The Gunslinger's Man Read online

  Table of Contents

  Legal Page

  Title Page

  Book Description

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  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

  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

  New Excerpt

  About the Author

  Publisher Page

  The Gunslinger’s Man

  ISBN # 978-1-78651-436-3

  ©Copyright Helena Maeve 2016

  Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright May 2016

  Edited by Sue Meadows

  Pride Publishing

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Pride Publishing.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Pride Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2016 by Pride Publishing, Newland House, The Point, Weaver Road, Lincoln, LN6 3QN

  Pride Publishing is a subsidiary of Totally Entwined Group Limited.

  THE GUNSLINGER’S MAN

  Helena Maeve

  Halloran was meant to free them, but Asher has never known a harsher prison.

  Hiring a band of outlaws to assassinate the mayor may be a bold move, but Asher Franklin can’t take another minute of bowing and scraping to the sadist who runs his hometown. Graveyards teem with the bodies of those have tried and failed to rebel against the powers that be, but the legendary Red Horn Riders hold an invaluable advantage over their predecessors: They’re already dead.

  Common wisdom would have it that vampires seldom keep faith with humans, though, and the Red Horn Riders are no exception. Halloran, the ruthless bandit at the helm of the gang and Sargasso’s prospective savior, would rather claim Asher for his own than grant him the fate he deserves. His unwelcome kindness is Asher’s worst nightmare. To be chattel is bad enough. To be the property of the one vampire whose duplicity just cost the lives of Asher’s friends is so much worse.

  Yet in the ungoverned deserts of the Wild West, vampires are a law unto themselves and terror comes in many forms. Halloran’s bite may be sharp, but worse foes roam the sands than Asher can begin to imagine.

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Colt: Colt’s Manufacturing Company

  Arbuckles: Arbuckle Coffee Roasters

  Pinkerton’s: Securitas AB

  Fabergé: Unilever

  Spencer carbine: Browning Arms Company

  Union Pacific: Union Pacific Corporation

  Chapter One

  Under normal circumstances, Asher Franklin would’ve held his tongue when pressed for answers by bloodsuckers, but the gun pressed to his temple had him feeling chattier than usual.

  “I swear—I swear I don’t know where she is. W-we ain’t been that close since we was kids. Ask around, anyone’ll tell you—”

  The safety clicked off.

  A bead of sweat trickled into Asher’s eye. “Swear to God, I don’t know anything!”

  He liked to believe he wouldn’t have breathed a word even if he did. Any secret worth keeping from vampires was a secret worth dying for. The kiss of a cold barrel held fast against his skin threatened to test that notion.

  “All right, that’s enough,” Octavian drawled. The swivel chair gave a squeak of relief as he rose, hydraulics compensating to boost the seat up to its usual height. Octavian was neither muscular nor heavyset. The first of his kind had been forged from a far heftier substance than dirt and subsequent generations had simply inherited that trait. “Boy says he don’t know, then I believe him.” He rounded on Asher, dimpled smile slithering off his mouth. His expression was as tender a hatchet. “You wouldn’t be tryin’ to dupe me, would you, Franklin?”

  Asher shook his head jerkily. “No, sir! Never!”

  If there was punishment to be had for bearing false witness, then let it be earned in the name of getting Octavian and his bootlickers out of the shop.

  The quiver in his voice must have been persuasive.

  “Know that I’ll be back if I find out you’ve been telling tales!” Octavian warned affectionately.

  The cheerful bell above the door chimed once as it swung open and again as it closed. Every last ounce of strength Asher possessed went into keeping upright until he found himself alone.

  He squeezed his uncle’s desk with both hands, spine curving like a cat’s. He was all right. The phantom chill of the gun pressing into his side would soon fade.

  “Asher?” His uncle’s voice echoed from the top of the landing. “Son, I thought I heard voices…”

  The shop connected to the living quarters above it by a set of narrow wooden stairs and a shared porch that saw blissfully little sunshine. The setup had the advantage of fencing off private and professional spheres—an absolute necessity when the latter was festooned with cuckoo clocks, ticking pendulums and loud, booming grandfather clocks—but imperfectly. Sound traveled all too easily between the loose floorboards.

  Asher sucked in a breath. “Everything’s fine.”

  “Was it a client?” Uncle Howard’s shuffling tread did little to drown out the note of excitement in his voice.

  “Not quite.” Plastering his best smile onto his lips, Asher spun around. “I was actually on my way to Pinkham’s. You need anything?”

  As deflections went, that one was calculated. A trip to the general store should have been an easy feat for a man at the ripe age of forty-nine, but Uncle Howard had made a science of avoiding the outside world. Today wasn’t the day that he changed his mind.

