Ralph Compton Thirteen Bullets by Sean Danker & Ralph Compton

Author:Sean Danker & Ralph Compton [Danker, Sean & Compton, Ralph]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2022-05-24T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

There was no way to sit in the saddle, where Petunia’s every step didn’t just make him hurt more, but Dan bore it. It wasn’t Petunia’s fault; she would never hurt him deliberately. That hill hadn’t given him the worst beating of his life, but it had certainly tried. Maybe there’d been a better way to go about all that. Maybe he was lucky those two hadn’t been any better at collecting a ransom than Dan was at delivering one.

He didn’t feel lucky.

A sinking feeling joined the chorus of pain in his body as the house came into view up ahead. Dan doubted that he had it in him to ready the traps this evening. Maybe he could if he could just sit for a minute first and have a bath. There weren’t so many traps, only a handful. They weren’t scattered about at random—there was no need for that. The open ground that surrounded the house made it difficult to approach unseen. Anyone with any sense would want cover; the cover was where the traps were.

Still, in the state he was in, it would take him nearly an hour to get them ready for the night. He couldn’t ask Kingsley to do it; Kingsley would only hurt himself.

Speaking of Kingsley, he was on the porch, pacing in the lamplight. The very last of the sunlight was gone, and evening had taken its place. The crickets were musical, and the fireflies were so plentiful that it was like a glowing snowstorm.

Sometimes Dan liked to sit out and watch them. Tonight, he made a noise like a dying animal and less swung than fell from Petunia’s saddle. Kingsley hadn’t been able to see him coming in the dark, but he heard his boots strike the grass.

“Dan?” he called out, hurrying down from the porch.

Dan stepped into the light, his coat gone and his clothes tattered, filthy, and bloodstained. He probably looked as bad as—well, as bad as Tom had the last time Dan saw him.

“Good God,” Kingsley said, his face white as he approached.

The others were coming out as well. This was the trouble with living in secret and everyone being cooped up all the time. Whenever Dan came back, it had to be a big event. Questions weren’t what he wanted. But it still wasn’t as bad as having everyone recognize him, as they had a few years back.

“Take her,” he said to Ephrem, giving the boy Petunia’s reins and more or less pushing past the rest as he went into the house, going straight to Kingsley’s study. There, he took a crystal glass and helped himself to whatever was in Kingsley’s fancy decanter, pouring two or three times what he normally would.

He gulped about half of it down, then leaned on the mantel and closed his eyes.

“Shut the door,” he groaned, and Kingsley did so, although Helen, Gwen, and probably Maryanne would be out there trying to listen.

Kingsley joined Dan in front of the fireplace.

“Herman Fisk and Walton Burrows.

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