Kill or Die

William W. Johnstone
with J. A. Johnstone

PINNACLE BOOKS
Kensington Publishing Corp.
www.kensingtonbooks.com

All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

Table of Contents

A Mexican Mona Lisa with a come-hither smile was Sam Flintlock's undoing. In fact she damn near got him killed, a source of irritation that would trouble him for days.

The girl held open the blanket that served as a door to the cantina, stood to one side and beckoned to him. Now a man of Flintlock's experience should have heeded the warning signs. A woman who wore a red, clinging dress, yes, cut up to
there,
that barely covered her breasts, a tightly laced corset and high-heeled ankle boots was obviously up to no good. But the beautiful femme fatale wore an eye patch of scarlet leather adorned with a thin pocket watch . . . and Flintlock was fascinated.

How readily he ignored the two expensive horses standing hipshot at the hitching rail, one of them bearing an elaborately engraved silver saddle with the initials
AP
on the back of the cantle. A man of the West like Flintlock should have wondered if those initials could possibly be those of Alphonse Plume, the Nacogdoches draw fighter.

But the smiling seductress showed a deal of tanned thigh under fishnet stockings and black garters and Flintlock threw caution to the winds. He advanced on the girl with a smile on his homely face and a song in his heart.

It was a bad move and one he'd very soon regret.

After the heat and searing brightness of the southeast Texas day the cantina was cool and dark, lit by oil lamps. The odor of peppers and ancient human sweat hung in the air. The girl took Flintlock's hand in hers and led the way to a table. Her one good eye stared into Sam's pair of good ones, flicking between the two, and she said, “Buy poor little Conchita a drink, big boy?” She smelled musky, like desert flowers.

“Sure,” Flintlock said. “Name your pizen, little gal.”

Conchita lifted her head and yelled, in a now brassy voice, “Carlos. Tequila.”

Carlos, a fat, oily little cuss who looked like he'd put the grease in
greaser,
brought a bottle and two glasses. He gave Flintlock a pitying glance and said, “Are you hungry, señor? I have hard-boiled eggs and cheese. Do you like cheese?”

“He's not hungry, Carlos,” Conchita said. “At least not for food.” She smiled and rested her little chin on the palm of her hand, and the dozen or so silver bracelets on her arm chimed. “You're very handsome, señor,” she said. “We will enjoy ourselves tonight, I think.”

Flintlock knew he was anything but handsome, and the thunderbird tattooed across his throat added nothing to his appearance, but he still didn't smell a rat. Even when one of the two Americanos who sat back in the gloom got up and crossed the floor, his big-roweled Texas spurs jingling, he didn't notice, or care. The man opened the curtain, glanced outside and then returned. He whispered something to his companion and the man nodded.

Had Flintlock's head not been filled with the glorious scent of Conchita and his mind dwelling on mattress time he might have put two and two together and realized that the man had looked outside to check on Flintlock's horse, to see if it was worth killing him for. It was a brown horse and Sam had paid a hundred dollars for it. On the frontier a man's life was worth a whole lot less than that.

Conchita set down her glass of tequila, bade Flintlock to drink up, then waved a hand in front of her face. “I'm so hot,” she said. The lashes of her good eye fluttered and she smiled. “You'll have to help me out of my corset tonight . . . what is your name?”

“Flintlock, but you can call me Sam.”

“Sam is such a beautiful name,” Conchita said.

“Yeah, I'm right partial to it my ownself. How does that there corset work?”

“It laces up the back. See?”

“Oh yeah, I see it. I'll have that off'n you in a trice, little lady.”

“Bad boy,” Conchita said, smiling. “We'll have fun, huh?”

Flintlock drained his glass. “Depend on it.”

Then a man's voice, loud, commanding and belligerent.

“There's a woman in this here cantina cheating on me,” he said. “I won't mention any names, but if she don't get up and come over here quick I'll take my fist and close her other eye.”

Conchita's anger flared. She jumped to her feet, flipped her eye patch onto her forehead and placed her little fists on her hips. “Alphonse Plume, you don't own me!” she said. “I can entertain any gentleman I want.”

Flintlock saw that Conchita's eye under the patch was every bit as healthy as the other, but that didn't bother him much. Women wore some strange fashions. But the name Alphonse Plume did. He was a top-name hired gun and a man to be reckoned with.

