The Obedient Servant [Going for the Gold 6] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Read online

  Going for the Gold 6

  The Obedient Servant

  It’s time for revolution in California, and pioneer Milo Stephens is the man to lead the republic into a new dawn.

  Tallulah Crabtree knew she could hide in this remote frontier. She has no intention of repeating a marriage to an abusive philanderer. But when rebel leader Milo bumps into her at her Blue Wing Inn, her passion for him opens up old wounds.

  Milo has only consorted with men since the death of his wife and child. He thinks he’s just toying idly with Corporal Reynaldo Vargas to pass the time. But Tallulah and Reynaldo have plans for the dangerously hot Milo. The man they both love is about to set a torch to the old rule. But to love again requires trust and submission, and the domineering Milo stubbornly refuses to play the role of the obedient servant.

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

  Length: 55,008 words

  THE OBEDIENT SERVANT

  Going for the Gold 6

  Karen Mercury

  MENAGE EVERLASTING

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

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  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Ménage Everlasting

  THE OBEDIENT SERVANT

  Copyright © 2012 by Karen Mercury

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-62242-924-1

  First E-book Publication: November 2012

  Cover design by Les Byerley

  All art and logo copyright © 2012 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.

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  www.SirenPublishing.com

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  THE OBEDIENT SERVANT

  Going for the Gold 6

  KAREN MERCURY

  Copyright © 2012

  Chapter One

  To speak of California was like mentioning the end of the world.

  —The World Rushed In: The California Gold Rush Experience, J.S. Holliday

  Near Sutter’s Fort

  June 1846

  When Milo returned down the hill from pissing behind a rock, Stuttering Zeke was talking to a stunningly handsome soldier.

  Every nerve in Milo’s skin became alert—tense, tingly, on fire. He went to stand next to the luscious soldier. He put his hands on his hips and cocked his head, just vaguely listening to their palaver. But really, he was studying the craggy face and bowed lips of this reprobate corporal.

  Milo knew Corporal Vargas was a reprobate mainly because he was from Spain. They were all deviant buggers in Spain. But this deviant bugger’s demeanor was entirely sensual. His lush lips curled up arrogantly at the corners, and his thick tousled head of hair was hidden under the ratty cloth turban he’d fashioned. Some tendrils that escaped at his neck gave him an erotic, almost girlish look.

  The lashes fringing his malachite-green eyes were also girlishly long. Those were the only feminine features of this devilishly delicious soldier. He was obviously powerfully muscular under his fringed leggings and the navy shirt with stars on the collar. The naval supplies issued to Frémont’s California Battalion, however, hadn’t lasted long. Most battalion men wore a mishmash of clothing, handmade or stolen, and this fine specimen of manhood was no exception, with his Digger moccasins. A brace of pistols in his gun belt, the requisite bowie knife, a sword, and a rifle slung across his back, and Corporal Vargas was bristling like a porcupine with armament.

  “I’m telling you, Zeke. Is it Zeke?” asked Corporal Vargas. His tone wasn’t Spanish at all. He’d obviously been born in the States. Milo wondered what conflict ran through this beautiful soldier’s emotions, to be sympathetic to a rebellion that promised to take away the entirety of Alta California from Spanish rule. Vargas was of Spanish extraction, yet he’d obviously never set foot on Spanish soil.

  “Stuttering Zeke Merritt,” Milo clarified, just to draw attention to himself. “Leader of us Osos.” The men had decided to use the Spanish word for bear as their emblem. It was suggested by the many bear hunters in their midst, fresh from the blood and fat of the bruin.

  Frémont had dubbed Zeke lieutenant of their irregular battalion. Milo didn’t think that was a good choice. Zeke was constantly roostered on some colorless Dutch liquor called schiedam, and his temper was quite fiery. Not that Milo thought Frémont should’ve chosen him, either. He was nearly as bitter and roostered as Zeke. No, someone like the ungainly, rational Semple, or his friend and former neighbor Grigsby, should have been chosen.

  Vargas considered Milo, as though he hadn’t noticed him before. The pupils of his dazzling green eyes dilated in appreciation. “Stuttering Zeke,” Vargas repeated obediently, dazedly, as though mesmerized with Milo. Slowly he returned to his train of thought, clearing his throat. “Yes. Well. I was just telling, ah, Stuttering Zeke here that a Lieutenant Gillespie just came from President Polk with messages for Frémont. And I don’t mean to sound skeptical of my own commander, but I think Frémont may be fomenting your rebellion.”

  “What was Polk’s message?” Milo asked eagerly.

