Wildfire

by J. R. Roberts

  She was a tall, full-figured woman with dark red hair. Although her face was smudged by smoke at the moment, it was clear to see she had a smooth, creamy complexion underneath the grime. When she saw Clint, she smiled and waved before excusing herself from the trough. As soon as she stepped aside, her spot was filled by another local who was eager to help.

  “Are you all right?” she asked as she rushed over to Clint.

  “I came back to ask you that question.”

  “Well, I wasn’t the one who sent that madman running.”

  “No,” Clint replied. “You were the one who was grabbed up by that madman. I hope he didn’t hurt you.”

  She shook her head. “No,” she replied breathlessly. It didn’t take long for her to add, “But he did scare the daylights out of me.”

  “Did he say anything to you?”

  “He told me he wanted to see me burn. That’s all.”

  “You’re certain?” Clint asked.

  The woman closed her eyes and looked down as she nodded. “I’m certain. I’ll remember those words for the rest of my life. I thought they were going to be the last ones I’d ever hear.”

  “Well . . . they weren’t.” After hearing those words come from his mouth, Clint had to hang his own head and laugh. “I probably could have thought of something more comforting than that, but I’m awfully tired.”

  She was laughing as well. “It’s all right. I’d say you have a pretty good excuse.”

  “How about we get away from here? It seems like these folks have everything well in hand.”

  “I’d like that,” she said.

  “Excuse me,” a man hollered from the bucket brigade. “Pardon me. Sir?”

  Clint looked for who was shouting and found a portly man with a long beard waving for his attention.

  “Yes, you,” the portly man said. “Could I have a word with you? It’s about the man who set this fire.”

  “That’s the town marshal,” the woman told Clint. “And I don’t think he’s going to take no for an answer.”

  “I’d still like to—” Clint said before he was cut off once more by the portly fellow.

  “I need a word with you, sir. Please. It’s very important.”

  Stepping back before she was knocked aside by the town marshal, the woman told Clint, “My name is Janie McGowan. I’ll wait for you at that restaurant right on the corner.”

  Clint turned to get a look at where she was pointing and saw the place. He nodded and turned back to find the marshal practically standing toe to toe with him.

  “Fred Butters,” the portly man announced as he took hold of Clint’s hand and shook it. “Didn’t mean to be rude, but I wanted to be sure and have a word with you before you got lost in all this commotion.”

  Looking over his shoulder, Clint saw Janie wave and walk toward the corner restaurant.

  “That was a hell of a job you did, sir,” Butters declared. “This whole town’s in debt to you.”

  “My pleasure,” Clint replied.

  “Now I’d just like you to let us know what the hell happened.” In a more intent tone, the marshal added, “I’d also like to know how you just happened to be in the right place at the right time. I don’t believe I’ve seen you around here before.”

  “Look, I just . . .” Clint trailed off when he caught sight of someone in the corner of his eye. Bower and Mark spotted him at the same time and walked over to stand beside him.

  “He’s gone,” Mark said. “God damn him, he moved too damn fast! I should have shot him when I had the chance.”

  “You tried, Mark,” Bower said. “We both did. We just missed, is all. At least Clint had some better luck than we did. Hell of a good job, Adams.”

  Butters cleared his throat and raised his voice a notch. “That one’s Adams, so who are you two? In fact, why don’t you all just come with me and we can talk in my office?”

  “How about we catch our breath first?” Mark snapped. “Is that all right with you?”

  “Watch your mouth, boy. I’m the town marshal here, and for all I know, you men are the ones who had something to do with starting this fire.”

  Before Clint or Mark could get too bent out of shape, Bower stepped in to do the one thing neither of them could.

  “It’s all right,” Bower said as he held out his badge. “These two are with me. I’ll be glad to answer your questions.”

  “You’re lawmen, huh?” Butters asked as he glanced at the badge. “Well, I suppose that’s more like it.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  Clint walked into the restaurant, found Janie’s table and sat down. Letting out a tired breath, he said, “That marshal of yours is a real piece of work.”

  Janie laughed and poured Clint a cup of water from the pitcher that had been sitting on the table. “Hopefully he didn’t give you too much trouble.”

  “He didn’t, but it wasn’t from lack of trying.” Clint took the water and drank some. Although the cool liquid washed out the smoky taste from his mouth, Clint was getting awfully tired of breathing in soot.

  “Do you know who that man was?” Janie asked.

  “Yeah. And now that you mention him, I’d prefer it if we got away from this place. That man’s got a nasty habit of tracking me down.”

  “We’re safe here, aren’t we? I mean, the law’s right outside. Aren’t you a lawman?”

  “None of that means we’re any safer in here. Considering I can still smell kerosene, I’d say it’s unwise to push our luck any further.”

  Janie was reluctant to nod, but she did. She also forced a smile onto her face as she stood up. “I was hoping that man was long gone by now. Do you think he’s still waiting out there?”

  “I honestly don’t know. Why don’t I just see you home and make sure you get through your own door safe and sound?”

  “All right. I’d appreciate that.”

