The Family Tradition

By Seamus

The following is a very long installment in a very, very lengthy tale—a story of a family pushing the boundaries and engaging in forbidden sex in the final days of western expansion in the old American West. It is fiction, pure and simple. If you think you recognize some of the players in this saga, you are wrong. I don't know them and couldn't possibly have included them in my story. Any resemblance to any particular individuals, alive or dead, is absolutely coincidental and completely unintended.

Please read the first Book in this series for the characters, their backgrounds, ages, etc. It's just too much to repeat all of that from the first twelve chapters here.

* * *

BOOK II: Getting To Know The Neighbors

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Now that we'd arrived at the sanctuary Pa'd been aiming for all along—I wondered if he'd been planning this for years—we Richardsons began exploring the valley and immense mountains that surrounded us. A couple of days after we arrived, we found the heavily-wooded bench halfway up a tall ridge Pa remembered fondly from his trip out here a couple decades ago.

The neighboring hills and mountains, plus mammoth stands of trees nearby, protected the site from wintry winds that might have otherwise swept through our community right off the high-mountain snow packs. Those mountains also shielded us from the rest of the world. They limited travel to a single pass from the east, and none from the west, north and south. It wasn't difficult to set up posts to cover the one existing pass where we could keep lookouts and thus control those who might become a menace to us. Not wishing to strain ourselves thinking up a name, we called the place the 'Hidden Valley'. It stuck.

The valley had some clear advantages in addition to simple location. For instance, there was a hot spring welling out of a granite outcrop real close by. It was full of minerals—we wouldn't drink it, by choice—but Hiram Conklin had him an idea and told us we could use it to warm water from fresh-water springs that we could drink. We marveled at what Hiram was suggesting. We could use boiling (it was almost that hot, literally) mineral-laden water to heat good, sweet water from a nearby spring-fed stream or wells, couldn't we? An' that meant we wouldn't have to cut so much firewood.

That'd sure save a bunch a' trees from bein’ chopped down and the backbreaking chore of gettin’ the cut timber cut up and then hauled up and down intervening hills to stack it close by the cabins we were goin’ to build. We looked around at the deep virgin woods all around and imagined them cut down for firewood. The idea didn't appeal to us at all.

Okay, we reasoned, if we didn't have to heat water and if we could use piped-in hot water to make our cabins comfortably warm, that would help a bunch. We’d still have to have firewood for cooking, but our need for fresh wood would be a lot less than the amount we’d have to cut down and wrestle down to our cabins otherwise. We asked Hiram for more words on how we could do what he suggested. What would we need to build? What would we need to buy? Where could we get parts ... things like that.

The hot spring was about a quarter mile from the nearest ground that was level enough, and sheltered enough, for us to build cabins. How about, Hiram asked, if we piped that boiling hot water over to the bench on the mountain where we really wanted to put up log cabins. And … Hiram said it wouldn’t be any big deal to run pipes under the cabins to provide heat for the interiors all winter long, just like the Romans used to do way back when.

Caleb Struthers told us around the campfire that Hiram Conklin was influenced quite a bit by the engineering accomplishments of the ancient Greeks and even more so by the Romans. I didn't know 'influenced' from a hole in the ground, but if it meant Hiram saw ways we could do what other folks had already figured out how to do, and it would benefit us—by which I mean, would make our lives easier ... well, sir … I was willing to be 'influenced' myownself.

We considered what Hiram Conklin, late Lieutenant Colonel in the Union Army's Engineering corps, proposed. We liked the idea of not having to cut timber for heating our cabins ... it was hard, dangerous work, particularly in the depth of winter. An axe blade could hit weirdly on a tree trunk, or a log, or somethin' and could fly right back at you to nigh cut off your leg maybe. And … you always were just a few days' worth of blizzard from running out. Also, we were beginning to see the tall timber as a refuge, something that hid us from the outside world. On the other hand, this was new to all of us, and what Hiram proposed sounded like a venture that would involve a lot of hard labor before we’d be able to use what we were workin’ at.

How about, Grace asked, if we only build one huge cabin big enough for all of us? We'd gotten used to practically living on top of each other whilst coming west in the wagon train … lately we'd also been naked most of the time and fornicatin' up a storm. Well … we were still doin' that. We got done that work which was necessary, but our evenings and nights were filled with expanding our intimacy inside our families, and between families too.

So, anyway … Grace pointed out this thing called privacy wasn't needed near as much as it had back in the Tennessee hill country. Fact is … we didn't hardly need any privacy at all—not these days, we didn't. Our wanton little Grace was thinking of ways we could continue with our new lifestyle, and expand it ... without ever having to go out into the cold to be with someone.

And ... truth was, we were all caught up in a fever of exploring each other sexually, so Grace’s idea found fertile ground to grow in, you might say. Also, running pipes to only one building sounded a lot simpler than routing pipes to many cabins. The idea was popular right from the start, for all those reasons.

On the other hand, running water from the hot spring and from a fresh water stream too—that meant we were goin' to need a lot of pipe, and a bunch a' digging in the ground ... 'cause Hiram said we'd need the pipes buried deep enough so they'd be insulated by the ground. Otherwise, the hot water would arrive at our building site about a gazillion degrees colder'n ice, and the water from the cold spring wouldn't arrive at all—it would be ice blocking up the pipes. Hiram Conklin was our only trained engineer, so we took his word for it.

We also took his word we'd need to build fireplaces into our common cabin in the woods as a back up, with chimneys that had nice, tight flues and everything. Sounded like good sense to everyone. A fear of our home catching fire was something we'd lived with all our lives. A log cabin burns quickly, trapping people and animals inside....

The fear of fire led to another decision—we'd build the cabin of stone, insulated with wood and mud ... probably something Hiram got from the Romans again. There was a tall, sheer expanse of rock cliff not too far away and at its foot were tons and tons of fallen rock. Stone was far more permanent than logs would be, it would make us safer from fire, and would make our home a solid fortress too.

About this time, we began to refer to what we would build as a 'longhouse' in the style of the ancient Vikings or the Iroquois Indians back east. It was a natural thing to do ... both those societies lived in communal homes, and the Vikings in particular did it as protection against the cold—and we could see very well the place where we were settling would be right cold in the winter season. We wanted to be cozy enough inside so we could do without clothing. Our plans included a big communal bathing area (Hiram said the Romans did that, and it sounded just fine to us). It would be heated, of course. There would be a separate building (not very large) for a kitchen with wood or coal burning stoves for cooking—separate, again, thinking about the fire hazard. A covered passage built of stone would lead to our room full of privies.

We envisioned a warm, roomy 'castle' that would serve our needs this first winter and beyond.

Hiram Conklin stayed up for three days straight, working on a floor plan and trying to think of all the things that might go wrong ... he was THAT possessed by the idea of building a secure haven in Hidden Valley.

Seemed to us like he had a winner.

* * *

While Hiram was working on a floor plan for the Viking-style longhouse, four of us—Pa, Nick Conklin (my friend, Daniel's, eighteen-year-old brother) and my sister Mary Ann turned right back around and left the valley afore anything was really settled. Mary Ann was good with numbers, making lists, and organizing things; she was fast turning into Pa's accountant—she had a talent for such things. They went to find some place where they could order pipes, fittings, concrete, and other stuff Hiram couldn't do without.

They lucked out. There was a place where the new east-west railroad they were building crossed over what was left of a major north-south trail on the eastern side of the mountains. There, Pa's group found a small town in the process of growing up. In the little saloon they had, Pa heard of a mining company up in the mountains near a town called Cripple Creek that had gone broke before they even started work on their hydraulic mining. All of their piping was sitting in a warehouse right here at the junction, just taking up space.

Pa bought ever' foot of pipe, connections and I don't know what all from the bankrupt company's lawyers, doin' danged near all the buyin' by way of using the telegraph, as they called it. Pa went up to Cripple Creek right at the last to get a bill a' sale and give over his money, but that was the only time anyone ever saw a lawyer or owner from the now dead company.

He hired wagons and teamsters to haul all the pipe and fittings and other stuff down to the little-used stop on the new railroad where the trail crossed over. Pa didn't want them carrying the gear all the way to the valley, because we were going to keep the location … and even the existence of the valley, as best we could … very close to the vest. But, with the pipe and other things at the little settlement (we named the place, 'The Crossin’), when we were ready for the pipe, we'd have a much shorter haul. Pa's big Conestoga-built wagons were busy for a month making regular runs between the train depot and our Hidden Valley.

The rest of us learned how to dig nice, deep trenches in the ground, chop down tall trees, and generally worked our asses off, getting things ready. I never was so danged tired, for days on end, in my life....

* * *

Ever so often, as a break from the hard work around the settlement, Pa offered folks a chance to get out of the mountains to fetch needful things from The Crossing and other places. After a while, it got to be my turn.

So it was that I, Mary Ann, and all the Owens ... Samuel, Nelson, and their insatiable thirteen-year-old little sister, Sophie, took two of Pa's heavy-duty Conestoga-built freight wagons and went back out of the valley, some weeks after we arrived. We were on our way down to the railroad stop out on the prairie to pick up a mess of pipe fittings, valves, clamps, plus some shovels and other tools we needed 'cause what we had was plumb wore out.

The Owens boys were there for wagon driving and general toting and lifting; Mary Ann was along 'cause she'd become Pa's trusted accountant and Sophie Owens came with us just 'cause....

I was in the group as the designated scout, meat hunter, and general handyman. I wanted Wasté Thózi Ishtá, my Pretty Green Eyes to go with us, but my Lakota maiden was a medicine woman among her people, skilled in the identification and preparation of any number of natural cures for human ailments and she was busy gathering herbs, flowers and such, so she could treat all of the people in Hidden Valley, 'cause all of them were her people now. I missed her from the moment our two wagons left the confines of our mountain valley retreat.

We talked about it a'fore hand. Neither one of use would withdraw from the intimacy, the sex between our family members, with other family members just because one of us wasn't there. When we were together again, we'd concentrate on each other—least for a while—but when we were apart, we'd be with our family (and the families from the wagon train) … and all that was coming to mean.

* * *

We were within a few miles of The Crossing when I came back to the wagons after a short early morning hunt. I thought I'd seen tracks of a cougar sniffing around where we set up camp the evening before and I went out looking for the beast. I couldn't do it in the dark so I had to delay 'til the next morning, but if there was a cougar around, I wanted to kill it—before it killed one of our mules, and also because Caleb told me they were good eating. I wanted to find out.

We were using mules for this trip 'cause they were faster than our oxen, and speed was beginning to be an issue—considering how late in the season it was getting. We woke up every morning in Hidden Valley wondering if this was the day we'd see the first frost on the ground. It couldn't be long before we wouldn't be doing much traveling at all.

Just couldn't find no tracks ... of cougar or much of anything else, least wise—nothin' interestin'. I was willing to believe my eyes had tricked me 'cause where I was certain sure I'd seen something, there wasn't any sign any animal had been there all summer long. Turning back, I followed a coulee that meandered across the prairie for a ways before emptying out right behind our wagons. When I left the wagons, Mary Ann and them had been getting ready for our final few miles to The Crossing.

I heard voices ... loud, angry voices that didn't sound like any of my companions and I commenced stepping right lively along the bottom of the dry wash. Directly, I came up behind our second wagon and carefully looked all around.

I couldn't see much of anyone from where I was, but Mary Ann was up on the wagon seat of this wagon. She was sittin' sideways, trying to talk calmly so the two men I'd already heard wouldn't get any madder than they already was. I didn't know where the Owenses were. I could see three sets of horses' legs under Mary Ann's wagon—they were just a few feet away from where she was sitting at the front of the wagon. None of them looked like they were our livestock.

Nobody heard me stepping soft-like from out of the mouth of that dry wash. The rustling of the tall prairie grass in the breeze and all the yelling covered any sound I might have made as I walked quietly up to the wagon's tailgate.

Leaning my Spencer up against the spokes of the wagon wheel, I reached in and lifted out a Colt revolving shotgun from just inside the tailgate of the wagon box. As I checked the loads in the cylinder, I caught sight of Sophie through the wagon cover bow of this wagon, and past Mary Ann sitting on the seat with the reins in her hands.

Sophie was up in the first Conestoga and it didn't seem like she'd been discovered yet. She was crouching well back in the wagon box, well hidden from the three horsemen by the bonnet. She saw me and an expression of intense relief passed over her face. Then she flushed and a deep anger came over her features. Young Sophie was gettin' mad as all get out. She held up her pistol and gestured in the direction of the three riders.

I shook my head and motioned her to stay down. I hefted the shotgun so she couldn't miss seeing it. I pointed a forefinger at my weapon, then in the direction of the three strange horse's legs to let her know I was going to handle the situation. I pointed at her and made a motion for her to get down–I didn't want her involved with this. The girl was absolutely given to being flighty from time to time … no tellin' where the rounds might go if she started firing.

I pulled the stiff hammer back, cocking the ten-gauge shotgun and took a deep breath.

"I DONE HAD ENOUGH OF YOR DANGED TONGUE, WOMAN!!" a rough voice yelled. "GIT DOWN OFF THAT WAGON AND ON TO MY HORSE, ELSE...."

"Else what?" I asked politely, stepping around the end of the wagon. The shotgun butt was parked securely against my shoulder and most of the slack in the trigger already taken up.

The feller who was doing the yelling was the one nearest me, and he didn't even turn to look in my direction before he started drawing a pistol out of his holster. So he never saw I could get the shotgun into action long before he started his draw. His elbow went back, he clamped his fist around the pistol grip and started hauling the long-barreled pistol out.

I wasn't no more'n fifteen feet from him when I pulled the trigger. I was right at the edge of the wagon box, standing on the ground, and he was sitting on a tall horse. The pellets made entry through in his lower-right ribcage and slanted up through his body 'til they came out under his left armpit.

Going in, the pattern of shot probably wasn't much more than an inch an’ a half across, 'cause the individual slugs hadn't traveled far enough to spread much in that short a distance. The exit hole, on the other hand, was easily the size of a big man's fist and then some. The shot blew bits of shattered bone, pieces of heart and lung and God knows what all, right out the other side a’ his body, splashing the other two bastards sitting their horses beside him. It danged near severed his left arm too, not that it mattered to him, 'cause he was dead before he even plowed face first into the hard-packed soil on the trail.

By the time the other two shifted stunned gazes from their fallen comrade back to me, I had that ol' side hammer cocked back again and a new charge in rotated into position for firing. I'm purty sure that ten-gauge muzzle pointing at them looked as big around as a darned cannon. Their faces lost every bit of color.

I never said another word, but both them fellers' hands shot up in the air as quick as they could get 'em there. Their horses kinda danced around a little bit, not a bit happy about the smell of blood and death so close under their hooves.

"Best I not get the idee you fellers're thinking of pulling yore guns," I cautioned. I was looking at the next closest man right over the gun sight and my finger was still curled around the trigger. He was a dead man if I squeezed the least little bit, and he knew it. Both of them tightened their legs around the horses' barrels and tried to control them.

By now, the two Owens' boys had caught up the rifles Sophie threw out the back end of the front wagon. Mary Ann had dropped to the bottom of the wagon box in the wagon next to me and was aiming her pistol at them. Next thing ya know, Sophie was leaning out over the wagon gate and pointing her little pistol at them too. The one feller looked around at all the weapons pointed at them from close range. He managed to turn a paler shade of gray than he already was.

I looked over at Sam. "Get their guns," I said curtly.

Now, I had not—in any sense of the word—been told I was in charge of our little group. If anyone was, that should of been Mary Ann's place, 'cause she had Pa's confidence and it was her who could hand over money to sellers, write new orders for whatever we needed, and stuff like that. But Mary Ann didn't have anything to say right now. I expected Sam might complain that he was more'n two years older'n me and shouldn't have to mind me, but he never opened his mouth.

In fact, Sam moved quick, not even answering me. He pushed up close to the horse the feller furthest from me was ridin’, tucked the muzzle of his Yellow Boy under the guy's chin and snaked the feller's revolver out of his holster; then he pulled a rifle out of the feller's saddle scabbard. His brother, Nelson, did the same for the other guy.

With both of the riders disarmed, I tilted the muzzle of the shotgun up in the air and lowered the hammer carefully down on the shell already in the chamber.

I motioned the two riders down off their horses. "Mary Ann," I said harshly, "hand down that old shovel and the pick for these gentlemen ... they have a grave to dig."

"Now wait jest a danged minute here...," one of them started out angrily.

I pointed the shotgun at his brisket and he shut right up.

"…Or three graves?" I asked politely.

He shook his head. So did the other guy ... emphatically.

"Over yonder!" I said, pointing to a solitary oak maybe twenty yards off the trail.

They dug.

* * *

"You mad at we'uns?" Nelson asked cautiously as we stood together watching the two outlaws dumping the dead man's body into the open grave. Nels knew the danged answer already.

"Me? Mad?" I said, snorting. "Why would I be pissed off that y'all should let three armed bastards ride right up to ya, huh? They probably wouldn't of done much more than rape the girls and then kill them, ya know. Wouldn't matter to you though ... you'd already be dead!"

I was seething.

"Don't make me no never mind," I continued, "…but my Pa? He might be some kind of unhappy. He sets store by his oldest girl child ya know and he looks on yore sister almost like she was one of his own children. And he prob'ly would be a tad upset to lose two wagons too ... but me? Nah ... I kind of figger iffen y'all let them bastids ride right up to ya, then you prob'ly deserved what you were going to get," I said.

I admit ... it come out mighty mean, but I didn't care right then.

I turned abruptly and walked up to the first wagon. "Sophie, honey?" I asked in a more gentle voice. She'd been the only one with a weapon to hand when I came up. "Could you hand me down one of them biscuits and some jerky ... I'm so hungry, my stomach thinks my throat's done been cut."

* * *

I purty much ignored my companions the rest of the way into town. When we got there, there sure wasn't much to see. It was built on both sides of a well-traveled trail that ran vaguely north and south, an’ that trail was the only street the town had. We'd come south on that same old trail this morning. It ran north an' south for what may have been hundreds of miles. We'd picked up that trail, and followed it south ever since we came out of Hidden Valley, which was up in the mountains west of the trail.

The railroad tracks, of course, faded out into the distance both east and west. They was part of the transcontinental railroad that'd just been completed. The train depot was at the north end of town, right beside the rails. There was a restaurant on the south side of the tracks, catty-cornered across the old trail from the depot, and I could see a saloon, two general stores and some other buildings further down the wide street. There weren't but eight buildings on the left of the street, and nine on the right as we looked down it from the north edge a' town. The train depot was the only thing north of the tracks and I didn't know why it was. It looked kind of strange, a sittin’ off on its lonesome like that.

Most important to me right now, a Town Marshal's office and a little jail was the last building on the south side of town.

Them two want-to-be rapists and murderers had been marching right down the trail ahead of my horse and they were a mite footsore. Them boots they wore weren't made for walking a-tall. I motioned for them to just keep on walking and they went right into the Marshal's office, glad to have somewhere to stop.

* * *

"You mean you aren't going to do anything about it?" I demanded. "They ride up to a couple of wagons of peaceable citizens and it's okay with you if they was going to rape the women folk ... they'd have killed the girls afterward ... but you won't take 'em to hold for the circuit judge?"

I was plumb outraged, disgusted, and incredulous ... and I didn't bother trying to hide none of it.

The Marshal was a sloppy-fat, early middle-aged man, slovenly in dress and appearance. I wasn't sure, but I don't think he'd changed his shirt in a month, or more; there were food stains all over the front, and he smelled something fierce.

"Ain't nuthin’ I kin do," he declared placidly, digging in one ear for something. "Happened outside of town whar I don't have no 'jurisdiction'," he said virtuously. He smiled meanly at me from the straight-backed chair he'd tipped back up against the clapboard wall.

I couldn't believe it! Them two scalawags stood there grinning, sure now that they were going to get away with it.

That Marshal was too danged comfortable sitting there and grinning like he was at me. So I just naturally hooked my toe under one of the chair legs that was off the ground and pulled it toward me. The chair came away from the wall, the Marshal overbalanced, and he fell backwards, flat of his ass. Made a hell of a racket, what with the chair crashing and splintering into something more like kindling than something to sit on.

He started in to roaring and sputtering obscenities ... and he mixed some threats in there too.

"Go ahead," I invited him. "Do it—iffen you think you can."

He'd made some motion toward his belt gun like he was going to draw it. Flat of his back, he’d have been dead before his gun cleared leather. I'd carried my shotgun inside with me and it was pointed vaguely in his direction. He thought about it a mite and carefully took his hand off the pistol butt.

I snorted contemptuously.

Leaving him to Sam and Nelson's rifles, I motioned them two bastards out the door to the board walk. I pointed south with the shotgun. "You fellers git on your horses and ride thataway," I told them. "Don't never come back this way. If I EVER see you agin, I'll kill you on sight," I promised.

They believed me. Without a word, they mounted their ponies, reined them down the street and took off out of town and down the trail, headed south at a high rate of speed.

"Goes fer you too," I heard Sam tell the 'Marshal'.

"Don't let us catch you around here neither!" Nels said emphatically. "Git moving," he added.

The slob of a marshal shuffled out the door and disappeared down the street. We saw him a moment later, leading a pony out of a corral. When he mounted, he turned the horse south and took off out of town at a right quick pace.

Whoever the city fathers were, they never came to us and said we done wrong, so I guess the marshal hadn't been held in very high esteem by them neither.

* * *

By late afternoon, we'd finished loading up all the order of parts for the pipe network, the extra tools and supplies, plus a few other odds and ends. We were all famished. For myself, I hadn't had much to break my fast in the early morning. None of us had eaten lunch, what with everything that was going on, so we decided to head on down from the store to a restaurant right down near the railroad tracks for a good, solid meal before we hit the trail back home.

Sam was driving the heavily loaded wagon with all the goods in it down the street, and Mary Ann was driving the one where we had our sleeping rolls, food for the trip back home and what not. Sophie was in the back of Mary Ann's wagon, changing her blouse. She'd discovered a rip on the left side a' her blouse, probably from leaping down off the wagon to the ground, right after the morning's entertainment.

Sam and I were walking side-by-side down the street, me leading my roan gelding, Hinto. Half-way down to the eating place, a commotion caught our attention.

Over on the other side of the street, a couple a buildings short of the restaurant we were heading for, two young women had been stopped by a tall, older gent dressed in a black suit and hat with a white shirt buttoned all the way up to the neck. Four riders, dressed a tad more casually, were sitting horses close by and were watching closely.

"NO!" One of the girls screamed. "WE'RE NOT GOING BACK!" She wrenched away from the older man's grasp, jostling the low-brimmed black hat he wore low on his forehead. It slide down and hid his eyes. Looked like that upset him a mite. His face flushed an even deeper shade of red than it already was.

The girl who'd dislodged the hat, and the younger girl with her, retreated a couple of steps up the plank board walk and huddled against the building. They looked scared, but determined.

I never thought about it. The day had begun with me mad at just about everyone in the world … and things hadn’t improved much since. With all the smaller frustrations I'd endured since killin’ that one bastard, I was primed to go off half-cocked again if I got even the slightest opportunity. An’ this seemed like a thing that would set me off even at the best a’ times. What I saw was two young ladies in some kind a’ trouble, just like Mary Ann and Sophie had been this mornin’. Tossing ol' Hinto's reins to the dirt in the street in a ground hitch, I started across the street just like I knew what I was doing, taking long strides and moving fast.

One of the riders saw me coming and tried to turn his horse into my path, but I reared back and slapped that animal on the rump with my open hand. Judging by the sharp crack, and how much my hand stung afterward, I expect it startled the horse somethin' terrible. That bronc took off like a shot and commenced trying to switch ends in his own length, buck-jumping all down the street.

The feller riding him didn't last but a few seconds. He flew a couple of yards through the air and came down hard on his backside, raising a cloud of dust in the street.

I was up the steps to the board walk and putting my body between the old gent and the girls faster'n the older man could react. When he reached to his waist for a gun he had tucked behind his belt, I laid the barrel of my Yellow Boy against his chest, the muzzle pointed up under his jawbone ... and then I waited.

His hand come back up without a gun in it. He carefully stuffed both his hands in his pants pockets and kept them there.

