Jan Springer - The Pleasure Girl

It wasn’t like them to not give him a warning. Something bad must’ve happened to them. Something real bad.

Logan readied the bottle. He’d crack it now and rush the intruder. As if sensing what he was thinking, Teyla shook her head, grabbed a robe hanging off the hook and put it on. Without another glance at him, she walked out of the bathroom, closing the door firmly behind her. Fuck!

Teyla’s knees literally shook as she closed the door behind her and came face-to-face with the law.

“Linus? I didn’t hear you knock.” She tried to keep the anger out of her voice, but it was hard. Linus McWilliams, the self-appointed sheriff around these parts, was a constant thorn in her side. Not only was he the law, he was also the banker who held the mortgage on her land. She’d never liked the creepy way he looked at her with the palest blue eyes. He wore his blond hair in a short military cut and had a large moustache that curled upwards at the sides. He was a short, plump man with a red face who was always dropping in on her uninvited, pretending to check up on her. But what he really wanted was to have sex with her. She’d told him many times she didn’t service married men. Under any conditions. He’d been pretty much the only man she knew whose wife had survived the Catastrophe. All other couples she’d known had lost their partners.

“I knocked, but you must not have heard,” he replied, but she could read the lie quite clearly in his eyes.

Like hell he’d knocked. She’d been drifting leisurely in the after-sex glow, but she hadn’t been asleep. She’d been enjoying the sounds of Logan’s easy breathing and the way his cock had been swelling once again against her foot, but she hadn’t heard anything aside from the creak on the floor of her bedroom to indicate someone had entered.

“I was bathing,” she explained, casting him a smile she certainly didn’t feel. Inside, she felt cold toward him and couldn’t wait for him to be gone. “I had a customer. You just missed him.”

His smile dropped at the mention of a customer. She knew he’d been chasing her clients away. Had heard the rumors and could tell by the way his eyes blazed that he was angry.

“I’m here on business, actually,” he said tightly. A muscle twitched in his jaw, giving away his tension.

“Oh? And what business is that? Your next payment isn’t due until the end of the month. That’s still a week away.” She wondered if he’d seen the saddlebag Logan had brought into her kitchen. She’d moved it off the table and placed it in the corner behind the table out of the way. If he’d glanced down at the floor behind the table, he would have seen it. Surely, he’d seen Logan’s black leather jacket. She couldn’t remember where he’d left it. And had his two friends left anything of theirs lying around? How was she going to explain that? Like it was his business. She’d tell him that straight out if he asked.

Without waiting for an answer, she walked over to her dresser, grabbed her brush, and started brushing her hair. If he thought it odd she hadn’t washed the top of her hair while she’d been taking a bath, he didn’t mention it. Perhaps it was damp enough from all that splashing around during their foot sex? She tensed as his eyes strayed to the closed bathroom door. Thankfully, though, he didn’t move toward it.

“There was a train robbery over in Parkway,” he said. Parkway was a city south along the quickly crumbling highway going through an area that had once been called Banff National Park. City and town names used before the Catastrophe were being changed as survivors took over. There were so many changes, she hadn’t bothered to keep track any longer.

“Oh? So that’s the one that’s thirty or so miles north of here?”

“Thirty-five miles south, actually.”

“Anyone hurt?” she asked as she kept brushing her mid-back-length strands and stared at him in the mirror. She noticed how his gaze drifted from the closed door to her face as she asked that question. Good. Now all she needed to do was keep his attention focused on her, and hopefully, he wouldn’t ask why the door was shut.

“One of the guards was wounded. Nothing serious.”

“Well, that’s a good thing. So what brings you here?”

She leaned over, allowing the top part of her robe to fall open as she brushed her hair from underneath. Hopefully he’d be distracted enough by a good look at her breasts to forget why he’d come? Yeah, right.

Linus cleared his throat, but his gaze remained on her the curves of her exposed breasts.

“T…The Durango Gang…was responsible. They…uh…split up…um…into groups of three men each.”

A blade of uneasiness swept through her. Okay, so she didn’t have to do the math regarding having three men on her property.

“They…uh…ride horses.” He cleared his throat again, and shifted uneasily on his feet.

Lovely, Logan had come with a horse. What about the other two? She hadn’t seen any, but they could have put their horses in the barn before they’d even come into the house to announce their arrival.

“Doesn’t everybody ride horses these days? Gas prices being the way they are.” God, she hoped he didn’t hear the loud thumps of her heart. Had he checked the barn? No, he would be jumpy or out of character if he’d investigated and seen a strange horse or horses. Or, for that matter, if he’d seen Cassidy and Spencer. And if those two had seen the sheriff approaching, surely they would have sounded the alarm. So, that probably meant the sheriff didn’t know she had company, and Spencer and Cassidy may not know. Great scenario if the two decided to announce their arrival in her farmhouse with this guy here. If they were the outlaws, there was the potential for a shootout here. She needed to get him out of here and fast.

Her blood froze at his next words. “I…um noticed…two sets of horse tracks about a mile from here. A single set…uh…two miles up the road. All three sets…um… disappeared into the river that runs directly through your land. Um…did you see anyone?”

Teyla laughed, hoping it didn’t sound as forced and nervous as it sounded to her.

“With most of the world’s population wiped out, I’ve seen maybe one stranger since the Catastrophe.” Too bad you didn’t get wiped out too, she added silently. Life would have been a whole lot easier if he had literally been snuffed to dust.

“I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place,” she continued. “If you’re looking for three men, sheriff, I only do one at a time and two a day. Keeps the doctor away.”

She winked at him, and the sheriff frowned and shifted restlessly, obviously not comfortable with what she was saying.

Once again, he cleared his throat as she stopped brushing her hair and straightened up, the top part of her robe naturally covering her breasts again.

“I just want you to…um…to be careful. You being here all alone and everything. People with self-sustainable farms are being killed outright and their homes taken.”

Great. Was that a threat? Teyla steadied her nerves and placed her hair brush onto the letters Dr. Liz had sent regarding Logan and his two friends, then slipped hand into her robe pocket, quickly withdrawing the item she kept there. It was her backup gun. One of many that she’d found while pillaging through neighboring homes after the Catastrophe. Homes where her friends had once lived before her friends, too, had disintegrated. No ammo for this gun, but, hey, he didn’t know that, now did he.

His pale blue eyes widened in surprise and his long moustache twitched nervously when she pulled out her gun. Bubbles of excitement burst inside her as he took a couple of steps backward. If the deep valley of her exposed breasts hadn’t fully caught his attention, well, her small derringer certainly did.