.45-Caliber Cross Fire Read online

  PRAISE FOR PETER BRANDVOLD

  AND HIS NOVELS:

  “Make room on your shelf of favorites; Peter Brandvold will be staking out a claim there.”

  —Frank Roderus

  “Lots of action … If you thought they didn’t write ’em like this anymore, this is the book for you.”

  —Bill Crider

  “Brandvold creates a fast-paced, action-packed novel.”

  —James Reasoner

  “Action-packed … for fans of traditional Westerns.”

  —Booklist

  “Takes off like a shot.”

  —Douglas Hirt

  “A writer to watch.”

  —Jory Sherman

  “Brandvold writes a lot like L’Amour.”

  —The Fargo Forum

  “One of the best writers of traditional action Westerns in the business right now. He’s very prolific.”

  —Bookgasm

  “Brandvold’s rousing adventure … feels more cinematic with every passing chapter.”

  —Cowboys & Indians

  Berkley titles by Peter Brandvold

  The .45-Caliber Series

  .45-CALIBER CROSS FIRE

  .45-CALIBER DESPERADO

  .45-CALIBER FIREBRAND

  .45-CALIBER WIDOW MAKER

  .45-CALIBER DEATHTRAP

  .45-CALIBER MANHUNT

  .45-CALIBER FURY

  .45-CALIBER REVENGE

  The Bounty Hunter Lou Prophet Series

  THE DEVIL’S WINCHESTER

  HELLDORADO

  THE GRAVES AT SEVEN DEVILS

  THE DEVIL’S LAIR

  STARING DOWN THE DEVIL

  THE DEVIL GETS HIS DUE

  RIDING WITH THE DEVIL“S MISTRESS

  DEALT THE DEVIL“S HAND

  THE DEVIL AND LOU PROPHET

  The Rogue Lawman Series

  GALLOWS EXPRESS

  BORDER SNAKES

  BULLETS OVER BEDLAM

  COLD CORPSE, HOT TRAIL

  DEADLY PREY

  ROGUE LAWMAN

  The Sheriff Ben Stillman Series

  HELL ON WHEELS

  ONCE LATE WITH A .38

  ONCE UPON A DEAD MAN

  ONCE A RENEGADE

  ONCE HELL FREEZES OVER

  ONCE A LAWMAN

  ONCE MORE WITH A .44

  ONCE A MARSHAL

  Other titles

  BLOOD MOUNTAIN

  .45-CALIBER

  CROSS FIRE

  PETER BRANDVOLD

  BERKLEY BOOKS, NEW YORK

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  .45-CALIBER CROSS FIRE

  A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley edition / April 2012

  Copyright © 2012 by Peter Brandvold.

  Cover illustration by Bruce Emmett.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ISBN: 978-1-101-56133-1

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  Berkley Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY® is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

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  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  ALWAYS LEARNING

  PEARSON

  In Memory of Buck

  1997–2010

  Table of Contents

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  1

  CUNO MASSEY SET his feet a little more than shoulder-width apart, the right one slightly forward of the left, and pivoted sharply as the Yaqui brave lunged at his bare belly with the antler-handled, razor-edged bowie knife.

  The knife’s talon-like point missed Cuno’s hard midsection by a little more than a hairsbreadth. The Indian gave a shocked yowl as the momentum of his thrust left him open for a split second. Cuno took advantage of that opening, using his left hand to chop at the Indian’s knife wrist and lunging forward with his own bowie, the curved point angled up.

  Cuno heard himself grunt with the violent thrust and thought the knife’s savage tip would disappear in the brave’s bronze belly. But at the last eighth of a second, the fleet-footed brave pivoted back and sideways enough that the tip of Cuno’s knife merely etched a thin, red line between two of the Indian’s clearly defined ribs. The brave’s eyes brightened with a fleeting look of fear that changed instantly to glee as he lunged forward with his own knife extended and drew a similar line across Cuno’s lower left side.

  The warrior grinned and stepped back, constantly shuffling his feet, his long black hair held back from his face by a braided deerskin band. His round, flat features were tight with menace, black eyes dancing and glittering. Cuno could hear Camilla groaning anxiously as she watched the fight. She sat by the freight wagon that the Yaqui had been pulling across the desert and which they’d likely confiscated from a train heading north toward Nogales, before they’d spied Cuno and Camilla and decided to have some fun.

  Five other bra
ves sat in a circle around the two fighters, whooping and hollering and passing a bottle they’d likely found on the wagon. A sixth held Camilla on his lap near the wagon, squeezing one of her breasts through her calico blouse while pressing a bowie knife against her throat. She did not move but grunted and cursed against the Yaqui’s assault, her dark, worried eyes on Cuno.

