Read Trap Angel (Frank Angel Western #3) for Free Online Page B

back the way you came.’
    Angel smiled. ‘I really do
need a job,’ he said.
    ‘Tough shit,’ snarled
Atterbow. ‘Move on, cowboy.’
    ‘You do Denniston’s
hiring?’
    ‘You better believe it. An’
like I said, we don’t need no saddle bums.’
    ‘Suppose I ask
Denniston?’
    ‘Nobody asks Denniston
nothin’ without going through me.’ Atterbow snarled. ‘Now finish
your beer an’ get the hell on your way.’
    ‘You’re very noisy,
Johnnie,’ Angel said mildly, and hit him as hard as he could in the
belly.
    Atterbow’s eyes bugged out
of his head as the fist drove into his flabby gut. He went
backwards like a runaway windmill, arms and legs flailing, smashing
a table into kindling in his fall, the men who had been sitting at
it ending up on the floor with him in a shouting jumble of bodes.
Angel stood right where he had been standing, aware that the entire
saloon was silent, awed, waiting for Johnnie Atterbow’s next move.
Angel watched his hands.
    He hoped his gamble would
pay off. He didn’t want to have to kill the man.
    Atterbow got slowly to his
feet, a frown knotting his heavy eyebrows. He shook his head. ‘You
just made the worst mistake of your life, sonny,’ he
rumbled.
    That was what Angel had been
waiting to hear.
    He unbuckled his gun belt
and laid it on the counter behind him.
    ‘If I’ve got to fight you to
get to see Denniston, I’m about ready to get started,’ he said
softly.
    ‘You’ll not be in any
condition to see anyone when I’m through with you, bucko!’ snarled
Atterbow.
    ‘It hasn’t crossed your mind
I might whip you?’
    ‘Not the once,’ Atterbow
said. ‘They’re goin’ to have to bury you in a sandbag to weigh your
box down.’
    ‘Talk, talk, talk,’ Angel
said. He stepped forward and cuffed Johnnie Atterbow lightly across
the face. In the background he heard the indrawn gasp of
astonishment from those watching and then with an inarticulate
scream of rage Johnnie Atterbow launched himself at Angel, his huge
fists flailing in killing arcs.

    Wells made good time over
the Glorieta.
    Towards nightfall he was
about a dozen miles from Las Vegas, hurrying the team
along.
    Sherman had organized a fine
pair of bays and a surrey and he was making good time, frankly glad
that he didn’t have to cover the mountainous ground on horseback.
His old wounds ached.
    There was thunder in the air
above the Sangre de Cristos, rumbling like some faraway avalanche
behind the clouds. Once in a while he felt the heavy smack of a
raindrop hit his face. His mind kept going over the details of the
ambush below Raton, trying to stretch his imagination to a point
where he could see why anyone would want to steal a Gatling gun.
Where before there had been the possibility that the stolen rifles
and ammunition had been finally destined to Comancheros, or to be
sold south of the border where there was an incessant market for
guns, the hijacking of the Army wagons and the disappearance of the
Gatling gun with its enormous firepower scotched that theory
completely. He simply could not imagine what whoever had stolen the
field piece intended to do with it. Shaking his head, Wells gigged
the horses to an even faster trot.
    With luck he would make Fort
Union by midday tomorrow. Maybe the young Lieutenant would be able
to tell him something that might help.
    Ahead of him loomed the
lighter strip of Tecolote Creek. He slowed the horses as they
approached the ford, timbered heavily on both sides low and close
to the water. The horses splashed through the shallow flow,
enjoying the cool sting of the snow-chilled stream, and Wells
leaned over to scoop up some water in his hand.
    The movement saved his
life.
    He heard the flat crrr-aaa-ng of the rifle
and instantaneously the searing pain across the fleshy part of his
right thigh. It was as if someone had touched him with red-hot
steel. Without conscious thought he screamed at the horses,
whacking them with the reins, startling the bays into a