I turned kind of sideways without moving my rifle from where it was so I could watch the riders still on their horses. I could even see the two girls out of the corner of my left eye. I had my back to the building, the older gentleman was glaring at me from my right on the board walk, the horses and their riders were in front of me, and the two girls were to my left. We all stood right there and watched each other for a moment.

I let the hammer down on the round in the chamber so I wouldn't shoot without meaning to ... I didn't actually recall cocking the rifle, but there it was.

"This your Pa?" I asked, darting a glance at the girls.

"They're my betrothed," the old feller ground out. "I'll thank you not to interfere in my business," he added.

"That right?" I asked the girls.

"NO!" the older one spat out. "He thinks our uncle has the right to tell us who we get married to, but nobody ever said he could," she said indignantly.

I didn't know who they were; I didn't know who their uncle was—and I sure didn't know who this old guy was, but I didn't like none of it. Since there were two girls saying they didn't agree with any arranged betrothal, I guessed they were all 'Saints', but the Mormons had officially renounced multiple marriages some years back. This kind of thing wasn't supposed to be happening no more.

I looked back at the older man. "Well, there you have it," I said coolly. "They say they ain't betrothed to you at all ... and they're the ones who'd know. Guess you're mistaken, eh?"

Well sir, if this feller had been a steam engine, all the gauges would have slapped right over into the red. His eyes narrowed down 'til they were just slits and he looked like he was about to explode. I reckon he wasn't used to folks telling him no. His eyes flicked to his right, hoping the four riders were going get involved.

What he saw was Sam and Nelson holding rifles on them four already. Even if they could get their mounts turned and then managed to get their guns out, the Owens brothers would have their rifles in action before the horsemen could do much of anything at all. And, at that range, the Owens brothers couldn't miss, not even on purpose. Sophie was leaning out the back of Mary Ann's wagon, pointing her pistol at the closest rider to her ... and Mary Ann herself had jumped down too. She was already drawing them two Mormon girls back away from where me and the old man were, and down the wooden walkway a ways. She had her revolver out too, ready for use.

I looked at the man for a minute. "I don't hold with a man forcin' womenfolk to do anything," I told him. "I’m jest dead set against it," I added.

I thought of something else. "You know Mister, we just fit a Civil War a few year back—you may of heard about it—and they ain't no slaves nowhere no more, so you just back off and go on about your 'business'," I said. "Else you and your business are going to wind up dead as dead can be ... right here, right now!"

The old feller tugged his hat down on his head angrily and made to back away from me. Don't know what he wanted the extra room for, but I plucked his pistol out from behind his belt before he could stop me. I held it loosely in my left hand, not aiming it toward anyone. In spite of my words, I didn't really want to kill him and if he didn't have a gun, I wouldn't have no call to kill him ... one killing a day was one more than I wanted.

I looked around at the riders still on their horses in the street. "You fellers unbuckle your gun belts and drop them off your horses." I motioned behind them. "Nelson, would you gather them up and drop them in the wagon ... I believe these gents need to be delivered from temptation."

We got all the rifles and belt guns gathered up and put away without any trouble at all. Getting a group of folks under your own guns before they know what's happing makes them mighty meek.

"Mister," I said, "y'all need to pull in your horns and get back to where you come from. These girls don't want you and no one is going to force 'em to marry you while I'm around. You try and you'll have to kill us all ... and I don't think Brigham will be thanking you for stirring up trouble, will he?"

He was furious, but he was thinking hard. The Mountain Meadows massacre—where a band of Mormons had attacked a settler wagon train back in 1857—had brought the Army down real hard on them. Several of those raiders were executed by the soldiers without a trial. Kind of got the Saints attention....

These days, the church was right peaceable and Brigham Young was doing all he could to get Utah made a state. It wasn't likely the Mormon leadership would look with any kind of favor on someone leaving the territory where their teachings held sway to forcibly bring back two women to the fold who didn't want to come. A killing would've made that much, much worse.

"We'll send a box with all the guns ... to wherever you tell us," I said, changing my mind a little. "You can pick 'em up there, and we'll all just let bygones be bygones."

He thought for a spell, but he didn't see any way around it. "Spanish Fork," he ground out. "Bishop Myers," he added. Then he turned around and walked away.

The riders trailed along behind him, looking kind of lost and bewildered. They looked back at us ever' so often, but there was no fight in 'em. The feller who'd got thrown off his horse didn't have his wits about him yet. He was trying to lead his horse, but he kept leaning off to the left and staggering a few steps in that direction before straightening up again.

We watched. They walked down to the sole hotel in the town, two riders went inside and came out with a passel of gear, one went down to the stable and came back with another horse. When they were all together again, they mounted and rode off to the west. The addle brained one had to have his friends help him stay in the saddle, but they were making tracks.

"We can go?" one of the girls asked, kind of timid like. "Is it all right?"

I turned around to face them. "I don't think they'll be bothering you again," I said. Seemed pretty evident to me those guys weren't goin' to bother anyone for a considerable time.

They brightened up considerably and I really looked at the pair of young women for the first time. They were some kind of pretty, I'm here to tell ya. They had lively, good-natured faces with pert little, up-turned noses and soft brown eyes that were dancing now that they figgered they were safe and could smile again.

The girls' natural good nature showed, even through all the dust and dirt a traveling person picks up without ever realizing it's happenin'. All dressed up in traveling clothes with little caps on their heads and a couple a' those hooped skirts fairly well-to-do women folk wear—one was dark blue, one dark green—topped by matching jackets, the girls looked a trifle plump for my tastes, but not unpleasing by any stretch of the imagination.

"Ladies," I said, "I'm Jeremiah Richardson, late of Brooks Hollar back in the Tennessee hills ... at your service," I told them by way of introduction and trying to be gallant about it ... don't know why. Seemed the right thing to do at the time.

"This is my sister, Mary Ann," I said, pulling my sis to my side. "That young lady over there is Sophie Owens," I said, "and those are her no-account brothers yonder, Samuel and Nelson." Sam and Nels tipped their hats when I said their names and grinned broadly.

And then, no one quite knew what came next, so we smiled at each other for a spell. Then I had an idea.

"Ladies," I said, "we were on our way to get a bite to eat that we didn't have to kill and cook our own selves," I told them, gesturing at the restaurant a short distance away behind them. "We'd be pleased if you'd join us for a late lunch or early supper ... whatever it is," I concluded, looking up at the sun for the time.

Their faces tightened a bit. They clutched carpet bags closer to their bodies and looked at each other.

I had an inspiration. Looked to me like funds were short with them. "Our wagon train Captain just paid us our wages," I said. It was kinda true. Pa'd paid Sam and Nels a pretty fair wage for drivin' a wagon out West here, and he'd given them the last of their wages just before this trip commenced. He'd given me some walkin' around money too.

"I aim on treating all of THESE jaspers with me and I'd take it as a favor if you'd come with us," I continued.

Put that way, they could agree without being upset about having to accept charity.

They smiled and strode arm-in-arm with Mary Ann and Sophie down the walk. The Owens boys and I dealt with the wagons and my horse.

* * *

We walked into the restaurant, pulled three tables together in a corner of the room and sat down. The young girl doing the hostessing chores came up smiling and seemed to accidental-like, put her right hand down on Sam's strong shoulder when she come around one a' the corners a' the table.

Sam was right happy with that. He perked right up, smiling and wriggling around like a puppy; he looked a tad silly to me.

The girl said her name was Natalie, and Sam allowed as how that might be the purtiest girl name he'd ever heard.

Sophie kind of looked disbelievingly at her brother from beneath dark eyelashes when he said that, but he didn't pay no never mind. I had a feeling, though, young Sam wasn't going to be allowed to forget that remark once Sophie got him in private.

I took a five-dollar gold piece out of my right pocket and put it on the table near the young woman. "Mistress Natalie," I said, "we'uns are just about starving to death here. You let me know when that runs out, hear?"

Well sir, the menu on the wall said a dinner cost two-bits, so however much we thought we could eat, five dollars in hard money was going to pay for it—no matter how much she brought us. There wasn't going to be any of that five dollars 'running out', but it let our shy two young Mormon girls know we weren't short on cash and they weren't putting us out including them in our meal.

Natalie smiled happily. "We got beef steak, some deer, some antelope, and one a' my brothers shot a turkey t'other day ... 'taters, peas, and some fresh carrots just come in on the train from the east yesterday," she told us. "What of that strikes your fancy, folks?"

"Miss," I said, looking earnestly into her eyes, "you just start bringing some a' each in and set it down on the table here. I expect we got enough appetite for anything y'all have." I smiled, she smiled back and grasped my shoulder real familiar like from behind.

Sam sniffed disdainfully.

I grinned more widely. My mad was fading for just about the first time today. This Natalie was cute enough to settle any man right down ... she wasn't much over five foot tall, slender, with some breasts that made a pair of big peaks in the blue gingham dress she was wearing, and she had some well-groomed dark brown hair that hung half-way down her back too. She was awful cute and sassy looking.

I went to the door to look down the street and check on our wagons and the hobbled mules out under some trees where they could graze some. I didn't really expect to see any of the fellers I'd had words with today coming back up the trail, but it didn't hurt to be wary.

Mary Ann met me right when I came back inside. She blocked my path back to the table, then stood up on her tip toes inside her Ehawee-made moccasins and kissed me ... on the lips. Maybe a little too affectionate for local tastes, but not too much out of line. Lots of families kissed on the lips back in Tennessee.

"Are we all right?" she asked, looking me dead in the eyes from a nose's distance away. Her arms were wound tight behind my neck, holding my body close to hers.

"You scared me this morning, Mary Ann," I admitted slowly, my voice low and kind of husky. "I don't rightly know what I'd do without my big sister," I said quietly. "…don't know at all...."

Tears gathered at the corners of Mary Ann's eyes and she did what she could to blink them away. "Scared me too," she whispered. She sniffled and put her head down on my chest. Her body pressed up against me even tighter. "Not going to happen, ever again," she said. There was a quiet determination in her voice. "Never!"

She kissed me again. Long and slow; her tongue flicked at mine a couple of times and her groin wormed around on mine before she broke away. For a moment, I wondered if she was ever going to do that—break away, that is. My goodness, that kind of kissing was generally reserved for the bedroom… and wasn't done betwixt a brother and sister, so far as folks here in The Crossing figured. She planted another, very quick peck on my lips, then turned back to the table and I started to follow.

I caught sight of my hands and frowned. I looked up and saw Miss Natalie watching me.

"Is there somewhere I can wash up?" I asked politely.

She nodded. "There's a pump out back, close by the kitchen door," she said, pointing into the kitchen.

I nodded and went back out the front door to make my way around the building, not wanting to traipse through their kitchen. I made sure to keep an eye out ... never paid to be sloppy 'bout such things. Any of the ones I'd had words with earlier could come back and use a Winchester rifle to make sure I'd never need to worry 'bout bein' sloppy ever again. I could of made it just one trip back behind the building if I'd asked earlier.

I'd finished cleaning off the grime and was wiping my hands off on a stray bit of toweling when Mistress Natalie came out the kitchen and pulled the door shut behind her. She stepped up to me and smiled most temptingly.

"She didn't like it when I put my hand on you, did she?" she demanded.

I didn't know what she meant for a moment. At first I'd thought she was going to say something about the shooting this morning, or me having a tussle up at the jail or in front of the general store or…. Then it dawned on me. Missy Natalie had a more narrow set of interests in this world.

"Oh…," I told her. "It wasn't that. Mary Ann's my sister and we had a little trouble this morning. She was just making sure we weren't still on the outs," I said.

Natalie looked up at me a little skeptically. "Didn't look much like a 'sister' kiss to me," she retorted. "I seen folks married a bunch of years don't kiss like that!" she remarked, tapping a fingernail against a tooth while she studied my face.

"On t'other hand," she commented. Her gaze dropped to below my waist. "I figger brothers have the same thing swinging between their legs what other boys do, don't they...?" She wet her lips with a saucy pink tongue. "I'm pretty sure my brothers do, anyway...."

I just smiled down at her.

When I didn't take offense, she frowned in concentration. She wasn't vexed, but she didn't seem to be able to get beyond what she'd just said, intending to confront and shock me. I wasn't shocked, and not nearly impressed with her confrontation.

I took charge a' the conversation, you might say, gatherin' her up in my arms ... she didn't resist ... and I kissed her long and deep. We were both breathless when we came up for air.

I smiled down at her. "The day you can tell me you've found out for sure 'xactly what your brothers have swinging between their legs ... and you can tell me how them things feel inside you," I said gently, "me and Mary Ann ... and all my other brothers and sisters ... will treat you'uns to a party you won't never forget."

"okay...," she said vaguely as I pulled away.

I almost turned around the corner to go back up front before what I'd said hit her. I looked back at her when I heard her gasp right out loud.

"You ... all a' you 'uns…?" she breathed, just loud enough for me to hear. Her voice was some kind of strangled and forced. Her mouth gaped a mite and her right hand was twisting and twining with her left.

I just smiled and blew her a kiss, turned and walked back alongside the outer wall on my way to the front door.

* * *

When Natalie began to bring out huge platters piled high with meats of all kinds, plus all the fixings, she wasn't near as composed as she had been before. In fact, her hands looked to be trembling just a tad and the platters rattled a bit when she laid 'em on the table. She had a smile fixed on her face and she couldn't take her eyes off me ... well, me and Mary Ann.

"That girl is excited all over herself," Mary Ann commented, whispering in my ear. "What did you do to her?"

"Suggested she should get to know her brothers better," I whispered back.

"So...?" she breathed, excitement in her soft voice.

"So ... maybe we'll come back this way some day, and we'll invite Miss Natalie and her brothers to a party," I murmured.

Mary Ann nodded with a tiny grin, leaned back in her seat and tried to pretend nothing was amiss. I think the two Mormon girls were convinced Mary Ann was content with whatever I'd told her, though they couldn't have heard any of our whispering. Mary Ann, herself, appeared to be composed and relaxed again, but the rest of us knew better.

All three of us boys had seen Mary Ann's blood runnin' hot and ready for some lewd playin' more'n a few times before. It was in her eyes … something about the flickering light in them.

* * *

I studied those two Mormon girls while I shoveled food down my throat, trying not to be obvious about it. We’d learned first off that Laura, in the green traveling dress, was seventeen, and Melissa, in blue, was fifteen. Plump and pretty, they relaxed and told us what all the fuss had been about.

Turns out their mother had died a while back, and their father more recently. They'd gone to live with their mother's brother, who'd taken it upon himself to promise them in marriage to a local bishop in the church ... probably in exchange for some land the bishop owned bordering their Uncle's, they speculated. I personally didn't like that uncle at all—sounded kind of mean to me.

On the other hand, the thought passed through my head that if a feller jest had to be married to two sisters, then these might be the sisters a man could be satisfied hitched to. I smiled to myself, wondering what the girls were hiding under them full skirts. The young girls smiled at me, so maybe my smile hadn't been as much to myself as I'd thought it was.

The sisters had intended to catch a train here at The Crossing, and head east to Illinois where there were some a' their pa's relatives with whom they thought they could take refuge. They had brought away enough money to get this far, and enough for the train, but they'd been on short rations since buying the tickets.

Over a few cups of some fine coffee made, we learned, by Natalie's mother … we came up with the idea that Laura and Melissa should travel with us a ways back in the direction of our Hidden Valley. Effectively, they would simply vanish since there wasn't that much road traffic headin' up the trail north.

What we talked about was we would deliver them to some place where they could catch a stage and work their way back down to a railroad town where they could continue their journey. All of that was just in case the Bishop might double back when he felt he could get away with it, and try to catch up with them. If the girls just disappeared, it was doubtful he'd ever catch up to them. He couldn't watch every whistle stop on the railroad; he didn't have the manpower.

It sounded good to everyone—so when we hitched up our mules and got on our way, we had two more very comely young women riding in Mary Ann's wagon than when we'd come to town this morning. It only took a minute or two for the girls to sell them train tickets back to the railroad, and then we were off.

As we drove across the railroad tracks in the first dimness of twilight, I turned back in my saddle to watch as young Natalie walked up to a young man who favored her too much not to be kin.

She smiled up at him and gave his arm an affectionate pat as she started earnestly talking up into his face. He was listening real close.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Two nights and parts of three days' later, with it raining cats and dogs for two of those days, we pulled off the main north/south trail and pointed our wagons westerly up a lesser-used track that commenced to climb right smartly before leveling off again. Eventually, we found a rambling house built of sawed timber sitting set near a small stream. It was a fine place for a home, with good views in all directions. The dwelling seemed to be comfortable and well-appointed.

Pa had reminded me to stop in and see the Tillmans—Isaac and his wife, Elizabeth—who lived there on a little ranch they ran all by themselves. Pa’d run across them on his first trip to The Crossing. It had been during one of the Tillman's supply visits to the little railroad town. Pa said they were good folks. Mary Ann had been along too, so she knew them, and they knew her.

Isaac was a gentleman about my Pa's age, tall and distinguished looking, but with a ready smile to welcome us to their home. His wife, Elizabeth, was a tall woman with luxurious brown hair that fell in waves down her back. A dark-eyed beauty with poise, charm, and a ready smile, she was quick to put folks at ease. She was also much younger than her husband ... not that there was anything wrong with that. It occurred to me my own Pa had a wife who was a bunch younger than he was, and it wasn't that unusual back then.

Turned out the Tillmans were on their way out of the mountains, heading down to the town we'd just left. From there, they'd be off to Kansas City over in Missouri. 'Twas a highly-desired shopping trip for Elizabeth and an excuse to stock up early on supplies, gettin' ready for the coming cold weather.

They invited us to stay in their home a while, having been told we were kind of ducking folks, avoiding even the chance that someone connected to Bishop Myers might recognize Laura and Melissa and let the bishop know in what the direction the two girls had fled.

The closest the Tillmans came to officially noticing all seven of us were still purty young, was an admonition from Isaac to not do anything he wouldn't. I did kind of wonder just what it was he wouldn't do, but I kept the question to myself. They said to make ourselves to home and rest the livestock for the trip further north.

We accepted their offer. There were good reasons for not making tracks for a while. There were those who can read tracks laid on the trail as well as some folks can read a book. But if you ain't moving, you can't be leaving no sign to be read.

The rain would have wiped out all traces of our wagons on the main trail by now. Even if it hadn't, the Tillmans promised to roll their own wagon over any sign of ours they came across on the trail from their house to the main one. We would have pretty much vanished into the wilderness as far as the Bishop and his crew were concerned.

Also in my mind was the fact that we'd pushed our mules purty hard coming down from Hidden Valley, making the trip in only seven days where it probably should of taken ten or more. In The Crossing, we'd hurried to get everything loaded—and had all the drama besides—that morning, then rushed out a' town with the Mormon girls. Heck, we kinda needed a break.

* * *

There I was, naked as the day I was born, squatting a little so that my body was neck-deep in the pond that Isaac Tillman had created by damming up the creek that ran through his property. The creek bed was mostly nice and sandy with a few stretches of a rock shelf, all of which reflected the sun's warmth right back into the water, making this a real comfortable place to be. With the weather havin' turned back to beautiful blue skis, the Indian summer we were enjoying made being in the water something very entertainin'. That pool of water had been warmed by a harsh sun all summer long, and yesterday's infusion of rain-fed runoff hadn't been enough to make it frigid. Give it another month or so, though, and I'd about been freezing.

Sam and Nels Owens were nearby, just as naked, and keeping low enough that we didn't show nothing scandalous to the Mormon sisters ... who were just as naked but just as hidden from our gaze by sunlight reflecting off the water's surface. You need to recollect that, in them days, men and women went swimming together dressed in garb that nigh covered a body from neck to toes.

Not us! We knew exactly what the elders back east would a’ thought about what we were doin’, but we were all young and a trifle rebellious, even at the best a’ times.

Our Mormon girls, plus Mary Ann and Sophie, were all in a group maybe fifteen yards upstream of where us boys were. They were just a whispering and giggling and carrying on something fierce. So there we were; the womenfolk over yonder and the guys downstream some, shooting glances every second or two over at the girls.

Me, Sam, and Nels talked quietly amongst ourselves about how the hunting might be good up on the far mountains slopes off yonder, but how the farming would surely be better down here and in general, just tried to ignore how frustrated we were. We were doin' our best to convince ourselves our blood wasn't poundin' through our veins from the realization there were nubile young women … naked nubile young women … just a few yards away.

This surely wasn't what I'd expected when my sister had breathlessly come up to me in the Tillman's parlor and asked if I wanted to go swimming. She'd said Laura and Melissa had already agreed.

I knew when she asked that none of us had any swimming clothes an' Mary Ann had to a' known that too. So, we'd be in our altogethers down there in the dammed up creek. I was interested right off. Sam and Nels' were just as quick to agree and I'm sure, for the same reasons I did.

I was about to accept that we were only going to get some teasing looks every once in a while when I heard the conversation upstream turn a mite heated over in the girls' section of the pond. I started paying more attention and hoped I wasn't being too obvious.

What I didn't know until some later, was that this was the last battle in a campaign my sister, Mary Ann, had been waging for a while, and most 'specially, all of today. She'd judged right now was the time to spring her carnal little trap. What it was … was that she'd been bedeviling these two Mormon girls ever since we left the railroad town behind.

I didn't know Mary Ann had noticed a knowing glance Laura had shot at Melissa when Mary Ann was giving me a lover's kiss in the restaurant. Trust a woman to be able to pay attention to something else happenin' whilst bein' given a lover's kiss by her brother.

What captured Mary Ann's attention was that the sisters' eyes went wide with interest, not condemnation. Their interest had sparked some speculation in Mary Ann's mind and she resolved to find out why the two Mormon girls' reaction had been so mild.

My sister had started her investigation with no delay. A ways out of town, Mary Ann had changed to pants inside her wagon while the mules drove themselves. That alone was enough to amaze Laura and Melissa, 'cause women just did not wear pants in them days. Nor sirrreeee, they didn't! Scandalous!

On top of that, Mary Ann simply went to the back end of the wagon and started changing without worrying about who might be able to see through the open hoop of the wagon top. When they tried to warn her that Samuel, who was riding along back there and could plainly see her bare bottom if he chanced to look in that direction, Mary Ann pertly allowed as how Sam had already seen it.

That shut our Mormon girls up; Mary Ann said later their eyes were big around as saucers. They didn't say anything though; nor did they signify they understood what Mary Ann said was an invitation or anything. It made Mary Ann that much more determined, 'cause the two Mormon girls' reactions just hadn't been how a girl in that society would, and should act in that kind of situation. Curious.

And so it went, with Mary Ann chipping away at Laura and Melissa's reserve ever time she got a chance.

Long before the moment we all wound up in the swimming hole together, Mary Ann found out neither of the two sisters had their maidenheads, and hadn't had them for a long while—just by talkin' to them. Apparently the girls hadn't thought that was a thing to be concealed … an' that too was a clue.

Not realizing how much they'd revealed about themselves, the Mormon sisters pretended to be appalled by Mary Ann's admission she hadn't had hers for some time either. Mary Ann told me later though, that their faces lit up when Mary Ann told them about finding lots of willing partners for some hot fun and games all during our journey west.

She teased the Mormon girls unmercifully the whole three days traveling to the Tillman's, allowing as how it was okay that the sisters didn't have Mary Ann's experience 'cause she knew they'd been stuck back in the Utah territory and stuff like that. Allowances had to be made, she said.

When Sophie had hugged both of her brothers at once in an unguarded moment, Mary Ann hinted to Laura and Melissa that Sophie and her brothers were 'awful, awful affectionate'. She'd smiled a thoroughly naughty grin at both the Mormon girls and let her raised eyebrows hint at much more than she said.

Mary Ann found out in the course of some girl talk that the sisters had three brothers back in Utah. Mary Ann had immediately begun to wax eloquent about the time she'd had three brothers in a bed with her, way back on the Oregon Trail.

Now, Mary Ann had been with three brothers on a number of occasions, and they'd been three of her brothers, but it hadn't been on no Oregon Trail—it'd been up in Hidden Valley when me and my older brothers, Jesse and David, treated her and, later, our other sisters to an afternoon of total debauchery … not more'n a couple weeks ago.

