ROBERT J. RANDISI
The Lawman
LUCKY SHOT
“Senor, I am sure you have taken the wrong attitude. We are not bandidos, we are just a little bit down on our luck. We would appreciate it if you could help us out.”
“No.”
Gold Tooth’s face went from amiable to stern.
“Senor, please, you are being insulting.”
“Not yet,” Decker said, “but I’ll be getting there soon if you and your friend don’t ride…now!”
“Ay-yay-yay-yay,” Gold Tooth said, shaking his head at the gringo’s folly.
His compadre was obviously watching Gold Tooth closely, for when the leader made his move for his gun, so did the other man.
Decker never even pulled his sawed-off, cut-down shotgun from its holster. He simply swiveled his holster up and fired that way. The cloud of double-o came out and spread just enough to catch both men. Had they remained side by side he might have missed one, but in moving back the second man had positioned himself not perfectly, but certainly more helpfully, giving the shot pattern time to spread. At the proper distance, a shotgun is simply a devastating weapon that not only kills, but disfigures and dismembers as well.
Prologue I
Johnny “Red” Moran woke to a warm presence next to him. A warm, naked presence.
He frowned, trying to remember who it was without looking. Finally, he had to give up, turn over and take a look.
“Wake up!” he said, slapping her on the ass.
“Hey!”
The girl’s head snapped up and she looked around. Red got a good look at her face then, but the name still didn’t come to him.
“Good morning, honey,” she said, smiling.
She shouldn’t have smiled. She had a decent body, though a little heavy in the breasts and flanks, but her teeth were bad. She really shouldn’t have smiled.
“Time for you to get moving,” he said.
“Now?” she asked. “It’s early.”
“It’s gettin’ later all the time.”
She frowned at him, then said, “You don’t remember my name, do you?”
“No, I don’t. Get out.”
She sat up so he could see her breasts. They were large and beginning to sag. From behind she looked like a girl, but from the front he could see that she was creeping up on thirty pretty quick.
“You ready to give me a wakerupper?”
“I’m always ready, honey.”
He slid his hand down over her fleshy belly to her thigh, where he pinched her flesh between his fingers.
“Oh—” she said, closing her eyes and biting her bottom lip in pain. “Hey—”
“I told you to get out,” he said, “and I meant it.” He let her go and snapped, “Now get dressed and get out.”
“Okay, okay” she said, her eyes wet with pain.
She stood up and he watched her as she hurriedly dressed. If she was the best this town had to offer him after two months, then it was time to move on.
When she was dressed she rushed to the door and opened it, then stopped and turned.
“Mandy” she said.
“What?”
“My name is Mandy,” she said, and then burst into tears and ran from the room.
“Jesus,” he said, shaking his head.
Moran got dressed, strapped on his gun, chucked some belongings into his saddlebags and carried them downstairs with him.
“Goin’ someplace, Sheriff?” the desk clerk asked.
“No place in particular, Jed.”
He left the hotel and walked over to the livery stable.
“Would you mind saddling my horse, Arnold?” he asked the towheaded sixteen-year-old who worked there.
“Sure, Sheriff. Goin’ someplace?”
“No place special, son.”
When his horse was saddled, Red Moran, sheriff of Pemberton, rode him over to the bank. He sat tall in the saddle, tall and wide shouldered. No one knew why Moran called himself “Red.” It certainly wasn’t because he had red hair. He had hair so blond that it sometimes seemed as if he had no hair at all. Still, when asked what people should call him, he always answered, “Call me Red.”
And so they did.
Sheriff Red Moran.
Moran had been sheriff of six different towns in the last eight months, towns that had been looking for lawmen. When he got tired of a town he moved on, and he usually got tired within two or three months.
Before he moved on, though, there was something he had to do—something he always did.
He went to the bank.
He left his horse outside and walked into the bank. It was early, and there were only two customers. He asked the teller to get the bank manager, Mr. Hampton.
“Sure, Sheriff.”
When Hampton came out he said, “What can I do for you, Sheriff?”
