The Hunt for Clint Adams (2 page)

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that woman is already destined for your bed tonight, and you haven't even spoken a word. I don't know how you do it.”

Rick was right. She was in Clint's bed that night, the next night, and this past night. For the third morning in a row he was looking at her hair, her skin, her butt, and wishing she'd turn over so he could see her breasts.

“You ain't goin' anywhere, mister,” she told him. “Not yet.”

“It's morning,” Clint said. He had pulled on his trousers and was now buttoning his shirt. “I'm hungry. I'm going to have some breakfast.”

“Uh-uh,” she said, shaking her head.

“Lisa,” he told her, “you make a man build up an appetite.”

“Clint—”

“There's only one way you're going to stop me from going out that door,” he said.

“How's that?”

“You'll have to turn over onto your back.”

She smiled at him, revealing beautiful white teeth, then bit her bottom lip and rolled herself over very slowly. Lying on her back, those solid, chubby breasts were like two mountains of flesh.

“Oh boy,” he said, stripping off his shirt.

He moved to the bed, slid his hands over her breasts, rubbing his palms over the nipples, which grew beneath his touch.

She moaned and put her hands over his.

“I love when you touch me,” she said.

He leaned down and kissed her mouth, then her neck. He slid his hands farther down, over her belly, down into the tangle of bushy black hair. His fingers parted the hair until he saw something shiny and glistening, wet and pink. He rubbed his palm over her pussy and she arched her back. He slid his middle finger up and down that moist slit until she was moaning and writhing beneath his touch. Then he stopped.

“Wha—”

He moved around the bed so he could look down at her, then unbuckled his belt. She watched as he got naked again, his rigid penis jutting out at her.

“Oh, yes,” she said, her eyes brightening, “now that's what a girl calls breakfast!”

She pulled him down onto the bed with her, rolled him onto his back and mounted him.

“I don't want to waste any time,” she told him, lifting her hips and sliding down on him, enveloping him in her heat. “Just lie still and let me have you, and then you can go and have your breakfast.”

Almost an hour later, Lisa once again watched from the bed as Clint got dressed.

“This time I'm going to make it out the door,” he promised her.

She laughed, wrapped in the white sheet so that only her pale shoulders showed.

“You know,” she said, “I'm supposed to leave town today.”

“That's right,” he said. “You've got other shows to do, right?”

“That's right,” she said, “but I could be persuaded to stay a while longer.”

“That wouldn't be very good for your reputation, would it?” he asked. “Missing a show?”

“Well,” she said, “you give it some thought. I'll wait right here for you, and when you get back you can tell me if you want me to go or not.”

“I don't think I should have any say in the matter, Lisa,” he said, “but okay, if that's the way you want to play it.”

“I'll just take a little nap while you eat,” she said, “because, Clint Adams, you do tire a girl out.”

When Clint walked into the café, Rick Hartman was sitting there with a plate of steak and eggs in front of him.

“You're late,” Hartman said as Clint approached his table. There were only a couple of other tables still occupied, as most people had finished their breakfasts and gotten on with their day.

“Couldn't be helped,” Clint said, sitting across from Rick. “By the way, late for what?”

“This is where you've been having breakfast most of the time, lately,” Rick said.

“And you usually have it at your own place,” Clint said. “What's changed?”

“Well, I figured I'd find you here, but . . . why don't you order first and then we'll talk,” Hartman suggested.

The waiter came over and Clint ordered the same thing Hartman had.

“Steak and eggs comin' up, Mr. Adams,” the waiter said.

“Thanks, Ed.”

Clint picked up the coffeepot, righted the cup on his side of the table, and poured it full. He drank some of the brew then topped off his mug.

“Okay, Rick,” he said. “What's on your mind? Must be something important for you to eat somebody else's steak and eggs.”

“Tarver.”

Clint looked at Hartman over the rim of his coffee cup.

“What about him?”

“He's out.”

“Is it time, already?”

“The word I got is he was let go early,” Hartman said. “Good behavior.”

Clint laughed. “Good behavior,” he said, shaking his head. “Jed Tarver?”

“Sounds funny, all right.”

“Where is he now?”

“That I don't know,” Hartman said.

“Tell me what you do know, Rick.”

Ed came back at that point with Clint's breakfast, set the plate down in front of him with a basket of fresh biscuits and some butter.

“Thanks, Ed.”

“Sure, Mr. Adams.”

“Okay,” Hartman said. “The Yuma guards saw three men waiting for Tarver when he got out. They said he was real friendly with one of them. The other two sort of stood by and watched the reunion. Any idea who that man would've been?”

“Probably Bart Dexter,” Clint said. “They always rode together, like brothers.”

“Dexter know you?”

“He does.”

“Tarver's going to want to come after you, you know,” Hartman said. “He's been waiting for this.”

“I figured that all along,” Clint said. “I knew he'd come after me when he got out.”

“What do you want to do about it?”

“Not much, I guess,” Clint said. “What would you suggest?”

“Maybe you should find him before he can find you,” Hartman said.

“And what? Kill him?”

Hartman shrugged.

“Before he kills you. Why not?”

“He paid his debt,” Clint said. “I kill him, I could end up in Yuma, myself. And if I go looking for him while he's looking for me, we could just end up going around in circles and missing each other.”

“Would that be so bad?”

“Well,” Clint said, “I spend enough time looking over my shoulder as it is. I don't need to be looking for Jed Tarver.”

“He any good with a gun?” Hartman asked. “As good as they say?”

“He's damned good.”

“But you took him.”

“I helped put him in jail.”

“Didn't face him?”

“It didn't come to that.”

“What if it had?” Hartman asked. “What would've happened?”

“I don't know.”

Hartman frowned.

