something.  However, when he said, "Oh darling" he sounded so wooden, she motioned him to get going.  He felt like a fool.  As he slid around the boulder, Bandit followed.  He tried to send him back, but RJ motioned for him to go along.

        By the time he positioned himself with Bandit in the rocks behind the horses, Johnny could hear someone approaching close in.  A minute later a man with a rifle came around a small bend in the trail.  Johnny watched him sneak up to the group of trees.  He stopped and listened to RJ’s expressions of passion.  Johnny had to admit that under other circumstances the things she was saying would have gotten him aroused.  It seemed to be working that way on this stranger.  Johnny saw him rub his crotch as though in readiness for something.  As the man got closer to the low hanging branches that hid RJ, Johnny got ready.   He was about to call out, rifle at ready when Bandit nudged his leg.  He pushed the dog away, trying to concentrate on what the man was doing.  He stood up and was going to make his way behind the man, when Bandit nudged him more insistently.  Pesky dog.  Couldn’t he tell Johnny had seen the man?

        Almost too late Johnny heard some loose rock dislodged above him.  But for the dog, he might not have noticed.  He looked up but couldn’t get a good angle.  He heard shots from the trees and ran toward them but kept his eye focussed above.  It was  good that he did.

        He saw movement.  He dived and rolled as a rifle bullet hit the ground just where he had been.  He came up shooting toward the sound.  A man fell out from behind a boulder and tumbled halfway down to the trail.  As Johnny turned toward the trees again, RJ came out revolver ready, her shirt only half buttoned.

        He dusted himself off and looked at her shirt, worried about how it got that way.  "He make a grab at you?"

        No, I took it off.  You’d be surprised how much a half naked woman distracts a man with a gun."

        Johnny smiled, "No, I wouldn’t be surprised at all."  He motioned toward the trees.  "He out of commission?"

        "Yeah, he took you out first, thinking maybe I looked worth doing something else with.  He went down with a hard on and a bullet in the chest.  I was hoping you could question him about the money.  Now I guess we’ll have to find it ourselves."

        "Took me out first?"

        She gestured for Johnny to follow.  When she got under the trees, she picked up his jacket, shook out the leaves she had used to make it look occupied and she held it out to him.  "Sorry about the holes."

        He held it up to the light.  There was a hole just under the badge and another in the back, lower down as though a bullet had entered at a downward angle.

        "You took a big risk letting him shoot first."

        "Maybe.  I guess I don’t like to kill someone without being sure he’s got killing on his mind."

        Johnny put a hand briefly on her shoulder.   She looked up at him.  He met her eyes and let her know without a word that he agreed.

        She bent and picked up his hat.  "Look, he left your head intact at least."

        Johnny just smiled as he put his hat back on.  "Now we got some figuring to do.  There was a second man up there.  Was he waiting there or could we have missed a second track?   Or maybe two of them rode double."

        RJ shook her head.   "I think he was waiting here.  And where there’s one, there could be more.  Makes it seem more likely the money’s here too."

        Johnny was troubled.  This had clearly turned into more than the Marshal had sent them after.  He wasn’t bothered for himself but he knew the Marshal wouldn’t have allowed RJ to go with him after more than one man.  Should they get back to the posse or settle things here?

        RJ settled it for him.  "We need to back track to where these guys were keeping watch.  We should be able to tell from that position if there were any others.  Where was the guy you shot?"

        Johnny pointed to the boulder the man had tumbled from.

        "One of us should back track him.  The other can back track my friend there."

        Johnny was stymied at that.  He didn’t think they should separate.  But what she said made sense.  If they followed her plan, which route was the safest?

        She could see he was troubled.  "Johnny, any chance you could just pretend I’m Jess and follow the same plan you would follow if he was here?"

        "Jess’s not nearly as distracting with his shirt off."

        "Speak for yourself Johnny."

        That broke his tension a little.

        She made the decision for him.  "No offense, but I expect I’m a better tracker than you.  At least I can read my dogs better.  I’ll take Briar up top and work from there.  You take Bandit.  Find a good footprint and just indicate it to him and tell him to track it quiet.  He’ll do it.  Make sure you add the quiet part.  We’ll just keep an eye on each other as long as we can.  We’ll both be heading north I expect.  It didn’t take them long to get here so they must have been right at the mouth of the canyon.  You bring the horses with you."

        He couldn’t find a flaw in her plan.  He wasn’t easy about it, but it’s what he would have done if he’d been with Jess he supposed.

        He ended up at the mouth of the canyon before she did.  There were two horses tied out of sight a little ways in.  He saw tracks that indicated at least two more had gone further in.   He looked up just as Briar popped out of some bushes above him and ran down the little trail that ended where the horses had been tied.  RJ appeared a moment later.

        "What’ve we got here Johnny?"

        "At least two more horses going in."

        She took a few long minutes to look at the tracks, but couldn’t find more than the two.  She pointed to one hoofprint.  "That’s the horse we followed from where they first split up."

        Johnny was impressed.  He knew he’d never have been able to distinguish that single track from any other.  He had been able to figure there were two sets of prints but he hadn't been able to distinguish them except by size.  But Chad had told him his partner was one of the best trackers in Texas and he'd been RJ's teacher.    He considered what to do.  "If it's the man we've been following, that means he’s probably got the money.  The others may have just been his look-outs and body guards."

       As RJ put her hair back into it's braid, she wondered out loud if there was a trail that went through and might wind around to intercept the posse.  I wonder if there’s some way a man could get out on horseback?"

      Johnny thought a minute.  "Slim and I did a search in this area about three years ago for a runaway kid.  His horse was found a few miles north of here.  We tried to backtrack from the horse.   I seem to recall that the men who came this way said it was a blind canyon but that there was a path that could be taken on foot.   If we hadn’t found the kid, we were going to try that path.  I can’t think that these men would really want to abandon their horses though."

        RJ agreed, "Yeah, my bet is they’re going to hide the money and then join the rest somewhere after picking off anyone from the posse who followed them.  Maybe hole up for awhile though.  We could meet them coming out or come across them camped further up.  Either way, we’d better approach careful."

        Johnny pointed at the two dogs resting in the sun.  "How far away will they give us warning?"

        "Depends on the wind direction and strength.   Sometimes a quarter mile or more.  Sometimes they can get right on top of someone if they got the wind at their backs.  Doesn’t do to get careless and depend on them too much."

        They followed the tracks deeper into the canyon.  An hour in they hit a real tricky mile of trail, steep and treacherous.  A couple of miles after they got back on a relatively good trail, the tracks split up.  Johnny knew that if he was with Jess or the Marshal they’d split up too, but he was reluctant to let her go on alone.

        "Can you tell which one is the one we trailed to this place?"

        RJ got  down and checked both sets.  "See the little split in this hoofprint here?  That’s the one."

        Johnny was relieved to have an excuse to keep them together.   "Then let’s both go after him.  Maybe he didn’t want the other one to see where he hid the money."

        "Or maybe the other one went off to get water or something."

        The way she looked at him, Johnny figured she suspected he didn’t want to split up.  But she went along without comment.

        Bandit went ahead on the trail.  RJ sent Briar on little excursions off in the direction the other tracks had taken in case that man headed back this way.  About a half hour later, Bandit came back and jumped up on the saddle in front of RJ.   He nudged her, then jumped down and headed a little ways in the direction he’d come from.  Then he ran back and jumped on Johnny’s horse.

        "I reckon the man we’re looking for is not too far ahead?"  Johnny whispered as he patted the dog who looked like he expected it.

        "Fifteen minutes or so Bandit time.  Course he can’t tell us if the man is settled, still heading out, or on his way back.  We’d best be extra cautious.  We’ll just keep sending Bandit out."

        "Won’t Bandit make him suspicious?"

        "Bandit’s a ghost when it comes to this kind of thing.  That man will never see him."

        Bandit ran out and came back a couple of times.  Then the third time, he blocked their path.  RJ dismounted and signed silently to Johnny that the man could be right up ahead.

        They tied their horses and left Briar on guard.  Rifles in hand, they each took one side of the trail.  Johnny took the side closest to where the second man was likely to cut back.

        The man they were looking for was sitting at a small campfire.   Johnny signaled for RJ to stay where she was and cover him.   He took a wide circle around to the opposite side, looking out for the second man.   Finally he walked into the camp, rifle at ready.  As the man started to lunge for his rifle, Johnny said quietly,  "No chance mister.  Toss it here.  And the gunbelt."  The man tossed the rifle Johnny’s way.  Then his gunbelt.  He sat back down without a word.

Just then Bandit came up from behind and nudged him.  Even before RJ shouted, "Behind you Johnny," Johnny whirled to see a man on foot raise his rifle.  Johnny hit the ground rolling and came up shooting.  The man went down.  Johnny heard a shot behind him.  He whirled to see the other man fall across the fire.

        RJ walked up with her rifle raised.  "Gun in his boot", she explained.

        Johnny saw the small revolver in the dead man’s hand.

        RJ was thinking aloud. "Should we try to get out of here tonight or wait until morning?  That trail’s pretty tricky and we won’t get to that bad patch before dark.  There’s no moon.  We’d have to walk the horses part of the way."

        Johnny paused, weighing the options.  "I’d like to catch up to the posse as soon as possible.  This ambush might be part of a bigger plan.  But we’d never catch up to them tonight anyway.  Why don’t we head back a couple of miles and camp just before that bad patch.  Then we can get started before dawn and hit the tricky part at first light."

        RJ agreed.  "Let’s take the two extra horses with us.  We might want to press hard once we get past that steep section.  We can use them up and leave them near some water.  Save our horses as much as we can."

        Johnny nodded,  "Let’s take a few minutes to look for the money.  Think one of your dogs might help?"

        "It can’t be too far away.  Bandit seems partial to you.  You chose a side and take him hunting.   Tell him to find close.  He’ll alert on anything that smells human.  And tell him to search loud.  He hates being quiet, though as you’ve seen, he’ll do it if you order him to."

        Ten minutes into his search, Bandit came running at Johnny full blast, barking loudly. almost knocking him over in his exuberance.  "What’d you find boy?"  Bandit ran barking full tilt over to a pile of boulders.  As Johnny walked over, Bandit ran back and forth barking and leaping.  Sure enough, there was a pair of saddle bags tucked way back with some rocks piled on top of them.

        As he brought them out, RJ and Briar appeared.  "Told you he loves to search loud.  You make sure you make a fuss over him.  Give him that piece of jerky in your pocket and love him up.   Dogs got to have an incentive to work too."

        Johnny didn’t have any trouble fussing over Bandit.  It would be nice to have a dog this useful.  He’d always thought of dogs being only for hunting, herding or guarding.  But this one would be as good a deputy as most men he knew.

