So I forced myself to sit still, to ignore the burning, twitching, tingling sensations that had turned my twat into an itch that desperately needed scratching. Damn that Billy! And damn my own desperation, my inability to ignore the sight of him thrusting into a conniving Lucy Legg. I was too high-minded for my own good; had too much to lose, to be mixing myself up with this rutting mutt who followed in the footsteps of all the Tripplehorn men.
"You're full of shit, Mister-"
"And you're full of jism, Billy," I rasped. Before my left hand knew what my right hand was doing, it took the reins while I reached over to grasp him. From within my thick glove, I felt the throbbing of his pulse in that vein along his underside. Up and down I pumped, tentatively at first-for I'd rarely had such an opportunity, except in my wildest dreams-until Billy's broad shoulders strained and his eyes squeezed shut. He sucked air as I pumped him harder, my own need raging as those first squirts shot out.
"Jesus-I-" He could barely speak, he was so caught up in his impending climax. To keep from slipping, he pulled my body against his, and then he cut loose. His strangled cries echoed through the dusky countryside while the rocking of his hips set the seat to squeaking with a highly suggestive rhythm.
Again and again he shot, straining and writhing within the grip of my gloved fingers as flumes of crystal-colored semen arched over the buggy's front. The heat between us magnified until I thought I'd melt from the sight of it-from the magnificence of the member that pumped its stuff like a rigid fire hose hooked up to a well. God, how I wished he was pumping it into me! I stiffened against the inner shimmies of my own climax, hoping my heavy coat hid the way my body was responding to his release. When he was finally emptied, he let out a delicious sigh, panting like the randy pup he was.
Then he came back to the present moment, to the fact that we were ascending a wooded hillside and leaving Redemption far behind us in the light of the rising moon. He scooted away, and I took the reins in both hands. For a moment there was only the matched, secretive beat of our breathing while we tried to ignore what had just happened. Being younger, and accustomed to this sort of thing, Billy recovered first.
"So where are you taking me?" he demanded, his swagger returning now that his need was met. "I could've gotten away in time, you know. Old Harry Legg could never catch me-nor could Lucy entrap me the way you say."
"Precisely why I'm taking you out of sight. So Miss Lucy will have to find another victim before the old ladies start remarking about her belly."
"So where-"
"The orphanage is just ahead," I said, nodding at the rambling brick structure set among skeletal trees that shone with new snow. "Nobody will come looking for you at the house just beyond, where the Sisters of Samaria live. A perfect cover, don't you agree?"
Billy knitted his dark brows to form one long, forbidding ridge along his forehead. "The Sisters of Samaria?" he jeered. "Why-they're nothing but a bunch of church ladies! Why do you think I'd stay with them, for chrissakes?"
If I'd given him the real reason most folks never left the Samaritans' antiquated mansion, grown over with ivy and the underbrush of unsavory rumor, Billy wouldn't have believed it anyway. He was too caught up in himself, too convinced he was invincible, to accept the stark naked truth. So, since it was a story I couldn't tell him outright…a story that now made me realize I might not have done either of us any favors by bringing him here…
"Perhaps you'll see things differently when you meet these old girls," I replied breezily, pulling the buggy to a halt in the covered carriage port at the side of the house. "They'll adore you, Billy, so behave yourself, all right? Accept their hospitality until we can think of a better way to dodge Judge Legg. It won't kill you."
Or at least I hoped it wouldn't. A lamp came on in the parlor, its pale illumination passing like a spirit through the large window nearest us. The three sisters would soon make their evening's appearance, so the household would be coming to life now…in a way the casual visitor would never suspect. I swallowed hard, reminding myself to remain in Alex Moore's character-thinking ahead to the consequences I hadn't considered when I'd plucked my prize from that alley in town.
Just once, I wanted to entertain a man like a normal woman-or even sneak him into my room like the young, excited girl I'd never gotten to be-without the difficulty of revealing my disguise. And without these ladies of the night laying claim to him.
But the longer I hesitated out here in the entryway, the more curiosity-or suspicions-I'd arouse. The Sisters had heard the buggy, and they knew without even watching out the window that I wasn't alone. I would simply have to find a polite way to leave Billy Tripplehorn in the parlor making small talk while I changed my clothes-my entire appearance and personality-and then emerge from my room before the ladies who'd raised me could move in on him with their predatory, flirtatious ways.
Bitches. It was a deal with the Devil they'd made me sign, when I was too young and frightened to know better. It was my only chance for the education, the profession, I yearned for, even if it meant I'd attached myself to the three of them and their demonic ways with invisible bonds: I would keep their secret and they would keep mine, for such love makes the world go 'round, doesn't it? Such love indeed, although it was spawned on the dark side of the moon.
"Come in and warm yourself, Billy," I said as I turned the doorknob. "They'll have the fire crackling to keep themselves comfortable, so I'll warn you not to peel off your clothes, young man! They may be old, but they're not blind. Even a handsome young stud like yourself would have trouble satisfying the three of them."
Tripplehorn's face creased with a cocky smile, unleashing a male beauty that made my blood sing in my veins again. An unfortunate thought, that.
"I've already shot it off, remember? But maybe-if the right offer comes out of the right withered lips-I could rise to the occasion between the scripture lesson and singing the hymn," he teased. "A night to remember for us all, I'm sure."
"Something to tell your friends about," I assured him with all the male bravado I could muster. Meanwhile, the promise-the potential-of those words made my slit clench with the possibilities of Billy's spending the night here. But I had to play my cards very, very carefully. "Shall we go in? They're waiting."
The parlor's warmth felt at once welcome and overwhelming, as though we were being brought in out of the cold to warm ourselves at Hell's hearth. Justin and Jeremy, the twin house boys, were tidying this room with its blood-red walls, knowing they'd pay dearly if our three queens were displeased with its appearance when they emerged to spend the evening there. I noted Billy's scowl as he took in the pale blond twins, who wore only exotic silk sarongs of a Byzantine print, which glimmered with the gold threads woven into them. Just then the French maid, Cerise, entered with her silver tray of goblets, wine, and cheeses held strategically beneath her bosom, so her cleavage appeared as rounded and lush as a pair of oversized peaches on the tray.
"Ah, good evening, Monsieur Alex! And you have brought us a guest, oui?" she chirped in her lilting French. Her gaze followed the planes of Billy's face to linger on his muscular body and then the bulge in his pants-to which my companion responded like a stallion downwind of a mare in heat.