Plume rose to his feet, grinning. Even in the broadcloth and frilled-shirt finery of the frontier gambler/gunman he looked half man, half gorilla. He was a foot taller than Flintlock and at least fifty pounds heavier. Plume had mean eyes and the talk was he'd killed eight men in gunfights. Looking at him and the two ivory-handled Colts on his hips Flintlock had no reason to doubt that figure. The man next to him was also in broadcloth, not quite as brawny as Plume, but he looked just as mean.

Plume crossed the floor, grabbed Conchita by the arm and said, “Get to your room and wait for me there.”

“I will not,” the girl said, her generous breasts heaving. “I don't need to do anything you tell me.”

“You always have when I've been paying you,” Plume said. He had big teeth. Yellowish white, like walrus ivory. “Now do as you're told.”

“I will not,” Conchita said, breaking free of his hand. His grip left red welts on her arm. “You don't own me.”

“Yeah,” Plume said, “you told me that already.” He grabbed the girl again and cocked his fist. “You want to wear two eye patches?”

Flintlock got to his feet. His Colt was shoved into his waistband, his usual mode of carry. “Let the girl be,” he said. “She wants nothing to do with you, at least for today.”

Plume was surprised. He looked Flintlock over from the crown of his battered hat, his sweat-stained buckskin shirt, shabby pants and scuffed boots. His gaze lingered on the Colt for just a moment, then he said, “What the hell are you?”

“Nobody. A peace-loving man is what I am. Flintlock's the name and I always say, Flintlock by name, Flintlock by nature.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Plume said.

“I have no idea,” Flintlock said. He reached into his pants pocket and palmed a silver dollar.

Plume pushed the girl away from him and she fell heavily against a table.

“I want no trouble,” Carlos said. “I run a respectable establishment here.”

“You run a damned brothel,” Plume said. “So shut your trap.” He glared at Flintlock. “Some men need cut down to size, mister, and you're one of them.”

“Like the man said, I want no shooting scrape,” Flintlock said.

“Maybe so,” Plume said. “But you got one.”

“You're hunting trouble,” Flintlock said.

“No kidding,” Plume said. “But you're not going to give me much trouble, saddle tramp. It's just been a while since I killed a man and I'm overdue.” He nodded to Conchita. “And I enjoy a woman after I kill somebody. So you see how it is with me.”

“I see how it is with you, but I'm not buying into it,” Flintlock said. He flipped the dollar at Plume. The gunman reacted for just a split second, his eyes flicking to the coin. It was all the edge Flintlock needed. He drew from the waistband and fired. Hit hard at a range of less than five feet, Plume went down.

The second gunman was much faster than Flintlock on the draw and shoot. His right hand blurred as he went for his gun. But Flintlock's Colt was in his fist and he had the drop. He fired before the man cleared leather. The gunman staggered back a step, his revolver coming up. Flintlock shot again, a hit. His second bullet missed, but it wasn't needed. The gunman crashed onto his back and lay still.

His ears ringing, gun smoke drifting around him, Sam Flintlock looked down at the havoc he'd wrought. Two young men dead in the time it took for the watch in his pocket to tick off five seconds.

Conchita was the first to recover. She let out a wail of anguish, flung herself on Plume's bloody body and covered his face in kisses. Then, her pretty face twisted in a mask of fury, she turned to Flintlock and said, “You murdered him, you no-good son of a bitch.”

The man called Carlos was at Flintlock's shoulder. “You better run, señor,” he said.

Deafened by the roar of his guns, Flintlock said, “Huh?”

Carlos raised his voice. “They were Brewster Ritter's hired men. He'll come after you.”

“You're already a walking dead man,” Conchita said. “Get out of here and die somewhere else.”

“They didn't give me much choice,” Flintlock said.

“Brewster Ritter isn't going to give a damn about that,” Carlos said. “He's a hard-driven man, señor, and nobody kills two of his men and gets away with it.”

Conchita's anger mangled her accent. “You feelthy peeg, Reeter will keel you so slowly you'll scream for days.”

Flintlock shoved his gun back into his waistband. “I guess I'm not wanted around here, huh?” he said.

Carlos shook his head. “No, señor, stay if you wish and drink tequila. But where there are two of Ritter's pistoleros ten more will be close by.”

Flintlock, not liking what he heard, thought it through. Then he said, “How much for the drinks?”

“On the house, señor. Now leave before it's too late.”

The writing was on the wall and Flintlock saw it clear. A single chair stood under a window opposite and above it in black paint were scrawled the words:

Flintlock, all his attention focused on Conchita, had not noticed the writing before. Now he took it as a bad omen. “Well, I'm outta here,” he said.

“A very wise choice, señor,” Carlos said.

As he walked to the door Flintlock heard Conchita spit in his direction.