STORY EXCERPT

They shared a knowing smile, and Worth again wondered. Their courtship seemed to have progressed mightily after the fandango. He could kick himself for being so occupied in the merriment of dancing he hadn’t even noticed that his partner was puking into the buffet, but it was only right that Foster had been the one to take her home and care for her. Care for her a little too well, apparently.

Jeremiah hopped feebly from the carriage. He had to grip the door sash to steady himself after the effort involved. “You must not be a very good lawyer if your most famous client wound up having his hair raised, as you mountain men like to say.”

This angered Worth—Jeremiah was constantly belittling others!—but Foster took it in stride. “Made a big name for myself.”

“Yes,” Jeremiah sniffed. “And you capitalized upon that by riding off into the mountains wearing a possum on your head.”

Foster laughed fully then, and it was a beautiful sight. “A beaver,” he corrected the puppeteer.

The shop was dim and absolutely choked with dust. Incense hung heavy in the air, and Worth navigated to a counter crammed with jars containing dust, roots, and herbs. In one jar, serpent eggs floated in a vile liquid, and something lived inside another jar. Worth wobbled the jar a bit to see black beetles swarm all over a branch. They had horns on their noses, and some reared on their hind legs and hissed at him.

“My good sir,” Jeremiah proclaimed loudly. Worth looked up and spied a diminutive Chinese fellow wearing a skullcap and one of those robes where they could hide their hands in the sleeves. “I would like assistance with this area of my body.”

Jeremiah pointed to a poster tacked to the wall. It depicted all the internal organs of the body labeled with Chinese characters, and Chang squinted at it.

“You wish help with penis? I have exactly the thing!”

Jeremiah went stiff with mortification. He swiveled his head to study the poster. “Am I pointing at a penis? No, I am not! I am pointing at the intestines.”

But Chang was dead set on his penis idea. “I make very good prick tea! Will rejuvenate the organ so you never have to worry about miners ever again.”

The only muscle in Jeremiah’s body that moved was his lips. “Miners? What does that have to do with miners?”

Chang replied happily, “You will sink the shaft every time!”

Jeremiah rolled his eyes. “Oh, jumping Jiminy! Can someone help me out here? I’m pointing at the intestines, and this fellow keeps mentioning penises and miners. Look, riceman. Bowels. Intestines. Innards.”

Chang frowned. “You need shaft help!”

Tabitha said, “I suspect that is his remedy for everything. I hesitate to ask him my question.”

Foster said, “Look, let me ask about this skull. That’ll distract him.” He placed the skull, wrapped in the green gown, on the counter next to a mounted armadillo. “Chang, I need you to tell me. What is the green dye in this gown? It also appears to be the same dye that has colored this canine skull.”

“Ah, lawyer Richmond!” Chang apparently recalled his former client quite well. “Who died this time?” He chuckled fondly at the memory. “Your criminal was quite amusing. Used a barrel for a toilet. Wreaked havoc at the Morning Star Gallery.”

“Yes, well,” said Foster, “he won’t wreak havoc any longer now that he’s met Judge Lynch. Chang, what can you tell me about this gown? See the same green tinge on this skull?”

Chang placed a lamp on the counter but seemed to shy away from the pile of green things. When Foster unwrapped the skull, the jumpy pharmacist even cringed back from it, although he evidently had seen his share of skulls in his life.

“This is not good!” he declared.

“You’re telling me,” Tabitha agreed.

ADULT EXCERPT

Should he leave? They didn’t seem to be aware of his presence. Tabitha’s hand moved down Foster’s neck to caress his chest, his shirt opened at the collar. Foster had not replaced his fandango shirt with his old mountain man fringed shirt, perhaps feeling it didn’t befit a lawyer, and Tabitha moved to unbutton his collar. Tabitha luxuriated in running her hand over his well-developed pectoral, and when she pinched Foster’s nipple, Worth knew he had to leave.

They would not stop their petting, and Worth was only a perverted onlooker. His friends snacked on each other’s mouths like there was no tomorrow, and now Tabitha’s hand was drifting toward where Foster’s long, enormous penis was cradled between his well-worn leggings.

Worth banged his whiskey glass unnecessarily loudly onto the table next to Bettina’s writings, probably hoping they’d notice him.

