Ace in the Hole

by J. R. Roberts

  He thought about what he’d agreed to do, play in this big game with gamblers from around the world. Certainly one of his friends Bat Masterson or Luke Short would have been better suited to this. Even Ben Thompson. But the fact was he’d walked into this, and the curiosity level was too high for him not to do it. He’d played in some high-stakes game before, but nothing to match this.

  “Clint?”

  He turned and looked at the girl on the bed. She was naked, propped up on one elbow.

  “Come back to bed,” she said. “I’m cold.”

  He was kind of cold, too. He went back to bed, took her in his arms and they fell asleep while keeping each other warm.

  Clint rose the next morning and left the room without waking Loretta. They’d already said their good-byes. He took all his gear, because he doubted he would be returning to Virginia City.

  He left the hotel and walked to the livery. When he got there, he was surprised to find the banker, Arliss Morgan, already there, the horse hitched to the buggy.

  “What took you so long?” Morgan asked.

  “You’re very anxious to get going, aren’t you?”

  “You bet,” Morgan said. “I would have saddled your horse, but I couldn’t get near him.”

  “Yeah, he’s temperamental sometimes. I’ll saddle him and be right with you.”

  “I can ride over to the general store and pick up our supplies,” the man offered.

  “It’s better if we do everything together from now until we get to the ranch,” Clint said.

  “You think somebody would try something?”

  “You’re carrying a lot of money, aren’t you?”

  “Well, actually, no…”

  “I thought you told me a banknote wouldn’t work.”

  “Actually, our host is arranging to have something set up so that we can all get the money we need rather easily.”

  Clint squared up and stared at the banker.

  “Is there anything else you haven’t told me yet?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why was it so important to hold back that little bit of information?”

  The banker actually shrugged, looked as if he’d just been scolded.

  “Look, just wait here while I saddle my horse,” Clint said. “Don’t do anything, and don’t go anywhere. Somebody is sure to know where we’re headed, and they won’t know that you don’t have a bunch of money with you.”

  “All right.”

  Clint turned to go inside, then turned back and pointed his finger at the banker.

  “Once we’re on the trail, you’re going to have to do what I tell you to do, when I tell you, without question,” he explained. “Is that understood?”

  “Understood,” Morgan said.

  Clint went into the livery…

  “Get away from the edge!” Tom Kent hissed.

  Looking down at the livery from the roof of the building across the street, Tito Calhoun said, “They’re not gonna look up here.”

  “They might.”

  “Relax, Tom.”

  “And how are you gonna get down from here fast enough to follow them?”

  “We just have to see what direction they take when they leave,” Calhoun said. “I’m not gonna be right on their trail, Tom. They’d see me for sure.”

  “What about this other fella you said was gonna help you track ’em?”

  “I’ll be catchin’ up to him outside of town.”

  “Maybe I should go with you.”

  “You leave when we planned,” Calhoun said, “in a few hours. You head for Carson City and pick up the rest of the men there.”

  “I don’t know if this is gonna work.”

  “It’ll work,” Calhoun said. “We know the general area the ranch is in, and they’re gonna be there for days.”

  Kent wasn’t sure that Diane was going to be happy with this plan.

  Tito Calhoun, on the other hand, had seen Diane happier than Kent had ever seen her, and just the night before. Running into a woman like Diane Morgan fresh out of prison was something Calhoun had not expected. He intended to enjoy her as much as possible, and use her to get ahold of the money. But he had no intention of sharing the money with Kent, Diane or any of the other men involved, except maybe for one. His intention was to use this money to make sure he never went to prison again.

  He’d learned a valuable lesson in Huntsville Prison. No matter how tough you think you are, prison will wear you down and kill you, if you’re there long enough. Luckily, his stretch was short—this time. But he thought if he ever went to prison again he’d probably die there. So he would do whatever he had to do, to whoever he had to do it to, to make sure that never happened.

  But Diane Morgan…well, she’d be the last one he killed. He’d been without a woman for too long to dispose of this one too soon.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  Clint saddled Eclipse and walked him back outside, where Morgan was waiting. They then went over to the general store to pick up the supplies he’d ordered. Now that they had the buggy, they probably could have carried more, but Clint decided to stick with what he’d bought—coffee, beef jerky, some beans and bacon and cans of peaches.

  As Clint stowed the supplies, Morgan, dressed in a banker’s version of trail clothes—which meant he could have worn them to church on Sunday—stood by and asked, “Is there any way we could make it to the ranch tonight?”

  “Not if it’s where you told me it is,” Clint said. “Better to spend one night on the trail. Why?” He turned to face the man. “When’s the last time you slept on the ground?”

  “To tell you the truth,” Morgan said, “I don’t think I’ve ever slept on the ground.”

  “Then it’s probably a good thing you’re not trying to ride, as well,” Clint said. “One new experience at a time should be enough. Ready?”

  “Uh, sure, I guess,” Morgan said.

  He walked around and climbed into the buggy while Clint mounted up.

  “Are you armed?” Clint asked.

