OverTime 03: Slipping (First 70 Chapters)

Chapter 54: Doing His Job (Garrison) - WARNING: More racist talk

Garrison disapproved of fisticuffs on a cattle drive. So much else gunned for a fellow on the trail, from the weather to the livestock to actual bad men, that they ought not turn on each other.

Also, injured riders did inferior work.

Still, he could not police his men's every move. And he'd learned, over the years, that some men needed regular bouts of violence to appease their darker impulses. Better that they take that out on each other than on his animals.

So he weren't too wrought up about Ropes' split lip. In fact, he half-hoped that expending their anger on Ropes might satisfy the men who were most infuriated about Amos.

About Elizabeth's lips on Amos's.

He should have known better than give any credit to hope.

To judge by the fervor with which the Texians grumbled and gestured among themselves, they weren't near spent. Elizabeth hadn't likely helped by nursing Amos all day and lecturing the others about their language as pertained to him. While Garrison distracted himself eyeing his latest trouble, she even hugged the old man goodnight, wholly blind to the damage she did.

By the time Garrison noticed, it was too late to stop her, so he held his tongue when she returned to his side and took his arm in both her hands. The damage was done, had been done since that afternoon, maybe before.

She hung off him some before straightening right up against his side and asking, "Will you be long?"

He looked down into her blue eyes, so purely innocent of the uglier natures that festered and chafed the men around her. In her mind, if folks just avoided hurtful words and protected the Africans and Mexicans, or somesuch, all would be well.

Garrison did not know whether to chide her for her naiveté or kiss her for her goodness. He did know that he envied her.

"Yep," he said—in answer to her question about him being long. She pouted. He very much wanted to kiss those pouting lips.

In fact, just to make sure the others remembered whose woman she was....

Garrison bent and covered her mouth with his, savoring her opening lips' softness, the way they pressed and played and seemed to smile under his. He felt an unexpected flutter in his chest, or maybe his stomach, at her usual eagerness. As much as he'd come to enjoy some moderate lust, this was not that.

Could be the loving.

When she fell back onto her heels—he would have to bend even further, for her to continue kissing him without standing on tiptoe—Elizabeth caught her breath with a sparkle of anticipation. He truly regretted having other responsibilities.

Especially these responsibilities.

"Behave yerself," he warned her, and she bit her lower lip and flared her eyes at him in a wholly misbehaving way.

"Wake me up when you get done working," she pleaded, then spun and sashayed to the tent, her fine rump too clearly outlined by Murphy's old trousers for his comfort.

But Garrison would not be working, that night. This night, folks weren't keeping their schedule.

Neither Shorty nor Lee unrolled their beds, despite a long day's work. Clayton had not yet ridden out to the remuda, to relieve Tomas and take up his duties as nighthawk. The first-guard riders had traded shifts with Jose and Romero, while Juan stood guard on the bluff, cleverly robbing Garrison of any support from men loyal to him and outside this particular grievance.

Even Cooper had joined the malcontents, as they had surely expected, what with him hailing from Mississippi. But Cooper had always fancied the romance of espionage. He of course sided with Garrison.