by Tony Healey
Mikhail didn’t answer the question. Instead, he said, “I got to go fetch Randy. Can I trust you to stay here and not cause more trouble?”
Bobby nodded absently, unable to take his eyes off the patch of ground where the fire had been. “I won’t go wandering.”
Mikhail looked at him for a moment, unsure. But he was caught between a rock and a hard place. He had to trust Jack’s son long enough to get Randy, like he’d been asked. “I will be back soon,” he said, unable to think of anything better to tell the boy.
He walked away, then ran to get to his horse. Randy was staying at a cabin several fields over. It would take fifteen minutes to reach him and another fifteen to ride back. Could he trust Bobby for half an hour? He wasn’t sure. Riding away, he realized he should have tied Bobby up. But how could he tie up the son of the boss? Jack hadn’t told him to. As he raced to fetch Randy, he was conflicted about what he’d done but knew the mistake—if it was one—couldn’t be undone.
* * *
* * *
With Mikhail gone, Bobby walked over to the patch of ground where the fire had been. Mikhail—or whoever had made it—had bordered the area with rocks and sand to prevent the flames from spreading. They’d clearly burned a lot of wood, a fire so fierce that the sand at the pit’s edges had turned to dirty glass from the heat. Bobby picked up a piece and studied it. It was the size and shape of an arrowhead or a shark’s tooth. He tucked it into his pocket and was about to walk away when something about the pit stole his attention. He leaned in closer, squinting in the dark to make it out. He saw not just logs. He saw bones, too. Blackened by the fire but definitely bones. A round thing that at first didn’t make sense to him. But when he walked around to the other side, he saw that it was a skull. Staring right back at him. Black and charred but unquestionably a human skull.
Horrified, Bobby backed away, hand to his mouth. I’ve got to get out of here, he told himself. Far away as I can.
In that moment, everything he’d cared about in the past vanished before his eyes, and he was left with the daunting realization that his father and everyone in his employ were plain evil. And he included himself. But perhaps, before he followed in his father’s footsteps completely, he could change course. A fork in the road of his life appeared before him, and Bobby found himself making a stark choice. Left or right. North or south. Right or wrong. Leave the place he’d been born, the place he’d grown up, or stay and end up just as corrupted as his father.
* * *
* * *
Jack Denton sat on horseback, his hands resting on the horn of his saddle. June sat astride her horse next to him, the belt still tight around her arm to stem the bleeding, which was already slowing, even without stitches. She would need those stitches before long; the wound would not heal completely by itself. But for now the belt was doing its job.
Randy sat atop his pony, chewing tobacco and spitting the gloopy brown result of his efforts off to the side, where it splattered onto the ground. He stared blankly into the black distance, as if trying to decipher what lay behind the veil of the night itself.
Mikhail arrived last, riding hard to reach them and panting for breath.
Denton scowled at him. “What the hell’s wrong with you?”
“Bobby has got away,” Mikhail reported.
“He’ll be back,” Denton said flatly.
“Boss, I do not think so,” Mikhail said. “He’s cleared out all his stuff. I know because I checked. I think he’s running away.”
It was hard for Jack Denton to ignore the pang in his chest, a feeling indecipherable but close to hurt, to loss. He pushed it down, the knowledge that he might never see Bobby again.
“It is what it is,” he said finally. He led his horse out in front of them and turned in a tight, well-executed circle. “Now how’s about we ride to the Hart place and settle the score, huh?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Alone in the house her brother had built from scratch, Myra Hart remembered the last meal she had shared with Glendon, Celia, Matthew and Maria at the big table. Celia had outdone herself, preparing what could only have been described as a feast. It was the last night of her last visit. Outside the rain—the kind that sweeps in off the pasture as a gray curtain—fell soft and slow.
They’d stayed up too late, eaten too much and, when the children had gone to bed, drunk more than a little. Any worries or troubles Glendon and Celia had were swept away for a night. Myra had thought back on that time fondly. The laughter. The hopes they’d shared about what the future would hold for them. A future that would never materialize. A dream that would never come to fruition.
The smile she’d adopted at the memory faded to be replaced by a blank expression she could not help but wear. Myra’s thoughts turned to their caskets at the undertaker’s and how they’d looked in them with coins for eyes. She pictured the plot on the hill and them buried deep within it. Throwing in handfuls of dirt and hearing it scatter on the coffin lids. Myra ran her hand over the worn top of the dinner table, feeling every little scratch and imperfection that gave it character. Myra wondered if Bercow had removed the coins prior to the burial. What kind of luck would those coins buy you if you spent them somewhere?
Expecting company, Myra had set glasses and whiskey down on the table. Now she took her pistol and checked the chambers. She hid it beneath her vest so that it wasn’t readily visible, but could be pulled free within seconds.
The house creaked around her. She remembered Glendon telling her that even when wood had been chopped down and cut, it wasn’t quite dead. It continued to live, to warp and shift in place.
