HELL HATH NO FURY (A Jess Williams western novel) (21 page)

             
Jess smiled up at the two men. “Don’t worry about her. She can handle herself just fine,” replied Jess. “I might ask the same of you two and while I’m at it, why did you come riding into our camp with shotguns on your laps?” asked Jess.

             
“I can explain that,” replied the man on the left. “We’re hunting down a man who killed my partner’s brother about a week ago. He shot him in the back late at night over in Devil Ridge. That wasn’t you that did it, was it?”

             
“Nope, it wasn’t me or Annie here. We’ve been hunting down the two men who raped Annie and her mother and killed her father. We got one of them, but we’re still looking for the other one,” replied Jess.

             
“Maybe it’s the same man we’re both hunting,” said the man on the left. “Would you consider teaming up with us?”

             
“Sorry, but I always like to work alone,” replied Jess.

             
“It doesn’t look like you’re working alone right now,” replied the man on the left, nodding at Annie who was still holding the cut-down shotgun Jess had handed her.

             
Jess glanced at Annie, who hadn’t said one word yet, which was somewhat of a miracle in his mind. “Well, I made an exception in her case. She’s had a rough go of it for a while and I agreed to help her and I’m a man of my word.”

             
Jess noticed that the man on the right had been staring closely at him. “Hey, I just recognized who you are. You’re that famous bounty hunter Jess Williams. I’ve heard a lot about you in them dime novels I been reading lately.”

             
The man on the left looked at his partner. “Are you sure that’s Jess Williams? He looks pretty young for a man who has done all that his reputation claims—if you believe all you read in them dime novels and newspapers.”

             
“I know, but I’m certain it’s him. They even sketched a drawing of him in one of the dime novels I read recently,” replied the man on the right. It’s him for sure, I know it.”

             
The man on the left looked back at Jess. “Well, if you really are Jess Williams, I can’t think of anyone else I’d like riding with me. Are you sure you won’t change your mind, although I wouldn’t really want your woman riding with us.”

             
Jess and Annie looked at each other and then he looked back up at the two men. “Usually I would gladly help you two hunt down the man you’re looking for, but I got a good lead on the man I’m hunting and we’ve missed him a few times already. So I am sorry, but I have to keep on his trail before it goes cold again.”

             
The two men both looked disappointed. “Well,” said the man on the left, “I wish you’d change your mind, but I do understand your thinking on the matter. You two watch your backs out here. It ain’t no place for a lady, even one wearing a gun.”

             
“We’ll do that for sure,” replied Jess, as the men turned their horses around. “You two men do the same.”

             
“We will,” hollered one of the men over his shoulder, as they headed back to the main trail and in the direction of Devil Ridge.

             
Annie handed Jess the cut-down shotgun he had given her and he slid it back into the back of his holster. Annie was looking at Jess with a somewhat funny look.

             
“Now what?” Jess asked.

             
“First, that whole thing was somewhat unusual,” replied Annie.

             
“What do you mean by that?”

             
“Two men riding into our camp and being able to leave alive and still sitting upright instead of lying on the ground with one or more slugs in each of them,” replied Annie.

             
“They meant no harm, at least not to us. So why would I shoot either one of them unless they went for those shotguns they had?”

             
“I just meant that usually you just shoot men without so much as a thought.”

             
“Yeah, but only the real bad ones,” retorted Jess. “And what was the second thing?”

             
“Oh nothing,” replied Annie, that same devious smile she had on her face back at the saloon in Devil Ridge.

             
“Don’t tell me that, you know you meant something else. You said first so that meant there was a second thing and I want to know what it was,” demanded Jess.

             
“Well, if you insist. When that one man called me your woman, you didn’t say that I wasn’t your woman,” replied Annie, smiling a devious smile.

             
Jess sat down on a rock and picked up his now cold plate of beans and salt pork. “I’m sorry I even asked.”

             
“So, then maybe I am your woman?” asked Annie.

             
Jess almost spit out his mouthful of beans. “No, you’re not my woman. You’re just a very good friend that I’m helping and that’s the whole of it.”

             
“Are you sure about that?”

             
“Yes, I’m sure. Now finish up with your meal so we can start riding into Buford.”

             
Annie took a mouthful of beans and salt pork and when she finished chewing and swallowing it she looked back up at Jess. “You know what? You’re just like those fish in the river you catch all the time.”

             
“Now what the hell does that mean?” Jess asked, with what only could be called a very painful look on his face now.

             
“You’ve been hooked, but you don’t even realize what’s happening,” replied Annie. Jess simply took another bite of the cold food and chewed it with his head hanging down, not realizing he was indeed hooked.

             
When they both finished eating, Annie went about cleaning and packing things and Jess got the horses ready to ride. They rode in complete silence for hours. Annie with that devious and somewhat knowing smile on her face; Jess with that same painful and now somewhat confused look on his.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

              Jess and Annie made camp outside of Buford, Kansas just before darkness was settling in. Jess wanted to ride into Buford in the early afternoon and hopefully catch Cliff Hunt sleeping off a drunken stupor. Not wanting to risk a fire, they ate a cold meal and turned in early. They didn’t practice any shooting since they didn’t want to attract the attention of any curious men who might hear the gunshots and come to find out who it was. In the morning, Annie cooked up some salt pork and beans along with some pan bread and plenty of hot coffee. She fixed Jess a plate and he sat down on the ground to eat. He looked at Annie and he could tell that she was thinking hard about something and he figured he might know what it was.