  The Indians had attacked his and Camilla’s camp at the first wash of dawn, riding in with the fury of a hundred demons, and took the pair by surprise while they’d still slumbered in their blanket rolls. He and Camilla hadn’t taken turns keeping watch like they normally did because they’d been exhausted from outrunning a Rurale troop and had badly needed the sleep. Besides, they hadn’t seen any Yaqui or Apache signs in the past three days, since they’d crossed over the border into Sonora from Arizona.

  Cuno had managed to grab his Winchester and kill three of the braves before another, galloping through the camp on his war-painted mustang, had smashed the butt of his Spencer carbine against the back of Cuno’s head. The braining had laid Cuno out for several seconds. When he’d regained his senses, he was being dragged to his feet by two braves while another pulled the freight wagon into the camp and yet another held his rifle on Camilla, who was bent forward at the waist, screaming at the bronco braves in a mix of her own native Spanish and broken Yaqui.

  They found the pretty, sharp-tongued senorita dressed in men’s trail garb quite amusing and told Cuno that, despite his killing three of their party, they’d set both him and Camilla free if he could defeat the best fighter amongst them in a fair fight with bowie knives. Cuno wasn’t fooled. They merely wanted to enjoy themselves further here before killing him and then most likely raping and killing Camilla. Which was why, now, as the brave facing him lunged toward him once more, Cuno had his next moves clearly etched in his mind.

  He chopped down hard with his left hand, knocking the brave’s knife down and to one side so hard that he heard the Yaqui’s wrist crack. Grunting, Cuno bounded off his heels, lunging forward with his right foot while dragging the left one for balance, and drove his own bowie smoothly into the brave’s belly, just beneath his breastbone. He dropped his wrist and, gritting his teeth, angled the knife point up and under the breastbone. He knew immediately that he’d punctured the warrior’s heart as hot blood washed over his hand.

  Quickly, before the other braves had even realized what had happened, he jerked the knife out.

  The brave staggered forward as his shoulders sagged, the light in his dark eyes fading and a befuddled expression washing across his face. A gob of blood oozed over his bottom lip. One of the other braves gave a shout that broke off abruptly when Cuno grabbed the dying brave’s wrist, jerking him forward and throwing him into a stocky brave lounging on the ground, a little apart from the others, and just now bringing his Spencer carbine up.

  The dying brave’s foot kicked the carbine out of the other Indian’s hand, and releasing the dead brave to sprawl over the living one, Cuno dived onto the rifle as the others shouted and squealed and scrambled to raise their own carbines. Cuno came up fast, the Spencer in his hands. He’d seen the other brave cock the weapon, so he drew his right index finger over the trigger, taking hasty aim on the brave nearest Camilla. His eyes wide with exasperation, the Indian held the bowie down by his side, as though he’d decided to reach for his own rifle and try for Cuno rather than kill the supple senorita in his arms.

  It was the reaction Cuno had been betting on.

  The carbine roared in Cuno’s hands, and the brave who still had one arm wrapped around Camilla’s neck jerked backward as the .56-caliber hunk of lead slug punched a hole through the middle of his chest, opening a veritable cavern. As the brave yowled and looked skyward, instantly dead, the bowie dropped from his right hand into the red desert caliche.

  Only about six seconds had elapsed since Cuno had thrown the dying brave atop the one raising the Spencer he now held in his own hands, and the others, drunk and reeling in confusion from all that had happened so quickly, were just now stumbling to their feet and raising their own rifles. Cuno rolled twice to his left as two braves triggered their carbines, kicking up dust behind and around him while another slug spanged off a rock to his right.

  Cocking the Spencer, Cuno rose to a half-sitting position, drew the hammer back with his right thumb, aimed quickly, and fired. He fired two more times, shooting and levering the Spencer’s trigger-guard cocking mechanism. He was familiar with the weapon. He’d owned a similar one when he’d first headed out on the trail to find the men who’d killed his father and stepmother four years ago in what now seemed another lifetime, in Valoria, Nebraska Territory.

  But firing the old, creaky, .56-rimfire seven-shot repeater was still an awkward maneuver. His position made it all the trickier and so did the fact that the drunk braves were now on their feet and scrambling around, screaming wildly as they returned fire with their own carbines, blowing up dust and gravel around Cuno. Thick puffs of blue powder smoke rose as the Yaqui stumbled around, startled and frightened, drunk and enraged.

  Cuno managed to deliver two killing shots, spinning both braves around and down, screaming, one accidently shooting the other one in the thigh before dropping his carbine. When Cuno had emptied the weapon’s seven-shot tube, the other three attackers had twisted around and fallen in the brush lining the notch between low, rocky hills, two of the three moaning and thrashing, still alive.