        Johnny checked the saddlebags.  It didn’t look like enough.  "Wells said there was $10,000 in gold.  I don’t think there’s more than half that here."  RJ checked and agreed.

        "He must have split it up.  Lets work a circle around this spot." RJ suggested.

       They searched for another twenty minutes with no result.

        Johnny called a halt to it.  "Maybe the other men have the rest.  Or maybe he hid it on the way in.  Let’s not spend any more time here.  We can always come back if we don’t find the money on the way out or with the others.  Lets get started out of here.  We’ll ride their horses, get the feel of them now.  Give ours a rest."

        They checked the bedrolls on the dead men’s horses.  Johnny put all the identification he could find in one saddle bag with the money and checked all the guns.  RJ spread out the all blankets she’d gotten from the four bedrolls.  Johnny looked at the single pile.  "You going to share any of those?"

        "Sure, whatever you want.  But I think without a good fire, we’re going to have to sleep close to each other.  It’s up to you though."  Johnny looked a little disconcerted but tried to hide it.  She covered for him.  "Let’s see if we can make a fire last long enough to heat some water up for a little soup and tea.  Unless you insist on that sludge you men call coffee."

        An hour later they were sitting on the blankets next to the dying fire. They were both wrapped in their own bedroll blankets, leaning against their saddles.  They were close together but barely touching elbows.  R.J. knew she should leave him alone.  But she also knew she wouldn’t.

        "I’m glad we got a chance to work together like this.  I think maybe we can trust one another a little easier now."

        "Is that important?" Johnny asked.

        "It is to me.  I know in your job you're sometimes the only thing between Dan and a bullet.  I needed to know you were worthy of the trust he has in you."

        "You don’t trust the Marshal’s judgment?  I've been with him four years.  I have to prove myself to you now.  Did he tell you something makes you think I'm not good at my job?"  Johnny sounded surprised, disapproving or both.

        RJ hastened to clarify her thought.  "Of course, I trust him.  In my head I know he’s a good judge of character.  And you’re not just someone he settled for.  Not for four years.  He’s says he trusts you completely.  Certainly he wouldn’t have let me go off with you like this unless he did. I was sure he wouldn’t let me out of his sight.  And after what we just had to do, I know in my gut that you’re the right man to be at his back.  Sometimes that deep in the gut belief is just something I need."

        Johnny relaxed a little.  "He probably thought we had the safest assignment.  He couldn’t have guessed four of them had set up an ambush.  He’ll be mad as hell when he finds out.  I just hope they haven’t set up something worse for the rest of them."

        They lay back against the saddles, but neither seemed ready for sleep.

        "Johnny, tell me about Lily."

        "Lily? What do you want to know about her?  If you have a problem with her running a saloon, I can tell you her girls aren't there to take on men for money.  Maybe a few of them do sometimes but not with her approval.  And if they do it too blatantly, she sends them somewhere where it's encouraged."

        RJ smiled, actually glad to know this was the case but it wasn't what she was asking.  "I guess, I just wondered about her and Dan.  It looks to me like he really cares for her and I was hoping I was right.  And that she cares back.  Dan isn't capable of a casual relationship.  Hell as long as I've known him, he hasn't been capable of any kind of strong relationship.  He seems to have found that here, not only with Lily, but with you."

        Johnny was startled, "With me?"

        "Don't tell me you can't feel it.  Dan never had much in the way of real family.  I got the impression from Uncle Ed that he was deeply in love once but the woman chose his brother Clay and then she was killed by a stray bullet in some kind of senseless fight his brother was involved in.  Dan closed himself off to all women after that so he never had any children.  His brother was wild to start with and after the woman died he really veered onto a path different from Dan's.   They weren't  as close as brothers should be before that and afterward they didn't have much contact.  Then Dan wrote me that Clay was killed here in Laramie protecting Dan.  It isn't Dan's way to speak of his emotions but his letter suggested that Clay tried to make up for what he took from Dan so many years ago.  Maybe that's why Dan is a little more open to a real friendship with you.    He had some good experienced deputies in Abilene and he respected them.  I guess you could even say they were friends, but it was nothing like what I see here with you.  You're like a son to him.  I know he'd never tell you.  He'd be worried it would seem like he was depending on you too much.  He wouldn't want to stand in the way of you taking a different path if you wanted.  But even if he never told you, you know it in your heart."

        But RJ could feel more than see that he didn't.   And his response confirmed it.

        "Maybe you're just seeing that he doesn't quite rely on me as much as the experienced deputies he had in Abilene.  Treats me more like someone who needs experience and instruction, like a kid.  Like any kid, not like a son."

        RJ tried to see the expression in Johnny's face but it was too dark.  But the expression in his voice told her he wanted badly to believe her.

        She sighed, "I'd say Dan is still able to keep his feelings hidden pretty well, but he let something slip the other day when we were talking."

        "About Lily?"

        RJ chuckled quietly.  The boy was fishing and didn't want her to know it.  "Dan told me about the appointment to West Point that you were offered a few weeks ago.  I'll bet he never told you how devasted he was and how badly he wanted you to turn it down."

        "He told you that?"  Johnny voice indicated complete disbelief.  "He never encouraged me to stay.  I guess I was a little hurt that he didn't at least show he'd be sorry if I left."

        "No, he wouldn't do that.  He wouldn't have wanted to influence you to give up such a big opportunity.  But when he told me about it, the fact that he might have lost you was still fresh in his mind.  He let his guard slip a little in front of me because he was still so happy you'd decided on your own to stay."  RJ reached over and squeezed his forearm.  "Johnny, the bond between you is as strong as any I've seen between a blood father and son.  You must have a least seen how relieved he was when you didn't accept the appointment."

        With her hand still on his arm, she felt rather than saw him shake his head.  RJ shook her own head in mild disbelief.  "Well, if you don't see how he feels about you, then I guess you're the wrong person to ask how he feels about Lily.  At least you probably know how she feels about him."

        "Well she doesn't make much of a secret of it.  Not that she shows it much in public.  Mr. Troop wouldn't react well to that I'm sure."

        RJ laughed out loud.  "I can't even imagine it.  But Johnny, I can see he's happier here than I ever saw him in Abilene.  And I'm sure it's because of the two of you.  You've touched something in him that he hasn't let anyone touch since his first love chose his brother  and he closed himself off to the thought that he would ever have his own son.  Don't ever doubt it just because he may still be incapable of showing it."

        Johnny didn't answer at first.  And when he did, he changed the subject.  She thought maybe what she'd told him as so precious, he didn't want to risk spoiling it with more talk.   "How did you get separated from your sister?"

        RJ sighed.  That's a longer story than you probably want to hear.  My mother let me visit an aunt of hers in Boston.  I was a wild thing as a child but I wanted to see the city and my mother probably thought it would do me good.   My mother was Norweigian but my father's mother was Cherokee and that's how I was raised.  Of course, the Cherokee in Georgia and North Carolina were more assimilated than any other tribe in this country.  We were the "good Indians."  And so successful at adopting white men's ways that we attracted a lot of jealousy and it finally got most of them thrown off their land.  But I suppose you know about that.  My father's family was in a part of North Carolina where they weren't disturbed, at least until the War.  I never knew exactly what happened to my family until I got my sister's letter.  Uncle Aaron hired Pinkerton agents and others to track them down.  I knew my parents were dead because I found their graves when I finally got home. I was ten then, my sister Gena was eleven, my sister Sonia was my twin and my brother Jeff was only five.  I figured they'd gone to my father's Cherokee family but whatever word they'd left me, I never got.   We found later that most of  my father's family had been killed.  In the years after the war, that wasn't uncommon.  An old woman who survived told us she saw my sister Sonia killed and never saw my little brother at all.  Since Sonia had pale yellow hair, I knew she hadn't mistaken her for someone else.  But I wasn't willing to believe that Gena was dead too even though we had some reports of her death.  She had dark hair like me but her eyes are blue.  Although her dark hair made her more likely to be killed by a white man looking to kill a Cherokee, it also made any witnesses to her death more unreliable.  And besides.  I just didn't feel she was dead.  She and I had always had a very tight bond.  We were closer and looked more alike that my twin and I.  So I've always continued to look for her and my brother.  As it turned out, she was adopted by a couple who returned to England.  She married an Englishman but she continued to send for American newspapers.  That's how she knew to write to me in care of Uncle Dan although the letter actually went to Abilene first as the paper she finally saw with my advertisement in it was five years old.  And you heard everything else about her when I told Dan and Bret.  At least everything else I know."

        It was then that she made the move she'd been pushing away since dark had settled in.  The one she knew out of deference to Chad she shouldn't make.  The one which after the events of the day she was almost compelled to make.

        "Johnny, you ever been with a woman?"

        He turned and stared at her, startled at question like that coming out of the blue.  "What kind of thing is that to ask a man?  You think maybe I can’t get a woman?  Was my kissing so bad today that you figure I haven’t had any practice?"

        "Oh, a good-looking boy like you with a responsible job?  I’m sure you’ve kissed lots of girls.  Couldn’t tell from the way you kissed today, but I chalk that up to the circumstances.  I’ll bet some of those girls even let you touch their breasts through their clothes. But I don’t think you’re looking to get married yet.  So you’d be careful not to do anything to make a girl expect you were going to marry her or which might force you to."

        Johnny smiled slightly, at least she though he had.  "Well, you’re right about that, I guess."

        "I expect most boys your age, if they’ve been with a woman either they’re engaged or they’ve paid for it.  I guess a lawman could get it for free if they were so inclined.  But I’ll bet Uncle Dan doesn’t let things go that way.  So my question is a reasonable one."

        "But incredibly nosy."

        "Well sure.  And you’re free not to answer.  But here we are.   I’ll bet you wouldn’t be at all surprised about that question if it came from a man.  You men sit around a campfire telling tales of your conquests.  I’ve sat around a few fires when the others thought I was a boy."

        "But a man would expect me to lie.  You probably expect the truth."

        RJ smiled at the insight in that observation, "Maybe I was just trying to start a conversation.  Tell you what.  You tell me about your first time and I’ll tell you about your friend Jess’s first time."

       "What could you know about Jess?"  Johnny seemed astonished.  "And he sure wouldn’t talk about his first time to you.  I think maybe I’m the only one he ever did tell unless he’s shared it with Slim.  It isn’t a happy memory for him.  Don’t be making stories up about Jess.  Why don’t you tell me about your first time?"

        RJ was thoughtful for a minute.  "What they did to me in that place didn’t have anything to do with making love.   My first time wouldn’t be something you’d sleep easy over."

        Johnny hastily clarified.  "I wasn’t talking about what happened to you as a kid.  I would never ask about that.  I was just meaning you didn’t try to hide what you were doing with Bret so I knew that you’d been with a man before.  In the pleasant sense."

