The Killing Blow

by J. R. Roberts

  “Well, it looks like we might have shaken them loose.”

  “And what if we didn’t?”

  “In that case,” Clint said as he left most of the town behind him and snapped Eclipse’s reins, “we’ll just have to make them regret getting on their horses today.”

  Clint couldn’t tell if he felt relief or fear coming from the mousy woman behind him. Whichever it was, it made Lisa hold onto Clint that much tighter.

  EIGHTEEN

  Judging by how fiercely the other riders bolted through the more crowded section of town, they weren’t about to let Clint get away from them. Even though Clint had every confidence that Eclipse could outrun any of those other horses, he decided to slow down and let them catch up once they were on the outermost edge of Westerlake.

  The trail still had a few buildings along its edges, but most of them were about to fall over. Since they were pretty much abandoned as well, Clint slowed Eclipse down and circled around one of the bigger buildings. The place felt like an abandoned boomtown, which was odd since the sounds of the more populated area could still be heard.

  “Why are we stopping?” Lisa asked as she nervously tapped Eclipse with her heels.

  Eclipse waggled his head and let out a few annoyed snuffs, but didn’t move a muscle in response to Lisa’s kicking.

  “Just climb down here and stay put.”

  Looking around at the empty lot behind the building, Lisa shook her head. “I’ll be fine with you.”

  “Just do as I say. You either trust me or you don’t and if you don’t trust me, you’re better off on your own.”

  Unable to come up with a good argument, Lisa grudgingly slid down from Eclipse’s back. Clint took hold of her arm to help her down, but Lisa quickly pulled away from him. “You’d better come back for me,” she said.

  But Clint was already riding back around the building to leave her alone. Lisa leaned against a wall, crossed her arms and closed her eyes so she could focus more on listening to what happened in the street.

  Clint just made it back around the building when he spotted the other riders charge straight toward him. There were four of them this time and they came to a skidding stop the moment they caught sight of Clint.

  One of the riders was older than all of the riders that had met Clint and Ordell outside of town. In fact, he looked like one of the mountain men that had been at the trading post where the bear skin was now on display. His face was covered by a bushy beard and he wore a pistol strapped across his belly.

  Two of the riders were Indians dressed in dusty jeans and faded shirts. One of those Indians had a shotgun in hand, while the other kept his rifle in the holster on the side of his saddle.

  The fourth rider was closer to the others Clint had seen before. He was a clean-shaven kid with long, stringy hair. He was also the first one to jump down from his horse and stomp forward as if he meant to pull Clint down to his level.

  “Get back here, Will,” the mountain man said, “before you get yourself hurt.”

  Will stopped where he was, but didn’t take one step back. “Where is she?” he asked Clint. “We know you had her. What’d she do? Hire you to get her past us?”

  “Why would she need to do that?” Clint asked.

  “You could ask her bastard kid about that.”

  Clint’s eyes narrowed as he studied the faces around him. As near as he could figure, none of those men knew Josh was already dead.

  “Just take a step back, kid,” Clint said. Looking over to the mountain man, he asked, “What the hell’s the meaning of this?”

  “I know you was with Mark Ordell. I saw you and him splitting up that reward money.”

  “So?”

  “So tell me where he is or we’ll just start shooting pieces off of you until you feel like talking.”

  With that, the mountain man and both Indians got their weapons ready to fire. None of them took aim, but that didn’t make Clint feel any better.

  “What’s your problem with Mark Ordell?” Clint asked.

  The mountain man’s lip curled under his beard as he stared unblinkingly at Clint. He spoke in a gravelly rasp when he asked, “You really don’t know, do you?”

  “If I did, why would I ask?”

  “Then what are you doing with that woman?”

  Deciding to test the waters a bit more, Clint replied, “None of your business.”

  “What about the men that bastard killed?” the mountain man snarled. “Is it their business?”

  “You know something? I’m getting pretty damn sick of hearing you talk about things that I’ve never even heard about before. If you’re so pissed off at me, then at least tell me why. If it doesn’t have to do with me, then ride away and we can all get back to our lives.”

  “Watch your tongue, mister,” Will said. “You’ll tell us where that bitch is and you’ll do it real quick.”

  Clint couldn’t help but notice that Will’s hand had tightened around his gun. The kid had holstered the weapon when climbing down from his horse, but now held onto the grip as if he were about to clear leather at any second.

  “Or what, boy?” Clint snarled.

  The fierceness in Clint’s eyes was almost enough to back the kid all the way to his horse. Although Will didn’t quite move that far away, he did take a couple steps back before he managed to push down the instinct.

  “Damn it, Will, get back here,” the mountain man snarled.

  But the kid wasn’t listening. His eyes were narrowed down to slits and his lips were drawn tightly against his teeth.

  Clint realized he was gritting his teeth almost as much as the kid. Since he had enough experience to know where bad intentions could take two armed men, he let out a breath and slowly held his hands to the sides to show Will his empty palms.

  “It’s been a long couple of days, kid,” Clint said. “Let’s not make it any worse.”

  Will shook his head.

  Leaning forward in his saddle, the mountain man barked, “I said get back here right now!”

