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collapsed beneath his weight it gave Kase a heart-stopping scare while the four working girls and the local madam, all bedecked in sequins, satin, and feathers, squealed in fear from the muddy backyard below.
    No, he thought, I’ll be lucky if I run into any more danger than that.
    Sometimes Kase wondered what he was doing wasting his days amid the clutter of the unkempt office or, when the spirit moved him, walking along the wood-plank sidewalk that fronted the few stores and shops that comprised the whistle-stop town of Busted Heel.
    But then he would think back six months to the disclosure that had knocked him over with the swift, sure power of a mule’s kick, and Kase Storm knew that it would be a while longer before he could go home again.
    Three hollow knocks sounded on the door and without moving a muscle, Kase called out, “It’s open! No use standing on the other side.”
    The door swung wide and Flossie Gibbs, the owner and madam of Busted Heel’s Hospitality Parlor and Retreat, swept in on a gust of plains wind and cheap perfume, her flounced, chartreuse satin skirt rustling as she crossed the floor. The door banged shut behind her, and Kase knew without turning who had entered.
    “Hey, Floss.”
    “Hey, Kase,” she boomed in salutation. “How come you always know who it is without turnin’ around?”
    “I don’t have to see folks to know who they are; I can smell ‘em.” He didn’t tell her it was the overpowering scent of her perfume that gave her away.
    Kase dropped his hands and spun the chair, then stood and stretched out to his full six-foot-three-inch height.
    “All I have to do is peer into them crystal-ball blue eyes of yours and I forget you’re part Indian at all,” Flossie said.
    “Well, as much as I’d like to forget it right now, I am.” Because it was Flossie and she was his friend, he knew she meant no insult. Still, the reference hurt. “What can I do for you, ma’am?”
    She reached up and straightened the collar of his brown cambric shirt and smoothed the seam along the shoulder. The fringed and beaded reticule that dangled from her wrist slapped gently against his chest with every move.
    “Well, I jes’ came over to invite you to supper with us, Marshal. It’s been some time since we had us a dinner party, so I thought to cheer up the girls I’d order us a mess o’ fried chicken over from Mrs. Matheson’s boardin’house. That’s about the only dish she can make without poisonin’ us.”
    He nodded in agreement. “Sure, I’ll be glad to come for dinner. What time?”
    “Thought we’d start early. ‘Bout five.”
    “Fine.” He hooked his thumbs into his hip pockets and rocked back on the heels of his boots. “Things a little slow this time of year, Flossie?”
    “No slower than any other time of the year in this four-whore town.” She chuckled bawdily again, throwing back her head with a motion that set her ponderous bosom shaking. The lace that edged the low neckline of the shocking shade of green bobbed and fluttered as she laughed. “You noticed I don’t count myself anymore, didn’t ya, boy?”
    Flossie peered at him out of the corner of her eye, and Kase could almost imagine her as she might have appeared forty years earlier. But now, at sixty, powder and rouge caked her skin, creating deeper creases in the lines around her eyes and mouth. He knew that beneath the brassy henna tint, her hair was no doubt frosted with silver. She told him once that she had begun whoring at sixteen. He guessed that she was probably quite a looker then.
    “You’ve still got what it takes, Flossie, no doubt about that.”
    “Don’t lie to a liar, boy. You know firsthand that I don’t hold a candle to any of my girls.”
    He flushed at her words and was thankful that his earth-toned complexion hid his embarrassment. He had only befriended the youngest, Chicago Sue, but Flossie could not know that the young blonde who was only seventeen reminded him so much of his