        "What I was doing with Bret, wasn’t exactly what you think," she responded.

        "Sorry, I wasn’t accusing you of being a bad woman or anything."  Johnny’s reassurance was tinged with skepticism but no real condemnation.

        "Oh, I’m not saying I didn’t want to do what you thought.  But what I wanted to do with Bret was not exactly what he wanted to do.  I guess all those men who were involved with taking down that whorehouse have fatherly or at least big brotherly feelings about me.  I went upstairs with him just to talk.  Guess I hoped to talk him into what he refused me, but I didn't.  Came down later but I guess you didn't hear me."

         "Of course, just because Bret turned me down doesn’t mean I’m claiming I haven’t been with other men.  The first few years after I got out of that place I don’t think I could have handled being with a man, that way.  I was crazy in love with Joe Riley but it was a safe kind of love.  Nothing on God’s earth could have induced him to touch any girl under 18 and he was especially careful of me.  Still is.  He loved me back, but in a very brotherly, protective way.  But eventually I was old enough to act on a need I had to be with men who could sort of cancel out what had happened to me.   I can’t get pregnant.  There were things that happened to me there that will never allow that to happen.  Maybe it’s just as well.   Anyway, when I’m around a certain kind of man, under certain circumstances, well I long ago gave up being a good girl.  Maybe being with good men is something I need to prove to myself that there are men who don't satisfy their needs by inflicting pain."

        Johnny couldn’t help but ask.  "I expect that most men aren't looking to inflict pain.  What kind of men are you talking about? "

        "Men with a clean soul for one."

        "You must spend lots of time in church seducing ministers."

        RJ laughed bitterly, "One of my regular customers was a minister.  If I told you what he liked to do to me, you’d never be able to look a preacher in the face again without wondering.  There was a priest too who came once.  I know he was a priest because the men who ran the place liked to tell us those things.  I think it drove in the point that there was no one we could trust.  I often wonder now if he didn’t go to confession in the local parish and lead to the whole thing falling apart.  Father Andre would never tell of course."

        "By clean soul I don’t mean some holier than thou, God-fearing, Bible-thumper.  Just someone whose soul doesn’t have the dark places that let him take pleasure from inflicting pain.  I’m sure you know of men who take pleasure from beating up their wives or emotionally torturing their own children or drawing on old men in bars.  Not all the men with stained souls go to places like the one I was in.   And in addition to that, a man won’t tempt me unless he has physical and moral courage and the physical prowess to back it up.  I guess that’s just my need to feel protected."

        Johnny seemed surprised at this, "You have a need to feel protected?  That I wouldn’t have guessed.  I would have figured you for a need to be a protector.  Mr. Troop says he was afraid you'd go after those men because you saw what they did to the banker's wife.  Doesn't seem like you were looking for a protector following the posse out here."

        "They’re not mutually exclusive - being a protector and looking to be protected."
 

        Johnny fell silent for a moment.  "Do you really know about Jess?  Or maybe you know the girl he was with?  He’s got some bitterness about her, but I get the feeling he loved her too.  And she hurt him bad."

        RJ nodded.  "Yeah, I think he did love her.  Much as a seventeen-year-old boy can love, intensely without reason.  But you tell me about your first time."  She had his attention and his curiosity.

        Johnny was hesitant.  "But my story involves, well, one of those places.  After what you went through . . . ."

        "No place was like that place.  It’s not an easy life in any of those places, but for some it’s no worse than other jobs or starving.   There’s factories back east where women and even small children are working 16 or 18 hours a day at mind numbing drudgery for less money.  And I’ll bet one thing.  A boy like you goes in one of those places you don’t mistreat the women or insult them or treat them like dirt.  So tell me."

        Johnny laughed, a little shyly.  "I went off on a cattle drive with Jess when I was just turned eighteen.   It was one of those times early on when he was restless.  Still not sure he was going to stay put.  And the ranch was running cash poor, had a mortgage payment coming so Jess got it in his mind we should sign on to take some horses south and then help bring a herd up from Texas.  Jess isn't that much older than me but he's been on the road since he was fifteen.  He was full of confidence and everywhere we went, women liked him."

        Johnny looked her.  "You know what Jess looks like?"  Sounded like a challenge.

        RJ closed her eyes and pictured Jess as he’d looked at eighteen.  "Dark hair like you.  Not so tall, at least not then.  Lean, wiry, light on his feet like you.  And eye’s so blue a woman has trouble looking away."

        "That’s Jess."  Johnny didn’t seem to know what to make of this, but he continued.  "The drive ended up in Abilene.  That was a ripsnorter of a town then.  Probably still is.   Lucky I never had trouble with the law ‘cause Mr. Troop was the law there I found out since.  We got ourselves cleaned up, bought new clothes and just thought we were God’s gift to women.  At least Jess did.  Truth to tell I was scared spitless.  Jess knew I’d never been with a woman.  He’d been talking up Abilene the whole time we were out on the trail.  You know, what kind of woman he was going to find for me, giving me advice on what to do."

        "We wanted to have something to show for our hard work after we left Abilene so we didn’t go to one of the high class places.  But we didn’t go too far down either.  The place looked real fancy to me.  We went in and ordered whiskey like a couple of seasoned cowhands.  Course Jess was twenty-one then, so I guess he was seasoned.  I was just lucky I managed to get it down without choking.  It was a close call at that."

        "Jess took it on himself to check out the line of women.   He had one all picked out for me.  I was excited, but the excitement sort of felt like fear in the pit of my stomach.  I didn’t think I could handle myself with my stomach all in knots.  The whisky hadn’t helped any either.  So of course I ordered another one.

        I told Jess I wanted to sort of look around first, not rush into anything.  He said he was going to go ahead then.  Maybe by the time I’d got my fill of looking, he’d be ready to go a second time.  He went upstairs with the girl he’d picked for me.  Told me he’d let me know if she was the right one."

        "I took a seat against the wall, trying to be inconspicuous.  I noticed a girl in the line who looked kind of shy.  She was pretty enough, but not so flashy as to be intimidating.  Maybe she caught me looking at her.  Anyway, she came over and asked if I’d like to buy her a drink.  Course, I wasn’t going to say no.  So I ordered two and there I was on my third whiskey, only the third one I’d had in my whole life."

        "She told me how she was new there and kind of scared.  She was trying to earn passage to get back home to Boston.  She looked to be only a couple of years older than me.   I was feeling pretty good talking to her.  Then she said she could get in trouble just sitting there talking, did I want to take her upstairs."

        "I was lucky I could get upstairs, I was sort of dizzy from the whiskey.  I guess she helped me.  When we got up to this little room, she kind of sat me on the bed, leaning against the headboard.  I couldn’t have sat up on my own.  Then she asked me how did I want it."  Johnny chuckled at the memory.

         "What did I know?  I couldn’t remember anything Jess had told me.  I just said, I guess I wanted it the regular way.  I guess I hoped there was a regular way."

        "We didn’t even get our clothes off.  She unbuttoned my pants.  Then she lay down beside me and hiked up her skirts.  She pulled me on top of her and sort of helped me.  It didn’t last long.  I guess with the way I was feeling the whiskey, I was lucky I got anything for my money."

        RJ tried not to laugh and almost succeeded.  "Sounds like it didn’t quite live up to Jess’s build-up."

        "Well, it was pretty awkward."  He paused and then said quickly.  "But it felt good enough I knew I wanted to do it again, without the whiskey the next time."

        RJ didn’t try to hide her laughter this time and Johnny laughed with her.

         "You think that girl ever got back to Boston?"

        "Not on my money.  She seemed so scared about being in that life, I might have given her everything I had to help her.  But the girl Jess was with told him that the scared girl new-in-the-life was just a come-on she used to attract men who liked that kind of thing.  She probably got all kinds of scared kids like me.  She was really twenty-five and been working in Abilene for several years.  Not that she was bad or anything.  She didn’t try to steal from me though I guess if I’d given her all my money out of pity she would have taken it."

        Johnny stopped short, "Look at me.  Now I just told a girl something I've never told anyone.  Didn’t have to tell Jess of course.  He was way ahead of me."  He abruptly changed the subject.  "You know Jess or just the girl he had his first time with?"

        RJ shrugged, though she didn’t know if Johnny could even see it in the dark.  The fire had gone out completely and there was no more fuel.  "Both."  She looked up.  "Johnny, what did Jess tell you about his first time?"

        Johnny didn’t answer.  Then he said, "I don’t think it’s my place to tell you that.  It’s his story."

        RJ appreciated that.  "Fair enough.  But I’m going to tell you mine anyway.  I’m not just gossiping about Jess.  I got a reason.  You’ll see."  She fell silent for a minute, trying to tell it right.

         "If Jess told you about his first time, I’ll bet the girl didn’t come off too good."  She looked at Johnny.  In the dark she couldn’t read anything.

        "There’s another side to that story.  A side Jess doesn’t even know about."

        "And what’s that?"  Johnny’s tone was noncommittal.

        "That girl really loved him.  She had to lie to him and then she had to make sure he’d never try to see her again.  She did it to save his life."

        "How could you know that?"

        "Because I was that girl."

        Johnny contradicted her immediately.  "No way.  We’re talking about a different thing.   Jess was the same age as me when he had his first time.   Well, a little younger because it was his eighteenth birthday.   Mr. Troop told me you’re a younger than me.  When Jess turned eighteen you weren’t but . . . ."

        RJ interrupted his figuring.  "I was only thirteen.  I met him in that place."

        Johnny got his back up immediately.  His voice had a hard edge to it.  "Stop right now.  I’m not going to believe for a minute that Jess is the kind of man who would go to a place like that and do what you said with a child.  I don’t know what you’re after but I don’t want you telling those kinds of lies about Jess."

        Johnny was angry.  He wasn’t going to settle until RJ admitted she was mistaken or lying.   Jess must be quite a friend to him.  RJ put her hand on his arm.  He shook it off.  He started to get up.

        "Johnny, listen to me.  I don’t have anything bad to say about Jess.  I swear."

        "Then how could you be telling me he was in that place?  In that place with you.  He told me his first time was in a whorehouse sure.  But with a girl his own age.  And he’d never go to a place like that.  Never."

        "Johnny, I told you there were things Jess didn’t know.  He had no blame in this.  Just listen and you’ll know why I’m telling you."

