Kentucky Showdown by J. R. Roberts Page A

chance, carrying the beer in his right hand while she led him by the left. He wondered if he’d get up the stairs, but before long they were there, walking to her door. She opened it, and drew him inside, closing the door behind her.
    She moved away from him, then turned and smiled. She peeled the dress down from her shoulders, exposing herself little by little.
    He watched, sipping the beer as the dress pooled at her feet and she kicked it away. She wore no undergarments, and was gloriously naked. She smiled again, cupped her breasts in her hands, used her thumbs to flick the nipples until they were distended.
    He knew his attention was supposed to be fixed on her, but he could hear the footsteps in the hallway behind him.
    As she spread her legs and reached down between them, probing herself with her fingers, the door suddenly slammed open. She had closed but not locked it.
    He dropped the beer mug and turned. Before it shattered on the floor, his gun was out and he was firing.
    There were three men in the hall, two framed in the doorway and one behind them. Their guns were out, but they had no chance. The two in the door folded over as his slugs struck them in the belly, their guns falling from their hands. They got a few shots off, but they went wild.
    The third man started running down the hall. Clint stepped over the dead men and raced after him.
    â€œStop!” he shouted at the fleeing man.
    He wanted to talk to him, but the man turned with his gun in his hand.
    Clint let the man get off a shot, but in the end he had no choice. He fired, striking the man in the chest and the belly. He fell to the floor, dead.
    Clint moved down the hall and checked the body, then returned to the room to check the other two. When he looked at Jesse, he saw her lying on the ground, bleeding from a bullet wound in her chest, right between her breasts.

THIRTY-FOUR
    Clint was waiting in the saloon when Sheriff Hackett arrived.
    â€œWhat happened?” he demanded.
    â€œYou don’t know?”
    â€œI just got here, Adams.”
    â€œYou got some dead men upstairs,” Clint said. “And a dead woman.”
    â€œWoman?”
    â€œJesse,” the bartender said.
    â€œYou know what happened?” the lawman asked the barkeep.
    â€œThree men went after him when he went upstairs with Jesse,” the bartender said. “That’s all I know.”
    Hackett looked up toward the second floor, then back at Clint.
    â€œDon’t go away.”
    â€œI’m not going anywhere.”
    Hackett nodded, went upstairs to have a look.
    â€œLet me have another beer,” Clint said to the bartender. “I spilled the other one.”
    * * *
    Clint was working on the beer when the sheriff came down. At the same moment his two deputies came through the batwings. Clint saw them in the mirror.
    The sheriff walked up to him.
    â€œYou killed three men and a woman, Adams,” Hackett said. “I’ll need your gun.”
    â€œI killed three men,” Clint said. “They killed the woman. And I’m not giving you my gun, Sheriff.”
    â€œYou defying the law, Adams?”
    â€œI’m defying you,” Clint said.
    â€œWhy do you want to do this the hard way?”
    â€œThere isn’t any other way to do it,” Clint said. “You’re in Fontaine’s pocket. Did you think I didn’t know that?”
    Hackett wet his lips.
    â€œDon’t risk your young deputies on this move, Hackett,” Clint said. “Go back to Fontaine, tell him this didn’t work, and you tried to do your job.”
    Hackett wet his lips again.
    â€œSheriff?” one of the deputies said.
    â€œStand down,” Hackett said.
    â€œBut—” the other started.
    â€œI said stand down!”
    The two deputies relaxed.
    â€œGet out!” Hackett said. “Go back to the office.”
    The two young men backed their way to the door, then went out.
    Hackett looked around.