Rated R
Cassie and Ray rode back to the ranch in silence. Finally, Cassie leaned over and pulled on the reins, easing the horses to a slow trot and then halted them completely. She smiled beguilingly up at Ray and said, "Ray I need to stop and stretch my legs, for the baby, okay?"
She walked down to the nearby stream and with a small basket began to pick wild lemon balm, lemon verbena and sorrel. The first two would make good scents for soap, the latter a good soup for a late dinner. She sensed that Ray was behind her; she always could feel his presence now even before he made a sound. He stood behind her and began to embrace her as she slowly stood up. Cassie leaned back into his embrace.
He started to speak and Cassie knew not to interrupt him, "Cassie, in all of my life and all of my days, I never thought I would ever be lucky enough to meet someone and fall in love. My mama used to tell me when I was a boy that God made someone special just for me and for all the other little children and that when we grew up we would find that special someone. Well, Cassie until 4 months ago, I never believed her, I wanted to but I did not ever think I deserved it. Cassie you are the perfect love, the person that God deigned for me. Trouble is, I do not think I deserve you or your love. I love you so much my body aches for the pain of my heart beating so hard in anticipation of seeing you and being with you every minute."
Cassie turned in Ray's arms and kissed him gently on the lips. "Ray you make me so happy, I feel so complete in your love and your embrace. Not that you make me who I am but that your love allows me to become the person I want to be."
"Cass, all I have ever learned is that life is hard and life is not fair. I dread the future now, although yesterday I yearned for it. I know the other shoe is going to drop anytime now and I will-- Oh Cassie, I am so afraid of losing you, of losing your love."
"Oh Ray, you will never lose me or our child, I promise you that. I love you too, with all of my heart." She reached up and pulled his head to her touch her own, she pulled on his neck to deepen their embrace and as their foreheads touched, she reached down between them and began to unbutton his pants.
"Cass, wait, um er," and he was gone with the usual lustful feelings she aroused in his very being. He pulled her closer and slowly walked arm in arm with her back up the small bank. Then he slowly and playfully backed her up against the wagon. Their kisses built up to a raging fire, hell, they built a bonfire at that moment. Ray leaned down and undid the buttons on the front of her dress, he traced a slow meandering length of kisses down to the well between her breasts, and she pulled him closer and attempted to push her legs up and around him. He lifted her then in one fluid movement and laid her on the cushioned wagon seat.
She began to pull at his clothing, undoing the buttons on his shirt and following each opened button with deep kisses down his chest starting at the place which made him laugh when she kissed him; it tickled him when she kissed that small place where the collarbones meet. She then began moving southward and began to pull on his pants, pulling open the buttons, she then unfastened the loops on his rawhide belt and threw it into the air like a lasso. She yelled yippee and he seized her mouth again and did not stop kissing her until she began to moan and cry out his name to give her release, as only he knew how to do.
She began to move beneath him wiggling her body down his sensuously feeling his muscles contract in response to her movements. He rolled them both over so that she sat astride him and slowly at first; he penetrated her body and taught her to ride him as if he were a young green stallion that needed breaking. He helped her find the perfect pace and moved his hand between them to work some taming moves of his own. Ray loved seeing her mane of lioness hair move back and forth in the fading sunset. He loved watching her large breasts move about while they made love; her breasts were growing larger now as the result of the fruit of his loins now planted deep in her belly.
Their lovemaking was wild and rough and tumble and full of joy just like always. He felt her start to spasm and contract around him and he already lost in passion for this woman soon found his release almost at the same time as she did. They lay together, she on top of him, her back covered with a blanket which he threw over her for warmth and protection. Ray lay on the bottom feeling the warmth of her full body encasing his. Slowly and reluctantly, he pulled himself from her body and away from her warmth. She stirred and mumbled and he said "honey, we need to get."
As Cassie shook off the dazed effects their lovemaking always left her with, Ray helped her straighten and fix her skirts and they both helped one another dress-buttoning up where need be. Ray found his belt in a bush of stickers and teased Cassie relentlessly about it. The afterwards for them was as much a part of their love as the actual act was for them both. Ray righted Cassie on the wagon and said, "Honey, now I need to say this once and you need to hear me out."