Mary Ann hadn't told Melissa nor Laura she had any brothers 'cept me, but they found out later when I answered an innocent question put to me outside Mary Ann's hearing. I think they guessed there'd been at a lot more to Mary Ann's admission than she'd first admitted. Or maybe Mary Ann planned for them to find out about our brothers 'accidentally' as a part of her plan. She never said.

By the time we were all in the pond together, I can imagine Laura and Melissa's blood was about to boil with all the suppressed emotions they were feeling. Looking back on it, after Mary Ann confessed some of her plan to me some weeks later, I could see how my sister egged on the Mormon sisters ever chance she got.

Eventually, all of Mary Ann's machinations came to fruition. Fifteen-year-old Melissa was driven nearly out of her mind with innuendoes, disparaging remarks, and condescending attitude Mary Ann had assumed.

Seething with indignation and pushed past the boiling point, Melissa snapped and abruptly screamed out her frustration.

"WE DID TOO FUCK OUR BROTHERS EVER CHANCE WE GOT!! YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT ALL WE DONE, MARY ANN RICHARDSON, SO DON'T YOU NEVER SAY WE DIDN'T!!"

"HOT DAMN!!" Mary Ann shrieked right back at the incensed girl. "Took you long enough to say so, by golly!" she added, wholly satisfied with the confession she'd spent so much time extracting. She threw me a beaming smile and motioned me nearer.

I had completely turned around by now and I didn't care if the girls saw I was listening. Melissa was standing in some shallower water with most of her body exposed. She had 'er hands on her hips, her jaw thrust out, and her face was flaming red with anger. Miss Melissa was thoroughly upset with my big sister.

I saw right off I'd been dead wrong when I'd first met them—actually, these girls weren't plump a-tall; sturdily built, maybe, but nowheres near 'plump'. Melissa, and I was pretty sure Laura would too, had big, round tits that swung pendulously and swayed most deliciously as her body moved.

'Course their bodies were sturdy enough to support those big, lovely breasts ... they had to be. That's what led me astray—thinking they were plump and all. I shook my head—I just had to start looking closer at things that were right in front of me.

Mary Ann shot me a quick, excited, look and beckoned to me again. I wasn't yet fifteen-years-old, but even I could tell my big sister had felt the bait nibbled on her hook, and now she was ready to set it.

I raised up to my full height and walked over to them. Considering what Melissa had just proclaimed to one and all, I didn't reckon either girl was going to be shocked seeing a naked boy in the water with them.

Melissa, once she realized what she'd done, dropped back down into the water like a thrown rock. Her red face looked like it was going to be permanent condition if something didn't happen in her favor, and pretty darn soon.

I walked up behind Mary Ann and put my hands on her shoulders. She promptly leaned back against me and plastered herself against my front. I just naturally let my hands find their way around to my sister's breasts and cupped them, squeezing slow and gentle like.

Mary Ann turned her head, tilted it up to my lips and kissed me enthusiastically. "They're wicked, naughty folks just like us, Jere!" she said happily, using her right hand behind her to search out my rapidly hardening cock and squeeze me passionately.

"I HEARD!" I said delightedly. I wanted to assure the girls that there was nothing wrong—that they were among friends of a like attitude toward such things as Melissa had admitted to doing.

I glanced at Melissa, but her body was still under water, demurely covered ... but I knew what I'd seen and heard. "Melissa?" I said softly.

She wouldn't look at me for a bit, but eventually turned a beet-red face to me.

"Honey," I said comfortingly, "I think your brothers were awful, awful lucky to have you and your sister to play naughty games with!"

Her face flamed even brighter for a moment but, as she studied my hands kneading my sister's breasts, and lightly pinching Mary Ann's nipples into standing even prouder and more erect with ever passing second, Melissa's eyes began to change. She shot a look down at the Owens' where the three siblings were already engaged in a three-way groping hug that they weren't even trying to conceal. I didn't know when Sophie had gone to them—she had to have gone right past me, but I never noticed—couldn't have been too long ago, though.

Laura rose to her full height and stepped toward me and Mary Ann in the slow-motion walk the water demanded. I couldn't help sucking a deep breath. Laura's breasts were even more pendulous, and at least as inviting as her younger sister's.

She shook a finger in Mary Ann's face. "You're mean!" Laura said, but she was smiling. "You could of just asked flat out iffen we were fucking our kin...."

"Well, no ... actually, that's NOT something that can just be asked right out like that," Mary Ann replied unperturbedly. "There's just too many ways to git in big trouble a doin' that." She grinned nastily. "And it was so much fun watching you girls get more and more heated up about what I wasn’t saying," she said with a grin. "And anyway … now," Mary Ann said softly, "here we all are ... with no secrets we need to keep from one another—not no more … right?"

The sisters nodded, almost in unison. Melissa's frown was fading fast. Her anger had changed swiftly to chagrin, but now it was being replaced by a primal expression I knew well. Melissa, and Laura too, were ready to be fucked. The moment just required....

"Would you like to watch my brother fuck me?" Mary Ann asked sweetly. "Just to prove we do it too?"

The sisters blinked in unison. They'd never heard such a thing voiced out loud in their lives! But they recovered almost instantly.

"No," Laura answered quietly, "we want your brother to ... fuck ... US!" The little pause before the word 'fuck' was because this was probably the first time she'd ever used it openly, right out in the daylight with no walls around to deaden the sound or hide the person saying it.

I looked at Laura and smiled broadly. Then I cocked my head to one side and looked closely.

Mistress Laura, late of the Mormon community, was taking this awfully calmly. She hadn't even been that too upset from the start; she'd laid back and let her younger sister lead the way with the impetuousness of the younger and lesser experienced. I wondered if Laura had seen the way things were shaping up early on, and decided to step out of the way to watch and see how things played out. I reckoned it could be that Laura knew her sister would try to evade doing what she really wanted to do deep down inside ... unless 'forced' to admit wanting to do it in such a way she couldn't take back.

I saw Laura glance at the Owens' kids ... Sophie was already on all fours on the creek bank. Samuel was inserting his cock into her from behind and Sophie was sucking Nelson's cock enthusiastically in front.

Laura smiled serenely and let her eyes drift back to me. “...If he wants to," she added. She drew her younger sister along with her, taking back the 'duties' of older sister. Melissa willingly let her big sister lead the way. The two busty young women stood side by side in front of me, and waited for what I was to do.

And so Mary Ann's little drama played itself out.

"You two shaved your ... private parts?" I asked interestedly, opening with a shot across the bow, so to speak.

Laura nodded and smiled prettily. She wiggled her generous hips most delectably. She liked being bare down there, and her delight with her body and how she appeared to other's was overcoming her chagrin at having been so totally tricked into revealing what she and Melissa had never expected to talk about.

"Your sister allowed as how it felt soooo good yesterday," Laura said dryly. She laughed lightly. "She said all the boys she knew liked a woman who was smooth all over."

"Well ... I know I do," I replied, looking down, thoroughly fascinated.

"I thought she meant you!" Laura remarked. That confirmed what I’d been thinking earlier. She'd seen through Mary Ann's maneuvering, but hadn't had a problem with it.

"Do me proud, little brother," Mary Ann whispered in my ear. She released my cock, turned to the Owens and put her hands on her hips. "NELS OWENS ... YOU WANT TO FUCK??" Mary Ann yelled.

Nelson looked up, took in the situation quickly, and nodded enthusiastically ... but he needn't have bothered. Mary Ann had taken it for granted he would want her, and she was already striding up out of the water to the grassy creek bank where Nels was busy extracting his cock from his sister's sucking mouth. She wasn't cooperating too awfully much.

Just to be perverse, Sophie was sucking on him all the harder, making complaining noises, growling and glaring at him ferociously. When Nels' cock was his own again, Sophie grinned wickedly at him, having thoroughly enjoyed the byplay. She dropped her upper body to the grass, then rested her head on her folded hands and hiked her ass a little higher into the air, presenting an even better target for her brother Sam's cock ramming deep inside her.

Nelson waited for Mary Ann at a blanket she'd brought down from the wagon for this specific purpose. When my sister got there, she grinned up at him and grasped his already hard member in her right hand. Then she just caved in, winding up on her backside in a slow fall and pulling Nels down on top of her. His cock slid into her steaming little cunt without any wasted time.

Never saw it done any prettier. Sister was in a rutting mood and she wasn't messing around.

Me, Laura, and Melissa watched the beginnings of Mary Ann and Nelson's coupling but then we turned to each other. All three of us knew we had better things to do. I set my feet on the creek bottom so Laura was to my left front and Melissa was on my right.

"May I?" I murmured, slipping my hand slowly down from each girl's hip and around to their front. Neither objected, so my hands went lower to cup their mounds. They both sucked in a quick breath. Laura shifted her right foot outward to give me more room. Melissa, two years younger than her sister, didn't open her legs until my hand urged them wider. The middle fingers on both my hands began to gently prize their pretty cunt lips apart and probe deeper.

Laura's juices were already flowing strongly. She was ready for a cock right now.

Grinning, I took their wrists and tugged them toward the western edge of the pool. There was a big boulder there with nicely rounded edges and a flattish top surface that slanted down a mite from west to east. Putting my hands on Laura's hips, I boosted her up onto the stone's smooth top where all of Laura's privates were exposed to the warm sunlight. My eyes feasted on the sturdy young woman's body for a moment. I grinned gleefully.

"Will you take her left?" I asked Melissa, pushing my chin out to indicate Laura's left breast. Melissa nodded and took her sister's left nipple between her lips and teased it into a stronger erection, making it a more ruby colored protrusion and thicker than ever. I busied myself with Laura's right breast, sliding my right hand between her meaty, shapely thighs to delve between her cunt lips again.

"Have you tasted your sister?" I asked Melissa. She nodded, her eyes flashing. I bent low to nuzzle Laura's left breast for a moment, then turned to lap a long, slow swath down her pink slit.

"Ooooooooooooooooooo," Laura wailed. Her face screwed up into an expression of overwhelming pleasure.

I busied myself with some more tonguing of Laura's quim for a moment, then backed away and urged Melissa forward. Melissa shot me a wondering glance and bent forward to take over licking her little sister's cunt.

She didn't exactly know what I had in mind, but she was willing to go along with whatever I asked. When I maneuvered in behind Melissa and rubbed my cock up and down the small of her back, she was even more cooperative, shifting her legs apart and bowing even lower over her sister's sweet lips.

Melissa and I were in deeper water. It came up to my short ribs and to the lower slopes of Melissa's breasts. I dipped, and came back up with my prick probing between Melissa's firm thighs. A second later, my cock head was sliding like a hot spike through warm butter all the way up Melissa's slickened love channel. She groaned aloud into Laura's cunt, making Laura give out with a little whinny. My cock was settled deep inside the younger Mormon sister in seconds.

Melissa reared her head back. "Ohhhhhhhh God!" she moaned. "I need that so bad!" she whimpered over her shoulder. "It's been soooooooo long...."

Well, it'd been too long for me too ... almost four days since our last night on the trail down to the railroad. I'm pretty sure Melissa and Laura's wait had been a tad longer.

Neither Melissa nor I were in a mood for lengthy encounter, with slow increases in the intensity of our union. In moments, we were thrashing about in the water, danged near making it foam with the force and speed of our thrusts and counter thrusts.

"Angh, angh, angh, angh, angh, angh, angh," Melissa grunted with every in-stroke I made. Her ass whipped around in a tight circle, making my cock grind around her cunt opening. We both felt it. There was no way we could last much longer.

I came off, spouting my cream deep inside the young woman, my hips thrusting in short jerks. I almost lost my grip on Melissa's hips and fell back into the water with the violence of my orgasm.

"AAAAAAAAIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Melissa screamed, making more noise than I knew a woman could make in getting her satisfaction. She left off sucking at Laura's cunt and arched her head back, shivering with the strain and sensations surging through her body ... and then it was over.

She was left gasping and shuddering, weak as a kitten and panting for breath. She lay her head on Laura's belly and stayed there a long moment, striving to regain control over her body.

And what I done for the younger, I meant to do for the elder of the sisters also. They switched places; Laura hustled her sister up on the rock while Melissa was still shaky and out of breath.

"This isn't fair," Melissa drawled dreamily, finally settled on her back on the boulder. She was just about as relaxed a woman as I ever saw. Melissa didn't have any qualms now. The 'hook' Mary Ann set had captured Melissa beyond the power of uncertainties to take Melissa back away from our licentious ways.

"What's not fair?" Laura asked suspiciously. She left off sucking my cock to make me hard again that much faster and positioned herself between Melissa's thighs and spread her own.

"You get to suck out some of Jere's spending from my cunt," Melissa explained, "and I didn't!"

I laughed. "Mistress Melissa," I interjected. "Anytime you want some, you just whistle and I'll come a running with more, okay?"

We all three chuckled, and then got down to making Laura just as relaxed as her big sister.

* * *

"So...," Melissa asked slowly. "How'd you get started fucking your brothers?" She was looking at Mary Ann, who was laying between my legs and fondling my balls, taking one or the other into her mouth from time to time. She gave my cock head a kiss ever' now and then too. We were all seven of us sitting or laying around on the additional blankets and robes we'd made a special trip up to the wagons to bring down to the creek bank.

Mary Ann looked up. "Oh ... Jere saved me from a naughty ol' outlaw who was going to rape me in a store back in Nebraska," she said. "And then he killed a bear and got hurt, so he couldn't run from me any more." She sucked the head of my cock for a moment.

Melissa and Laura's faces took on faintly dumbfounded expressions.

"For real?" Laura finally asked.

"For real!" Mary Ann replied firmly. She went into more detail.

I threw in the fact that there had been more menfolk from the Richardson wagon train keeping her from harm in that store ... and that black bear did some unkind things to me before dying, but that didn't stop Laura and Melissa both eyeing me with a little more respect.

"How'd you and your brothers get started?" I asked desperately, hoping to change the subject so ever'one would quit looking at me.

"Oh!" Laura said, settling back against Sam's body. Looked to me like she was looking for the right words, never having had to tell this story before. We were the first ever to hear it.

"Well," I was ten," she said slowly ... and me and Calvin—he's our oldest brother—were out in the hayloft and he got to tickling me something fierce and ... well ... after a while, I was holding on to his cock through his pants and he had his hands under my skirt and...." She made some gestures, her hands waving in the air kind of aimlessly. "We didn't start out to put his cock in me ... it just kind of happened," she finished.

There was a small frown on her face. "I don't think so anyway," she added.

"Was it fun?" Sophie asked interestedly. She had given her brothers up to the sisters and was laying with her slender legs outstretched and her head propped up on my stomach, sorta watchin' what my sister was doing for me.

"Ohhhhhhh yessssss," Laura drawled, reliving the memory.

We all laughed, and she joined in a moment later.

"And I saw them," Melissa asserted. "They didn't know it, but I was up there too ... and the next time they started looking all around to make sure Pap didn't see them, I figgered out what was about to commence. So I climbed that ladder up into the hayloft and jined in!" She giggled. "You should of seen Cal's face when I popped up off a' the ladder and whistled at 'em real loud. He thought he'd been caught by our Pap and he looked awful scared for a minuet!" she said.

"Then Melissa said that our other brother, Mark, should come up there too ... and he started coming to the hayloft whenever he could ... and then me'n Melissa thought our baby brother Andrew shouldn't be left out neither," Laura said.

"How old's Cal?" Sophie asked.

"He's twenty-two," Laura answered after a moment's though. "Mark is twenty, and Andy is fourteen."

I took my sister's head in both hands and raised her mouth off my cock. "How come you didn't get me up into Pa's hayloft back when, huh?"

Mary Ann looked at me and just sniffed. "Ain't we making up for lost time?" she demanded.

I chuckled. "I reckon," I said.

"So ... what are your brothers doing now," Nels interjected. "They got used to having their sisters ... and now...?"

"Well," Laura said, "Cal and Mark're married and got kids an' stuff," she told us.

There was a short silence. "Do their wives know about ... you know?"

"Nah," Laura said shortly. "I don't think they'd of stood for it, not knowing them."

But Melissa had a thoughtful expression on her face.

"Melissa?" I asked, prodding for more of the story.

"Well ... one time, I thought Charlotte—that's Marks' wife—said something like...." She stopped, trying to bring something said long ago back to the forefront of her mind. "Well ... I don't know 'xactly what it was she said, but I got the idea that she was telling me it was all okay, but we weren't really talking about sex nor anything like that right then," she ended aimlessly. "And Nancy, Cal's wife, was right there with Charlotte when she said it," she added after a bit.

"Hmmmmmmmmm," I said, "you just remember thinking maybe they were trying to tell ya something without saying anything, eh?" Melissa nodded.

"Interesting," I said with no particular emphasis. I looked between my legs. Mary Ann's eyes were fixed on the two Mormon girls and she was hanging on ever' word, with her lips pressed to the end of my cockhead.

I smiled and turned to look out over the foothills that mounted like stair steps up to the mountains off to the west. Utah, and the sister's brothers—and their wives and children—lay across those mountains, though I wasn't looking exactly in the right direction, of course—I had no idea where the sisters brothers' homesteads were out there in Utah.

The afternoon had advanced into early evening and, pretty soon, we'd be heading inside the Tillman's nice, warm home. The evenings were getting coolish this late in the year.

"You know what we could do...." I drawled slowly. "Y'all could come up to our ... we call it Hidden Valley ... 'stead of going back east. You know how me and my brothers and sisters are ... like this," I said, letting my gesture sweep over the whole group of sprawling naked bodies. "And there are other families up there too," I added.

Melissa and Laura looked at each other for an instant, then turned and nodded their heads emphatically.

That was quick! Not that I'd thought there'd be much of a decision to make. I grinned.

"We could get word to your brothers," I continued, "so they wouldn't think y'all dropped off the edge of the earth or anything," I said carefully.

"And … we might could find a way to get them out here on this side a' the mountains and we could do stuff with them whenever we wanted?" Laura demanded.

I pursed my lips. That was certainly the outcome I was instinctively ready to help the girls achieve. Her question was just a tad premature, though. We had all sorts of problems to resolve first … like whether the brothers wanted to or not, and whether the girls could be reunited with them, AND if the wives of said brothers would allow….

My sister may have been thinking along the same lines.

"A letter?" Mary Ann contributed. "A letter that asks them if they're still hankering for some lovely, sweet, sister-cunt?" Trust my wanton sister to get to the meat of the matter quickly. Mary Ann left off sucking my cock and scrambled up to straddle my hips. She sank down and took my hard cock up inside her, as if that was how she did her best thinking.

It set everyone off. In another second, Sam and Nels were shoving their dicks into one or the other of the Mormon sisters' holes and Sophie was squatting over my mouth, urgently rubbing her cunt all over my face. There wasn't anymore conversation for a long while.

* * *

Turned out writing a letter about what Laura and Melissa had discovered about our way of life was a lot of fun ... doing it naked and all. Also, we took breaks for some good fucking ever' now and again.

Of course, we couldn't just write a letter to the girls' brothers asking if they'd like to come live where they could fuck their sisters any time they wanted. Letters could be intercepted and read.

Howsomever, our Mormon girls could certainly send a letter to let their brothers know the two sisters were safe and happy. The letter would say the girls lived in a place that reminded them a lot of home, and then they'd write down a question asking whether the boys remembered the tickling fun and games up in their Pap's barn. We didn't expect the boys could have forgotten that any more than the sisters had. Then the letter would say the sisters sure missed being tickled like back in the old days up in the hayloft. All of us were purty durned sure the boys would pick up on that real quick.

The girls wrote long, rambling paragraphs, saying how much they missed their brothers and wondering if their brothers' wives ever got tickled like that and whether the wives might be jealous of our two sisters being tickled ... and then … well … we left it at that. Anything more would just be too much. Laura and Melissa added some other, meaningless questions and comments so the important questions wouldn't stand out. We'd have to wait on a reply to see where things might go.

In the meantime, we fucked ourselves into a deep sleep every night.

* * *

Two days later, Isaac and Elizabeth Tillman got home, right when they said they would. They were awful tired and weary, so we kids had them sit right down in their own kitchen and rest whilst we took care of them.

I'd spotted a stray mule deer off on the other side of the creek the day before and brought him down with a lucky shot; he was running and was already near three hundred yards off. It'd hung overnight and maybe it could a' stood hangin’ one more day, but it would do.

Mary Ann and the girls set to work making a dinner of deer steak and some late vegetables right from the Tillman's garden. Everything was ready by the time us boys had Isaac's team of horses cooled off, watered, curried, and put in their stalls with a bait of oats as a reward for their hard work.

"Oh!" Elizabeth exclaimed when the meal was nigh all set out on the table. "I've some butter down in the pantry ... I'll just go get it." She was on her way out of the big frontier kitchen before anyone could offer to fetch it for her.

When she came back, she stood for a moment behind her husband's chair with her left hand on his shoulder. It was the first time I'd actually taken notice of the two, side-by-side like that.

I saw Elizabeth's blood was up. There was a rosy blush to her cheeks. Where a pulse had been beating in her lovely throat before—it was pounding now. I wondered why she was so excited.

A few moment's reflection was all it took for me to think of something that might be the cause. See, the door to the stairs leading down to what Elizabeth called her 'pantry'—it was actually a small cellar—was in a spare bedroom a short way down the hallway from the kitchen. The Tillmans didn't use that bedroom, but they kept a very comfortable bed there for company.

Now ... we'd been careful not to sleep on any of the Tillman's bed linen or mattresses that weren't covered in some of our robes and blankets, and we'd aired out all rooms where we'd been copulating. We even cut off our partying as of the night before, so as not to have fresh fucking-odors in the house on the morning of the Tillmans' expected return.

But I was suspicious. I was guessing we hadn't been careful enough. I knew Sophie had been tasked with airing out that room, but I hadn't thought to check. Sitting there, chewing on a hunk of deer meat, I figgered maybe Sophie probably forgot to raise the windows in that bedroom and maybe the … ah … odor she and her brothers—you know how that goes—plus maybe something … a spot of a … liquid, for instance, might have been left behind and its presence made it clear precisely what someone had been doing in there.

So ... maybe we were found out. I was glancing around, checking to see if the way was clear to the door to get out of the house quickly. A body never knew how adults were gonna react to something like this.

But Mistress Elizabeth didn't say a word about it, not right then anyway. What she was doing was shooting glances at all seven of us kids. The idea we'd been found out took hold in my head. I figured Elizabeth was likely wondering who had been doing what to whom back in there. The flush was still with her, the blood vessel in her throat was still throbbing, and her breathing was fast and shallow.

When we were done ... everyone was hungry and we took our time stoking the inner fires real good ... Mary Ann brought out a couple of dried apple pies she'd prepared from our own supplies. I remembered a certain apple pie, my sister had fed to me some months earlier and I smiled to myself.

I caught Mary Ann's eye and she winked innocently, from the eye nearest me and away from our hosts. Her face was quite serene. She remembered it too.

When Mary Ann had served everyone, she perched daintily on my knee to eat her share instead of working her way back around the table to her seat. Off to the side, I could tell Elizabeth Tillman noted what Mary Ann had done, though it wasn't that unusual for a sister to sit on her brother's knee for a bit.

Elizabeth swallowed hard and she grinned broadly to no one at all. She cleared her throat.

"I noticed, Mr. Tillman," she said formally, the way it was ofttimes spoken betwixt a husband and wife in those times. With Elizabeth, it was more a way of opening a new conversation than anything else, "that these children explored some of the things you would do, while we were gone to town," she told Isaac.

It took a moment for him to figure out what she meant, but he finally remembered he cautioned all of us to 'not do anything he wouldn't do' as he waved goodbye to us a few days ago.

"Indeed, Mrs. Tillman?" he said. Husband and wife were sure awful proper and such all of a sudden. Made me nervous as all get out. While their eyes were lit by an inner passion, they appeared to be outwardly quite calm and unworried.

"Indeed, sir," Elizabeth replied to her husband. Her eyes were dancing and none of that flush of suppressed excitement from earlier had faded at all. I figgered we weren't in all that much trouble after all. Mrs. Elizabeth Tillman was havin’ way too much fun with this. Lots more than she would if she’d been angry.

