“I’d be interested to see the place you store your jerky,” Mildred said.
“Why?” The word was snapped like a steel bear trap.
The woman looked up at Mrs. Fairchild, surprised at the vehemence of the reply. “No reason. It was so damned good I just would have liked to have seen the carcasses and the way you dried it. To keep the flavor.”
“Secret.”
Mildred shrugged, palms out. “That’s fine. Didn’t want to cause any trouble.”
“Sure, sure.” A doubtful smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “Sorry I snapped. Just that there’s always folks sneaking around, trying to find out my secret recipe for the jerky. Get tired of it.”
“I understand.”
“Good, real good. Just so long as you… That’s fine, lady. Fine.”
A small part of Ryan’s mind was puzzled by the woman’s strange reaction to what had seemed an innocuous question. But his stomach was well filled with the fine food, and he was warm and dry, with the prospect of a decent bed for the night to come. Life was rich and interesting, and he set the minor doubt away.
JAK LED DOC and Dean into the gloom, along the eastern flank of the main building, to where a narrow path wound out alongside the foaming stream, among the trees. He held one of the stained brass lamps above his head, the yellow flame turning his hair into a tumbled veil of gold.
Mrs. Fairchild indicated to Ryan and the others where they were to sleep, pointing to a white-painted door that opened into a narrow hallway. “One room with a double bed on that side. Another one, mite bigger, on the other side. And remember what I said about bolts and locks.”
“Sure. Thanks. We’ll take breakfast before we leave in the morning.”
She nodded. “Sure, sure. Got plenty of eggs and sausages. Running a mite low on jerky. Though I feel sure there’s some fresh supplies on the way.” She paused, smiling to herself, by the heavy steel-lined door to the restaurant’s kitchens. “Y’all sleep well, now.”
RYAN AND KRYSTY TOOK the smaller room. The shutters were heavy, with iron bolts, and he shook them, making sure they were solidly locked.
“She kept on about the danger, didn’t she?” Krysty said doubtfully.
“Yeah. So?”
“Like…like she was almost preparing us for something dark happening.”
“You got a bad feeling about this, lover?” He had sat on the bed, starting to unlace his combat boots, stopping as her doubts communicated themselves to him.
She stood by the door, reaching up to slide across the top bolt, looking back over her shoulder, her fiery red hair gleaming in the candle’s glow.
“There’s something that doesn’t set right. The way she’s out here on her own. With those mutie rats. And the Apaches in the neighborhood. I know she seems kind of tough, but…”
Ryan ran his index finger alongside his nose, easing it up under the patch over the puckered socket of the left eye and rubbing at it. “If she had something planned, then why make such a fuss about warning us?”
“True.” She moved over to the other side of the bed, dusting her hand gently over the stained patchwork quilt. “Guess I’m getting paranoid.”
Ryan sat, unmoving, thinking. “You got me thinking,” he said quietly. “Still, we got our blasters, and the room seems double secure. I can’t see where any serious danger’s going to come from. Over, under, through or around, like Trader used to say. All seems safe.”
She peeled off her white shirt, revealing her magnificent breasts. The nipples were erect, shadowed.
“Got the itch, lover?”
He nodded, grinning. “Seems like I do.”
“Then let’s get to scratching it.”
Chapter Fifteen
The luminous numerals on Ryan’s wrist chron showed it was seventeen minutes past one in the morning. Outside he could hear rain beating steadily on the roof of the bedroom.
Ryan stretched, wincing a little at the cool stickiness that he could still feel around his groin. At his side Krysty was sleeping on her back, mouth partly open, snoring slightly. He was aware of pressure on his bladder, and he considered paying a visit to the bathroom that he knew was just along the passage, past the door of the room where J.B. and Mildred would be sleeping.