  “I have a thirty-two-caliber Colt in a shoulder holster,” the banker said. “I usually only wear it when we’re transporting large sums of money.”

  “Can you shoot?”

  “I can hit what I aim at, at close range.”

  “Okay,” Clint said. “If we get into a shooting situation, you’ll wait for word from me.”

  “Understood.”

  “Are we ready to go?” Clint asked. “You’ve said good-bye to your wife?”

  “Oh, yes,” Morgan said. “That’s all taken care of.”

  “Does she know where you’re going?”

  “She knows I’m going to a poker game,” Morgan said, “and that a lot of money is involved.”

  Clint studied the man. He knew when Morgan was bluffing at the poker table, and he knew now the man was lying. He was going to have to act on the assumption that Diane Morgan knew every detail, and go from there.

  From his office window Tom Kent could see Clint Adams and Arliss Morgan loading their supplies onto the buggy. Kent wondered how much money Morgan had on him at the moment, and if it would be worth it just to ambush them for what the banker had on him. Given what Diane had told him about the amount of money involved, the banker must have had a hundred thousand dollars, at least.

  That kind of money would last Tom Kent a lifetime. It would not, however, be enough for Diane Morgan.

  Diane looked at the time on the grandfather clock in the sitting room of the house she shared with Arliss Morgan. If things went well, though, she would not be sharing it with him any longer. In fact, if things went the way she planned, she wouldn’t even be seeing him again, ever.

  Tito Calhoun had come into her life and transformed it. One afternoon with him and she knew that she was his sexual slave, and not the other way around, which is the way it usually went with men. She’d finally found a man who could enslave her. And not only that, he had modified her plan, making it even better. Rather than robbing the g
ame and taking off with the money, she’d stay behind, become a wealthy widow and then sell off everything her husband owned. After that, she’d meet up with Calhoun. Between Arliss Morgan’s personal fortune and the money they picked up from the game, she and Calhoun would be millionaires.

  Millionaires!

  That she had never planned on. It had taken Tito Calhoun to come up with that plan, and that’s because he was a real outlaw, and not a wannabe like Tom Kent.

  A real man and a real outlaw. That was what she needed, and that was what she had.

  Finally, things in her life were going to go her way!

  Tito Calhoun had sent Kent away because the man was driving him crazy. He thought he might have to kill him before the job just to shut him up.

  He watched from the roof as Clint Adams and the banker left the livery and went to the general store. Tito had chosen this vantage point because he could see both structures very easily. While he watched, they loaded their supplies, had a discussion, then climbed aboard their buggy and horse and started west.

  Calhoun had his horse saddled and ready behind the building. He got down from the roof, mounted up and slowly rode out of town. He had to pick up Dave Coffin—the other man he thought he might split his take with—outside of town. Dave was camped to the north. But he wanted to give Adams and Morgan a good head start anyway, and then track them. That gave him the time he needed to pick up Dave.

  Dave Coffin was the only man he knew he could count on: uneducated, loyal and good with a gun. Coffin had laid low the entire time Calhoun was in prison, but once he was out, Dave was ready to go. As soon as Calhoun heard from Kent, he had sent a telegram to Dave.

  Tom Kent could never be a Dave Coffin. He’d spent too many years wearing that star, and whatever potential Kent may have shown years ago, whatever edge he may have had, that little hunk of tin had smoothed off of him long ago. Calhoun didn’t even think Kent was going to be able to go through with this. The man was going to balk at some point, and that was probably when Calhoun was going to have to put a bullet into him.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Dave Coffin sat at the fire and poured himself another cup of coffee. When he heard the sounds of an approaching rider, he dumped the contents of the coffee cup into the fire and stood up, right hand hovering above his gun. When he saw the rider and recognized him as Tito Calhoun, he relaxed.

  “Pour me a cup,” Calhoun said, reining in his horse.

  “We got time?”

  “We got time,” Calhoun said, tying off his horse, “but not a whole lot.”

  “Enough for you to tell me what this is all about?” Coffin asked. “You go away for a few years, then you get out and I hear from you out of the blue. Camp north of Virginia City and wait for you? What kinda telegram was that?”

  “The kind that got you here, I guess.”

  Calhoun accepted the cup of coffee with one hand and shook his compadre’s hand with the other.

  “Long time, amigo,” Coffin said.

  “Too damn long,” Calhoun said. “Good to see you, Dave. Hunker down here and I’ll tell you what we’re into.”

  “As long as we’re into somethin’,” Coffin said. “I been laying low way too long.”

  “I think you’re gonna find it was worth the wait.”

  “Are we being followed?” Arliss Morgan asked as Clint turned in his saddle once again.

  “Not that I can see,” Clint said, “but I keep checking.”

  “Adams, I’ve got to be honest with you.”

  “Never thought I’d hear those words from a banker or a gambler,” Clint said good-naturedly, “let alone from a man who is both.”

  “I told my wife where I’m going and what we’re doing, and no one else,” Morgan said.

  “That wasn’t such a good idea, Mr. Morgan.”