"I have discovered, husband, that someone!" Elizabeth asserted, “...someone, sir, was most certainly fornicating in the back bedroom … and for a long, long spell, judging by how strong the scent is there. It must a’ happened whilst we were in town, dear husband." She looked around the table at the lot of us. "Now, I wonder just who made that room just reek with the smell a' sex, eh?" she remarked, watching us closely.

Well ... we might could of bluffed our way out of this, but when Elizabeth asked that question, Sophie dropped her chin to her chest ... and her brothers weren't far behind ... and then our Mormon sisters did the same thing.

Elizabeth's eyes widened when all three of the Owens kids ducked their heads, guilty like. When the sisters did it too, Elizabeth's eyebrows threatened to climb up past her hairline.

Me? I just put my right hand on Mary Ann's skirt-covered thigh, then slipped my hand underneath the skirt and massaged my sister’s well-toned flesh. I grinned right into Elizabeth's face, daring her to make the next leap ... which she did in the space between two heartbeats.

"Oh my...," she breathed. Her pretty pink tongue slipped out and moistened her lips. Those lips were full, red, and looked very kissable to me ... also already plenty moist for most anything. She looked down the table to her husband. "They ... they ... Isaac ... do you see...?"

"I do!" Isaac replied, but he didn't really … not until he saw my hand working 'neath Mary Ann's skirt.

"Oh, yes," he breathed. He swallowed hard. "You don't mean...?"

He blinked a couple of times and looked again, as if not really believing what he saw. Then his smile got wider, and a chuckle rumbled deep in his chest. "How ... excellent a thing to happen!"

He cocked his head to one side and looked down the long table at his wife. "So, wife, what do you think we should do about this ... this ... state of affairs, eh?" he asked with an edge in his voice. I got the feeling that Mr. Tillman was challenging his wife. He wanted to see where she was willing to go with all this information.

Elizabeth looked back at her husband with an intensity that didn't seem entirely warranted by her husband's question. Were they goin’ to go to arguing about somethin’ or t’other?

Then … Elizabeth nodded; she understood. Her husband had handed her the reins and was leaving a decision up to her. I figured this wasn't a new conversation—the topic had come up before. This was, rather, a resolution to a discussion they may have been having, and perhaps one that had gone on for a lengthy period without being settled. She leaned back in her straight-back chair.

Me? I think the decision was already made when she walked back into the kitchen.

"What I think ... UNCLE ISAAC...," Mistress Elizabeth said a trifle unsteadily, "is that we should join in these children's games—and give every room in this house that lovely aroma ... what do you think?"

"HAH!" I crowed, grinning fiercely. "I was just thinking a while ago that y'all sure favored one another." I grinned broadly at Elizabeth and then at her ... uncle.

"Uncle, eh?" my sister contributed from her place on my knee. She looked interestedly at Isaac.

Now, I guess it was presumptuous of me, but I hadn't really given Uncle Isaac any time to ponder whether his wife/niece's proposal had merit or not … not that he noticed. The Owens' heads all bobbed right back up and Sophie was suddenly sporting a grin that threatened to split her face wide open.

Sophie would flirt with a fence post if nothing better was available ... and fuck it too. She was always ready for that. She turned to 'Uncle' Isaac, flipped her skirt up, and her knees spread wide for Isaac's inspection.

Mr. Tillman's eyes fairly clicked in their sockets as he glanced down at the young girl. He never did reply to his wife's question.

I urged Mary Ann up off my lap ... or maybe it was she departed of her own will before she felt my hands on her back. She moved off in Isaac's direction. I stepped up behind Elizabeth's chair and pulled it out from the table, real gentleman-like. She rose and stepped around the chair, then lifted her lips for an excited kiss that went on and on. I had time to mold her right breast in my left hand and adjust my stance to do the same for her left breast before we came up for air.

Putting my hands on her shoulders, I turned her gently around and lifted the back of her hair to begin unbuttoning the long grey dress she'd worn back from town. In a trice, she was holding her own hair up with her left hand and her right was behind her, exploring the hard bulge that was building in my pants. Once Elizabeth Tillman made her decision, she didn't hold back.

When I had the dress' buttons undone down to her waist, I pushed her small clothes down enough to bare her breasts. I hefted them, loving the soft firmness in my hands. I squeezed gently, taking her nipples between thumb and forefinger and pinching lightly to make them stand up more proudly.

"Oh my God!" Elizabeth breathed, pressing her body back against me. Her right hand was still busy in my crotch.

Kissing the hollow of her neck and up behind her ears, I looked over her shoulder; the sudden cessation of talk in the room was because everyone was completely involved doing something with someone else. Sophie was already naked and sitting on Isaac's equally bare lap, working to fit his manhood inside her cunt. My big sister was standing next to the man, her shirt apart and she was fitting her left breast into Isaac's mouth. Her head was thrown back as the older man sucked at her teats and doing his best to swallow them whole.

The Owens brothers were setting back in their chairs with Laura and Melissa on their knees in front of them, servicing their cocks with wet, open mouths. As I watched, the boys pressed the girls away far enough for them to rise and strip the sisters’ small clothes off from under their skirts. In another few seconds, the girls were hoisted to the tabletop and their hot cunts filled with the brothers' hard meat.

I chuckled. This whole thing had been ignited in the space of seconds, based on no more'n a few words ... well, that and the carnal lust we all lived with inside us that was waiting for the slightest spark. And I was falling behind!

I quickly pushed Elizabeth's dress all the way down her hips, taking her small clothes with it and had her step out of them. When she was out of her expensive looking dress, I tossed it over the top of the door leading down the hall. And then I looked at her. She was taller than she'd looked in the dress, what with a couple/three petticoats that had made the skirt billow out.

She had lovely, slender thighs and beautiful calves. Her breasts were full and round, her hips voluptuous, spreading from a waspishly narrow waist. I couldn't see her ankles or feet because she was wearing a pair of those lace-up ladies' boots with those high heels—I think they call 'em Balmorals. The tall heels on 'em molded her calves into wonderfully sculpted columns of soft girl flesh.

She made a move to sit down and unlace them.

"Don't," I said softly, liking the look of a naked woman prancing around in nothing but boots that came up over her ankles. Taking in my admiration, Elizabeth put her hands on her hips and strutted around for a bit.

The Owens' boys noticed ... and so did Isaac. The boys grinned and nodded their approval, but Isaac was overwhelmed by Sophie bouncing up and down on his cock. I hadn't seen how the girls got his clothes off, but they were sure enough gone. He had two fingers of his right hand up my sister's cunt, too, pleasuring her no end.

"Come here, woman," I said to Elizabeth, and she came submissively, ready for whatever I was about to do to her. In fact, she was dang near breathless.

I used my hands on her shoulders to urge her lay face down across the kitchen table. She willingly bent over and spread her legs wide for my assault on her cunt, jutting her delightfully rounded ass out as far as she could get it. I dropped my pants around my ankles and wasted no time removing any more of my clothes before taking her hips in my hands and plunging my rod deep inside this beautiful woman.

Them Balmorals raised her whole body upward by the height of those heels, and made it easy for me to slide my cock into her without no knee bending or nothing. Elizabeth groaned deep in her chest as I speared her, then commenced to give forth a whining grunt with each slamming thrust I made.

"Angh, angh, angh, angh, angh, angh, angh, angh, angh...." When I slowed down fucking into her, she slowed her grunts. Just for fun, I reached around her body and cupped each of her full breasts in my hands and pinched her nipples gently 'tween thumb and forefinger. Well, sir ... when I did that, the noises Elizabeth was making rose somewhat in pitch and she got louder too.

"AIINGH, AIINGH, AIINGH, ANGH, ANGH, ANGH, ANGH, ANGH, ANGH!!!"

So I experimented. Twirling one nipple created a slightly lower pitched wail … doing both of them, raised the level ... and if I coupled nipple teasing with some corkscrew cock thrusts ... her grunts took on an almost desperate quality.

I'm ashamed to say it ... okay, I really ain't ... but my sister said later I should be—I played that woman like a piano, squeezing first one nipple, then the other, sometimes both, occasionally neither, sometimes fast, and other times not. I was having a ball! I'm sure I had a huge grin on my face.

After a bit, I didn't know if I was shoving my cock in her in time to her grunts, or whether she was grunting in time to my thrusts. After a bit longer, I was beyond wondering. In gradual steps, I lost the ability to ram my cock into her at a measured pace. Before too long, the urgent noises from the other copulating women and men in the kitchen were pushing me to plunge into Elizabeth's hot cunt with ever-increasing speed and power.

It was Sophie who gave vent to a screaming orgasm first. Her high-pitched wailing and carrying on, and the fast-paced wet slaps of skin-on-skin between her and Isaac, helped set us all off.

In seconds, Elizabeth was bucking like a rogue mare under me, and then she joined Sophie in twin keening screeches of release.

I came off right there with her, as she wriggled her body to and fro for the longest time. I know I spewed enough milky white spending into her to spatter against the walls of her sheath and splash all over her insides.

Elizabeth's face got all scrunched up like she was in pain or something and then even the tabletop she was resting her elbows on was shuddering and twitching something fierce as she and our Mormon girls got their orgasms at near the same moment.

The table held together ... it was stoutly build ... even when Elizabeth collapsed face first onto it and, at the same time, Laura and Melissa fell back, stretching their lengths on it's surface.

It was a while before any of us were able to catch our breaths. Gasping for breath replaced the excited moans, grunts, and moans that'd filled the kitchen only moments ago.

Elizabeth lifted her body up tiredly and looked around at the shambles we'd made of her kitchen. She smiled a satisfied little smile at everyone. She'd been supporting her body with her hands on the tabletop, sometimes dropping to her elbows. Now her right cheek was on the gingham tablecloth. She lay there panting, along with all the other people in the warm kitchen. Her eyes fastened on a pie plate a few inches in front of her eyes.

"My goodness," she said tiredly, "would anyone like a little more desert?"

"Ooh!" Mary Ann replied, suddenly recovering, "Uncle Isaac," she said, apparently adopting Mr. Tillman on the spot. "I know a real good game we can play with apple pie," she said naughtily.

She reached out to the pie plate down at her end of the table and put it directly in front of 'Uncle' Isaac.

Sophie dragged herself off Isaac's cock and found a seat in a chair just before her knees collapsed, so Mary Ann's path was clear. My sister hitched her arse up on the table, then wriggled around to get herself situated. She dipped a finger in that gooey, cinnamony, pie filling and smeared a healthy couple of finger's worth up and down the length of her hairless labia ... and then did it again.

Isaac's eyes near popped out, but when Mary Ann leaned back on her elbows, Isaac didn't hesitate. His tongue was out and probing my sister's cunt lips before she could spread her legs as wide as she wanted them.

I hadn't gone soft after I come off in Elizabeth and I just kept slowly moving in and out of her cunt while I recovered. It takes a while for some women to get ready for another bout and I didn't want to rush her.

Elizabeth looked around at me, totally astonished. Her eyes were wide as saucers and her eyebrows threatened to climb right out of sight over her forehead.

I widened my eyes, pasted a huge grin on my face, and nodded dramatically.

Elizabeth's jaw dropped. She threw a look at her husband/uncle, and what he was doing, then she jerked into motion. She bumped her butt back at me to move me away from her, let my cock slip out of her cunt and turned around. In a second, she was flat of her back on the table, her bent knees were raised in the air and her Balmoral-clad feet were kicking happily.

I took the pie plate from beside her head and scrapped up some stickiness on my first two fingers and coated her outer lips with a thick layer of apple pie. The woman groaned like I'd just spread salve on a scrape or something. A couple more finger's worth, and I squatted on the floor in front of her. I began licking Elizabeth's labia up one side and down the other, then I probed for a bit of apple that I had pressed deeper. I got that fragment of apple, sucking it up from right underneath her clitoris.

Elizabeth's thighs were living lives of their own. She wanted desperately to close them about my head to keep me right where I was, but I kept levering them apart. A feller has to breath regular, ya know, in order to do a good job of licking a woman's cunt lips....

"Jere's real good at licking pussy, isn't he?" Sophie asked, watching interestedly, her chin almost on Elizabeth's left shoulder. I hadn't seen her come up, but she could always be trusted to be in the heart of the action.

Elizabeth opened her eyes to look at the young face only inches from her own. She nodded, then cleared her throat. Most of her attention was centered on the area between her legs right now. "Jeremiah's only the second man I ever had," Elizabeth remarked unsteadily.

"Oh, yeah?" Sophie replied, but almost uninterestedly. "He's a good 'un to have for a second cock in ya, huh?" She grinned impishly and looked around at her brothers, who'd swapped Mormon sisters and were plowing steadily into their current partner's cunt.

So, I couldn't keep my mouth shut. "Aunt Elizabeth," I said slowly, taking a moment to blow a warm breath up her cunt, "I have a suspicion you're going to take numbers three and four cocks inside your quim before this day is out!" I chuckled ... again into her open cuntlips.

Involuntarily, Elizabeth shot a glance at the two brothers fucking the two Mormon sisters. "Ooooommmnnnn!" she croaked softly. I guess she noticed each brother was doing the other sister now, the two brothers having swapped girls.

"Have you ever done anything with another girl ... yet?" Sophie asked interestedly.

Elizabeth gulped out loud. "No...," she croaked.

"Fine!" Sophie squealed. "Can I be your first?" she added.

Elizabeth didn't know how to react, but she was game. She glanced again at Laura and Melissa, who were swapping kisses and playing with each other's' tits while they were being fucked side-by-side. "okay...," she said faintly. "I guess...."

Sophie took that for complete permission to do whatever she wanted to do. Her tongue joined mine slathering all over Elizabeth's steaming cunt lips. Bending over Elizabeth' body, Sophie took the top of Elizabeth's slit and I took the bottom. After a while, I leaned back for a breath ... and finally took a moment, one-handed, to get my danged boots off and then my pants. I pushed them all under the table and tossed my shirt on top of the pile. I felt better naked.

"If you want...," Sophie said. I took over for her sucking the hood to Elizabeth's clitoris to bring out the sensitive little nub. "...you can suck Uncle Isaac's come out of my pussy," Sophie offered.

Elizabeth's eyes widened in shock. I could tell she'd never even considered such a thing but… after a moment to look around and consider all the licentious things happening between the other people at the table, her shoulders shrugged just the tiniest little bit. She nodded tentatively, then more firmly.

Sophie threw her right knee over Elizabeth's head, moved her hips lower until her bald outer labia nuzzled Elizabeth's lips. She licked at Elizabeth's pussy lips. Her tongue probed inside Elizabeth's steaming cunt.

After a short pause, I could see Elizabeth licking tentatively up at her first girl's pussy. After a few minutes, she was using broad, long strokes of her tongue and sucking at the top of Sophie's young slit, probably copying what she was feeling Sophie do to her.

I was watching most of this. I had my right forefinger stabbing slowly in and out of Elizabeth, but that was all I had been contributing for a while. Now, though, it was time for me to get back into action.

When I inserted my cock, Sophie reared back to let me have at it, while she squatted on her knees to receive Elizabeth's tongue. Sophie grinned at me and wrinkled her nose. I suspect Elizabeth wasn't the most skilled cunt licker in the room, but she seemed danged enthusiastic.

"Want to show you something," I told the grinning urchin. With my right thumb and forefinger well coated with apple pie filling, I smeared the concoction on Elizabeth's big left breast. She moaned, but didn't let up licking Sophie.

Winking at Sophie, I bent to take Elizabeth's left nipple in my mouth and suck on it to make it even more erect. Sophie and I could both see it turn a darker red, lengthen, and harden even more than it already was. Pushing deep inside Elizabeth's hot cunt, I sucked her nipple and made the woman moan with each thrust. Each groan was a little muffled, but it was clear the rhythm was getting to her.

"You try it!" I told Sophie. Grinning broadly, Sophie took some pie filling between her fingers and caked it on Elizabeth's right nipple. She couldn't suck at Elizabeth's teat as I had and still keep her cunt on Elizabeth's mouth, but she could sure twirl her fingers and thumb around to achieve the same end.

Then we switched. Sophie's fingers worked on Elizabeth's left breast and I sucked her right. Elizabeth began a high-pitched keening that filled the whole kitchen. I started ramming harder into her, interrupting the wailing with heart-felt grunts with each stroke.

In only a few moments, Sophie lifted off Elizabeth's lips because Elizabeth wasn't really in control of her mouth any longer. Seemed to me like Sophie was as like to drown Elizabeth with Sophie's and Isaac's combined juices if they continued with what they were doing—and also, I could see Elizabeth's teeth might just do a sight of damage to Sophie's tender pussy, seein' as how Elizabeth wasn't able to judge whether she was tonguing or a bitin'.

Elizabeth shuddered for a long moment and then off she came—arching her back off the table so only her shoulders and arse were still down on the surface. She wailed, giving vent to the rapture ... and then she collapsed bonelessly back onto the messy tabletop.

I held off, wanting to be able to take care of at least one more of our lovely, randy wantons before the night was done. I thought the possibilities were pretty good one of them would open their thighs for me.

Well, I hadn't seen it, but everyone of the copulating couples had used the pie filling to make the second round of fucking a little more of a bawdy romp than just straight fucking. We were all sticky and come was coming out of more places than a little bit, so we all traipsed down to that dammed-up creek to wash off. Walking down the path in the moonlight, we were all stark naked. A month later, it would have been far too cold, but tonight it was highly enjoyable.

I was walking hand-in-hand with fifteen-year-old Melissa. Elizabeth was escorted by Mr. Samuel Owens who, incidentally, was Elizabeth's second man of the evening ... his brother became the third a little while later. Long about midnight, Elizabeth found out that numbers two and three for the evening could also do her at the same time, which was another first for her.

Not bad for a woman who'd only had one man in her when the evening began, huh?

* * *

So, we stayed two more days. What else we could do? Nobody … nobody … put on a stitch a' clothing the whole two days!

But then we had to get on the road home. I was sure if we didn't, Hiram would be fretting about the final parts to complete his heating project.

When we got home, the whole town turned out to see who them crazy Richardson kids ... apparently me and Mary Ann were making a name for ourselves ... were bringing home. As we rolled in, Laura and Melissa were setting on the lowered tailgate in short skirts, swinging their feet and showing off their shapely thighs and lower legs. They were smiling broadly. They'd cut up their traveling clothes into Hidden Valley style short skirts and Mary Ann had provided them with some of her spare Lakota-style moccasins with the dark red fringe around the top.

Now, a funny thing happened right after we rolled into town. We ... all five of us kids on the trip ... had assumed Laura and Melissa understood that all of us kids and the adults were in on that lewd, carnally liberated sex thing we were doing. The example set by Isaac and his niece/wife, and how Mary Ann and me, and the rest of us, should of told the girls something, but apparently it didn't say enough.

When Mary Ann brought Pa to the wagon tailgate where the girls sat, admiring all the boys and being admired in return, the Mormon girls thought Mary Ann was just being polite. When Mary Ann started fondling her father through his corduroy pants, Laura and Melissa's faces blanked with shock. Seeing she had their 'undivided attention', you might say, Mary Ann unbuttoned Pa's trousers and delivered his cock out into the bright sunlight for the girls' inspection.

Well, I'm here to tell you, those girls watched Mary Ann's hand slowly jacking Pa's cock back and forth with the same concentration a snake watches a mouse just come within striking distance. They rose up off that tailgate like they was floating and glided up to my Pa graceful as drifting smoke. It was like Christmas come early to Laura and Melissa.

Pa and my three brothers and some other boys and girls escorted the two young women back to the longhouse which was still under construction. The girls went along with dazed looks on their faces. Actually, the girls were being stripped naked as they walked and they couldn't help staring around at my brothers, who were also getting naked as they sauntered along. About the time everyone got to the long house, all of them were bare-ass naked and the girls each had two cocks in their hands from boys on their right and left. I don't know as I ever saw two happier girls in my life.

It left me standing there with nothing to do. My Pretty Green Eyes was on guard duty close to the opening of the valley onto the prairie. It was her first such duty, something she'd been wanting to do for the longest time, and there wasn't no way she was going to ask for someone to relieve her.

The unchangeable rule was that the guards set there were there to watch and listen, and NOTHING else ... it was too important. So my beautiful Lakota lover wasn't going to get a visitor today at all—we'd be together tomorrow, when she got off duty, yes, but not tonight.

So I was at loose ends, when I felt the warm comfort of a bare breast on the back of each upper arm.

"Hello, Jere," a woman drawled warmly. I recognized the soft voice of my sister-in-law, Cynthia, my brother Jesse's wife. I looked around at her, delighted to see she was naked 'cept for moccasins and an expression of delightful, wholly carnal sensuality on her pretty face. She had her two-year-old daughter, Constance, on her hip. The younker was just as naked as her mother, and she had a wide grin just for her Uncle Jere.

"Hi, Jere," another girl said from my other side. It was my other sister-in-law, Paula. A glance showed me she was naked too.

"Ladies...," I said by way of acknowledgement.

"Since our husbands look to be busy for the next little while," Paula said, pressing my upper arm between her young breasts, "we're going to take you on a picnic up to the spring."

Cynthia was all of seventeen years old, and Paula just fifteen. I grinned. It sounded fine to me.

I was completely over-dressed for the occasion, so I sat on a stump and pulled off my clothes just quick as I could. In seconds, my skin was being stroked by the girls and a gentle breeze.

Just then, a crowd of youngsters ran up, my younger sisters Emily and Rachel among 'em, along with some other girls and a passel of young boys. Every dang one of them was stark, staring naked. The young boys were all sporting little hard cocks and looking hungry at all the girls bare bodies, their eyes were fairly dancing with delight at what they were anticipating happing.

So, with my twelve-year-old and ten-year-old sisters carrying a big basket of vittles between them and boys carrying what all they could, we all marched up the trail leading to the fresh-water spring.

Me? I was carrying a squirmy, wriggling two-year-old who was intent on rubbing her bald little cunt lips against her uncle's body just as much as she possibly could, and for as long as she could.

Life in Hidden Valley was a hoot….

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

The letter we wrote to Laura and Melissa's brothers got took into town and posted by Elizabeth and Isaac Tillman the first chance they got. The Tillmans made us promise to come by every time we passed that way and said they'd make it a party ever'time we did. We did exactly that—to check on whether the brothers replied, if nothing else—and the Tillmans did themselves proud with the parties they threw every single time someone from the valley broke their journey at Tillman's fine home.

Some weeks later, we got a cautious answer from Laura and Melissa's brother Cal, writing for himself and the others too. Cal was specific on that point—he was writin’ back in behalf of all of the people there. We thought it was significant he made sure to tell Laura and Melissa that. In guarded words, Cal wrote that all the brothers sure 'nough remembered the tickling up in the hayloft, and they allowed as how they surely missed those times just as much as the sisters did.

Seemed like he was trying to tell Laura and Melissa something without actually saying it. I wasn't sure exactly why he was being that careful, but maybe he thought the Mormon girls weren't able to read their mail in private … or something….

A second carefully worded letter from the girls got an equally wary reply, and the letter exchange went on for most of the Winter and in to the Spring. In fact, for a long while, seemed like ever' time we ventured out of the valley, we were either mailing a letter to the girls' brothers, or getting one in reply. By late Spring, we were pretty sure we were all purty much singing from the same hymnal, even with the stilted, very bland language all the parties were using.

Reading between the lines, it seemed Cal and Mark's wives not only knew of the brothers' involvement with Laura and Melissa, they didn't mind ... since they'd been getting a lot of tickling from their brothers before they were married too, whether it was happenin’ in a hayloft or not.

In convoluted words, designed to be interpreted in innocent terms, we were informed that, when Cal and Mark's families got together, one brother might even be found tickling the other's wife. Also, the youngest brother was also being included in the action—at least that was how the two Mormon girls interpreted a passage that I couldn’t make head nor tails of. About this time, Laura and Melissa fired back a letter asking if all the kids might not be tickling each other up on the old hay loft ... it was a one sentence question in three pages of letter writing, so it was pretty well hid.

