Friday, July 09, 2021

Pre-release Excerpt 2 from What Shows the Heart

 I'm back, as promised, with the second pre-release excerpt from the third Cowbird Creek book, What Shows the Heart, coming out on July 15th. This one immediately follows the excerpt I posted yesterday.

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Jake reached the outskirts of the town — Cowbird Creek, that farmer had told him, not that it mattered much — and wiped the sweat off his forehead. It’d been a hot one, and not cooling down fast enough to suit him. He would cut the trail dust at the saloon with the tallest beer they had. And find Wrangler a whole trough-full of water.

Maybe the town would have a bed-house. He hadn’t had a woman in a month or more. Maybe that’s why he was so quick to fly off the handle these days, spoiling for a fight. A good brawl had its own satisfaction. And just like a willing woman, it reminded him how far he’d come from his younger days. Not so easy to push around now, and women not so hard to come by — when there were some around, and no husbands or fathers to get in the way.

Hmmm. The town wasn’t big, but it was bigger than he’d guessed. It might have two saloons or more.

But while he was looking and listening for signs of one, he caught a glimpse of red. A red lamp? He rode toward it. And once he could see the building plain, he kicked Wrangler into a trot. That was no ordinary hookshop. That, unless he’d fallen asleep on horseback and dreamed it, was a parlor house! It was almost a shame to walk into a place like that covered in caked-on dirt and baked-on sweat. He probably smelled worse than Wrangler.

A place that fancy would have its own bar, like as not, and maybe even a piano player.

But as he got close, what he heard was a far cry from piano music. Someone was cussing a blue streak, and another fellow was shouting back. By the time Jake jumped off Wrangler’s back and threw the reins around a post, he could see which was what. A cowboy almost as grimy as Jake was trying to push his way in, and for some reason a fellow in a fancy jacket was trying to stop him. And not doing too great a job of it.

Did this parlor house make its customers clean up first? That could annoy a man — it’d annoy Jake, with how he was feeling at present — but he didn’t much care for how the cowboy was handling it. And while the doorman, or whatever he was, might not appreciate a stranger horning in, it looked like he could use the help.

In the meantime, just the other side of the doorman, a crowd of gents had turned up inside, all dressed to the nines, and none of them offering to get their hands dirty. And they sounded like they’d been drinking pretty deep. Was every son of a bitch in this goddamn town drunk except for him? And him riding with a throat as dry as desert for the last five miles?

Jake grabbed the cowboy by the shoulder, yanked him out of the door, mostly ducked the man’s wild punch, and threw him halfway across the street. The cowboy landed hard, the wind knocked out of him, but after half a minute or so he managed to get up and limp back toward the door. Jake waited for him to get close and gave him one good shove.

The cowboy collapsed in a heap, and seemed inclined to stay there. Jake turned around to see the doorman slinking away. A crowd of ladies had appeared behind and around the gentlemen, and one of them squirmed on through, grabbed Jake’s hand, and pulled him inside. There he stood, surrounded by the smells of beer and whiskey from the men and perfume and face powder from the women, and it looked like he was minutes from being the middle of a tug of war between the men wanting to congratulate him and the women wanting him for other things.

And then a voice cut through the noise, feminine and commanding. “Girls, get back! And gentlemen, if you would, give the poor man room to breathe.”

Had the cowboy got in a punch Jake hadn’t noticed? Why was he feeling like Wrangler had thrown him, disoriented and confused? How could that voice sound so familiar?

The crowd had backed away, just like the woman had told them to. He could see her now, standing on a big polished staircase, a few steps up so she could see better. She had a grand shape to her, and blonde hair up in some sort of do, and a handsome face that had him as mazed as her voice. He stared, and then he gasped.

Jesus God, it was Mamie. Mamie from home.

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Tomorrow's excerpt comes a little further into the story. I hope to see you then!



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