One Man's Law Page 8

  Pushing her long, coal black hair behind her ear, she stopped in front of the bakery and asked, “You the man that’s been asking about me?”

  Clint had his answer ready to go, but had to pause for a moment. The woman’s thick Cajun accent had somehow taken away even more of his breath. “Y-yeah,” he said as he clumsily got to his feet. “Are you Patricia?”

  She nodded slowly as if she still didn’t know quite what to make of him. Glancing down at the hand Clint was offering, she waited for a few more seconds before finally shaking it. “Are you a friend of Rand’s?”

  “More of an acquaintance, really. He told me I should find you.”

  “Why?”

  “Is there someplace else you’d rather talk other than the street?”

  Patricia crossed her arms over her chest and cocked her hip to one side. “This street is fine for now. You just say what you wanted to say.”

  “How do you know Liddell?”

  “I only know him through someone else.”

  “A mutual friend?” Clint asked.

  Although Patricia’s expression didn’t exactly change, Clint could read her just enough to detect a flare of anger behind her eyes. It reminded him of someone looking down at her cards in a poker game, hating what she saw and then trying to cover it up.

  “All right,” Clint said. “Maybe not a friend. At least, not anymore.”

  Letting out a breath, Patricia turned on her heels and said, “I don’t have time for this. Leave me alone or I’ll have you run out of this town.”

  “Do you know a man by the name of Brewer?” Clint asked the back of Patricia’s head.

  She stopped in the middle of the street. Even if there’d been something rolling toward her, it seemed doubtful she would step out of its way.

  Reacting to the nibble he’d gotten on the line he’d just cast out, Clint went fishing once more by adding, “Chuck Brewer, to be exact.”

  Patricia turned back around and stomped toward Clint with an expression on her face that made him wonder if he’d done the smart thing in keeping her from leaving. “Who are you?” she demanded. “How do you know me?”

  “I spoke to Liddell yesterday and he told me to come find you.”

  “What did he tell you about me and Brewer?”

  “Nothing,” Clint replied.

  “Then how did you know that I knew him?”

  “When I see someone get that mad that quickly, they’re usually thinking about someone like Brewer.”

  Just when Clint thought Patricia couldn’t look any better, her full lips curled into a smile and he was proven wrong. Even so, there was still a bit of an edge to her voice when she asked, “Are you a friend of Brewer’s too?”

  “Not hardly. I am looking for him, though, and Liddell must think you can be of some help.”

  “Unless you want help in hurting that son of a bitch, I’m not the woman you’re after.”

  “So far, you seem like the answer to my prayers.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  Clint and Patricia walked along a secluded stretch of land that bordered on a swiftly flowing river. The ground was damp beneath their feet and gave a bit under their weight like a mossy sponge. Gnats and mosquitoes buzzed around them, but she didn’t even seem to notice. Clint, on the other hand, couldn’t stop swatting at them.

  “You’re not from around here,” she said.

  “Pardon me for not being too impressed with that observation.”

  Patricia smiled again, but this time it seemed more genuine. She quickly pushed her laugh down again and walked so there was a little more space between her and Clint.

  “So, tell me what you want from me,” she said.

  “I’m after Chuck Brewer.”

  “Are you the law?”

  “No, but you might say I’m working in the interest of the law.”

  She nodded knowingly. “That means you’re a bounty hunter.”

  “Actually, I was riding on a posse with a lawman when we were attacked by Brewer and his gang. We captured them, but Brewer got away and killed some good men in the process. He nearly killed a marshal as well.”

  “That wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “Brewer’s on the run and he’s hiding out in Old Mexico. We tried getting him there, but he’s dug in too deep. Rather than sit and wait for Brewer to kill again, we thought we’d come here to pay a visit to Rand Liddell. He just might be able to tell us a better way to get to Brewer.”

  “He just might,” Patricia said. “Brewer came through here a while ago to tell Liddell to kiss his ass if he thought he was going to risk his neck in trying to break anyone out of Callahan.”

  “Did Liddell tell you this?”

  “No. Brewer did. Bragged about it is more like it.”

  “So are you friend or family to him?”

  Anger flared in Patricia’s eyes, but it quickly faded. “Neither. I was almost dumb enough to share a bed with him, but he threw me away as soon as he realized I’m not some whore.”

  “So you were never ... ?”

  “We were close,” she said. “He thought he was closer. He laid on the charm real thick the moment he saw me, and he never let up. He came here a bunch of times over a few months, and I figured he was here to see his friend in prison. That’s when he told me what he thought about Liddell. He also told me he was coming all this way just to be with me.

  “He was a charming man,” she said with a faraway look in her eyes. “Right until he got tired of talking to me instead of groping me. After I told him to step back one too many times, he got fed up and tried to hurt me bad enough that I wouldn’t be so pretty again. At least, that’s what he said at the time.”

  “He hit you?” Clint asked.

  She nodded slowly and looked toward the river. Even though the town was still close enough to see behind them, the river made it feel as if they were miles away. Judging by the look in Patricia’s eyes, she could have been even farther away.