“He was that fast that you're not sure you could've taken him?” Hartman asked. “It's not like you not to have an opinion.”

“A man can never be sure, Rick,” Clint said. “He's always got to be ready, though.”

“So you're sayin' whenever Tarver comes along, you'll be ready?”

Clint nodded. “I'll be ready, but now I'm ready to tuck into this steak.”

“While you're doin' that,” Hartman said, “why don't you tell me how it all happened?”

“That was a long time ago,” Clint said.

“You're not sayin you don't remember, are you?” Hartman asked. “I'll help jog your memory: It was Abilene, four and a half, maybe five years ago.”

Clint stared across the table at his friend. “You're not going to let me eat in peace unless I tell you, are you?”

“Nope,” Hartman said. “Come on, what else have we got to do while we're eatin'?”

Clint looked down at his bloody steak, his knife and fork hovering over it. Finally, he cut into the meat and popped a hunk into his mouth.

“Sure,” Clint said, chewing, “why not?”

Clint was riding with a posse out of Wichita. The Tarver gang, four of them, had robbed a bank, and they'd managed to do it without killing anybody. That was going to work in their favor when they were caught. It would keep them from hanging. But didn't keep a bunch of townsmen—whose money was in the bank—from volunteering to ride with the posse.

The posse was made up of store clerks, business owners, a couple politicians, the sheriff, two deputies, and Clint Adams.

“Glad you decided to come along, Mr. Adams,” Sheriff Jack Murdo said. “My deputies are green, and those townsmen and politicians even greener.”

“Well,” Clint said, “I did make a deposit in that bank just before it was robbed. I'd like to get that money back, along with everybody else's in town.”

“Sure, sure,” Murdo said. “Don't worry, we'll catch up to them. The trail is pretty clear.”

“I can see that.”

“By the end of the day,” Murdo predicted, “we'll have them.”

They followed the trail for hours, but by the end of the day it was obvious that the bank robbers had split up and gone in four different directions.

The sheriff called the posse to a halt and dismounted, along with Clint. They studied the ground, then turned to the posse.

“We'll split into four groups,” the sheriff said, “and follow these four different trails.”

“How do we know who's got the money, Sheriff?” one of the clerks asked.

“We don't know,” the sheriff said. “What's the difference?” He looked at Clint.

“Could be they split it up already,” Clint said. “Maybe they each have a quarter of the money. But the sheriff's right, it doesn't really matter. We'll have to split up and keep tracking them.”

“Okay then,” Sheriff Murdo said, “you and me can go that way—”

“I think we need to split up, Sheriff,” Clint said. “You, me, and your deputies, I mean. You can each take a posse member. I'll ride alone. I'll move faster and better that way.”

“Okay,” Jack Murdo said with a shrug. “Pick a direction.”

“Hey, Sheriff,” one of the deputies said, “what if Adams catches up to the one who's got the money. Who says he'll bring it back?”

“I say,” Sheriff Murdo replied. “Ain't never heard nothin' about Clint Adams that says he won't bring the money back.” He looked at Clint. “You go ahead, Mr. Adams. We'll split up, just like you say. Anybody catches one of the bank robbers takes him back to Abilene. We'll meet up there.”

“Hopefully with all the bank's money,” the deputy said.

“Shut up, Parker,” Murdo said. “You and Bud Kellogg follow that trail . . .”

 

Clint knew that they were trailing the Jed Tarver gang. He knew who Tarver was, knew his reputation as a thief—an extremely smart one—as well as an extremely fast and dangerous gunman.

What he didn't know was that he was following the trail being left behind by Tarver, and that Tarver was carrying all the money from the bank robbery. Tarver didn't trust any of the other men with it, and he didn't give any of it to the only man he did trust—Dexter—because he feared the others would kill him and take it from him.

So Clint was following the trail with a certain amount of ignorance—or, at least, ignorance of a few facts. But to play it on the safe side, he decided to assume that the man he was following was Jed Tarver, and that the sheriff, deputies, and the rest of the posse were trailing the rest of the gang.

That was the only way he could be ready for Tarver when he caught up to him.

What he didn't know was that he wouldn't catch up to the man for days.

 

Jed Tarver was miles ahead of Clint Adams. He didn't think there was a posse on earth that could catch him. He had the entire bank haul in his saddlebags, and intended to split it only with his partner, Bart Dexter.

Their plan was to split up, dump their two temporary partners, and then meet in a small Kansas town called Manhattan, right on the banks of the Blue River.

As Tarver rode into Manhattan, he realized he may have made a mistake. This was not the sleepy little town he expected. Unbeknownst to him, since the Kansas-Pacific Railroad had laid its track in town, Manhattan had grown by leaps and bounds. Still, in a town that size perhaps he'd be able to go unnoticed, after all.

He put his horse up at the livery, asked the fella there to recommend a hotel. He got himself a room in the hotel and spent some time counting the proceeds from the robbery, after dumping it onto the bed. Forty-two thousand dollars wasn't bad. He collected it together and stuffed it back into the saddlebags again. He was hungry, decided to get something to eat, but was too nervous to leave the money in the room.

He ended up walking around town with the saddlebags over his shoulder.

Clint thought that Jed Tarver may have had a reputation as a tough one and a fast gun, but he sure wasn't very smart. According to the tracks the man was leaving behind, he was making no attempt to get out of the state.

Clint came to a few towns that Tarver's tracks bypassed, but midday the next day the trail finally led him to Manhattan, Kansas.

Clint had camped the night before, built a fire but really didn't have anything to prepare in the way of a meal. He'd had to make do with some beef jerky and water from his canteen. The sheriff's prediction—and it was actually a promise he'd made to get Clint to ride with the posse—obviously had not come true. The others may have caught up to the rest of the gang by the end of the first day, but Tarver was still on the run.