A sound like thunder came from over the horizon and it took Myra a moment to realize it was the clamor of horses approaching. Myra patted the gun as she’d done repeatedly, making sure it was there. Try not to shoot yourself, she ordered silently. Ethan had delivered just that same advice before he left to get into position. Leaving her on her own in a house of ghosts to face down the very killers who had murdered her family.
Everything had come to this moment, it seemed. Traveling to Amity Creek on the train, she could not have imagined how events would transpire. In fact, if someone had told her, she’d have laughed in their face. A shoot-out in the street? She’d have dropped to the floor, clutching her sides.
Myra opened the front door and stood on the porch, watching the riders approach the house in a line. Each of them carried a lantern to light their way in the darkness. Jack Denton in the middle leading the posse. June Proctor to his right. And to his left, a huge man, maybe the biggest she’d ever seen. His pony didn’t look big enough to bear his weight. Myra worried for the poor beast beneath him. There was another man at the end of the line she had not seen before. Denton’s employee, perhaps.
Should I be scared right now? Myra thought, because in that moment, she felt no fear. Indeed, she felt nothing at all. Her heart was beating at a steady rhythm. She was able to stand there on the porch and look into their eyes, into their souls, because of the serenity that had befallen her. It was the peace that came with acceptance. Is Denton expecting me to be cowering inside? Won’t he be surprised?
He raised a fist, and the others pulled back, coming to a standstill just before the courtyard. Denton rode on until he was right in front of her.
Myra looked up at him. “Mr. Denton, To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“I think you know all too well.”
“I’m afraid I don’t,” Myra said. “Why don’t you elaborate?”
“My people were killed in a gunfight in town tonight,” Denton said. He cocked his head to one side as he regarded her. “Happen to know anything about that?”
“No,” Myra said. “Sorry.”
Denton let the reins sit in his lap, holding his lantern with one hand and the horn of the saddle with the other. He leaned forward slightly as he spoke to her, and in the lantern’s unsteady glo
w his face was fiendish, disfigured by shadows.
“Let’s quit the games, little miss. We both know Harper’s boy killed April Proctor in the saloon. Blew her brains right out for all to see. Not the way a woman should go, is it? As for poor May, she got shot hanging from a second-story window, and I believe it was you did the shooting that time.”
Enough of the games, Myra thought. “Guilty as charged,” she said without hesitation.
Denton looked hard at her. “Here you stand, no protection, no weapon.” He shook his head in disbelief. “The pure embodiment of audacity you are, girl.”
“I like to think it’s an eye for an eye, Mr. Denton.”
“How d’you figure that?”
Myra leaned against one of the porch posts and folded her arms. “Well, you sent the Proctors to kill my brother, his wife, his children. Two of them have been killed and the third, sitting over there on her horse, will get her comeuppance, too. Justice will be done, Mr. Denton.”
“Am I included in that?”
“Well, there’s the rub. I am on my own out here. I can’t fight you forever. You know that, and I know that. Eventually I’ll be dead, and you’ll get my brother’s land anyway.”
Denton peered past her to the inside of the house. “Your protector not around no more?”
“He was arrested in town by Deputy Mitchell.”
“When was this?”
“After the shoot-out.”
Denton nodded slowly. “So he’s in a cell?”
“For the moment,” Myra said. “The deputy has his hands full right now, trying to find the sheriff. He’s gone missing, wouldn’t you know?”
“I did not know that.”
“Yes, a terrible shame, a man of his age. Anyway, as we were saying, I know when the game is up, Mr. Denton. I know it’s probably best for all concerned if I just cut my losses and make a deal with you. I’d rather not. I’d rather see you burned at a stake for what you did to my family . . . but I must accept my loss. Just do not imagine I will grant you my forgiveness.”
Denton’s expression faltered. He looked away, then back again. “I never wanted it to get where it did.”
“This country brings out the worst in folk.”
“Like tying up my son and interrogating him?”
Myra straightened. “That was necessary, I’m afraid. I’m sure you’d have done the same thing in my shoes.”
Denton looked her up and down. “Woman, you are not as I thought you would be.”
To hell with your respect. “As pleasant as it is talking like this, Mr. Denton, how’s about we discuss this inside over a glass of whiskey and come to some arrangement that suits us both?”
“I think that can be done,” Denton said, climbing down from his horse. He hitched it to the porch post Myra had been leaning against. He signaled his people to let them know he was all right, then Myra showed him through to the house. Denton removed his hat and looked about. “He did a fine job in here.”
He sounded genuinely appreciative of Glendon’s handiwork. It made his presence there sting all the more. Denton set his lantern down on the floor and walked over to the table. His spurs jingled as he trod heavily across the floorboards. He lifted the stopper off the decanter and sniffed at the whiskey. “Expectin’ company, were you?”
“I figured you’d get here before too long,” Myra said, taking the decanter from him and pouring two glasses. They drank without a toast; then Myra invited him to take a seat.
Denton rolled the whiskey around in his mouth, over his tongue, before swallowing it down. “A nice drop of liquor, that.”
It’s got me through, Myra thought. As it’s getting me through now, having to breathe the same air as you. “Now, I don’t wish to sit here with you any longer than I need to, so let’s get to business, Mr. Denton, and iron something out that benefits us both.”