        "This place, I told you had a front part that looked like any other whorehouse.  A nice one even.  At thirteen, I was a little older than the children they kept there.  But I had one thing they liked.  I healed up real quick.  There are men who take no pleasure from being with a woman unless they can hurt her.  That’s what they used me for.  Course when I was all bruised and cut up they couldn’t sell me the same way.  A man who pays big money wants to inflict his own suffering.  So when I got beaten up bad enough, which was often, I had to work in the front.  The way they made me up and dressed me, I easily passed for seventeen.  When they worked me in the back they could make me look twelve or younger.  Mostly I served drinks, but if some man wanted me enough to overlook the bruising, he could have me for a price."

        Johnny sucked in his breath, but didn’t say anything.

        "Jess was working on a ranch a couple of hours away over the border in Texas.  When he turned eighteen, some of his friends decided to get him a girl for his birthday.  That place was the fanciest around, so they brought him there.  I was working in front when they all came in.  They were a rowdy bunch but not mean.  Jess seemed full of bravado but I think underneath he really wasn’t any more sure of himself than you were your first time.  His friends didn’t keep it a secret that they were getting a girl for his birthday.  Even then he was a nice looking boy and some of the girls got into a little competition over him although they were playing up to his friends as much as to him."

        "A little while after his bunch arrived, a man I’d seen before came in.  He showed up about once a month.  He was a filthy pig.  He never made any effort to clean himself up.  Everything about him stank.  And he was mean, crude mean.  I’d avoided him before but I was forced to bring him his drink that night.    It made me sick the way he looked at me.  The whole left side of my face was one big bruise with a cut over the cheekbone.  I kept that side of my face to him but it didn’t seem to make a difference.  I expect he figured he could have me at a cut rate."

        RJ felt the shame of that night wash over her.  "Johnny, I was so tired.  I would have done anything to avoid that pig.  I wasn’t thinking that if I avoided him, some other poor girl was going to have to take him on.  I just wanted some place to hide."

        Johnny didn’t say anything, but he reached over and put his hand around hers.

        "And there was Jess."

        "I brought him a beer.  Paid for it from some tips I got for serving.  Said it was for his birthday.  It gave me a chance to talk to him quiet like.  I tried to make my hair cover the left side of my face.  Kept the right side facing him.  I told him my stepfather had beaten me for using the money I earned to buy food for my Ma and four sisters instead of giving it to him for booze and poker.  I told him I could show him everything about pleasing a woman.  A lot of men wouldn’t care about that, but there was something about Jess told me he would.  Since I was bruised up, he could probably have me for twice as long for the same money.  Then I pointed out the man who was going to get me if Jess didn’t.  There’s some men wouldn’t have cared about that either.  Jess did."

        "And he did like I said.  He held out for twice the time even though I know he would have taken me even if the floor man had refused.  I gave the floor man the rest of my tips for even more time.  Got the smallest back room so maybe they’d forget us.  They pretty much did too.  I think we could have had all night if his friends hadn’t come looking for him to ride back after a couple of hours."

        "I kept the room dark so he couldn’t see I was bruised in lots of places other than my face.  He would have been afraid to touch me."

        RJ stopped.  The memories overpowered her momentarily.  She lay her head on Johnny’s shoulder.  He put his arm around her.  "No more.  You don’t need to tell me any more."

        "No, I want to."  She snuggled up close to Johnny, her lips so close to his ear she spoke barely above a whisper.   "Anyway, I thought Jess was just a way to avoid the pig.  But when he came back a few weeks later, I wanted to be with him even though there was no one I was hiding from.  He could only get there about once a month.  He couldn’t have afforded more anyway.  There was no way I could let him have me without paying.  I used whatever tips I could get to buy more time with him.  He never knew that."

        "There was lots he never knew.  I kept up the story about my stepfather beating me and needing the money for my family.  He never knew all the ways I was hurting.  He never knew that when he made love to me in a way that would have pleased most any woman, tender and gentle, it hurt me so bad I could barely hide it from him.  I stood the physical pain because the sweetness of being with a boy who took no pleasure in it."

        "The sixth time he came, he brought me a ring.  A beautiful silver ring.  I think it must have been from his family, but he didn’t say.  Probably afraid I wouldn’t take it if I thought it was too precious.  But it was better than he could have afforded while he was spending so much money coming to see me."

        "He wanted to marry me, to take me away.   He said I could get a job at the ranch as a cook.  We could keep giving money to my mother.  He was so excited, had so many plans it broke my heart.  I knew I couldn’t see him again.  And I knew I had to make sure he never came back.  The men who kept me there would have cut him down without a thought.  And I could see the kind of man he was becoming.  If he’d gotten any hint about what was really going on he would have put his life on the line to get me out of there and he would have been killed.  He was just a kid.  A kid becoming a special man, but still a kid."

        "I wrote him a letter and sent it to him by way of one of his friends.  I tried not to make it too mean, but I had to make sure he didn’t come back.  Told him a rich man had taken an interest in me and was willing to set me up in Tucson as his mistress.  He was going to take my mother and sisters with us.  I warned him not to try to see me because he could spoil everything.   Told him I couldn’t afford to settle for some going nowhere cowhand.   It worked.  I never saw him again."

        Johnny said quietly, "And you kept the ring.  It was almost the only thing he had from his mother."

        RJ took a deep breath.  "Yes, I kept it.  I should have sent it back.  But instead I hid it under a loose floor board under my bed.  I took it out every day before I went to sleep and imagined what it would have been like to have gone off with Jess.  I made up all kinds of fantasies.  Jess bringing a big posse of gunmen to rescue me.   Jess saving the life of some rich man’s son who’d buy me out of there.  Johnny, I can’t tell you how much comfort that ring gave me."

        "When I did get out of there a few months later, I tried to find him to give it back.  But he’d left the ranch after he got my letter. The closest we came was finding that wanted poster a year later.  When we got him cleared on that I figured we were even."

        "You cleared him of that robbery charge?"

        "I suppose it as more Aaron and Joe, but I was part of it.  I guess Uncle Dan didn’t tell you.  Unless Jess said something about me to him, Dan might have figured we wanted to stay anonymous.  We sent the news out to dozens of lawmen in all the states around Texas but we didn’t give details.  I guess Jess would only have known that the Rangers had caught the right men."

        "Johnny, I had a reason for telling you that story.  I didn't know if I actually should see Jess.  I’d hoped mainly to find out where he was so I could send him the ring.  Maybe seeing me would just stir up bad memories.  But maybe him thinking I betrayed him might have affected other things about his life.  Maybe the way he thinks about women.  Tell me Johnny, would it be good for Jess to hear what I just told you?"

        Johnny didn’t hesitate.  "It would.  He likes women and they like him, but he’s got a mistrust down deep that won’t let him get close.   We go into Cheyenne together pretty regular and he's always warning me not to get attached to any of the women at the Palace.  Finding out you didn’t betray him would have to help."

        "But I did use him in a way.  And finding out I was only thirteen, wouldn’t the guilt cause him pain?  Not that he earned any guilt, but he’s bound to have some.  He was that kind of boy.  From the deep feelings you have for him, I reckon he’s that kind of man."

        Johnny nodded.  "He is.  But if he can see you didn’t suffer for anything he did, that you were better for having been with him.  Maybe you don’t need to tell him how much physical pain being with him cost you."

        "Yeah, that part needn’t be told."

        RJ stood up.  "I’m going to check the horses, take a piss, switch the canteens and think about getting some sleep."   She figured Johnny might want to water a rock himself.

        When she returned to the campsite, Johnny was lying on his right side with two blankets over him.  He’d left room for her beside him, but was facing away.  She kicked off her boots and placed her rolled belt in one of them.  She got under the blankets and snuggled up to him.  She put her left arm around him, putting her hand under his coat.  He covered her hand with his.  "Cold?" was all he said.

        "Just not ready for sleep yet."

        "Mr. Troop says you don’t sleep much.  But if you were up when those men came barreling by the relay station, then you didn’t sleep at all last night.  I at least got to bed at ten thirty and slept til you waked me.  But I still could use a full night’s sleep tonight."

        "Meaning maybe you’d like to get back to it?"

        "You got something else in mind?"

        "If you don’t know what I’ve got in mind, you don’t take hint very well."  She accompanied those words by nuzzling the back of his neck.

        "RJ,  I guess I should be flattered seeing as how you’re choosing me over those two dead men we left under the rocks back there.  But I heard you tell Bret I’m not your type.  I don’t want to take advantage of some momentary weakness when there’s no one more suitable around."

        "Johnny McKay.  What the hell are you talking about?  I never told Bret any such thing."

        "I didn’t mean to be eavesdropping.   I was just coming out to ask about the game.  Just before you went off to Bret’s room that night he was here, I heard you tell him I wasn’t for you."

        "Ah, well I guess I did say that."  She hastily added, "but I didn’t mean what you think."

        "Right."

        "I just meant that my life was tangled with yours in ways that would make it unwise for me to follow up on any predilections I might have in your direction."

        "What the hell does all that mean?"  Johnny sounded almost amused in spite of himself.

        "Predilections?"

        "No, that tangled up crap."

        "Well, first Uncle Dan doesn’t think much of me messing with you.  Thinks I’ll break your heart or something."

        "I suppose you could.  But I’d be on guard against that."

        "Second, Jess is your best friend.  From what you say he’s still pretty bitter toward me.  You have your loyalties."

        "That’s easily straightened out.  Just tell him the truth.  If he won’t listen to you, I’ll make him listen.  And he’ll have to listen to the Marshal tell him how you got him off the hook for that robbery.  Is that all?"

        "There’s one more thing, but I’d rather save that until after I seduce you.  Just let it be said, it doesn’t seem so important now.  I promise, the way I feel this won’t take so long you can’t get a good night’s sleep."

        She kissed the back of his neck and stroked his chest until he turned around to face her.  She initiated a kiss, but he needed no additional encouragement.  The kiss became feverish as she unbuttoned his shirt and drew his hand to the buttons on hers.  He followed her lead, always no more than a heartbeat behind but never taking the initiative.  It was too cold to take their coats off, but it felt good to press her naked breasts against his  chest.  She'd thought he might be a little on the skinny side since she'd never seen him when he wasn't dressed against the cold.  But his chest was well-developed, smooth and leanly muscled.

        Fast enough her hands went to the buttons of his pants.  She undid them and then her own.   She talked even as she continued to kiss his face and neck.  "Johnny you’re going to have to get out of these by yourself.  And you’d better do it fast."

        They both sat up and skinned off their pants under the blankets.  When they lay down again, he started to roll on top of her.  She made just the slightest resistance and then rolled on top of him.  She whispered in his ear, "Let me show you how nice it can be this way."

        He made no objection.

        She hoped he was as ready as she was; she wasn’t waiting.   She rubbed herself against him just to test.  Just as she figured he was hard enough, he put his hand to her shoulder to stop her.  "You keep doing that I can’t be trusted to wait til I get inside, assuming that’s what you want."