It only took ten days for a return to that. Buried two pages deep, Cal's newest letter mentioned how Cal's wife Nancy had taken to tickling her oldest boy up in the loft. She'd begun doing that, having found out he liked tickling his sisters so much up there. So our suspicions were true—the younger generation were getting together too, and now they were getting together with their parents.

So it looked to me like the girls' brother Cal, his family, and prob'ly his brother's family too, were working their way into being a little society just like those of us on the Richardson wagon train were in. Evidently living on a spread way out in the badlands of Utah was a lot like working a wagon train across the plains. People were people and they had the same kinds of wants and desires ... and isolation begat different solutions to different problems.

Cal's last letter remarked as how his oldest boy liked tickling his mom just fine and he was learning to tickle his aunt and his cousins too. I just smiled.

* * *

We didn't get many visitors. Not many folks even tried going west through the unremarkable pass that would eventually lead a traveler into our valley. We intercepted the very few who did and turned them right back around toward the prairie, with a good map showing in what direction Denver lay, and where the railroad could be found. We sent them away with plenty of supplies to get where they were going so they all went away better off than when they got to us.

We thought we were safe from incursion from the west too, 'cause it was all windswept mountain slopes, impassable, fast runnin' creeks, and treacherous canyons. The country fairly stood on end up that way with little in the way of level ground. It was pretty barren too, 'cept for some mountain sheep here and there. Even grizzlies refused to live up there.

Well, we were almost right. In all the time we was in Hidden Valley, only one teenage girl, with her little brother and sister, got to our hideaway from the west. Somehow or other, their pa and ma was killed in a landslide on the western slopes a' the mountains and this sixteen-year-old girl was bound and determined she was going to get her brother and sister back to civilization. She'd picked up a lot of knowledge from her grandpa who was a mountain man back in the old days of the beaver fur trade, so she knew a ton of things even most frontier men and women didn't.

Me and Caleb Struthers tried backtracking them back to the west after my brother Jesse brought them in the final few miles ... but we couldn't get more'n three days journey into the actual mountain range we knew they had to have come through. They couldn’t have come over the crests of the mountains, so they had to have found some pass or passes, that we just couldn’t find ourselves. Granted what few passes there were, now had snow that was deeper than when they'd come through, but still....

We cared for them, of course, setting them up in a log cabin we'd built for another purpose a short distance from our long house. We emptied that smaller cabin out, constructed some beds for them, and let the trio rest and heal up after their incredible journey.

Well, sir ... that young lady was just sharp as a tack. Didn't take her long after recovering from the deprivations of the journey for her to figure out what we were all doing in that remote mountain valley with each other. In fact, first time she was able to walk outside unaided, she found a couple of naked girls squirming happily all over a naked young boy. When she saw the boy's prick inserted inside one of the girls, she knew for sure something was going on in our little settlement. A warm chinook had blown down the mountainside a few days earlier and it was unseasonably warm, or the girls and boy wouldn't even have been outside ... but we all reasoned the girl was going to find out sooner or later, so no one was too terribly upset.

She ranted and raved for a while—told us she was going to make sure the sheriff, wherever she could find one, would come and send us all to everlasting perdition in some dark prison somewhere, or something like that. It sounded fierce, but in the process of threatening us, we found out she didn't really know where she was, she didn’t even know which direction a town lay, nor much of anything else neither. All we had to do was take her out on the prairie, turn her around a few times, show her what direction the closest town was ... and then turn her loose. She’d never be able to tell what direction she’d come from nor how to get back to where she was when she started.

She got to making drawings of the festivities and such, so she could show the Sheriff exactly what was happening. Well, doing the drawings meant she had to watch the goings on so she could do her work ... and that meant she began to see no one, not even the smallest of the children, was being hurt nor injured in any fashion.

She was a rarely fine artist too. When she drawed something, it was like the real thing was right there in front of you, and you wondered how it was that you had never seen the beauty in it before. She had a fine eye for detail and a craving to make her drawings as perfect as she could get 'em.

Judy—that was her name—started out just trying to draw folks' faces as they went inside the longhouse we'd built of stone when we first arrived in Hidden Valley. The longhouse was where we lived that first winter. It was where we slept, bathed, and indulged ourselves in our special brand of partying. And, by the way, lordy, lordy, lordy … did we ever party!

Well, it was okay sketching something outside the longhouse when the weather was fine, but come late January, it wasn't okay at all. The kids—mostly other teenagers like herself—talked Miss Judy into coming in out of the cold to do her drawing. It was a bunch warmer inside, and a lot more moist too, what with our Roman style baths and all ... and there were all sorts of naked people wandering around.

Judy accepted the fact that she couldn't draw while sitting in a chair outside in the cold. She came inside our longhouse to watch and draw what she saw. But wearing one of them heavy, woolen pioneer dresses inside the longhouse with all that warmth and moisture from the baths was hard on her. Bit by bit, Judy stopped wearing petticoats, sweaters and shawls and such. She would have just fainted dead away ever' time she came inside if she hadn't.

When she started drawing, folks just naturally came near to watch what she was doing and they'd help her by pointing out things in her sketch that maybe she'd left out, or didn't have the right perspective on, or whatever. All the kids were real friendly with her, helping her out and suggesting other things she could draw and stuff. And they were naked—they didn't think nothing of it and, wouldn't you just know it, Judy began not worrying about it either ... so long as she, her brother, and sister weren't naked and fornicating too.

I should have known when I saw two unrepentant schemers of putting their pretty heads together that something was about to change on the I'm-getting-the-sheriff-on-you front. My sister Mary Ann and step-sister Grace were talking a LOT together, though I think I was the only one who noticed ... for a while, anyhow.

Anyways, the kids started offering little suggestions to Judy on how to improve her drawings. At first they were pointing out little things … like, maybe a lantern sitting up on a mantle that she hadn't included, the pegs over the door where a rifle rested ... details like that. After a while though, folks began pointing out that just heads and faces with fuzzy bodies just weren't enough.

I don't know which one put the idea in her head that she needed to draw folks' whole bodies to show what they were doing so the Sheriff would see exactly what was going on. It was effective though. Judy was surprisingly eager to correct that problem … she saw the sense in what they were saying in a suspiciously quick manner. So she started drawing cocks and pussies and boobies ... and getting darn good at it too. Now, you KNOW most of those hints came by way of kids who chanced to have just been seen talking with Grace or Mary Ann ... or both.

Me? I just sat and watched, waiting for what I was purty sure was going to happen. I knew also that Judy's brother and sister weren't anywhere near outraged by what was going on as Judy was. From what I was told, whilst Judy was engaged with her drawin' in the long house, her brother and sis were engaged with exploring something else up in their little cabin. At first, that had included a discrete visit from another boy or girl, but lately the siblings were known to be having parties all by themselves.

Little by little, the distance between Judy and the things she was drawing got shorter and shorter. I recall one time when Grace hauled one of Sophie's brothers up to Judy and explained to Judy in great detail how Judy hadn't got the shape of the boy's cock right.

"See," I heard Grace tell her, "Nelson's shaft kind of bows up in a curve like a banana ... and the head is almost purple when it gets hard ... see?" Grace had the cock in question in her hands and was demonstrating her points with her graceful, slender fingers. That cock wasn't more'n a few inches from young Judy's nose.

Well, some days later, Mistress Judy was talked into taking off her shoes; her stockings a few days later; and eventually she left off her small clothes too. If you'd asked her, all this was so she could be just a little cooler in the hot and steamy longhouse. One day, Judy even got into the water with a representative group of her new friends, even though they were all naked and Judy had on a regular dress—it was all she had—instead of a swimming dress like they wore back East.

You just know it was working on her mind. All these friendly, naked kids—and grownups too—were all around, fornicating and carrying on without any sign of guilt or embarrassment ... and other times they were just kids and their parents. From the way Judy was acting, she slowly got over being shocked by anything that was going on around her.

I knew Judy was lost the day Mary Ann talked Judy into putting a tentative forefinger on Samuel Owens' cock to 'see how smooth' it was. Mary Ann went on to explain that Sam's cock had that hard ridge under the foreskin … his glans … and, really, Mary Ann said, Judy needed to show that more clearly in her drawings. Some later, Mary Ann explained to Judy that a cock didn't taste any different from any other skin on a person's body—and demonstrated by licking her own forearm and then Sam's cock from its root to the little slit in the end of it.

Pa had been watching, same as me, but he got up at that moment and walked out the door to the dressing room to hide the grin on his face. Mary Ann and him shared a wink that Judy never saw. Mary Ann had a radiant smile on her lips as she watched Judy shorten the distance her eyes were from the head of Sam's johnson to see what she'd missed in her first drawing. Judy didn't even realize she was licking her lips as she examined Sam's prick. She almost….

Well, sir … a couple months later, we had us a grand ol' party. okay, we most certainly DID take advantage of pretty much every opportunity we came across to have a party—so what? Anyway, this particular party was to celebrate getting the crops planted. Other times we celebrated the harvest, the beginning of summer, the end of summer, July Fourth ... and sometimes we celebrated Wednesday, or whatever. We weren't what you'd call real picky about when to party naked.

Anyways, at this planting celebration I'm talking about, sixteen-year-old Judy was on all fours, naked as a newborn baby, and I was fucking her from behind while she sucked her baby brother's cock—he was standing up in front of her. The whole time, she was yelling at me and slapping back behind her—tryin' to get at my arse—wanting me to fuck her harder and faster, and bawling entreaties to her little brother to please, please, please come off in her mouth. Ten minutes later, she swapped ends like a bucking pony. Now I was fucking in and out of her mouth and her little brother was fucking her cunt.

She was still drawin' most everything she came across, but no sheriff ever saw them pictures. Young Judy was now in the business of drawin' and paintin' pictures for folks to hang up on their walls.

Some problems just settle themselves if you wait for 'em to, huh?

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Coming back from a mining camp up in the mountains, a bunch a' us rode into The Crossing one evening tired, trail-worn, and ready to break our journey. We were some suprised to see the town had grown just in the six weeks or so since we'd last seen it. The nicest surprise was the brand new hotel sitting near the railroad depot—right about where the restaurant we favored used to be. Well, the restaurant was still there and, in fact, was now a part of the same building as the new hotel. Both had freshly painted signs out front saying they were 'Minnie's Eatery' and 'Mother Minnie's Hotel'. We didn't know who Minnie was, but we decided real quick to spend the night here instead of in a hard wooden wagon bed or on the ground further up the trail to Hidden Valley.

The hotel lobby smelled of newly sawn lumber and fresh paint. The floor was finished with a number of coats of varnish and it fair gleamed in the glow of some fancy lanterns. There were furnishings—settees, loveseats, and overstuffed chairs scattered around. Looked to us like it was the best hotel in many, many miles ... even allowing for the fact that it were also the only hotel in a couple of long day's rides in any direction. We judged it was the finest one we ever did see.

The first person we saw inside was the girl Mary Ann and me had met already—the waitress in the restaurant—some time back. Now she was the hotel clerk behind a reception desk agin the wall off yonder. She was still purty as all get out ... and when she looked up and seen me and Mary Ann, a quick blush made her look even more appealing.

She was surprised though, she surely was. She threw a glance up the stairs right next to the reception area, then to her left, through a set of french doors, and a third glance back to 'er right at a closed door. Clearly, she didn't have a good idea of what to do next and she was wishful a' havin' someone give her an idea 'er two.

Mary Ann shot me a quick glance when she saw the girl's color. My sister knew exactly what I'd told this young woman when we'd first met.

Natalie! That was her name. I'd almost forgotten.

"Mistress Natalie!" I greeted her heartily and with a big smile. "It's good to see you again—you've given up waitressing to clerk in a hotel now?" After startling her the way we done, I thought this would be an easy question to answer ... kind of get the conversation going, ya know?

"Oh!" Natalie said faintly. She grimaced at the lack of strength in her voice, glanced around at our group, then back to me. "My Mother and Aunt Sophia own the restaurant and the hotel ... we're only just now getting the hotel goin'," she remarked. "You all won't be the first guests we've had, but some of the rooms have yet to be used." Once she got going, her voice strengthened considerably.

"Indeed?" I exclaimed. "We're not the first guests you've had; I'm disappointed. I've always wanted to be the first ... somewhere," I remarked. I started out just wantin' to fill in the silence and get her to talking, but my tongue was running away with itself and I didn’t have any feel for where it was goin’ yet.

My comment seemed to mean more than just words to Miss Natalie, though. Her eyes darted up to mine and then they flicked over to Mary Ann's. Her blush had started to fade, but now the color rose in her cheeks again ... quite prettily too.

"But if you're staying with us," Natalie blurted, "y'all will be our only guests tonight." We had four people here last night, but they left on the east-bound train this morning," she added carefully. "There aren't no trains coming through tonight," she continued, "so there won't be any more guests coming in…."

I blinked. That was a right curious thing for a hotel clerk to tell someone about to sign the register for an overnight stay—well, it would have been if I didn't have a 'history', you might say, with young Mistress Natalie. On the other hand, maybe the girl was just flustered and embarrassed.

I was a tad perplexed but nodded wisely. That seemed to go over well. Natalie looked pleased. Well, maybe she wasn't remembering the last words she and I had had together in the dark that night behind the restaurant. A body had to go slow dealing with cute young girls out this far West. Things were beginning to change, but there were still too durned few of them and men were mighty protective of them. Get outta line with one of the proper young women and folks around just might decide to convene a necktie party in the vicinity of the nearest tall oak tree in the blink of an eye.

A tall, strongly built young man about twenty or thereabouts, came into the lobby from the previously closed door at the back of the room. He smiled at all of us and hurried to join Natalie behind the desk.

"Russell," Naomi said carefully, “...this is the man and his sister I was telling you about," she continued.

She looked at me directly. "Russell is my brother," she told me in a husky voice. There was a powerful lot of meaning in her glance for just those little words. An' I got the message. I managed to not start purring like a big ol' catamount stretched out on a rock to sun hisself.

Now ... Master Russell didn't really like seeing me there. Before he could disguise it, a frown started to wrinkle his forehead. An’ then my sister, Mary Ann, stepped forward and offered him a dazzling smile along with her hand.

"I'm Mary Ann," she told the tall, blond man. "Jeremiah's sister," she added.

Where Russell's expression had been a storm in the making, rays of brilliant sunshine broke through betwixt one heartbeat and the next. He blushed, but then regained enough composure to bow gallantly and kiss my sister's hand ... which made her blush. Far as I know, that was the first time her hand had ever been kissed.

"I'm honored to meet you, Miss Richardson," he said gravely. A toothy grin broke out all over his face.

"Where are our manners?" Mary Ann scolded, looking at me with some kind of message in her eyes.

I had a pretty good idea what my big sister was thinking about.

"Oh ... sure," I said, turning around so I could point folks out to Natalie and this Russell feller.

"Mistress Natalie … Russell … may I present my sister, Emily," I said formally ... well, formally for me. "And this here's my sister, Rachel...."

"And we all just love our brother, you know," Mary Ann interjected. She looked at me expressionlessly. I knew she was doing the same thing I was—watching Natalie and Russell from the corners of our eyes to see what their reaction would be.

The two of them shot quick glances at each of my younger sisters, then at each other. Something got decided right then, betwixt the two of them. They didn't quite nod at each other, but it was close enough.

Mary Ann smiled a contented little smile. Emily and Rachel were lookin' at Mary Ann like she'd gone crazy. Mary Ann and I had shared with Pa what I'd told Natalie on our first meeting, but we'd not spread the information beyond that. We would fill them in directly we were alone....

"And this is Mrs. Kittie Adams…," I continued, introducing Hiram Conklin's oldest daughter, "…her daughter, Sarah, and her son, Joel. Miles is Kittie's husband—he's still at the stable putting our livestock in the corral ... along with my brother, David, and my good friend, Dan."

I stepped back and sidled up behind the last young woman with us. "And this is Esther Conklin, Dan's sister," I said, putting my hands on the points of Esther's shoulders and kneading them familiarly. "Esther's just like a sister to me," I added.

Which was news to Esther. The only thing she really had in common with my sisters, beyond friendship, was that she and my sisters took my cock in various parts of their bodies now and again.

I turned her around and kissed her forehead very chastely before she could blurt something I didn't want said just then. I needed more information first.

I saw a flash of understanding in Esther's eyes before I let her go. She hauled me back in for a far more intimate kiss than I'd given her ... and I let her do it.

When she let me go, I acted as if nothing at all was amiss.

"Daniel and Miles and David will introduce themselves when they come in," I told a startled Natalie and Russell. "Is it okay if I put their names in the register for them?" I asked.

"Sure!" Natalie said. She hesitated. Her tongue flicked out to wet her pink, full lips. "And how many rooms will you be needing?" she asked.

I looked around, pointing first at my sisters, then at the other's. "I think we can get by with three," I replied. That was one less room than I really thought we needed. "We're sooooo close, you know. We're like all part of the same big family."

Russell swallowed hard, darting looks at all the comely young women in front of the desk.

"That'll be fine," Natalie replied. "Three rooms...." Looked like she was swallowing hard too. "We have baths...." she said in a strangled voice.

Then she pointed at the door Russell had come out of. "And right through there is the restaurant a' course," she said, nodding at the double-wide french doors to her other side.

"Oh my!" Mary Ann exclaimed. "A bath will feel sooooo fine."

"And when we're finished," I said, "we're going to eat everything on the menu ... just like last time!"

* * *

"How tired are you?" I asked Mary Ann softly when we got to the door of one of our assigned room upstairs. I didn't know who'd be staying there ... hadn't gotten that far yet.

"I'm feeling right chipper, even after a hard day's ride," Mary Ann returned in a whisper. "You thinking this is a good time for that party you promised Natalie?"

"I believe so," I replied, grinning. "I think we'll know more soon."

I was right.

"Ahhhh ... Mr. Richardson?" a voice called from downstairs. "You forgot to sign the register...."

That was true. I'd done it, or rather hadn't done it, a' purpose. "I'll be right down," I called back.

I signed the register and was about to go when Natalie walked around the desk and right into my body. If I hadn't thrown my arms around her, she'd have fallen on her back when she bounced off, 'cept she had no intention of bouncin' off me. Her arms were around my neck quick as you please.

"You remember what you told me last time?" she demanded in a breathless whisper.

"I sure do," I answered.

"Well … I know exactly what all three of my brothers—and my Uncle Lemuel too—have between their legs," she said hoarsely, "and I know how wonderful and hot and wicked-good I feel when they're inside me," she added. "And so does my sister ... and my mother ... and my Aunt Deborah...." she said with a lewd grin. All this time, young Natalie was rubbing what was between her legs against my thigh.

"Ahhhhh," I smiled, "you've been a busy young lady, haven't you?"

"Well, come to find out, my Ma was already having sex with Uncle Lem, and Aunt Deborah was doing the same with my big brother Elias," the excited girl murmured. She wasn't whispering any more. I got the idea she was finished hiding things—I hoped no one was around who shouldn't hear what she had to say. Maybe she already knew that to be the case, 'cause she wasn't 'specially tryin' to be quiet.

"All I had to do was whisper in Russell's ear," she added, thoroughly delighted in her naughtiness. "He climbed up on me before I could finish talkin'," she said. She giggled. "And my little brother, Victor, saw me … and then it was Elias figgered things out ... and they all wanted to do me!"

"And then my sister, Clare ... she's thirteen ... told Russell she was going to tell Mother what he was doing to me if he didn't do it to her too...." Natalie giggled from sheer exhilaration. "And nex' thing ya know, we're all doing it—Mother too!" She chuckled delightedly again, then sobered.

She arched her back away from my chest. "You promised a party with all your brothers and sisters, I believe," she remarked.

"All my sisters are here and one of my brothers," I replied with a grin. "They was all I could round up on such short notice," I told her with a smile. "But I’m sure we can have us one FINE little party with who all we have here, don’t you think?"

She turned about a hundred degrees more excited and thrilled. Her eyes were dancing and her body quivering, she was so wound up.

"I have to tell Mother," she breathed. "She'll know how to...." She broke off. "Mother'll know what to do!" she said firmly. "Oh, I've got to go...." She kissed me determinedly, fondled my prick through my trousers for far too short a moment, then gathered herself and raced excitedly through the french doors.

I grinned at the empty lobby, then took myself upstairs. There were people to tell what was going on, baths to take—stuff like that.

* * *

Supper that night was something special. There were half a dozen in the restaurant when all of us from the Richardson wagon train trooped down the hotel's stairs and into the restaurant. We learned later there were sometimes more, often less, and it was all according to who all was in town that day. Passenger trains generally emptied out with all the passengers rushing to get into the restaurant afore the train left. And on occasion, if a freight train crew would break their journey to take a meal there but, as Natalie already told us, there were no trains coming through that night.

Natalie was there by the entrance, radiant and highly animated. For the privacy of the various dining parties, the whole room was partitioned with shoulder-high room dividers made of slender wooden supports and silk paper. Miss Natalie guided us back to three big tables over by the kitchen where we could be alone and pretty much unseen, though we could hear other restaurant customers out beyond the partitions. The important thing was that, with everybody sitting down, we couldn't see the other folks out there and they couldn't see us! 'Course, if someone stood up, and made an effort to look over the paper wall … well, that it was a different matter. We had to be a little wary, but we could still have sexy fun.

Natalie held me back long enough to whisper in my ear that all her family were ready to be in a naughty party—a bacchanal, she said, almost choking on the word in her excitement. She wanted to make sure all of us were ready too. She took my forearm and guided me to the table nearest the kitchen door. The girl was almost dancing and skipping, she was so happy. I was fortunate that I knew that word bacchanal—Pa had used it once in my hearing.

Anyway, with everybody seated, Natalie bent low beside me. "Oh, do let me help you with that!" she exclaimed ... for the benefit of the other customers, I'm sure. She reached down and pretended to adjust a cloth in my lap—probably not what a lady should do, but not too far over the top. However, when she put her hands under the cloth and proceeded to unbutton my fly and tug my prick out into the open … well, that wasn't done all that often in polite society—okay, never!

Now, I admit no one who wasn't one of us could see under the long, red gingham tablecloth draped over the tables, but it was a novel condition in which to consume a restaurant meal. I was pretty sure I could get used to it though. I became certain of that when Natalie bent low and kissed the tip of my penis. She straightened up and grinned naughtily at the other's in our crowd.

"Does anyone need any help with the menu?" she asked brightly, pointing at the wall where a list of the fare had been chalked on a slate. It was clear she was really asking if everybody saw what the rules of the game were … 'cause her other hand was holding up her skirt to expose her pussy to everyone there.

I didn't have any questions a-tall. To prove I understood, I swiveled to the left and twisted my shoulders around so I could run my right hand up the insides of her right leg, all the way up to that wonderful place where her legs met.

Natalie's smile grew a little tremulous, and she had to stifle a whimper every time I wiggled my fingers, but she managed pretty well, considering.

"I believe we'll have platters of everything up there," Mary Ann commented, looking Natalie in the eye. "I hope you have plenty of the beef ... the stew and the steaks both," she added. "We've been traveling all day and we're really quite hungry."

And that last was absolutely true, no matter if it had a hidden message for Natalie or not. Reminded of my hunger, I became even more ravenous ... so much so, I took my fingers out of Natalie's quim, licked them off, and put my hands down beside my plate so they wouldn't hinder Natalie's departure to bring back lots and lots of food.

"I wonder," I said, "if we could all start out with a bowl of that fine stew of your mother's? And then we'll pass on to the serious eatin'?"

We could. Soon Natalie, her sister Clare and their mother, Minnie, were setting big bowls of fragrant beef stew down in front of us and helping all the men with their lap clothes.

Natalie's sister, thirteen-year-old Clare, made a point of taking my prick in her hand, bending low and kissing the tip just like her sister done. So I did just what I'd done to her sister and reached under her dress for a little exploration. It wasn't a thing young Clare was completely used to, but she smiled happily at me whilst I was doing it ... even spread her legs a mite to make sure my fingers went all the way to the top a’ her thighs.

I gestured to young Clare, pointing to Daniel and the other men with us, and Clare gleefully made the circuit around to everyone. She'd thought she was going to only be handled by the males here, but Mary Ann took her turn too. Clare's eyes were big around as little saucers. She was a happy young girl when she finally moseyed back to the kitchen. We made sure Mother, she was the ‘Minnie’ on the billboard, and Minnie's sister, Sophia, were made just as welcome when they came around checking to see if everything was goin' well with the meal.

