Tip of the Spear (2 page)

He
entered the building, making certain to keep his rifle pointed at the floor. Several
others stood before him, and as he waited in line, he wondered if the stranger
he’d encountered had come this way, and if he’d visited the office. Hinto would
bet a month’s worth of gold he hadn’t.

“Next.”

Following
the deep voice, he turned left and placed his rifle and papers on the counter. A
large man checked over his rifle, inspected his iron approved rounds, and took
a hard look at his papers.

“You
plannin’ on wood cutting?”

“No.”

“Mining?”
he asked in a sharp voice. Miners received as much love as murderers in these
parts, but demand for precious stones and gold kept them in business all the
same.

“Hell
no.”

“Good.”
The Territorial rifled again through his papers and glanced up at him. “Hinto
Dakota?”

“Yeah.”

“You
bring what you promised?”

Hinto
frowned. “Not sure I know what you mean, UT.” United Territorial, what most of
the Territorials preferred to be called.

“I’m
a friend of Annie’s.”

Hinto
wasn’t sure if the UT was part of Annie’s family, as in a protectorate, or just
a friend. Since females were hard enough to find in the territories, many folks
had taken to living in extended families called protectorates, usually because
they consisted of one female and the many males who protected her and their
resultant offspring.

Hinto
answered with respect, just to be on the safe side. “Ah, yes, Sir. They’re
sitting outside just waiting on me.”

The
UT stamped his papers without another word. “Marshal’s fifth station on the
left down the street.” He grinned, showing bright white teeth. His eyes looked
as flat and hard as steel.

“Right.
Thanks.” Hinto left without another word. Anytime spent near the UTs unnerved
him. Most of them would consider his abilities a threat, an unnatural source of
energy with the potential to pollute the air, the town, or hell, the local
populace. A load of horseshit, but not everyone had been raised to ask
questions first and shoot later.

Outside
again, he unhooked the lead from his saddle and pulled his bounties with him. “Beast,
stay here. I’ll be back to get you soon.” The animal nodded and lowered his
head to a nearby trough. To Hinto’s amusement, the vore received more attention
than the Appersons.

In
no time, he handed his bounty over to the marshal, counted out the marshal’s
take, and measured the rest of his payment. Three hundred and eighty gold
nuggets would go a nice way toward the stash he’d already banked. Three hundred
and sixty, he amended, needing a woman, a meal, and a bath, and not necessarily
in that order.

He
returned to Beast. Once in the stabling yard, he found one stable hand brave
enough to handle him. “Beast, don’t give him any nonsense, you hear?” He tugged
the vore’s bridal and stared into its eyes. A familiar heat tingled, and he
knew the vore felt it. A communal sense of understanding infused him, and he
let go of Beast and patted its thick neck. “He’ll be good,” he said to the
stable hand. “Just make sure to keep a hunk of meat nearby, in case he gets
uppity.”

The
stable hand nodded, captivated. To his credit, not many had ever seen a vore,
let alone been brave enough to care for one. Taller and broader than a normal
horse, Beast possessed red eyes that glowed in the dark and contrasted sharply
with its black hide, sharp canines able to tear apart a human body in minutes,
and a white, unexpectedly silky mane. A branch of the equine family, vores
evolved hundreds of years ago after the Great Storm, when the natural and
unnatural began to merge.

Not
wanting to dwell on his own unnatural differences, Hinto left the stables,
visited the bank, and deposited his gold. The gold transfer would take a few
days to hit home, when the railroad and Runners delivered the bank’s statements
to outlying branches, but the actual gold would be safer here than in Shine,
his hometown in Big Sky. The southwestern section of Big Sky Territory had a
reputation as a wild reserve. The UTs left it well enough alone, not wanting to
deal with the creatures that drifted through from the tainted Divide.

Vores,
skin walkers, walking weeds and other Zoners found refuge in Big Sky, where
being a local meant more than being natural. For that alone, he’d have called
Shine home.