  “He wanted to beat me to a pulp,” she said. “Maybe even kill me. Instead, he showed just how little he knew about me. He was wrong about me being a whore and he was wrong about me being weak and helpless. I grew up with four brothers, and the first thing any child in a house like that learns is how to defend themself. I may not have been able to do what I wanted to do against that man, but I sure as hell kept him from whipping me like a mule.”

  “Brewer’s probably hurt plenty of other women,” Clint said. “He’s probably even killed some of them.”

  “Oh, I have no doubt about that.”

  “Then will you help me catch him?”

  Shrugging as she put her back to the river so she could face him, Patricia asked, “What can I do? You carry a gun and you must know how to use it. Otherwise, you would have been dead already. What do you want from me?”

  “Liddell seemed to think pretty highly of you. He had a few seconds to tell me something that would show he was earnest in being able to get to Brewer, and you’re the first person he mentioned.”

  “He didn’t say anything else?”

  “He didn’t have enough time to say anything else. I’ll try to talk to him again soon, but I’d like to ask you for your help. I swear I won’t put you in danger, but going against a man like Brewer is never easy. You, more than anyone else, must know how important it is to put him away.”

  “He’s a rabid dog,” she said. “That much I know for certain. I know more about him than I know about you, that’s for sure.”

  “What would you like to know?”

  Patricia looked at Clint to size him up. Although she didn’t seem to be disgusted by what she saw, she also didn’t seem overly pleased. The best read Clint could get off of her was that she was being careful not to put herself at risk any more than she already had. If what she’d told him was true, there was no reason for Clint to expect anything else.

  Holding his empty hands out to either side, Clint filled the silence by saying, “For one thing, you haven’t asked me
my name.”

  “Most men who look at me the way you do would probably just lie about that, just like they’d lie about anything else.”

  “I apologize for that, but it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a woman who looks like you. If you saw the ugly cuss I’ve been riding with to get here from Texas, you wouldn’t blame me for taking a moment to savor such a pretty sight.”

  As much as she tried not to, Patricia gave Clint a genuine smile. “All right, then,” she said while doing her best to put her poker face back on. “What’s your name?”

  “Clint Adams. Pleased to meet you.”

  She nodded slightly and allowed a portion of her smile to return. “We’ll just see about that, Clint Adams.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  Ed was belly down in the muck, had snakes slithering across his back and swore he could hear something big approaching him from not too far away. Crawling on his stomach, his hands pushed through a mix of mud and slime to make a sucking sound every time he moved forward. His feet sank into the wet ground so deep that it was a chore to pull them out again.

  His head was wrapped in a bandanna because he thought that might do some good in keeping the leeches or whatever else out of his hair and ears. Now the bandanna was attached to his scalp and he doubted he could get it off without a fight.

  “Goddamn, Adams,” he muttered as he crawled through a dense bunch of reeds. “Sticking me with this shit work. He wants me to earn my percentage? I’ll earn it by—”

  Ed shut up and froze in his place the moment he heard footsteps stomping toward him. Unlike the steps that had haunted him earlier, he knew these were being made by something that walked on two legs. Ed stared through the reeds and watched for a minute or two before he spotted the guard.

  The big man wasn’t either of the ones who’d greeted Clint at Callahan’s front gate. This was one of the others, who was big enough to put those first two to shame. From his angle with his belly and chin pressed against the swamp’s floor, Ed had to push aside a few of the wider reeds so he could get a better look. There was just one guard this time, but he was carrying enough ammunition for his shotgun to kill half the living things in the swamp.

  For a second, Ed was sure he’d been spotted.

  With his legs splayed out behind him and his body stretched like an overgrown snake, he wondered how the hell he couldn’t be spotted.

  The guard stopped for a second as if he was trying to make out the odd shape in the mud. He shifted his shotgun from one hand to another. Then, he pulled out a wad of tobacco and stuffed it into his lip. From there, the guard continued stomping a path around the wetter section where Ed was laying.

  When he tried to move again, Ed couldn’t so much as budge. Even though he knew better, his first instinct was to strain even harder to free an arm or leg from the mud that had risen up to envelop him. But it wasn’t the mud that had risen. He’d merely sunk down a few inches since he’d stopped to let that guard pass him by.

  Ed only had to be pulled down another couple of inches for him to come to his senses and stop moving. Of course, that was right about the time the putrid water began to seep into his mouth and nose. Forcing out a slow, steady breath, Ed stretched his neck while also dog-paddling slowly toward drier land.

  It wasn’t anything close to swimming, but the slow movements of his arms and legs were enough to get him moving. Panic began to settle in when Ed realized he couldn’t see much difference between the spot where he was and the spot he was moving toward.

  When he sank a bit more, his panic jumped into his throat.

  When his fingers and toes scraped against the bottom of the hole, Ed felt like a kid who’d been flailing desperately in two feet of water.

  “Jesus Christ,” Ed grumbled as he got his legs beneath him and stood up. “I just earned a bigger percentage, that’s for damn sure.”

  Now that he was out of the muck, Ed hunkered down and looked around to get his bearings. He pointed his nose toward the prison grounds and moved in that direction while watching and listening for any more guards.