Natalie's three brothers made their appearance too. Russ started things off, carrying out a huge tray of beef steak and picking Mary Ann's table for last. He stood at her shoulder and smiled at us all while Mary Ann unbuttoned his trousers, delivered his cock from beneath the material and sucked it deep into her mouth before taking her first bite of beef steak. I'm purty sure Russ wasn't seeing anything in front of him whilst he was standing there so straight and stiff ... and smiling broadly ... but so long as he kept his back to the other diners outside our partitioned area, they couldn't see the strain in his face nor what Mary Ann was doing that made him so red-faced and tense.

Elias, another of Natalie and Clare's brothers, came out also. When Kittie's little five-year-old, Sarah, turned right around in her chair and sucked on the head of his cock, Elias came off all over Sarah's cut-up steak and mashed potatoes. She didn't mind a bit and smiled up at him while pointing his cock at her plate and pumping as hard as she could. Elias moaned a high-pitched little whimper that set most of us off laughing, but no one besides us even noticed.

Ten-year-old Victor, Natalie's little brother, found five-year-old Sarah utterly fascinating. She lifted the front of her skirt to show off her pussy, and young Victor was lost. Esther, my buddy's sister, finally got his attention by unbuttoning her blouse and letting him touch her breasts. Victor thought those lovely round globes just about as entrancing as Sarah's puss.

And so it went, all through our supper. We were all having a grand time. Twilight was gradually yielding to nighttime outside, so Natalie and her family went all around lighting lanterns here and there.

Eventually, the last customer out in the main dining room departed and the outer doors were closed, locked and barred. We all relaxed.

We were just a’ sitting there, pretending to just be interested in our meal, and in visiting with our kin and friends. Inside, we were wondering what Natalie and her family had in mind for the remainder of the evening.

My twelve-year-old sister, Emily was sitting next to me and Emily was squirming happily. She had a pussy full of my fingers for most of the time we spent at the table. On the other side of me, Daniel's sister Kittie had a handful of my cock for that whole time too, so young Jeremiah Richardson was having himself a FINE ol' time.

The man who'd been introduced as 'Uncle Lemuel' came through, moving fast, right after we heard the outside doors being locked. Uncle Lem hadn't taken part in any of the hot teasing so far; he'd stayed purty much up front with the other customers. Aunt Sophie whispered in my ear that her husband had been tasked with making sure none of them diners strayed back to our tables. When he saw what we were doing, he laughed out loud, but didn't slow down ... he clearly was on a mission.

I rose and turned my chair around to face the kitchen door, then sat myself back down, like I was sitting in front of a stage, waiting for the next act to start. Other folks with their backs to that door, swapped their chairs around too.

A few minutes later, the kitchen door opened and all of Natalie's family came strolling out-naked as naked could be. It was a lot better stage play opening than any other attempt I’d ever seen. We Richardsons had been wondering what the next step would be—the teasing and playing during our supper was good fun, but ... it had gone on long enough. Apparently that was the feeling amongst Natalie's family too.

There was a mad scramble amongst the tables, much scrapping of chair legs, chuckling, and such. When it was done, all of us Richardson wagon train folks were naked too.

Natalie shrieked happily, took a couple of running steps, hopped up on my lap, and stuffed her right boob into my mouth. And it was a mighty fine boob too—jutting out so round and firm the way it was; her breasts were 'bout as big around as my clinched fist. Her nipples were hard as little pebbles and sticking out like cherries, ready to be sucked on, so I made them both even more erect than they already were.

It was fun taking her nipples betwixt my teeth and nibbling just as gently as I could. When I sucked them into my mouth and slathered my tongue all over her aureoles, the girl commenced squirming all over and gasping something terrible. When I slid a finger into her quim, young Natalie couldn't sit still no more.

She jumped up on her feet and tugged on my wrist. "COME ON!" she squealed.

I got to my feet—I was perfectly willing to go anywhere the naked young woman wanted to go.

"Where?" I asked.

"THE HOTEL!" she wailed, and hauled at my arm all the harder.

It made sense to me. Hotels are known for having all kinds of beds and other places to lay down with girls.

I let her pull me along, but I made a point of noticing heavy drapes were drawn over all the restaurant windows now ... and I could see similar ones over the big windows in the hotel lobby. That stilled one concern I'd been harboring in the back of my head.

Natalie pulled me through the hotel's lobby to a round settee of sorts right in the center of the room. There, a cushioned bench with a tall back was built in around a central column whose chief purpose was, I supposed, to support the weight of the second story. The cushions were colored a deep, satisfying burgundy—I'd noticed the furniture when we came in this afternoon—but it was covered now with a sheet thrown over it.

"Some stains simply cannot be explained," Natalie's mother murmured in my left ear. At the same time, she took hold of my penis ... Natalie having imprudently left it unguarded. She waved her other hand around the lobby. All the other furniture was similarly protected—clearly in response to an expectation that body fluids were about to be splashed hither and yon. I nodded my understanding ... and I smiled my appreciation for what Minnie's hands were doing to my cock.

This was my first chance to get a really good look at 'Mother' Minnie. Natalie was just a couple inches over five foot tall—but her mother didn't have even those couple a’ inches. Didn't seem to bother her none. Minnie had big brown eyes with laugh crinkles at the edges, a pert nose, and a round, pleasant face. Minnie wasn't beautiful; nor was she unattractive. She had a calm, almost serene visage and plainly, there were few emergencies Mother Minnie couldn't deal with. Her ordinary, refined appearance made her nakedness even more erotic than it would have been otherwise.

I licked my lips. Minnie's breasts were what Natalie's might be someday. Where Natalie's filled my hands quite comfortably, Minnie's were too big for one hand. Where I could see Natalie's gentle curves from her upper body down to a slim waist, and then swept back out to blend with smooth, slender thighs, Minnie's figure was far more lush.

Minnie's waist was slim as her daughter's, her breasts were bigger, her hips more robust. Her thighs were meatier, firm to the touch, and her skin was silky smooth under my fingers. Both her and her daughter’s calves were curved and shapely, their ankles fine-boned, and their feet surprisingly tiny.

I knew their flesh was smooth and their bodies firm and supple to the touch ... 'cause I touched. I was holding both women at arm's length, frankly examining and contrasting their bodies ... memorizing them so I could recollect their appearance whenever I wished. I stroked Minnie's slightly rounded belly—she was a mature woman, after all—and Natalie's flatter one, then let my fingers seek out their labia further below.

Both of them sucked in their breath when I touched them there; both their hands strengthened their hold on my forearms; and both were soon excitedly dancing on their tiptoes as my fingers delved inside their pussies. Minnie's breasts swayed pendulously—much more heavily than her daughter's. Natalie’s actually jiggled and danced. Both movements were delightful; I smiled at each of the women.

"Mother...," Natalie said warningly. Minnie's hand was still on my cock and Natalie wanted it off.

"Mother Minnie," I began. I broke off to kiss her soft lips. "I have a promise to keep with your daughter ... but I hope you'll take a few moments out later on to visit."

"Honey," Minnie replied, "I don't know about visiting ... but if you promise to shove that beautiful prick of yours deep in my cunt, you'll have all the time with me ... all the time in me ... you can handle!"

"I promise!" I said promptly.

Mother Minnie didn't mince words. We grinned at each other. Then Minnie bent low, kissed the head of my prick, and relinquished my member to her impatient daughter.

Minnie spun away, stepped to an open area and clapped her hands. "Everybody!" she called in a strong, clear voice. "I just want you all to know the restaurant is closed, but we have leftover stew on the back burner, meat and taters are a warming in the oven, and biscuits are in the basket on the counter. So when y'all get hungry later on, you just help yourself, hear?"

There was a murmur of approval from all around the room. As a growing boy, I appreciated there being something to nibble on later.

Then Mother Minnie went around the room, blowing out some of the lanterns and turning other ones down low. The hotel lobby became a dimly lit, shadow-filled cavern where licentiousness was the only rule. And tomorrow morning, the ordinary folk of the town would be coming and going through here, never knowing of the indecencies committed tonight. That made it seem just a little bit more naughty and wicked.

Natalie pulled me to the round settee, bent over and put her hands on the seat cushion, and wriggled her hips at me. She looked back at me and grinned impishly.

I took the hint and moved up behind her. Mistress Natalie looked most fetching in this pose—the swell of her young hips and wonderfully rounded buttocks were emphasized.

Apparently, I spent too much time admiring her body, 'cause Natalie slid a hand between her legs, took hold of my cock and put the head of it 'tween her pussy lips. Then, the wicked little hussy backed up on my penis, impaling herself neatly. Evidently the evening of teasing had worked its magic on the young woman and she was more than ready to start fucking.

I pulled back; she followed me, not willing to allow my prick to escape her tight sheath. I loved the feeling of her tight cunt squeezing and massaging me, but I wanted to move inside her. I took the points of her hips in either hand and held her firm, butting her asscheeks with my body to push her forward ... then I pulled back and thrust in again.

"Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…," she crooned. She couldn't stay still. While I was thrusting and pulling out, she was positively dancing and wiggling all over herself.

I shoved my cock in deep—I could feel myself bottoming out in her cunt—and I stayed there, moving my groin around in a tight circle so as to stroke Natalie's labia with my prick's shaft. Withdrawing slowly, I jammed my cock back in fast and hard—then I pulled out quickly, and plunged back in slowly.

"YEOWW!" she squealed. "EOWWW!!”

“EOOOOOOOOOWWW EOWWW EOOOOOOWWW EOWWW EOWWW!!!" She yelped every time I slammed my cock inside her and bleated a breathless complaint whenever I worked my cock in—or out—slowly.

After a bit, moving deliberately wasn't a thing I could do anymore. For one thing, Natalie's cunt was becoming more skillful at tightening around me and holding me in. The girl hadn't been fucking long enough to know what her vagina muscles were doing. For another thing, I could feel the heat in her already steaming cunt rising ... and I could feel the hot come beginning to flow inside me too.

"ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH! ANGH!" Natalie was grunting like I was pummeling her with body blows every time I stabbed my cock into her. The faster I plowed into her quim, the louder and quicker her grunts became.

She wasn't moving around much now ... just pushing back at me when I drove forward. So I bent over a little more and caught her breasts as they swung and danced 'neath her chest. Every time my balls slapped against her groin, her breasts were bounced forward.

"OHHHHHHHHH, GODDDDDDDDD! Jeremiah, FUCK ME!" she shrieked.

I did what I could to plunge my cock deeper and faster. I was trying to distract myself, trying to stave off the inevitable eruption of come that was building fast. But looking around did me no good.

Mother Minnie was on her back on the carpeted floor nearby, taking my friend Daniel in her cunt while her youngest son squatted on her mammoth breasts and fucked her mouth. Victor's hands were behind his mother's neck, holding her head in place so he could push his little prick in and out of Minnie's lips all the faster. As I watched, the ten-year-old boy's stamina gave out—his thin spendings sprayed all over Minnie's mouth and cheeks. Evidently that set Minnie off too. She began hunching her cunt up into Daniel's thrusting cock and howling something around Victor's cock that I couldn't understand. None of the three of them slowed down for a couple long minutes. When they did, they purty near collapsed in a mound of naked bodies.

I should have been paying attention to what was happening beneath me … or maybe not. Maybe because I was distracted, my stamina was thereby increased and….

"ANNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Natalie shrieked abruptly. Her counterthrusts to my plunging cock became ragged and short.

"GAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWD!" she screamed. "FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!" she yelled in a strangled bellow.

I hammered my cock into her cunt as fast as I could, and for as long as I could. Then the exquisite tension in my balls burst into urgent need. Come raced through my groin to explode out the slit in the end of my prick. I could feel it spurting, spewing into Natalie's young cunt. The heat splashed into her vagina and sprayed all over her cunt-walls.

I slammed into her again—and withdrew a little.... Some of my come showed on her pussy lips. I plunged in again—remained motionless inside her for a long moment. More come gushed out to mix with Natalie's cunt honey. I pulled back. The juices on her labia were fairly frothing now—I was moving as fast as I could, drilling deep and yanking my cock back out to thrust again ... and then I couldn't.

"AAAAAAAAERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!" I roared. "AAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!"

"AIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!" Natalie's scream announced to everyone she was transfixed by the ecstasy.

We held there, neither of us able to move, straining against each other, trembling and shuddering our way through the rapture ... and then we were done ... finished ... with hardly enough strength to stand.

"Oh, God!" Natalie gasped. Her body gave up struggling to stay upright. She collapsed to the settee's seat cushion, breathing hard and shallow.

I followed her down, landing beside her and breathing almost as hard. I leaned back against the back cushions and let my head fall back. I was exhausted—totally drained for the moment.

* * *

A few minutes later, Natalie's body was soft against my side; my arm was between her breasts, my hand moving between her pussy lips.

"That was really fine!" Natalie murmured in my ear. Her soft lips kissed at my earlobe ... then she nibbled gently.

She kissed her way down my neck to my chest, and then below. When she reached my cock, she kissed the head and grasped the staff in her hand.

Natalie smiled in my face, swiveled her body around and went to her knees. Pushing my thighs apart, she knelt between them and without saying a word, opened her pretty lips into a big 'O' and took my cock into her mouth.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" I moaned. Her mouth was so wet and hot around my glans. She sucked me deeper, driving her head forward and down until all my still growing penis was in her mouth. I closed my eyes, intent on enjoying Natalie's mouth to the fullest.

"OOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!"

I couldn't keep from groaning. Natalie giggled around the circle of my cock, and that did special things for me too.

There was movement beside me ... then something was in front of me close by. I opened my eyes to find Natalie's sister, Clare, standing on the seat cushions, straddling my body. The thirteen-year-old grinned down at me. It was her lower belly and groin that was brushing my face.

"Hi, Mister Jeremiah," Clare said saucily. "Would you please lick my pussy for me while my sister takes your cock in her mouth?"

"I would love to," I replied, and proceeded to prove it. The young girl tasted wonderful—full of the essence of young girlhood and womanly juices, all at the same time.

I did what I could to time things. When I began erupting into Natalie's mouth, that was when young Clare stopped dancing on my tongue and trembled like a quaking aspen while she spilled little-girl honey all over my lips.

The two girls grinned wickedly at me when we finished. Clare hardly waited for me to recover before she impaled herself on my cock and began bouncing up and down, squealing gleefully and begging me to squeeze her young boobies even harder than I already was. I didn't notice where Natalie went off to.

* * *

We spent almost the whole night in our shameless debauchery. We alternated acts of lewd pleasure with quick baths and quicker snacks from the kitchen.

At one point, I found myself with Mother Minnie and her maiden sister, both a' them atop me—one taking her pleasure by rising and falling on my hard cock, the other rubbing her quim all over my face and tongue. Then they switched and started the ride all over again. I remember one time I was pushing my prick into the valley between Sophie's big breasts until my come spewed all over her upper chest and chin. She mopped up all the come with her fingers and sucked them dry.

In the wee hours of the morning, we stumbled into beds wherever we could find one. I wound up in a bed with Daniel's two sisters, Esther and Kittie. We fucked, but all the urgency was gone. My strokes into my partner were long and languid, deep and satisfying. I fell asleep, layin' on my back, with one girl holding my penis, the other holding my balls protectively. I slept like a log.

* * *

It was near mid-morning the next day before us Richardsons set out again. As much as we loved the bacchanal, as Natalie had called it, we still had to get home. We didn't forget our new friends though.

In late summer, after Minnie and Sophie sold their hotel and restaurant, the whole kit and caboodle of them up and moved north into our mountain refuge. They opened a restaurant where either of the owners were liable to take the price of a meal out in trade when the notion struck 'em. If you fucked one or t'other to her satisfaction, right there on the dining room table, your supper was free.

I don't know how they made a profit ... or if they made a profit ... 'cause Mother Minnie and Sister Sophie gave away lots of suppers down in their little restaurant. They had a real loyal clientele, though....

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

In late summer, nearly Fall, and almost a year to the day after we first arrived in Hidden Valley, me and my old roan gelding, Hinto, and a big, big old packhorse name of Tall Boy went wandering out of the confines of the valley. I was fifteen now, and I'd been doing a man's work every day for a long time now. I was purty much man-growed too.

Pa trusted me to be able to take care of myself. And also, trips out of the valley by myself weren't near as dangerous as they would have been in years past. Red Cloud was on the reservation; he didn't trust the white man any further than he could throw a wagon full of them, but he couldn't fight no more. His band of Lakota were there on the reservation with him, peaceful for the most part.

What remained of the huge Kansas herd of bison still roamed the northern prairie, but the European market for fur was already causing hundreds of hunters to fan out across the grasslands, shooting buffalo by the hundreds for nothing more than the hides. They hadn't succeeded in completely eliminating the herds yet, but everyone could see that was coming. On the other hand, that freed up a ton of land that could be converted from partially used grassland to productive farm land. And also, where bison probably could be domesticated, cattle already were domesticated and ready to provide meat for a hungry nation. Good-bye to the American bison.

For all the tension building between the Indian nations and the white man, there was still a relative peace near the western mountains, and I got restless from time to time. I loved being part of the community, but I had other cravings too. For one thing, the hunting in the mountains nearby was getting leaner. I was at a point where I'd have to start going deeper into the wilderness, and I didn't much want to do that—it was too hard to get the meat out to where I could sell it. It was in my head that I should be a rancher and raise … cows, or horses or something … somewheres near the settlement. So I took off from time to time, lookin' around to find where, and how, I might do such a thing.

* * *

I was collecting our mail at the railroad town when a feller heard the postmaster say my name.

"You any kin to Franklin Richardson," the feller asked, leaning up agin’ the store's single, long counter.

I nodded. "My Pa," I replied. I didn't know the man I was talking to, but he didn't size up to be much trouble—didn't have that look about him.

"I run into a feller name of 'Curtis' Richardson, sometime back," he said. "Was looking for his brother Franklin ... seemed kind of anxious like. Had three girl children and a boy with him," he added.

"I'll be danged," the postmaster remarked, looking through the short stack of letters he was about to hand me. "Here's a letter I plumb forgot 'bout from that there 'Curtis' feller," he said. "Been holding it a couple ‘er three weeks now, Jeremiah."

"Thank you kindly," I said politely, taking the letters from the postmaster. I turned to the guy who'd told me about running into my uncle and his children some time ago.

"You come across my Uncle Curtis again," I said to the traveling man, "I'd be obliged if you tell him to stick around this here railroad crossing town. Tell 'im to stay put and we'll come find him, 'stead of the other way around."

He nodded. "They was south of here ... three, maybe four day's ride when I saw 'em ... and that was a couple weeks now," he said. "I see 'em, I'll tell him, but I ain't likely to be headed in that direction for a spell," he said apologetically.

"Obliged, sir," I said. I touched the brim of my hat and nodded to him; then I walked out to the street. Now that letter was really addressed to my Pa, but I'd got the idea in my head all of a sudden, that things wouldn't wait 'til I could get the letter back to Hidden Valley for Pa to deal with. Besides, there was nothing Pa and I held back from each other. Heck, we even bedded each other's wife when the urge struck. So … I opened that letter sitting in the saddle right in front of the general store that served as a post office too.

Turned out, my Uncle Curtis had the lung disease and had come west to get away from the smoky, impure air, and stuffy confines of eastern homes, but he was failing, and getting worse faster as time passed. He was desperate to get his children to my Pa before he died so they could be taken care of.

We Richardson's set a lot of store by our kin, so there was no question about what I needed to do next. I bought a couple week's worth of supplies and loaded 'em on Tall Boy quick as I could.

In the store, I told the feller who'd pointed out where he'd last seen 'em that I was going to find them instead of waitin’ for them to come back on their own. My uncle was sick unto dying, I told him. Then I stepped into the saddle, turned my horses south and rode out to find them Richardson's out there who were lost and in need.

* * *

Found 'em!

And it wasn't even that much trouble. A man and four kids stand out, 'specially if they're asking ever'one they meet about a man name of Frank Richardson. It was just the vast expanse of prairie that made for a week and a half getting to them. I knew I was close one evening, 'cause the part-time marshal in a little hamlet a half day behind me had spoken to 'em only two days earlier. I took off after them after buying more supplies.

Riding a horse is a lot faster than sitting on top a wagon and watching the hind end of a team of mules or oxen, so I knew I'd catch up to them purty quick. It was near sundown when I caught sight of a thin column of smoke rising from a campfire. In the old days, like when Pa had first come west decades ago, it would of been a dangerous thing to do, setting up a big fire for cooking that way, but it wasn't near as risky these days ... I guess. Made me a little nervous but I'm the careful type, and sometimes I'm overly careful. Actually, truth be told, that caution a' mine drives some folks I know to tearing their hair out.

"HELLLOOOO the camp!!" I called out. It wasn't a good idee to come up on folks who didn't know you were there. Most ever'one was armed, and wouldn't hesitate to shoot at someone they thought was a threat. It was considered danged impolite too.

"Come on in," a man's voice replied. My eyes narrowed at how frail the voice sounded.

I kneed old Hinto in the ribs and we walked in slowly. A man lay on a pallet of buffalo robes and whatnot near the fire. Seeing me, he laid the pistol in his fist down beside him and waved weakly. I stepped down and tried to work some kinks out of my back.

"Y'all the Richardsons?" I asked, knowing they had to be. One sick man and four kids—it was clear who they was.

"Yep, light and set," he said. "You one of Frank's boys?"

I nodded and took off my wide-brimmed hat so they could all see me better. "I'm Jeremiah, Pa's third boy," I said.

"Knowed it right off!" my Uncle Curtis replied with a stronger voice than he'd had just a moment before. "You favor him," he added.

I smiled. All Pa's sons bore a strong resemblance to him and it wasn't the first time someone'd said so to me.

"Yes, sir. Sorry it took so long to catch up with you," I said. "Just heard of you'uns a while ago up north at the railroad crossing ... and there's a lot of open space out here."

"You're here now," Curtis said. "Good to see you, nephew," he added. The relief was evident in his voice. He lay back on the robes and seemed to relax for the first time, maybe in quite a while. He smiled up at the stars beginning to come out.

I looked around. The campsite was well situated and set up. There was a little stream thirty or forty yards away. It flowed fast, but wasn't moren' six inches deep. It still provided more than enough water for a goodly number of folks. The wagon was the center of the camp and the livestock were hobbled downstream, reasonably close to the creek.

I studied the travelers here too, my uncle and four cousins, none of whom I'd ever met. Curtis' oldest child was a sturdily-built young girl about twelve or thirteen. She looked back at me without being shy about it. "Mistress," I said quietly, "I killed a mule deer a ways back. If I bring in my pack horse, could you cook up a big supper for us? Got some beans somewheres in my pack too."

She nodded, but didn't speak.

I wasn't sure if she was just naturally unfriendly or if she was too worried about her Pa to be sociable. So I went out into the gathering darkness and brought in Tall Boy, my pack horse and put the hide full of deer meat close to the fire along with the beans and other fixings.

It took a little while to water both animals and hobble them both in some tall grass. I did a little nosing around too. Their camp was in a little hollow, so when we banked that fire down, we'd be hidden purty durned well.

When I come back up to the fire, I saw the gal had everything in hand, so I went to set by my Uncle Curtis. I looked him over carefully. I didn't know much about him—had never met him. I just knew he was some ten years younger than my Pa. When my Pa had left home way back when, Curtis wasn't nothing but a younker not even into long pants yet.

Now, Pa's younger brother was in bad shape, little more than skin and bones. His skin was so thin, it was almost translucent. A couple of times, he folded in on himself and turned away from me to cough into a rag he tried to hide from me. There was blood on the rag though, and the second time he coughed, he was so weak, I had to help him roll back onto the mound of buffalo robes that was his pillow.

When I looked him in the eyes, there was a calm acceptance there. I think he knew when he laid down on that pile of hides this evening, he wasn't going to get up again.

