The Accomplice (19 page)

In a quick motion, the blade was pulled free, and the man behind Kyle stepped aside to let the fat man drop. Kyle’s back hit the floor, forcing more blood out of his wound. The gun dropped from Kyle’s hand since he was now more interested in getting a look at the ugly face that was staring down at him.

Taking the blue bandanna from around his neck, the man used it to wipe off the bloody blade of his knife. When he smiled, it made the deep creases in his face twist into something that looked more like a vat of putty being stirred by an invisible finger. In places, the flesh seemed to hang loosely off of his skull while it stuck to other spots without moving.

Seeing that both cousins were down, Weeks spun the pistol around his finger as he dropped it back into its holster. “You all right?”

The man who’d been holding onto the humpback quickly examined his wound and started to nod. “Nothin’ but a scratch.”

“Go out and say that one of these two took a shot at you as they tried to head out the back,” Weeks ordered. “Go on, while that blood’s nice and fresh.”

The other man did as he was told, marching past Weeks to pull open the door and stagger through it.

Weeks made sure to stay behind the door so he could ease it shut with the back of his boot. “What about you, Grissom?” he asked the man with the knife.

Grissom let out a breath and sheathed his knife. Turning reflexively to face Weeks with a side of his face that was less scarred than the rest, he said, “Oh, I’m just fine. This tub of shit didn’t even get a gun in his hand.”

It was hard for Weeks to take his eyes off of Grissom’s face, even though he’d seen it plenty of times. So many layers of scar tissue were piled onto his neck and cheek that Grissom’s flesh appeared to be flowing right off of his bones. “Yeah,” Weeks said. “Well, I thank you for stepping in.”

“That’s what you pay me for. That is, unless you plan on taking back my fee as well as that miner’s.”

Laughing uncomfortably, Weeks said, “No, no. You’ve still got a job to do.”

“I hope it’s more along my normal line of work. I’d prefer that over gutting pigs any day.”

“It is. Hopefully it will be as productive as the job you did back in October.”

Grissom nodded and grinned like a man who was thinking back to a day spent in bed with a beautiful woman. “It’ll be all that and more. You just let me know when to start in.”

“Shouldn’t be long, but you need to sit tight until I give the word. If you do have to wait a while, you’ll do just that.” Still seeing the gleam in Grissom’s eye, Weeks took a step forward and asked, “You hear me?”

Although that snapped Grissom out of his thoughts, it didn’t peel the smile off his face. “I guess I can hold off for a while longer, especially since you been taking such good care of me since I got here.”

“Speaking of that, I’ll need you to stop beating on my working girls. They need to stay pretty if they’re gonna earn their keep.”

“Well, you might have to give me a girl all my own if’n you want me to stay around here doin’ nothing.”

“I’ll see if I can spare anyone,” Weeks said. “For now, I’ll need you to get these carcasses out of here. I should be able to keep the law from poking around too much, but it wouldn’t look right to have this room full of blood and stinking all to hell.”

Grissom looked around and quickly spotted the narrow door that was all but hidden behind a stack of crates full of liquor bottles. “That lead outside?”

“Sure does. Haul those two out of here.”

Even as Grissom was squatting down to slip his arms underneath the fat man’s corpse, Weeks grinned and said, “On second thought, why don’t you just get out of here?”

“An’ leave these two?”

“That’s right. I think the skinny one’s got a new knife. Check his boot.”

Grissom pulled up Jim’s pant leg and found the scabbard. Sure enough, there was a knife in there to replace the one he’d lost behind the Busted Flush.

“Put that knife in his hand,” Weeks said as he stepped over to Kyle and dug the pistol from the fat man’s holster. Reaching down with his free hand, Weeks took hold of Kyle’s wrist and straightened out the dead man’s arm before fitting the gun in between Kyle’s pudgy fingers.

“Oh yeah,” Grissom said. “Pretty as a picture.”

The audience had cleared out of Field’s Opera House hours ago. After drinking their cordials and saying their long-winded good-byes, the more cosmopolitan crowd tucked themselves into their beds while the more sporting among them made their way back to the saloons and gaming halls.

Like many other towns of its size, Dallas took on a second life when the sun went down. Bawdy music and the promise of easy money handed out by girls in their sparkling dresses was more than some men could resist. Most of those men never had any intention of resisting.

It wasn’t much when compared to the opera house, but Jed had worked at the Busted Flush for a while and could play a mean harmonica. He could even strum a banjo before he got too much whiskey in his system. By the time Steve Wright made his way back into the Flush, the banjo was long gone and Jed was spitting his foul breath into his harp.

Caleb spotted the grinning newcomer immediately and welcomed him with a hearty handshake. “I was just about to give up on you, Steve,” Caleb lied. “You finally managed to find your way back here?”

Steve nodded and shook Caleb’s hand vigorously. “As soon as I could get away from the missus.”

Caleb winced sympathetically. “I’ve been dragged to the opera house once, myself. It wasn’t pleasant.”

“I hear that. I’ve been thinking about getting back here ever since that fat lady began to sing. Is Doc around?”

“He sure is, but he’s over dealing faro.”

“Faro, huh? Are we still on for poker?”

“Of course,” Caleb said as he draped an arm over Steve’s shoulder and steered him toward the narrow table against the wall, which also just happened to have some of the house’s most favorable odds. “But didn’t you say you wanted to try bucking the tiger?”

Steve’s eyes were already widening as he spotted the one empty seat toward Holly’s end of the table. “Actually, yes. I did.”

“Then tonight’s your lucky night, my friend. Doc’s one hell of a teacher.” Standing behind Steve, Caleb showed the man to his seat and gave Doc a subtle wink. “This is the man I was telling you about, Doc. Steve Wright, this is Doc Holliday.”

