The Merry Widow of Tanner's Ford (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 4

  “Yep?”

  “Good afternoon. I would like to speak to Mrs. Ted Grant, please.”

  Marci stepped back, dropping the phone as if it was a snake. The black receiver smashed against the wall before swinging back and forth, hanging by its black cord. It made a rattling sound as it scraped against the grooves in the fake knotty pine paneling.

  If she didn’t prove to the official-sounding man that she wasn’t here, he would keep calling. He might even send someone out to check on her. She had to be tough. Marci couldn’t do this, but Billie Rose, her long-ago neighbor from Alabama, could. She closed her eyes and pretended to be the hard-looking bleached blonde.

  “Dayam,” she swore into the receiver when she picked it up, “Ah broke ma nay-al! Like, who’re you askin’ fer, agin’?”

  “Mrs. Ted Grant. She may have gone back to her maiden name, Marci Meshevski.”

  “Who the hey-all is tha-yat?”

  “This is very important Miss…what is your name?”

  “Billie Rose, not tha-yat it’s any of yer bizniss. And who the hey-all are yew?”

  Marci stuck one hip out and jammed her fist on it, just like she’d seen the woman do many times. She was really getting into sticking it to the cop or whoever he was.

  “My name is Jones. Edgar Jones. Are you sure there’s nobody by that name in town?”

  “Duh! Mister, Ah’ve lived here fer years and I ain’t never met nobody with them nay-ams. Naow Ah’ve got hogs ta feed, so if ye ain’t gonna send me no money, Ah ain’t got no time for yer.”

  He cleared his throat. “There could be a reward for information.”

  Marci’s racing heart rate doubled. They wanted her that badly?

  “A ree-ward?”

  “Leading to proper identification of my, ah, client, and subsequent clarification of our business.”

  “Hunh.” She pretended to think about it. “How much?”

  She stuck her jaw out as she said the word to drag it out. All she needed was a cigarette hanging out of her mouth and a bleached-blonde beehive on her head.

  “A thousand dollars.”

  “Hey-all, fer thay-at much I’ll drug her by the hay-er raught to yew! Gimme yer number. If’n Ah sees her, Ah’ll call ye. Ah always wanted tew go ta Vegas. If’n Ah see her, this betch is gonna be mah ticket to a good time.”

  Marci scribbled the information with trembling fingers before hanging up. She leaned against the slick paneling and slid to the floor. She wiped beads of sweat off her forehead with the hem of her T-shirt, then used the fabric to wipe more from under her breasts.

  Her lawyer must’ve been issued a court order to release her whereabouts. Jones didn’t say his rank but cops would know not to say who they were when talking to someone who sounded like Billie Rose. Hopefully she’d given a strong enough impression of wanting to find a way to Vegas that she’d scour the county for the missing woman.

  Nikki said townsfolk protected their own. Would they protect her for Nikki’s sake? Not if they’d never met her. Therefore she had to get out of this apartment and meet people. By the time the cops realized they weren’t getting anything out of Billie Rose, Marci would have friends in Climax.

  She’d spent her childhood as a poor, scrawny kid with hand-me-down clothes. No one cared that they were clean and patched. So much shorter than the rest of the class, too afraid of rejection to make a fuss, she’d tried to fade into the corners of life. She was wearing someone else’s clothing again, but it was temporary, until she could buy her own. She dug through the donation bag until she found a pair of jeans that fit fairly well. She covered her T-shirt with a thick plaid long-sleeved shirt. All her fancy lingerie, the only part of her assigned wardrobe that she enjoyed wearing, was gone. Nikki had bought her new panties but she’d put off wearing the bra since it didn’t fit comfortably. After all, who would care what she wore?

  A hot cowboy would.

  He would be tall, of course. She barely cleared five feet so almost anyone was tall as far as she was concerned. He had to be smart. No mouth-breathing, hee-hawing drooler for her. And he had to want to please her sexually. She’d been so horny that it wouldn’t take much. His mouth on her nipples would be a good start, followed by his fingers in her pussy. She’d never had either, but wanted both.

  She could do this. Her mind was set. She’d had it with hiding.