  Minutes later, armed with a better grip on his nerves, Asher strolled onto Main Street with as sure a step as he could manage. There was no sign of Octavian on the road, though Asher spied one of his goons sprawled in a rocking chair outside the Pony Inn.

  Asher hurried his step and ducked into the town’s one and only saloon.

  Uncle Howard wouldn’t notice if he was
a little late coming back to the shop. He never did.

  “Whiskey. And make it the good stuff.”

  It was early in the day, but Sargasso kept its own rules as far as liquor and who got to drink it when. A man learned early and often that being drunk helped take the sting out of a whole slew of humiliations.

  Behind the bar, Romero cocked an eyebrow. “And what might you be needin’ liquid courage for?”

  “Angel Eyes took French leave.”

  Romero’s left eyebrow joined the right.

  “Octavian stopped by with the news,” Asher reported, lowering his voice.

  “Shit.”

  “Yeah.”

  As soon as Asher downed the contents of his tumbler, Romero refilled it, unprompted. “On the house.”

  “Thanks.” After twenty years of eking out a living under vampire dominion, Asher knew better than to look a gift horse in the mouth.

  “Don’t mention it. Octavian’ll come to his senses. There’s plenty more fish in the sea.”

  “Uh-huh. Think I saw him at the Inn a minute ago…”

  Romero scoffed. “Men.”

  She might have said vampires and it would’ve been just as true. Mere men could always lose their heads hankering after a woman, but few had the means to chase her to the ends of the earth if they put their mind to it. Few had that kind of time.

  For Angel’s sake, Asher hoped she took her whoring all the way to the North Pole.

  Rye soothed his injured pride and Romero’s company had a calming influence, particularly when she assured him that Octavian was just a blowhard with no real power. Actual, physical harm to the human population had been outlawed back when Asher was just a babe in arms. Accidents still happened, of course, but there were consequences for any lowly vampire who savaged the mayor’s property beyond what could be mended with a little salve and bandage.

  Halfway through feeding Asher the latest gossip floating around town, Romero trailed off, frowning at the grimy saloon window.

  Outside, dust freshly stirred into orange-yellow eddies had just begun to settle around a group of riders. Asher counted seven, all in long leather dusters, their hats worn low to keep the sun at bay. Their hands, too, were covered in thick gloves.

  Vampires, all of them.

  “More of the same,” said Romero, as if reading his mind.

  “Maybe.” Asher tracked the posse with his eyes. He didn’t want to hope because hope was dangerous, but it was nice to think that last month’s trip to the telegraph office in Redemption hadn’t been for nothing.

  “Maybe?” Romero scoffed. “Octavian must’ve knocked all the sense out of your head.”

  She turned her broad back to Asher and slammed the whiskey bottle down on the counter just outside his reach. Bloodsucker clientele called for a different sort of beverage.

  Asher pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth.

  It was maybe ten paces from the hitching post to the swinging saloon doors. Fifteen, after a few drinks. Asher counted them down. He reached ten just as the jingle of spurs reached the threshold. His barstool creaked when he swiveled around for a casual peek.

  “Welcome, gentlemen,” Romero called, the picture of nonchalance. “What can I get you?”

  “This Sargasso?” asked the stranger at the head of the group. His companions fanned out around him, their boots scraping the scuffed floorboards, their hands never straying far from their holsters.

  A grubby sign by the door read Check firearms at the bar. Something told Asher it wouldn’t be enforced today.

  “It is,” Romero answered. “If you’re huntin’ for somewhere to stay, I got rooms upstairs, bathhouse and stables around back.”

  “May take you up on that,” the stranger mumbled. He swept his narrowed gaze over the saloon and, apparently satisfied with what he saw, resumed his slow, lazy stroll to the counter. The sign by the door drew no reaction.

  Asher clasped his glass in a sweating palm and tried hard not to draw attention to himself—a hopeless task, given that vampires had a knack for detecting the slightest change in a man’s heartbeat. Perspiration beaded on his upper lip and stuck his shirt to his back. He was vaguely aware of Romero filling three glasses and sliding them along, then filling three more and reaching for a fourth.

  The ringleader stopped her with a raised hand. “Lookin’ for a man named Ambrose.”

  “What for?”

  “Does it matter?”

  Romero weighed this for a moment. “You see that big house in the heart of town?”

  The rider nodded. “Thought that was town hall…”

  “It is,” Romero answered, furrowing her brow.

  With a headshake, the vampire propped his elbows against the bar. “Was afraid you’d say that.” Even beneath the folds of his duster, his broad shoulders and thick biceps were easy to discern.

