A Savage Breed (Splatter Western Book 6) by Patrick C. Harrison III

Author:Patrick C. Harrison III [Harrison III, Patrick C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: epub, ebook, QuarkXPress
Publisher: Death's Head Press
Published: 2020-10-06T20:00:00+00:00

3

A frontiersman, Father Milton was not. Not that one needed to be a frontiersman to navigate the prairieland around Barrier Ridge or even the low and relatively unobtrusive Wichita Mountains. But Father Milton preferred to stay within the confines of his hometown, and within reach of his comforts—the church and the bank and the saloons and the whores. That being said, every man had a price that would propel his ordinarily stoic legs to step outside their comfort zone. Three hundred dollars in paper money and a leather handbag of various coins was apparently his.

Still, riding his less-than-fair steed through the blustery winds of Indian Territory as the sun descended before him (it was becoming quite the nuisance for his eyes, despite the overcast skies), he reckoned it probably wasn’t enough. His stomach grumbled and he cursed himself for not thinking to bring more than the three apples Mrs. Hughes sent him with, all of which he’d already eaten. Sure, he could have popped into Mac’s General Store and picked up some food and supplies, but that would have put him even further behind the little—that wretched thing, Elizabeth Hughes.

In all honestly, Father Milton had no desire to find the little trouble-making bitch. If there ever was a thorn in the side of Barrier Ridge’s populace, it was none other than Elizabeth Hughes. It was not unusual to come upon her stealing fruit from folks’ gardens or throwing rocks at windows just for the hell of it or frying every bug in a ten-mile radius with a magnifying glass—she’d burnt down half of the town’s only barber shop doing just that. And the girl had done much worse, Father Milton was well aware. If half the filth she spewed during confession was true—never mind that the good priest quite enjoyed those sessions—then the girl was crazier than a headless cock.

And Mrs. Hughes thought Father Milton and God Himself could help this child? That was even less likely to happen than him, an overweight man of the cloth with no tracking skills whatsoever, finding Elizabeth before a band of Comanche or, worse, the Tate Gang fell upon her and had their way with her. (Not that he’d mind bearing witness to such events, but it was unlikely he could do so in relative safety.) Elizabeth Hughes, whether he found her or not, was what Father Milton considered a lost cause. There was no helping her. He couldn’t do it and neither could a thousand Our Fathers and a thousand more Hail Marys. The priest doubted if God Himself—Praise the good Lord!—could descend on Barrier Ridge and make that little girl into a decent and proper lady. A lost cause, that’s what she was. Possibly even a demon wrapped in little girl’s flesh. Father Milton wasn’t as knowledgeable on demons as he proclaimed, so likely wouldn’t wager much money on Elizabeth Hughes being one, but if there was a person on God’s earth that was destined for the pits of Hell, it was her.

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