  The nervous tremors in her stomach were nothing new. The desire to get past them was. If she could find a reasonable man, one Nikki could vouch for, she would have herself a cowboy fling!

  For once she was taking steps toward a future she wanted. By the time feet shaking the rickety stairs leading to the apartment warned of Nikki’s arrival, Marci was ready. She’d changed, cleaned the wall, and was spreading frosting. The brownies would still be warm when Nikki brought them to the small clinic lounge to share. Marci turned, spatula in hand. Nikki stopped in the doorway, hand still on the doorknob.

  “You look so much better in those jeans,” said Nikki, smiling.

  “Thanks. So, was your shift, like, totally awesome? Or was it, like, gag me with a spoon?”

  On the flight to Montana the two of them had sat in front of a set of girls who chatted in Valley Girl-speak the whole way. Marci figured putting on the accent would show Nikki how much better she was feeling.

  Acting the long-suffering older sister, Nikki rolled her eyes as she dropped her keys in the carved wooden bowl on the hall table. Marci had rescued the table, and the bowl, years earlier, refinished them, and given them to her student sister. Part of the reason she’d followed Ted’s rules was that he allowed Nikki to live free in the basement apartment during her years of med school and then residency. It was dark and small, but Marci helped decorate it with found items that she cleaned, restored, and made beautiful. Ted didn’t want her working outside their home, and she had to do something with her time other than cook, clean, do volunteer work, and tend to her husband.

  Thank God Nikki had taken all the gifts with her when she moved to Montana. Otherwise they’d be gone, along with all the expensive, trendy things Ted loved to show off and she hated to dust.

  “It was more like gag the cowboy,” replied Nikki wryly. “I’ve got a stubborn man who insists he can live alone and do ranch chores when he has a cast from his toes to his hip.”

  “He broke his leg?”

  “Yes, and then didn’t bother coming to the clinic until he’d fed the animals and shopped for ranch supplies.”

  “Wow,” said Marci. “A man who doesn’t think of himself all the time and has a real job. I suppose he’s married or had his sixtieth birthday some time ago?”

  Nikki hung her coat on the hook beside the door. She didn’t answer, so Marci started licking frosting off the spatula. What would it be like to spread chocolate on a cowboy’s hot body and then lick it off? Or even better, rub herself against him and have him lick it off her?

  “Simon MacDougal’s file says he’s forty, but he’s in excellent shape. He could pose as the Marlboro Man. When he puts effort into it, his smile would make a gal drop her panties faster than a bottle of gin. And,” added Nikki with emphasis, “he’s single, which is the whole problem.”

  A hot, single cowboy with a killer smile. The perfect antidote to Ted. She didn’t care how old he was. A touch of maturity in a man would be a nice change from the obnoxious spoiled child she’d married.

  “Why is his being single a problem?”

  “He’ll barely be able to walk with crutches. He will not be able to bend, which means he’ll need assistance to get dressed, to get in and out of bed, and there is no way he can work in a barn or ride a horse. He won’t even be able to stand for long to prepare his own food or clean up after himself. He lives alone in the cabin his great-whatever grandparents built. He needs a caretaker and there’s no girlfriend, aunt, cousin, or anyone else available. He insists on going home anyway.”

  Nikki ran her hand through her short hair and sighed.

  “The man
will drive everyone crazy unless we gag him and tie him to the bed. And since that’s not ethical, I don’t know what we’re going to do with him.” She set her baby blues on Marci. “Unless you’re willing to take the next step and use him to banish Ted.” A sparkle appeared in her eyes as she waggled her eyebrows suggestively. “I’ve heard patients boast about what an eager woman can do with a man lying on his back. Maybe being in charge makes a gal wilder.”

  Marci’s entire body tightened in a spasm of lust and need. She gasped at the feeling. That was better than the sum total of my sexual experience! If she went with this cowboy, she might do even better. Best of all, she’d be gone from Nikki’s tiny apartment.

  “As a widow, I can do whatever I want with whoever I want,” she stated to Nikki. “And I want hot sex with a cowboy. If there’s a problem, since he can’t move without my help, I can leave if I want.”

