The Badger's Revenge

what his next move would be.

An empty keg nearly blocked his exit from the compact alleyway, if it could be called that, but Josiah was certain he could jump it.

Another shot rang out behind him, and a bullet dug into the dirt a couple inches from the heel of his boot.

Josiah jumped but did not run out into the light. Not yet.

Another shot came. This time, an inch closer. The next one would be right on target if Josiah didn’t move quickly.

Big Shirt was yelling at the top of his lungs in his native tongue, as he and his horse danced at the other end of the building—a raging silhouette born of wartime nightmares that ended in nothing but blood and death.

Without warning, Big Shirt jumped off the horse and disappeared briefly into the darkness. The shooting stopped, and Josiah saw Big Shirt return and lift Little Shirt to his feet, forgoing a shot at Josiah, instead offering aid to his brother.

There was only a matter of seconds to decide what to do next. Hurrying footsteps through the saloon grabbed his attention as precious seconds ticked away.

Three men pushed through the batwings of the Tall Gate Saloon, turning their heads up and down the street, searching for the cause of the ruckus, each with a gun in his hand, his fingers ready on the trigger.

It only took one short second for Josiah to determine that one of the men was Liam O’Reilly.

Just as Josiah had thought, the outlaw was riding with the law, even though he wasn’t wearing a badge. Not like in Waco. The other two men were unfamiliar to Josiah, but both of them were wearing silver stars on their chests.

If Josiah had been a praying man, he would have started a conversation with God right then and there—or earlier, when he’d been taken captive by the Comanche. But the fact was that Josiah Wolfe wasn’t much of a churchgoer or a praying man. As far as he was concerned his own fate rested squarely on his own shoulders.

He’d never had the curiosity or the push toward church from his parents to decide one way or another whether the promise of eternal life was real or a tall tale. His folks had left that choice up to him. The war had almost made him a believer, his survival a testament to something other than luck . . . but even then, he couldn’t bring himself to ask an invisible force for help as so many of his brethren soldiers had done. But it was his wife Lily’s death that had put the final hard glaze on his heart and shut out any possibility of belief in an all-knowing, all-loving and -forgiving God who had time to come to his side when Josiah needed help.

As his wife and three daughters lay dying from the fevers, the preacher man from Tyler wouldn’t come out to the cabin, though Lily had requested his presence—since she was a believer—to pray them into Heaven, for fear of contracting the sickness himself. Lily was heartbroken and lapsed into a forever sleep, then died, with the certain fear she was on her way to Hell because she had not been blessed by a man of God.

There was no forgiving that man as far as Josiah was concerned.

Big Shirt fired another shot blindly into the alley. This time the bullet grazed Josiah’s calf.

His first instinct was to scream out, but Josiah put his wrist up to his mouth to shield any sound of breathing that might clue O’Reilly and his men in to the fact that he was only a few feet away from them.

He restrained himself as much as he could, bit into the cloth of his shirt, trying his best not to scream out, not to make any noise at all.

Big Shirt called out again, this time for help, clearly in English.

“Damn it, they’ve let loose of Wolfe.” There was no mistaking the Irish brogue, no mistaking Liam O’Reilly’s angry voice. “Stay here, Clarmont, just in case he comes up this way.”

The man nodded in agreement, then O’Reilly and the other man turned and disappeared back into the saloon.

Josiah assumed the two were hustling to the back of the saloon to help Big Shirt. It looked like it would be a one-on-one fight, if it came to that, with the remaining man, Clarmont.

Josiah wanted to avoid fighting the man at all costs. The pain in his leg was worsening, and his pant leg was wet with blood. The air smelled of gunpowder and death, an all too familiar odor that Josiah hoped never to become immune to. But it was his blood he smelled, and the pain was excruciating.

Without any further hesitation, Josiah picked up a rock and chucked it as hard as he could down the boardwalk, opposite the entrance into the Tall Gate.

He quickly scurried to the ground and found another rock that fit neatly into the palm of his hand, a crude weapon, but a weapon nonetheless, which might help even the stakes if he did have to take on Clarmont in a hand- to-hand fight.

The rock clunked on the hard, dry wood, capturing the man’s attention.

“Hey,” Clarmont yelled out. “Who is that?” He walked right by Josiah, who had ducked back behind the keg.

Behind him, Josiah could hear yelling—Irish and Comanche, a mix of anger on two foreign tongues that needed no translator to understand.

Clarmont had his back to Josiah, went about ten feet past him, then he stopped.

It was now or never, so Josiah mustered all the energy he had, kept his mouth clamped so he wouldn’t cry out in pain, jumped over the boardwalk, and took off straight across the street—hoping like hell he could disappear into the shadows before O’Reilly’s man was able to get a shot off at him.

The door to the Darcy Hotel was ajar, and Josiah pushed it open without slowing his run from across the street.

Somewhere behind him, a shot was fired, and Clarmont yelled for him to stop, but Josiah didn’t stop running, he just kept on pushing, the burning pain in his leg not slowing him down, hanging on to the rock like it was a brandnew Peacemaker made out of solid gold.

A tall woman dressed in the latest fashions gasped and pulled her daughter close to her, most assuredly assuming that Josiah was an outlaw on the run, as he ran into the hotel lobby.

The woman had perfect blond hair, suddenly reminding Josiah of Pearl Fikes. Pearl was the daughter of the late Captain Fikes, and the first woman since Lily had died that had caught Josiah’s eye. This woman wore an elegant, tall, dark blue velvet hat with several white and gray bird feathers sprouting from the center. Her jacket covered a blouse of scalloped lace, with a standing pleated collar, and she was wearing a long skirt the color of which perfectly matched her blue hat. She was a fine-looking lady, well put together, probably waiting for a Butterfield to points unknown.

The Darcy Hotel was a three-storey affair, an example of perfection and high manners rarely seen in such a small town as Comanche. Josiah wouldn’t have noticed the stateliness of the lobby and the hotel itself if it wasn’t for the woman and child, who was probably about twelve, near the age of his oldest daughter—if she had lived.

“Sorry, ma’am,” Josiah said, slowing to doff his sweatsoaked brown felt Stetson.

The woman stepped back, fear frozen hard on her face as she gripped the little girl tighter.

Josiah stopped for just a second to get his bearings, looking for a way out of the hotel. “I’m not here to cause anyone harm,” he said, making eye contact with the girl. The thought of causing a child any undo stress was unthinkable to Josiah.

“You will have to leave this instant, sir!” A mousy clerk yelled from behind the marble counter just inside the door.

The clerk’s collar was pressed into high wings, a black ribbon tie pulled tight at the neck, making his Adam’s apple bulge unnaturally. He looked proper, well scrubbed, like he’d been a fixture at the hotel for a long time. For all Josiah knew, the man was the owner.

But it didn’t really matter.

Josiah took a deep breath and ran directly toward the clerk, propelling himself over the counter with one hand, trying his best not to land on his injured leg, making sure at the same time he didn’t lose the rock.

The clerk screamed and went tumbling backward, trying to avoid Josiah’s perceived attack.

The noise from the clerk’s mouth sounded more like something that would have come from the woman’s