See You Later, Matt
by Lilyjack
A short, sweet vignette for all you hopeless romantics.
Folding his tall, broad-shouldered body into a comparatively small chair at their usual table, the U.S. Marshal pushed his sweat-stained hat back off his forehead with one long index finger, grimacing a bit at the pain in his aching leg, compliments of too damn many injuries on the job. Then he waited with his large hands patiently folded before him, his skin weathered by years of riding the wide, open prairie.
His intense, pale blue eyes, sun-creased at the corners, followed her every move until she gracefully glided over to join him at last, setting two foam-capped, yeasty-scented beers on their table. He helped her with her chair as she uttered her thanks, and a heartfelt smile transformed her face from simply beautiful to utterly radiant. The tough, seasoned U.S. Marshal felt his heart catch in his throat at the sight, not for the first time. He realized he was one helluva lucky man.
She smoothed rustling emerald satin skirts over her lap while pretending to merely survey the boisterous crowd populating the Long Branch Saloon that evening. But to her companion, she murmured quietly in her distinctive whiskey voice, "Missed you, Cowboy. Been nearly two weeks." They sat side by side, not touching, surveying their Dodge City subjects while sipping cool amber liquid from heavy glass mugs and licking white foam from their lips.
"Yep." One word in reply, but rife with meaning for the both of them. Two weeks could feel like an eternity to a body sometimes.
He turned his head to face her then, and those intense blue eyes roamed over her in that hungry way he'd always had from the beginning, even before they were lovers, making a pleasurable shiver run down her spine and straight to her center where the sensation trembled exquisitely. The man didn't have to say a word or lay a hand on her, and yes, it had been way too long since they'd lain together, the marshal and his woman.
Discreetly glancing around first to make sure no one was close enough to hear, his deep voice rumbled low only to her. "Can't wait to take that pretty dress offa you, Kitty Russell." The intimate sound of his blatant confession in the middle of the Long Branch melted hotly right through her and she worked hard not to visibly shiver again in anticipation. With that, he calmly took a deep draw from his beer, wiping his lower lip with the back of his hand.
Auburn brow arched, she quickly glanced away, cheeks flushing prettily. She cleared her throat, a private memory from two weeks ago suddenly making her mischievously smile. "Let's try not to break any furniture this time, Marshal Dillon. That blanket chest was kinda expensive."
She could feel his heated gaze on the back of her neck and then she heard a strangled laugh. He countered, "Thought that thing was built outta sturdy oak."
She turned back to face him, one corner of her tantalizingly painted mouth turned up in a droll smile. "Well, truth be told, it wasn't really expensive. Just cheap pine. Bought it off a traveling salesman." She bit her thumbnail and grinned a little.
Dillon laughed out loud, a belly laugh that filled the room. Several patrons at neighboring tables glanced with interest to see what was so amusing to the ordinarily restrained marshal of Dodge City. Raising his brows in surprise at drawing so much attention and coughing self-consciously, he considerably lowered his tone. No one could hear his reply but the flaming-haired proprietress of the Long Branch. "Sorry, honey. Now that I'm back, I'll fix it for ya."
"That's okay. Festus already fixed it up good as new."
His voice rose a couple of notches. "Festus?"
"Yep." Her tone was matter-of-fact.
"What did he say when he saw it?" Matt Dillon drained the last of his beer and looked at her questioningly. "What did you say?"
"I didn't say anything. I just asked him to put it back together." She smiled crookedly over the rim of her mug. "He did look at me a mite curiously and started to ask me a burning question several times, but to his credit, he just muttered and hammered…hammered and muttered." She flashed Matt another impish grin.
Matt pressed his lips together and grunted.
Kitty retorted, "You took off the next morning to chase down that outlaw Rowdy Lee Baxter and left me with broken furniture, Matt." She gazed at him through a veil of long, dark lashes, the soft red curls that he loved to wind around his fingers shining bewitchingly, then finished quietly, "What was I supposed to do?"
He blew out a loud breath, restlessly removed his hat and held onto it so he would have something to do with his hands rather than get himself into trouble with all that heapa woman sitting right next to him. He pretended nonchalance and squinted pointedly at his girl, still so pretty after all these years she made his chest ache. She was also still a wildcat in the bedroom, too. It was her own damn fault the furniture got broken to begin with. The memory of it started to stir him up, and what with the way she was looking at him right now, he knew it was high time for him to skedaddle and head out on his nightly rounds. Besides, he couldn't sit here and make a fool of himself acting like a lovesick schoolboy. Yessiree, two weeks was an awful long time to be separated from the considerable charms of Kitty Russell. Too long, it seemed.
The U.S. Marshal arose to his full impressive height, his chair squeaking on the wooden plank floor. He resisted the overwhelming urge to touch the silken cheek of the owner of the Long Branch who sat looking up at him with eyes so blue they took his breath clean away, just the same as the first day he ever laid eyes on her. How many years ago had it been now?
She ventured a daring touch to his sleeve before he strode away. "I'm glad you're back, Matt."
Jamming his hat back onto his head, he spoke in a louder tone, "Maybe I'll come back after my rounds and we'll have a nightcap."
That bewitching smile again when she answered, "I'd like that."
He watched her full, rosy lips curve enticingly one more time as she continued, "We sure missed you around here."
"Thanks, Kitty." His eyes twinkled at her. "And, uh, I'm glad Festus could help you out with your repairs."
She threw her head back as raucous laughter pealed from her creamy throat. The delightful sound gave him pure pleasure all the way down into his belly. By golly, it was going to be a long evening making rounds in the town until he could hightail it back to the Long Branch for…a nightcap. He gifted her with a charmingly sideways little grin and touched the brim of his hat. "See you later, Kitty."
She instantly sobered and gazed evenly at him. "I'll be waiting." Kitty dabbed a tear of laughter from the corner of her eye, then sat back and enjoyed the view as her man exited the saloon. "See you later, Matt..."
end
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