This Violent Land Read online

  “What are you doing here?”

  “You didn’t figure I was gonna let you take on Richards and his men all by yourself, did you? I got Lobo, Beartooth, Greybull, Pugh, Deadlead, and Powder Pete camped just outta town. I figure the eight of us, countin’ you, ought to be able to handle things all right.”

  Smoke laughed. “Yeah, I would think so. How did you find me, anyway?”

  “Hell’s fire, boy! I just followed the bodies! Can’t you keep them guns of yours in leather?”

  “Come on, Preacher! Tell the truth. I know you would rather lie, but try hard.”

  “I didn’t have to find you, I been followin’ you for a coon’s age.” Preacher looked over at Sally. “Do you see how unrespectful he is, missy? Can’t a pretty thing like you do no better than the likes o’ this fella?”

  “I’m going to change him,” Sally said primly.

  Preacher grinned. “Ha. I’d love to see that. Smoke ain’t easy to change.”

  Smoke frowned. “You had better get used to calling me Buck, Preacher. You might slip up in town and that would be the end of it.”

  “I ain’t going into town. Not until you get ready to make your move, that is. When things is about to happen, we’ll be there.” Preacher looked at Sally. “You look after this boy now, you hear me?”

  Sally smiled and looked at Smoke. “Oh, I intend to, Mr. Preacher. I’ll be looking after him from now on.”

  Preacher mounted his horse, and with a nod to the two of them, rode off.

  “I like your friend,” Sally said. “He is the old man you were talking about when you told me your story, isn’t he?”

  “Yes, and when he dies it will be the end of the old mountain men, the end of an era.”

  “No it won’t, Smoke,” Sally said. “Not as long as you’re around.”

  On the train to Denver

  Janey Jensen rode comfortably in the Wagner Palace Car. Elam Jefferies was on the same train, but in a different car. He had a huge smile on his face. In one pocket was one hundred and fifty dollars in cash. In another pocket was the signed deed to an elegant Brewster Brougham and a team of matched, Andalusian horses.

  CHAPTER 39

  PSR Ranch, office

  “Who did you say he was?” Richards shouted the question so loud that spittle sprayed from his mouth.

  “The feller that’s callin’ hisself Buck West is actually Smoke Jensen.” Morgan was a thin, baldheaded man who ran the leather goods store in Bury.

  “How do you know this, Morgan?”

  “On account of I seen ’im back in Red Cliff. This here is Smoke Jensen, all right.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Richards said under his breath. “She was right.”

  “Who was right?” Stratton asked.

  “Janey. She told me this Buck West was trouble.”

  Stratton frowned. “Where is Janey, anyway? I ain’t seen her in a day or two.”

  “I don’t have any idea, and to be honest with you, I don’t care. I’ve had about as much of her as I want to put up with. Get the word out. We’ll divide the thirty-thousand-dollar reward among all the men who take part in killing Smoke Jensen.”

  Stratton nodded and left to do as Richards had ordered.

  Bury

  “You’re Smoke Jensen, ain’t ya?” The PSR cowboy who had stepped out from behind a building was already holding a pistol in his hand.

  At that moment, Smoke realized his identity had been compromised. “I’m Buck West.”

  “No, you ain’t. You’re Smoke Jensen, and Richards and ever’one else knows that now. Only I’m the one who’s goin’ to kill you and collect that thirty thousand dollars.”

  “What’s your name, cowboy?” Smoke asked.

  The cowboy smiled. “I may as well tell you, seein’ as I’m goin’ to be rich and famous after today. Folks call me Sunset.”

  “Sunset? A fitting name, seeing as the sun is about to set on your life.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Put the gun back in your holster, Sunset, and walk away. If you do that, I’ll let you live.”

  Sunset laughed. “You’re the one that’s goin’ to die.” He raised the pistol to fire, but before he could cock it, Smoke drew and fired. Sunset died with a shocked expression on his face.

  Smoke hurried back to Sally’s house. “Sally, they know who I am. Come with me. I’m taking you down to the Pink House. You’ll be safe there.”

