Carter, Beth D. - Lawless Hearts (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Read online

  Lawless Hearts

  Scharlie Thorn is the local schoolteacher of Rock Ridge, Missouri, who everyone looks at with pity. When she was fourteen, her stepfather attacked her, scarring her face. Her brother, Harlow, accidentally killed him while defending Scharlie, forcing him to run from the law.

  Ten years later, she is visited by two handsome men, Cassidy Brooks and Garrett Webb, who come to tell her that Harlow has been murdered. But the man who killed Harlow is now after Scharlie. As the two men try to keep Scharlie safe, she learns that they are outlaws. And worse, Harlow was an outlaw, too.

  Scharlie has decisions to make. Does she trust Cassidy and Garrett when they tell her they love her? Or will she hand them over to the law? More than her life is at stake. Her heart is on the line, too.

  Genre: Historical, Ménage a Trois/Quatre, Western/Cowboys

  Length: 27,792 words

  LAWLESS HEARTS

  Beth D. Carter

  MENAGE AMOUR

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

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  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Ménage Amour

  LAWLESS HEARTS

  Copyright © 2011 by Beth D. Carter

  E-book ISBN: 1-61034-729-3

  First E-book Publication: September 2011

  Cover design by Jinger Heaston

  All cover art and logo copyright © 2011 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  Letter to Readers

  Dear Readers,

  If you have purchased this copy of Lawless Hearts by Beth D. Carter from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.

  Regarding E-book Piracy

  This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.

  The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.

  This is Beth D. Carter’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Ms. Carter’s right to earn a living from her work.

  Amanda Hilton, Publisher

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  www.BookStrand.com

  DEDICATION

  My thanks to Siren.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  There is some question as to when the game Truth or Dare, the game Scharlie, Garrett, and Cassidy play in the cellar, was invented. There seems to be no right or wrong answer. Regardless of when, I took the liberty of incorporating it into Lawless Hearts, which is set in the 1880s.

  LAWLESS HEARTS

  BETH D. CARTER

  Copyright © 2011

  Chapter One

  “Here ya go, Scharlie,” Tom Kern, the storekeep, said as he laid two stacks of brown, wrapped bundles on the counter. “They came in just an hour ago.”

  Scharlie Thorn smiled and gave a large sigh of pleasure. Finally, after waiting for five months, the new books had arrived.

  “Thanks so much,” she said, reaching out a gloved hand to touch one bundle almost reverently.

  “What are they?”

  “Hm? Oh, books, for the children,” she answered.

  Tom scratched his head. “You pay for these yourself? ’Cause I don’t remember sending money in with Tommy.”

  “These books are at no cost for the parishioners of StoddardCounty, Tom. Just my way of helping the children learn.”

  She smiled at him, and she saw his eyes flicker over to the right side of her face. The old shame of her scar reared its ugly head, and she couldn’t help but turn her head away, trying to hide the ugliness on her face, which was ridiculous because there simply wasn’t a way to eradicate her disfigurement.

  Her stepfather had made sure of that when he had cut her.

  “Here, let me put them in your wagon,” Tom offered, coming around the counter and grabbing the heavy book stacks.

  “Thank you,” Scharlie mumbled, following after him but keeping her head bent.

  Usually, she wasn’t so embarrassed about how her life had turned out. She knew the people of Rock Ridge had grown used to seeing her and the scar that ran from her temple, down her cheek, to bisect her upper lip. She had more than gotten used to the pitying looks cast her way. But being around Tom was different because when she had been fourteen, she had been smitten with the blond-haired, blue-eyed young man. Of course, a world of change had happened since that summer, least of which had been eighteen-year-old Tom falling for Angie Bursting. Now she taught their son.

  “Much obliged,” she mumbled and turned to climb into the wagon.

  “Scharlie!” came the breathless call from Tom’s beautiful wife, Angie, as she raced out of the general store. “I have a letter for you!”

  Scharlie kept her eyes averted from Tom as she reached down to take the letter that Angie held out to her. There wasn’t a return address, but the postal mark came from St. Louis.

  “Thank you, Angie,” she said as she slipped the letter into the pocket of her skirt.

  She knew Angie and Tom waved at her, but she didn’t even spare them another glance as she headed out of town toward her little home located about a mile west.

  She rode for a while, trying hard not to think of anything. She didn’t like to remember how that long-ago summer had changed everything. Lots of things she could forget, forgive, but her brother forever branded a killer wasn’t one of them.

