Chapter One

After making this string of poor decisions, Vash should accept now that taking the caravan to Fondrique was a mistake. Not only was the caravan's primary cargo slaves and he couldn't free them with how many people present profiting off of it and willing to commit violence for their greed; ever since they had stalled next to the demisalt sprays, an inexplicable lust for the short insurance girl had hit him. The tenacious, angry, and surprising one, not the tall, friendly one.

He had thought calling Meryl names while warning that Inepril teenager to leave her alone was a suitable revenge for how she had growled at him all day. Bonus if it made her mad enough to call off the stupid stalking and go back to December City. Instead, she had sent Milly out of the distressed plant facility, and had found him and the assassin in the bulb room Elizabeth had locked them inside. He staggered out of the control rods, disoriented from communing with his sister and stopping an explosion with her, and could only blink at Meryl pressing the muzzle of one of her derringers against the assassin's forehead.

"If you're done, he needs to go to the authorities for bombing the hotel." She said while ignoring the assassin's babbling about how Vash wasn't human and that lady didn't pay him enough to deal with not human.

Vash had pried the assassin loose from the floor, glad that he was no longer in trouble for the explosion that left him sleeping in the street and hoping like hell Meryl didn't pick up what the assassin was saying and sideswiped completely when she whipped a pair of handcuffs out from under her cape and snapped those around the assassin's wrists. Why did she have those? What else was she hiding under that cape?

But it turned out, Meryl didn't give a damn about what the assassin was saying and just thought he was being insulting to the heroic outlaw Vash the Stampede. She gave the assassin a shove out the plant facility door. "Honestly, you should express more gratitude than that for Vash not killing you or not letting you get blown into smithereens."

Vash lost track of the insurance girls while dealing with Elizabeth and knew he had to ditch them before they asked how an outlaw could stop a plant from melting down and before the short one handcuffed him to something so he couldn't run from her yelling at him. Catching a ride on the sandsteamer Flourish should have worked, but they had gotten on board too, working for passage. Not that he could sneer about that. After all, he ended up working for an upgrade to a cabin.

And just when he thought he had failed protecting the sandsteamer, had failed saving the insurance girls from the hostage situation the other passengers and crew were in, had failed keeping Kaite safe; the insurance girls popped up to stop Brilliant Dynamite Neon from shooting him. Introducing herself with that insurance society's name and giving herself an outlaw moniker.

She had surprised him again by getting under his duster after the duel while he was trying to encourage Kaite to do the right thing over his transmitters and distracted him. Vash had reared back and smashed his head against a wall. "I do not paw you!"

"Permission granted to paw if I'm bleeding out!" Meryl yelled back.

He still didn't let her under his body armor with the bandages with the excuse that she was not a medical professional, and he was relieved when she didn't whip out a certification that she had gone to nursing school too from under her cape. Her temporary bandage on top of his body armor had held him together long enough to speak to Neon, and then she had browbeat him into the sandsteamer's medcenter. Milly had been nice enough to draw her partner away, so his body only drew the doctor's disgust as Vash got stitched together again, and they had left him alone while he waited for Kaite to wake up.

Vash had loaned them bus fare because Milly had cried that their bosses would fire them, and he concluded that had been a mistake after the third time Meryl popped him. But she was the one who made the bus driver turn around and pick up him, Wolfwood, and the little girl from the buried ship. The stay in May City hadn't been too bad; once Meryl had realized Wolfwood set him up and he was trying to help people, she stopped yelling about the Quick Draw contest. After two months of orbiting each other and she still hadn't figured out that he enjoyed helping people?

He wanted her strong thighs to squeeze his hips as he buried himself in her. Desire hadn't hit him this strongly in a hundred years. He wanted to lick the sweat off her pale skin and hear her moan his name as loud as she yelled it when she thought he had done something wrong. He wasn't about to mention it to either of them, nor act on it. Meryl would start hitting him again and she finally quit doing that!

But why her? Milly was closer to the physical type he found beautiful in women before, even though she hid her assets under her coat with her stun-bolt gun. But no, ever since the caravan stalled, it was Meryl's presence that made his heart pound like he had jumped into the flying ship's lift, made him want to tip her into his arms and explore her mouth with his.

She would slap his face off.