Tabitha did. She broke away with the mussed hair of a distracted, hot woman, looking at Worth as though she’d never seen him before. “Oh. Worth.” She lifted an arm to him. “Come here, you sweet man. We don’t want to drive you away.”

What did she mean by that? Worth approached but stood stupidly with hands at his sides. He didn’t want to be caught glancing at Foster’s juicy erection, but his eyes kept flickering there.

Tabitha said to Foster, “If reincarnation is a fact, can men become reborn as women?”

“No,” Foster said with finality. “That’s impossible. Men are men.”

Tabitha’s eyes shone with a new form of glee. “Let us turn the tables. Mix it up. That was one thing I learned in my marriage. People thrive on the stimulation of doing something new.”

Worth’s prick expanded at just this small hint of naughtiness. What did Tabitha have in mind? He had gotten the impression that her marriage had been unconventional, and just the idea that he’d be allowed into their intimate circle steamed him unbelievably.

“Yes,” Foster agreed. “New things are always welcome.”

Tabitha blatantly put her hand over Foster’s delectable cock and squeezed deliberately. “I want to watch, Foster. I didn’t get to watch when you and Worth were playing in the bathroom.”

Foster’s eyelids flickered with distraction. “What is it you want to witness?”

“I used to play with two men at once. But I never got to witness the two men playing together.”

Worth couldn’t believe his ears. His balls instantly filled nearly to bursting, moving up close to his body as though in preparation for spurting. He felt light-headed and would have fallen to his knees had not Tabitha commanded him to.

“Kneel, Worth.”

As Worth practically flung the low table aside in his eagerness to kneel, Foster finally looked at him. His nostrils flared wickedly at the things he must have been imagining, and he was clearly just as eager to give Tabitha her wish.

Tabitha took Worth’s hand and placed it on Foster’s knee. Putting her lips close to Foster’s ear, she whispered, “Kiss him, Foster.”

Foster did so immediately, without hesitation. Worth fell into the kiss naturally, as though he’d spent the past ten years kissing men. It was odd that he’d enjoyed the intimacy of fucking with Foster but they had never kissed. Fucking was all right for men—it was even highly manly, in a very base and primal way—but kissing seemed even more intimate.

Now Worth inhaled Foster’s cowhide scent. He imagined he could smell the lust radiating from Foster, the most masculine he-man Worth had ever known. Foster immediately gripped Worth by the back of the neck and held him still as he licked and nibbled at Worth’s lips. Worth’s cock expanded even more upon hearing the slurping sounds they made as they smacked upon each other’s mouths. Worth, too, gripped Foster by the back of the neck as he kneeled between his partner’s outspread thighs.

Tabitha’s voice startled Worth. “You like that, don’t you, Worth? Tell me you like it, and I’ll let you do more.”

“I like it,” Worth murmured. Jiminy crickets. A year ago—hell, even a month ago!—if someone would’ve told him he would be enjoying the hell out of kissing another man, Worth would have wrestled this someone to the ground in violent denial. Now? Suddenly there was no shame, perhaps because Foster was such a damned libertine. Foster’s lack of shame encouraged Worth.

Foster had just grabbed him in the bathroom and fucked the stuffing out of him without regard to whether Worth really wanted it or not. Of course, Worth had, but did Foster know that? No, he did not. And Foster was such an all-out reprobate he had even given Worth’s own prick a little frigging, just to make it fair and square.

“I know you like it, you twisted stud,” Foster whispered against Worth’s mouth. He gave Worth’s lower lip another lick. “You liked it when I fucked you in the bathroom. You liked it when I speared you with my big penis. You liked it when I got you off against that mirror so you could watch.”

“Yes,” Worth admitted. “Watching gets me off.”

“It gets me off, too,” Tabitha purred. She took Worth’s free hand and placed it on Foster’s naked penis, which she must have unclothed while Worth was distracted. “Since I like you, Worth, I will give you the first suck of this beautiful, long penis. Would you like that?”

“I don’t know,” Worth murmured, licking the exquisite tip of Foster’s nose. “I’ve never done it before.” He had also never held another man’s tool in his hand, but he was somewhat experienced in navigating around a stiff one. He pumped it in his fist, taking great pleasure in Foster’s twitches and gasps.

Tabitha pressed against Worth’s shoulder. “Get down, Worth. Take this monstrous cock into your mouth. Suck.”