The Devil's Lair (A Lou Prophet Western #6) (18 page)

Fianna snapped,
“Wallace!”

Prophet scowled, befuddled.
Wallace
Polk?

The man mumbled incoherently as, stepping
slowly forward, he kept the pistol extended at Prophet—a snub-nosed
Bisley, it appeared. Probably a .38.

Prophet turned toward him,
keeping his left hand on the girl, ready to jerk her behind him.
Sure enough—Wallace Polk, the town druggist, had a .38 pointed
right at his head. As the man approached, Prophet saw the rheumy
blue eyes of Wallace Polk, minus their mildness. Snarling and
shivering before him, like Polk
’s evil twin, the man extended the pistol and
thumbed back the hammer.

Prophet stared down the bore,
wide-eyed.
“Easy, Polk. Better give that to me. Don’t want no one
gettin’ hurt here now, do we?”

Prophet extended his right hand
half-defensively, only half-hoping Polk would give him the gun.

“
I saw you walking this way,”
Polk spit through gritted teeth. His voice had lost its customary
timidity and politeness. “Just knew what you had on your sexually
depraved mind.”

Prophet
’s brow arched. “Sexually
depraved?”

“
Weren’t satisfied with Frieda
Schwartzenberger, eh? Decided to comfort the sheriff’s grieving
daughter?”

Prophet winced as one part of
his brain wondered if his bath with Frieda was known throughout the
entire county, while the other tried to grasp
Polk
’s
presence here in Fianna’s parlor, snarling like a wolf over a deer
bone.

Wallace Polk with his liquid blue eyes and
timid grin.

Prophet
’s brain revolted at the
image.

Was this whole town
crazy?
Maybe
the place really had been hexed by an Indian spirit, as Mad Mary
had insinuated.

Meanwhile, he tore his eyes
from. Polk
’s
crazed face to stare down the Bisley’s gaping bore, awaiting and
dreading the blossoming report, the bullet carving a messy hole
through his brain.

So this was where it ended.
After all the badmen he
’d hauled to justice, he was going to be taken
down by a mild-mannered, crazed druggist with a burr under his
saddle for a crazed brunette.

Who would tell Louisa? She would sure be
disgusted with him, after she got over the heartbreak.

Prophet
’s brain recoiled again. Was he
getting as crazy as everyone else around here? He wasn’t going to
just stand here and get shot by a druggist.

“
Polk, goddamnit, there’s nothing
goin’ on between me and Fianna. Put down that gun!”

“
Wallace, you put that gun down
this instant!” Fianna ordered, her voice quaking
slightly.

Polk didn
’t seem to hear them. Eyes so wide
the whites glowed, he moved toward Prophet across the room, one
slow step at a time. He kept the gun extended at Prophet’s face,
his hand shaking. Behind the gun, his thin lips formed a snarl.
Sweat dribbled down his cheeks.

He stopped ten feet away.
“I should’ve known
you’d prey on our women. That’s what men like you do, isn’t it?
Lone wolf, come to town. Come to take all the women. I tried to
tell Henry—”

“
Wallace—”

Polk
’s pinched voice cut her off. “He’s
just taking advantage of your sorrow. I’d have been at the funeral,
but you know how people talk.”

“
Wallace I didn’t
want
you at the funeral.
I’ve told you, whatever there might have been between us ... it’s
over now…”

He hadn
’t heard a word of it. He jerked the
gun at Prophet, but spoke to her. “I won’t hold this against you
... at a time like this. I know it’s me you love.”

He paused, sniffed as though he had pepper
in his nose, then shifted his eerily bright, narrowed eyes back to
Prophet. He steadied the gun. His hand shook.

“
Polk, no!” shouted
Prophet.

“
You
bastard

The gun barked. In the close quarters, it
sounded like a cannon. Instinctively, Prophet threw himself against
the girl. She cried out as she slammed into the table, knocking
over glasses and bottles.

Though fired from only ten feet away, the
bullet had somehow missed him.