Doc smiled in a way that raised the cigarette clenched in the corner of his mouth. He extended a hand across the table and said, “I hear you’re quite the gambler.”

“Not really,” Steve said. “I just like to dabble when I’ve got some money burning a hole in my pocket.”

“Well, by all means, burn away.”

Steve laughed good-naturedly enough but was unable to hide his discomfort when looking down at all the markings on the felt-covered table. “I . . . uh . . . don’t exactly know what I’m doing here, so—”

“Nonsense,” Doc cut in smoothly. “Don’t let all this trouble you. This here,” he said, tapping the wooden box at his right hand, “holds a deck of cards.” With his left hand, Doc produced a deck of cards and deftly fanned them out and in before spreading them onto the table in a perfectly symmetrical arc. “As you can see,” he explained while flipping the end card to cause the arc to ripple over until each card was now faceup, “it’s just a standard deck. Nothing special and nothing to be worried about.”

Catching the intimidated expression on his own face, Steve chuckled and nodded. “So far, so good.”

“I put the deck into this box, drain the soda . . .” After dropping the deck faceup into the box, he peeled off the first card, revealed it, and set it aside. “Top card’s the soda, by the way. We have to come up with new names to keep this simple little game interesting.”

That got a laugh from Steve as well as the others sitting at the table.

“I take one card off the top,” Doc said, “and set it aside. That one loses. The one you see in the box wins.”

Taking the cigarette from his mouth and holding it between two fingers of his left hand, Doc made a sweeping motion across the felt table. On the table were depictions of every card in the suit of spades. “You bet on a card by putting your money on which one you think will show up. Put one of those pennies on top of your bet if you think that card is a loser.”

“And what if none of those cards come up?”

“Then that would make you the loser. But don’t worry, the odds are about fifty-fifty since we don’t mind you keeping track of which ones have already been played.” As he said that, Doc pointed to the spot directly across from him where a skinny old man sat behind a contraption similar to an abacus.

The abacus was sectioned off into portions representing each of the thirteen types of cards with beads in each area to show how many of those cards had already been played.

“And just in case you don’t trust me,” Doc said as if such a possibility was too absurd to even be considered, “Holly stays right here to keep an eye on me.”

Reflexively, Steve’s eyes went to the redhead perched on a stool next to Doc. Her long, scarlet hair was pulled into a braid that hung over one shoulder. The braid stopped just short of tickling the skin above her ample cleavage, which was bared thanks to the low-cut neckline of her purple dress.

“Howdy, ma’am,” Steve said with a tip of his hat.

Holly winked at him. Technically speaking, she was there to keep more of an eye on those doing the betting than the dealer, but she didn’t see any need to point that out.

“You ever hear of skinning?” Doc asked as he collected the cards from the table and box so he could shuffle them all together.

Steve shook his head. “Nope. But I do play plenty of five-card stud.”

Doc ignored the invitation for poker and kept shuffling. “Skinning is a wonderful game I used to play as a child. This right here isn’t too much different. Faro’s an easy way to make me a very poor man.”

Although a few of the other players chuckled under their breath at that, most of them were just anxious for Doc to shut up and start dealing.

“Give our friend here a loan, Holly,” Doc said as he cleared his throat and set aside the cards for a moment.

Leaning forward, the redhead fixed her eyes on Steve and slipped two pale fingers down into her ample cleavage. When her hand reemerged, there was a folded dollar between her fingers.

Coughing under his breath, Doc reached into his pocket, found his flask, and took a few quick sips. When he put the flask down again, his breathing was more or less normal.

“I couldn’t take this,” Steve said while holding the dollar. “I’ve got my own money.”

“Pick a card,” Doc said as he put the deck into the box. “Any card.”

Even before Steve had made his decision, the other players at the table scrambled to put their money down on the various cards depicted upon the felt. Some of those bets had pennies on them and others were covering more than one card at a time. Eventually, Steve slapped his dollar onto the eight.

Nodding, Doc cleared his throat and slipped the first card off the top. “Here’s the soda,” he said as he revealed the nine of clubs.

One of the men who’d put his money on the nine to win swore and punched his knee.

Doc’s hand drifted to the box and peeled off the top card, which was the king of hearts. Under that one was the eight of diamonds. “There now,” he said in a southern drawl that was smooth as honey. “Wasn’t that easy?”

Once again, Holly leaned forward and slid some money toward Steve. She also paid off the other two gentlemen at the table who were smart enough to follow the newcomer’s lead.

“That’s it?” Steve asked.

Doc nodded. “That’s it. There’s plenty more cards in here to go,” he said while patting the box. “What’s your next lucky pick?”

For a moment, Steve glanced back and forth between the felt layout in front of him and the poker games that were taking place less than five feet in almost every direction. Doc was taking another drink from his flask and wincing as the liquor made its way down his throat while Holly played with her hair in a way that seemed to tickle the uppermost curve of her breasts.

“I’m in,” Steve said decidedly. “Can I bet on more than one at a time?”

“Only if you want to break my back even quicker. Holly, show the man the finer aspects of this little game.”

“Glad to, Doc.” With that, the redhead leaned forward again to explain where bets were placed and what each spot on the table meant. This time, every man at that table seemed more than happy to wait and watch the show as she explained what they already knew so well.

Caleb leaned on the bar with both elbows. Although he’d tossed a few drunks out for trying to fall asleep in that very same position, he figured that he’d cut himself a little slack since the sun was turning the sky a bright blue. Not that Caleb would have seen the sky, of course. At the moment, he was doing his best to keep from seeing double.