  “All right,” Sally said without question.

  Smoke led her through the alleyways until they reached the big, pink building. They found Flora in her parlor.

  “Yes, of course I’ll keep her here,” Flora said. “She’ll be safe with me. We’ll lock the doors, and I’ve got enough shotguns for everyone.”

  “Thanks.” Smoke leaned toward Sally, then stopped and glanced toward Flora. “Look away, would you?”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake. Kiss her, then go take care of your business.”

  Smoke kissed Sally, then with a wave toward both of them, left the house.

  “Help me say a little prayer for him, Flora, would you?” Sally asked after the door closed behind Smoke.

  “I’ve already started. You’ve grown quite fond of him pretty quickly, haven’t you?”

  “Fond of him? Flora, I love him.”

  “That all happened fast, didn’t it?”

  “When you know it’s the right man, it doesn’t take you long to make up your mind,” Sally replied.

  Flora smiled. “Make up your mind about what?”

  “About marrying him. I intend to be Smoke Jensen’s wife.”

  “If he lives through this.”

  “He will,” Sally said confidently.

  * * *

  Smoke headed back downtown, encountering Sheriff Reese and three other men.

  “Hold on there, Jensen!” Even as Reese shouted, he pulled the trigger on the shotgun he was carrying. But he fired too quickly. Smoke, who was coming up from the alley, had not yet stepped into the street from behind the building. He leaped back just as the double load of buckshot tore into the corner of the building.

  He stepped out then and started shooting, taking down a deputy and one of the other men. Reese, having expended both barrels of the shotgun, didn’t represent any immediate danger. Two men turned and ran, while Reese dropped the shotgun and went for his pistol.

  Reese was fast, faster than Smoke had expected, but he was able to shoot just before Reese brought his pistol to bear.

  * * *

  From outside of town, Preacher heard the gunfire of more than the occasional gunshot and knew that it was significant. “Grab your rifles, boys! The fun has started!”

  Grabbing the assorted buffalo guns, Creedmores, Henrys, and Winchesters, the seven mountain men took up positions overlooking the pass that was the only way into town from the PSR Ranch. A veritable army of more than twenty heavily armed men were on their way into town.

  “I’m gonna take the first shot,” Lobo said, raising the Henry to his shoulder.

  “All right. Go ahead,” Preacher said, considering himself the leader.

  Lobo pulled the trigger, and the riders kept coming.

  “You missed!” Preacher jeered.

  At that moment, one of the riders lurched, then fell out of his saddle.

  Lobo grinned. “I didn’t miss. It just takes this damn Henry a little longer to get the job done.”

  Beartooth was next, the boom of the buffalo gun sounding like an explosion.

  After that, all seven mountain men opened fire, and the pass rang with the echo of gunfire.

  Less than five minutes after the shooting started, the pass lay somber under the heat of the sun. Bodies were everywhere; men and animals sprawled, soon to be bloated by death. Among the dead were gunhands who had been gathered from all over the country; Telford, who was wanted in Wyoming, Olds, who had paper on him from Nevada, and Peyton, who had been one of Reese’s deputies, and was wanted for murder back in Iowa
. The pass was quiet now that the gunfire was over, and, except for the circling buzzards, still.

  PSR Ranch, office

  “There ain’t nobody left, Mr. Richards.” Bozeman was the only one who had survived the fight at the pass, and even he had not come through it unscathed. He had a bullet hole in his leg staining his trousers red with blood. “Ain’t nobody left in town neither. Leastwise, not nobody we can count on. Sheriff Reese, he’s been kilt.”

  “Do you think Jensen’s comin’ out here?” Potter asked, his voice reflecting his fear.

  “Yes, sir, I’m sure he is.”

  “All right, Bozeman, you get down by the front gate. Hide somewhere, and when you see him comin’, shoot him,” Richards ordered.

  Bozeman shook his head. “No, sir, I don’t want nothin’ more to do with it. Onliest reason I come back here to warn you was I was thinkin’ maybe you might give me some money, enough to get out of here.”

