by Kurt Barker
The tall man jumped to his feet, but Blackshot had already drawn the pistol from the little man's holster as he fell, and sat him back on the rock with a bullet through his forehead that sent a long streak of red stretching across the ground behind him. He slid to the ground and tumbled face down into the pool of blood issuing from the lifeless body of his comrade.
As Blackshot turned to face the third man, the stocky bandit hurled himself at him, the dagger in his hand flashing in the sun. Blackshot dove forward to meet him, guiding the arcing blade over his shoulder with a sharp thrust of his forearm to the man's wrist. He slammed his head into the bandit's thick, unshaven jaw and drove the stunned man backward with his powerful arms. The big man tried to regain his footing and lashed at Blackshot's side with his free hand, but the strength of his opponent was overwhelming; a grip like steel closed around his waist and lifted his feet off the ground.
Blackshot stumbled toward the line of graves with the thrashing bandit in his arms and slung him down hard onto the sharp wooden spike at the head of the nearest grave, shattering the dusty skull atop it. The bandit let out a strained cry and strove to free himself, but Blackshot forced him down onto the spike with all his prodigious strength until the point burst from his corpulent gut with a gush of blood.
As the bandit's body fell limp, Blackshot heard the creak and subsequent slam of a door, and the voice of Sheriff Valdez called from the side of the house, “Hey, why did you shoot already? Did he finish digging so soon?”
The sheriff rounded the corner of the main house and stopped short as he took in the scene of carnage in the courtyard. He started forward, then stopped and turned to run back the way he came, then stopped short again, for now he was looking right into a pair of cold gray eyes not a foot from his own.
“The digging has been called off,” Blackshot growled. “The vultures need to eat just like everyone else.”
Chapter 9
The back garden of Casa Amarillo was so different from the bleak front courtyard that it might as well have been from a different planet; a spring of water bubbled up into a pool at the center of the garden, and lush greenery emanated from it in all directions. From what once were beds of flowers sprang a riotous sprawl of vines and unkempt shrubbery, covering much of the overgrown lawn. Into this verdant confusion a broad stone patio extended from the back of the house, with a few rotting timbers standing atop it, the sorry remnants of a wooden overhang that had once shaded the patio from the vicious summer sun.
It was from one of these rafters that Georgia hung suspended by a rope around her wrists, sweat running down her naked body as her feet strained vainly to reach the ground several inches below them. Mad Devil Jack circled around her, looking more like a scarecrow brought to life than a man, his ragged duster swirling about his bare feet as he danced about the patio, twirling a braided rope in his hand.
“So you come to kill poor old Jack, eh?” he mocked, “Why would my petit cherie want to do such a thing? So senseless, and so dangerous....”
He cracked the braided rope across Georgia's bare back, and cackled with perverse glee as she tried to kick at him. “Maybe it is vengeance, hmm? I did bad things to you at some time? You come to make me pay?” he laughed again and shrugged his bony shoulders. “I'm sorry, how can I remember you? I have done so many bad things!”
Jack lashed the rope across Georgia's stomach, then jumped back to dodge the foot that jabbed out at him. He grinned as he observed the hatred in her narrowed blue eyes, then stopped to stroke his long beard. “Or do I remember you?.... Peut-être que je me souviens....”
The opening of the tall wooden door at the back of the house interrupted his musings. The head of Sheriff Valdez peeked out from around the partly opened door, and Jack turned to address him with hands on hips.
“Well, what did you learn?” Jack inquired sharply. “Did they disobey and kill him so soon?”
Sheriff Valdez said nothing; his dark eyes stared straight ahead and as the door swung slowly wider the sunlight fell on the deep red stain that covered his shirtfront and marked his throat. His body pitched forward and hit the stone floor with a loud thump that sent a thin cloud of dust into the sultry air. Blackshot stepped out of the shadows of the doorway and rolled the sheriff's body out of his way with his boot. The sheriff's silver revolver was in his hand.
“You will be pleased to know that they were obedient to the very end,” he said.