  “And,” added Nikki slyly, “he won’t be able to escape if you attack him in bed.”

  Arousal brought her nipples to peaks. Surely a man living on his own, one without a girlfriend, would be interested in sex with a horny woman? She desperately wanted an orgasm that didn’t come from her own fingers or the assistance of batteries.

  “What’s he like?”

  “He’s cranky and out of sorts because he wants to go home.”

  Marci felt the same, only she no longer had a home.

  “I asked Brenda Anderson about him,” continued Nikki. “Both Simon and his twin brother, Lance, are polite to women and have never been known to hurt an animal, woman, or child. Lance is away working in Texas for the winter, which is why Simon is alone.”

  “Twins?”

  Heat flashed up her face, hardened her nipples, and zapped to her pussy. For the last few years she’d had all sorts of fantasies. One of her favorites involved two men pleasuring her at once. Two big, strong, powerful men doing everything she wanted and even some she wasn’t sure about.

  “You know the history of this area?” asked Nikki. “How thousands of men came out to the gold fields?” Marci nodded. “Remember how I said there weren’t enough women to go around so people in Tanner’s Ford found a way to even the odds by sharing a wife?”

  “Yes,” said Marci, drawing it out. Nikki waggled her eyebrows. “You mean, Simon and his twin brother plan to share their wife?”

  “That’s what I heard, but you’ll probably be gone before Lance gets back. Unless Simon needs more help to recover. Once his full leg cast comes off on Monday he’ll get a walking cast. But that still doesn’t mean he can do everything.”

  “I guess it would be best if he has help for a couple of weeks.”

  “Marci, Simon MacDougal is one good-looking cowboy. He’ll be completely at your mercy. What he eats, reads, or anything else, is your choice. There’ll be just you and him in that log cabin. Nothing to stop you from seducing him…”

  “He sounds perfect!” Laughter bubbled up. Instead of stifling it to hide all emotion as usual, she let it go. Nikki grinned in return. “A sexy cowboy under my control, living in a log cabin. How could I say no?”

  “Plus, he’s wild about local history. He has all his ancestors’ diaries and complained about never having a chance to read them. He’ll have time to do that now. Maybe he could read them aloud while you’re working.” She waggled her eyebrows playfully. “I’ve heard that some of those women who came West on the Bride Trains were pretty wild. Maybe it will give the two of you ideas. Simon will have to spend most of the next three days on his back with his foot elevated. That still leaves his mouth, and fingers, and—”

  “Nikki!”

  Without even seeing the man Marci’s body had come alive. Her breasts and nipples ached and she felt a new sensation of fullness as her pussy swelled. He was a red-blooded cowboy who’d gone without sex for too long. She was going to seduce him if it was the last thing she ever did! She walked past her sister to the closet and grabbed her suitcase. Like the clothing, it had been donated. She began filling it with the few things Nikki had purchased for her. Marci hadn’t been ready to go out in public to choose her own things. She would just have to go with what she had.

  “I don’t want him to know who I am,” she called over her shoulder. “I’d like to be judged for myself, not your poor widowed younger sister.”

  “We’ll introduce you under your married name. Brenda knows everything but she won’t talk.” Nikki looked down at Marci, who was eight inches shorter, and a lot narrower. She sighed. “Simon MacDougal is a man. He’d never notice we’re sisters.”

  “Especially since you inherited all of Mom’s breasts.”

  Nikki grimaced. She lifted her big girls. “You think I want to carry these around all day?”

  “No,” said Marci mischievously, “but I think you wouldn’t mind a helping hand at night, as long as it belongs to a hot cowboy.”

  “Or two,” added Nikki impudently. “I’ll bring the truck around.”

  “What truck?”

  Her sister gave a wicked, superior, smile. “I figured Mr. MacDougal might try to sneak away so I removed his truck for safekeeping.”

  “Veronica Meshevski, even I know you don’t take a cowboy’s truck!”

  Chapter Five

  Whatever Brenda had put in the needle, one she’d had far too much enjoyment sticking him with, had zonked Simon out. The clock said he’d slept for a couple of hours, but he was now raring to go. He had a bit of pain below the knee, but that didn’t matter. Not when he was heading home.

