by JR Roberts
“Should we go after him?” Sven asked.
“Eh, to hell with him,” Hall replied with a dismissive wave of his hand. “If he wants to sign his own death warrant, then I’m inclined to let him.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
When Clint stepped into the large tent, he was greeted by a rail-thin woman with black hair and a pretty face. “Hello, handsome,” she said through a painted smile. “See anything you like?”
“Andrea Bennelli,” Was Clint’s crisp reply.
“Are you a friend of hers?”
“Not yet but I’m very anxious to make her acquaintance.”
The slender girl turned to look at a rough looking man behind her. He shook his head and posted himself in the doorway leading to the rest of the tent. Turning her attention back to Clint, the skinny woman said, “She’s not available but I’m sure I or one of the other girls can take good care of you.”
“She’s back there?” Clint asked. The skinny girl twitched and shifted on her feet, which prompted Clint to move straight ahead. “I’ll just show myself around.”
He made it to the man who’d been standing there like a specter and glared directly into his eyes. “Step aside, mister,” Clint snarled. “You’re not frightening me just by taking up space.”
The man bared his teeth, perhaps to say something, but wasn’t able to do much else before Clint snapped his head forward to connect with the bridge of that man’s nose. It wasn’t a hard knock, but it certainly rattled him enough for Clint to get past him without any further difficulty.
As soon as Clint stepped through that doorway, a big fellow with fists like thickly knotted rope emerged from one of the little rooms in the rear portion of the tent. Clint stopped and looked at him. “Can you take me to Andy Bennelli?”
Obviously not hired as any sort of guide, the man brought his fists up and took a couple long strides toward Clint. He took a swing with enough steam behind it that Clint could feel the breeze as he leaned back to let it pass him by. If the swing had connected, it might have sent Clint sailing out of the tent completely. Since it met no resistance whatsoever, the punch took the man off his balance and sent him staggering for half a step. That was more than enough for Clint to pick his shot. The one he chose was a quick jab to the side of the other man’s face which caught him between his nose and upper lip. The man’s head snapped to one side and he continued staggering until he became tripped up by his own feet. When that man toppled face-first into another room, Clint was already on his way further into the tent.
“Andy Bennelli!” he shouted. “I just want a word with you.”
The flap separating yet another room from the hall snapped open directly to Clint’s left. A stout fellow holding a sawed-off shotgun took quick aim and thumbed back his hammers. Clint’s hands were even faster as they wrapped around the barrel of the shotgun, twisted, and pulled the weapon away from its owner. In one swift movement, Clint swung the shotgun straight back around to crack it against the side of the stout man’s head. The shotgun’s previous owner blinked a few times and stumbled out of sight once the flap closed again.
“Andy Bennelli!” Clint shouted. “I’d hate to drive away all these paying customers!”
Whether or not that threat made the difference, the flap at the end of the row was pulled aside so Andrea could show herself. “You think you can just walk in here, kill my men and have a conversation with me?”
“None of those men are dead. What do you think I am?” Clint asked. “Some kind of animal that would murder someone and put them on display? Oh, sorry about that. I was talking about someone else.”
“Just who do you think you are?”
“I’m Clint Adams.”
“Is that supposed to mean something to me?”
“Your men stole my horse and I want it back.”
Opening her arms to grant Clint a clear view of her body, she said, “Do I look like a horse thief to you?”
“No, but looks can be deceiving. I have it on good authority that you are associated with the men who stole my horse and several others. Now this whole thing has become a much bigger mess than I would have anticipated so if you’ll just return what was taken from me, I can be on my way.”
“I don’t know about any horses that were taken.”
“So you want me to believe that you’re not associated with Victor Howlett? He was seen coming and going from this camp as well as this very tent more than once.”
“My girls and I entertain many men,” Andrea replied.
“What about Farraday?” Clint asked. “Keeping company with the likes of him can be awfully dangerous.”
Andrea sighed and rolled her eyes. “There may have been someone named Howlett that came through here,” she said. “As for Farraday, you have no idea how dangerous he can be.”
“The man you need to worry about is me,” Clint warned. “If you thought Texas was tough on horse thieves, you haven’t considered what I’m ready to do to anyone who harms one hair on my horse’s head. It’s been a hell of a long couple of days. I’m tired. Help me get my horse or I’ll take out some more of my aggressions.”
“There were some horses out back,” Andrea said.
“Were there?”
“And a cart.”
Clint’s first instinct was that she was simply trying to get him out of her sight. But when she mentioned the cart, he figured there could have been some truth to it. Besides, if he wasn’t going to listen to what she’d said, it would have been a waste of time storming in there in the first place.
The men that he’d knocked around on his way to have his talk with Andrea were starting to get to their feet. Some of the others inside that tent were taking an interest in him as well. Those things, along with the realization that he may have acted a little quickly, all drifted to the top of Clint’s mind as he backed away from Andrea. After taking one more step, he bumped into someone. Clint wheeled around, ready to either defend himself or apologize. But the man he found wasn’t trying to toss him out ad he wasn’t a customer.