        She slide him inside her and moved slow just to get the feel of him.  And let him get the feel of her.  His breath was coming fast and he seemed unable to speak again.  She couldn’t hold back.  She supported herself with her hands on his biceps and rode him hard and fast.  No finesse, no sweet teasing, no stopping to make it last longer.  She came in a burst of pleasure so intense she collapsed on top of him.   But she kept moving on him until  he joined her just a few strokes later.   He put his head back, closed his eyes and just whispered "Damn".

        RJ stroked his face ever so lightly.  "I guess I should apologize."

        That snapped his eyes open.  "Yeah, you should.  You took terrible advantage of me."

        She punched him lightly on the shoulder.

        "I mean it.  I really wanted to make this first time so sweet for you and I ended up rushing through it like a whore in a hurry to get to her next customer.  But Johnny, I couldn’t help it.  I wanted you so bad.  I promise we’ll do it again and I’ll make it last so long you’ll beg me to let you come."

        Johnny held her face between his hands and kissed her lightly on the nose.  "Nothing a man likes better than having to beg."

        She collapsed in laughter at this.  She slid off to his side and propped her head up on her hand.  Under the blankets, her left hand traced the wiry muscles under the smooth skin of his chest and continued down his flat belly.  She was going to want him again real soon, she thought.

        Johnny turned until he was facing her, his head propped up on his left hand.  "I’m afraid it might be a few days before you get to test out your powers to make me beg."

        RJ stroked his face lightly with the fingers of her right hand, then pulled him to her for a long, slow and intimate kiss.  When they parted for a moment, she said very softly, her face only inches from his, "Now what are you talking about, making me wait?"

        "We could be out a few more days chasing down the rest of the gang and looking for the rest of the money.  And then we have to get back to Laramie.  You can’t think I’m going to share a blanket with you with the Marshal and everyone else around."   He added emphatically, "Especially when you’re going to go back to being a boy."

        She kissed him again.  "I wasn’t of thinking of waiting past maybe the next fifteen minutes.  You don’t think I’ll turn into a boy by then do you?"

         Now he became shy and hesitant.  "RJ, I’ve never done it twice in one night.  Maybe I can’t."

        "What are you 22 or 82?  Are you trying to insult me?  You got some health problem I don’t know about?"  She tried to sound gravely affronted.  "Of course, when you’re paying for it you’re not going to do it twice in one night."

        "Jess does sometimes, especially when he hasn’t had it in a while.  I just never wanted to that bad.  So I don’t know if I can."  He was starting to sound uncertain.

        "Johnny, if we didn’t have to get some sleep so we can get out before first light, we’d be doing it half a dozen times tonight.  And you wouldn’t be struggling to get it up either.  Just relax."

        She didn’t give him any chance to protest.   She took his right hand, gently kissed his palm and placed it on her left breast.  He needed no more encouragement.  He lightly ran his fingers over her nipple.   When it got hard, she thought he was pleased at this reaction which he might not have expected but seemed to take as a positive sign.  He cupped the breast in his hand and gently ran his tongue over the tight nipple.  When it got even harder, he sucked on it gently as though it was a precious, fragile thing.  He pushed her unbuttoned shirt and jacket aside and worked on her right breast.  She encouraged him by stroking his hair and kissing the top of his head.

        He moved to place feather light kisses down her rib cage and belly while he massaged her breasts gently.  At that point her groin was on fire and she silently willed him to move lower.  It would have been so sweet to have his tongue there.   But he didn’t have the experience for that yet.  Instead he worked his way up to her neck and shoulders, keeping his right hand at her breasts, touching them ever so gently.  When he put his lips to hers, she pulled him tightly to her.

        At that point he dropped his sweet restraint and they kissed savagely.  His hand at her breast was not exactly rough, but more forceful, squeezing and massaging.  Soon she felt him getting hard again; he needn’t have worried. She ran her fingers through his hair then pushed his face apart from hers.  She whispered hoarsely, "Johnny, Johnny I’m sorry.  I wanted to make this last for a long time.  But I just can’t wait.  Please, I need you inside me."

        He started to roll off her, but she stopped him, keeping him on top.  "It’s nice this way too," she said.

        She used her hand to guide him inside her.  Once he was there, she wrapped her legs around him.  She watched his beautiful face, barely visible in the starlight, as he concentrated intently on keeping up a slow, steady rhythm. Each time he moved away from her, she tightened her muscles around him as though to keep him inside.  The pleasure was intense each time he moved against her but she became maddened at the slowness.  "Please, faster," she begged.

        In response, his movements became even more deliberate.  "You said you wanted to show me how to make it last longer."  He sounded pleased with himself.

        "We’ll make it last longer the third or fourth time," she bargained.  He just chuckled.  RJ put her hands inside his shirt and coat, running her hands down his sleek bare back.  She unwrapped her legs and moved her hands to his buttocks.  As he thrust himself inside her, she tried to force him to go faster.  He resisted her.  As she pushed against him, his thrusts became harder and deeper, but she couldn’t make him go faster.  She arched her hips against him, but he just compensated for her movement.  She dug her fingernails in but he ignored the pain and even in her lust she wasn’t really going to hurt him.

        His control made her exquisitely frantic.  Each thrust brought both an elusive pleasure and an intense frustration as that final peak eluded her.  Finally, he either relented or could hold back no longer.  His thrusts came so fast she almost cried out at the swiftness with which her pleasure overtook her.   A moment later he made a final thrust and collapsed on top of her.  But even in that moment of intensity, he deflected his weight onto his forearms as though protecting her from being crushed.

        They were both breathing fast.  They didn’t try to speak at first.  She ran her thumb across his cheekbone, around his ear, across his jaw as though attempting to see his face with her hand.  She could feel his smile better than she could see it in the dark.

        "You’re pretty smug aren’t you pretty boy?"  she teased.

        He didn’t respond.  He rolled off to the side and gathered her up in his arms.  He kissed her sweetly on the cheek.  With his head resting on his curved arm and his other arm resting protectively over her torso, he whispered with what she was sure was feigned sleepiness, "We need to get some sleep now.  You can make me beg some other time."

        She rolled over, putting her back to him but keeping his arm around her.  She put her hand over his and hugged it to her breast, tucking it under her coat.  He pulled her closer, kissed the back of her neck and seemed to be ready to sleep.  But then he had a question.

        "You always go that fast or did you mean it when you said you liked to go slow?"

        "Well, Johnny, it’s like eating.  Don’t you sometimes have a hunger so intense and overwhelming that even if there’s a nice table set with good china and silver flatware, all you want to do is take the nice Sunday roast chicken, rip it apart barehanded and stuff pieces in your mouth as fast as you can?"

        Johnny laughed softly at the image.  "Maybe, but my mother would have skinned me so I never did it.  And by the way, your example is just a little scary speaking as the Sunday chicken."

        "I can’t explain it any better.  I guess with what happened today and being with a man like you, I just got a big hunger."

        "Killing makes you hungry for a man?"

        "Not the killing Johnny, the not being killed.  And the not getting you killed."  Then she realized where he might be leading.  "Johnny those desires don’t come up unless I’m with the right man.  I wouldn’t have had those feelings with anyone else on the posse or anyone else in town for that matter.  If I’d been with someone else . . . . "  Then one more thought came to her.

        "Johnny?"

         "Um" he muttered.

        "I don’t need a lot of sleep.  That’s just the way I am.  My father was the same way.  So if I get up in the dark and start getting the horses ready, you just keep sleeping if you can.  We’ll both be better off if you get as much sleep as you can.  Promise?"

        Johnny squeezed her gently.  "Are you going to bring me breakfast in bed too?"

        "If you like beef jerky and oatmeal cookies for breakfast."

        It was still too dark to read his face, but his tone when he said, "Sorry" and walked off gave her a pang of regret.  She wanted to make sure he wasn’t distracted by what had happened last night but had probably accomplished nothing more than giving him something less pleasant to be distracted by.  And if he was anything like Chad, what they’d done would just make him sharper anyway.

        He mounted and started off at a walk without another word.  RJ mounted quickly and caught up to him.  Drawing up close, she reached out and touched his knee.  "I guess I’m pretty full of myself worrying that you might get distracted thinking about last night and get yourself hurt or something.  I have no reason to believe you won’t put everything into the job at hand.  I’m sorry."

        His voice had a relieved lilt to it as he responded.  "I’ll have to remember next time I kiss a girl and she reacts like I’ve dropped a spider down her shirt, she’s just trying not to distract me."

        His tone changed a little.  "My best guess is we’ll get out there to find the Marshal has everyone else rounded up and headed back to Laramie.  But there’s a chance we might end up in the middle of a shooting war.  And if we do you’re going to expect me to treat you like anyone else in the posse aren’t you?"

        "You managed that yesterday.  Pretty much anyway.  Is it going to be a problem today?"

        "I don’t think so.  But I’m going to do one thing before we head out.  I’m going to kiss you and you’re going to let me."  He spoke with a bravado she found amusing.  And endearing.

        He leaned toward her, put his hand behind her head and drew her toward him.   His lips on hers were firm and only slightly parted.  The kiss was long and intimate not feverish but with a touch of  passion delayed.  As he broke the contact, he traced his finger over one of her cheekbones with his thumb and said softly. "Now let’s get it done."

        They rode their own horses over the worst of the trail just out of trust in them.  As soon as they were beyond it, they switched to the other two.  Instead of ponying their own horses, they left Devil and Boudine for Briar to herd if needed, although the horses didn’t seem inclined to wander off anyway.  On the way out of the canyon, they picked up the other two horses they’d left grazing by a little stream near the entrance.  They headed northeast in an attempt to intersect the trail the posse had taken.  They pushed as hard as they could given the footing.

        About an hour into it, RJ noticed Bandit in the distance veer west as though checking something out.   He didn’t follow through but then he didn’t have any orders to track anything.  It was worth checking out.  When they got to where Bandit had veered off, RJ stopped and dismounted.

        Johnny stopped his horse.    "That little scoundrel find something he’s not telling us about?"

        RJ found some tracks.  It took her a while in the rocky ground but she finally figured it out.  She walked back to where Johnny was watering the horses out of the canvas bag.  "Anything?" was all he said.

        "Looks like three horses went that way.  No more."

        "What do you make of that?  Maybe two tracking another one of the robbers like we did?"

        RJ looked thoughtful.  "I can’t be sure, but it looks like one of the sets belongs to that big old horse of Bob Carson’s.  The one that looks like it should have used to pull a plow or a draft wagon instead of carting his fat carcass around.  Maybe Uncle Dan sent them out after another one who peeled off.  Now I guess the question is, do we follow after them in case they got themselves in trouble like we could have or do we try to hook up with the rest of the posse?"