  Still shaking his head, Will planted his feet. “To hell with that,” he said. Then, he pulled his gun from its holster and even managed to touch his trigger before a shot from Clint’s modified Colt punched through his chest.

  NINETEEN

  There was an instinct in Clint’s head that wanted him to shift his aim and fire at the other gunmen before they opened up on him. But he managed to push that instinct down since he didn’t see one bit of movement from any of those three other men. Still, he kept the Colt in his hand just to be safe.

  Smoke curled from his barrel as Clint let his eyes sweep over the remaining gunmen.

  Moving just his mouth, the mountain man said, “Crow, pick him up.”

  The Indian with the rifle kept his eyes on Clint while climbing off his horse. He landed on the balls of his feet without making more than a subtle crunch of dirt. Still keeping his rifle at the ready, he walked over to where Will had landed and easily hefted the kid over one shoulder.

  As Crow strapped the body to the kid’s horse, the mountain man said, “That wasn’t supposed to happen, mister. You gotta believe me on that.”

  “Why should I?” Clint asked.

  “No reason, except that me and these two Indians could have gunned you down where you stand if we wanted to.”

  Clint nodded slowly. “Maybe. Why’d this kid want to get his hands on that lady so badly?”

  “Because she’s the only one that Josh would have spoken to. And she’s also the only one around here who knows what her brother’s been doing these last few years.”

  “Mark?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “What’s he been doing?” Clint asked.

  “Making a hell of a living scalping Crow and Three’s people for one.”

  When Clint looked over to the Indians, he saw their faces darken as if ghosts had just drifted past them.

  “He’s also been putting together hunts for himself and a few rich folks,” th
e mountain man continued. “And he ain’t been hunting much of anything on four legs.”

  “He hunts people?”

  The mountain man nodded. “Been doing it for a while. His nephew found out about it and tried to do something about it. He got a little squeamish, though, when push came to shove and he decided not to take what he knew to the law like he said he would before. That’s when me and some of the other relatives of folks that were killed got together to do some convincing of our own.”

  Clint scowled and shook his head in disgust. “And that includes convincing women like Lisa Ordell?”

  “Your friend Mark Ordell don’t just kill men. He’s killed women and children in order to flush out his prey. One poor lady lost her leg in a trap and Mark was the one who kept her out there screaming until the right person heard her. I’ve got plenty more of these stories, but the longer I sit here talking to you about them, the more of a head start Mark gets.”

  “So why waste your time here?”

  “Because we want the woman,” the mountain man replied. “I doubt Mark has enough of a soul left to care if we hold her hostage, but there’s always that possibility. Even if he don’t care, she’s got to know something about where he went or what he’s got in mind.”

  “I’m not letting you take her,” Clint said plainly. “Whatever Mark’s done, hurting her won’t help matters. It’ll just make you every bit as bad as he is.”

  The mountain man shook his head slowly. “After I lost my own kin to that killer, I have a real hard time caring about what’s right or wrong anymore. All I know is that Mark Ordell needs to die and he needs to die real slow.

  “The only reason I’m not saying the same about you is because I’m startin’ to think you truly didn’t know who you were working with. You can prove me right by putting this place behind you and letting us do our work, because it’s gonna get real bloody before too long and you’ll do well to stay clear of it.”

  “Mourn your dead and honor their memory,” Clint said. “But don’t spill more blood in their name.”

  “This ain’t for them,” the mountain man said. “You can be damn sure about that.”

  TWENTY

  Clint rode around the building and had no trouble whatsoever finding Lisa. That was due to the fact that she was standing right where he’d left her, with her arms crossed and a bored look on her face. For a second, Clint considered asking if she’d even heard the gunshots.

  “Where’d those men go?” she asked.

  “Away,” Clint replied while reaching a hand down to her. “Now let’s do the same.”

  “You sure they’re gone? Those bastards’ve been coming after me relentless. Especially that kid.”

  “The kid’s dead. Now, let’s get moving.”

  Oddly enough, Lisa seemed a bit shocked by the bluntness in Clint’s voice. She took his hand, climbed onto the saddle behind him and held on for the ride. Her grip relaxed a bit when Eclipse rounded the corner and she could see that the rest of the street was as empty as Clint had claimed.

  They rode in silence all the way out to the spot where Clint and Ordell had met up with Josh and the other riders. Clouds had rolled in from the north to cast a gray hue to the sky, while also adding the cold promise of rain. That seemed to be enough to keep the road clear, since they didn’t pass a single other soul until they got into the trees where Clint had told Allison to go and hide.

  Lisa kept her face resting against Clint’s shoulder until she felt the Darley Arabian come to a stop. She then looked around as if she’d just woken up from a sleep.

  “This the place?” she asked.

  Clint pointed toward a mound of freshly turned dirt that was marked by a simple cross made from two lashed-together boards. It was a simple grave, but it was the best Clint could manage when he’d raced out to this spot earlier to bury the kid rather than have his mother see him lying where he’d been dropped.

  Lisa climbed down and walked slowly toward the grave. She stood there for a few seconds, gazing at the cross. Then, she muttered, “I want to see him.”