"I am not the man you think that I am. I do not even think that I am the man you need. I sure as hell know that in the past, I would never have been the man you wanted. I have done many stupid things, I have broken the law, used people, stolen land and those are just the things I can fess up to tell you about today. Lord willing I am going to try to rectify and fix everything because I want to for myself, for our love and for our child. I guess what I am saying is that no matter what happens Cass, no matter what you find out about me, or hear about me, I want you to know one thing."
Cassie was confused and sad but still trusting of Ray, her Ray who had made her a better person, who had brought her love and fulfillment and desire for the future. "Ray tell me this one thing, sweetling."
Ray bit down on his lip, he was not a man to ever cry, this was as emotional as he got about things, "Cassie, I want you to remember no matter what, that I have truly and deeply loved you as I have loved no one else in my life. You are the most treasured, the most beautiful, and the dearest thing to my heart, in my heart for all eternity. There is only you Cassie, it has always been you even before I met you. Please promise me that you will always remember these words and that you will believe they were, they are true until the die I take my leave from this earth. Do you promise me then now darling? Because in a short time our lives may be over as we know it now. This bliss we are sharing my love may be short lived. Tell me that you know you are my special angel on earth, that you know I have only loved you forever."
"Ray I do honor your pledge and I hear and believe what you have told me. I do not understand it Ray, but I trust you and I trust in our love. Now I am cold honey and this little baby is too, take us home Ray, please?"
So they rode to the ranch and they lay once more in their big bed and held each other for the entire night, Cassie in blissful happiness and Ray in mortal fear of losing the only goodness that ever entered into his life.
Danny walked over to his office and greeted his deputy. Jim LeMay was there again, and the Marshall gently reminded Jim that he was deputized only on an as needed basis. Jesse and Jim both questioned Danny about what "as needed meant" and got Danny to admit that in the case of an emergency when he was missing or hurt, Jesse could deputize Jim once more and the two of them could conduct Marshall-like business. Danny emphasized the emergency and missing parts of his statement several times for the duo. He walked out on the street and saw Ross Mahler running down the street yelling, "Where is Doc Bauer and Nurse Blume, Blake is having the twins early, too early, has anyone seem them? She was unloading twenty sacks of root vegetables while I was doing the books and I fear that might have brought on the birth time too early." Danny wondered at his statement, what brought about Blake's early labor? Ross's doing the books or this buffoon having his wife unload sacks of root vegetables while she was eight months pregnant and no doubt caring for 10 children.
Matt Reardon, the livery hand, who was bringing up a horse freshly shod, he served as a horse farrier (one who shoes horses) as well as a blacksmith and liveryman, suggested that Ross try the Doc's office. Ross looked aghast as if he truly had failed to think of that as an option. Danny chuckled, new fathers, but shouldn't Ross be used to this by now?
Within minutes Ross, Doc and Abby were all safely ensconced in Doc's little surrey with his faithful horse, Popcorn, leading the way. All of this was so odd to the Marshall for so many reasons. First off, why didn't they all just walk, the grocery store and the Mahler's house was just two blocks down Front Street. Secondly, it always struck him as odd that Mahler kept getting his wife pregnant. If both of these twins lived that would make 12 children for the middle-aged couple. Ross was downright pompous at times when he bragged about his law degree (Santos believed that out here in the West, the only useful purpose for a law diploma was to burn it on a cold winter's night) and the fact that he wanted a bakers dozen of children, thirteen in total.
How could an educated man, a man with advanced degrees keep putting his beloved wife in jeopardy and through painful childbirth repeatedly? There were things a man could do to protect a loved one, a wife from becoming enceinte repeatedly. No one talked about it in polite company. Still everyone knew the concepts. It just called for a little will power.
Mahler yelled out from the surrey as the threesome rode by, "Hey Marshall, keep plenty of hay in the barn and you'll find that a smart horse always finds the way home." Danny assumed this applied to his new marriage. He needed a handbook or a notebook to write all these sayings down that was for sure.
