She laughed girlishly and demurely said, 'Well, don't let me stop you, you big damp silly.'
He considered her words before he soberly replied, 'Unless you mean that sort of naughty, this is pushing past flirty into cruelty to animals, Miss Godiva.'
She answered simply, 'I'm never cruel to animals I'm fond of, Custis. What's the matter? I know I'm almost thirty, and I told you how that mean thing broke off our engagement. But he said it was because I wouldn't quit my job at the Sentinel, not because he found me disgusting in bed!'
So Longarm had to prove he didn't find her disgusting by kicking off his boots and jeans, moving her thin cotton frock up above her trim waist, and just rolling his own naked body between her welcoming thighs.
He didn't ask her how come she'd removed all her underthings to crawl into a male traveling companion's bedding. But she confessed she'd been gushing for him since before sundown as she finished the chore of shucking her frock over her head while he proceeded to put it to her.
It was a good thing she was as wet as she'd said inside. For she was tight as a girl in her teens despite her mature curves, and when Longarm tried to hold most of his weight off her, in consideration of the packed earth under her friendly tailbone, Godiva bounced her soft rump even friendlier and told him not to hold back, but to crush her, crush her, crush her. Gals who read a lot tended to talk like that when they were screwing.
After she'd been crushed enough to come more than once, Godiva wanted to get on top. So he let her, and didn't object when such a frisky little thing said it was awfully stuffy under all that vulcanized canvas and threw the poncho down to straddle him bare-ass in the gentle rain. For it felt swell to lie there, kissing both her cool nipples in turn as the rain ran off them while, below the waist, the two of them felt warm and wet as hasty pudding.
By the time Godiva bounced herself to climax and collapsed atop him, her bare back had gooseflesh and he had to roll her over on her back, haul up the covers, and warm her up some more. Then he rummaged around near the bottom of the bedroll till he found a dry feed-sack he'd packed away as a towel, hardly expecting to use it for such delightful drying.
He figured they'd just doze and cuddle with the rain gently tapping on their vulcanized cover. But Godiva seemed to be crying as she rested her damp head on his bare shoulder.
Longarm didn't ask why. No man who'd slept with more than one woman in his life would be dumb enough to do that. So just as he expected, Godiva finally volunteered that she just didn't understand what had just gotten into her.
He said, 'Aw, come on, I ain't built that unusual, honey.'
She giggled through her tears and replied, 'Yes, you are. But I've no complaints about that. I'm just so ashamed of practically begging for it. Whatever must you think of me, Custis?'
He patted her bare shoulder and said, 'That you wanted some almost as badly as I did? What just happened was natural as falling off a bronco. I'd be more concerned for the both of us if we'd just fallen asleep like babes in the wood, assuming said babes were way the hell younger than either of us.'
She sighed and said, 'It's true I'm a more experienced woman than I like to admit. I guess you could tell there's been more than one man in my unusual life.'
He said, 'Why, no, I figured you learned to screw so fine from reading romantic books. Have you read that new novel by Mister Zola about that frisky French gal Nana? I'll bet you hundreds of young gals are trying out those wild positions Nana and her frisky female roommate got into in that one chapter right this very minute!'
He chuckled and added, 'Gives a man a hard-on just to picture those two pretty frustrated things trying to screw one another without a pecker to their name!'
Godiva reached down between them to gently take the matter in hand as she sniffed and said, 'At least we don't have that problem. I'm not sure I want to be compared to Emile Zola's fallen women of the Paris underworld.'
As she started to jack it up for him, she added, 'I'll have you know I don't do this with every man I meet!'
'Nor I with every gal,' Longarm primly replied as he found himself rising to the occasion. Then he moved his own free hand down her smooth belly to part her damp pubic hair with skilled fingers as he murmured in a more serious tone, 'Don't give away all the magic by telling me all your secrets. You don't really want to know who taught me to strum your old banjo like this, do you?'
She sobbed, 'Jesus, that feels good! Just keep that up until I'm almost there, and finish me off with this lovely thing I have in my own hand! I promise, I won't say a word about anyone else!'
CHAPTER 9
So a good time was had by the both of them, all the way up to Fort Sill. A good time at night anyway. Days on the trail with a herd of cows could get tedious.
It could have been worse. The Running X had contracted to be paid by the head, half in advance and half on delivery. So Harry Carver was only worried about getting them up the trail alive. With Quill Indians still skulking out yonder, for all they knew, that made for a faster pace than most market herds were driven. But less than a dozen drovers could only get cows to move so fast, and so the one day's hard ride on horseback stretched out to almost another seventy-two hours on the trail, meaning two more nights bedded down to one side after dark. Godiva could really get acrobatic on a clear cool prairie night with no covers in the way and nobody but Longarm to watch her wriggle and jiggle.
He wriggled and jiggled a heap himself, of course, but by the third night he was tempted to ask her to quit showing off and just enjoy it with him. For, not unlike that Nana gal in Mister Zola's sassy novel, she seemed to be working harder to pleasure him than to please herself, and while he was getting it all free and had no call to compare her with the hookers in that book, he recalled with some discomfort how they only relaxed and let themselves go all the way with old pals they felt more comfortable with.
He tried to make her feel more comfortable with him. During the sunlit hours on the trail he let her ride along beside him as he rode flank for old Harry Carver, and despite riding sidesaddle, the newspaper gal and erstwhile army brat got to where she could head off a straying yearling pretty fairly. When complimented, she sniffed and said it was no great wonder they called gents who did this as a full-time occupation cowboys. Longarm was too polite to start a stampede and show her how a top hand was occasionally called upon to earn his forty a month and beans.
It was after dark, with her duds off, when Godiva reverted from high-toned Eastern gal to dirty past the line of
