California Carnage Read Free Page A

now.’’
    ‘‘Aren’t you coming in?’’ she asked. ‘‘Mr. Stoddard is staying here, I believe.’’
    ‘‘I’ll talk to him later. Right now I want to tend to my horse.’’ He had left the magnificent black-and-white Ovaro stallion tied at a hitch rail down the street, not far from the cantina. Pablo had a stable and a corral out back where pilgrims who rented the rooms in the rear of the cantina could leave their mounts. Fargo intended to see to it that the Ovaro was unsaddled, rubbed down, and given grain and water before he dealt with the rest of the business that had brought him to Los Angeles.
    ‘‘All right. Thank you again, Mr. Fargo.’’
    He tugged on the brim of his hat. ‘‘You’re welcome, Miss Grayson. Good night.’’
    She went inside the hotel. Fargo waited until she had closed the door behind her before he turned away.
    Across the street, Colt flame bloomed in the darkness, and Fargo heard the wind rip of a bullet as it tore through the air next to his ear.

2
    As the slug splintered wood somewhere behind him, Fargo threw himself to the right, lunging off the porch so that the light through the hotel’s front windows wouldn’t make him a better target. By the time his boots hit the dirt of the street, his gun was in his hand.
    More muzzle flashes gouted from the shadows across the street. Fargo ducked behind a two-wheeled mule cart that someone had left there after unhitching the mule. It didn’t provide much cover but was better than nothing.
    Lead came out of the night, searching for him, thudding into the cart. He crouched low, thrust his Colt around the corner of the cart, and triggered three fast shots toward the dark alley mouth where the gunmen lurked. Someone yelled in pain, telling Fargo that he had winged one of them, at the least.
    They spilled from the alley: dark, running figures that split up, two going right, two going left. They wanted to circle around him, get him in a cross fire. Fargo knew that as well as he knew his own name.
    He couldn’t afford to let that happen, so he tracked the men sprinting to the right and fired the two rounds he had remaining in the Colt’s cylinder. Hitting a running man in bad light was no easy task, but one of the bushwhackers yelped and tumbled off his feet. He rolled over a couple of times and then lay still.
    But the other one kept running and ducked behind a water trough.
    Fargo bit back a curse as he started to reload. Now he would have them coming at him from two sides. If they had done that to start with, they probably would have gotten him with their first volley. They had overestimated their gun skill, though, all four of them opening up at him from the alley across the street.
    Fargo’s eyes were sharper than those of most men, but even he couldn’t see in the dark. He glanced to the left and saw no sign of the men who had gone that way. They were hiding somewhere in the shadows. He would have to rely on his other senses to warn him of their approach. As he finished reloading the Colt, putting six in the wheel this time instead of the customary five, he kept his eyes on the water trough where the third man had taken cover.
    A flurry of shots came from Fargo’s left, chipping away at the framework of the cart. No doubt thinking that Fargo would be distracted by that, the man behind the water trough leaped up and tried to dash across the street, so he would be on the same side as his quarry.
    Fargo ignored the other threat for the moment, lined his sights on the running man, and squeezed the trigger. As the Colt roared, the man went backward as if he had been punched in the chest by a giant fist.
    As soon as Fargo saw the man start to go down and knew he had scored a clean hit, he twisted around and flattened himself on the ground. The other two men had reached the boardwalk on this side of the street and now charged toward him, the guns in their fists spewing lead. Fargo took aim and fired three times, fast.
    One of the