Lucky Penny Read Free

belonged?
    David wasn’t the only male on the street who reacted with a start. Tobias froze with his broom in midswing, and his grown son, Brad, the town’s newly appointed garbage collector, almost took out an overhang post with the right rear wheel of his fully loaded wagon as he cut the corner from the alley onto Main. One of the mules brayed in protest as Brad jerked hard on the reins to stop.
    “Good morning, Mr. Thompson,” Marcy crooned to Brad as she caressed one hip, smiled, and tipped her head so that the henna tint of her brown hair flashed in the morning light. “I keep hopin’ you might pay me a call one of thesenights, and my little heart’s just broken that you never come.”
    Trying to back up his team, Brad turned three shades of crimson and gripped the lines in one hand to tug at his shirt collar, which apparently had shrunk a size between one breath and the next. “I . . . um . . . Well, lands, Miss Marcy, I’m a happily married man.”
    “I’m partial to happily married men, Mr. Thompson. They know how to treat a lady.”
    Brad coughed and ran a hand over his face. “Well, um, my Bess—she wouldn’t like it if I visited you. No, ma’am, she wouldn’t cotton to that at all.”
    Marcy sighed theatrically. “Too bad. Her bein’ in the family way and all, I bet you’re not gettin’ any at home. If you should start to feel cross and out of sorts, you come see me. I’ll cure what ails you. You have my personal guarantee.”
    Tobias glared at Miss Jones and then at his son’s broad back. He was clearing his throat and about to speak when Brad’s wife, Bess, a petite and very pregnant blonde, emerged from the dry-goods store. Prior to having children, Bess had been the schoolteacher, and despite her diminutive stature, she still carried herself with an air of authority even though she now had the swaybacked posture common to so many women heavy with child. She stepped off the edge of the boardwalk into full sunlight, circled the wagon, and stood between her husband and the saloon as she met Marcy’s gaze. The sparks that shot from her green eyes could have set fire to stone. David realized her anger stemmed from jealousy, which baffled him. Miss Marcy was easy enough on the eyes, he guessed, but she didn’t hold a candle to Bess.
    “Where is Mac?” she demanded of the prostitute. “I’m guessing he doesn’t know his upstairs
girl
is indecently exposing herself on the town boardwalk in broad daylight!” Bess had perfected the schoolmarm haughtiness that always snapped kids to attention. Chin up, eyebrows arched, she almost made David want to dive for cover. “You’ll kindly remove yourself from public view, Miss Jones, or Ishall report you to the city council. We do have laws in this town to protect the innocent!” With a fling of her left arm, Bess gestured up the street at the schoolhouse. “
Children
are out and about, my good woman. I don’t believe that Charley and Eva Banks would be pleased to learn that their boy Ralph witnessed this indecent display on his way to school.” Bess fluttered her fingers in front of her chest and added with shrill accusation, “Your feminine
protrusions
are showing.”
    “They’re called tits, honey,” Marcy replied drily. “You got so much starch in your petticoats, it’s a wonder you don’t crackle when you walk.”
    David was greatly enjoying himself until Bess turned that fiery green gaze on him. He leaped to his feet as if he’d just been prodded with a pitchfork tine. “We do have a city ordinance about appropriate public attire, Miss Marcy,” he said loudly, so Bess would hear, hoping as he spoke that
ordinance
was the proper term. The city council had so many names for laws—
appendages
,
bylaws
, and all manner of other shit—that he could never keep them straight. Bottom line, he had been appointed marshal because he was halfway smart and fast with a gun, not because he had a gift with words. “Standing about on