Mad Devil Jack's drawn face seemed to tighten even further across his sharp cheekbones. He held up a long finger and waved it at Blackshot. “No, Monsieur, no! You are fighting dirty!” he snarled.
He leaped suddenly behind Georgia and held her body in front of his. She kicked back angrily at his legs but he ignored it. The crazed smile returned to his face as he poked his head out from behind her back, first one side and then the other.
“You should never shoot an unarmed man, Monsieur Bastard!” he called, “Especially when you might not hit the one you aim for! Fight me man to man if you dare!”
Blackshot chuckled and held up the pistol. He thumbed open the loading gate and knocked the bullets from each cylinder, letting them fall one by one onto the stones at his feet. Then he tossed the gun aside into the tall grass. “Why Jack, if you thought I was planning to let you die without getting my hands on you first, you were badly mistaken.”
Jack grinned and stepped out from behind Georgia. “You're not so smart, Monsieur Gunfighter,” he hissed, circling around Blackshot. “It's funny to me, eh? I remember the petite pute now! A wedding, a year ago, everyone had to die! Now you come all the way here to get revenge, but you are not so smart!”
He danced around Blackshot, feinting and weaving, jumping back to stay out of reach of the iron fists that jabbed at him.
“You should have stayed home and killed the man who hired me; yes, I did it only for money! The chien sournois wanted to be rich so he tells me to wait until the wedding is finished and when they come out, bang bang! They all die!” He laughed suddenly and motioned toward Georgia. “But look, she's still alive, so the fool never got rich!”
“Some people are just unlucky,” Blackshot said. He made as if to grab at Jack again, but then lunged as Jack dodged and drove his fist into the bandit's jaw, sending him spinning to the ground.
Jack leaped to his feet, his eyes ablaze with manic rage, and threw himself at Blackshot. He fought with a fury and strength that belied his gaunt frame, but his efforts were to no avail. Blackshot's blows fell like hammers, driving him backward and then to his knees. Finally a bone-crushing roundhouse cracked the madman's jaw and sent him whirling to the ground with his face in the dirt.
Jack groaned, spitting gold-capped teeth into the pool of blood that had issued from his nose and mouth onto the dusty stones. “I told you that you should never shoot an unarmed man, Monsieur Killer,” he rasped, “but I never said that I was an unarmed man!” He shook his arm and a small revolver fell from the sleeve of his duster into his hand.
“I never said I was either,” Blackshot replied. In a flash he drew the fat bandit's dagger from the back of his belt and thrust it deep into the side of Mad Devil Jack's neck. The sharp point burst from the other side of his neck in a gout of blood, making the gun fall from his clenched fingers. The bandit fumbled weakly to reach it again, but a powerful hand ripped the blade of the knife out through his jugular, and he fell limp to the earth, his clothes turning as red as his beard.
Blackshot cast the knife down beside the dead badman as he stood up. He turned to Georgia and saw that tears were streaming down her face.
“I shut my eyes!” she sobbed. “For all these months I've dreamed about watching him die, and when the time came I couldn't do it! I had to shut my eyes!”
Blackshot crossed over to her and loosed her hands from the ropes, easing her gently to the ground and holding her close. “That's good,” he said. “It means the new Georgia isn't as bitter as the old one.”
She looked up into his eyes, bl
inking away the tears. “I don't feel new at all,” she whimpered.
Blackshot held out his hand to her. In his palm were several rings which he had taken from the notorious killer's fingers. “Maybe this will help,” he said. “Do you see yours here?”
Georgia sorted through them with her finger, wiping her eyes with her other hand, then snatched one up. It was a plain band with a tarnished patina; she held it up for Blackshot to see. “That's it! I knew he would keep it! I knew it!” she enthused.
She was quiet then a moment, turning it over in her hand; the hot sun reflected faintly across the dull metal. Suddenly Georgia let out a hearty laugh and tossed the ring into the garden pool. She looked up at Blackshot with a cheery smile on her face. “It's been so long, I had forgotten how ugly it was!” she laughed. “I should have been glad to be rid of that piece of cheap tin!”
