Disorder in the House [How the West Was Done 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

How the West Was Done 2

Disorder in the House

The first train hurtles into Laramie City. Liberty Hudson is so full of exhilaration to be independent that when rowdy passengers thrust her into a stranger’s arms, she freely necks with him, but flees in a panic when the train reaches Laramie.

The stranger is Levi Colter, the new Indian Agent at the nearby fort. His predecessor Shady has left him in the lurch, having sold all the supplies meant for Indians to settlers. The fort’s cook, Private Garrett O’Rourke, seems to know too much—that Shady has killed an Indian chief.

Garrett realizes Liberty is the one Levi seeks—unfortunately, not before he kisses her and has fallen irretrievably in love with her, too. The men unite when a “talking board” warns them to protect Liberty from cold waters. Their love is cemented by prophecies and their practice of daily lessons from an Oriental love manual they discover.

Genre:
Historical, Ménage a Trois/Quatre, Western/Cowboys
Length:
53,369 words
 

How the West Was Done 2

Karen Mercury

MENAGE EVERLASTING

Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

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DISORDER IN THE HOUSE

Copyright © 2012 by Karen Mercury

E-book ISBN:
978-1-61926-795-4

First E-book Publication: June 2012

Cover design by Les Byerley

All art and logo copyright © 2012 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

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Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

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Disorder in the House
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For KH

Would that thy knife were as sharp as thy final no.

DISORDER IN THE HOUSE

How the West Was Done 2

KAREN MERCURY

Copyright © 2012

May, 1868

Laramie City, Dakota Territory

The day the first train came into Laramie City was the day Liberty Hudson nearly had sex with Levi Colter.

To start with, the train was a monumental enough event. Fireworks streaming past the train windows and a rickety band blaring “The Yellow Rose of Texas” heralded the arrival of the Union Pacific train at the end of the track. This freight brought crossties, plows, and tents, mostly for the warehouses of Liberty’s father, Simon Hudson, allegedly the wealthiest man in Laramie City. The second- and third-class cars were jammed with gamblers waving little flags and bawdy prairie flowers waving unmentionables, but Liberty had purchased a first-class ticket.

Thrilled to ride on the first train to ever lay track this far west, Liberty had made an uncustomary splurge on this fancy ticket. It was invigorating to chug along in the fancy railcar decorated in burgundy and gold leaf, savoring the sense of freedom the open plains displayed to her.

She first laid eyes on Levi—of course, she didn’t know that was his name back then—when she decided to go to the necessary. She had needed to piss for a while but didn’t feel like walking back there when the train was going over the dizzying new Dale Creek Bridge. The train swayed on the wooden timbers a hundred feet over the enormous chasm, seemingly floating in midair, and Liberty clutched the armrest of her seat. She had never been anywhere this terrifying in her thirty-two years. Engineers slowed the train to a crawl, but even then, passengers leaning out of windows reported that some boxcars looked about to tumble into the gorge.

But she’d come west for adventure, and she really had to find the necessary once the train was shooting downhill safely past the bridge. Panting with excitement, Liberty wended her way down the center of the car, jostled from every angle by arm-waving rowdies reeking like a trash barge. She held her breath, highly annoyed to be shoved directly into the chest of one such shiftless loafer, but she looked up into the most stunning, glittering eyes she’d ever seen.

And breathed.

This fellow’s rich chocolate eyes simply brimmed with emotion. Lust, probably, but suddenly Liberty didn’t particularly care. Son of a gun, this man simply knocked her into the middle of next week. He even tried to reach a hand up to politely tip his Stetson, but he was also being jammed from all angles by the rancid armpits of gamblers waving playing cards, pemmican, and other garbage.

“The whole kit and caboodle’s been getting a bit roostered,” he said in a vivid, seductive voice.

“I know,” Liberty replied breathlessly.

She just stared up at him stupidly, her breasts flattened to his warm chest that emanated the manly scent of hay. She knew this feeling that surged up and down her spine. It was desire, pure and simple. She had felt this upon occasion for a couple of beaus—and was overly familiar with it from her nightly assignations with her secret toy—but she’d never been this suddenly stimulated and overwhelmed by merely looking at a man. His eyes brimmed with many tales to tell, and she instantly knew the reality of his sweet but shattered heart.

“I’m sorry a pretty vision like you has to be subjected to this.”

She was about to say “I know” again, but a nearby roughneck suddenly bellowed, “Hey, Hiram! You’re so crooked you could swallow nails and spit out corkscrews!”

“Oh, yeah?” Hiram hollered back. “You was the one who marked the card deck back in Omaha!”

The brawl that erupted then caused nearly everyone to surge to that end of the car to get a better view. In the knot of limbs that encased her, Liberty was detached from the fellow with the magical eyes. She was tossed down the aisle by swearing men, and before she knew it, she found herself suddenly in the necessary, taking the place of a frazzled prairie flower who clawed her way to view the fight.

More practical urges took precedence then.

She sat back in her first-class compartment, barely aware of the scenery. Her entire body fairly buzzed with the thrill of her upcoming adventure in Laramie City—and the confrontation with the bewitching man. She was embarking on a new life just full of possibilities! She could possibly even wear trousers as she rode a horse about town—she had already left her only, rarely used corset back in Hyde Park, New York. Her first task would be to find her father’s house, allegedly the largest in the town.

Her younger sister Ivy had already boldly ventured into Laramie City before her, while Liberty had stayed back East to take care of business matters. Their mother had passed on finally after a long struggle with consumption, and now Liberty wanted to shake off her reputation as being the level-headed, businesslike one. The monotonous restriction of her life while caring for her mother had created a fresh new passion for living.

Liberty wanted to become involved in the politics of this brand-new frontier town! She longed to expand her passion for the suffrage of women. She had attended the National Women’s Rights Convention in New York in 1860, one of the last truly thrilling things she’d done in life. The convention had been a whirlwind of activity and stimulation that she sadly missed.

The man she had just literally run into was a good omen. Liberty smiled as the loud merchant next to her talked someone else’s arm off about the price of lumber. The fellow in the Stetson had a very classically handsome face, as though he could scowl or be effectively menacing while orating, so he might even be a fellow politician of sorts. His intense, deep gaze and the cherubic bow of his upper lip had Liberty in a fuzzy daze. She was aware she was pleasantly moist between the thighs, remembering the feel of her nearly bare bosom against his chest. She barely noticed when dilapidated shacks came into view, signaling their arrival at Laramie City and the end of the line.

The shacks seemed composed of logs, canvas, rejected railroad ties, and old wagon boxes—the usual disarray of the Hell on Wheels towns that popped up as the railroad progressed. Liberty strained to catch sight of any women, potential fellow suffragists, but she only saw a glut of men. Tracklayers probably, most of them, wringing out clothing, chewing on pipes, and, of course, imbibing liquor. Liberty snatched up her carpetbag—she could retrieve her trunk later from the baggage car—as the first fireworks trails landed among the ramshackle town outside. A distant tattoo of several drums attempting to play “The Yellow Rose of Texas” told her they would soon near the platform, and she wanted to at least be somewhat near the door when the train stopped.

The remote strains of cornets and saxhorns floated over the hubbub of people crowding the aisle. A meaty hand even groped her ass, but she couldn’t tell who it was attached to. Thugs from the second-class car had apparently flowed into first class, and the corridor was one giant sardine can of body parts. When Liberty’s face was squished against a brass lamp bolted to the wall, a slight feeling of panic began to creep into her innards.