first shot had been fired. He knew better than anyone that it was always easier to talk like an outlaw than ride like one.
“They sure as hell ain’t turning,” Long Face said to Joseph. “You think we can outrun them?”
“If you don’t mind giving them your back,” Joseph replied. Seeing the way the men were squinting ahead at the approaching horses, he drew his own gun and pointed it toward the other group. “It’s the posse!” he shouted. “That’s one of them right up front!” Before anyone could say a word or do a thing, Joseph pulled his trigger.
The shot cracked through the air, but Nick didn’t hear the hiss of a bullet come anywhere close to him. Even so, he took a shot of his own. “They’re shooting at us!”
That was all the rest of the men needed to hear before they took aim and started firing wildly.
Nick gritted his teeth and kept shooting well above the other riders until he could make out which of them was Joseph. As return fire started coming back at him, he prayed that Joseph’s men were as rattled as the ones behind him.
Joseph didn’t need to act in order to look rattled. He’d heard about men riding into battle during the war and always figured it was terrifying. This scene was more than enough to prove those stories right.
Glancing over his shoulder, he could see the hardened faces of the remaining riders as they squeezed off shot after shot. The bullets flew in a steady stream, most of which came from pistols. Long Face had enough presence of mind to draw the rifle from his saddle and take his time before pulling his trigger. Joseph kept firing and then eased his horse slightly away from the rest.
“One of them’s bolting!” Nick shouted. “Let him go. Try to get the rest before they get too close.” Even though he repeated himself a few times, Nick knew his voice was being swallowed up in the growing crackle of gunfire.
As the two groups drew closer, the gunfire intensified. A few men around Nick let out pained grunts as some of the bullets found their mark. None of the men had fallen, but with the shots hissing closer and closer, that would change soon enough.
THIRTY-ONE
Nick steered Kazys away from the group, but a few of the horsemen followed. He knew that, soon, men on either side might recognize a familiar face or two. He wasn’t certain any of the new prospects had met each other, but it was always better to assume the worst.
As if reading his mind, Joseph let out a piercing whistle that could be heard over the gunshots and thunder of horses. A loud holler followed as Joseph snapped his reins and steered his horse back around to the group, which turned their horses directly toward Nick’s group.
Recognizing an experienced cattle driver when he saw one, Nick snapped the reins and touched his heels to Kazys’s sides. The horse responded immediately and put some extra steam into his strides. From there, all Nick had to do was guide the horse with an experienced hand and hang on for the ride as he used the same tactic to get his own men charging faster.
The groups rushed toward each other like steam engines on a collision course.
Shots blasted between them and men screamed curses back and forth.
The chaos lasted for a few seconds before building to a peak. After that, the men closed to within a pistol’s effective range. Two riders from Nick’s group were ripped from their saddles and one from Joseph’s bunch fell. One of Nick’s boys pulled his horse to one side and tore away from the fight as fast as he could.
“There’s no way I’m going to that fort!” Long Face said as he sighted down his barrel and shot one of their opponents off his horse. “Lord only knows how many more lawmen are coming.”
Joseph tried not to look angry that the other man was sticking so close to him. “Then get as far from here as you can! Just go!”
“To hell with that! I’m riding to that ranch. Mister Bertram may be mad now, but he’ll take all the help he can get when they start that raid.” Shifting in his saddle, he shouted, “Come on with me!”
One of the men jerked back as a bullet ripped through his shoulder, but he managed to stay on his horse and nod to Long Face.
“You coming along?” Long Face asked.
Joseph heard a bullet hiss past him and got his horse running in the opposite direction from the others. “That’s not my dance,” he said.
Long Face waved him off and got moving. He switched to a fresh pistol from his double-rig holster, fired at the other riders and headed west.
“Dammit,” Joseph muttered, as more and more bullets were aimed in his direction.
“They’re running!” Nick shouted to the three men that were left in their saddles on his side.
A few more shots were fired, but those quickly tapered off. After that, there came the metallic clicks and rattles of cylinders being emptied and fresh rounds being put in their place.
“I say we go after them,” one of the horsemen shouted. He was a thick man with a head so bald that it shone like a wet rock in the moonlight.
“We ain’t even getting paid yet!” the youngest of the horsemen replied. “This was just to keep from gettin’ strung up!”
“They’re already gone,” Nick said. “That fort’s probably full of dead men by now. You men should just get the hell away from here.”
“The fuck I will,” the bald horseman snarled. “Those goddamn law dogs killed my partner and tried to kill the rest of us. I don’t let nothing like that pass.”
Nick shook his head and tried not to feed the other man’s fire, but he could tell that at least one of the others was starting to be swayed. The third horseman was the youngest. He hadn’t spoken either way on the matter, but was already maneuvering his horse next to the bald man.
“Look there,” the bald horseman said. “One of ’em’s coming this way.”
Nick had to squint, but he could see that one horse was circling back. Despite the great pains Joseph was taking in riding as stealthily as possible, the terrain was simply too open for a rider to go unnoticed for long.
“He is coming back,” the youngest rider said. “He might be scouting so the rest of them can attack us again.”
“Or his horse is scared,” Nick offered anxiously. “If they’re lawmen, we can’t stand around and let this one see our faces. If they’re vigilantes, I sure as hell don’t want to give them another reason to come after us. Just get the hell out of here and be done with it! He won’t be able to spot any of us if we cut out now.”
As he fixed his eyes upon the horse in the distance, the bald horseman switched his pistol into his left hand while taking up his rifle in his right. “Fucking lawman. Fucking vigilante. Whoever this asshole is, he’s gonna regret not running with his chicken-shit friends when he had the chance.”
“Let him go,” Nick said sternly. “We shouldn’t push our luck.”
Even the younger horseman picked up on the change in Nick’s tone. All of the remaining three riders now watched him as carefully as they were watching Joseph closing in on them from the shadows.
“What’s the matter?” the bald one asked. “You gone sweet on those fellas?”
“No. I just want to get out of here without having to dodge any more bullets.”
“I think you gone sweet on them. Or maybe you’re with them. You sure seemed to lead us straight into this shit storm.”
The young horseman started to nod as his eyes grew wider. “Yeah! Yeah, he did. Holy shit!”
“This is crazy,” Nick groaned. “They were shooting at me just like they were shooting at you.”
“But they didn’t hit you.”
“They didn’t hit you, either.”
“But I’m not the one that wants to let ’em go.” Turning to address the other two, the bald horseman said, “You know what Mister Bertram would like? If we dropped this cowardly asshole right here!”
Just as the other two horsemen started to raise their voices in agreement, three shots blasted through the air: one for each of them.
Nick had drawn and fired all three shots from waist level before any of the others even knew what