        Johnny didn’t take too long to decide they should continue after the Marshal.   RJ figured the decision might have been based more on loyalty than strategy, but it’s the same decision she would have made.

        They switched the saddles on the two horses they’d been riding to the two other remounts and continued to ride hard until they intersected the main trail.  They picked up the tracks of the four left in the posse following the three left in the robbers’ band.

        When the two horses they were riding were about spent, they stopped and unsaddled them.  They decided to leave all four loose and just continue on Devil and Boudine.  No point signaling their arrival with the dust of six horses.

        An hour later they stopped to rest and water the horses for a few minutes.  They tried to figure how many men they’d be up against.  "We’ve already accounted for eight.  Assuming there was a least one extra man to meet up with the man the Carsons went after, that’s nine, maybe ten." RJ wondered aloud how far they were willing to split up $10,000.

        "Unless there was some other motive in addition to the money" Johnny mused.

        "The only person they could have known would be in the posse for sure was Uncle Dan.  Even you weren’t for sure.  If he’d gotten enough good men for the posse, he’d probably have preferred to leave some law in town."

        "He’s got lots of enemies for sure.  But I don’t suppose it’ll help us to be making random guesses."

        An hour ahead they heard the sounds of shots being exchanged.  They pulled up.   She looked at Johnny.  "You ever follow this trail?  Any idea what’s up ahead?"

        "I’ve only been this way once.    If I remember right, there’s a ridge up ahead that would make a good spot for an ambush on anyone riding below.  Of course if the three they were chasing had ridden up there, the posse could have picked up their tracks.  But if they had some other men take positions there riding in from another direction . .  But since we don’t care about leaving tracks, we could skirt the ridge and get behind whoever was up there."

        RJ followed his thought.  "I guess if the posse is on the ridge, all’s we’d be doing is adding a couple more guns.  But if the posse is down below, which seems more likely, we could be a big help picking off gunmen off the ridge."

        He took off without a word.  RJ followed.  When they got it in sight, they veered toward the ridge.  They checked it out with binoculars but couldn’t get a good look.  There were no tracks that they could find, suggesting that whoever was up there had come in from another direction.  They rode to the backside of the ridge, hoping there’d be a way up.

        There was, but it wouldn’t be easy.  They took out boxes of shells and  made sure their gunbelts were full.  They put rifle ammo in their coat pockets.  RJ had three throwing knives in scabbards in the back of her belt.  When she took the rifle scabbard off her saddle and put her arms thru the straps, she could see Johnny admiring her little pack which would keep her hands free for climbing.

        "Don’t suppose you have another one of those?"  he asked.   She shrugged her regret.  They both took some last swallows of water and started up, leaving Briar with the horses.  Bandit took his own path ahead.  The gun fire got louder as they went up.  They didn’t dare show themselves on the top of the ridge because the posse might shoot them by mistake.  They’d have to send one of the enemy tumbling off the ridge before the posse would know someone their side was on the ridge.

        They crept along just below the ridgeline.  The footing was bad and they had a couple of close calls.  When Bandit came back to report, he almost sent Johnny tumbling.  They could hear the man Bandit had spotted.  When they finally got him in sight, RJ put out a hand to stop Johnny as he sighted his rifle.  She pulled out a knife and gestured toward the man.  Johnny nodded.  She guessed he could see the sense of not announcing their presence any sooner than they had to.

        The knife hit square between his shoulder blades and he tumbled into a deep crevice without a sound.   Unfortunately, there was no way the posse could have seen him go down and no way they could retrieve the body to send it down in view.

        The gunfire was much heavier from the ridge than it was from below.  They must be conserving their ammunition which probably meant they were running low.

        Johnny took the lead as they proceeded and RJ wasn’t going to do anything to make him think she was trying to take over.  The next time Bandit reported, there was a man with a rifle high above them, flat on the highest boulder around.  Johnny looked at her and made a throwing gesture.  She shook her head.  She couldn’t get a good angle from there.  She would only have made him scream at best.  Johnny timed his shot with one the shooter was trying to make.  The shot took him out but didn’t send him tumbling.

        RJ had an idea.  She untied the yellow bandana she had around her neck and gestured for Johnny to give her the red one he carried in his pocket.  She tied them together, then tied them to the end of her rifle barrel.   They edged up to where the man’s body was resting in his blood on the boulder.  As Johnny sent the body tumbling down toward the bottom of the ridge, she waved the rifle in the air, hoping Uncle Dan could see it and that he would remember what color bandanas they carried.

        It didn’t seem that the other gunmen on the ridge had missed their two comrades yet.  Or at least they hadn’t figured out that they’d been taken out from their own side of the battlefield.

        From the sound of the gunfire, there were at least five more men shooting from the ridge.  Damn, RJ thought, either the boss was paying the gunmen cowhand’s wages or they figured that half might be dead before the money got split.

        Before they moved on RJ tied the yellow bandana around her hat and tied the red one to Johnny’s.

        They took out the next two gunmen without incident.  RJ never even drew a gun, using her knife on the first while Johnny took the second with his rifle.  However, at that point the remaining three, or at least a couple of them, must have realized they had unwelcome company on their side of the battleline.  Bullets started coming their way.  A ricochet off a boulder sent a granite chip into Johnny’s temple.  It was just a surface wound but it bled profusely.  RJ used her bandana to bind it up as they hunkered down to decide how to approach the last three.  Part of the problem was taken care of when the closest man screamed out and tumbled off his perch.  Apparently he’d been careless trying to get a shot at them and exposed himself to gunfire down below.

        RJ gestured that they should split up.  One going lower behind the men and trying to come up on the other side of the one furthest away with the other laying down fire from the position of the man who had just been shot down.  Since RJ hadn’t fired, they couldn’t know there were two of them.  She could see Johnny trying to figure which position was the safest so he could put her there.

        She made the decision for him.  "I’m better outfitted for climbing.  And you’re the lawman.  It’s your job to stay here and get fired on."  She handed him most of her extra her rifle cartridges.  "I’m not going to fire until I’m in a position to take him out.  You’re the one keeping up the barrage."

        As Johnny laid down a heavy line of fire, RJ slipped way down below the ridgeline.  She then paralleled the ridge until the sound of the gunfire told her she was beyond the last shooter.   She worked her way up until she was close behind him.  He was firing down toward the posse while it sounded like the other was concentrating on Johnny.  She pulled out her last knife and got him in the side of the neck as he raised up to fire at a target below.

        She kept low as the men below fired at the spot where the shooter had raised up.   She crept up and checked him.  The knife had severed his jugular.  As she pulled it out and wiped it clean on the man’s shirt, she hoped he was the one who had bashed in the skull of that poor helpless woman in the bank.

        She heard no more fire from where she had left Johnny, no fire from either direction.   She crept up to the position she figured the man had been.  He’d taken two bullets.  One in the chest and one in the side.  She guessed one was Johnny’s and one was from a shooter below.  She called out to Johnny but got no response.  She felt a little bubble of panic rise in her throat and yelled louder.  The bubble burst when she heard him answer.  She heard no more fire from below but wasn’t taking any chances.  If they saw a target one of them was likely to take it.

        She shouted, "Johnny, lets go down the backside until the men below know for sure they don’t have any enemy targets."  But even as she finished shouting, she heard a noise just below her.  Bandit ran toward it with such excitement, she knew it was Johnny.  She started down to intercept him.

        She spotted him resting against a boulder.  She touched the bandana where it covered his temple and he flinched a little.   "We’d better get that washed out.  I have some bandages in my saddlebags."

        He protested.  "It’s nothing.  Let’s see if we can find where they left their horses.  Maybe the rest of the money is there."

        "You don’t want to leave any glory for poor Uncle Dan do you?  My bet is the horses are at the far end of the ridge.  I got pretty low when I came around and Bandit gave me no indication of anything further below.   Anyway, I need to get back to the body of the first man we took out.  He’s got my knife.  And I might need your help out of that crevice."

        "I’ll buy you another knife.  You don’t need to go risking your life going after that one."

        RJ leaned over and kissed him lightly on the mouth.  "Joe gave me that knife.  I’m not leaving it.  You going to help me or at least stand by so you can get a rope if I can’t get out?"

        Johnny shrugged resignedly.  "Does anyone ever tell you no?"

        "Sure, I just don’t usually listen."

        She actually got the knife without incident.   After Johnny gave her a hand out, they started down the loose shale to their horses.  About two thirds of the way down, Bandit ran too fast and lost his balance.  He bumped Johnny who lost his balance and slid into RJ.  Together they slid down about thirty more feet.  When they finally came to a halt, they were filthy but unhurt.  In fact, the slide left them overcome with laughter and wrapped in each other arms.   Both dogs were bouncing around them barking.    Johnny pulled her to him for a kiss but as they rolled over they heard a horse whinny. Dan was standing there holding their horses, watching with what RJ thought might be the barest hint of amusement in his eyes.

        Johnny scrambled to his feet and gave her a hand up.  He forgot to let go of her hand as they stood there.  Dan looked back and forth between them.  Finally he just said, "That was you took care of our little problem up there?"

        RJ nodded as Johnny answered, "Yessir."

        Dan nodded, "Good work."  Then noticing that the bandana on Johnny’s head was stained.  "You hurt boy?"

        "Just a little chip from a ricochet.  Nothing to worry about."

        RJ added, "I was just going to wash it out.  Is everyone alright on your side Uncle Dan?"

        "Waterston took a bullet in his outer thigh, in and out.  He’ll be uncomfortable riding but he’ll live.  He’s a tough old coot.  Murphy was grazed by a bullet that went through his hair.  He panicked, fell about ten feet and busted his arm.  Allistair is putting him in a sling.  He’ll be alright.  Might slow us down though.  He’s a real complainer.  You find the man you went after?"

        "Him and three others," Johnny answered as matter of factly as possible.

        RJ chimed in.  "We recovered half the money.  Couldn’t find the other half but we didn’t spend too much time looking.  Thought there’d be time for that later."

        Johnny finished, "We figure we’d better get back to where the Carsons trailed off that second man.  They might have run into what we did.  Or they might have run into the second half of the money and taken off with it."

        Dan looked surprised.  "How did the you know it was the Carsons we sent after the next man?"

        Johnny indicated RJ with his thumb.  "Either your friend Joe is a great teacher or she’s a great student."

        "I guess so.  You OK to ride boy?"

        Johnny waved him off.   RJ got her canteen and used his bandana to wash off the cut again.  She put a clean bandage around his head as he talked things over with the marshal.

        "Mr. Troop, if Waterston and Murphy are going to slow us up, I think we ought to let them come at their own pace.  We need to get back to where we picked up the Carson’s trail.  Those gold coins were weighing us down so we hid them there.   Maybe you can send Granger to round up the horses that the five up there must have stashed someplace.  Could be the money is on one of the horses."

