There had been no more attempts on Padgett’s life, which came as no surprise to Longarm. He followed Padgett and Mercer back to the paddock, where Caesar was being brushed and rubbed down by his trainer, a wiry old Irishman named O’Malley. Padgett snapped a series of questions about Caesar’s condition and performance at Cy, who seemed nervous as he answered them. The jockey kept glancing at Longarm. Not wanting Padgett to suspect there was anything unusual going on between Longarm and Cy, the big lawman eased back into the long building.
He spotted the door to a room where he had seen jockeys going in and out several times. When he tried the knob, it was unlocked. Opening the door slightly, Longarm called, “Anybody home?”
No answer came back.
He slipped into the room and closed the door behind him. Just as he had thought, he was in the room where the jockeys changed into their silks and stored their gear. There were separate cubicles along the walls, and he found the one being used by Cy, identifying it by the colors on the silken shirt hanging there along with the white pants. There was a carpetbag on the floor of the open cubicle.
Longarm bent quickly and picked up the bag. If Cy was indeed still up to something, this might be Longarm’s chance to discover it—as long as nobody walked in on him. Cy’s traveling bag was back at the hotel, Longarm supposed, so this carpetbag would contain gear relating to the race.
He opened the bag and delved into it, finding a spare set of silks, a pair of riding boots, some gloves, and some cloth-covered weights that gave the bag a surprising amount of heft. Those were the weights that Cy would slip into the pouches on Caesar’s saddle to even things up if some of the other jockeys were heavier than he was. Longarm knew there was some method of determining how much weight each of the horses was supposed to carry during the race, but he had never learned what it was.
At the sound of footsteps just outside the door of the jockeys’ room, Longarm dropped the square weights back into Cy’s bag and closed it up. He put it back where he had found it, then stepped out of the cubicle. When the door into the room opened, he was standing in the center of the floor, lighting a fresh cheroot.
“Oh, there you are, Marshal,” Leon Mercer said. “The senator and I wondered where you’d gotten off to.”
“Just came in here for a smoke,” said Longarm. He dropped his voice conspiratorially. “Just between you and me, Leon, I’m getting a mite tired of the smell of horseshit.”
Mercer frowned. “That’s too bad,” he snapped. “Your job is to protect the senator, not to stop and sniff posies.”
That was quite an outburst, considering Mercer’s mild nature. Longarm put the cheroot back in his mouth and puffed on it to hide the grin that passed across his face. “You’re absolutely right, Leon,” he said. “I’d better get back to work.”
Padgett didn’t question him about his whereabouts when Longarm rejoined him. The three of them went back to the hired buggy and Longarm drove it to the hotel.
Dinner that evening was shared with Padgett and Leon Mercer, and it wasn’t nearly as enjoyable as lunch had been. Having ol’ Leon for company just wasn’t the same as the Cassidy sisters, Longarm reflected. Janice and Julie weren’t in the dining room, and he wondered if they were eating in their room upstairs. On the third floor, they’d said. Room Number Twelve.
Longarm couldn’t quite get that thought out of his mind.
After dinner, Senator Padgett spent a couple of hours in the lobby talking politics with several other men, some of them guests in the hotel, others local men who came there to pass the evening in stimulating discussion. The talk wasn’t that stimulating to Longarm, however. He knew that such things as grain futures and government regulations were important, at least in the long run, but their immediate impact on a fella like him didn’t add up to a hill of beans. Still, he sat in a wing-back chair next to Padgett and tried not to yawn overmuch as the senator discoursed on such matters.
Finally, after what seemed like a longer time than it really was, Padgett went up to bed, trailed by Longarm and Mercer. Longarm made sure the senator locked his door to the hall; the connecting door between the rooms was left open. Longarm took off his boots, coat, vest, and tie, draped his gunbelt over the head of the bed, then stretched out on top of the covers in his shirt, trousers, and socks. He waited until the stentorian snores from the other room told him that Padgett was sound asleep.
The senator was as safe here as if he’d been in his own house in Washington. Longarm was sure of that. And though some might call it neglecting his duty to slip out and pay a visit to the Cassidy sisters … those who would condemn him for doing so had probably never had two such lovely young women waiting for them. He pulled his boots on, eased out into the hall, and locked the door of his room behind him.
The door of Room Twelve opened almost instantly when he rapped lightly on it. “Custis!” Janice exclaimed happily. “We thought you’d never get here! We were worried that you had decided not to come.”
“Just had to wait until the time was right,” Longarm said with a grin as he stepped into the room. Janice closed the door behind him.
She was breathtaking, he thought as she moved around him so that he could get a good look at her in the soft light coming from a turned-down lamp. She wore a gown of gossamer lace and blue silk. The neck plunged low enough so that he could see nearly all of the valley between her plump, creamy breasts. Her nipples were erect and stood out urgently against the silk.
Julie was lying on the huge four-poster bed, propped up on a pile of pillows, an equally lovely vision in a gown that was identical except for its color. Julie’s outfit was red. Longarm looked from one to the other of them and said to the one in blue, “You are Janice, aren’t you?”
Both sisters laughed. “Does it really matter?” said the one in red.
“Well …”
“I’m Janice,” the twin in blue said. “You should be ashamed of yourself, Julie. We don’t want to confuse poor Custis.”
No man who ever found himself with bounty like this could be called poor, thought Longarm. Janice stepped forward, and his arms came up instinctively to pull her into an embrace. Her head tilted back, and her lush red lips parted invitingly.
Longarm was about to kiss her, but then he paused and looked at Julie. She smiled and said, “Go ahead. I’ll Just watch for a while.”
Longarm had to chuckle and say, “Lordy!” He usually took his loving one at a time, but he supposed in a circumstance like this …
Janice’s lips pressed hotly against his mouth. He didn’t say anything else for a while.
Her body was as soft and warm and intoxicating as he had expected it to be as she pressed against him. The encounters he’d had with each sister had been mighty pleasurable, but the circumstances had forced all three of them to hold back somewhat. He sensed there would be no holding back tonight, none at all.
The kiss finally ended, and Janice stepped back out of his arms. Julie swung her long legs out of the bed and stood up. “My turn,” she said, swaying toward him seductively. She looped her arms around his neck and pulled his mouth down to hers.
If anything, her lips and tongue were hotter and wetter than her sister’s had been. Longarm’s shaft was achingly hard by now, throbbing with the need to be released from the tight confines of his trousers. The Cassidy sisters weren’t done tormenting him yet, however.
But it was mighty sweet torture, Longarm thought.
Julie stepped back and stood side by side with Janice. Both of the women slid the straps of their gowns off their shoulders and let the silky garments slide down over their smooth young bodies. The gowns fell in crumpled heaps around their feet. They stood gorgeously, gloriously—and identically—nude before him.
Well, maybe not quite identically, Longarm discovered as his gaze played hungrily over them. He lifted an eyebrow in surprise. Sure enough, he could tell the difference between the two of them. Janice’s breasts were full and round, crowned with large coral nipples. Julie was slightly less endowed, and her breasts were pear-shaped. Her nipples were smaller and darker but just as erect as her sister’s. Longarm’s eyes dropped lower, comparing creamy bellies. Janice’s was slightly softer, he judged, but Julie worked with the horses and got more exercise, so that was only logical. That brought him to the triangles of fine-spun blond hair at the juncture of their thighs. He cleared his throat and said, “Ah, I reckon if you wanted me to compare, I’ve spotted a few differences so far, but …”