Prophet swung his left arm
toward Polk. His hand closed on the man
’s forearm, then slid to the gun. As
he wrenched it free of the druggist’s grip, he straightened and
leveled a left jab at the man’s face, connecting solidly with
cheekbone.

Polk gave a cry and stumbled
sideways and back before
dropping to his knees. He lunged forward, as
though trying to bolt to his feet, but reconsidered and cowered on
his haunches. His shoulders fell as he lowered his head in defeat,
brought his hands to his face, and sobbed.

“
Goddamn you!”

‘
Took the words right out of my
mouth,” Prophet said, breathing hard, adrenaline still raging in
his veins.

His glance found the small,
round hole in the wall behind where he
’d been standing when Polk had fired.
Polk’s quivering hand had nudged the bullet a hair left.

Prophet turned to Fianna. She too was on her
knees, leaning on one arm against the table. Her hair hung down
along her face. Several bottles and tumblers had fallen from the
table and lay strewn about the spread folds of her nightgown and
wrapper.

“
Goddamn you, Wallace,” she said,
her voice low and hard. She swept her hair from her face with one
hand and sniffed. The movement caused her to lose her balance, and
she had to grab the table again. “I told you there was nothing
between us ...
could never be
anything between us!”

Polk dropped his head even
lower, then jerked it up, regarding her with crazy-bright eyes—the
eyes of a dope-head, like those Prophet had seen in opium dens.
Obviously, the druggist had been dipping into his own goodies
behind the counter.
“You goddamn bitch! You whore!”

“
Shut up!”

Her scream on top of the gunshot
still echoing in his head made Prophet
’s temples pound. Enough of this. He
reached down, grabbed Polk under both arms, and heaved him to his
feet, then shoved him out into the foyer.

“
Goddamn her to hell!” the
druggist wailed. Stumbling forward, he dropped to his knees,
rolling up the runner around his shoes.

“
Outside, Polk.” Prophet jerked
the man to his feet, then gave him another shove toward the front
door. ‘Time to get sobered up, old son.”

Polk turned to yell back toward
the parlor,
“You’ll never get any more
gifts
from me, you goddamn, double-crossing bitch. Your
father wanted you to marry
me!
That was his wish!”

“
Shut up!” Fianna’s voice broke
on a sob.

Prophet turned the druggist around, shoved
him through the inside door, across the porch, and out through the
screen door. Polk stumbled down the brick steps and fell in the
front yard.

He was making wheezing, grunting, crying
sounds. Insane sounds. The sounds of a man so overcome with emotion
he was like an animal.

Prophet hunkered down beside
him, grabbed a fistful of the man
’s collar, and shook. Polk’s head flopped
back and forth. “You the bastard been taking potshots at me,
Wallace? Huh? Are ya?”

He stared into the
man
’s eyes.
Polk stared back, glassy-eyed crazy, like some leashed stud dog
heated up over some forbidden bitch two houses down. But for a
moment, they acquired a genuinely befuddled cast, lines forming in
the bridge of his nose.

He either
didn
’t
understand or didn’t know what Prophet was talking about. Probably
the latter. He’d just proven he wasn’t much of a shot.

Prophet sighed and straightened.
He had a mind to throw the druggist in jail with Leo Embry. But
that wouldn
’t
change anything that had happened here tonight. Polk wasn’t a
killer, just a hophead obsessed with a woman who didn’t want
him.

Glaring down at Polk, Prophet
saw the wedding band on the man
’s finger. “Stay away from the lady,” he ordered.
“Whatever you had goin’, or thought you had goin’—it’s over. Go on
home to your wife.”

He turned, started back to the house, then
stopped. Polk had leaned forward and was grinding his forehead into
the grass, as though trying to burrow into the earth.

Prophet stared at him a moment,
sucking his tooth. He really needed to get out of this town.
“Polk, Polk
...”

Polk looked up at him, tears streaming down
his cheeks.