It was a minor miracle that the Marshall could hear Ross Mahler at all. He had tried to lean in when they drove by to hear what Ross said above the din created by the incessantly arguing two of a kind, Doc Rick Bauer and Nurse Abigail Blume. Today's topic seemed to be whether to encourage Blake Mahler to use natural childbirth procedures in line with Abby's training as a midwife or to use chloroform and laudanum during the childbirth process to assist Blake with her pain. Abby said proper breathing, standing, and walking during the labor pains would be beneficial. Doc Bauer said knocking her out until the last minute was the ideal recourse.
Somehow, inevitably the conversation turned as it always did to the old Civil War debate. Would these two fools ever stop talking about that war, it was over eight years ago and in the past? Why continue to bring it up? Danny had burned or sold most of his old uniforms, equipment and tack to who ever wanted it right after the war, one thing was for sure; that old stuff would never be worth anything. Would people still be talking about the war even ten years from now, heck no!
Danny pondered, beyond the fact that it gave good people like David Grant and Miss Vicki a free and honest start to a new life, he did not see what good the war had done. Even though the slaves were freed it would be years before the south would ever change enough to allow voting privileges to the black man, legally and properly no matter what laws and amendments the Congress enacted. Things were not much better in the north, where like other minority groups the blacks were just like the Irish, Swedes, Poles and any other group just off the boat from Europe; underpaid and abused by the richer more affluent and established white man. Nope the only place for immigrants and the black man to get an even shake was in the west, out here at least these groups could make a go at it and meet with less prejudice. There was still prejudice for sure but less of it. Nope, out here in the Wild West, another minority was the one oppressed. By taking their lands, starving them, giving them diseases like small pox and taking away their pride and way of life, the white man was quickly destroying the Native American tribes. Pushing them to smaller and smaller tracts of land called reservations the Indians were left with insufficient resources to support their families and livestock and if they chose to go to the reservation they were turning their lives over to the white man to become subservient to their way of life. If they stayed true to their way of life they faced constant persecution, moved farther west to unknown territories such as Arizona and New Mexico and constant fears of being mowed down by the Union Army. Danny shook his head, he had to think on something else, he was just one man, he did what he could for the local tribes still in the area, he was proud of that. But the fact remained that Santos was one man compared to the thousands and thousands of other white men who had a different idea.
What had he been thinking on, oh yes, Abby and Rick, the two of them fighting the Civil War repeatedly? Those fools, it was not as if any of this would matter a hundred years from now. No way would a bunch of people be reading about, plotting, thinking or debating the war between the north and the south. It was over, done, finished.
Danny Santos walked into the hotel and greeted Miss Vicki. He inquired about his wife and the kind proprietress told him that Mrs. Santos went up to their rooms' hours ago. Miss Vicki rolled her eyes when she saw Danny carrying the half-full bottle of whiskey he had retrieved from LeMay. Two drunken deputies down at the jailhouse were just an accident waiting to happen! He did not ask Miss Vicki why she gave him a look and she did not offer up a reason. He hoped that she was one of the few people in town Michelle had yet to tell that their marriage was a sham.
His first day back as the Dodge Marshall had started out with a near romantic encounter with his little wife and had gone from interesting to downright befuddling. One hell of a long day, he thought. I need to get some shuteye.
He walked up to the suite, opened the door and went directly to his room. He cleaned up using the pitcher and bowl on his washstand, allowing the moonlight to serve as a substitute for the light from a kerosene lamp. Without paying much attention, he stripped down and climbed into bed. Flinging his right arm up over his head his fingers came in contact with something soft, wispy. He turned over and in the moonlight saw his bewitching wife watching him with her big brown eyes, "Hello Marshall, nice to see you again so soon."
Without thinking, Santos muttered loudly, "Oh God, you are in for it now little lady." He pulled her to him and she willingly rolled over towards him and folded herself into his waiting arms.
Part 12C, The Lesson For The Day
