“We take our own bonus first.” The big man, with tobacco drool at the corners of his lips, reached out to touch Sierra’s breast.
His fingers never reached their intended destination. Quick as a cat, Roper stepped toward him, grabbed the man’s arm and yanked him away before latching onto his neck with a vicelike grip. He then slipped his hand upward, grabbing the jaw with one hand, and held the hapless man steady while the razor-sharp Bowie blade raced along the fleshy throat. “Like that, boy?” Roper asked, releasing his hold and letting the guard tumble to the ground to bleed out.
Sierra looked wide-eyed at Roper, who was wiping the knife blade on his britches. She had already seen the man called Georgie go down with arrows sunk in his throat and chest. “I’ll get my hat and tell the others to bring our horses and come on through.” She could not help but be shaken by what had transpired and almost stumbled into Growling Bear, who was headed toward his kill, hopefully to recover his arrows. She would not insult him by reminding the warrior of the “no scalping” order.
When she returned, she found that the corpses had been dragged away from the entrance and secreted someplace. Growling Bear held the reins of two bay geldings she had not noticed previously. He was obviously claiming the horses.
Roper had slipped up silently beside her and startled her when he spoke. “He offered me my pick, but I turned it down. I’d rather be where I’m at than where he’s headed. Figure he can make use of whatever he can cabbage on to.”
She Who Speaks rode her sorrel gelding over to Sierra and dismounted. “Your plan worked flawlessly, it appears.”
“Credit that to Roper and Growling Bear.”
“What’s your next move?”
“Do you have any ideas?” Sierra asked.
“Well, the horse sorting will come later, so we need to sweep all the critters from the canyon. But you will want to confirm that yours are here—or most of them anyway. What if we split up, and I take my warriors and try to quietly dispose of the men at the camp? There cannot be more than a few. We can collect their horses to take with us while you and the Lucky Five crew search out the branch canyons, take care of any guards and drive out the horses. We will join up with you to herd the animals out the east end when you send somebody to tell us you are ready.”
“This will take us some time. As soon as there is gunfire, that starts Grandpa Jack’s troubles at the other end.”
She Who Speaks said, “That’s the only way we get this job finished. We can’t just call it off now. We will just hope we can hold off the shooting as long as possible.”
“I know. I just wish I had called it off a week ago. Of course, Grandpa would tell me I can’t rewrite the past. ‘What’s done is done,’ he would say. Okay, I like your idea.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Smack pushed the door open and nodded for Jack to enter and then stepped back out and closed the door behind the rancher. The room was dusky, but two unframed window openings admitted enough light to allow him to make out the occupants once his eyes adjusted. In the center of the room a diminutive figure sat at a desk, leaning back in his chair and smiling at the visitor. In one corner behind the desk stood an obese, scraggly-bearded man with his hand resting on a pistol holstered on a belt beneath his pendulous belly. In the other corner, a slight Mexican man leaned back against the wall with arms folded across his chest and a smug smile on his face.
“Hello, Alfonso,” Jack said. “It’s been a few years. I think of you every year or two.”
“Oh, I think of you often, I assure you. It is beyond belief that fate would deliver you to Lookout Canyon.”
“I am here as a businessman, not a Ranger.”
“But if you leave, you will inform the Rangers where I am at, won’t you?”
“Why should I care? I’m not a Ranger anymore. I am a businessman with merchandise to sell, and maybe a business proposition.”
“You are, above all, a lying son-of-a-bitch. You didn’t answer my question. Yes or no? Will you inform the Rangers of my whereabouts?”
“I would need to think on that. Depends on whether we make a deal or not.” He stepped forward and tossed the inventory list on the desk. “This is what we’ve got in the wagons and the prices. Ten per cent discount if you take it all off our hands. Then we can talk about the canyon becoming a relay station for our freight business. You could turn your people toward making honest livings.”
“What in the hell are you really here for?” Potter said.
Before Jack could reply, the echo of gunshots from downcanyon drifted through the window openings. The former Alfonso Perez would have an answer to his questions shortly.
A gun roared outside the building.
“What in the hell?” Potter said. “Jorge, see what’s going on. Pronto.”
The Mexican gunfighter slipped one of his pistols from its holster and broke for the door and opened it. He came tumbling back with a mass of black fur nearly swallowing him as he fell to the floor, his pistol clattering away out of reach. He struggled to grasp his other gun, but Thor’s massive jaws closed on Jorge’s neck and the dog’s teeth sank into flesh and tore as blood spewed. The gunfighter cut loose with frantic screaming. “Kill him, kill him.”
Thor kept biting ferociously, chewing up the man’s shoulder and ripping open the hand that tried to push him away. The obese gunman stepped out, trying to aim at the dog,
