Savage Impulses

By

(C) Copyright by Danielle Dubois, September
2013

(C) Cover Art by Alex DeShanks, September
2013

ISBN 978-1-60394-859-3

Smashwords Edition

New Concepts Publishing

Lake Park, GA 31636

www.newconceptspublishing.com

This is a work of fiction. All characters,
events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be
confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is
merely coincidence.

Langtry, Texas, 1882

Marigold had thought that the ship that had
brought her to America was hell, but now she knew better.

“No,” she said, tears filling her green eyes.
“Please, sir, I can't put that on. I won't!”

Jocelyn Black, the man who had brought her to
this place, only stared at her for a moment and then shrugged,
closing the door behind her.

Shocked by the reprieve, Marigold almost
collapsed with relief. After the filthy ship that had borne her
away from her native city of Bristol, and after the cramped train
ride that had brought her to the wilds of Texas, she had been ready
to prove herself. She was willing to cook, to clean, to haul wood
and muck out stalls if she had to. She could even read and write,
and she had thought that perhaps a man would take her on as a tutor
for his children.

When she had arrived in Texas and been
brought to the batwing doors of Langtry's Blue Cat saloon, however,
she knew with a dreadful certainty that that hadn't been the work
that they had brought her here to do.

The sullen gazes of the gaudily-dressed
prostitutes bored into her as Black led her up the stairs to the
tiny bedroom, and she realized that soon she might be standing
among them, waiting for customers with that same vacant
hostility.

With a burst of frenzied energy, she shot to
the window. It was so small, but perhaps she could squeeze through
it.

Just as she was looking for something to pry
it up, however, the door opened and Black returned. This time, he
was not alone.

The girl was tiny, which made Marigold think
that she was a child, but when she looked up, Marigold could tell
that she was close to her own age, perhaps twenty or so. The girl
was dressed in the most flimsy silk skirt she'd ever seen, and she
blushed when she saw that she wore nothing under her corset.

The girl looked up at her fearfully.

Marigold had to restrain the urge to go hug
her, to get her away from the monster who walked like a respectable
man.

“You're new,” Black said flatly. “I guess
your hide's a little too nice to mark up before I get anything from
you, but Maisey here, she's not new at all. You get those clothes
on or I'm just going to beat her ass until you do.”

At the word, Maisey went limp in Black's
hands, sobbing hysterically.

He held her up without a tremor.

Marigold could see red welt marks on the pale
girl's shoulder, shockingly bright and livid.

Black fingered his silver-chased belt
meaningfully.

In the face of that black leather slamming
into the other girl's skin, Marigold's resolve broke. She nodded
tightly, expecting them to leave.

Black slouched back on one leg, watching her
coldly and keeping the sobbing Maisey in place.

Hot shame scoured Marigold as she realized
that she was meant to undress in front of this man, but the threat
of his belt on the poor girl's body steeled her. She stripped off
her cracked leather shoes, but she realized that that was the easy
part. Taking a deep breath, she undid the hooks of her calico
dress. She resolutely ignored Black's low sarcastic whistle as she
draped her dress over the room's small bed and unlaced her old
corset. Soon she was standing and shivering in nothing but her
camisole, her drawers and her stockings. Her hands were shaking too
hard to continue.

Maisey squealed piteously when Black pinched
her soft upper arm. “Please, Miss!” she cried woefully.

The girl's plea forced Marigold to continue.
Soon she was standing naked.

Black made her pause while he examined her
from breasts to ankles. She’d revealed a body that was as pale as
cream and as smooth as she undressed.

She was barely above medium height, but her
curves were voluptuous. In the fading light of the day, her skin
glowed, and her dark hair, still in its demure bun, took on hints
of copper. Against the cooler air, her coral-colored nipples
tightened making his dick hard.

Marigold resisted the urge to cover them and
the curly hair between her legs. Instead, she took a deep breath
and turned to the clothes that had been provided.

First were the flimsy drawers that barely
covered the curves of her rear, and she realized with a sick
feeling that they were made without a center seam. Anyone could
part the fabric and see her most secret parts. Underneath the
drawers were a pair of barely-there stockings and an old set of
tall heels that made her wobble. She flushed with shame when she
bent to fasten the clasps. Then was the corset, black silk and far
finer than her old canvas set, but it nipped her in so tight that
she gasped. It plumped up her breasts, forcing them high and round.
She realized it stood her up straight while pushing her rear out at
the same time. The skirt came last, a swishy fall of green taffeta
that rustled around her legs but barely came below her knees.

“There's... there's no blouse.”

Black sneered at her. “Of course there's
not,” he said.

She realized with a fresh surge of horror
where she was and what Black intended for her.

* * * *

Langtry rose up out of the prairie like a
nightmare, and Jake Sloan scowled hard at it as he drew even
closer.

Sensing her master's displeasure, Tamu
whickered, dancing nervously on the road.