Beautiful
and untamed, and lawless as well.

Hinto
wouldn’t trade it for the world. Nor would his father and brothers. Now he just
had to get his ass home again and convince his father to be less stubborn than
usual. He sighed, not wanting to dwell on the potential of another huge
argument, and focused on the here and now.

With
the UTO, Beast, and the bank handled, Hinto could finally take care of himself.
He passed Annie Collins on his way down an alley toward Third Street. “Best of
luck, ma’am.”

She
smiled and saluted him with a leather crop, then continued on her way.

Appersons
are gonna wish I’d never found them.
Hinto smiled, not
feeling a lick of sympathy for the bastards who’d made their own problems. Needing
the same respite Annie would soon feel, Hinto thought about DeeDee and focused.
She had a particular energy that spoke of the feminine, an electro-magnetic draw,
as his father would say. All people, all living creatures, possessed it. But
Hinto could sense it. It made tracking a helluva lot easier when he could
literally feel his quarry from miles away.

He
followed her trail toward Kitty House, an upscale whorehouse and one much
cleaner than Delware’s a few doors down. At Kitty’s, DeeDee would draw him a
bath, feed him then ride him until he couldn’t think anymore.

Lost
in fantasies of DeeDee’s mouth, he nearly ran into an altercation he could have
done without.

Four
horse-handlers—wranglers—by the looks of them, sported with a young man covered
in dust. A one-piece gray jumpsuit, which should have camouflaged his mining
dust but didn’t, complemented the helmet atop his head and the steel-toed boots
on his feet.

The
kid couldn’t have been more than sixteen at most, but he had that same glazed
look of hunger and exhaustion all miners possessed. At one point in history
they’d called it Gold Rush Fever. Now they called it by its real name:  unfathomable
greed. Hinto didn’t know whether to feel disgusted or sorry for the boy. What a
life to lead.

“Come
on,
miner
. Why don’t you fight real men, and not the good earth that
feeds our families? That provides grass for our animals and lumber for our
homes? People like you have no place in Little Valley, tainting our crops.”

Maybe
they weren’t all wranglers. The speaker sounded like a farmer.

“I
don’t want no trouble. I just need to get back to my family.” The young man
tried to go around them, but the foursome boxed him in. “I got a younger sister
to feed,” the boy said quickly. “Honest. If I don’t help her, she’ll have to go
whoring for food.”

“What?”
One of the men stepped forward and punched the boy in the gut. His friends grabbed
hold of the youngster’s arms and held him upright. “You saying your sister’s
too good to whore for us?”

“No,
no,” the boy rasped. “But Momma never wanted her to—”

“Dammit,
Hank. Let the boy go. I wanna see his pretty little sister,” the farmer said with
a sneer.

And
again, Hinto thought of that word “abuse.” There was no doubt in his mind every
one of these
good men
would rape the boy’s sister until they’d had their
fill. Sex had never been more necessary than it was lately. As if humanity
sought a hold on its own existence, men wanted nothing more than to shove a
pecker in a warm hole and strive to create in their own image. Even he had
thoughts of making a child someday. A fantasy, but one that haunted him despite
his troubles.

With
a sigh, he moved forward to help the kid when a familiar form stepped in
instead, gripping a troublesome, ivory-hilted knife.

“Let
him go. If it’s not a fair fight, you shouldn’t trouble yourselves.”

The
stranger’s voice was husky, low, and…feminine? Hinto stopped a few feet away
just as the kid ripped his arms free and dashed to freedom.

“Well,
now, friend, you just ruined a fine day’s entertainment,” Hank said.

Hinto
heard the slur of alcohol in his words.

“I’m
not your friend. But if you want a fight, I’ll happily give it to you.”

She
spoke with an odd accent. To his surprise, up close, Hinto couldn’t see her as
a male at all. That the others did attested to her height, her leanness, and
the clothing that hid all but her eyes from view.

“You’re
everywhere you shouldn’t be today, aren’t you?” he drawled.

