Kitabı oxu: «Scandal: A tempting Western romance»

Contents

Cover

Blurb

Book List

Title Page

Copyright

Author Bio

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Extract

Endpages

About the Publisher

Chapter One

“I tell ya, Ellen, I’m just not having it!”

Ellen stared into the hard, dark eyes of Al Swearengen. Her heart thundered and she trembled from head to toe. The familiar aroma of stale sweat and whisky that permeated the bar of the Gem suddenly made her feel queasy.

“It ain’t your choice to make, Al!” she snapped.

She would not give in to him on this. She had every right now to follow her own heart. Her life would finally be her own.

“But…what’ll I do without you?” Al wheedled. He held out his hands and tilted his head. “I need you here, Ellen. You’ve been with me since the outset. Besides…” He gestured around the saloon. “The girls need ya. How’ll they manage? Most of ’em will end up pregnant after a flop or two then try to get rid of it themselves and wind up dyin’ of a fever.”

Ellen ground her teeth together and pressed her fists into her thighs. She tried not to look around at the faces of the whores but the urge was overwhelming. They gazed at her from all corners of the Gem, their painted faces haggard and drawn, their eyes sad and pleading.

What Al said was true. They did need her.

Her resolve started to drift away like gun smoke on the breeze.

“Don’t you let him change yer mind!” Kacey appeared at her side. “You’re doin’ the right thing, honey! It’s time for you to get outta this hell hole!”

“If you’re gonna listen to that dried-up old dove then you’re a bigger fool than I had ya pegged for!” Al shrugged then moved behind the bar and poured himself a slug of whisky.

Ellen turned to Kacey. “I know that it’s time for me to go.” She straightened her corset and repositioned her breasts. “It’s just…I feel so responsible for all of you.”

“I know, Ellen. You’ve been like a mother hen to us but you’ve a right to try out a different kinda life. Hell, we all envy ya! But not many whores have the determination to save a dime, let alone enough to set off into the world.”

“The world?” Ellen grinned.

“Well…Custer City at least,” Kacey shrugged.

“Hell, it’s gotta be better than this place.” Ellen slapped her thigh. “An’ if it ain’t then I’ll just keep on goin’.” She hoped that she sounded more confident than she felt.

“Come on, sweetheart, I’ll help ya pack.” Kacey strolled through the bar then up the three-tiered wooden staircase.

Ellen followed, casting an apologetic glance at the girls as she passed them. Surely the time had come for her to cut the apron strings? It wasn’t easy for any of them. She knew that. She’d been where they were now. These poor daughters of Deadwood had little to make their lives bearable but Ellen had done her best for them. She’d protected them from Al’s fiercest rages, rescued them from violent customers and helped them to get rid of the babies they could never manage to care for. She had tried to ease the tragedy that surrounded them daily in the only way she could – by being there for them.

But now it was her time. Time to leave and live a little while she still had the chance.

She just wished that it wasn’t so difficult leaving them all behind.

She’d been with Al since 1877, just after he’d opened the Gem. Thirteen years of her life dedicated to whoring then caring for the other girls. With her help, he’d rebuilt it following fire and flood. He was an old goat and could be hellish mean to the girls when his black moods took him. But he was all she’d ever known. Ellen had been just sixteen when he’d taken her in and she’d been swayed by his charm for, what, all of five minutes. Then she’d become a victim of his harsh treatment and bullying.

And she had been so young and vulnerable then. Her mama had died of the smallpox and her stepfather had immediately taken up with another woman. An actress no less. He spent his days drinking and gambling away what money her mama had saved and Ellen was left with nothing. As a young woman, her choices were limited. She had gone to the handsome young Al Swearengen and naively asked him for employment, hoping that he would offer her a job cleaning the rooms or helping with the cooking. But he had coerced her into another role altogether. One flop led to another and before she knew it, she’d been whoring for a year with no prospect of escape.

The years had passed and she had sunk into a kind of acceptance of her role. She was a whore. That was how it was. Whisky helped to numb the distaste and occasionally opium offered a complete numbness that helped her to drift away from her life altogether. But when one of the girls had overdosed on the drug, Ellen had weaned herself off it and sworn never to succumb to its deadly embrace again. It just wasn’t for her.

Until finally, just after her twenty-seventh birthday, she’d found the bravery to stand up to Al and the lifestyle she loathed. She couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it was that changed in her, but something snapped. Perhaps it was losing that last little baby…She shook the image of the perfectly-formed little corpse from her mind. It could well have been that.

And enough was enough. Al had given her a few days to recover from the miscarriage then told her to get on her back again. She had refused. Sure enough, she’d gotten a black eye and a few cracked ribs in the process as she had continued to refuse, but after that he left her alone and stopped trying to make her whore. She was surprised at his acceptance…amazed if she was honest…but he was a hard man to understand and, in the face of the opportunity to keep her pussy to herself, she didn’t want to question his intentions. So, instead of being ground into the straw-filled burlap ticking of an evening, she stayed on as a kind of nurse to the other girls, helping them with their daily scourging and treating them when they got poorly. It had suited her…for a while…as she continued to save the money she got paid for her new role. It wasn’t much but it was what she intended on using to support herself once she got to Custer City. After that, she’d find work cleaning or perhaps in a shop. She had to believe that there would be a way for her to earn money that didn’t involve opening her legs for a string of randy men.

“Hey, Al,” she called from the bottom step. “I don’t want no trouble atwixt us, ya hear? It’s been a long journey and I just wanna move on now.”

Who was she trying to convince?

He gave her one of his sardonic smiles then raised his shot glass. “I wish ya well, ma dear! I wish ya well.”

****

In the small messy bedroom, Ellen handed Kacey her silver-plated hairbrush.

“Here, I want you to have this.”

She turned and stood before the smudged full-length mirror, gazing at her sorry reflection. She’d changed so much in her time at the Gem. Her long black hair still shone but a few strands had turned white and, though her eyes were still as blue as cornflowers, they were hard and tired. If only she could turn back time to be a sweet and innocent sixteen-year-old once more.