Page 19 of My Darling Clementine

As their lips touched, all pretense melted. Tongues met at parted lips and darted past each other, exploring the flavors of apple pie and sexual want.

The stranger’s large hands spanned her waist, pulling her closer as the kiss deepened. With a thrill she’d never known before, Kizzy returned the passion she received. They were still kissing when the men’s footsteps and voices returned.

“She’s around somewhere, and they don’t let whores work out of the hotel. Someone beat us to her. We’ll find her.”

“Yeah, but I wanted to be the first, ya know?”

The other two barked out ridiculing laughter as they headed for the bar. “The first in Independence, maybe…” Their voices drifted away.

The stranger pulled back from the kiss, but left her hands around Kizzy’s waist. “Are you a working girl?” She gave a nod toward the men on the street. “Won’t bother me if you are,” her hands slid up to just under her breasts, “though you look more like a tomboy who ran away from home than a lady of easy virtue.” Her eyes twinkled even in darkness.

She leaned in and licked Kizzy’s swollen lips. “But you taste like a woman who knows what she wants.” The stranger kissed her again, and this time her hands rose to cup her breasts. “Who are you, Keziah Walker?”

“How do you know my name?” Kizzy stepped back, bracing herself against the general store wall, examining the woman still holding her breasts. She fought the instinct to bat her hands away, sensing a need to offer something in order to get what she wanted. And besides, it felt good.

“I pay attention,” answered the woman dressed as a man. Her thumbs began rubbing through Kizzy’s clothing, exciting her nipples to rise.

“Are you staying at the hotel?” Kizzy asked with a gasp. When the stranger nodded, she added, “What’s your name?”

“Clem.”

“I prefer Kizzy.” A mad impulse took her. Swept up in the surreal moment, she took a chance, slipped the second room key from her pocket, and held it out to the woman. “When everything’s quiet, come to my room and we can talk.”

With a boldness that felt wicked and good, she rubbed against Clem’s crotch as she twitched her way sideways out from between the two buildings. With quick, light steps, she kept to the shadows and made her way back to the hotel, feeling the eyes of the stranger watching her all the way.

She had to introduce herself to the night clerk who had not been advised of an unmarried woman staying unchaperoned on the premises. It took showing him her signature in the registry, along with the corresponding room key in her pocket, to convince the clerk, and even then, he fetched the owner, Mr. Bates, for final consent. With obvious disapproval, the clerk watched her climb the stairs, turn to the left, and open the door of room four, which she slammed and locked as soon as it closed behind her.

She damped the light to cast the room in shadows. With steady swiftness, she rummaged in her bag for Dottie. Pulling the rag doll forth, she removed its dress and separated the two halves she’d stitched together a year earlier to hide a small pistol she’d purchased from a peddler traveling through Rocheport. Taking it apart to check and polish each piece, she reassembled and loaded it with the only six bullets she had left.

When she first starting to think about leaving home, Kizzy knew she needed a weapon to defend herself. Her father being a minister, he would never teach her to fight, not that she’d have asked him to, anyway. But her friend Bart, who came to every Sunday service, hadn’t laughed when she told him she wanted to get out of Rocheport. A gentle boy with big blue eyes, he was very serious about most things. “Me, too,” he confided, “but I won’t.”

“Why not?”

“It’d break my mother’s heart.” Bart shrugged. “But I think my father would think a whole lot more of me, to tell you the truth.”

Bart taught her how to shoot his rifle and even loaned it to her for a week to practice. When she gave it back, she knew she could aim and hit a target, but she needed a much smaller weapon, one she could keep hidden.

When the peddler came through her part of town, she asked about a smaller gun. The next time he passed through, he brought her the small pistol with its pretty mother-of-pearl handle and fancy scrollwork. She’d insisted on trying it before buying, and even then wouldn’t part with a coin until the peddler showed her how to take it apart, clean it, and put it back together. She bought three boxes of bullets, forty-five in total. She practiced with it plenty, and felt secure in using it, but the peddler hadn’t brought new bullets.

“I’ll get some before leaving town,” she promised herself aloud, placing the locked and loaded weapon under the pillow of her bed.

“What has gotten into you?” Kizzy scolded herself in the standing mirror. “You invited a woman to your hotel room, you shameless hussy.” She grinned at her reflection. “You even gave her a key.” Her eyebrows rose in shocked delight as her heart skipped a beat. “Clem. She said her name is Clem.”

I’ve never seen another woman do what she’s doing. I want to do it, too.

Kizzy threw her arms wide, and twirled on her toes, carried away by her own impulsiveness. I can’t believe I invited her here. She expects to get lucky; I would, if a strange woman handed me her room key and invited me to visit in the middle of the night. She touched her tingling lips. After that kiss, maybe I’m hoping to get lucky, too.

The familiar excitement of sexual anticipation flared in her loins, but this time felt different. Since discovering she liked girls, she had pursued them, always overcoming their resistance to being with a woman rather than a man. The women she’d been with needed convincing, but gave in to her power of seduction.

Clem was a woman, of that she was sure, but unlike the others she’d been with. She pressed herself against me first. And what was that in her pants? A flush of warmth spread between her legs. She looked at the clock on the wall.

She had to get ready. Glancing at her image in the oval glass, she raised one eyebrow. But ready for what? A jug of room-temperature water stood on a stand, with a water basin beside it. She removed her clothing, examining herself in the mirror as she washed every inch of her body. Her hands palmed her breasts, and she pinched her own nipples, sighing with remembered pleasure. What kind of lover is Clem?

Kizzy watched her reflected hands wipe the inside of her thighs and then sweep the folds of her sex. She re-wet her washcloth and cleaned herself inside and out. Her own curves caught her eye in the mirror: high, firm breasts that filled more than her hands, a slender waist that tapered to wider hips. Swiping down her long legs, strong and able to run several miles without stopping, she stared in the mirror upside down from between her legs, examining her backside as she rose and finished up. “Not bad,” she acknowledged, slapping her bare hip with an open hand, enjoying the sting of sexual anticipation.

Refreshed, she stared at herself in the looking glass. Should she wear her nightgown? Just her chemise? Or nothing at all? She dithered for a while before pulling on the long white nightie edged in blue satin she’d worn ever since her mother made it for her last Christmas. It looked prim and proper, covering her from her neck to her toes, and while it didn’t suit her mood, she felt it wiser to start with it. She needed time to gather information, learn more about the mysterious Clem, before seducing her. Kizzy put out the lamp and waited with growing anticipation.

She woke with a start at the sound of a key in the lock and sat bolt upright in the bed as the door swung open on silent hinges.