  “I trust her,” Morgan said. “And you yourself have said there’s no one following us.”

  “That doesn’t mean there’s not a plan afoot somewhere.”

  “She’d never do that,” Morgan said.

  “Excuse me, Arliss,” Clint said, “but I understand your wife is quite a few years younger than you.”

  “Yes,” Morgan said. “About thirty.”

  “Now, don’t take offense, but when I see a situation like that I usually think the woman is after something.”

  “Like my money?”

  “For one.”

  “If she wants my money, she can have it,” Morgan said. “I love her.”

  Clint didn’t like the look on the man’s face.

  “How much money are we talking about?”

  “What?”

  “Your personal worth, Mr. Morgan,” Clint said. “Just how much is it?”

  “I don’t see how that—”

  “You’re broke, aren’t you?”

  “Wha—”

  “Don’t try to bluff me, Arliss,” Clint said. “I’ve already proved I can read you.”

  Morgan was silent for a few moments, just the sounds of their horses’ hooves audible, and then he said, “I have had some financial setbacks.”

  “And does your wife know about those?”

  “No.”

  “And are you broke?”

  “I’m…cash poor.”

  “So all you’ve got is your property?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Where’d you get the hundred thousand to put up for this game?”

  “I borrowed it.”

  “Where’d you get the money you’re supposed to pay me?”

  “I have enough money to pay you, Clint,” Morgan said, “and if you win, there’ll be plenty more. You know that.”

  “Oh, I know I’m going to do my part,” Clint said. “It’s your part I’m worried about.”

  “I’ll do my part,” Morgan said. “Believe me, I’ve been both rich and poor many times before.”

  “Well,” Clint said, “to tell you the truth, I’ve never been either. I’ve always been somewhere in the middle, and that has suited me just fine. I’m not doing this for the money.”

  “Well, I’m not, either,” Arliss Morgan said, then added, “Completely.”

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  “Trail,” Coffin said, pointing to the ground. “With the buckboard this is too easy.”

  They fell in behind the trail Clint Adams and Arliss Morgan were leaving.

  “How are we gonna signal the others?” Coffin asked.

  “They’re only supposed to be going a day’s ride,” Calhoun explained. “Once we pinpoint where they’re goin’, you’ll ride back and collect the rest.”

  “Where?”

  “They’ll be in Carson City,” Calhoun said. “You find the nearest town with a telegraph and send one there to Tom Kent. He and the other men will then ride hell-bent for leather to here, and we’ll take the game.”

  “What if it takes too long?” Coffin asked. “What if the game ends sooner than you think?”

  “Believe me,” Calhoun said, “a game like this will go on for days. We’ll have plenty of time.”

  “I thought we knew where they were going.”

  “We know the rancher’s name,” Calhoun said. “We don’t have the exact location.”

  “Well, why don’t we just stop in some towns on the way and ask?” Coffin suggested. “A ranch that size, somebody in a nearby town’s gonna know how to get there.”

  “See?” Calhoun said. “I knew my brain was rusty from bein’ inside and you’d come in handy.”

  “Then once we find out, we send a telegram and we’re ahead of the game.”

  “That’s fine with me. In fact, let’s hit the next town.”

  “And what’s the split gonna be?” Coffin asked. “You said we’d talk about it on the way.”

  “The split is gonna be you and me.”

  “You’re gonna double-cross your friend Kent?”

  “He ain’t my friend,” Calhoun said. “He’s a lawman gone rogue.”

  “You can’t trust a man lik
e that.”

  “I know it.”

  “And what about your partner back in Virginia City?”

  “It’s a woman,” Calhoun said. “The banker’s wife. I’ll hang onto her for a while. After all, I was in prison a long time.”

  “Can’t blame you for that. What about the other men?”

  “We’ll just pay them off for a day’s work. They never have to know how much is on the line.”

  “And if they find out and want a full share?”

  “Then we’ll give them a full share of lead,” Calhoun said. “That sit right with you?”

  “Long as I get my share, that’s all I care about.”

  “You’ll get your share. You got my word.”

  “Good enough for me.”

  They rode in silence for a while, and then Calhoun asked, “But why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why is my word good enough for you? I mean, if I’m willin’ to double-cross everybody else, why wouldn’t I double-cross you?”

  “Because we’re the same, you and me, Tito,” Coffin said. “We got to have somebody we can count on. We kill each other, then what do we got?”

  “You had that answer quick enough.”

  “Well,” Coffin admitted, “I was considerin’ double-crossin’ you and takin’ all the money for myself, but then I decided against it.”

  “When did you get so honest?”

  “While you were inside,” Coffin said. “Don’t worry, it’ll wear off.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  They camped in a clearing with good visibility all around them. Clint quickly realized he’d have to do all the work in camp, but he figured he was getting paid enough for it. Once he had the horses bedded down, he made a fire and cooked their supper. All the while the banker was trying to find a comfortable rock to sit on.

  Clint prepared the bacon and beans and handed a plate of them to Morgan, along with a cup of strong trail coffee.