Blackshot grinned down at her. “Are you sure you don't feel just a little bit new?” he asked.
“The new feeling is kinda growing on me a bit, to tell the truth.”
“It shows. You look very much a new woman. I like it.”
Georgia smirked mischievously at him. “Are you just saying that because I'm naked?”
“Only partly.”
Chapter 10
A week later, Blackshot was standing on a wooden station platform, listening to the whine of the brakes on the train from Kansas City as it slowed for the upcoming stop. Georgia was by his side, her arm looped around his, watching the big engine belch out the last black jets of smoke from it's stack before it ground to a halt in front of them. She turned to look up at Blackshot, her big blue eyes glistening.
Blackshot laid his hand on her shoulder and gave her a warm grin. “Give my regards to Charleston, Miss Motherwell,” he said.
Georgia smiled coyly. “I'll never forget what you've done for me, Mr. Blackshot,” she said. “And I certainly won't forget what you did to me.”
“I would be tremendously disappointed if you did.”
“Georgia Lee!” the gruff voice came suddenly from behind Blackshot's back. He saw the smile disappear from Georgia's face, and he turned to see a short, round-faced man in a tan suit striding toward them. His short black hair and bristling eyebrows were a sharp contrast to his pale, sallow face, and his suit, while smart, looked a size too small on his stocky body.
“Beau, what are you doing here?” Georgia asked in a flat voice. She turned to Blackshot. “This is my cousin Beau that I told you about. Beau, this is Mr. Blackshot.”
“Beauregard Dodd; pleased to make your acquaintance,” he said in a smooth drawl, pumping Blackshot's hand.
“Tom Blackshot. Nice to meet you.”
Beau turned to Georgia. “I had to come out here and find you, little lady,” he said. “When you said you were headed out West by yourself, I got worried for you. I wanted to make sure you were safe.”
“Oh, that's sweet, Beau,” Georgia replied with a forced smile, “but Mr. Blackshot was taking care of me, so I was just fine.”
“Good to hear, good to hear; that's a relief to my mind.” He unnecessarily shook Blackshot's hand again. “I'll be traveling with you on the train, so I'll be taking care of you from here on.”
“I'll be taking care of myself from here on,” Georgia said sweetly but firmly. “You don't need to worry with me.”
“Of course! Right you are!” Beau grinned and winked at Blackshot as he guided Georgia toward the door of the nearest train car. “We'd best get a move on, darlin'; time and the tide and eastbound trains wait for no man!”
A short time later, the train was steaming along the open prairie, and Beau Dodd was making his way toward his private cabin after installing Georgia in the cabin he had reserved for her. When he opened the door he was surprised to find Tom Blackshot waiting for him.
“Why, Mr. Blackshot! This is unexpected,” he said cordially, “I didn't know that you would be traveling with us, or I would have invited you in for a drink.”
“Thanks, but I don't need to be invited in as you can see,” Blackshot replied. Dodd was about to bluster a polite response, but Blackshot continued, “Besides, I'm only going as far as the next stop; I just have a piece of business to settle.”
“Well, make yourself at home, sir! Can I offer you anything? A whiskey or...”
“So what's the plan this time? How is it going to go down?”
Confusion showed on Dodd's face. “I beg your pardon, sir? I don't-”
“How do you plan to kill Georgia this time?” Blackshot asked. “Maybe tonight she opens the window to get some air and loses her balance and falls out? It might work; third time's a charm, as they say.”
“Look here, I don't know what you're getting at, but-”
“It is the third time you'll try to kill her, isn't it?” Blackshot interrupted. “First you hired Mad Devil Jack to do it after the wedding, and then there were those toughs you sent after her when you found out she was coming out here.”
All the color drained from Dodd's already pale face. “You're crazy,” he muttered.
“At first I suspected that Jefferson Donner's brother Maxwell was behind it; he'd have wanted to keep Georgia from getting her hands on the Donner fortune, but it didn't quite add up,” Blackshot continued calmly. “Then Mad Jack told me something that made it clear; he was hired to kill Georgia and Jefferson after the wedding. Why? Maxwell would have no reason to stipulate that, so who would? Maybe one Beauregard Dodd, the last living relative of the recently departed Georgia Lee Donner nee Motherwell?”
