Westerns by
Spur Award–Winning Author
Johnny D. Boggs
RETURN TO RED RIVER
MOJAVE
VALLEY OF FIRE
WEST TEXAS KILL
THE KILLING SHOT
A THOUSAND TEXAS LONGHORNS
JOHNNY D. BOGGS
PINNACLE BOOKS
Kensington Publishing Corp.
www.kensingtonbooks.com
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
Table of Contents
Also by
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
PART I - Winter
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
PART II - Spring
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
PART III - Summer
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
CHAPTER FIFTY
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
CHAPTER SIXTY
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
PART IV - Autumn
CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
CHAPTER SEVENTY
CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR
AUTHOR’S NOTE
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PINNACLE BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 2020 Johnny D. Boggs
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
PINNACLE BOOKS, the Pinnacle logo, and the WWJ steer head logo are Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.
ISBN: 978-0-7860-4621-8
Electronic edition:
ISBN-13: 978-0-7860-4622-5 (e-book)
ISBN-10: 0-7860-4622-8 (e-book)
For Max McCoy & Kim Horner McCoy
“Live through it,” Call said. “That’s all we can do.”
—LARRY MCMURTRY, Lonesome Dove
PART I
Winter
CHAPTER ONE
The first thing he noticed were the trees.
Not a leaf, not a branch, not a twig, and nary a pine needle in sight. Nothing. This high up in the Rockies, with plenty of water, Virginia City, Montana Territory, should have been lumber rich, but Mason Boone turned his head and spit. Log cabins dotted the hills, and wooden-frame buildings lined the main street, with some picket, board-and-batten, and clapboard shacks mixed among a few stone structures. Wood had to be around here somewhere. Smoke puffed out of brick chimneys and iron pipes, and Boone smelled woodsmoke, not coal.
Boone stepped out of the way as a mule-drawn wagon headed toward Nevada City. Wooden wagon, too. The driver didn’t look altogether friendly, and his blue overcoat reminded Boone of damn Yankees. Boone looked in every direction.
Not even a shade tree.
That didn’t matter, because there wasn’t any sun here, either. Just dark clouds, closer to the ground than they ought to be, but although Virginia City sat in a bowl, the elevation topped five thousand feet. For the time being, the only snow could be found in the shady parts, caused by the buildings, or in the dirty piles shoveled off walkways and boardwalks, or swept over any flat-roofed structure. Boone figured his toes had frozen solid after trudging through drifts on his hike here. Around the city, clouds, threatening more snow, obscured peaks of most of the surrounding mountains.
One tree. That’s all I want. Just one tree. Just to sit under. Rest my feet. Scratch my back.
Another wagon driver hollered at Boone to get the hell out of the road.
“Ride around me.” Boone’s tone and eyes must have warned that cackler that Mason Boone wasn’t one to trifle with. Boone looked down one boardwalk—if anybody would actually call those planks a boardwalk—and across the street. Over the rooftops at the hills. Nary a tree. Maybe higher up, behind or above the gray clouds, but not here.
Virginia City, Mason Boone figured, might as well be in Kansas.
“Pies. Fresh-baked pies.”
Discovering the source of the voice, Boone forgot all about trees. What in God’s name had gotten into him? Trees? He was no lumberjack, no carpenter, could barely tell the difference between a sweet gum and an aspen. It might have had something to do with that dream from the past night, another one of those he barely remembered—like most of his dreams, the rare times he ever dreamed—but, more than likely, this preoccupation with trees could be attributed to walking from a piss-poor claim in the Gravelly Range all the way to Virginia City. His feet hurt. Not enough left of his socks to darn. Holes in both boots, if you could call them boots. If some Quinine Jimmy told him that his nose was frostbit and had to be cut off, Boone wouldn’t have cared. He didn’t even stop to look at the wares in the window of the Mechanical Bakery.
He forgot about how much his feet hurt. He forgot about trees. He walked, picking up the pace, when the woman with the
pies turned down another street. Boone didn’t catch up with her until she stood in front of the Planter’s House. His focus trained so hard on the raven-haired woman hawking pies, he didn’t even notice the sign above the building on the other side of the street.