“Don?” Clint said.
“I saw your horse, Mr. Adams,” Don said. “Black Darley Arabian, right?”
“Yes.”
Don pointed to the front of the tent and when Clint glanced in that direction, a heavy blow was delivered to a spot directly behind Clint’s ear.
Everything went black and Clint was out before he hit the ground.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Clint had been knocked cold several times in his life. In fact, he’d heard someone once say that any man who hadn’t been knocked down more than once hadn’t lived a very exciting life. He couldn’t recall who’d said that, but when Clint woke up, he also couldn’t recall what he’d had for breakfast.
His head was throbbing so badly that he wondered if his skull had been split apart like an egg. He felt everything spinning around him. After taking a few steadying breaths, the sensation lessened to the point where he felt more like the ground was just pitching back and forth beneath him. He took a few more breaths, which did nothing to make him feel any better. Before allowing himself to worry about his health, he took a moment to try and figure out what he was hearing.
There were muffled noises coming from all around. They droned in a thumping, irregular rhythm. There were also creaks, breaths and the occasional splash. Clint tried to move and found he couldn’t. Not much, anyway. He could flex his hands and when he did, his fingers scraped against rough wood. He heard an impact of something cracking against something else, which was followed by everything around him shifting from side to side.
He was in a wagon.
His hands were tied.
He was moving.
Of those things he could be certain. Clint listened harder for a bit longer to put a few more pieces together.
The cart he was in wasn’t very big. Clint’s eyes were covered, but he could tell by the way the sounds rattled inside there with him that there wasn’t much space. He confirmed that by str
etching out his legs only to have his boots knock against a wall before he could straighten them all the way. Since his ankles weren’t bound together, he spread his legs and kicked out to either side with both feet to see if he could find any other barriers around him.
His left leg tapped against a wooden wall almost immediately. His right thumped against something as well but it wasn’t made of wood.
“Hey,” a familiar voice hissed. It came from only a foot or so away.
“Who is that?” Clint asked, trying to sound fierce instead of surprised by the discovery.
“I … I don’t…”
“Sven? Is that you?”
“Y-yeah.”
“Tell me what’s going on,” Clint said. “Now.”
“How should I know?” Sven replied in a vaguely trembling voice. “I’m tied and blindfolded. I didn’t even know anyone else was in here until you started squirming.”
“How long have we been in this cart?”
“I don’t know. I was knocked out at that camp and when I woke up, I was here. That was a half hour ago. Maybe less. I can’t really say for certain.”
With every second that passed, Clint felt more of his strength returning. He pulled against the ropes tying his wrists together but could barely get himself any slack. When he leaned forward, he realized those same ropes had been threaded through something embedded within the floor itself.
“Can you move?” Clint asked.
“I’ve been trying, but haven’t had much success.”
“This feels like a prison cart. Probably rings in the floor meant for shackles to be threaded through.”
“Could be a wagon,” Sven offered. “We could even be in a box or crate of some kind.”
“No,” Clint said. “It’s a wagon. The same wagon we’ve been following since leaving Parker.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Pretty much. It feels like it’s about the size of the one we were after. There’s no way for me to be absolutely certain just yet but it makes sense.”
Sven sighed. “Yes. I suppose it does. It also makes sense that we’ll end up hanging from one of those trees with all the bodies piled around them.”
“Only if we give in. They want something from us,” Clint said, mostly as a way to air out his own thoughts. “Otherwise they would have killed us already. It’s a lot easier to store two bodies instead of worrying about tying up two live ones.”
“What about Don and Mr. Hall? You think they’re in here with us? You think maybe they were killed and left somewhere?”
“Don played a part in putting me into this cart,” Clint replied. “My guess is that he’s the one that knocked me out. As for Hall, I’d say he probably had a hand in us being here as well.”
“Never trust a bounty hunter,” Sven said in a voice that had an uncharacteristically rough edge to it. “At least an outlaw has some loyalties. Bounty hunters don’t know what loyalty is.”
“We’ll see about that.” As the cart rolled to a stop, Clint added, “And we probably won’t have to wait very long.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
The first thing Clint thought when he heard the back of the cart being opened was that he had to watch his step. Even if he couldn’t understand what was being said by the men outside, the tension in their voices was high and the metallic clicks of pistols being cocked were unmistakable. The back of the wagon was opened, unleashing a swarm of movement as Clint was threatened, pushed face-down against the floor, freed from the ropes and held down with several boots to his back and neck.
“Don’t you move!” someone snarled. “We got you covered. Try to run and you’ll be cut in half!”
The threats continued along those lines while Clint was dragged out of the cart, forced to his knees outside and tied up again. From the sound of it, Sven was getting fewer threats and more of a beating. Thumps of fists and boots raining blows down onto him were punctuated by pained grunts and moans from the lanky horse thief.
“Take off them blindfolds,” said someone with a voice that sounded like wet gravel being forced through a sieve.