She
didn’t give him an answer, not that he thought she would. Instead, she nailed
Hank in the balls and slammed her fist into one wrangler’s neck. He fell to the
ground next to Hank, gasping for breath.

His
friends roared their displeasure. One of them managed a punch that grazed off
her arm as she turned and crouched low with a leg sweep that took his friend
off his feet.

Hinto
grabbed her other attacker and knocked him out cold. He turned to help her with
the one on the ground and saw her calmly tying the man’s hands together with
his own belt. Hinto waited until she finished. “Not bad. Your hat’s falling,
though, and your bandana’s too low to hide that smooth chin of yours. How do
you keep the hat on, anyway?”

She
ignored him and stood. When she tried to walk away, he cut her off and
intercepted the fist meant for his throat. Her eyes widened.

“I
like your moves, but I’ve seen them before.” She met his stare, her green gaze
bright beneath the brim of her hat. “Damn, honey, you’re pretty,” he whispered,
conscious of the men around them and the fact that she dressed to disguise her
sex.

Pretty
didn’t come close to describing her, but it was all he could manage. Green eyes
dominated a face full of character and strength. High cheekbones, a slim nose
and stubborn jaw hinted at control issues. Her full lips remained flat, though
a rosy flush told him she wasn’t immune to his study. As he looked at the rest
of her, his body responded. How could it not? Despite the vest hiding her
chest, this close, he could see the faint swell of her breasts against the
denim underneath. She had a slender build, but no one fragile could take down
the Appersons or these louts. She stood only a few inches shorter than his own
formidable height. Were he to lean down, their lips would meet at the perfect
angle…

She
pushed away from him so suddenly she freed herself from his hold. She stepped
back and continued to stand in silence, watching him without expression. After
a few moments, she frowned, and her lips parted. He envisioned her on her
knees, her mouth open to receive him, and he had trouble stifling a groan of
pure need.

“What?
Don’t tell me you’re too scared to talk?” he asked in a thick voice, captivated
by the sweet femininity he could almost taste, wrapped in such a tough package.
He’d seen a few women who could handle themselves, but none of them had been
this fine. Or smelled so damned good. When the breeze blew, he caught a faint
flowery smell, one he couldn’t identify, but one that seemed to encapsulate the
woman before him. Pleasing, not overpowering, and addictive.

“I
don’t suppose you’d like to thank me for helping you by meeting me at Kitty’s?”
The cathouse rented rooms as well as provided services for paying clientele.

“Kitty’s?”
 

Definitely
new to town. “Kitty House is a whorehouse, a fine one, with a red awning over
the front porch.” Unlike Delware’s, Kitty didn’t advertise by forcing her women
to hang out the windows and flaunt themselves half-dressed.

She
blushed a bright red and focused on his mouth. “I have need of Kitty House.” She
licked her lips, and he wanted to shout out thanks to his maker.

“You
do?” He’d expected a refusal from this one. Not much shocked him, but this
woman continued to surprise him. “Well, hell, follow me.”

He
walked with a spring in his step, contemplating all the ways he planned to
slake this sudden lust. The fatigue weighing him down seemed to have all but
vanished. Conscious of her behind him, he wondered about her name, where she
was from, what brought her here.

And
then she walked around him to enter Kitty’s and requested a private audience
with the madam.

“What
the hell?” He walked in after her and saw DeeDee lounging in the blue room. Shit.
He didn’t want to upset her, but he couldn’t possibly ignore the opportunity to
slide between the thighs of this intriguing woman. He couldn’t explain his
urgent need to possess her, but until he rid himself of it, he’d get no peace. He
tried to follow her into the madam’s private quarters.

She
stopped right in front of him and turned around with an irritated expression on
her face. “Why do you follow me?”

“Honey,
you said you needed Kitty’s. And I sure as hell need you.” He glanced down at
himself, pleased when she followed his gaze and stared, her eyes growing wider
by the moment.