Nope, nope, nope. And he wasn't a Steve to demand sex from anyone. So the best thing to do was to nap behind his sunshades in their caravan trailer or in this mess tent that wasn't being used by anyone else until the caravan moved again. Once they were moving, his equilibrium would come back and Meryl would just be the annoying short insurance girl again. It had to come back. He had more patience than anyone on this dust-ball planet; he could wait for this to pass.

Then the owner of the caravan sent men to bring Vash the Stampede to him for a job proposal. So that strategy (the very good strategy that wouldn't get him yelled at or hit) ruined because Fondrique tattooed their security pass on the arm of a kid and that kid bailed on the whole dirty trade and the kid's father met the twenty million double dollar price tag Vash put on jobs he really didn't want to do. He probably needed to raise that rate.

He climbed behind the wheel of a provided jeep, surrounded by the caravan's crew, and Meryl jumped in before he could take off and leave her out of this. "What did that man ask you to do? It's nothing nasty, I hope."

The crew must have done an excellent job of keeping her out of earshot. He put his entire focus on driving and not manhandling the woman sitting next to him. When had she put on a sweet perfume?

"Hey, why don't you say anything?"

This is when the tall one would be handy as a distraction, but Milly wandered off hours ago. Vash kept his mouth shut because he wasn't sure what would fall out of it right now.

"When are you going to stop this thing and say something?" Meryl reached for the ignition switch. Did she want to wreck them? Vash pushed her away from it and back in her seat. Now Meryl's anger started coming out. "Alright then, you talk to me!"

The caravan crew following them were far enough away to not overhear a conversation. "He wanted a kill."

Meryl blinked at him. "A kill?"

"That's right."

"And you accepted?"

"Yes." There, she had answers. Now she would sit there and mull over what Vash the Stampede would do to her if he got money for it or got truly pissed off. And he could find the kids without wrecking the jeep.

Her voice went haughty. "You're nothing but a despicable outlaw, just like I thought. Very well, if that's the case, I have no choice but to execute risk prevention procedure." She pulled out one of her many derringers and aimed it at his temple. Practically a point-blank shot at this distance.

You know, after a month of them looking for him with Vash trying to avoid them and three months of them stalking him, he really should have asked them what the hell their insurance society bosses considered risk prevention. She would not shoot; he felt her indecision while what he just said argued with her observations of him. So he kept driving.

She pulled her gun back with a huff. "Would you mind at least explaining why you decided to do this?"

"He loves his son more than his profits," Vash said. "To give the boy he raised the freedom the boy wants will destroy the caravan. No enormous loss, really, but everyone else who earns a profit on Fondrique's slave trade won't let the boy go and will chase him down to get their slaves into Fondrique."

"So the boy has to die," Meryl said.

"For the audience. And if the audience believes, the caravan owner can keep it going to the other stops on the route."

"I don't understand how Fondrique can have a slave trade. Slavery is illegal."

"In the Seven Cities, sure. If the Federation Cavalry catches them, sure. But you're in the Outer now."

"The Six Cities," Meryl corrected softly.

It was just the six for her whole life. Vash pushed on from that. "Right. Are you helping?"

"Yes. Do you have a plan?"

"No. All a plan does is get people killed." Doc had told him he had planned on meeting someone in July City before it shattered, leaving everyone alive until starvation and exposure went to work. He'd made sure to never plan like that again. "I have a strategy. Unload my gun."

She pulled his silver Colt from the holster and dropped the bullets into her skirt-covered lap. She had a nice lap; he should have been nicer when he had gotten dropped on it before and he would have a chance at getting there again. Focus, you idiot. He tucked his hand into his pocket and passed new bullets to her while looking at the scene they were approaching. More of the caravan crew was surrounding the two teenagers, Milly, Wolfwood, and four of the caravan crew writhing in pain on the dune. Vash sighed. "The audience has the kids cornered, even though Milly and Wolfwood got involved."

Meryl holstered his gun onto his leg again and scooped the real bullets into her pocket. "You can see that far?"

He stopped the jeep and climbed out. "Drive the jeep to the other side of the dune and pick up the kids after I drop them. I'll take care of the rest of the show," he said quietly, just in case someone had excellent hearing out here.

She gave a terse nod as she scooted over to the driver's seat and drove off.

The show went off without an oh-shit change-his-reaction-right-now hitch. The fog and mists from the demisalt sprays helped sell it, along with the fed up with their bullshit tone Vash used to order the caravan crew that triggered their flight from certain death response. He could have done without Milly punching his jaw and Wolfwood breaking his sunshades and shooting him with one of the rubber bullets. Those things sting that close!