Jake calmed her with a soft touch of his hand
to her neck, murmuring gentle words in Comanche. She was a tobacco
paint horse, splotched pure white and deep chestnut. He had never
had a finer mount. She could be temperamental, especially if she
felt she had been slighted, but there had never been an animal as
responsive, as steady, or as even-tempered.

He had acquired her from his cousin, who
lived with his mother's people. She turned out to be worth every
buffalo robe he had offered. Some of the elders spat at a man of
mixed blood riding such a fine Comanche horse, but he thought wryly
that he could live with the dishonor. On the ranch, she was worth
her weight in gold, but even selling her wouldn't have made up a
fraction of the money that he needed right now.

In a drawer back home, there was a desperate
letter from his half-brother. They hadn't spoken in years, but
Peter had always treated him well. Now Peter's daughter Lily, who
Jake had last seen as a sweetly cheerful toddler in Boston, was
ill. The doctors of Boston had thought that she would die, but then
Peter had had hope in the form of a doctor in Vienna.

Please, if I have ever done anything to help
you, if we have ever been family, please help us...

Jake knew that he had to help where he could,
but he was also painfully aware of how precarious his own situation
was. He owned his own small ranch, his horse, and his cattle, but
they were just intended for his survival. Real cash was something
else, and he could only think of one way to get it.

He rode into Langtry just as dusk was
falling. The streets were already filling up with drunks and
cowboys as he pulled Tamu sharply to one side to avoid a man who
was reeling down the street. The man got a good look at Jake's dark
skin and knife-straight black hair, spat, and swore, but when he
saw the rifle that was comfortably holstered at Jake's side, he
moved on.

Jake hitched Tamu up outside of the Blue Cat
saloon, flipping one of the local boys a penny to keep an eye on
her, and walked through the batwing doors. He knew that what he was
doing was risky, but some part of him couldn't resist the thrill of
stepping back into a time of life he had thought long past him.

* * * *

Though she shivered in her thin clothes,
Marigold stood with her chin held high. Black had left her alone
for a bit, taking Maisey with him, and now he was back, looking her
up and down with no compassion at all in his cold eyes.

“Not bad,” he said finally. “You, girl, are
you a virgin?”

“Of course,” she said, shocked, and then she
was sickened by why he might want to know.

“Every girl down there says she is,” he
informed her, “but you, with that cute face of yours, I don't know,
maybe you can sell it.”

“I don't want to sell it,” she protested.

Her words were cut off with a brisk slap to
the face.

She cried out, stumbling back.

He wrapped his enormous bear's paw of a hand
around her upper arm, closing cruelly.

Now she could see why Maisey feared this man
so much, he was enormously strong and not overly concerned with
being gentle.

“You're going to,” he told her flatly, “or at
least, I'm going to. Come on, now.” With nothing more than that, he
pulled her half off her feet.

She was descending into the crowded common
room that she had passed through so quickly before. On the
stairway, she passed a girl hurrying up the stairs, nursing a split
lip. At the bottom, she saw another girl pressed against the wall
and being pawed by a drunken farmhand. She bit her lip against the
terror that it would soon be her that was so brutally mauled and
did her best to keep her balance on the uneven floor boards.

The saloon itself was dim but large. It was
lit with lanterns on every table, and, behind the long bar, there
was a fine mirror that was crackled with age. It gave everything an
air of debauched finery, as did the women in bright, flimsy
clothing, and the men who were already carousing the night
away.

Black brought her to a table close to the
back where there were already two men seated. They turned to hail
Black with cautious hellos, and he took his place at the table
silently.

Marigold looked for a chair where she was
supposed to sit.

With an icy glance and a gesture, Black told
her that she was meant to stand.

She instinctively tried to slouch and cover
her bared breasts with her hands.

When Black saw what she was doing, he stood
up again with a snarl. “Up,” he commanded. “Hands behind your back
and tits out, you understand? I want them to see what you got.”

“What, she's your stake?” one of the other
men scoffed.

The other man laughed.

They subsided under Black's murderous gaze,
muttering that whatever Black wanted was fine anyway, and they
started to play.

Marigold realized numbly that they were
playing for her. Despite their initial protest, she could see their
eyes start to scan her body, up to her breasts and down her thighs.
The thought of going with one of those men, of letting them touch
her and handle her, made her sick, and she choked back the tears
that were welling up in her eyes.

She didn't have much, but she had her
courage, and she refused to let them think that she was afraid.

Marigold barely flinched when Black wrote her
name on a piece of paper and tossed it in. At first, she kept track
of whose pile it was in, but then she couldn't even do that. She
sunk into fear and exhaustion, oblivious to everything until she
noticed that the table had stilled.

“Well if it isn't fine Mr. Sloan,” drawled
Black. “And we thought you were too fancy to come play in Langtry
anymore...”

The man who had just arrived was taller than
Black but slender and lithely muscled. When he removed his hat,
Marigold could see a face that was surprisingly young. The newcomer
had no mustache or beard, but there was a firm set to his mouth and
his hard jaw that told her that he was no one to be trifled with.
With his straight black hair, sharp nose and deep brown eyes, she
realized with a shock that he must be at least part Indian.