We talked quietly for a time, him filling me in on some family history I didn't know and he spoke of traveling west looking for us because his and Pa's sisters couldn't rightly take his children in. I knew Pa had three sisters and another brother 'sides Curtis, but I didn't know any of them. Uncle Curtis helped me put personalities to the names some. We talked about this and that for a long time.

Supper was ready about the time full dark was upon us, and we all sat quietly, chewing on some nicely cooked steaks and beans while the stars twinkled above. Thirteen-year-old Camilla had taken over the cooking chores from her father when he grew weaker, and she'd learned well.

I told her so and she smiled shyly at me. Her younger sister, Haley, was eleven and her brother, Lewis, was nine and a half. Harriet, the baby of the family, was only seven. The girls were sturdily built with pleasant features, and clean limbs—so far as I could tell. Their skirts and dresses hid a lot, of course. The boy was a husky lad and I figured he'd grow up to be a big-framed man who'd walk the land with long strides. I told him that, and he smiled at me too.

Curtis choked down what he could of a broth we fixed for him out of shavings from some beef jerky I'd brought with me, and then we let him rest, but he was unwilling to do that for very long. I gave him a little space, and he called the children to him, speaking to them low and earnestly for a time before they scattered to set out sleeping blankets. Curtis' eyes followed their every move.

I was still with him when, shortly after sunup the next morning, Curtis' body gave up the unwinnable fight. He looked at the eastern sky with something like triumph on his face, 'cause he'd cheated death and gotten to see one more sunrise.

I held his hand in mine when he settled back down and composed himself. His breathing was ragged now, awfully labored as scarred lungs fought to take in enough air to keep him alive just a little bit longer. He was hurting bad and I had nothing to give him.

"It's okay, Uncle Curtis," I said quietly so only we two would hear. "Your children will be safe; they'll be loved and grow up to be strong with us."

The contortions in his face eased a mite. He seemed to be listening to me.

"I'll take care of them," I said. "It's all right. You can let go, Uncle Curtis ... they'll be fine."

He squeezed my hand with the tiny remnant of strength he had left. A few moments later, he took a sudden breath, grunted softly ... and all the air in his lungs sighed out slowly. He gazed unseeing into the brightening sky.

I checked for a pulse, but I knew I wouldn't find one. I closed his eyelids, folded his hands across his chest and wrapped him in the buffalo robe on which he lay.

* * *

We buried Curtis, my uncle—their father—right where he died, setting a crudely carved cross with his name on it at the head of a rock cairn we piled over him. It was all we could do for him now.

The kids had lived with their father's coming death for a long time and seen him struggle hard these last few months, fighting through the pain while he searched for the brother he barely knew so his children would have a chance. That he had passed was a burden to them of course, but they also knew his passing was a release for him from the agony of a slow death.

Over the next few days, as we rode back north towards the Richardson's home ground, me and the kids got to know each other. I tied my pony and my packhorse to the tail of their wagon and rode the wagon with them, just to be closer and be available to talk to.

After a while, young Lewis wanted to try riding and I let him up on Hinto, who was getting mellow with his advancing years. He was downright gentle these days. The boy did just fine and I was free with my praise. He beamed his delight.

Haley was subdued for a while, then began to come out of it as we rolled steadily onward with the mountains clearly visible to the west. I pointed out landmarks as I saw them ... and when I recognized them ... and she quickly began taking an interest in things. Lewis and Harriet did too.

Camilla, though, was a pain in the butt. Nothing I did, from shooting a wild turkey right off the wagon bed for the pot, nor letting her little brother ride my horse, nor showing how much I knew about the territory met with her approval. I made allowances. She'd just lost her pa, after all, but she was beginning to wear me to a frazzle with all the complaining and criticism.

A couple of days south of The Crossing, I figgered things were about to come to a head. She deliberately spilt some of the coffee she was a bringin' me, and I was certain sure she'd meant to drop it in my lap, but I was too quick and got my legs out a' the way. She stood there, waiting for me to pass it off like I done for a dozen other slights ... but my temper got the better of me.

Snatching her arm, I pulled her across my lap before she could even think of resisting. I had her skirts up over her waist in a trice and was yelling, "Your Pa didn't raise you to behave—"

I stopped what I'd been about to say, 'cause with her skirts all up around her waist, it was clear young Camilla didn't have a stitch on underneath. I held her there ... and maybe I shouldn't a’ been looking ... but danged if her bare butt wasn't just as cute as the finest I'd ever seen up in Hidden Valley.

Camilla's behind was nice and plump, but firm under her silky skin ... and she had full thighs below that descended to well-shaped calves and ankles. My mind went right back to more'n a year ago now ... when my step-sister, Grace showed me she didn't wear nothing under her dress neither. It didn't escape my notice that this was the second girl I'd become aware of her nudity beneath the full skirts of pioneer dresses … and look how well the first time had turned out.

I had my hand up high, ready to slap down on the girl's behind, but there I froze. I was just gawking at that beautiful ass of my young cousin—giving her a spanking was completely forgotten. For a long moment, I didn't have any idee what to do.

I heard Haley snicker. "You look funny, Jere!"

And I reckon I did. I brought my hand down, but it wasn't to slap Camilla's butt. I kinda let it settle on her right ass cheek ... real gentle like. I squeezed, kneaded Camilla's ass once ... then twice. She didn't complain at all. In fact, where she'd been fighting to get away, now she was just still as she could be. Her right hand was on the ground; her bare toes were touching clean grass behind her.

I squeezed her other butt cheek and she didn't move, 'cept to kind of wriggle her hips around slowly. If anything, she was hunching her crotch on my thigh where she was resting. So ... Grace had wanted me to see she wasn't wearing smallclothes under her dress and fell into a buffalo wallow so I'd have to take notice—and Camilla had pushed me and pushed me 'til I had to do something like this. I shuddered at the thought of the couple of days of hell Grace'd put me through just so I wouldn't think she was easy—I just wasn’t going to go through that again.

I made a show of massaging Camilla's butt and stroking down one of her bare thighs. I nudged her legs further apart and caressed the inside of them a couple of times. She didn't make a sound, and she didn't even try to get away from my hand.

I looked at the other kids. Haley was just a standing there with her hands on her hips, and watching real close. I couldn't figure out what her expression meant. Nine-year-old Lewis was standing next to his seven-year-old sister with his left arm was around little Harriet's shoulders. The little girl's right arm was around her brother, her left hand was on his belt buckle. None of the three looked the least little bit upset at seeing their oldest sister being fondled so lewdly.

I was holding Camilla over my lap, bending over her with my chest against her back and pinning her down. My left arm stretched across her back to hold her upper body in place that much more firmly. She wouldn't have been more securely held if I'd a hogtied her.

I set there for a time, just contemplatin' the situation. Curtis had said something in the night before he died ... about how his kids were used to a special loving and for me not to think poorly of them for it 'cause it was all his doing. I reassured him we wouldn't, that it was all lovin’ natural and we'd never fault a child … or him, neither … for loving. I hadn't known what he meant, but his eyes widened when I replied that way ... and a relieved expression came over his features. He rested a mite easier after that.

Now ... well, I wasn't near as good as Mary Ann at keeping books for a business and such, but I could add two and two and come up with the same answer dang near ever' time. Seemed to me like all my worrying about what the Richardsons were going to do with these four young'uns had all been for naught. If what I was thinking was right, they'd fit right in.

I grinned at Haley. "You wearing any small clothes, sweetheart?" I asked. I was pretty sure of the answer before I asked.

She shook her head emphatically. She giggled at Camilla's upside-down and beet red face. Haley was tense, but not unhappy or afraid.

"Show me?" I said softly.

She did, raising her dark grey pioneer skirt up high enough for me to see her smooth groin and puffy young cunt lips. She grinned.

"Very pretty," I said appreciatively.

My right hand was between Camilla's thighs; my fingers were busily exploring her outer pussy lips now. I unhooked my left arm from around her upper body, giving her room to roll out of my grasp and flee if she wanted to.

She didn't. She rolled off my lap, but never did try to stand. All she did was go down on all fours in the grass, then reach a hand back to pull her skirt back up over her waist. (It had slipped down when she got off my lap.) And there Camilla waited, looking around at me with a hopeful expression.

I didn't need to have it said to me. I could hear the invitation plain as day. I undid my trousers and dropped them to my ankles. I dropped down behind Camilla, rubbed the head of my prick against her pussy lips. She was already wet and slick. I didn't have to be patient about what we were about to do. Thrusting slowly, my cock worked into the heat of Camilla's young cunt.

"Ommmmmmmmmmmggggggg!!" Camilla groaned contentedly. She dropped from all fours down to elbows and knees, hiking her ass way up in the air.

Pushing into her quim didn't take but a minute. She worked with me, adjusting her body to the best angle to receive my cock, and wiggling her butt around ever so often to ease the way. I pressed my penis deeper into her cunt, finally feeling it when I bottomed out.

Off to my right front, Lewis and his two sisters were naked already and getting their body parts all arranged for some quick sexual satisfaction. Harriet was on both knees, astride Lewis' head, and Haley was atop his midsection, inserting his young prick into her pussy. Appeared to me, they didn't need any pointers. They were getting to it like they knew just what they wanted to do and how to do it.

So I commenced to plow Camilla's vagina with my hard cock, jamming it in strongly and withdrawing it in a leisurely fashion. When the thirteen-year-old showed me she wanted something harder and faster by pushing back at me on my in-stroke, I started to drive inward a little harder and some faster ... pulling back quicker with nary a pause betwixt the two.

In a couple of minutes, Camilla was breathing more rapidly and it sounded hoarser in her throat.

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmmnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!" she whimpered. She crossed her arms in front of her and put her face down atop them. "Jerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrriiiiieee!"

"You like ... to fuck, Camilla?" I asked her, a little breathless myself.

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!" she moaned.

I took that as a yes, but I wanted to have a little fun with her. "You like it when I fuck you ... fast?" I asked, speeding up my piston-like hammering into her cunt.

"Yeah!!" Camilla gasped.

"So, you don't like it when I fuck you slow?" I quipped. I drove my cock slowly inside her, held her hips tight in my hands and working my johnson around in a little circle. My groin was tight against her, so a lot of naked skin was rubbing over naked skin.

"Ohhhhhnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh!!" she cried. "I love it when you do like that!!" she murmured.

"So, should I do it fast...?" I pounded my cock into her a few rapid strokes, not taking care to be gentle a-tall. "Or do it slow, Camilla...?" In mid-stroke, I held back ... moving only gradually inward.

She promptly humped her ass back at me, impaling herself deeply. "FUCK ME ANY WAY YOU WANT, JEREMIAH RICHARDSON," she wailed. "JUST FUCK MEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!"

I laughed and began plunging into her purty smartly and then pulling back out the same way.

"OHHHHHH GAAAAWWWWWD, JEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRR!" she shrieked. "FUCK MEEEEE!!" "FUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!" Camilla came back up to all fours and grabbed big handfuls of prairie grass. She began slinging her body back and forth, timing her swings so to meet my forward plunges.

"FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCKKKKKKK!!!"

Then she stopped bucking back at me completely. She stopped howling and carrying on, and just hung there shuddering a little. Her head was throwed back, but I didn't think she was seeing any of the sky she was a' looking at.

I pulled my cock back slowly, then drove forward harshly ... once, twice.

"AAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE—JEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!" she screamed. She held there another couple of seconds ... then collapsed and lay face down in the grass, whimpering a little and her body quivering when a new twinge of pleasure swept over her.

Gently, I pulled out of her cunt and eased back on my knees, keeping contact with the young girl with my hands stroking down her back, and thighs. I rested there, still hard as a railroad spike. My cock was sticking out in front of me, bobbing in the air. Camilla hadn't made me come; in fact, I had wanted very much to NOT come in her the first time. There was an eleven-year-old young lady just over there....

I looked where my other three cousins were. They'd stopped their own fucking to watch Camilla and me. I guess all that yelling Camilla done was a mite distracting.

Without me saying a word, nor making a gesture or anything, Haley stood up over her brother's body, lettin’ his little prick slide out of her. She glanced down at her little sister and brother.

"Harriet," she said, "you go ahead and get on Lewis' prick, okay?"

The seven-year-old cute little girl nodded eagerly, grinning broadly and hopped down her brother's body without even the slightest of delays. Watching her, it was clear she knew she absolutely could take Lewis' slender cock in her ... and she knew exactly how to make that union happen.

"Mistress Haley," I said in a gallant, mock-formally tone, "I wonder if I might have the pleasure of your company over here ... next to your sister?" I grinned.

"Only iffen you're gonna fuck me!" she retorted, answering my grin with one of her own. She pranced nearer. She had her hands on her hips and she was leaning back as much as she could and not fall backward; it pushed her pussy out into much greater prominence. It struck me I hadn't even been aware of her stripping the dress off her slender body. Her plump outer lips were already pinkened and slick with little-girl fuck juice.

"In a heartbeat!!" I vowed, and stretched out my hand to take hers. I guided her down beside Camilla and let her get into whatever position she wanted to take.

Like Camilla, she scrambled down to all fours and commenced wriggling her cute butt at me.

I took her offer and in a few minutes, we two were gasping, moaning, and pitching our sex parts at each other in a frenzy. When we came off, we both yowled a chorus at the twilight sky.

* * *

"Are you going to be our new Pa?" young Harriet demanded.

We were all comfortably naked and resting around the coals left over from cooking supper. I was laying on my back, my head pillowed on my saddle, and Harriet had hers on my belly. She'd made me promise I'd do something with her next and she was making sure neither of the other two girls would be able to change my mind.

"Honey," I said slowly, "you'll never have but one Pa." I looked around at the four of them. "But if you ask if I'll make sure no harm comes to you ... and do things with you like your Pa done, then yeah ... I think we can do that." I smiled wide.

They took a moment to absorb it all. The four of them went a little misty-eyed for a bit, but blinked unshed tears away before they were shed.

"SO ... tell me!" I demanded loudly to put paid to that conversation and start another. "How long have y'all been...?"

"Having sex stuff with our Pa and each other?" Haley asked.

I nodded.

"Since forever," she replied steadily, looking in my eyes to make sure there was no censure there. "Why didn't you want us girls afore now?" she asked curiously. "Pa said you'n him talked about how we was and you said you didn't think it was bad of us."

I knew what her Pa had said, but he'd actually couched it in different words. I hadn't understood at the time. I'd put it down to the meanderings of a dying man more than anything else.

"I didn't quite understand what he was telling me at the time," I said, by way of an answer. "But I understand now." I looked at each of them. "This is okay with all of you?" I asked.

They nodded ... they were even a tad impatient with me.

I grinned. "Well, I got some good news for you then," I said. "Our whole family up in Hidden Valley feels the same way as you'uns and your Pa about such things," I told them. "And not only that ... how 'bout we got us a whole town full of folks who think the same way?"

They were dumbfounded, of course, disbelieving and buoyant by turns. Then the questions started ... and the happy chatter too. We all decided we needed more to eat, so we scrounged around for some jerky and leftover biscuits. After a while, we all went down to the creek to wash ourselves and make ourselves fresh for the next round.

* * *

When Uncle Curtis' wagon full of kids and me rolled into Hidden Valley, ever one of the kids were wearing our Lakota moccasins with the dark red fringe at the ankles. We'd made 'em up special from the hide of that mule deer I'd shot so's all the town could see our Uncle's children were already full members of the society we were building. The hide was still pretty green and their moccasins weren't gonna last very long, but the footwear served the purpose of helping make my cousins feel to home.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Letters can keep folks in touch with one another, but that means of communication can only do so much. It came to a point where it was clear someone needed to have a sit-down talk with Laura and Melissa's brother ... or brothers.

From where we sat, it seemed like the Mormon sisters' kin were kind a' eager to join up with us, and it looked to Pa like Cal and his brothers had skills that would be a benefit to our growing community. But there were too many uncertainties created by chance words in the correspondence ... and our interpretation of those words. We were sure some uncertainties were in the brothers' minds too.

My own brothers had things to do, families to take care of and things like that. But Pa wanted a Richardson to go talk to Cal. I thought Mary Ann was the obvious one to go, but she was too involved in keeping track of Pa's businesses an’ they were at a critical point in their development.

It wound up that I was going to go with my younger sister, Emily. Even though I was purty much man-sized, I always looked younger than I really was. Emily, though, looked a lot more grown-up than she was, so together we could pretend to be a couple—married early, yes, but a loving pair to all appearances all the same. Since we started out from Tennessee, Emily breasts had grown larger; her legs longer and even more lovely than they'd been; and she was prettier too. At thirteen, Emily impressed everyone with her composure.

So me and Emily; our Mormon girls, Melissa and Laura; Hiram Conklin and his wife, Helen, plus two of their children (Clayton, who was eight, and their baby, Martha, who was three) ... all eight of us went down to the railroad and took a train west to Ogden through the snowy mountains and into the great basin. From Ogden, we set out to find the girls brother, Cal, ranch up in the foothills of the mountains.

It wasn't a country running over with milk and honey. Some would say these were part of the badlands, but it sure enough offered a wealth of privacy. Not many folks traveled this way.

We took care, not making any more splash among the citizenry than we had to whilst traveling through, and we were watching our back trail closely. There was a remote chance we'd run into one of the men who'd been part of the confrontation I'd had with that Mormon elder at The Crossing. On the other hand the old man who'd tried to enslave Laura and Melissa lived way south of the Salt Lake—that's where he had us send their weapons, anyhow—'stead a' north ... and so, presumably, would any of the men he'd brought with him.

Anyway, I was the only one of this party who'd been there, and I stayed in the background purty much. If necessary, I could cut and run, make my way back over South Pass on horseback and leave the other's free to fade away quietly. But I didn't think it was going to come to that.

Perversely, I felt a part of me that wanted the worst to happen. I could see myself, on my own and responsible for no one, traveling through the wilderness and doing my best to keep away from those who would hunt me down. I'd never been in a desperate situation like that; I kind of relished the idea that I might be able to find out how I'd react.

* * *

So it was, one fine Spring afternoon, the eight of us rode a couple of rented double-seated buckboards into the ranch headquarters of our Mormon sisters' oldest brother, which was absolutely out in the middle of danged nowhere. The sister's last letter had told their brother to expect some visitors but it hadn't said how many or when, so our arrival was something of a surprise.

A tall, graceful woman came out far enough on the front stoop to shade her eyes so’s to see us better, but not too far so as to be unable to grab the rifle I suspected was standing against the wall just inside the door. That was where I would a' had it, anyhow. An older boy had disappeared inside the house when we came in sight and I watched as a shuttered window eased open to the right of that open door. Another shutter opened up in what was probably the loft. No one remained of the passel of kids we'd seen playing in the yard when we were riding up.

Which was pretty much what we'd expected. It didn't pay for anyone to assume a big party like ours was friendly, 'til we proved it.

"OH MY GOD! LAURA! MELISSA!"

It was the tall woman on the front porch, the one who'd been shading her eyes and watching us come slowly into the yard. She launched herself down the steps and trotted quickly to the sisters' buckboard.

"NANCY!!" the sisters squealed in excited unison. They piled off the wagon and commenced to hugging and kissing the woman ... and then all the kids who come running out of the house when the woman identified who it was had come calling. Clearly our bona fides had been established to the woman's satisfaction.

The rest of us got invited to get down too ... a thing folks politely waited for, back in them days ... and the older boy we'd seen earlier showed Hiram and me a corral we could turn the horses into. A big lean-to was built into one side of the corral and the three of us shoveled grain into troughs for the horses before we made our way up to the house.

Inside, I found out just how much our two Mormon sisters had not told us. They just hadn't thought to, I guess. And it never occurred to me to ask.

For one thing, Laura and Melissa's big brother had married a woman a trifle older than he was—I found out later Nancy was a good seven years older than Cal. She was twenty-nine to Cal's twenty-two and she was a widow, having been married at fifteen to a man who gave her four children before he died of some ailment. She had two babies from Cal also, a four-year-old and a two-year-old. There were a lot more kids running around than I'd thought would be the case.

Howsomever, Cal's wife sure didn't look like she had six children. My goodness, she was a looker—I didn't have to guess why Cal had married her. Tall, slender and graceful to a fault, Nancy seemed to just glide through her kitchen, handling all the children and the sudden arrival of visitors with perfect aplomb. Her well-kept brunette hair was allowed to flow down around her shoulders like a brown flood—a thing that wasn't generally done in them days. Most women wore their hair up in the daytime an’ only let it down come nighttime and in the privacy of her and her husband’s bedroom.

The second thing that Laura and Melissa didn't tell us was that Nancy's sister, Phyllis, lived with Cal and her. Phyllis was the spitting image of her older sister; tall, poised, slim and pleasant of face. She had two children herself, an eleven-year-old boy, Ralph, and a nine-year-old girl named Josephine.

The third thing our Mormon sisters didn't tell us Richardsons was that Nancy, and Phyllis, were French. I figgered there might be some kind of interesting story there ... 'cause I didn't think Nancy nor Phyllis were French names. How they came to have these new names might be a yarn worth listening to.

However long the women had been here in America—and none of us were rude enough to ask—they hadn't completely lost their accent … made some words they said just a tad different. Sometimes also, their pronunciation hit hard at the ending of a word, for instance, where we'd normally emphasize the first part of the word—or the other way around. Didn't make a problem for us though—we got used to it in a trice. None of their children had any accent that I could hear, so I reckoned the sisters had been in America for a while—and all their children had been born here.

When she realized who we were, Nancy sent her oldest boy, Harrison, off to let Cal know his sisters and some other's had come home and arrived on their doorstep. The thirteen-year-old youngster mounted a fast pony and went out of the yard at a gallop. He hadn't wanted to go—looked like he was afraid he was going to miss something.

The house was just neat as a pin. The floor was wood, where many a house out here had dirt floors; the planks were smooth and well put together. The area right inside the door was a kind of mudroom and I quickly took my dusty boots off and left them there, slapping the trail dust off my clothes as best I could. Hiram and the others did the same, so we wouldn't seem like barbarians in Nancy's home. She saw what we did, and her face said she approved.

Nancy set out a big platter of donuts—bear sign, the old timers called them out west here—and we all found seats at their long table and pitched in. The kids found places to sit cross-legged on the floor and begin making friends with each other. There was some hesitancy in the air ... no one quite knew how to start the conversation going.

"My Pa spent a year 'er two in France," I offered ... just throwing it out carelessly. "Had him a fine time there, back afore he met my Ma."

I took another bite of a really fine donut and a swig of equally good coffee. I thought I saw an opening to turn the slight conversation in a direction that might relax the whole crew of us.

"Pa was working for a feller who knowed another feller—some guy who took a lot of photographs—his name was Daguerre ... Louis Daguerre." I said. "Apparently, this here Daguerre was the first feller who invented a way to make a ‘xact picture of anything that come to hand—folks named them Daguerreotypes."

I reached for the pot of coffee in the center of the table and refilled my cup. Both French girls were quiet ... both of them were watching me closely after having shot each other a fast glance. I couldn't read their expressions.

"My Pa brought a bunch of those Daguerreotypes home with him from France," I continued. "Lots of them Daguerreotypes were of naked women, ya know? My Pa's real partial to pictures of naked women," I added, smiling all around. "Nekkid women with naked men doing things ... together," I finished.

The room was still for a long moment. I just munched on some of that fine bear sign and swallowed hot coffee down my gullet.

Phyllis cleared her throat. "Funny you should say 'Daguerreotype', she began. "Our mother, she say one time that a long time before ... well, she ... ah ... may have posed for some of these … Daguerreotypes."

Which got my attention real quick, I can tell ya that for a fact. I looked the French sisters over purty durned closely. Both were slender, very presentable, with well-shaped bodies and long legs. I'd seen a bunch of women in the type of clothes they were wearin’ … and I’d helped a number of those women out of them clothes. You might say I was beginning to get a real good idea of how women and girls would look without their clothes on. So I was certain both of these French women would be very nice to look at when, and if, I saw them naked.

The two sisters weren't great beauties, but their features weren't unpleasant neither. Both had long, brown hair, friendly faces, and dancing eyes that seemed more amber than brown. They had a light dusting of freckles across their noses and full lips that seemed made for kissing. Their dresses were long, but the hems didn't drag on the floor. They had slippers on their feet and their dresses were short enough to expose nicely shaped ankles and the beginnings of curvy calves.