“I can drink to that,” Denton said, knocking the rest of his whiskey back in one go. He set the glass down on the tabletop, loud as a judge’s gavel convening a court to order.
There could be no going back now.
* * *
* * *
Ethan crawled up the shingles on his knees and elbows, careful to take it slow and not make a sound. His pistols were secure in their holsters, his rifle slung over his shoulder by its strap, readily accessible within seconds. He peeked over the ridge of the roof at the riders in front of the courtyard. They sat patiently, waiting as their leader discussed matters with Myra inside the house. Which was of course exactly where they wanted Denton to be. Cut off from his people. Isolated from help.
Ducking back behind the ridge, Ethan removed the rifle and flexed his hands, one on the stock, the other on the barrel. He slid his hand down the barrel and positioned his finger through the trigger guard, ready to go in a moment’s notice. He would know when the time came. His ears were still ringing from their shoot-out in town, and he knew Myra’s must have been also. It was something he’d forgotten to warn her about. Not that it could have been helped at all. Sometimes, things were as they were. It was simple as that.
Ethan looked over once more, noting the belt around June Proctor’s arm. So they had gotten her, then. And there was the big Russian who’d come to the barn to kill him. Probably would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn’t been for the deputy.
He hoped Myra was all right inside the house with that devil. He knew what to listen for and what to watch for, but it didn’t make the waiting any less interminable. Times like this, seconds had a way of seeming like minutes, and minutes dragged out like hours. Waiting did that to you, made your gauge of time’s passage lousy. That was when people made mistakes. Gave away where they were hiding. Got itchy trigger fingers. He’d seen good men taken that way, losing their lives to boredom and fidgety digits.
Ethan had given little thought to what he might do after this. He’d never spent time considering the prospect of seeing justice done and being left without a purpose, but now that he was up on the roof, perched on wooden shingles Glendon Hart had nailed into place himself, the idea of a life without direction dawned on Ethan. For the first time in a long time, he had that feeling in his gut, in the center of his being, of being wayward and lost. What would he do when Denton was dead? Where would he go? He did not know. There had been three men responsible for the murder of his parents and brother, and Bertrand Woodward was the last one. The third notch to be carved on the stocks of his father’s shiny twin pistols. After each kill, Ethan had sat before a fire and hacked a mark deep into the stock of each pistol so that he would feel those grooves in his palms when he handled the guns. So that he would be constantly reminded of why he was doing this. Avenge their deaths. Rid the world of the three men who’d made it a far darker, more dangerous place than it needed to be.
Tonight, Denton would get what was coming to him, or Ethan would die in the trying. That was all there was to it.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
I always respected your brother,” Denton said. “I didn’t like him, but I respected him. The two don’t always have to go hand in hand, you know. Just like I know the people of Amity Creek can’t stand me. If I dropped down dead in front of them, it’d be like Christmas come early. But they respect me, and that’s the only thing that matters.”
“Why do you think that is?” Myra asked.
Denton tilted his head as he looked back at her. “I don’t follow.”
“Why do you think they respect you?”
“Well, why don’t I let you tell me, since that’s what you’re aiming to do anyhow?”
Myra looked at the glass of whiskey in her hand, then back up at Denton. “They don’t respect you. You fool. They fear you. That’s all it is. They know you’re not who you appear to be. They’re all sheep and you’re a wolf in lambskin.”
Denton grinned. “Don’t mince words, do you?”
“For
men like you? Never.”
“You got fire in your belly. An admirable quality out here in the sticks. All that pasture and woodland. Even the mountains can be daunting when you’re on your own, the way they sit there on the horizon. Takes a lotta mettle to strike out on your own in life.”
“I do okay.”
Denton tapped the first two fingers of his right hand on the table. Tap. Tap. “Let’s discuss a price for this place.”
“Before we do,” Myra said, setting her glass down slowly, “I want your word I’ll get a fair shot at June Proctor when this deal is done.”
“Are you saying you won’t sell if I don’t let you shoot June?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
Denton shrugged. “Then let’s call it a done deal.”
“You are unbelievable!” Myra said, laughing dryly.
“What?”
“You really have no loyalty to anyone or anything, do you?”
Denton considered this. “My loyalty is to myself and always has been. That’s how I’ve survived all this time, because I never relied on anyone to have my back but myself,” he said, looking off to the side.
As he did so, Myra reached inside beneath her vest for the pistol. Her hand closed around it, ready to pull it free as Denton continued.
“I learned the hard way years ago you can only trust yourself. The world’s a treacherous place, and everyone’s just out to get their own piece of the pie. Why should I be any different?”
“So it doesn’t matter who stands in your way. Is that what you’re saying?”
“I say if it ain’t you doin’ the plowing, Miss Hart, it’ll be only a matter of time before somebody comes along and plows you out of the way instead,” he said, turning back to her and frowning at the sight of her with her hand inside her clothes. His expression of confusion turned to shock as Myra pulled her pistol free.