BARNARD, SLAVIN & CO.,
at the
~ Liquor Emporium ~
PURE RYE & BOURBON WHISKEY
Brandy, Gin, Rum,
Stoughton and Plantation Bitters,
Port Wine, Claret Wine, Heidsick Champagne,
Sparkling Catawba, Carbon Oil,
ETC., ETC., ETC., ETC.
She saw him, though, yet did not step back, even though Boone knew he stunk to high heaven. His nose might have been frozen by the wind, but he could smell. Yet penetrating his stench came the delectable aromas of delicacies that had eluded him at that boar’s nest where he had been mining.
He hadn’t seen a woman since Easter.
“Ma’am,” he managed.
“Would you like a pie?”
The voice might have been guarded, and the eyes colder than the wind, but she managed a smile. At least, Boone convinced himself she smiled.
He stared without blinking.
“Ma’am?” This time, many seconds later, it came out as a question.
“A pie,” she said. “Dried apple today. That’s all we have.”
“Dried apple,” he repeated, which came out as if he were speaking Blackfeet. Black hair. Parted at the middle. Dark eyes. Round face. Coat of winter wool. He saw the tray she carried, pies with golden crusts lined in a row. Four pies. Not very big, but deep-dish. From the vacant spots, she must have already sold nine.
“Would you like a pie, sir?”
Boone found his voice. “How much?” His right hand reached into the pocket in his denim britches.
“Five dollars.”
He stopped reaching. His hand had gone through the big rip and his fingernails began scratching his thigh. He had used the remnants of his underdrawers the previous night to get a fire going.
Boone stared. “Five . . . dollars?”
She did not debate him.
For a puny pie?
Fellow come all this way, nigh two thousand miles—most of that on the ankle express—well, Boone figured, a man who traveled that far, he deserved a pie. But nobody ever charged five dollars for a pie back in Texas or Tennessee. Besides, Boone didn’t have five cents. Hadn’t seen a dollar in a coon’s age.
“Five . . . dollars?” He stopped scratching his leg, removed his hand from the pocket, stared at his fingernails, noticed the filth. He also saw people stepping out of the Planter’s House, and even more from the building across the street. That’s when he finally saw the sign.
All of a sudden, he felt real thirsty.
“Five dollars.” The raven-haired beauty spoke again. “Maybe you’ll have sufficient funds tomorrow.” She moved back toward Wallace Street.
The men in front of the Liquor Emporium laughed.
Later, Boone figured, he must have gone crazy. All those months on the Ruby, all that hard work—for nothing. The long walk to Virginia City. Not to mention all the miles he had traveled just to get here. Sure, that’d be more than enough to drive a fellow loco. Mason Boone wasn’t the kind of man who’d let some walking whiskey vats drive him to do something stupid. Then again, later, when his brain became less addled, he would also remember that folks back in Smith County had said Mason Boone wasn’t the type of man who’d quit his country and desert.
The pie-selling angel stopped when Boone caught up with her.
“Yes?” There was no warmth in her voice, no humor in those deep, dark eyes. He noticed a slight scar above an eyebrow. Wondered how she had gotten it.
Laughter from the far boardwalk reached him.
Mason Boone smiled. “Maybe,” he said, “we could work out . . . a . . . trade?”
The eyes did not blink. His face suddenly warmed, and he knew why. Damn it all to hell if he hadn’t blushed. The woman should be blushing, or turning red with rage, but it was Boone who felt embarrassed. And now the laughter across the street angered him, and if he had not been so captured by those dark eyes, he would’ve charged across the street like he had charged at Missionary Ridge. Instead, he just looked into eyes like the darkest, deepest mine.
He hated himself.
A kaleidoscope of colors replaced the beautifully shaped face, and pain blinded him, shooting from the top of his head to his toes. Someone had to be screaming, and blood ran between his fingers as Boone tried to squeeze the split in his skull back together.
Maybe Boone let the oaths fly. If anyone still laughed, the roaring in Boone’s ears drowned out that noise. He thought he had drawn his legs up, smelled the mixture of manure and gravel in the dirt, felt as though he had rolled himself up into a ball.
He prayed that he hadn’t messed his britches.
He swallowed snot.
He tasted blood.
For a brief moment, he remembered Kennesaw Mountain and beginning that long, stupid walk.