I grinned at Phyllis and cocked my head a little to one side. "Well, I bet you ladies favored your Ma quite a bit, didn't you?" They only smiled at me; but they didn't say no, so I took their reaction as a yes.

"And I'm quite certain if my Pa ever saw one of them Daguerreotypes of your mother, he’d a come home with it," I told them. I didn't remember any of Pa's Daguerreotypes showed a woman who resembled these two, but I hadn't seen all of them. Most a’ the time, my attention wasn’t on the faces anyhow. I was hopeful I might find one next time I saw Pa's collection.

"Pa would surely let you go through all of the ones he has, if you want to," I remarked. "It'd be real interesting if you found one of her, huh?"

Both the girls giggled naughtily, and the tension in the room eased a lot.

We Richardsons could tell by the French girls' responses, and their kids' too, that they weren't embarrassed or insulted by me referring to naked women. Most kids, and women, would be blushing and thoroughly shocked by what I'd said. These women weren't … and neither was anyone else in the room.

The French girls saw we could admit to something that would never be acceptable in 'polite' society. It meant our two groups had something of a common interest and confirmed the impression they surely got from the letters that had been going back and forth.

We sat there another couple of hours, gradually becoming more comfortable with each other. I noticed Nancy and Phyllis' kids were leaving the living room and kitchen area, disappearing through a door. When they came back, they were neat, all clean, washed, and wearing fresh clothes. The girls came back wearing slippers like their ma's and the boys had on stockings, but nobody was wearin' any real shoes or boots. So I picked a time when none of the kids moved when the latest one came back in, and I asked if it was okay if I was to take a bath. A wink and a smile from Nancy was my only reply, but it was enough.

About three hours after we arrived, our Mormon sisters' big brother, Cal, walked in the door, smiling all around. With him was the youngest of the brothers, young Andrew. I knew Andrew was fourteen, only a few months younger than my fifteen years.

Laura and Melissa squealed in unison and jumped up, racing to their brothers and throwing their arms around their necks for some kisses. They weren't what you'd call 'brother-sisterly' kisses neither. Cal's wife ... or were Nancy and Phyllis both his 'wives'? I didn't know ... anyhow, they weren't concerned at all. Cal and Andrew swapped sisters for another round of kisses and then Nancy's boy, Harrison, elbowed his way in for some kisses from the girls too.

I reached out and grabbed hold of Nancy's oldest girl, Florence, who was passing by after having refilled the pitcher of buttermilk. "THAT looks like fun, don't it?!" I said, grinning into her face and pointing at the two girls and three boys all in a group kissing and such. They, particularly the girls' brothers, were quickly moving into some intimate stroking and grasping and stuff like that.

Young Florence was startled at first. She threw a quick glance at her mother, who nodded, and then Florence looked to her step-father, Cal (who was too busy to return her fleeting look). What he was doin' with his two long-lost sisters was kinda an answer for Florence, though. She looked back at me and smiled happily, her body relaxin' just a little. When I drew her down on my lap, she came willingly.

I commenced to kissing her soft lips. 'Flo' was a freckle-face twelve year-old, pleasant of features and sturdy of body, with clearly defined boobies that made prominent little bumps in the material of her dress. She had what looked to be awfully nice, shapely legs peeking out the bottom hem too.

Florence started enthusiastically returning my kisses. When my hands strayed under her dress and my fingers stroked down to her ankles, she didn't show the slightest sign of discomfort ... so I didn't stop. A few seconds later, my hidden hands were above her knees, caressing the young girl's smooth, firm flesh.

"Nancy...?" Laura asked her sister-in-law tentatively.

I looked over to see what the next step in this game was going to be.

Nancy pitched her chin up inquiringly, smiling most tolerantly.

"Ahhhh ... would it be all right if me and Melissa take ... uh ... Cal and Andy out back to get a bath ... is it okay with you...?"

"Surest thing in the world," Nancy replied promptly. "You think I like my husband smelling like horse sweat and tracking dirt through the house like that?" she demanded. "Bring Cal back nice and clean, and smelling purty, would ya, please?"

"And make sure you wash all the nooks and crannies on that hellion, Andy, too," she added. "And if you get a chance, make sure my boy doesn't miss out on the soap and water ... and other stuff," she concluded.

Laura and Melissa happily took their brothers and Nancy's oldest boy, Harrison, by the hand and led them out back for what I was sure would be a fun time getting clean.

"They're going to need some help," my sister Emily remarked, gettin’ up from her seat and striding purposefully toward the door out back. "Laurie and 'Linda can't be taking care a washin' all three fellers all by themselves."

Without me noticing, she'd managed to reach behind her neck and undo the top three buttons on her dress. When she reached the door, she turned and beamed a smile back to the long table where the rest of us were still sitting. Then she backed up against young Harrison, pushing her arse right back into him. "Unbutton me the rest a’ the way, please." she murmured to the lad.

Now, Harrison was a tad surprised, but not too surprised to do as Emily bid. A couple of seconds later, Emily shrugged her shoulders and the top of her dress came down to her waist, baring her young boobs to the world. She worked the dress down over her hips, let it drop to the floor and stepped out of it. No one said a thing as she stood there for a moment, naked except for her moccasins. She didn't move ... jest stood there and let everyone look at her. Then she bent over to pick up her clothing, hung the dress on a peg in the wall, slipped off her moccasins and waltzed into the room with the big tubs.

"Ooooooooooo!"

I heard the squeal from the little girl named Blanche, Nancy and Cal's oldest child.

"Ooooooooo!" she exclaimed insistently a second time. "I want to go too," she said emphatically. "Can I Mommy? Can I?"

"Ask your father," Nancy said, nodding her head at Cal.

"Can I, Pa?" the little girl demanded.

Cal smiled and beckoned the toddler to come to him.

Blanche jumped up and scampered to the doorway, shedding clothing all the way.

Before the door closed, I could see Emily fondling Harrison's johnson in his pants and lifting her lips up to his for a long kiss.

I chuckled. "How old is Harrison?" I asked, turning to his mother, Nancy.

"Just turned thirteen," she replied, smiling back at me. "And Cal's daughter is four," she added. "And how old are you, Master Jeremiah," she asked.

I grinned. "I turned fifteen back afore Christmas," I told her.

Her eyes widened some. I knew I didn't look exactly fifteen; I looked older most times—if ya looked only at how tall I was in my stockinged feet and how heavy I was. I was purty near a man growed and I'd been doing a man's work ever day since I was a younker. I grinned 'cause, on the other side a’ that coin, there were girls who told me I looked even younger than fifteen when my eyes were bright and dancing with naughtiness. That's the side of me I showed most often to the world.

"I'm twelve," young Flo offered, bringing my attention back around to her.

"Twelve?" I repeated. She nodded. "You’re sure a very pretty twelve, honey," I told her.

She smiled delightedly.

I thought for a moment. "You know...," I said slowly, "my sister, Grace, was just twelve ... last summer ... when me and her started ... fucking." This was the first time any of us had used the word, but I didn't think it would put anyone off. No one doubted what the excited squeals and gasps from behind the closed door meant.

"I mean ... she was kind of my step-sister—but really she's my auntie, by marriage, even iffen she is just thirteen now," I continued.

I chuckled at Flo's mystified expression—and her mother's too.

"Grace's big sister married my Pa," I explained, "an when we decided to come west last year, Grace come along too." I waited a moment. "Grace and her big sister are a lot alike when they fuck," I remarked, glancing slyly around the room. "…'specially when a man fucks them side by side!"

There was a soft murmur from the Mormon folks in the room. Hiram and Helen Conklin didn't bother commenting—they already knew all about it. They were too busy anyways ... Hiram had Nancy's ten-year-old girl, Victoria, riding one knee and her cousin, nine-year-old Josephine (Phyllis' daughter) on the other. The young girls were rubbing up a storm on Hiram's thighs while he fondled their little boobies through their dress material. None of them were naked yet, but it wouldn't be long.

Helen had Nancy's youngest son ... Nancy and Cal's boy ... on her lap, busily undoing his smallclothes while he laughed gleefully. Hiram and Helen's three-year-old, Martha looked on interestedly. As I watched, Martha began shedding clothes and trying to toss them at the wall behind the table. As I looked around, seemed like everyone was pairing up ... or tripling up ... and the party was well on its way to getting started.

"How me and Grace got started," I said, turning back to young Flo, "was she took a tumble down a buffalo holler and I saw she wasn't wearing nothing 'neath her skirt," I continued. "Found out later, she done it a purpose ... and then a couple of days after that, me and her met up behind her wagon and commenced to ... exploring," I told Flo.

I put my hands on Flo's waist and boosted her up onto the table in front of me. She giggled, a little surprised, but pleased to have my full attention.

The hem of her dress was a good three 'er four inches wide at the bottom. I took it in widely separated hands and folded it back up against itself again. Four more inches of twelve-year-old girl calf and ankle were exposed. I did it again. More of Flo's lower leg came into view.

Florence didn't make the slightest attempt to stop me. Her eyes were wide with fiery excitement now.

"...And Grace let me look up her skirt," I continued. I folded another hem's width of material upward, exposing her knees this time. I bent forward and kissed each kneecap. "She let me kiss her ... waaaaay up under her dress...."

I made another fold, revealing an expanse of girlishly slender thigh. "I really like kissing up a girl's thighs," I explained. I planted kisses up to the point my lips were touching the dress material.

"...And then one evening she let me see all the way up to where her legs come together," I said, folding Flo's dress up again. I didn't bother coming back up anymore ... I just stayed leaning over and kissing under the foldings of the skirt material.

I could tell Flo was getting more excited. She was keening a high-pitched little whimper, and her breathing was getting a little ragged.

I folded her dress hem back on itself one last time. "And Grace and me—OH! That is SOOOO pretty,” I exclaimed. The final fold had exposed her young pussy to my hungry eyes.

Flo inhaled a deep breath between her teeth. She humped up into my lips ... just a little bit, but it was plenty.

I kissed her outer lips tenderly, then I slid my tongue down the left side of her pussy, and back up t'other side. Story time was over. This was where I'd been aiming at and I wasn't about to waste time a talking.

"Unnnnnnggggghhhhh!" Flo grunted like she'd been thumped in the gut or something.

Another slurp and Flo began to hump her cunt up at my face faster and more strongly. I don't think she meant to; her body was pretty much doing it by itself. Her legs came up and draped themselves over my shoulders while Flo leaned back on her hands and worked her pussy all over my face.

I felt Flo's dress lift up. I broke off licking her pussy and lifted my head to see what was happening while substituting my left forefinger between Flo's pussy lips for my tongue.

Cal's wife, Nancy, grinned into my face and came over to kiss my lips. My mouth was all shiny with Flo's juices, but Nancy didn't seem to mind a-tall. Somewhere whilst I was busy with Nancy's twelve-year-old daughter, Nancy herself had shucked her dress and was gloriously naked. Tall, slender as a virgin girl, the woman stood there a moment to let me see her body.

Then, moving lithely and gracefully, Nancy stepped in and tugged Flo's dress up over her shoulders and off, leaving Florence naked 'cept for a pair of slippers on her feet. The young girl smiled a hot little grin at me, leaned back on her elbows, and let me look.

"Oh, my…," I remarked softly. "Those are just beautiful!" I leaned in to suck Flo's right nipple ... it was just a tiny thing, no bigger around than a .22 caliber bullet, but it was pointy and just about as hard as one too. It stretched, growing more erect with every second of attention I gave it. I moved to her left boobie and gave loving consideration to it too.

"Help me get Jeremiah clothes off," Nancy murmured.

I didn't know who she was talking to, but right after she said that, I felt two sets of hands undoing my pants and getting my moccasins off. I caught sight of a naked Nancy on my right side and her daughter, Margaret, on my left. Margaret didn't have a stitch on neither. Seemed like I was falling behind 'er something, so I stood up, pushing the long bench seat away with the backs of my knees, and I let them have their way.

Nine-year-old Margaret wasn't tall enough to help tug my shirt off, so she hopped up on the table's long bench beside me ... which put another naked young girl within arm's reach. About half a second after I realized that, my left hand was probing 'tween young Margaret's thighs to touch puffy pussy lips, fondling her butt, and stroking all the luscious little-girl flesh the youngster was making available to me.

So there I was—bent over kissing Flo's pussy, caressing and fondling Margaret's privates, and getting the final bits of clothing stripped off me by the two girls' hot, carnally-inclined mother. I was pretty sure life couldn't get much better than what I was experiencing right then. Of course, I was wrong; it got much better ... quickly.

With me naked—I didn't find where the woman throwed my clothes 'til two days later—Nancy had access to my hard prick and she took full advantage. Pasting the front of her body against me from behind, Nancy reached around and took my cock in hand and began slowly masturbating me. It felt REAL good ... so much so that when she stopped, I missed it and looked around to see if I could get her to do it some more.

But Nancy had moved on. From somewhere, she produced a wooden dildo, all varnished and shiny-like. Grinning at me like a maniac, she shouldered me a little bit to the side so she could have enough room to touch the dildo to Flo's pretty pussy lips. Nancy pressed the thing in a little, stroked it up and down the length of her daughter's young slit and working the rod around to coat it with Flo's sticky/slick juices. A short moment later, she pushed the stick inside.

"Annnnngggghhh!" Flo grunted. She wasn't hurting none. It was just the wonderfulness of her pussy being filled up with the wooden device. Her thighs popped open 'til they were as wide as she could get 'em.

"Remember what Mamma told you," Nancy murmured, “...relax and let it go up inside you, okay, honey?"

I took that to mean young Florence hadn't been doing this too very long ... which was an important thing for me to know. I couldn't take her like I could my step-sister Grace these days, for instance. It validated something that we Richardson's had been thinking—that this family, as a group, were just beginning to explore this kind of life.

Didn't mean Flo wasn't liking what was happening to her though. She nodded to her mother and hunched her groin up a little, deepening the penetration of the dildo. She had an expression of intense concentration on her face, and maybe just a little impatience too. Perhaps Mamma was being just a mite too careful?

I chuckled, shuffled my feet a little to the left so I could better watch mother and daughter for a moment. Margaret's feet were wide apart on the bench beside me and my left hand was cupping her young mound. I wiggled my middle finger a little, nudging her pussy lips apart a little, and then carefully pressed it inside.

"Unnnghhh!" Margaret half-gasped at the intrusion, but she didn't back away from the contact. My finger probed deeper.

"Ummmmmmm!!" she moaned. Margaret's barely-curved hips began to move ... not much ... just a little rhythmic back and forth motion that pushed her groin forward—and my finger deeper—then she’d back up a tiny bit, and then back again.

Nancy was moving the dildo in and out of her daughter's cunt quicker now; the motion was easier as Florence's body adjusted to the skewering she was getting from the device and more of her vagina honey flowed, coating the wooden thing with slick, sticky juices.

Flo's face was screwed up in a mask that looked like pain, but was actually a very deeply felt pleasure. Her brown eyes were closed, her lips tightened into a straight line. The blush on her cheeks she normally had was all over her face now. She panted for breath, holding her air in for a long time ... then letting it explode out before sucking in another lungful as quickly as she could.

I had to smile. I loved doing this to girls and women. I liked seeing them feeling so much delight that they lost themselves.

On the other hand ... I wasn't much involved in what young Flo was feeling, and hadn't been for a few minutes.

"My turn," I murmured into Nancy's ear. I moved closer to her and leaned into her body ever so slightly.

She looked around at me, her eyes blank for a moment. She didn't say anything, but she smiled before turning back to her twelve-year-old daughter and gently sliding the dildo out for the last time.

When she moved aside, I shuffled between Flo's thighs and took my cock in my right hand to introduce it between her pussy lips.

"Let me," Nancy whispered in my ear. She took my hand off my shaft and substituted her own, swiping the head up and down the short length of her daughter's outer lips.

I let her. Her long, delicately shaped fingers felt really fine on my cock, and this was new for me. I'd never had a mother put my prick inside her own daughter's cunt before. I really liked it and a part of my mind started scheming how to arrange this more often.

When the turnip-shaped head of my penis was well coated in Flo's cunt juices, Nancy pushed it into Flo's slit, pressed down gently with her forefinger ... and my cock slid smoothly through Flo's inner lips and into her vagina.

The breath hissed in between Flo's tightly clinched teeth. Her hips moved involuntarily, shifting from side to side a tiny bit, then rocking up and down a little. I waited 'til she seemed ready, then pressed inward a little more.

"Annnngggghhhhhhhhhhhhhh," she breathed softly. Her knees were up, her feet waving in the air near my hips. Her hands clamped on the back of my upper arms to urge me closer ... deeper. Florence wriggled her lower body gently, seating my cock a little deeper inside her. "Mamma," she moaned, "he feels so GOOD in me."

Nancy laughed softly. "I know he does, baby," she cooed to her daughter. She took her fingers off my prick and turned her body more to face me. Her right hand reached under my cock and cupped my balls. She massaged gently. Her left hand was on my buttock, squeezing and kneading before slipping beneath to massage the place between the base of my cock and my arse hole.

Flo might not have been too experienced at coupling with a man, but mamma didn't have that problem. I began to see why Cal had married an older woman. Lots of benefits to marrying a woman who knew how to treat a man ... 'specially if she has three daughters who could learn mamma's lessons.

"Margaret, sugar," I heard Nancy say. "Florence?"

The girls looked at their mother, preoccupied though they were—one with my cock, the other with my fingers working industriously in her cunt.

"You remember how I showed you two girls can pleasure one another?" Nancy asked.

They nodded.

"Margaret, I think Jeremiah would like to see you being tongued by Florence," Nancy suggested. She shot a quick glance at me—I think just to keep me involved. She surely didn't expect any objection. Jeremiah Richardson was nobody's fool, by golly!

I growled my assent, grinning happily.

A few moments later, Margaret was squatting over her big sister's face and bracing herself with a hand on the table top. She lowered her cunny to Flo's mouth. Flo extended her tongue and licked a long swipe along Margaret's slit, making Margaret throw her head back and moan.

Nancy returned to massaging my balls and squeezing my arse cheeks, and I returned to thrusting deeper into Flo's young cunt.

It had been several days since I'd had sex; we'd been very careful not to do anything that would invite attention to our group on the way to Cal's ranch/farm. I was anticipating having to pace myself now—I didn't like coming off before my woman did, whoever that might be at the moment.

Flo wasn't holding back though. The exquisite tightness of her cunt around my cock was a shared pleasure. She clearly loved the feeling of my organ plunging inside her, massaging her pussy lips as it passed through and drove deep inside her.

I loved the way her vagina muscles clamped down on my penis, sucking at it and trying to hold it in her when I sought to withdraw for another stroke. Her pussy lips were ruby-red now and her tiny nubbin was erect and probing beyond its sheath. I worked myself higher on her body and did all I could to make the contact between my cock and her clitoris as intense as possible.

I could feel the tightness in my balls increasing every second—I think Nancy did too because she left off mauling them and began stroking my lower belly.

"Oooommmmmmmmmmmm!" Florence moaned. Her hips were working up and down rapidly, smashing upward to meet my downstrokes.

I felt the heat begin to rise in my groin. My muscles tightened. Muscles I hadn't known I could tense became rock hard. "GAAAWWWWWDDDDD!!" I groaned. I took in a big gulp of air and clamped my belly muscles tight, trying to stem the rise of the come into my cock.

"AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!" Margaret howled. "ARRRRRRGGGGGHHHH!!!"

"MAMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!" she squealed urgently, rubbing her cunny lips on her sister's tongue and even her nose. "AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGG!!!" A second later, the nine-year-old stiffened ... held still for a long instant ... then began to collapse. If Nancy hadn't been there to catch her and guide Margaret's body to the side of Florence's, poor Flo might have been suffocated.

I think Flo had the advantage; she had to use some of her concentration to keep licking her sister's pussy for a long while. But when Margaret gave up and let her orgasm overwhelm her senses, Flo no longer had anything to distract her.

I began to stroke more strongly into her, increasing the speed of my plunges and withdrawals. I know my body was stressed so hard that I was quivering like a spring wound too tightly.

"MAMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA??" Flo shrieked insistently. Her hands fastened tighter on my upper arms, then she lost her grip. Her fingers found the edge of the tabletop and clamped into place. She used her grasp on the wooden plank to steady her and hunch back into my driving thrusts. "MAMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

A moment later, my body gave up its last resistance. My come rose, more speedily each second until I could feel the heat passing up the length of my cock.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!" I yelled, putting my head back and hollering my release to the ceiling. I pumped my hips forward and back very quickly two ... three times, then rammed my cock head as deep as Flo could take it. The extra sensation of Flo's vagina clamping down on me set me off. I felt the thick come erupting from my cock. "ONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!" I groaned, my jaw set tight.

My come, erupting deep inside her, set Flo off too. "AAAAIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!" she screamed. "AAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!" She was thrashing around like she was possessed, throwing her hips up off the table, desperately trying to keep as much of my cock inside her as she could manage.

Another spray of my come splashed inside the twelve-year-old girl's vagina. "UUUUNNNNNGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!" I yelled. I plowed forward and spewed another gob of white-grey semen into Flo's cunt.

Flo's face took on an expression of amazement. Her mouth gaped open. She arched her back on the table until the back of her head and her tailbone were the only things touching it. Freezing into position, she stayed like that for what seemed like a long time.

"Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss!!" she sighed. Her fingers tightened on the table's edge, her knuckles whitened, then relaxed. A little quake rippled up her abdomen and faded away.

I forced another spurt of a rapidly thinning come out my cock head. My strength was waning. The young girl was sucking it out through the little slit in the end of my prick. My knees threatened to give way.

"AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRKKKKKKK!!" I croaked weakly. I was finished. I pulled my cock out of the young girl's still squeezing vagina. I was moving awfully slowly, not wanting to withdraw too quickly.

She sighed regretfully again. Her hips wriggled tentatively, making me catch my breath.

When my penis was my own again, I stumbled back to sit on the long bench I'd pushed away earlier. I sat there, breathing heavily and my heart a’ pounding.

I watched as Nancy gently kissed Flo's pussy lips, lapping up some of the semen I'd deposited inside her daughter. She turned to me and smacked her lips, grinning broadly.

"You taste good, young Jeremiah," she cooed. Her hands came up to cup her breasts, then swept down to fondle her own pussy. Her hips began to writhe suggestively.

I began to recover ... swiftly.

When my chest quit heaving and my heart stilled a bit, I bent Flo and Margaret's mother over the table and carefully inserted the dildo Nancy had used on Flo into the woman's arse hole. Nancy craned her head around to look at me when I started pressing the wooden thing into her bowels, but she didn't protest. Her only reaction was to set her feet a little wider and relax her lower body a little more, wiggling around some.

Moments later, I put my cock into her pussy and began fucking her with strong, steady strokes. Margaret inserted her body beneath her mother's chest and began sucking Nancy's nipples, alternating between the two of them, and sliding a hand down her mother's body from time to time. Flo took over the dildo from me, happily sliding it in and out of her mother's arse.

When Nancy came, you could have heard her wailing scream all the way across the shallow valley they called home. She was shaky for the longest time ... almost up to the moment her son Harrison bellied up behind her and began to thrust his prick up inside the womb he'd come out of thirteen years earlier.

We Richardsons learned Nancy almost always accompanied her climaxes with piercing, lingering screams. She screamed a lot the week we spent with them ... so did her sister, come to think of it. When they had orgasms together ... and us guys tried to make that happen ever' so often just for the fun of hearing them ... it was a delightful, though shrill, duet.

Mark—Laura and Melissa's other brother—came out to Cal's spread the next day, with his family ... and everyone was moved to recreate the whole bacchanal from the day before. I don't think a happy grin left my lips the whole time we stayed there.

* * *

So it was that the next spring, our growing little settlement hidden deep in the mountains had an influx of two sizeable Mormon families moving in with us from across the western mountains. Their moccasins, with red fringes on the uppers, were on display for everyone to see.

THE END of BOOK II

* * *

Coming in BOOK III, "Those Who Were Lost, Now Are Found"

Comments? You can contact me at: caleboflannery@yahoo.com