  Clint offered her his arm and escorted her outside. There was still quite a large crowd in the street where the fire had been. He could also see Bower showing the town’s marshal where he and Mark had chased Voorhees. Seeing the way Butters postured and strutted made Clint glad he wasn’t forced to deal with the man himself.

  “So where do you live?” Clint asked.

  Janie started to answer, but found herself distracted by the blackened section of boardwalk where Voorhees had thrown his matches. “Oh,” she said while snapping herself out of her thoughts. “My house is right down that street. I can make it there on my own, thanks.”

  “I’d much rather see to it you get there, since that man is still out there.”

  Keeping her head down, Janie nodded. “All right, then.”

  After walking a few more steps, Clint asked, “How did that man get ahold of you?”

  “I was walking down the street and he just . . . grabbed me.”

  “And he said he wanted you to burn?”

  “Yes. Why are you asking me this?”

  Clint shrugged and kept walking. “Maybe I took in too much smoke. Must’ve fogged up my brain a little.”

  Janie smiled at that and stopped so she could stand directly in front of him. “I should be asking if you’re all right. After all, you’re the one who risked so much just to come and pull me out of there.”

  “Like I said before, I was already after that fellow. It’s too bad you got in the way.” Glancing up the street, Clint asked, “Is your house nearby?”

  “Yes. You’ve done more than enough. Please, just go and get some rest. Do you have a place to stay?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Well, you should try the Archer. They serve a wonderful breakfast.”

  Clint nodded. “I think I’ll do that. Are you sure you don’t mind walking the rest of the way on your own?”

  “I’m sure. Thank you so much.”

  Just as Clint was starting to turn around so he could walk back to the Archer Hotel, he felt Janie tap him on the shoulder. When he turned around, he soon felt Janie’s lips pressed against h
is own. The kiss took Clint by surprise, but not in an unpleasant way. He simply leaned into it and savored the touch of her lips for as long as it lasted.

  “I’ll check in on you tomorrow,” she whispered. “If that’s all right?”

  “What man in his right mind would refuse an offer like that?” Clint asked.

  She smiled and lowered her head as if she’d suddenly become shy. “I don’t know, but I’m glad you didn’t. Maybe we can have breakfast.”

  “Sounds wonderful. I’m pretty tired, so if I’m not there at a reasonable hour, just have someone rattle my cage a bit.”

  “All right, Clint. Thanks again for everything.”

  “You’re more than welcome,” Clint replied. He turned and walked away, smiling to himself as his thoughts raced like wildfire inside his head.

  THIRTY-THREE

  Voorhees stared out at the night sky and cursed under his breath. When he looked around at the buildings that were either dark or only lit by a lantern or two in a few windows, he swore again.

  “What’s the matter, darling?” Elizabeth asked as she came up behind him.

  “It should be burning,” Voorhees replied. “It should all be burning.”

  “I know. It wasn’t your fault.”

  “That doesn’t matter. It should . . .” The more he tried to talk, the more of an effort it became. The big man’s jaw locked up and he clenched his fists in frustration.

  Elizabeth reached out to stroke his cheek lovingly. “I know,” she said soothingly. “I’m angry, too. All that planning to find the perfect spot and to put down all that kerosene, only to have it all go to waste.”

  “We can do it again. We wouldn’t even need to get too much more kerosene. There ain’t no way they could have washed it all away.”

  Easing her hand away from his cheek, Elizabeth began gently brushing it through his hair instead. “Not here. Not anymore.”

  Voorhees slapped her hand away and wheeled around so he could glare straight into her eyes. “What do you mean? Why not here? Half this town is set to go up in a ball of fire!”

  She looked around at the small room behind them. At the moment, they were both on the tiny balcony extending from the bedroom window. There was a rocker out there, which looked like a child’s toy compared to the man standing beside it. Inside the room, there lay the bodies of the family who’d built the house that Voorhees had found.

  “Keep your voice down,” she said.

  “There ain’t nobody else alive in this damn house.”

  “I don’t know that for sure. I only got the ones I could see.”

  Voorhees turned to look at the bodies in the bedroom. There were four of them in all: a man, his wife and two boys. Neither of the two children was old enough to have shaved his first whisker yet.

  Curling his lip in an ugly sneer, Voorhees lowered his voice to a more acceptable level. “I don’t like leaving a job like that half-finished.”

  “Neither do I. Now, did any of those lawmen see you come back here?”

  Voorhees shook his head. “I lost them easy.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “If they knew where I was, they’d be comin’ after me. I saw that much in their eyes.”

  Elizabeth studied the big man’s face for a few seconds before she nodded. “Good.” When she felt Voorhees reach out to touch her, she pulled away and asked, “What do you think you’re doing?”

  He looked at her as if he was trying to figure out how a complicated machine worked. Then, he tried reaching out for her again.

  “No,” she snapped. “Not until we both get what we want.”

  “I want you. Right now.”

  Although she turned away as if coyly trying to keep him back, there was no mistaking the fierceness in her eyes when she wrapped her fingers around a small knife and brought it up to the man’s throat.

  “You keep pushing yourself on me and I’ll gut you,” she vowed. “Just like I gutted those pigs over there.”