  “That’s the thing,” said Vargas. “Gillespie went through Mexico to get here, so of course he destroyed the written dispatches and just verbally told Frémont the gist. Gill
espie seems to be Frémont’s confidential advisor, his adjutant. They’ve known each other a long time. Anyway, Frémont hasn’t given us any orders yet, but lots of guys are speculating he has orders from Polk to wage war against Mexico.”

  “Dobry,” muttered Milo in Polish. Good. Louder, he declared, “We must be allowed to defend ourselves and our companions-in-arms who were invited to this country by a promise of land for our families.” Mexico wasn’t responsible for the deaths of his wife and daughter, but their proclamation that they would extradite “foreigners” sent Milo over the edge, forcing him to leave his farm behind and joining up with the other irate Osos. They had as much right to farm in California as the Spanish “Californios.” The rumor that the Spanish government in Mexico City wanted to drive foreigners from the settlements had everyone up in arms—leaving their families and farms to find Frémont and see what could be done.

  For some reason Milo’s outburst made Corporal Vargas smile, charmingly. He was really quite boyish but probably at least the same age as Milo’s thirty and five years. “You are so eloquent.”

  Milo snarled, “I get fired up. When we arrived in California, we were denied even the privilege of buying or renting the lands of our friends. General Castro is threatening us with extermination if we don’t depart without our arms, our beasts of burden. Driven through deserts inhabited by hostile Indians to certain destruction! With Frémont on our side, our rebellion will surely prevail.”

  Vargas’s face hardened. “Those are flowery words, Mister…”

  “Milo Stephens.” He rarely told anyone his birth name was Milosz Stefanski. If he was to fight for Americans’ rights, he had better sound like an American. He had sailed from Poland right after the November Uprising fifteen years ago, so he considered himself an American. “They are flowery words because they are righteous words! Right, Zeke? A prosperous government must originate with its friendly and happy people—not these spooks in Mexico City who have already seized the mission’s properties and oppressed the laboring people of California!”

  Vargas looked around as though afraid someone might overhear them. “Those are fine words, Mr. Stephens.”

  “Milo.”

  “Milo. You’re a very magnetic and fearsome speaker. I can see you have righteous reasons to dislike the Mexican government.”

  Milo tried to exhale his anger. “I have a farm a hundred miles up the Sacramento River. When I heard two hundred Spaniards were coming to burn my wheat and drive off my cattle, I knew I couldn’t just sit there waiting for them, yanking on my bone.” His fervor for his cause was such that he nearly risked alienating this stolid solider, who, after all, seemed skeptical of his own commander.

  Zeke added, “Spaniards did send some Digger Indians to burn down my house.”

  Corporal Vargas said, “I sympathize with you. I really do. I’m just worried that Frémont, with the goading of all you hotheads, will search for any excuse to justify starting a war.”

  “But you’re a soldier,” Milo said, as gently as he could muster. “Don’t you want a war? What else do you do all day but tramp around from place to place, shooting elk and cougars?”

  Vargas insisted, “Don’t you see? Frémont can’t tear around like a renegade, starting premature wars, acting on his own prejudices. He’s been angry with Castro since we were driven out of Monterey, and I fear he’ll use any slight justification to begin aggression. He’s not supposed to do anything without the sanction of the United States.”

  Milo chuckled. Reynaldo Vargas was very handsome when self-righteously riled. He was probably just as handsome in other attitudes, as well. “And what’s wrong with that? We all know Polk will declare war sooner or later. Frémont is only being very farsighted. Listen. I’m going to bathe in these cool waters. I’m not a funky roughneck like the rest of these dogs. Vargas, your soldiers are more rough-looking than us frontier Osos.”

  With a knowing wink, Milo shouldered his rifle and started off toward the Sacramento River. That had been his goal ten minutes ago, anyway, and he had soap in the possible bag slung over his shoulder. Let these rowdy loafers run around smelling like a three-day-old dead skunk. Although as a recent mountain man himself, he normally would be wearing an animal on his head like some of these men. He’d just had to stop trapping and start farming because the beaver appeared to be all trapped out.

  He could feel Vargas’s eyes on his ass as he strode to the river. Dobry. Milo knew from past experience that Vargas would take his bait. He knew he had a curvaceous ass that looked tempting between the fringed leggings tied about his hips. Women were so scarce in California, men had practically started an uprising a few weeks ago when a thieving prostitute had been hung near Sutter’s Fort. This scarcity meant that most men put aside their normal mores from the Old States in order to enthusiastically bugger any fellow who caught their fancy. And Corporal Vargas had caught Milo’s fancy.

