Cotton's Law (9781101553848) by Phil Dunlap Read Free Book Online

dry-­gulcher returns.”
    “I’ll wake you if Henry gets back anytime soon.”
    The sun had set and the air was moist and heavy, with dark gray clouds being hoisted up over the mountains to the west like sacks of grain. A storm was brewing that would bring much needed moisture to the ranches. But only
if
it brought rain. That was never a certainty. Often, what at first appeared to be a blessing turned into a storm in name only, fetching nothing more than a thundering display of lightning that could spook a herd of cattle faster than a stick of dynamite, or turn a man leaning on a wire fence into a cinder. Of course, that much of a display of heavenly power also brought fires to dry timberlands and split trees down the middle. Cotton figured the storm would likely get to Apache Springs by midnight.
    He was seated on the porch of the jail, leaning against the clapboard wall in a rickety ladder-­back chair that had long ago seen its best days. It creaked every time he shifted his weight. He’d been sitting outside the stuffy office trying to get a breath of fresh air after a day that had seen no breeze, not even a hot one. The storm’s onset was announced by a thunderous discharge, followed by flashes of cloud-­to-­ground lightning erupting like gunfire on the Fourth of July. Thousands of shafts of electricity lit up thesky, the ground, and all the buildings. If it hadn’t been so potentially dangerous, he might have enjoyed the display.
    That’s when he saw it. In one nearby strike of lightning, he caught a flash, a glint off a barrel out in the distance, up in the rocks, right where he’d assumed someone had taken a shot at the jail two nights before. He had no time to think about it, puzzle it out, or come up with a plan of action. He dove for the porch planking just as a bullet splintered the chair back. A second later, the roar of the rifle caught up to the bullet’s whine. It had missed the sheriff by inches.
    Drawing his Colt, he rolled far enough to find minimal cover behind a water trough next to the boardwalk. He scrambled to his feet and made a dash for the alleyway and the deeper shadows between the buildings. As lightning continued to shower the landscape with brilliant flashes, his world danced back and forth between daylight and pitch-­black every few seconds. He tried timing each movement, but that proved impossible, so he had to take a chance that the shooter was having as much trouble adjusting to the changing light conditions as he was. If that was the case, it might give him an opportunity to get to the other side of the street and down the opposite alleyway, where he could move more easily using shrubs, cactus, and brush—­anything to cover his movements. He needed to get up into those rocks where the shooter was, or had been moments before. And he needed to get there quickly or lose his opportunity to capture the man who was trying to kill him. He doubted the man would be foolish enough to stay put for long hoping for another opportunity to send a bullet his way. This time, on target.
    Cotton was in a dead run, dodging and ducking to make himself as difficult to hit as possible. He raced to get closer to the outcropping of boulders where he and Henry had found evidence of a man with a large-­bore rifle having sat in wait to commit murder. A murder Cotton was certain had been ordered by his old nemesis: Bart Havens. He’d recognized Havens from the way Henry had described him at the shanty where he’d tracked the shooter. There was nodoubt in his mind that Havens was simply waiting to hear that Sheriff Cotton Burke had been shot down by some unknown person, which would be his signal to arrive in Apache Springs all puffed up with supreme confidence and ready to take another unsuspecting town for a ride straight down into the pit of hell. Havens would certainly wish Sheriff Burke dead rather than have to face him once again. After their last encounter, Cotton knew Havens would stop at nothing