Fool's Demise by A.T. Butler

Author:A.T. Butler [Butler, A.T.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: James Mountain Media

Chapter Seven

Jacob Payne and his rival bounty hunter, Clifford Pierce, had been sitting at opposite ends of the bar in the Rat Hole saloon for more than an hour. They were both after the same outlaw, and though Jacob felt as though he had a right to him, the other bounty hunter didn’t agree.

“What’s your suggestion?” Jacob had said, after Pierce insisted there was really no other option.

“We play for him.”

Jacob blinked, confused, and downed the last half of his beer before responding. “What are you talking about?”

“Well, what do we know about Billy Watts?”

Jacob wondered how much research Clifford had done, whether he had interviewed anyone in any of the towns Watts had been seen in. He stuck to the bare minimum of details, not wanting to show his hand.

“He plays poker and gets sore when he loses.”

“Exactly. He plays poker. So, my suggestion is whenever that kid comes in here—and we both know he will—you and I join the game he puts together.”

“And … what? Just pretend we don’t know who he is? Or pretend we’re not bounty hunters at all? What is the point of that? Seems cruel to lure him into a false security before busting him.”

“That’s exactly what we do. We play against him. And against each other. Whichever one of is able to win the biggest pot, take the most off of Watts and then provoke him into threatening us then has the opportunity to turn the tables and arrest him.”

“Every bit of that plan feels dishonest,” Jacob said. He hadn’t been so tempted to walk away from the entire job as he was at that moment, realizing what his only other option was. “The kid might be making mistakes, but that doesn’t mean he deserves to be tricked like that.”

“Bah. It’s exactly what it means. If Watts is as reckless as I think he is, catching him off guard like this is the only way to keep him from flying off the handle and shooting everyone in sight.”

Jacob stayed silent. No one wanted that option, that was certain.

And now, having agreed to such a ridiculous charade, Jacob had been wrestling over the problem for the better part of that hour, trying to find another option. He needed to discover the most honorable way to assert his claim on the job without having to play into Pierce’s plot. It was not even that he needed that cash reward so badly, but the marshal in Tucson had asked him to come arrest this kid for a reason. Though Jacob admitted he had never seen Clifford Pierce apprehend anyone, he certainly didn’t seem like the type that would go easy on naivety or foolishness.

God must be laughing at him right about now. Here Jacob was, sitting in a bar named after a rat, while another rat tried to scam him out of his fairly earned bounty. Jacob shook his head at himself. At no time along this journey could he have rightly made a different choice, but he sure was frustrated that he had ended up here.

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