  Voorhees glanced over to the family lying on the bed and propped against the wall. The sight of those innocent people didn’t do much for him. The fire in Elizabeth’s eyes, however, did plenty.

  “You can try to gut me if you want,” Voorhees said. “But if none of those lawmen could touch me, then I don’t think you’ve got much of a chance.”

  Elizabeth caught sight of the spots of dried blood on the man’s arms, shoulder and side. Some of that blood obviously came from wounds he’d gotten during the last couple of scrapes with the law. The rest of it could have come from any number of other sources. Her eyes stayed on that blood until she found herself gently brushing her blade along Voorhees’s arm.

  “We both want the same thing,” she said.

  “No, we don’t. I want the fire. You want the killing.”

  Elizabeth shrugged. “Six of one, half a dozen of the other. It all boils down to the same thing.”

  “I want to see that street burn. It’ll be the best fire I’ve ever made.”

  “Why settle for a street when you can burn an entire town?” she offered.

  Voorhees raised his eyebrows and asked, “You think we could burn a whole town?”

  “Yes, I do. There’s a place not too far from here that’s smaller and should light up real nicely. All we need to do is set things up the way we did here and that whole town should be on fire in a few minutes.”

  “I could go back to that street and do the same thing right now. Like I said, that kerosene has still gotta be there.”

  “Yes, but we can settle our other problems in the other town.”

  “What do you mean?” Voorhees asked.

  “The man leading those Texas Rangers is staying in Solace. Once we leave this town, they’ll probably head back there to figure out what to do next.”

  “And just to be certain, we can show up there.”

  Elizabeth nodded. “Now you’re thinking. Once those lawmen are all in the same place, we can burn them up.”

  Grinning, Voorhees said, “I like it when lawmen scream.”

  “They’ll scream and then they’ll die. After that, anyone will think twice about coming after us. Even if they do, we’ll have a big enough head start that they won’t catch up to us for a good long while.”

  “That’ll be a fire to see,” Voorhees said wistfully.

  “Yes, it will. And we’ll both get what we want.”

  THIRTY-FOUR

  Those killers were still nearby. Clint knew it. He could smell it. Actually, he could still smell kerosene, despite the fact that local business owners had been washing off their store-fronts all night long.

  Clint, Mark and Bower were all in agreement that any arsonist wouldn’t be so quick to leave when a fire was still within his grasp. Like any man with an obsession or strong desire, the killer would be chomping at the bit to finish what he’d started. It wasn’t as if his plan had been completely spoiled.

  All it would take was a spark thrown in the right direction.

  One stray match from someone walking down the street could catch onto a smudge of kerosene remaining on the boardwalk to turn the street into an inferno. For that reason, Clint and the Texas Rangers had picked a good spot overlooking the street and would take turns keeping watch.

  The danger would pass once all the kerosene had been washed away or the boards that were too soaked had been pulled up. There would also be reason to breathe easier if one of the marshal’s men caught sight of the big killer trying to leave town. Butters seemed to be a better blowhard than he was a lawman, but Clint thought he was capable enough to watch the borders of his own town.

  Bower insisted on taking the first shift of watching the street that was being cleaned up, and Mark offered to go next. That left Clint with a bit of time to himself in which he could rest up for whatever insanity might be coming.

  There was a small bar in the restaurant of the Archer Hotel. Because of that, the place didn’t feel like a restaurant, but it didn’t quite feel like a sal
oon either. It seemed most folks preferred one or the other, which meant the hotel was fairly quiet. While that was bad for business, it was good for Clint’s headache.

  He sat at a small table with his back to the wall, nursing a beer and wondering if the kitchen would still be open this late at night. He was getting tired, but not tired enough for his eyes to play tricks on him. Even so, when he saw Janie McGowan walk through the lobby, he suspected he might have mistaken her for some other redhead.

  Clint took his beer with him as he went to the doorway connecting the restaurant to the lobby. There may have been other redheads in town, but Janie’s curves were unmistakable. Part of him even kicked around the notion of letting her keep walking just so he could watch her from behind.

  “Is that you, Janie?” Clint asked from his spot in the doorway.

  The redhead stopped with one foot perched upon the bottom of the staircase leading up to the guest rooms. She glanced over her shoulder and quickly spotted Clint. Smiling as she walked toward him, she immediately made Clint glad he’d rejected his first idea of letting her pass by.

  Janie wore a different dress than the one she’d had on the last time he’d seen her. This dress wasn’t tainted black by smoke or rumpled from her tussle with a would-be kidnapper, and it was obviously intended for use in the evening. It was made from dark purple velvet and cut down low enough in the front to show Clint plenty of the smooth, creamy skin of her breasts.

  Her bottom lip was plump, and it curved into a warm smile as she got closer to him. When she spoke, it was in a voice that was just as smooth as her skin. “It sure is me,” she said. “I was just coming by to see you.”

  “Well, you found me.”

  “And in good health, I see.”

  Clint nodded and motioned toward the restaurant behind him. “Today was a little rough, but nothing a bit of rest couldn’t cure. Would you like to join me for a drink?”

  “Sure. Are the rest of those men staying here as well? The ones from Texas, I believe?”

  “They’re right upstairs.”