But it was the first time all day he could pretend that nothing else was going on.

The kids refused the reward money and the jeep, since they wanted to live without relying on anyone else. Can't blame them: one treated like property and the other learning misery and suffering funded his life of ease. Vash, Wolfwood, and the insurance girls waited in the wastelands while Milly watched the kids vanish into the heat shimmer on the horizon. No one from the caravan came back to the scene of the crime. Good.

Meryl finally got Milly into the jeep, drove it up the dune to pick him and Wolfwood up, and they headed back to the stalled caravan and their rented trailer. The insurance girls went inside first. Vash waved at it while facing Wolfwood. "We've got space if you need a bunk."

Wolfwood shook his head. "I've got things to do, so I'll be going now."

Vash blinked. Not the answer he expected or was hoping for. Wolfwood could keep him in line concerning Meryl. "Will I see you again?" he asked to cover the awkwardness.

Wolfwood laughed. "I don't know. And besides, whenever I look at you, I'm reminded of everything I hate about myself. You know it hurts." He waved as he carried away his cloth-wrapped, full of guns cross.

Vash returned the wave, though the priest had a lot of nerve saying that. What with all the secrets Wolfwood was hiding, it came across hypocritical to suddenly be upset with a bit of duplicity from Vash the Stampede. Whatever. Nobody died, concentrate on that part, he reminded himself as he headed inside the trailer. Milly sat at the table and Meryl was busy at the tiny sink that was available to them. "Um, Wolfwood left."

Great, now Milly's eyes were growing more watery. "He did?" she exclaimed.

Okay, maybe Wolfwood's leaving was less Vash and more Milly. But he didn't know what to say to that, so he just moved to sit on his bunk.

"All of life's journeys come with meetings, partings, and reunions." Meryl handed Vash an ice pack and set the money case on his bunk. Then she hung up her cape on her bunk.

Vash made a face at the money case. "You should've told me you picked that up. I could've given it to Wolfwood for his orphanage."

"Don't spend it all in one place and you should have some left the next time you see him. Now Milly, how did you hurt yourself?"

Milly sighed. "I'm fine."

Meryl looked unimpressed. "You didn't hit any of those bozos chasing you with stun bolts."

Milly sighed again. "A demisalt spray hit my back while I was covering Moore and Julius."

"Let me see your back." Meryl pulled a medical kit out of her suitcase. Vash grabbed one of the loose chairs and moved it to the window. He stared out at the darkening wasteland and put the ice pack on his still throbbing jaw. It was nice of Meryl to make him one. Milly had said she was nice months ago, but this was the first time she had demonstrated it to him. Especially when she was more worried about her partner. He made sure to not look at them as Milly was audibly undressing.

"You're lucky," Meryl said. "It didn't scar, but your muscles got strained. The salve will help." He heard the stirring in a cup of water. "Now drink this painkiller and go to bed."

Milly made a yuck sound. "It's bitter."

"You can have pudding tomorrow. Let's get you into your bunk."

"Mr. Priest bought me pudding, but I dropped it to help Moore." The bunk squeaked under her weight. "He should've stayed."

"Maybe next time," Meryl said. Items sounded like they were going back into a case and Milly began snoring. "You can turn around now," Meryl said to Vash.

Vash put the chair back at the table. Milly had on her pajama top, laying on her stomach in her bunk. He turned to his bunk and started putting the twenty million double dollars into his shoulder bag. His heart was pounding nearly loud enough to hear. Damn, Wolfwood should have stayed and kept him distracted. He needed a new distraction. Going to the pop-up saloons was out after what he did today.

Just talk to her, a pleasant conversation, no slapping. He had filled his shoulder bag with cash, and still had plenty of piles left. "I don't suppose you can take some of this money from a despicable outlaw." He flinched. What she said in the jeep hit a nerve he didn't know he had. So much for no slapping.

Meryl poured two cups of coffee from a fresh pot. "You can't bribe me to stop following you. I need my job for ongoing expenses and I like this job. But if you want to stash some of that in my luggage for space, I can do that for a while." She handed him a mug of coffee, keeping one for herself. "I'm sorry for calling you that earlier. You have proved you're not despicable since we met. I was mad and lashed out. I shouldn't have."

"Apology accepted." He sipped the coffee. When had she noticed how he liked his coffee?