Then he pictured the pine trees, even saw his ma and pretty Janice Terry, and smelled the scent of pine trees, pine sap, and felt the warmth of a fireplace back home in Tyler. Folks up here in Alder Gulch thought Texas was just like Kansas and Wyoming, some flat, treeless plain. They’d never seen the Piney Woods. Boone wished he had never left.
He heard that woman’s voice.
“Nelson. Don’t.” The last word came out as a scream.
Just before Boone disappeared into blackness darker than that pie-seller’s eyes.
CHAPTER TWO
Dried-apple pies toppled onto the boardwalk and streets. Four of them, ruined—twenty dollars’ worth of baking, lost—but Ellen Story could not, would not, think about that. She let the tray she had fashioned rattle on the stones, brushed past her husband, and knelt by the stinking, bearded young man who clutched his bleeding head. His hat—if one could call it a hat—rolled over toward the groggery. His hands turned crimson before they slipped from that fine, dark hair. His eyes fluttered, eventually rolling up and out of sight, and he let out a heavy sigh.
“Get up, Ellen . . . And you . . . you best go about your business.”
Looking up, she found her husband pointing the Navy Colt’s barrel at the men lounging in front of the Liquor Emporium’s entrance. They must have stepped out from their afternoon of idleness to witness the fun. Most of them disappeared for more drinking, but two moved down the street toward hobbled horses. Even the men standing in front of the Planter’s House began to find safer climes.
“Ellen. I said, ‘Get up.’”
There he stood, king of the world. Times like this, she wondered what she’d ever seen in him back in Leavenworth, Kansas.
Well, that wasn’t quite the truth. She knew exactly what she’d seen in Nelson Gile Story. About an inch under six feet tall, nigh two hundred pounds, with blond hair and blue-gray eyes, he wasn’t hard on the eyes like most of her would-be Jayhawker suitors. “Got a head for business,” Pa had told her. “And the Midas touch,” said her older brother, John. Nelson Story worked hard; of that she had no uncertainty. Any man who hauled wood for her father couldn’t fear calluses or be allergic to sweat. Back then, eastern Kansas, spitting distance from Missouri, could be the devil on courtships.
Nelson Story came from Ohio. The Trents started off in Kentucky before Ellen’s pa moved to Platte County, Missouri, when John was a youngster. Ellen was Missouri-born, but Pa moved the family to Kansas Territory in ’54 so when it came time to vote for statehood, the more Kentuckians and Virginians casting ballots, Ma explained later, the better chance Kansas could become a slave state. Well, that hadn’t worked out, but Pa never had been the luckiest or smartest man Ellen had known.
Nelson Story, on the other hand, was something else. So her father decided to forget about his Southern leanings, Democra
tic tendencies, and that forlorn hope of becoming rich enough to own a bevy of slaves.
In those years, Ellen rarely saw this side of Nelson Story, though a few gossips let stories slip out about him knifing a neighbor’s forearm up in Ohio, beating a man half to death in Monticello Township, using a Colt to buffalo a drunkard in Liberty—much as he had just done to this poor fellow.
“Ellen . . . I won’t tell you . . .”
“Shut your mouth, Nelson.” Her black eyes burned. Her husband blinked. “Hand me your bandanna.”
First he pouted, started to say something else, thought better of that mistake, and finally slid the Navy into the holster on his left hip. Another .36 remained holstered on the right hip. “For balance,” Thomas Dimsdale, editor of the Montana Post, often joked. “Montana wind would spin Nelson like a top if he didn’t carry two revolvers.”
She took the piece of frayed calico and pressed it against the man’s head, trying to be gentle yet hard enough to stanch the flowing blood. A wave of nausea struck her, and she hated herself for this. Her husband despised weakness, but, closing her eyes, she drew in a deep breath, held it as long as she could, and hoped she would not throw up black tea and fresh biscuits onto this poor man. When her eyes opened, Nelson Story squatted beside her, his hand out, eyes maybe a tad softer now.
“Here,” he said. “I’ll do it.”
Their gazes locked.
“It’s my bandanna, Ellen,” Nelson said.
Without waiting, he moved his right hand down and pressed the rag tighter on the man’s wound. Withdrawing her hand, Ellen looked away from the stranger, but the wreckage of her morning’s baking made her sob, “Oh.” She hadn’t meant to say anything.