Outlaw's Reckoning by J. R. Roberts

“I . . . sort of paid him a visit before robbing the bank. Kind of for insurance.”
    â€œWhat sort of insurance?”
    â€œThe kind a man gets when he holds another man’s family hostage and threatens to shoot up his house and home if he don’t let me rob that bank.”
    â€œJesus,” Clint muttered.
    Matt nodded slowly and lowered his head as if he didn’t want to look him in the eye. “I know. It was a bad one. That’s why it sort of stuck in my mind.”
    Before Clint could respond to that, the door of the little house Matt had picked out swung open. The hinges creaked loudly and made a grating sound that was soon followed by the knocking of wood against wood. The man who stepped forward wasn’t exactly old, but he carried himself as if an additional twenty years had been tacked onto the forty or so that he’d already earned.
    The man was skinny, balding, and had a sunken face. A bristly black mustache sprouted from his lip and waggled as he grunted and groaned with the effort of walking outside. Most of that effort was stemming from the fact that he only had one full leg at his disposal and needed to lean on a crutch so he could move.
    As soon as the man spotted Matt, his eyes widened and he turned to hustle inside. Considering his predicament, he actually moved pretty fast.
    â€œPardon us,” Matt shouted toward the house. “I wondered if you might be able to—”
    Before Matt could finish his question, the one-legged man hobbled back through the door. Along with the crutch, he also brought along a shotgun, which he propped on one arm and then pulled the trigger.
    â€œHoly shit!” Matt shouted as the shotgun roared and sent a plume of smoke into the air.
    Clint had pulled Eclipse away from the front of the house as soon as he’d seen that shotgun. Unfortunately, considering the one-legged man’s haste, that only put Clint in more danger. Between the man’s rush to pull his trigger and his problem balancing on his crutch, the shotgun blast wound up coming closer to Clint than to Matt. Even as the buckshot blazed past Clint’s head, the man who’d fired the shotgun was still glaring intently at Matt.
    â€œIt’s you!” the one-legged man shouted.
    Matt’s horse had reflexively turned from the house to get away from the shotgun blast. Coming around in a full circle, Matt faced the house again while patting the air with his free hand. “It’s not what you think,” Matt said.
    The one-legged man was trembling, but had collected himself enough to pull the shotgun away from Clint’s direction and point it at Matt. His aim might not have been perfect, but it was close enough for the shotgun to put Matt into a world of hurt.
    â€œJust give me a moment to explain,” Matt said.
    Slowly, the one-legged man shook his head. “No. I remember you. I won’t let you hurt me again.”
    The shotgun in the one-legged man’s hands was still shaking, but it wasn’t about to be taken away from its target. The look in the man’s eyes was full of fear, but there was enough determination mixed in to make his intentions plenty easy to distinguish.
    As the roar of the shotgun rolled through the air, the sounds of some distant voices could be heard. Matt’s voice cut right through all of that as he leveled his eyes onto the one-legged man and spoke with cool determination.
    â€œJust a minute of your time,” Matt said. “That’s all I’m asking.”
    But the other man barely seemed to listen. All he could do was shake his head and tighten his grip on his shotgun.
    The next sound to drift through the air was the brush of iron against leather, followed by the metallic click of a pistol’s hammer being thumbed back.
    â€œNo need to worry about him,” Clint said as he pointed the Colt at Matt. “If you let him have a word with you, I promise he won’t ever bother you