  If she could dig up her dead stepfather and kill him all over again, she would.

  A low rumble raced across the ground. Scharlie looked skyward, which seemed to be turning an ugly color that she didn’t like. She flicked the horses’ reins, urging them to move a little faster since she preferred not to be stuck in the downpour when it hit. She’d had a long day at the schoolhouse, and all she longed to do that night was take a hot bath and go to sleep early.

  As her horse and cart trotted down the dirt road that led to her cozy
little house, Scharlie noticed a shape lying in her path. As she neared, she pulled on the reins, coming to a stop. The wind whipped furiously at her as she applied the brake and then stepped down onto the road.

  It was a deer, a doe, and Scharlie realized that it was dead. The blacks of the eyes had already started to glaze over to white. From the back, the animal looked like she was sleeping. Scharlie walked around the poor creature and then abruptly stopped, the breath swooshing from her lungs. The doe’s face had been slashed from the high forehead, over the snout, and into the lip.

  Scharlie put a hand up to her scar as her stomach rolled. The wound looked eerily similar to her own.

  She spun around, looking for…for what, she didn’t know. But suddenly she felt too vulnerable out in the open. As chill bumps settled over her skin, she hurried back to her cart. With a deft flick of the reins, she maneuvered around the carcass without looking at it.

  When she reached her house, she placed the books inside the door and then ran to unhitch her horse. She secured him and her cow in the small barn before running to close up the chicken coop. Though she had a lot of land, she only had the necessary animals to maintain living in the small house that had belonged to her parents. She and her brother, Harlow, had been born here, had grown up here, and she couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.

  The heavens broke as she hurried inside. Scharlie breathed a sigh of relief and then proceeded to secure her little home. The unease from earlier lingered, though she didn’t know why. It wasn’t like anything had happened. Still, she couldn’t help but feel that the doe’s wound wasn’t accidental.

  Southeast Missouri lay on the border where tornadoes frequented through the central region of America, close enough to take the storms seriously. After securing the windows and door, she grabbed a traveling bag and stuffed it with a blanket, a change of clothes, a flask of water, and some dried jerky. Then she peeled back the rug that hid the storm cellar door in the kitchen and opened it. She hadn’t been down there in a few weeks, and a musty smell wafted upward. She lit a lamp and walked down the ten steps to place her traveling bag on the shelves. Next she moved the books as well, because after taking four months to get them, she’d be damned if she’d lose them to the weather.

  She blew out the lamp and left it there, using the light streaming from the open hatch to guide her way back up.

  While the wind howled and the rain battered her tin roof, Scharlie settled in for the night. She took off her confining dress, unbraided her long, dark hair, and curled up on her bed in her shift with the book hidden under her bed.

  The book had been dog-eared so much that the corners had turned brittle. The title had once been velvet on the front but had long since been rubbed off. And inside, the pages were the steamiest, the raunchiest acts Scharlie could wrap her mind around. Depraved acts of human nature and more than just sex, the book was a collection of stories from prostitutes, delineating the innermost aspects of not only the marriage bed, but what came after. It explained, in explicit detail, what men really craved away from their staid, puritan wives.

  It had come to her in the most casual, most innocent of ways. She had ordered one book and received this one, the velvet-titled one. At first she had been appalled, then curious, and then turned on.

  Ever since, she had faithfully read her book and fantasized. She had learned new words for private body parts, had learned to explore them. Though she wasn’t quite sure why the book had been written, Scharlie was only thankful it had found its way into her hands.

  She turned to her favorite story where two men pleasured one woman. The concept was mind-boggling. But it churned her stomach in a delightful way. As she read, her hand slid along her thighs, the nails lightly brushing over her skin, until her fingertips found the curls hiding her sex.

  John bends his head down to me and captures my lips in a deep kiss. He sweeps me up into his arms, and they take me upstairs.

  Scharlie’s fingers found their way past her damp curls to the nook hidden by the now swollen lips.

  Sam reaches out to grab the edge of my shirt and pulls it over my head. I stand naked, feeling powerful as each of them stares at me in hunger, looking as if they are going to devour me whole.

  “Now you,” I whisper.

  The men take off their shirts as well, and they are close enough that their arms brush each other as they reach out to caress me. Sam reaches out to tweak my erect nipples. John bends down and takes one nipple into his mouth, licking and lavishing it with care.