"Are you okay? You've been acting strange for the past few days."

Damn, she had noticed. "I'm trying to be good," he said.

"And nothing has blown up. But does being good mean you have to be silent and glowering behind your sunglasses?"

"I guess it does if I don't want you slapping me. And you're still not happy."

"Me? Why would I slap you?"

Vash drank some of the coffee, turned back to the window, and sighed. "I think the demisalts are affecting me. I've been trying to ignore it."

"You're ill?" She reached up and pressed her palm against his forehead, seeking fever.

His whole body trembled. He caught her hand and pressed his lips against her inner wrist. "Not that kind of fever."

Her cheeks reddened. "Oh. Didn't a brothel open up three rows over? Shit, they're probably enslaved."

"Probably. Don't want a call girl." He let her go. Won't be a Steve, will never be a Steve.

"You can't put the moves on Milly; she needs her sleep."

"Don't want Milly." He set his coffee mug onto the table, bent over Meryl, and kissed her, expecting a shove, a punch, and hot coffee thrown on him.

Meryl's hand that he had kissed found the back of his head as she accepted his kiss. She tasted of coffee and something sweet. He wrapped his arms around her back and pulled her closer. Gently pulled, since she still had coffee in her hand, but she pressed against him and kissed him back.

Vash's body felt like he was burning up and he needed to breathe. He let her go. Meryl's face was completely red, but her gray eyes looked full of wary disbelief. He wanted to kiss her again until she didn't look like that. Now the slap would come. He hunched slightly to duck away from the coffee.

She put down her coffee mug on the table next to his. "This is sudden."

No coffee in his face? No slapping his face? They were going to talk about this? "You're telling me."

Her eyebrow cocked like a gun. "Well, that's something every girl longs to hear."

"I didn't mean it like that. We barely know each other. I shouldn't want to go up your skirt. And you probably have work rules about that. And you're classy and deserve nicer than this." He waved a hand at the trailer and the caravan outside. "That sounds horrible, don't it? Look, you don't have to worry. I won't attack you. I wouldn't do that to anyone."

Meryl seized the collar of his duster and yanked him down level with her face. He let her, but she was stronger than she looked. Her soft lips pressed against his and he melted. She pulled back and smirked. "I have to remember that tactic to get you to shut up. Now let me get this straight; you're having a biological imperative to go up my skirt?"

Oh, so we're not talking about it, we're making fun of it. He gritted his teeth and spoke through them. "I'll handle it."

"Because your methods of handling it have clearly worked since it started?"

"I hate it when you're right."

Her smirk fell into disappointment. "Everybody does."

"Don't make that face." Sadness filled her disappointment, more than he expected. "I don't really hate it when you're right. I'm more mad at myself right now."

"Because you want to have sex with me, but you don't want to have sex with me?"

"Exactly!"

That answer wiped the disappointment from her face and gave her an ember of anger instead. "Are you trying to talk me out of having sex with you? After admitting that's what you want? I'm sorry I'm so repulsive you can't decide."

"I never said that! You're not repulsive. What about your job? It's important to you."

"They don't have to know. I only have to send in reports when something gets destroyed, and the Society has to pay claims. Don't blow anything up and the update is much faster to write."

That made sense, but he still felt he should defend himself because he never set off most of the explosions surrounding him.

But Meryl asked, "Now, yes or no; do you still want to have sex with me?"

Vash's whole body throbbed with her blunt words. "Yes."

"Come on, let's find a place where we won't wake Milly and you won't get shot at." He didn't hear that right, but she pulled him out of their trailer and let him go to lock the trailer door behind them.

Vash grabbed her hand and led her through the rows of tents, trailers, and trucks. They ended up on the outskirts of the caravan behind the massive gasoline tanker trucks and down the dune, so no one walking around would see them. He shed his duster and spread it on the sand. The moons were riding high in the sky, reflecting light back on Gunsmoke. He unbuckled his gun belt and put the holster and Colt on the ground close enough to grab. He tugged off the glove covering his right hand, leaving the longer body armor sleeve on his right arm. If he left the glove on, more of his scars would remain covered, but Meryl was doing this for him and she deserved to feel skin. She deserved a lot nicer than this, even if she was doing this out of pity.

"How do you want to do this?" Meryl asked.

"You on top. Ride me." He got his pants open around his straining erection before glancing at her for a reaction.