        RJ broached the question that was on her mind.  "Uncle Dan, do you think that $10,000 was the real motive for that robbery?"

        "$10,000’s a powerful motive."

        "But divided thirteen or more ways?  We ran into four men.  The Carsons followed one and I’ll bet they ran into two to four.  There were seven firing on you."

    "There’s an eighth and ninth hit the ground down below before you arrived."  Dan saw where she was going and didn’t like it.  "Seems as though someone wanted to get us out of town or kill me or both.  Or maybe the one who took the money never intended to share it.  If that’s the case, the rest of it should be somewhere on his trail.  Could you tell which one you followed in?"

        Johnny looked at RJ.  "She can.  Best I could have told you is he was riding a horse.  She could tell which one."

        "What did he look like, the one carrying the money?"  Dan looked at her with total faith that she could tell him.

        "About five foot eight, brown hair streaked with gray at the temples, clean shaven, long thin scar down the side of his neck and another shorter one on the back of his hand.  Carried a gun in his boot."

        "Bart Westphal."  Dan sounded sure.  "No question he’d like to have killed me, but I’ll bet he was financing a bigger plan with the money from this one.  Probably paid gunman’s wages to everyone except the four he took with him and never told the rest about the bank.  Maybe he was going to give the other four a split, maybe not.  Not an even split for sure.  It’s likely his plan died with him."

        Dan sent Granger and Allistair after the other horses with instructions for Granger to look around for the money and for Allistair to come right back with the horses.   RJ was pleased when Dan made it clear that she and Johnny would be riding back with him to where the Carsons had split off while the rest of them took it slow.  Of course, having her stay with him and Johnny could just mean he wanted to keep an eye on her personally.

        They rested in the shade until Allistair returned with the horses.  They picked the best three and rode off with their own horses trailing behind, intending to switch off as Johnny and RJ had on the way in.

        They heard no sound of gunfire as they trailed the Carsons and their quarry into a second box canyon.  They picked up two more sets of tracks at the mouth of the canyon, but none going out.  They found the Carsons’ horses loose about a mile in.  Bandit found the Carsons.  Bob was dead.  Bill was unconscious with a bullet in his shoulder and a bump on the head where he'd fallen.  Dan left RJ to patch Bill up for the ride back while he and Johnny went to look for the other two men.  When she started to say something Dan took as a protest, he looked at her with his steely gaze.  "Rose, this time you will do as I say."

        RJ smiled,  "I was only going to say that you should take Bandit with you.  He works good for Johnny there.  If he doesn’t find the men, maybe he’ll find the money."

        She had Bill bandaged up in a few minutes.  He regained consciousness which was a good sign but not a pleasant circumstance for her.  She couldn’t abide the man.  She knew from Johnny that he was a braggart, a lout and physically abusive to his wife.  But he had just lost his brother so she was as pleasant as she could be.  She gave him water and just had him rest.

        About half an hour into her wait, she heard gunfire on the other side of the canyon.  She wondered if she should ride after them.  She couldn’t rest easy until she saw them heading back.  They had two extra horses with them, one carrying a body, the other a prisoner.

        It was getting dark by this time.  They decided to stay put.  Bill could make it through the night better than he could take a ride in the dark and risk a horse stumbling.

        This night wasn’t near as pleasant as the night before.   She reluctantly tended Bill while Dan kept his prisoner safe.  There was more firewood here than there had been at their prior camp so there was a fire but that didn’t make up for the cold feeling of sleeping alone when there was a more pleasant alternative so close by.  Being with Dan made Johnny very self conscious around her.  He would no more flirt with her in front of Dan than slap her.  He wouldn’t even walk out of camp with her on the excuse of getting more wood.  He made his bed on the side of the fire near the prisoner, away from Dan and her.

        The next morning, Johnny and RJ got Bill on his horse and with Dan’s help Bob’s weighty body across his.  They buried the dead robber under a pile of rocks rather than cart a second body all the way back to Laramie.  The prisoner didn’t cause them any trouble.  Maybe knowing all his friends were dead had a sobering effect.

        RJ suggested that they intercept the trail Westphal had come in on and follow it out on the hope he’d left more of the money there.  It would have been getting heavy.  The prisoner claimed Westphal carried it all and Bandit hadn’t located any near where Dan and Johnny had captured him.  Dan was concerned about Bill.  He wanted to take the most direct route back to get him to a doctor.

        RJ looked at Dan without making any further suggestions.  Dan looked like he was weighing the options.   Finally he said, "OK you two.  You found the first saddlebag.  You think the two of you and that dog might find the second?"

        RJ let Johnny answer.  "Can you handle Bill and the prisoner Mr. Troop?"

       Dan smiled, "I reckon if RJ can leave that fool herding dog with me, I can manage to keep everything in line."

        Johnny and RJ rode off like kids going to a picnic.  When they got out of earshot, RJ asked, "You always going to let Uncle Dan make you feel like the father of a girl you’ve been secretly despoiling."

        "Was I that obvious."

        "Oh, it was hardly noticeable" RJ responded with a smirk.

        They backtracked Westphal letting Bandit search loud.  They were halfway back to the main trail when Bandit set up a ruckus.  Sure enough, a second saddlebag was hidden in some rocks much as the first one had been.  She tossed Bandit a big piece of jerky and fussed over him while Johnny counted the money.

        Three days and two nights out on the trail had worn everyone out, especially the horses.  RJ grabbed Devil and Boudine and told Johnny she’d take care of them so he could help Dan with the paperwork.  Then she leaned over and whispered, "I’m going to heat up enough water for two baths or maybe one big one.  We’ll have supper with Uncle Dan and Lily later and I’ll talk him into giving you tomorrow off."

        Johnny looked at her curiously.  "We got plans for tomorrow?"

        "No, we got plans for tonight that are going to make you completely useless tomorrow."

        She turned before Johnny really understood what she meant.  Then she heard him say, "Oh" as comprehension dawned.  She led their horses back to the barn without looking back.
 
 

        Johnny took the steps to the front door two at a time.  As he closed the door behind him, he called out for RJ.  She answered him from the back room where Aaron had built the damn’dest fancy room for bathing he’d ever seen.  Since the friend of Aarons who had lived in the house had gone to England and Johnny had moved in, he'd felt decadent every time he used it.  The Marshal even used it instead of the public bath house.  Drains on the floor, two big copper lined tubs, a big wood stove with kettles for heating water and a fireplace besides.  When he got to the door, he knocked.

        "Come on in Johnny.  Don’t want to let the water get cold."

        He opened the door and caught his breath at the sight of RJ standing stark naked in front of the fire.  She was squeezing water from a big sponge over her head.  The water ran down her body and into a drain near the fireplace.  She turned toward him with no modesty at all.  He felt he should look away but he couldn’t.  They’d made love twice, but he’d never seen her body.  The room was lit with a few candles on the mantle and her body glistened in the dim light.  Johnny loved the look of her.  She wasn’t the ideal woman by most standards he guessed, but he wouldn’t have changed a thing.  Her legs were long and slender, her hips as slim as a young boy’s, her stomach flat and her breasts like firm apples with those lovely nipples he’d had in his mouth only two nights ago.  He drew in a long breath.

        She pointed to a small tub of water in the back corner.  "Toss your clothes in there.  Angela will wash them later.  I hope you don’t mind I got out some clean ones for you from the stuff she washed this week.

        Johnny took off his gunbelt and hung it on a hook by the door.  He pulled off his boots and put them on the bench under the hooks.  He unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it in the laundry tub along with his socks.  It was at that point he slowed down.  He pulled off his belt and tossed it next to his boots and then hesitantly started unbuttoning his pants.  He couldn’t exactly ask her to turn around since she’d greeted him with no shyness at all.  And if he turned around . . .  well he’d have to face her eventually.

        He looked over at her.  She was watching him with her hands on her hips and a curious smile on her face.   Then she walked over, grabbed him by the waistband of his pants, and pulled him over to the fire.  She had the buttons to his pants and his long johns undone in a flash.

        "You gonna take them off or am I?"

        He turned and pulled both garments off and tossed them in the tub.  Before he could fully turn back to her, she dumped a whole bucket of warm water over his head.  She soaped up his hair good and rinsed it with more warm water.  She seemed to have buckets, pans and kettles of water all over.

        "Close your eyes" she warned him as she dumped another pan of water over his head.  It had a pungent smell.  "Vinegar and warm water.  My mother always said it was good to get the soap out of the hair."

        Then she started on him with a soapy sponge.   She scrubbed him all over.  He just stood there, entranced.  When she grabbed another bucket to rinse him off, he glanced over at the big copper tub that had steam rising from it.

        "What’d you fill that for?"

        "Oh that’s for relaxing in once we’re clean.  Aaron says the Japanese do it that way.  They don’t like to soak in the same water they wash in.  It’ll be cool enough to step in by the time we finish here.

        She poured that final bucket over him, then stood back to look at him.  Johnny had a nervous stomach.  He felt anticipation but also anxiety.  What did she expect of him?

        As it turned out, not much, at least not yet.  She started kissing his wet skin, his shoulders and his chest, licking some of the water as it ran down his body.  Then she was on her knees before him kissing his belly as she ran her hands down the back of his legs.  He was already hard when she put him in her mouth.  She pulled him into her with her hands firmly on his thigh just below his buttocks.  She moved on him slowly, so tantalizingly slowly.

        He couldn’t move, couldn’t talk.  He started to stroke her hair but ended up just holding onto two big handfuls of it tightly in either hand.  She moved her mouth back and forth on him.  Nothing had ever felt this incredible.  It went on for so long, but for no time at all.  Too slow but over too soon.  After a few endless minutes, she put one hand on his balls and squeezed gently.  Before he could warn her, he was going to come, he had.  His knees almost buckled.  He started to apologize for coming in her mouth but she put a hand over his lips.

        "That’s a good instinct Johnny.  Trying to give warning. Some women don’t want it in their mouth, but I don’t care.   She took a glass of wine off a little table by the tub and took a sip.  "I don’t really need this, but maybe you’d be squeamish  about kissing me after.  So now I’ll taste like wine."

        She offered him the glass and he took a swallow.  When he handed her back the glass, she put it back on the table and took his hand.  "I think the tub’s about ready."

        She indicated for him to get in first.  It took a second to get used to the heat, but then it felt fine on his sore muscles as he leaned against the back of the tub that seemed to be slanted just for relaxing.  She stepped in, and sat in front of him, leaning back, resting her head against his shoulder.  There was some kind of rose scent coming from the water.  With his arms around her, he could have fallen asleep in that tub and been the happiest man in the world.  But apparently she had other ideas.

