Fargo released the man he was holding and threw him into his friends. “You people make me sick. Now get the hell out of here.” As he said this, he dug the deputy’s badge out of his pocket and pitched it on Rule’s desk. “It’s all yours, Pete. It’s up to you. I’m going to go get a lot of whiskey and get out of this town by dawn.”
“I’m sorry for all this, Fargo.”
Fargo glanced over at Lenihan who was holding Amy so tight they looked like one person. He didn’t blame him. Lenihan was lucky to be alive. “I’m taking Helen Hardesty’s body over to the mortuary. The Raines boys tried to kill me but they killed her instead. You’ll find their bodies out on her property. I’ll pay for Helen’s burial. The town doesn’t have to worry about it.”
“You don’t have to do that, Fargo.”
“Yeah,” Fargo said, “I do.”
“Mr. Fargo—” Amy said from the arms of Lenihan. “We owe you so much—”
Fargo turned then and walked over to Deputy Parsons. Before the man could protect himself Fargo slammed his right hand into his solar plexus and finished with a left hand to his jaw. Parsons crashed backward into a chair, filling the air with his curses.
Fargo was sick of it all. He just wanted to get the hell out of there.
17
The bourbon was good, the fireplace warmed the elegant living room and Sarah Friese was quietly erotic as she sat next to Fargo on the long brocaded couch. The first and second floors of the mortuary might be dedicated to death but the third floor was very much given over to life. One wall was filled with a built-in bookcase, the other walls were covered with expensive reproductions of paintings by the masters and a genuine Persian rug covered most of the shiny hardwood floor. West of this room was a dining area as fancy as that of a top-flight San Francisco hotel. This was where she’d served him the steak dinner she’d insisted on preparing for him in the shiny new kitchen.
For Fargo two hours up here had softened his harsh feelings toward the town itself. He’d left the sheriff’s office bitter and angry. He’d stayed pretty much the same way while Sarah worked on Helen Hardesty’s body and prepared her for burial. But the whiskey and the fire helped as he waited for Sarah to bathe and reappear in a deep blue robe that fit her so well that he could easily see she was naked beneath. Now, as she’d said, she was all Fargo’s.
He turned to her and smiled. “This is quite the place.”
“My flat. My father and mother live in a house nearby. I wanted my own life. I’m not quite as old-fashioned as they are. And anyway, I wanted you to have a decent meal before you left town. We owe you a lot. Lynching is bad enough but lynching the wrong man is something a lot of towns never get over.”
“Well, Pete Rule finally told the truth. He should have done it a lot earlier.”
“At least he did it.”
“I’m just sorry Helen Hardesty had to die. She died because of me. Those damned Raines brothers are the ones who should’ve been lynched.”
She touched his face with silken fingers, the subtle scent of her perfume a perfect match for her graceful beauty. “You’re getting yourself all worked up again, Skye. You need to relax.”
He smiled. “You have any idea of how you could relax me?”
“Well, I’m only nineteen but I think if I put my mind to it I could come up with something.”
“You have anything particular in mind?”
She eased herself close to him, let her fingers fall from his face to tease his burgeoning manhood in the crotch of his pants. He gave a little start, pleasure spreading through his body like fine wine. Then her mouth was on his and she was finding his tongue with her own. By now he had filled his right hand with one of her breasts and he was easing her back on the long couch so that their bodies could fit together. Her robe rode up on her long, firm thighs so Fargo had no problem stirring the hot, moist center of her. She began to strain against him, wanting him inside her, her mouth filling his with warm wine-soaked gasps of pleasure and anticipation.
He obliged her first, his expert tongue tasting the elixir of her youthful beauty, her responding with cries, sobs and even a scream when her mind burst into a fireworks display of fleshly joy.
She helped him shed his pants so that she could hold his massive ramrod and guide it into her. “Oh, God, Skye, you’re huge.” She laughed about it. “I’ll have to mark this date on my calendar.”
But then she was serious again, spreading herself beneath him so that he could blaze a path up inside her that would fulfill the crazed need they both felt.
She got her slender, perfect legs over his shoulders and grabbed his buttocks. He grabbed hers. They were wet with her own juices. And then they embarked on their long journey, taking and giving by turns, the scents and sensations of their passion the only reality for either of them.
The expensive couch was never going to be the same as they pounded and slammed their way to mutual ecstasy, his mouth on her nipple only making her luxuriate all the more in the endless orgasms she was enjoying.
Then, as all things must, their coupling came to an end. Because the couch was so confining, Fargo let himself slide to the floor. He lay back against the couch and rooted around in his clothes for his makings.
Just as he was lighting his smoke, she joined him. She pleased him with her clean, young laugh. “You may have spoiled me for life.”
“I doubt that.”
She took his cigarette from his hand and put it to her own lips. She inhaled deeply then erupted in a coughing fit.
He took the cigarette from her when she was still hacking. “Little girls shouldn’t smoke.”
“I’ll get the hang of those things one of these days.” Then: “There’s more wine.”
“I’d better pass. I need to get up real early. I’m going to be out of here by dawn.”
“It’s not that late.”
“It’s that late if I want to get a full day’s travel in. I’ve got friends waiting for me. And besides, I’ve got one more stop to make tonight.”
Her blue eyes sparkled with mischief. “It’d better not be another woman.”
“Oh, no. It’s O’Malley.”
“O’Malley,” she said. “He’s sort of a joke around here. But I’ve always felt sorry for him.”
“Same here. He was so fired up about this whole thing but I didn’t see him anywhere around tonight. Did you?”
“Come to think of it, no, I didn’t. And he’s usually around at everything that goes on. He takes that little notebook from his back pocket and starts scribbling. I always josh him and tell him I’ll buy him a bigger one for his next birthday. But he calls it his lucky notebook. I don’t think you could pry it out of his hand if you had a gun to his head.”
Fargo was tugging his clothes on as she spoke. She was wonderfully, gloriously naked as she stood up and came to him. And not self-conscious about it in any way. “I don’t suppose you’ll be stopping through here again anytime soon.”
He took her in his arms. She was so fresh, eager. The temptation to change his mind, to stay came surging through him until he remembered O’Malley. Strange about him not being around tonight. Very strange.
He forced his arms to shed her and strode to the door before he changed his mind.
“I guess I could come back through this way when I’m done seeing my friends.”
That great girlish laugh. “You’d better. Or I’ll come looking for you.”
He went out into the cold harsh night. It was like being banished from Eden.
18
The lobby of O’Malley’s hotel bore a sign on an easel noting: RENT BY WEEK, MONTH, YEAR. The Mountainaire had probably been a simple two-story hotel in reasonably good repair a few years earlier. But now there were three other better designed and better constructed hotels. In order to keep its doors open The Mountainaire had likely had to turn itself into a boardinghouse of sorts.