  “He’s there, Lisa,” Clint said. “Trust me.”

  Shaking her head, she lowered herself to her knees with her hands folded in her lap. “It ain’t about trust. I just . . . need to see his face. I need to see my boy’s face.”

  Any other time, the request might have seemed odd. The solution to the request would have definitely seemed morbid, but the sorrow in Lisa’s voice told Clint everything he needed to know.

  Getting to his knees, Clint brushed away some of the dirt closer to where the cross was planted in the ground. “He’s right here,” he said.

  Lisa’s hands moved in to push away the dirt while brushing Clint away in the process. Her eyes were focused upon the ground and stayed that way until her hands finally touched something that wasn’t the ground itself.

  Letting out a trembling breath, she dug a little more and then finally uncovered the kid’s face. Lisa uncovered Josh’s shoulders and part of his chest before she lost the energy to move. Her hands stayed buried in the dirt and were the only things keeping the rest of her body propped up.

  Clint couldn’t make out what she whispered and didn’t even try. Whatever they were, those words obviously weren’t intended for his ears. He took a few steps back and waited until she straightened up, collected herself and started pushing the dirt back onto her son.

  “Mark killed him?” she asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. Josh had a gun drawn and looked ready to pull the trigger himself, but Mark did kill him.”

  “So, maybe he had to and maybe he didn’t. I guess I’ll never know.”

  “You don’t seem too surprised by all of this.”

  She shook her head slowly. “It’s been brewing for a good, long while.”

  “If you tell me what happened, there’s a chance I could do something about it.”

  Lisa Ordell looked at Clint as if she were staring all the way down to his soul. Her mouth was closed tightly and her hands were clasped in front of her so hard that her knuckles had gone white. “And just what could you do about it? You intend on bringing my boy back to me? You’re too late for that. You intend on dragging my brother back here? I don’t ever want to see that man’s face again.”

  “Why would Mark kill his nephew?” Clint asked.

  Only now did Lisa look away from Clint’s face. She seemed to have seen what she needed to see, which made her talk in a solid, unwavering tone. “Mark’s been hunting things since he was a boy. My father hunted and even I hunted. But Mark started becoming something else. He became a killer and I don’t know why.

  “What I do know is that Mark started getting into fights just so he could fight. He got himself into bad spots so he wouldn’t have any choice but to shoot his way out of it. At some point he stopped looking for excuses and he began to just kill for the sake of the kill.”

  Glancing down at the cross, she said, “Somehow, Josh found out about it. My boy loved his uncle and followed him around whenever he was in town. One day he saw Mark chase down a man and run him through the woods like a deer. This is what he told me.”

  “Go on,” Clint said.

  “Josh went to him and found out that Mark had done this plenty of times. It took a while, but Josh finally came and told me about it when he heard that one man Mark killed didn’t do nothing to nobody.” Blinking and looking at Clint, she added, “Josh used to see them notices at the sheriff’s office about wanted men. He used to ask me if his uncle Mark ever caught one of them, so I guess Mark might have mentioned being a bounty hunter somewhere along the way.

  “But Ed Gray never harmed a hair on a dog’s head, much less did anything to warrant being killed the way he was.”

  “Ed Gray?”

  She nodded. “He was found gutted in the woods a year ago. Gutted,” she repeated. “Like an animal. Just the way Mark used to gut the animals he and our father used to kill.” Lisa shook her head as more tears streamed down her face. “I didn’
t know what to do. Josh wanted to confront Mark about it, but I told him not to because I knew Mark would hurt him. I just knew.

  “Josh must have told someone else about it, because folks started coming to me and demanding I tell them what I’m telling you now. Right about then, Josh lost track of Mark. When that reward was posted for that bear, we both knew Mark would go after it. That’s just the sort of thing Mark lives for.

  “Josh got it in his head to find Mark by following that bear and then giving the reward money to Ed Gray’s family or anyone else he could find that Mark had hurt. It sounds silly,” Lisa said in disbelief. “And I told him as much.”

  “It’s not silly,” Clint told her. “It sounds like the best solution he could come up with at the time. Anyone who would truly do something like that has their heart in the right place.”

  “Thanks for saying so, but it don’t make me feel any better. Mark killed my son and he’s still out there doing whatever he pleases.”

  “Tell me where to find him,” Clint said. “And I’ll see about getting this resolved once and for all.”

  She stared at him and nodded. “I believe you’d really do that. If you want to look for him, try my father’s old hunting cabin. Mark loved that place and always thought he was the only one that knew about it. Josh also told me of a few spots where Mark was supposed to have taken some of the men that were . . . that were killed.”

  “I’ll find him.”

  “Do what you want. Right now, I want to be alone with my boy.”

  Clint gave her some time to mourn in peace.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Now that he had some names to go along with the accusations, Clint knew he could dig up plenty more regarding the wild things he’d heard about Mark Ordell. Even as he’d waited in the woods for Lisa to walk out to him, he had a hard time imagining those things were true.

  Part of that was because Ordell didn’t quite seem like the sort to do those things. On the other hand, Clint already had a suspicion that there was plenty running beneath the man’s surface.