WARNING: Sex! I mean it...if it will offend you to read about sexual encounters, please, please, please, I beg you stop reading right now. Last chance!

Okay...now that we have that out of the way, this story isn't only sex...really it's not but what's there is pretty explicit and I don't want to risk offending anyone.-J

Thrusting rapidly, James Hickok pounded himself into the woman beneath him. He heard her ragged breath indicating that she was nearing her orgasm as his speed increased until his whole body stiffened in that final thrust as she cried out, "Yes! Yes! Oh Wild Bill! Yes!"

As his semen spurted into her body, he found himself disgusted and angry. He wanted to grab her by the shoulders, shake her and scream, "That's not my name!"

The truth was this woman whose name he did not remember-not that it would matter-was under him now for the sole purpose of being able to say she had slept with Wild Bill Hickok. He pushed aside his anger; not that he was even truly certain which of them he was angry at, and rolled off of her. She wordlessly got up, dressed and soon he heard the door close leaving him once more to his lonely state.

There was a time in his life when he thought he might fall in love, marry, even have a family but he had set his fate before he even fully knew what he was doing and had found out the hard way that was not something he could change.

Being a lawman much of the time, he found Wild Bill could be handy to have around. He encountered little trouble and many women.

He took a swig from the bottle of whiskey next to the bed hoping it would dull the loneliness or hold the memories at bay. Sleep was searching for him and more and more lately, sleep brought dreams of that brief time in his life when he was Jimmy Hickok, not Wild Bill. The legend was being born at that time but that bunch had kept him grounded.

The other riders had loved him like a brother; Teaspoon had looked on him like a son. It had been the real, unconditional love of true family. They had been so very young then and learned their lessons the hard way; making mistakes as naturally and almost as frequently as they put their pants on. But no matter how many stupid things each of them did, there was never a question of defending each other. Jimmy had no friends before or since who were so dear or true.

They were scattered to the winds now. Somewhere inside, Jimmy wanted to believe they still loved him as he did them but the self-loathing voice that seemed to speak the loudest these days protested that too much time had passed, that they wouldn't forgive him his abandonment of them.

He told himself they were better off, that being in his proximity would only bring danger to them but he knew that was a lie. It sounded good enough to believe until he found himself alone and lost in thought. That was the problem with lying to yourself, you know you're feeding yourself a pile of bullshit and when you get sick of eating it, you've got no one but yourself to blame.

Laying in this hotel bed, half drunk and still smelling of the perfume worn by the most recent female visitor, Jimmy felt the bile rise in his throat as he contemplated what he'd become. He projected the air of a quiet gentleman to most but that was becoming more of a lie as time went on. In the daylight he'd argue that the women threw themselves at him while at night, alone, he'd know that a man who took a different nameless, faceless woman to bed each night was no gentleman. It had started in the belief he could stave off the loneliness with a little female companionship but it time had become more habit than anything else. While it was true that a man had needs and required a certain release from time to time, these shallow encounters were no different than what he could accomplish with his own hand.

Bringing the women to his bed each night was a pretense; one constructed purely for the benefit of one James Butler Hickok. It hid the one truth he would deny above all others, to himself more vehemently than to anyone else. He was scared.

Jimmy was never scared of a fight with guns or fists. He never had been and that was no bravado speaking, it was the solemn truth. The only times the prospect of a fight caused him concern was when he thought harm might come to someone he cared for. The worst that could happen in a fight was dying and he'd made peace with that longer ago than he could remember. He knew he'd see an earlier grave than most. Getting involved with people had much higher stakes than death. Once dead, there could be no more pain and even being wounded wasn't so very bad. Wounds might leave scars but they didn't keep hurting the way a pain inflicted by another person's words or callous actions could.

As it did nearly every night, Jimmy's mind played the "if only" game. If only he'd just apologized to Longley; if only he hadn't been such a hair triggered hothead around J.D. Marcus; if only-'oh hell,' he thought, 'Might as well try if only the sky were yellow and the sun blue for all the good it would do.'

He sighed loudly to the empty room as he acknowledged to himself as he often did that J.D. Marcus didn't create Wild Bill Hickok, he merely named him.

The sleep that had stalked Jimmy finally pounced and while he put up a valiant fight against it, the whiskey made it a fight impossible to win. He conceded defeat and fell into a fitful sleep.

The next morning found Jimmy out on the boardwalk of the main street of town bright and early and looking quite dapper if one overlooked the dark circles under his eyes. He hadn't had a decent night's sleep in at least a month. Sleep was something else that scared him these days.

