Slocum #396 : Slocum and the Scavenger Trail (9781101554371) by Jake Logan Page A

engineer, of course. Why else would he come out here to find gold?” She frowned. “What did you think his occupation to be?”
    “Never came up,” Slocum said. “I reckoned he was like the others, a man looking for quick wealth.” His guess of lawyer had been entirely wrong.
    “Oh, no, Papa is a methodical, realistic man. He had seen enough mining to yearn for gold, of course, but if he failed as a prospector, he could hire himself out at a tidy sum to design and oversee a working goldmine.”
    “What sort of mining did he do?”
    “Although he was most familiar with coal mining, he was quite well read in geology. I daresay he could run an assay office, with the proper equipment and chemicals.”
    Slocum stood and turned to the trail as the three prospectors in the trailing party made their way. They stopped, put their heads together, and argued. From the snippets Slocum overheard, they were discussing what he already had with Melissa and Stephen. He walked over to them, keeping his hands well away from his six-shooter.
    “Morning, gents,” Slocum called.
    They returned his greeting, and in a few minutes they huddled around the fire Slocum had built, drinking coffee and trying not to be too obvious about staring at Melissa. They were successful in draining the coffee; not ogling the lovely woman proved their bane.
    “We kin throw in with you. Heard stories of how scavengers pick up equipment tossed off to make the going easier,” said the burly prospector Slocum pegged as the leader.
    “More than simply picking up discarded equipment,” Slocum said. “A gang of road agents will kill everyone in a party and steal their mules and supplies.”
    More discussion went around the circle, only Melissa holding back from contributing her opinion. The way she looked at him made Slocum feel a bit warm—and tight in the jeans. For two cents, he would have let Stephen come to an agreement with the prospectors so he and Melissa could have more time together in the woods, out of sight.
    “Then it’s decided. We ride together but keep separate camps. We share guard duty, maybe with some overlap.”
    Slocum let Stephen seal the deal by spitting on his palm and shaking hands with Atkins, the other party’s leader. Healmost laughed when he saw Stephen rub his hand in the dirt afterward.
    Getting everything lashed onto the mules took longer than he’d expected since Melissa came to help. Every time he reached to tighten a cinch or pull a rope into place across a canvas pack, she stooped slightly and grabbed his crotch. By the time Slocum was finished, he was mighty sore between the legs.
    He told her so.
    Melissa laughed and said, “Just wait. You’ll be plenty sore by the time we reach the pass.” She sobered when she realized why they were on the trail, then flashed him a small smile. “We will find him, won’t we, John?”
    “Won’t be from lack of trying.”
    Stephen called that Atkins and his partners were ready to hit the trail. Slocum took special delight in helping Melissa up. His hand slipped under her skirt and stroked along her leg almost to her nether lips. He jerked free before she dropped hard onto the saddle. Otherwise his hand would have been trapped.
    “Serves you right almost breaking your hand,” she said. “That was an ungentlemanly thing to do.” In a voice even lower she added, “And I want more!”
    Slocum swung up onto the mule and got it moving to join the others. Melissa was slower to follow, having trouble getting her balky animal to obey, but she kept at it and soon passed Slocum and her brother to talk with Atkins and the other two.
    Stephen came up alongside and spoke, his eyes never leaving the three men and his sister ahead.
    “You think she’ll be all right with them? They’re rough fellows.”
    “Melissa doesn’t have any trouble talking to men, does she?”
    “The little tramp,” Stephen muttered, thinking Slocum didn’t hear. Louder, “She has an active social