She looked sarcastically pleased and aroused. Maybe she had her own itch to scratch tonight. "I can work with that."

He lay back on the duster without taking off any more of his body armor and clothes, and glad that his hips and lower stomach were free of scars. He wouldn't disturb her with the history carved into his skin.

Meryl toed off her boots before stepping onto the lining of his duster and pulled the hem of her skirt up to her waist. Her navy blue tights ended on her upper thighs, so there was a band of creamy pale skin crossed with a few elastic strings that ran from the tights up to under her white panties. He watched her pull off her panties. The elastic connected to a funny-shaped belt around her waist. "What is that?" he asked. "With your tights."

She straddled him below his erection. "My garter belt?"

He touched it and her hip through the beige-colored satin with his bare hand.

"You've never seen a garter belt before?"

"Way to make me feel like a hick for not knowing the latest December City fashions."

"They're not that new." She slid her wet folds along the length of his cock, making him groan. He caught her hands going for the zipper of his body armor vest. "Shy now?" she asked with a smirk.

"Protection."

He meant from a firefight but she went in a different direction. "Oh, I can't get pregnant."

"I can't either. I mean, I can't get any girl pregnant. It works but--"

She leaned down and kissed him to cut off the starting babble. "Shooting blanks out of this gun?" She moved, so she had more of it to wrap her delicate hand around.

"I can still show you a good time." He stroked the exposed skin on her thigh as he moved his fingers to her folds and her clit. He wanted this to be good for her, to give her pleasure. The way she let her head fall back when she moaned was a good sign.

She spread her slick along his shaft. The sand gave way to his head rolling back. He curled his neck to lift his head and watched her sink onto him. Slow, so slow, and his body screamed to flip her over and pound into her. He refused to do that. Hurting her was out of the question, and he had nearly done it with his words tonight.

"You're beautiful." He curled his fists down on his duster.

"There's something romantic, finally." She picked up his bare hand, running her finger against the raised scar on the back. "You still with me?"

Vash nodded. "I'm here, I'm with you."

She coaxed his fingers open and put his palm on her outer thigh. "Touch me."

Electricity danced between her skin and his nerves as he stroked her skin again. "I don't want to hurt you," he admitted.

"It takes a lot to break me." She rose on his cock and paused again. "What do you need?"

"Rough. Let me have it."

She slid back down and squeezed him with her inner muscles. He cried out and grabbed her hips with both hands.

"There we go. Come on, gunslinger. Show me what you got."

"Oh, insurance girl, you asked for it."

The rhythm they found was fast and hard. Meryl came again before his body stiffened and his orgasm shot into her. She slumped onto his chest and he ran his hands up her back, hugging her loosely. She chuckled breathy. "Okay, good time achieved. How do you feel?"

"Wrung out, in a good way. I'll sleep tonight." He was almost ready to pass out now.

She lifted to peer at his face. "You haven't been sleeping?"

"Fitfully." She still looked worried. "It's better now. Thank you," he said. He needed to let her go, but he didn't want to. He'd sleep even better holding onto her, but that would not happen. "It was good for you, right?" he asked.

"I told you it was. Odd, that's what you want reassurance about." She shifted, so he was no longer inside her before she sat up.

He hiked up on his metal elbow and caught her head with his flesh hand for a kiss. She deepened what he started, but he still remembered what he wanted to say when they parted. "I'm not so selfish to make it all about me."

"Your performance was fine. Your talking before performance needs work. Those boys in May City were right about that." She crawled off him and started redressing.

"How do you know about that?" He tucked his cock back into his pants and zipped his fly.

"Oh, they checked in with me and Milly to make sure you wouldn't be cheating on one of us if they found you a girl."

"Those brats."

"You are so confident facing down an opponent, but a woman? All this rubbish falls out of your mouth."

He shook the sand off his duster. "Love is more important and a lot easier to screw up."

"You have a point."

They headed back to their trailer in friendly silence. The whole caravan had settled down, not that the vast majority of the travelers knew anything about the slave trafficking in their midst. That was a good thing. Tonight had been better than he had hoped for and he would hate to have a shootout ruin it. They made it safely back to the trailer. Milly snored softly in her bunk. Meryl slipped into the tiny bathroom. "Good night," Vash said softly through the thin door before toeing off his boots and climbing into his bunk. Exhausted from battling his desires and finally obtaining them, he fell asleep before he heard Meryl come out of the bathroom.