Looking up, Jimmy was spurred to a thought that perhaps there were advantages to waking early. The vision responsible for this thought was seemingly the only woman on the street who did not throw furtive glances his way or look down blushing when he looked her way. She didn't seem to acknowledge him at all. It was the Widow Lassiter. It took him a moment to realize what was different about her today that she should catch his eye. He knew he'd seen her a few times before but something was different. Her hair was loose; not flying all over but loose and hanging down her back from beneath her sun hat. He typically paid no mind to whether a woman's hair was pinned up or not; at least not a woman he merely passed on the street. But he did find that a woman's hair hanging loose softened her features a considerable amount and when he was with a woman, he took pleasure in freeing her hair from whatever "proper" style it had been forced into. Jimmy could not help but to stare at her. He knew he probably looked a fool but he simply could not get enough of the way the sun picked out the odd strands of red hidden throughout her brown hair.

Any other woman on any other day and he would have imagined his fist tangling in that hair as his body merged with hers. But today he didn't want Wild Bill's fantasies and this woman deserved far better than Bill could or would offer. He instead imagined himself gently moving a wayward strand of that lovely hair from her face, perhaps brushing her cheek as he did so.

He shook his head to dislodge that thought. This poor woman had been through quite enough already. Her husband had gone off to war and only a telegram had come back. That must have been a good year ago, he thought. Then, only two months ago, her son of five or maybe six years fell from the hay loft and died. A woman dealing with all of that pain and the realities of still running a farm, all alone surely didn't need the likes of James Hickok anywhere near her. Of course, he mused, she also didn't need to be lugging her supplies home from the mercantile by herself either.

He strolled over and took the bag from her hands.

"Let me help you with that, ma'am," he said with a smile and she gladly allowed the weight lifted from her arms until she saw whose kindness she was enjoying.

"I can handle it Marshal," she said trying to take the sack away from him, "I'm certain you have more pressing matters to attend to."

"I can't think of a one," he answered flashing a smile that held no trace of the polished gentleman that was Bill Hickok. This smile was entirely the loopy, boyish smile of Jimmy Hickok. He saw her ponder him for a moment and then relent with a small blush.

"Well, if you're sure it's no trouble, I guess I could use the help."

The smile she gave back was grateful but wary and he didn't blame her for it. He blamed himself.

Once her supplies were loaded, Jimmy tipped his hat to her.

"Now if you'll just wait here a moment," he started, "I'll fetch my horse and ride out with you and help you unload."

Panic flashed in her eyes but never made it to her face. His mind went straight to Emma and how deep a body would have to look at her to know what was on her mind.

"Marshal Hickok," she began and something in her voice betrayed the calm smile she tried to put forth, "I'm grateful for your help but that would just be above and beyond the call of duty. I'm sure I'll manage it myself."

"Ma'am, that's not how my mama raised me," he replied affably, "I won't be long."

She opened her mouth to protest but Jimmy cut her words off.

"Please," he said sincerely, "You'd be doing me a favor too. It'd do me a world of good to get out in the fresh air. I've been spending way too much time cooped up in the saloon lately."

"Alright," she said reluctantly and in obvious opposition to her better judgment.

See...I might not have been that frantic in my warning earlier if it weren't the first freaking sentance! But I can't help how a story starts, now can I? Anyway...this is a product of my mental instability when I write. I talk to my characters and they tell me their stories...usually. So I recently wrote a story where Jimmy adopts this darling sweet little girl and it didn't have a happy ending and I didn't feel like I could face him again to ask for another story. I didn't think he'd want to talk to me anymore so I thought I'd get him laid to put it simply. God I hope this story turns out happier than the last or he might never speak to me again. And really that's not the only reason for my writing an "adult" (ahem) story. For reasons I need to know and you, dear readers do not, I needed to branch outside of my confort zone. I have written romance for a different fandom and there were sexual scenes in that but this will be more graphic and descriptive and I think this chapter marks a first for me as a scene of angry sex...we've all had it at one time or another but so rarely do I see it addressed. Jimmy's a natural for this to me as he has sort of a raw sexual power. He wasn't my favorite when I first watched the series. I didn't understand the concept of a tortured and/or reluctant hero and I was too young to appreciate his, um, heat. I think he frightened me...I wasn't the one who went for the bad boy at that time. Now I get it and, well, I love me a good tortured hero. And a grown woman of (ahem) years old can handle a sexually powerful man...TMI? Sorry.

So, yeah, that about covers my preliminary thoughts on this story. I hope I have piqued some interest in this one and perhaps some are even enjoying it. I welcome reviews, even if they are not glowing. We're all just trying to get better here, right?-J