  Asher’s heart threatened to vacate his chest. He was almost sure he had a handle on who these men were and what they were here for. Not many vampires would be displeased to find the way to the mayor’s door. But if this turned out to be the reason they turned tail, then all those risks Asher had taken would be in vain.

  “You ain’t from around here, are you?” he blurted, half addressing the man and half- speaking to the whiskey in this glass. Miraculously, he somehow failed to trip over his words.

  The ringleader spared him a glance, eyes hidden by the brim of his low-crowned hat. A crimson sheen dappled his bottom lip, but somehow he’d managed to keep the blood out of his ginger beard.

  Asher swallowed hard. “Only askin’ ’cause I hear there’s a band of outlaws pillaging towns from Provo to Santa Fe… They’re calling themselves the Red Horn Riders?” Anticipation pooled like acid in the pit of Asher’s stomach.

  “Dangerous times,” the vampire opined tepidly. Asher wasn’t interesting enough to hold his attention for long. “I wouldn’t believe everything you hear.”

  Asher deflated. “Oh.” He contemplated medicating the sting of disappointment with more whiskey, but he was already feeling slightly queasy and Octavian might be on the hunt for a scapegoat again.

  “You said there’s a bathhouse ’round back?” asked the vampire.

  “Sure,” said Romero. “Soap in there too… Let me get you the key.” Like any sensible soul in Sargasso, she kept her doors locked and her questions to herself.

  There was precious else anyone could do. The town wasn’t theirs. It would never be theirs. Asher could run, like Angel Eyes, and leave his uncle to suffer the consequences, or he could grow old in the shadow of monsters like Octavian. It wasn’t much of a choice.

  “Much obliged.” Spurs scraped the floor with a tinny jangle as the vampire snatched up the key in a meaty fist. “We’ll have this back to you in an hour.”

  “It’s two dollars a head,” Romero said evenly. She could well afford to demand payment from her clients, vampires or not. The neatly carved plaque behind the bar said Property of Ambrose Solomon for a reason.

  The ringleader must have noticed. He didn’t quibble at the price, merely gesturing to one of his men, who stepped forward to settle the fee.

  A human traveler stopping in town would’ve had to pay double that. Then again, a human traveler would’ve been better served riding right on by Sargasso, unless he had his master’s token with him.

  Though she was only one woman and they were seven potentially volatile vampires, Romero gathered up the coins and tested one between her jagged teeth. Her eyes never left the men.

  “Are we square?” her client asked.

  “If you want your clothes washed, too I’ll send one of my boys to take ’em.”

  The ringleader assured her that wouldn’t be necessary.

  “Don’t know, boss,” crowed one of his companions. “Blackjack here stinks like a dead mackerel.”

  Blackjack stood a head taller than Asher and sported a nasty scar on his face. When he started gritting his teeth about biting the sights off a six-gun, Asher shrank down i
nto his seat, a prickle of fear creeping down his spine. His pals seemed to take it in jest.

  “You know,” said their leader, tilting close so that his murmur reached no other ears but Asher’s, “as I hear it, them Riders ain’t ever been to Provo.” His voice was low and intimate, and his wink just before he stalked away made Asher’s stomach flip.

  The saloon doors fluttered shut in his wake.

  Asher let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

  “Best watch yourself, boy,” Romero hummed.

  He met her gaze with a scowl. “What?”

  “Way you were starin’ at that curly wolf, you’d think you saw the face of God.”

  Asher tracked the dusty shadows with his gaze. They passed before the window in an unhurried procession, their holstered Colts catching the sunlight.

  Romero had no idea just what a vision he’d seen.

  Chapter Two

  The night was velvet black beyond Asher’s bedroom window. Clouds had rolled in over the valley sometime in the early afternoon and blotted out the sunset. The gray cover might have grown darker and darker with the fading light, but in Asher’s room there was always that faint spill of radiance creeping through the floorboards from his uncle’s workroom.

  Asher heard him in there at all hours of day and night, tinkering beneath the hazy glow of the gas lamps. His clocks marked the hour, the half hour and all the arbitrary intervals at which Uncle Howard had to be reminded to brew himself a cup of Arbuckle’s so he wouldn’t fall asleep at his desk.

  The noise hadn’t bothered Asher in years. His uncle was as immovable as time itself, so getting used to his quirks was the only way to live. Yet that night, Asher couldn’t stop tossing and turning. He’d barely had any supper. His nails were bitten to the quick.

  It was little consolation to think that in beds all over Sargasso, his friends were just as agitated. He’d spent the day putting the word out that their plan had come to fruition—carefully, so as to avoid anyone else getting wind that something was afoot—although it gnawed at him that he couldn’t be more specific. When would it happen? How much longer did they have to wait?