  “Here!”

  Cuno glanced to his right. Camilla stood about ten feet away, holding up his ivory-gripped .45, which the brave who’d been molesting her had wedged behind the waistband of his deerskin breeches, keeping it for a trophy. She tossed it to Cuno, who flipped open the loading gate and spun the cylinder, making sure each chamber showed brass. Clicking the gate home, he cocked the perfectly weighted piece as one of the braves gave a squeal and began half running and half crawling up the rocky hill to the north.

  One of the other two warriors was on his hands and knees, trying to bring up a Spencer he’d found in the brush.

  Cuno walked purposely over to the brave fumbling with the carbine in his bloody hands and dispatched the warrior with a single round through his right temple. He cocked the pistol once more and strode up the slope rising to the rocky hill beyond, which the other brave was scrambling up heavily, streaking the rocks and twisted buckbrush clumps with blood, his breaths rising heavy and ragged.

  Cuno wasn’t one to back-shoot a man, but he’d make an exception for this brave who’d intended to kill Cuno and rape his girl. He and Camilla had been lying low, minding their own business out here as they slowly drifted deeper into Mexico on their desperate search for a new life. Camilla and her brother’s gang, all of whom were now dead, had busted Cuno out of a federal pen in Colorado, and they’d been chased to the border by a stubborn old lawman and a younger sheriff—the very man who’d wrongfully arrested Cuno in the first place and nearly condemned him to a lifelong stint in the federal pen run by a sadistic, diabolical warden.

  Cuno raised the Colt Peacemaker .45—a gift from the old pistoleer Charlie Dodge, who’d taught him how to shoot it back when he’d first started dusting the vengeance trail—straight out from his right shoulder, planted a bead on the back of the fleeing Yaqui’s head, and squeezed the trigger.

  The pistol barked.

  The Yaqui made no sound. His head bounced off the red-painted rock in front of him with a cracking thud. He fell onto his side, tumbled back down the rocks he’d just climbed, and lay still, curled up as though he meant only to nap.

  Most of his forehead was gone, leaving a gaping, bloody wound.

  Cuno lowered the smoking pistol and was about to turn back toward the camp when he heard something. Frowning, he glanced back at Camilla standing where he’d left her and holding her hand up to shield the rising sun from her eyes, her long, dark brown hair blowing about her shoulders in the breeze that was picking up. She’d found her own pistol, a Schofield .44, a heavy piece that normally sagged
low on her thigh but which she now held low by her side.

  Cuno held up a hand. “Stay there!”

  He bounded up the rocky hill, leaping the dead Yaqui and skipping from rock to rock, sweat dribbling down his back and chest and burning in the slight cut the Indian had opened in his side. He gained the top of the hill and stared into a broad, rocky bowl in the northeast, where gray morning shadows stretched out from the greasewood shrubs, barrel cactus, and tall saguaros pocked by nesting cactus wrens.

  The sound he’d heard, indistinguishable before, rose again—a savage war whoop.

  This time it was accompanied by the drum of galloping hooves. Cuno shaded his eyes with his hands, squinting across the bowl, his stomach tightening. A dozen or so riders were galloping around the shoulder of a distant hill and snaking into the bowl, heading toward Cuno.

  They were small, dark riders in red calico shirts, red headbands, and they were riding short, sinewy mustangs.

  Cuno raked out a curse and ran back down the rocky hill, again leaping the dead brave and landing flat-footed in the canyon where the other Indians lay strewn and bleeding, flies already beginning to buzz around them as the Mexican sun climbed higher and the heat intensified. He ran over to Camilla, who watched him gravely, and placed his hands on her shoulders.

  “You all right?”

  Her eye was swelling, and her lower lip was cracked, her blouse torn. She nodded, frowning impatiently. “What did you see?”

  “More Injuns. Headed this way.”

  Cuno—a former freighter with the bulky physique to prove it—grabbed his shirt from where he’d dropped it on the ground before he and the knife-fighting brave had squared off and drew it over his stout, broad shoulders. Camilla grabbed her saddle, which she’d been sleeping against when the Yaqui had stormed into their camp.

  “How many?” she asked.

  “Around a dozen, I’d say,” Cuno said fatefully, looking around for his Winchester repeater, which he’d dropped when the first brave galloping into the camp had brained him.

  He found it hidden in a clump of Spanish bayonet. Setting the octagonal-barreled ’73 on his shoulder, he grabbed his own saddle and canteen and glanced at Camilla, who was quickly shoving small food pouches into her saddlebags.