  Milosz Stefanski could care less about the prostitute who had been given the necktie party. He’d been happily bumfucking only men since his wife and daughter had died at the hands of Indians on that godforsaken Oregon Trail in forty-one. He didn’t want to—couldn’t—open himself up to the tender emotions even looking at another woman brought surging up inside him. Women were frail creatures and susceptible to every ailment that came down the pike. Who wanted to risk associating with them?

  Yet he still had the drive, the fired-up lust of the vigorous pioneer. Since there were so few women about to torture him anyway, Milo had easily fallen into a habit of seducing any attractive buck he crossed paths with. It had seemed foreign and strange at first, but it had become such a compulsive habit it was now like a drug that one had to return to again and again to feel pleasure.

  In fact, Milo had turned into something of a libertine. His prick was already halfway erect when he kicked aside his moccasins and stepped out of his leggings and pantaloons. He peeled off his filthy shirt. He’d paid Digger women to wash some clothes for him and was waiting for their return. He was accustomed to plunging into the melted snow waters of the Sacramento, which he did now. The water shocked his blood and numbed his skin, but he plowed on through the glittering sheet of water. Coming to a deep pool, he treaded water, as the river bottom was far below his feet. He dipped his head backward into the frigid water, instantly numbing it. But when he emerged into the bright sunlight, clarity and peace began to spread through him.

  Milo floated on his back for awhile, feeling lighter than air. He deserved to rest and bathe if he was going to spend the next several months engaged in warfare. There was plenty of time for flea-riddled bedclothes, trying to sleep next to snoring, belching soldiers. For now, Milo wanted to float in the pure, clean waters.

  His cock twitched as his mind drifted back to the virile soldier, Reynaldo Vargas. Milo knew that the curly-haired buck would succumb easily under his prodding. He knew it wouldn’t take long to taunt and tease that potent bugger to a healthy climax. Since surrendering to this Greek love type of life, Milo had heartily accepted his own domineering nature. He liked subduing other men, watching as their faces turned from innocent protestation to debauched joy. While Milo’s method of coaxing was usually quite brutal, it was always a pleasure to watch the men cave as bliss washed over them. By the time Milo cut them loose, they were usually a bowl of pudding in his hands.

  His prick was throbbing against his hip bone when a large splash sounded off the shore. He’d been on alert for weeks now since hearing about Castro’s proclamation, so he snapped to attention, eyes wide, treading water. His heart near about stopped when he realized his pistols were on the beach. But shortly, in a shower of diamond droplets, the soldier’s head emerged through the water’s surface, and Milo exhaled violently with relief.

  “What in hell, Vargas? I thought you were a band of greasers.”

  Vargas bobbed just five feet from Milo. The reflection off the water’s surface played against his sculpted, resolute chin. “Sorry about that. You’ll get your greasers so
on enough, I fear. You have a farm upriver, you said. Did you take an oath and convert to Mexican citizenship to be allowed to purchase the land?”

  “That I did, several years ago. It made me no difference at the time as long as I was allowed to own land. Now the rumor is Mexico is disallowing conversion and will expel all pioneers once the spring thaw clears the passes in the mountains.”

  A shadow passed over Vargas’s eyes. “That’s what I heard, too. I can’t say as I blame you for being a rabble-rouser. I’m just saying I doubt the veracity of Gillespie’s message to Frémont. I think the Pathfinder is more of an explorer than a soldier, and he’s going to interpret any message as an invitation to claim more land under his own glorious name. That’s all. One can’t just tear around starting a war with an entire country without direct orders.”

  Milo chuckled. “That’s Manifest Destiny for you.”

  Vargas smiled, a low smolder that had Milo’s penis lengthening even under the icy water. Perhaps this expedition won’t be so painful and unpleasant after all. Vargas swept his arms over the water’s surface and kicked away toward an overhanging rocky ledge where the water was so deep and cold it was turquoise. Milo stroked toward shore and grabbed the bar of soap, glad he always carried a length of reata rope in his possible bag as well. One never knew when one might need reata.

  Swimming out to where Vargas frolicked in the shadows of the overhang, Milo tossed his items on a little beach, stood where the water only reached his knees, and soaped up his hair. He wanted to gauge Vargas’s reaction to his thick, long cock waggling in midair as he pretended to squeeze his eyes shut against the foamy soap. He was gratified that Vargas didn’t bother averting his gaze. Indeed, the soldier’s jaw even went slack, and Milo could swear he could see his pupils dilate with awe. Just his luck this stud would prove to be a cocksucker, when Milo was the one who liked tasting that choice morsel.