  He’d been stewing in that mess for over an hour so he could get a feel for the guards’ patterns. The armed men didn’t move like clockwork, but Ed was fairly certain he had a few more minutes before another one came along. Of course, the snares set up here and there didn’t work on any timetable. They were always ready to cripple a man who took one wrong step.

  The dried mud smeared across Ed’s face cracked as he grinned and reached out for the closest trip wire. His fingers pinched the thin fishing line to keep it in place while he reached for the knife hanging from his belt. Ed pulled out the knife, swept it forward and cut the line with one smooth motion.

  Ed’s knuckles were turning white as he tightened his grip on the fishing line. This was one instance where being soaked in filthy sludge had given him an advantage. His fingers were so crusted and wrinkled that it made it easier to hold on to the line as he placed his knife back into its scabbard.

  Crouching down so he could follow the line to its source, Ed slowly eased it back until he heard a slow rustling coming from the ground nearby. When he saw the bent rod with the narrow spikes driven through it, Ed shook his head as if he were watching a kid take shots at him with a toy gun. Once enough tension had been relieved from the rod, Ed separated his fingers and allowed the spikes to smack against his boots.

  He kept walking toward the prison and quickly fell into a pattern of his own. Whenever he heard movement, he stopped and held his knife at the ready. He would quickly start to move again, while circling around whatever had been moving. Before too much longer, he spotted the rusted iron fence surrounding the prison.

  Glancing down at his own arm, Ed saw he was covered with a thick, hardened layer of mud and weeds. Since he’d made it this far, he decided to try and save some time by walking the perimeter of the fence instead of putting that off for his next visit.

  Ed stretched out his left hand while keeping his knife in his right. As he shuffled along the fence, he let his fingers drift along the bars so he could feel each of them in turn. Every now and then he stopped and tested a few of the bars. He even got bold enough to tap some of them with his blade. After he’d learned what he wanted to learn, Ed turned and headed back into the swamp.

  “Hello?” came a man’s voice with a thick Southern drawl. “That you, Bill?”

  Ed was already crouched, but he hunkered down even lower as he brought his knife even closer to his chest.

  The big guard stomped toward the fence with his shotgun held in front of him. Every step he took caused Ed to lower himself even more, until he was once again flat on his belly.

  Stopping less than a dozen paces from where Ed was hiding, the guard looked at the fence and shifted his shotgun back and forth.

  Ed held his breath while also figuring the strength and angle he would use to throw his knife into the guard’s neck.

  “Billy?” The guard grunted again. When he didn’t get a response, the big man shook his head and walked in another direction.

  Ed got back to his feet and hurried away from both the fence and the guard. Although the mud crust covering him from head to toe had been enough to hide him once, he wasn’t about to push his luck a second time. Just as he was thinking that he’d moved clear of the guards and the traps, Ed saw something rushing toward him from his right side.

  Reflexively, Ed’s fingers tightened around the handle of his knife. He turned and saw that he was seconds away from being knocked off his feet.

  At the last possible second, Ed planted his feet, brought his blade down and buried it deep into the top of the gator’s head that had been about to clamp down on Ed’s leg.

  The gator struggled, thrashed and kicked, but stopped moving completely after a twist from Ed’s knife.

  “Percentage, my ass,” Ed muttered as he pulled his knife free and kept running. “I just earned that whole goddamn reward.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The biggest saloon in t
own was only marked by a wooden sign with a crude picture of a bullfrog on it. It was easy enough to find, however, since nearly everyone who lived in the area was drinking, laughing or gambling in there. Clint sat at a small table not too far from the door, listening to a banjo player and watching a drunken Frenchwoman try to dance.

  Clint saw Ed walk past the front window. The one-eyed man stopped to look at the sign over the door, shook his head in disgust and stepped inside. Seeing Clint wave to him didn’t do much to take that disgust off of Ed’s face.

  “I almost didn’t recognize you, Ed,” Clint said. “You’re clean as a whistle and smell like a rose.”

  “I’d better. I had to take three baths to get the stink of that swamp offa me. Three baths which I had to pay for, by the way.”

  “Sounds rough.”

  “Maybe I should get paid back,” Ed snarled. “It is a business expense, you know.”

  “I never even knew you could sound so professional,” Clint chided. “How about I pay for the drinks, instead?”

  “It was your damn idea for me to crawl around in that goddamn filth.”

  “I never told you to crawl. Besides, I’m used to you smelling like a horse’s ass, so you didn’t have to bathe on my account.”

  Ed looked as if he was about to take a swing at Clint. His mood improved slightly when a fresh mug of beer was set down in front of him. “What the hell are you so happy about?”

  “I just got an idea of what I was missing by staying in town.”

  As much as Ed wanted to knock Clint’s head off his shoulders, he drained half his beer and let himself be distracted by the drunken Frenchwoman.

  “What did you find out while you were out today?” Clint asked.

  Staring at two big fellows leaning against the bar, Ed asked, “You know them two are guards over at Callahan?”

  “Do you think they can hear us through all of this noise?”

  Ed shrugged and looked away from the bar. “I found a path through the swamp that leads right up to that fence. There’s some traps scattered around, but most of them look like they were set up by a bored rabbit hunter God knows how long ago.”