Riding With the Devil's Mistress (Lou Prophet Western #3) by Peter Brandvold Page A

out on the
street of this ambitious little railroad stop, they might have
wondered what had brought this girl here—a pretty blonde in her
late teens riding a tall, broad-chested black Morgan. They might
have thought she was a farmer ’s daughter come to buy some flour or eggs at the
general store, for she wore a round, felt farm hat with a chin
thong, a weathered brown poncho, and the kind of long, gray skirt
favored by farm women.
    The fine horse would have thrown them off,
however. The Winchester carbine poking out of her saddle boot would
have stumped them, too, for few girls rode around this country
armed with rifles, let alone Winchester carbines.
    Running her tongue along her
upper lip and inhaling deeply, steeling herself, the girl kneed the
Morgan over to the hitch rack. She dismounted, while keeping an eye
on the hotel ’s single door and its single frosted window. Her hands
trembling slightly, she looped the reins over the rack.
    Turning, she faced the building for several
seconds before walking resolutely to the door, twisting the knob,
and pushing it open. She closed it quickly with only a cursory
glance around the room, and made for a table near the wall on her
left.
    She took a seat with her back to the wall,
planted her elbows on the table, and rested her chin in her hands,
taking the time now to glance around.
    There was a bar along the right
side of the room, and lined up at the bar, their backs to her, were
the four men who belonged to the four horses outside. They
hadn ’t seen
her yet. Only the barman had seen her—a stocky man with sandy hair
and an ostentatious mustache wearing sleeve garters and a white
apron. He gazed at her with a question wrinkling the bridge of his
nose.
    The four men standing at the
bar noticed the barman ’s gaze and turned to follow it to the girl, who
smiled, removed her hat, and tossed it on the chair beside her. She
shook her head, tossing her long, blond hair out from the collar of
her worn poncho, then replaced her chin in her hands.
    The barman cleared his throat,
lifted his chin, and called, ‘If you’re waitin’ for the stage, Miss, it don’t
get here till tomorrow noon.’
    ‘ I’m
not,’ she said.
    Puzzled, the barman glanced at
the others. The others glanced at each other. Then the man farthest
on the girl ’s left said, ‘Maybe she’s waitin’ for the
train.’
    The others laughed.
    ‘ Nope.
I ain’t waitin’ for the train, neither,’ she said. ‘I’m just
waitin’.’ Her voice was at once girlish and mature; it was a trait
that made her appealing to men. Especially men, she had found to
her horror, like the ones before her now: denim-clad
hookworms.
    The others shared glances again, chuckling.
The four along the bar elbowed each other, snickering. Finally, one
picked up his beer mug and made his way to the table, weaving a
little, sucking in his gut and adjusting the holster tied low on
his thigh. He had curly hair under a battered hat with a funneled
brim, and his brown eyes were bleary.
    ‘ Well,
you must be waitin’ for somethin’,’ he said when he’d stopped
before her, grinning down at her stupidly.
    ‘ No,
not really,’ she said. ‘I was just passin’ through and thought I’d
take a breather, maybe have a sarsaparilla’—she glanced at the
barman—’if you have any, sir.’
    The man before her laughed.
Turning to the barman he mocked, ‘If you have any, sir.’
    The three men at the bar laughed. The barman
turned to them, and he laughed, too.
    The man before her turned to
her and planted his left fist on the table, regarding her lewdly,
running his eyes over the two pert swellings in her poncho. ‘Why don’t you have
a beer with me?’ he said. ‘I’ll buy.’
    ‘ I
don’t much care for spiritous liquids, sir,’ the girl said. ‘My
grandmother raised me to believe they were brewed by the devil and
imbibed by the damned.’
    More laughter. The man standing
over the girl smiled down at her, showing his brown teeth.