        She let him relax for a few minutes.  Then she reached her arm around his head and tilted her face up for a kiss.  It was a languid kiss.  He was too tired to get stirred up again so fast.  She took his right hand in hers, kissing each finger, then the palm.  Then she drew his hand down and put it between her legs.  With her hand stretched out on top of his, she guided him down to just the right spot.

        "This little nub right here Johnny, it’s got every bit of feeling you’ve got in that big cock of yours.  Now you just stroke it ever so gently.  To start anyways."

        He tried to follow her instructions.  At first she just leaned against him and spoke little words of encouragement and pleasure.  After a few minutes, she started moving against his hand.  After a few more minutes she was urging him to go faster and bucking in time to his stroking.  She made a final thrust, sighed loudly and put her hand over his to stop him.

        She rested against him for a few minutes.  He thought she might be asleep.  Then she reached out and picked up a kettle.  She poured some more hot water into the tub, then lay back against him, closing her eyes.  He did the same.  His last thought as he drifted off was that for the first time in his life Chad and Jess would have envied him.

        He woke up when RJ went over to the stove and got a fresh kettle of hot water.  She poured it in the tub where the water had been getting tepid.  Then she got back in, facing him this time with her legs wrapped around him.  "Get enough sleep Johnny?"

        "Give me 24 hours, then maybe I’ll have had enough."

        "Aren’t we supposed to meet Uncle Dan and Lily for supper?"

        Johnny, looked at the clock over the mantel.  "We have a little time I guess."

        "Good, I can be real efficient with a little time."

        In a flash her lips were on his, her tongue deep inside his mouth.  This was all so new to him, he didn’t know how to react.  But he let her experience and his instincts take over.  He couldn’t get enough of touching her breasts.  She seemed to like it.  She leaned back a little, her arms resting on the edge of the tub.  It seemed like an invitation to put his mouth there.  An invitation he wasn’t going to refuse.  He loved the way her nipples got hard under his tongue.

        She urged him on for few moments, then touched him where he was hard again, gently stroking the bottom of his cock ensuring that it stayed hard.  Still leaning back a little, braced by one arm stretched out on the edge of the tub, she guided him into her.  He concentrated on not exploding inside her immediately.  As she moved against him, some of the water sloshed out of the tub.  She took his right hand in her left and this time kissed only the thumb.  She guided the thumb to a spot just above where he had entered her.  She showed him what she wanted.   As he stroked her, she moved more forcefully and more water sloshed out of the tub.  He tried to control himself, to stay hard for her. But trying to concentrate on touching  her as she wanted and on stopping himself from coming was just too much.  He finished so much sooner than he wanted to but she followed close behind.  She announced her satisfaction by saying "Oh, yes" as she dropped backwards in the tub, putting her whole head under water and sloshing about half the remaining water onto the floor.

        When she came up for air, she leaped to her feet, climbed out of the tub and grabbed some towels.  Throwing one at him that draped over his head, she announced, "Hurry up lawman, its time for some food."

        For Johnny supper was an uncomfortable affair.  He was starving but could hardly eat he was so self-conscious.  The Marshal had to know what they’d been doing.  It had to be written all over his face.  He kept his eyes on his plate because he knew he couldn’t keep it out of his eyes.  He couldn’t look at the Marshal; he wouldn’t look at RJ because the Marshal might see something in the look.  And looking at Lily was out of the question.  She’d know everything in a glance.  And he expected that would be more than he knew himself.

        The Marshal was the closest thing he’d had to a father since he was five even though he'd never expected that maybe the Marshal felt the same way.  And RJ seemed to be the closest thing the Marshal had to a daughter.  That was too confusing to figure.  And on top of that he was bound to make a fool of himself falling in love with girl he couldn’t have.  Even if he wanted their relationship to be entirely above board, and he figured the Marshal would approve if it was, she wasn’t going to hang around here and marry him.  But he was the man, so he was the one they’d likely blame for taking things where they shouldn’t go.  And to take advantage of a girl who’d been through what she had . . . .  He didn’t feel like he was taking advantage, but how could the Marshal feel any different?  And worse, there was no chance he was going to stop as long as she was willing to keep going.

        RJ didn’t seem to be having any similar qualms.  She ate with gusto, told their end of the story to Lily, with an emphasis on Bandit’s part, and was completely at ease.

        He was concentrating so hard on nothing, he didn’t realize for a minute that the Marshal was talking to him.  "Sorry, Mr. Troop, I guess I’m a little tired."

        "We all are boy.  But you’re more entitled than anyone.  You two saved us all out there.  Why don’t you take tomorrow off.  Catch up on your sleep."

        Johnny glanced up and just as quickly returned his eyes to his plate.  "Sure Mr. Troop.  That would be great."  He wondered if RJ had said anything to him.  But no, they had come in together so she hadn’t had the chance.

        When they’d finished their meal, Jake brought some more coffee.  Lily got up and said to RJ, "Millie baked a special pie just for our returning heroes.  Would you like to help me cut and serve it.  She’s gone home and Jake is busy with the bar."

        Johnny leaped up.  "I’ll help Miss Lily."  The last thing he wanted right now was to be left at the table alone with the Marshal.

        But Lily gave him a little push back into his chair.  "Women’s work Johnny."

        Patting him on the shoulder as she got up, RJ echoed Lily but with the tiniest of smirks, "Women’s work Johnny."

        As she passed by the Marshal, Johnny just barely heard Lily as she leaned down to his ear.  "Give the boy a break Dan."

        Johnny hunched over his cup of coffee as though he needed it to keep warm.  He couldn’t avoid the Marshal’s eyes forever, so he looked up and tried to keep his eyes steady.  The Marshal looked at Johnny and repeated the words he had used over a week ago after RJ had headed out to the relay station.  "She got you confused, boy?"

        Johnny let out a sigh.  The Marshal didn’t sound bothered.  If anything, he sounded sympathetic.

        "I wish I had some advice to give.  I can see how you look at her.  Or maybe how you've made such a point of not looking at her.   I think you’re in for a rough ride.  But at least I don’t want you worrying that I’m going to hold you responsible for anything."

        "That doesn’t make me much of a man does it Mr. Troop, if I can’t take responsibility?"

        "I didn’t say you couldn’t take responsibility.  I said I’m not going to assign you any here.  She’s a good girl Johnny.  But she’s not like any girl you’re likely to meet again.  She’s not one to let you take responsibility.  She keeps it all to herself."

        "Are you saying you approve of . . . . well, of her and me?  Supposin’ there was a her and me."

        "Not my place to approve or disapprove.  Let’s just say if you can be satisfied to accept from her what she has to give and not demand more, you’ll be better off and there won’t be any blame from me."

        Johnny wasn’t quite sure he understood completely, but he felt better.  And the pie went down a whole lot easier than the rest of the meal had.

  After supper, the two of them went home, supposedly to get some sleep.  The minute they were inside the door, she turned on him.  She had him pressed up against the backside of the door with her mouth over his.  He wasn’t exactly going to protest.  But when she started to pull him toward the parlor couch he stopped her.

        "I’ve got an idea for something different."

       "Sure, Johnny, anything you want."

         "You ever think of maybe being with a man in a bed?  You know, one of those things with soft mattresses, feather pillows and warm quilts."

        RJ laughed with delight.  "Now that’s not very original."

        "It is for me.  I’ve never had a woman in my own bed."

        "Well, come to think on it, I’ve never been in that bed.  Let’s give it a try."

        She let him lead the way into his room.  There was a fire in the grate.  Johnny threw a couple of logs on it, then turned to her.  He wanted to take the lead this time.   He pulled off her boots, then his own.  He kissed her, deepening the kiss until their tongues were exploring each other mouths with abandon.  He unbuttoned her shirt while they were still kissing.  After he pushed it off her shoulders, he knelt down and kissed and licked her breasts under both nipples were tight and hard.  Still kneeling before her, he unbuttoned her pants and pulled them off.

        When she was naked, he pushed her onto the bed.  With her head on a pillow, he lay down beside her and kissed her all over.  When he got down to her belly, he gently pushed her legs apart.  He kissed her inner thighs and then found the place she had showed him in the bath, where she had guided his fingers.  With his hands stroking her hips, belly and thighs, he put his tongue to her.  She responded to his ministrations immediately.  He gloried in his ability to evoke this response.  She moved against his tongue, moaning with pleasure.

        After a few minutes, he wondered if she wanted to finish this way, if indeed she could finish this way or if he was expected to do something else. He moved his mouth to her thighs and belly.  He looked up at her.  She was clutching the bars of the brass bed.  He hoped she would encourage him to do whatever she wanted next.

         "If you stop doing that, I’m going to kill you," was all she said.

        Her words were not quite the sweetly spoken words of tender encouragement he had been looking for, but they’d do.  In fact, the intensity excited him.   He put his tongue back to that little nub that gave her so much pleasure and moved his tongue around it, over it.  He was gentle at first, then, as she writhed against him, he moved faster and harder until her breath came out in a shuddering gasp and she pushed his head away.

        He rested his head on her belly, feeling as much pleasure as he had the first time he came inside her.  He waited for her to speak.  He knew he’d pleased her, but he wanted her to say so.  Instead she smacked him with a pillow.  "You sneaky, lying little bastard."

        Johnny looked up astonished and got hit with the pillow again.  "What the hell" was all he could get out.

        "You’ve been playing me all this time, putting on that innocent, inexperienced boyish act.  What did you do, decide your cousin Chad had a lock on the sophisticated lover role, so you went for the naïve, guileless part?  And I fell for it.  I was a little suspicious when you showed so much control that second time but overall you were so convincing."  She smacked him with the pillow again.

        Johnny knew she must be teasing him so he went along with it.  "What’re you talking about.  I never pretended with you."

        "Don’t give me that crap.  No innocent boy could do what you just did.  A boy wouldn’t even know to do that at all.  If he was asked to do it, he wouldn’t do it that well.  You’ve either practiced that little technique with lots of women or one very experienced woman who guided you through it a dozen times.  Those sporting women in Cheyenne must be more accomodating than I would have thought."

        Johnny laughed with delight.  He kissed his way up to her breasts again, then lay his head on the pillow besides hers.   "You showed me how.  You did it for me with your mouth and then you showed me the place with my fingers."

        She raised herself up and leaned over him as he stretched out on the bed fully clothed.  She started undoing his clothing as she talked.  "Well Uncle Dan was certainly right about you."

        "You talked to the Marshal . . .  about this."  Johnny was appalled.

        "Of course not.  But when I asked him about you, he told me you learned quick and had good instincts.   I’ll have to tell him just how good."

        "If you do that, I’ll have to kill you," was all Johnny could say before she had her hand in a place that drove out all possibility of speech.