  He’d been awake when the nurse replacing Brenda came in to check him. He’d charmed her into lowering the bars on one side of the bed. She said she’d be back before lights out to do it up again, after the doctor came back from her supper break. That gave him a time window to escape. The nurse had been gone fifteen minutes, long enough to check the rooms and go back to her charts or whatever.

  He had to go now. Using the chair beside the bed to help, he hopped across to his locker. He scowled at seeing only one boot, though he couldn’t bend over to put it on anyway, or his jeans. The only clothes hanging on the hooks were his shirt, hat, and belt. Thank God for small mercies. Brenda had the sense to return his belt and champion buckle. He’d left his coat in the truck.

  His shirt hung down but, even with the ridiculous thin cloth they called a nightgown on backward, his bare ass still flew in the breeze. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d been caught with a naked ass, but the last few were a hell of a lot more fun. Even better, he hadn’t been alone.

  “I rode all those bulls without an injury,” he muttered. “Then one stupid mistake, a slip of my foot, and I bust my damn leg!”

  He scrabbled for the keys, which he figured were on the shelf. Nothing. He stretched up to search the far end. Still no keys. With a sense of dread he slid-hopped over to the window, which faced the street. He pulled open the curtains.

  “Oh, hell!”

  No bright red F-150 waited for him. Donny was going to hit the roof. His cousin had just bought the automatic going-to-town truck for his wife, Aggie. Now that they had four children, she needed a truck with a back seat. Simon had been able to drive his own ride from his place to the J Bar C using great-grandpa’s cane on the clutch pedal. He’d heard the baby crying before he even left his truck. He didn’t want to bother them so quickly switched vehicles and took off. They often left the keys in the ignition on the ranch, figuring the truck would be ready to go whenever they had a notion.

  He couldn’t see Brenda taking it. She was a rancher’s daughter. She might stick him in the ass with the largest bore needle she could find, but she knew a woman never sat behind the wheel of a man’s truck. Brenda must have put his keys away for safekeeping.

  Please, God, let him find them!

  He couldn’t afford to stay here, even for one night. Hell, he couldn’t afford the X-rays, the cast, or the doctor’s bill. He certainly couldn’t afford to pay for the junk they called food or the plastic-wrapped, hard-as-nails bed. And he shoul
dn’t have to. Any man worth his salt could take a bit of pain to get a job done.

  Focusing on his objective, he slid the orange plastic visitor chair across the floor. He hop-stepped into the hall as quietly as he could. He was wobbly so kept close to the wall. Setting his sight on the office six miles down the corridor, he gritted his teeth and cowboyed up. He was halfway there when he heard voices behind him. He kept going, hoping whoever it was wouldn’t notice him.

  “Just what do you think you’re doing, Mr. MacDougal?”

  He whipped his head around and damn near lost his balance. Someone tall grabbed his left elbow. He didn’t see who took the other.

  “Why are you out of bed?”

  Damn, it was the doctor! He didn’t have his boots on, but she must be only four inches shorter. That meant he didn’t have to bend far to see how furious she was. Well so was he!

  “I’m going home,” he declared with as much dignity as a barefooted cowboy with his ass hanging out could muster.

  “You think you can drive with that cast?”

  “I got here, didn’t I?” He narrowed his eyes. “Did you steal my keys?”

  “That won’t fit in the driver’s seat.” She pointed to his cast, ignoring his question.

  “I’ll make it fit.” He ground the words out from between clenched teeth.

  “Who’s going to take care of you?”

  “I don’t need taking care of!” They glared at each other.

  “Mmm, mmm. That is one fine-looking butt.”

  Simon choked at the light female voice behind and to his right. All his twisting must have pulled his shirt even higher than he’d thought. He reached behind and found skin. Yep, his back end was visible to anyone and everyone. At least the woman sounded interested. Surely she wasn’t a nurse. They weren’t supposed to notice those things.

  This woman’s voice was like warm syrup, all thick and sweet, ready to pour on hotcakes. Or his belly. Or lower.