“You're insane! That's as senseless as it is outrageous! I ought to-”
Blackshot laughed. “Save the act, Dodd. Maybe it would have worked on Maxwell Donner, but we'll never know. When you found out that your cousin Georgia was going to marry the richest man in the West, you hatched a plan to get the money for yourself. Once they were married, Georgia would be legally entitled to inherit if Jeff Donner died suddenly; and if the newly rich Georgia happened to die just as suddenly herself, who would inherit from her? Her near and dear cousin Beau, maybe? You'd get the fortune, or at least force Maxwell pay you a healthy chunk of it to make you go away.
“Only Georgia didn't die! And she didn't even fight Maxwell for the money; she wasn't the gold digger in the family! But you didn't dare try to kill her again right away; you had to bide your time and wait until you could do it without arousing suspicion. When you learned that she was traveling out West all alone, well, bad things can happen out West, can't they? Bandits, Indian raids, even accidents; it'd be no surprise if a bad thing happened to poor unlucky Georgia! Only your plan failed again, thanks to yours truly!”
“You can't prove any of this,” Dodd snarled, his face flushed with rage. “You put that story in front of a jury and you'll be laughed right out of the courthouse!”
Blackshot poked a thumb to his chest. “I'm your jury,” he growled, advancing toward Dodd, “and I'm ready to sentence you.”
Dodd backed away, holding out his hands to keep Blackshot away. “Now, wait just a minute!” he stammered, “We can make a deal! Listen, we could split the money! Just take care of Georgia and you can have a share of it! Hell, I'll give you anything you want!”
“You don't have anything that I want,” Blackshot hissed. His hand darted to Dodd's throat and dragged the little man to him. Dodd struggled in vain to fend off the thick, muscular arm that encircled his neck and closed around his windpipe with increasing pressure.
The walls of the private cabin were reasonably thick, and the clattering of the train's wheels on the track was ever present, so the loud crack of Dodd's neck snapping went unnoticed by the other passengers in the car. Blackshot pulled the cabin window open and hoisted the limp body up onto the wide sill. A quick heft of his legs and Beauregard Dodd was gone into the gathering dusk, never to be seen again except by the vultures and coyotes.
“I guess the third time wasn't a charm after all,” Blackshot said.
Chapter 11
Des
pite the darkness, Blackshot was able to locate the cabin he was seeking without much difficulty, and he rapped lightly on the door.
“Who's there, please?” Georgia's lilting voice sang out.
“Take a guess,” Blackshot replied.
The door flew open and Georgia looked out at him, surprise showing in her large blue eyes. She wore a thin, flower print nightgown that clung tight to her luscious curves.
“Why Mr. Blackshot,” she drawled with a saucy smile, “you didn't tell me you were planning to move to Charleston.”
“I was going to get off at the next stop, unless you can think of a reason why I should hang around a little longer.”
“Well, perhaps you'd like to stay and learn a little more about the new Georgia Lee Motherwell. I have uncovered certain facts about her that may interest you.”
“Such as?”
“Such as the new Georgia gets just as horny as the old one.” Her little fingers gathered a handful of Blackshot's shirtfront and pulled him into the cabin and against her body.
“That is certainly fascinating news,” Blackshot replied, feeling her soft breasts rub against his chiseled stomach as he brought his lips to hers. He kissed her hard, savoring her warm lips and tongue the way a match savors a flint and with similar results.
Georgia pulled open the sash at her waist and let the gown slip from her shoulders to the floor. “Close the door,” she hissed. “There is a lot more that you may learn if you know the right way to ask.”
Blackshot kicked the door shut with the heel of his boot and tossed his hat onto the chair. Georgia was lying on her back on an upholstered bench opposite him, her golden ringlets cascading across the dark fabric like the sun breaking through the clouds. She let her head hang off the side of the bench and smiled an upside down smile at Blackshot.