  “You didn’t do your job. Why should we give you anything?” Stratton asked.

  “They was nineteen men got kilt for you three,” Bozeman pointed out. “I got shot up for you. That makes twenty, and you can’t even give me enough money to get out of here?”

  “You did it for the reward money, only you didn’t kill him. No, if you aren’t going to help now, get out of here.”

  Bozeman pulled his pistol. “Give me some money,” he demanded. “Or else I’ll—”

  Potter stepped up behind him and shot him in the back. Bozeman’s eyes bulged out like they were about to pop from their sockets. The gun slipped from his fingers and thudded to the floor as he opened his mouth.

  All that came out was a thread of blood before he collapsed on the floor.

  “What do we do now?” Stratton asked.

  “We’ve got to get out of here,” Potter said.

  “No,” Richards replied, shaking his head. “I ain’t runnin’ no more. We’ve got too much at stake here to be run off like some rabid dog. Potter, you’re wantin’ to be governor. How’s that goin’ to happen if you’re gone?”

  “Yeah.” Potter passed a shaky hand over his face. “Yeah, you’re right.”

  “What’s your plan?” Stratton asked.

  “The first thing is, I’ll meet him on the front porch, and I’ll offer him ten thousand dollars to be on his way and leave us be.”

  “You know damn well he isn’t going to take you up on that,”Potter scorned.

  “I know. That’s why I said I’ll meet him on the front porch,” Richards said. “You two will be inside. Muley, you’ll be just behind that window. Wiley, you’ll be over there behind that window. As soon as you hear him turn down the offer, shoot. The moment he says no, both of you shoot at the same time.”

  At that moment the front door opened and, startled, all three turned to see Deputy Rogers.

  “Rogers!” Richards said.

  “I was listenin’ to you out on the front porch. Bozeman is right. Reese and at least five more is dead in town. Ever’one else has left.”

  “Why didn’t you leave?”

  Rogers smiled. “I figure you’ll pay me if I kill Jensen for you.”

  “All right, you get—”

  “No,” Rogers said, interrupting Richards. “I heard what you was sayin’ to the others, and I plan on goin’ out on the porch with you. I want you to know that I’m the one that kilt him. I been wantin’ to kill Jensen ever since he come to town, even afore I knowed who he was.”

  “I don’t know how smart a move that is,” Richards said. “Jensen is very fast. I know because we’ve been trying to kill him for some time now.”

  Rogers disagreed. “No, you’ve been sendin’ people to kill him. You don’t have to send me. I’m already here.”

  “All right, Rogers. You’re welcome company.”

  “Richards!” The call came from outside the house.

  “Richards, Potter, Stratton! Come on out!”

  “That’s him,” Rogers said with an eager edge to his voice.

  Richards nodded toward Stratton and Potter, and the two men got into position behind the windows. He looked toward Rogers, who loosened his gun in the holster, then nodded back.

  The two men stepped out onto the front porch.

  Smoke stood in front of the ranch house, easy and confident. “Where are the other two?”

  “For the moment, you can deal with Deputy Rogers and me,” Richards said. “Excuse me. Seeing as you killed Reese, that would be Sheriff Rogers, now.”

  “Where’s Sally Reynolds?” Rogers asked.

  “It doesn’t make any difference to you where she is,” Smoke said.

  Rogers smiled. “Oh, yeah, it does. See, after this is all over, she’s gonna be my woman.”

  Richards wasn’t interested in that. “Jensen, suppose I give you ten thousand dollars? Would you ride away and never bother us again?”

  A faint smile drew up the corners of Smoke’s mouth, but his eyes glittered with hate and resolve. “I don’t think so.” He shook his head a little . . . and caught a fleeting glimpse of a gun appear in the window to his left. Drawing with lightning speed, he fired at that window, then swung his pistol to the right window and fired again. Potter tumbled out onto the porch from one of the windows, Stratton from the other.

