Page 7 of Runaway Hucow

The leader let his eyes linger on her chest for another moment, then he lifted his gaze to look at her face. He had the cold, blue eyes of a killer.

“Your name’s Tess.”

“No, I—”

“I weren’t askin’,” the man said. “Your name’s Tess. You’re a wanted hucow.”

“Please sir, I swear, whoever it is you’re looking for, I’m not—”

“Shaddup!” the leader snapped again. “You fit the description of the heifer we’re huntin’. Black hair. Tanned skin. Great big ol’ titties. Yeah… I can see why that feller is so eager to get you back.”

The leader moved forward and crouched right in front of her. Tess would have liked to kick him in the balls the way she’d done with the auctioneer, but she was afraid to do anything so long as that gun was pointed at her.

“You’re a pretty little thing, ain’t ya?” He pressed the muzzle against Tess’s breast and circled her nipple with it. The touch of the hard metal against her bare skin made her shiver. “Looks like you’ve been leakin’. I reckon maybe we ought to milk you before we haul you and your titties back to Crooked Valley.”

His free hand went to Tess’s other breast. When she tried to pull away from him, he dug the muzzle of his pistol into her flesh.

“Hold still,” he hissed.

He grabbed her breast again, and this time he squeezed her so hard she yelped in pain. A few white tears of milk wept out of her nipple. He brushed them away with the tip of his thumb, then he started to lift his thumb to his mouth, but before it got there, a voice boomed out across the plains.

“Let that hucow alone.”

The bounty hunter jumped up as quick as a snake and spun to face the new voice. His two partners turned as well, though not half as fast as their leader. Tess wiped the tears out of her eyes and looked too. When she saw what was there, her heart clenched like a fist inside her.

Twenty paces out, a shadow was standing in the swaying grass.

A huge shadow wearing buffalo hides and horns.

CHAPTER 5

For what seemed like an eternity, nobody spoke. The three bounty hunters and the lone stranger in buffalo hides watched each other across the rippling blades of grass, and Tess sat silently, watching all of them. The wind sighed patiently through the leaves of the aspen trees behind her, and behind the trees, the little stream continued gurgling over the smooth stones. Only the birds had stopped singing. Maybe if I’d noticed that sooner, Tess thought, I would have realized danger was approaching.

But it was too late for that now. Danger had already arrived, and there would be no escaping it. Every tiny hair on Tess’s body seemed to be standing on end in anticipation.

It was the leader of the three bounty hunters who first broke the silence.

“Listen, stranger. This here’s none of your mix. Go on about your business, and nobody needs to get hurt.” He kept his pistol aimed at the giant in buffalo hides, and his two partners did likewise.

The giant appeared to be unarmed. His eyes glinted darkly beneath the shade of his horned war bonnet, but the rest of his face was a black nothing. When he spoke, his voice was like distant thunder. Tess could feel it rumbling deep in the hollows of her bones.

“My business is with the hucow. As for nobody getting hurt, that’s entirely up to you. Lower your weapons and be on your way.”

For a second, all three of the bounty hunters just stood there gaping in disbelief. Then the leader let out a hoot of laughter, which his partners echoed.

“Mister, you’re outnumbered three to one. If’n you think you’re gonna steal our bounty—”

“I’m not interested in money,” the giant said.

“Oh yeah? Then what’s this little heifer to you?”

“The hucow is mine.”

Tess’s heart skipped.

The leader of the bounty hunters just scoffed. “You ain’t this hucow’s owner, mister. I met the feller what bought her fair and square at the auction up in Crooked Valley. I already done told you once not to mix in here. Now I’m tellin’ you a second time. I won’t tell you a third.”

“No, I reckon you won’t.”