             
“Annie, are you thinking about what you might do when you face this Cliff Hunt fellow if we find him in Buford?” Jess asked.

             
Annie fidgeted with her food; moving it around the tin plate with her spoon. “It’s been on my mind ever since we left Devil Ridge and I guess the closer we get to finding him, the more I think about what happened the last time when I was facing Darrel Clemmon. I couldn’t go through with it then, so why do I think I can go through with it now?”

             
Jess swallowed his food and washed it down with a swallow of hot coffee. He looked at Annie with a definitive look of knowledge regarding such matters, which was true since he had faced so many men in gunfights in his life already.

             
“Well Annie, I can speak from experience. I have learned that either you are a killer or you’re not, plain and simple. Sure, there are the extreme circumstances that drive someone to kill a person for extreme reasons, but that person would usually never commit such an act. I know of a woman whose child was killed when two drunken men were engaged in a heated gunfight. The two drunken cowboys both unloaded their six-shooters completely without either one of them hitting the other with one shot. The child, however, was not so lucky. One of the bullets from the two gunfight hit that child straight in the chest and the mother came out on the front porch with a Winchester rifle and shot both of the cowboys dead right there in the street. Now, she wasn’t a killer of any sorts, but she was driven to do what she did after she watched her child die right there before her eyes. People said that the woman had never done anything like that before and hasn’t ever since. On the other hand, there are people who will kill at the drop of a hat and never give it a second thought. They’ll go on to have supper and sleep like a baby after it.”

             
Annie looked at Jess and she knew that he was right, but she still had this feeling inside her that things would never be right unless she killed Cliff Hunt herself. “So, you’re saying that I won’t have the stomach to go through with it?” Annie asked.

             
“No I don’t. I think you really want to and probably think it will bring some sense of peace to you and it probably will; but I just don’t think you have it in you to do such a thing,” replied Jess.

             
“Well, I have to give it a try anyway just the same,” insisted Annie.

             
“Well then, I guess that’s settled,” replied Jess, as he climbed up in the saddle. Annie followed suit.

             
“But, if I fail to do it, you’ll be there to back me up, right?”

             
“You can bet your life on it,” replied Jess. “I’ll finish whatever you start and when it’s over, no matter how it goes down, Cliff Hunt is going down before the end of the day.”

             
They arrived in Buford in the early afternoon. Jess decided not to go to the livery, but to tie their horses up in front of a general store in town and walk down to the saloon. He was walking in the street and Annie was to his left, about four feet from the wooden boardwalk. Jess heard the crack of a rifle and the slug from the rifle hit the dirt only inches from his right foot spraying sand in his face. Jess never hesitated for even a split-second. He grabbed Annie’s right arm with his left hand and he swung her in a circle while he drew his pistol. When he finished the complete turn, he released Annie’s right arm and the force from the movement threw Annie up and onto the boardwalk. She fell flat on her face and scrambled to duck down behind a wooden post. Jess found the shooter on a rooftop across the street and the man had already levered another round into the rifle and fired, barely missing Jess a second time, but only because he kept moving around. Jess fired and hit the man square in the middle of his chest and the man fell backward onto the roof. Jess figured him for dead. He looked around for any other signs of trouble; scanning the rooftops and the street quickly.

             
Jess’ eyes caught something glistening off to his left and when he turned, he saw a man on a rooftop and to his right. Annie, who was now kneeling down behind the wooden post holding up the overhang of the roof up, was an open target. He could see that the man was aiming a rifle straight at Annie and Jess fanned two shots from his pistol, hitting the man with both slugs. He looked around the rooftops and down both ends of the street and saw no more threats. All of a sudden, he heard the sounds of a horse running at a full gallop. He looked down at the livery just in time to see a lone rider turning the corner at the end of the street and out of sight. He wanted to go after the man, but he couldn’t take the chance of leaving Annie here. He still didn’t know if there were any more threats looming yet, so he hurried over to where Annie was still kneeling down behind the wooden post for some cover.

             
Jess knelt down on his right knee to stay low, but he kept his left foot firmly planted so that he could move quickly. He kept looking up and down the street, but he saw nothing. Then, he saw a few of the locals come out from their houses and businesses to see what the commotion was all about. He noticed Samuel Davis coming out of the saloon with two other men. Samuel walked out into the street and Jess stood up figuring that it was now safe to do so. Samuel noticed Jess and walked straight over to him, who had now holstered his pistol, but not until he replaced the spent cartridges.

             
“Welcome back to Buford, Mr. Williams,” said Samuel, as he shook Jess’ hand.

             
“Well, it wasn’t exactly the welcome I thought I’d get, but then again, I’m not surprised by it either,” replied Jess. “Who in the hell are those men and who was the man riding out of town at a full gallop a minute ago.”

             
“I’m not sure, but I can hazard a guess. First, let me send someone up to those rooftops and see who is it that you killed this time,” replied Samuel, as he motioned for two of his friends to go up and check on the two men that Jess shot. Jess looked at Annie who was still frozen and kneeling down behind the wooden post.

             
“Annie,” said Jess, “I think you can stand up now.”