  When the shooting started, Rogers began his own draw, but he was too late. Smoke had already turned back to him and fired. One bullet into Rogers’s forehead, and the deputy went down, dead before he hit the porch.

  Richards managed to get his gun out and raised, but he wasn’t able to pull the trigger before Smoke killed him with a single bullet.

  Had anyone still been at the PSR Ranch, the four shots would have sounded like one sustained roar of gun thunder.

  Except for Smoke Jensen, not one living person was anywhere on the ranch.

  Bury

  Leading two packhorses and with Sally riding astride beside him on a saddle horse he had bought for her, Smoke was ready to put Bury behind them forever. The two of them left the town, heading toward the High Lonesome.

  Flora, Emma, and the other ladies of the Pink House stood on the front porch, waving good-bye. “Gee, I hate to see her go,” Emma said. “She was such a good friend to all of us.”

  “Yes,” Flora said, a little lump in her throat. “She was.”

  “It’s too bad she was a schoolteacher. She’s so pretty, she would have been really good at what we do here,” Emma said.

  Flora laughed out loud. “You know what? I think she would have agreed with you.”

  Summit County

  “Do you like dogs, Mrs. Jensen?” Smoke asked as they reined their mounts to a stop and sat atop a hill overlooking the vast sweep of mountains, streams, and richly grassed valleys.

  “Yes, I do,” Sally answered.

  “Good. I do, too. We’ll have a lot of them at Sugarloaf.”

  “Sugarloaf?”

  Smoke smiled at her. “That’s what we’re going to call our ranch.” He nodded toward the paradise in front of them. “It’s waiting for us out there, along with the rest of our lives.”

  TURN THE PAGE FOR AN EXCITING PREVIEW!

  USA Today and New York Times Bestselling Authors

  WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE

  with J. A. Johnstone

  THE GREATEST WESTERN WRITERS OF THE 21ST CENTURY

  The Kerrigans risked everything to stake a claim under a big

  Texas sky. Now one brave woman is fighting to keep that

  home, against hard weather, harder luck, and the West’s most

  dangerous men.

  A RANCH DIVIDED . . .

  After a long hard journey up the Chisholm Trail,

  Kate Kerrigan is in Dodge City, facing a mystery of

  murder. A cowboy she hired, a man with a notorious

  past, has been accused of killing a prostitute and

  sentenced to hang. Kate still trusts Hank Lowry.

  And when a hired killer comes after her, she knows

  she has
struck a nerve. Someone has framed Hank

  for murder—in order to cover up a more sinister

  and deadly crime spawned in the musty backrooms

  of the Kansas boomtown . . .

  Back in West Texas, the Kerrigan ranch is under siege.

  A wagon train full of gravely ill travelers has come onto

  the parched Kerrigan range, being led by a man on a

  secret mission. With Kate’s son Quinn manning the

  home front, one wrong step could be fatal when the

  shooting suddenly starts . . .

  The Kerrigans, A Texas Dynasty

  JOURNEY INTO VIOLENCE

  Available August 2016, wherever

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  CHAPTER 1

  “She ran me off her property, darned redheaded Irish witch.” Ezra Raven stared hard at his segundo, a tall lean man with ice in his eyes named Poke Hylle. “I want that Kerrigan land, Poke. I want every last blade of grass. You understand?”

  “I know what you want, boss,” Hylle said. He studied the amber whiskey in his glass as though it had become the most interesting thing in the room. “But wantin’ and gettin’ are two different things.”

  “You scared of Frank Cobb, that hardcase segundo of hers? I’ve heard a lot of men are.”

  “Should I be scared of him?” Hylle asked.

  “He’s a gun from way back. Mighty sudden on the draw and shoot.”

  Hylle’s grin was slow and easy, a man relaxed. “Yeah, he scares me. But that don’t mean I’m afraid to brace him.”

  “You can shade him. You’re good with a gun your own self, Poke, maybe the best I’ve ever known,” Raven said. “Hell, you gunned Bingley Abbott that time. He was the Wichita draw fighter all the folks were talking about.”