“
You can pick your revolver up at
the jailhouse tomorrow:’

With that, Prophet turned to the house. As
he did so, he saw two figures standing in the yard next door,
silhouetted against the twilight sky. Neighbors. Behind the house,
a dog was yipping. A horse whinnied in a pasture.

Prophet threw a neighborly hand
out.
“It’s
all right, folks. Just a little misunderstandin’.” As he walked
back into the house, he wondered how long it would take for this
gossip to make the rounds.

The druggist, the bounty hunter,
and the dead marshal
’s daughter...

He found Fianna where
he
’d left
her, sobbing on the floor beside the table. He was about to kneel
down beside her when he saw the cigar box next to her bourbon
glass, on the smaller table beside her chair.

Curious, he went over and picked up the box,
tipped it to the wan light filtering through a window.

Barely covering the bottom of the box was a
fine, white powder. He knew what it was before poking a finger
inside, then touching the powder to his tongue.

Cocaine.

One of Polk
’s “gifts,” no doubt. Prophet
had never indulged in the drug himself, but had been in enough
opium dens across the West to recognize it.

A little made you sweet and
dreamy. Too much turned your wolf loose. Fianna lay on the floor,
knees beneath her, sobbing into her arms and crying,
“Daddy, Daddy, don’t
leave me!”

She turned her head, saw Prophet holding the
box and watching her with distaste.

“
Give that to me,” she sniffed,
lifting her head and extending an arm. “Hand me the
box.”

“
Nope.” Prophet flipped the lid
closed, set the box on the table, and crouched over Fianna, lifting
her by the arms. “Time for bed.”

He picked her up easily and, one
arm under her neck, the other under her knees, carried her out of
the parlor and into the foyer.
“Okay,” she said, regaining her saucy tone, “we
can do that too.”

“
You need a long night’s sleep.
Then tomorrow should be a little better than today, and the next
day better than that.”

She tried kissing him, but he pulled his
head away.

“
Where’s your
bedroom?”

“
Upstairs,” she said through a
sigh, wrapping her arms tightly around his neck and snuggling
against him. “You feel nice.”

“
Don’t do that,” he said,
breathing heavily as he climbed the stairs.

She nibbled his neck, feeling
warm and soft in his arms. Her lips and teeth sucked and chewed at
his neck, raising his temperature.
“Can that shit,” he growled. “Is this your
room?”

She was too busy nuzzling his neck and
licking his ear-lobes to answer him. Before him, a door stood ajar.
He shouldered through it. In the dull light through the window, he
saw a brass bed with a ruffled pink skirt, brushes, combs, and
other female accoutrements strewn upon a dresser. On a small
writing desk, books and papers were piled. The air smelled like
her—lightly sweet nectar— minus the bourbon.

He laid her on the bed and tried
to rise, but she kept her hands clasped around his neck.
“No, don’t go,” she
gasped. “Stay with me.”

“
Sorry, lady,” he said, working
her hands loose, “but I don’t take advantage of liquored-up
women.”

“
Oh, do!” She clung to him with a
desperate, carnal
need that was almost palpable. Her breath was hot against
his face. “Please stay. You won’t regret it!”

She lifted her head, clamped her mouth over
his, and thrust her tongue between his teeth. He tried to
straighten, but she clung to him. He tried pushing her away, but
the kiss and the musky warmth of her body against him drained the
strength from his arms.

Stoked by hers, his own desire
rose. He tried to fight it off, like an old lady chasing the same
old neighborhood cur off her porch for the hundredth time in a
year. But that cur would have none of it. It knew the old lady
wasn
’t
serious. She’d snarl and poke at him, but eventually she’d soften
to his feeble yelps, warm to the charm in his eyes, put away the
broom, and fetch him a bone.

That
’s what Prophet was doing now as he
lowered himself and the girl back down to the bed—fetching his old,
amorous, flea-bit mutt another bone, one of many he’d thrown it
over the years. He kissed Fianna’s cheeks, nuzzled her neck,
smoothed her hair back from her face, and entangled his tongue with
hers.