Clint didn’t realize just how tight the blindfold had been until it was roughly pulled off of him. Sunlight hit his eyes to blind him momentarily. When he opened his eyes for a few quick blinks, he thought he might be blinded even longer. His sight returned in drips and drabs, telling him that it was even later in the day than he’d previously guessed.
“So you’re Clint Adams, huh?” the man with the gravelly voice said. “I heard’a you.”
“Well I’m real honored,” Clint dryly replied.
The light flooding Clint’s vision was eclipsed by a solid figure and the breath he’d just taken was forced from his lungs by a solid kick to the gut. Clint doubled over and stayed there for longer than he needed. Not only did that buy him a few more seconds to catch his breath, but it made whoever had hit him think he’d done more damage.
“I thought maybe you were just one of those men who claim to have made a name for himself,” the other man said as he placed his heel on Clint’s shoulder and pushed him down. “Looks like I was right about that. No man with that kind of reputation is brought down so easy.”
Clint knew better than to buy in to such an obvious taunt, but he wasn’t about to lie down and play dead like a common dog. He shrugged the other man’s boot off of him and propped himself up so he could look up at the men surrounding him. There were five of them that he could see. The one closest to him was the one who’d tried to keep Clint under his boot. Victor Howlett’s features were just as rough as the last time Clint had seen them. In fact, they may have seemed even more savage now that he was focused entirely on his prey.
“Ahh,” Howlett sneered as he looked directly into Clint’s eyes. “There’s the fire I was expectin’ to find. Looks like you may be Adams after all.”
“What if I am?” Clint asked.
“Then it means we was right to keep you alive. There are some folks that’d like to have a word with you.”
“I’ve got some words for you but I don’t think you’re going to like them.”
Howlett grinned before snapping his foot forward to send Clint once more to the dirt. “Yeah, I bet you do. Say all you want, Adams. The less breath you have in yer lungs, the easier it’ll be to make the rest of this ride.”
“How much farther do we have to go?” Clint asked.
“Not much. Thought you might want to stretch yer legs, though.”
Clint took a look around at the rest of the men surrounding him and Sven. One of them stood well over six feet tall and had more hair than a mangy dog. A thickly muscled torso, trunk-like arms and massive fists marked him as someone Clint did not want to trade punches with unless there was absolutely no alternative. Another man was about Clint’s height and had a lean build. He had long hair as well, but it was straighter and darker, framing a sunken face with sharply angular, Asian features. His stringy black mustache and beard resembled oil that was dripping off his face.
The man standing near the front end of the cart was clean-shaven and carried a rifle cradled in the crook of one arm. Like all the others, he wore a holster buckled around his waist. Unlike the others, however, he had a gut that was big enough to almost cover his buckle. The last man in sight was the only one wearing a mask. He was dressed in jeans and a waistcoat over a dark blue shirt. The shotgun in his hands was held at waist level but pointed toward Clint and Sven.
“You can drop the air of mystery, Andrea,” Clint announced. “And you might as well drop the mask too. It’s not fooling anyone.”
The man holding the shotgun reached up to peel the scarf down from his face to reveal that Clint had indeed been correct. Smiling, Andrea asked, “How did you know?”
“I might have taken a good knock to the head,” Clint told her, “but I can still recognize a woman’s curves even if they are wrapped in a set of men’s clothes.”
“There’s a creek right over there,” she said while nodding
away from the cart. “You should refresh yourself for the rest of the ride.”
“Don’t mind if I do.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
The stream was on the other side of a short row of trees that blocked most of the water from Clint’s sight. His head was still aching from being knocked out and more recently blinded by one hell of a bright day. Those things were quickly fading, however, and the fresh air was doing him plenty of good.
“I take it Sven doesn’t get to refresh himself?” Clint said.
“He’ll be along later. I want some time to talk to you.”
“Oh, so you didn’t pull me out of that cart just so I could splash some water on my face?”
“No,” she replied through a little smirk.
“What a surprise. Then I guess this is the part where you try to find out what I know regarding your little enterprise. Or perhaps you’re interested in where to find the man who was riding with me. In the interest of saving some time, I’ll tell you the answers are not much and I don’t know.”
“You sure do like to hear yourself talk,” Andrea mused.
“I have no qualms with keeping quiet.”
Behind them, the cart was being tended by most of the men who’d been there to drag Clint and Sven into the daylight. The ones who weren’t seeing to the cart or the horses pulling it were keeping an eye on Clint and Andrea. Sven was being questioned by Howlett and so far, it seemed to be relatively painless for the lanky thief.
As they kept walking, Clint could hear movement ahead of them. He guessed there were at least a few more men already at the stream. Clint’s hand drifted toward his hip out of reflex. He was surprised to find his holster still there. It was less of a surprise that the holster was empty.
“I’m surprised you didn’t guess what I wanted to talk about right away,” Andrea said.
“So why don’t you tell me?”
“To see if you’d like to join us, of course.”
“And what is it about me that makes you think I’m the sort of man who would enjoy stringing human beings up from trees like animal carcasses?”