  Juice already coated the tiny bundle of nerves. Sharlie pressed lightly, teasing it, rubbing it up and down as she continued to read.

  While John takes charge up top, Sam unties my pantaloons and eases them down, divesting me of all clothes. I shiver as he brushes his fingers over my slit in a teasing swipe. I undulate my hips, and before I know it, he is on his knees, widening my stance to suck my clit into his mouth.

  Scharlie pressed one finger into her own slit, adding pressure to the area, causing her hips to buck slightly.

  With one man sucking my tits and one sucking my clit, I am in total madness. My knees buckle as a tidal wave of bliss rolls over me, and I feel John reach out to hold me up. Then, somehow, without letting go of me and the places they are ravaging, they maneuver me to the bed and we all fall upon it with a small squeak of the hinges.

  John leaves my breasts and makes his way up to my mouth, kissing me deeply. I feel Sam’s fingers as they probe me, my juices coating his hand. The pressure is too much for me and builds too rapidly for me to fully appreciate what these two men are doing to me.

  “Did you like your tongue bath, Beauty?”

  I nod, too breathless for words.

  I hold out my hands for them, bringing their massive cocks into my waiting hands. Juice is leaking from each tip, so I wet my fingers with it and use it as lube. Up and down my hand travels, slowly, as I learn how to handle both at the same time.

  In and out Scharlie’s hand started to move, the juices flowing quickly. The scent of musk heavily lined the air.

  My ministrations bring a moan of pleasure from each man. Emboldened, I dip my head forward and touch Sam’s first with my tongue, and then John’s. Back and forth, I encase each with my velvet mouth. My tongue milks the juice from each slit.

  “Uhh,” Sam grinds out and places a hand on the back of my head.

  They have shifted until they are next to each other in front of me, and I am able to place both tips just inside my mouth. My teeth scrape them, and the slight friction makes them jump.

  John pulls back, letting Sam have full access. With his hand on the back of my head, he pushes all the way in and starts to hump my face. I lie still and let my tongue work on Sam, but I feel John’s hands on me as he tries to maneuver us into a different position. At first I don’t understand, but as Sam reluctantly pulls away and as John shifts me until I turn over, I quickly start to understand the intention.

  The imagery burst over Scharlie’s mind, increasing her hand movements as she ground down on her clit, rising higher and higher, being wound tight, and waiting for the fall.

  So I lie on my belly, my heart beating at a rapid pace, and I feel two pairs of hands on my legs, sliding upward and separating them. When they reach where my butt curves, one set of hands gently rubs and massages while the other dips between my cheeks.

  Fingers gently brush against my puckered hole, and I shiver with a blend of fear and anticipation. One takes me from the front while the other slips into my ass channel. I am too excited to do anything but moan. John leans over me and licks my hole, and I must say, I really enjoy that feeling. And then I feel him and I can’t help it—I clench.

  Scharlie moaned loudly as she fell off the precipice. Cream splashed against her hand as her fingers milked the sensation, her body tightening in a realm of heightened sensitivity. She panted as the book fell from her fingers. Scharlie lay spread-eagle on her bed, languid.

  Boneless, utterly content, she closed
her eyes and let the rhythm of the rain, combined with complete relaxation, lull her off to sleep.

  Chapter Two

  She wasn’t quite sure what woke her. Scharlie noticed right away that the rain had stopped and that she was quite cold without a fire, but that wasn’t what had dragged her out of a deep slumber.

  She sat up in bed, dragging the blanket with her, looking around her small home, and listened.

  And there it came again, the creak of the porch boards outside squeaking as if someone had stepped on them. In a flash, Scharlie was out of bed, ignoring the cold as she wrapped herself in her robe and pulled out her Colt Frontier Six-Shooter with pearl handles from under her mattress. She checked to make sure the chamber had rounds and cocked it, her hand only trembling slightly.

  She waited. Breath held, nerves strung tight, she heard another set of footfalls behind the house. Flashes of the dead doe streamed through her mind, and she thought about hiding in the cellar but was afraid any noise would cause the unwanted person outside to come barreling in. She had bolted her front door but somehow didn’t think that would hold back anyone determined to come inside.

  And then there came a knock.

  Scharlie could only blink through the darkness as another knock sounded on her door.

  She took a deep breath. She doubted very much that outlaws would actually knock before ransacking the place.

  She lowered the hammer of the Colt but kept it down at her side. Holding her robe tight at the throat, she walked into the den.