Someone threw guns out onto the boardwalk from inside the jail. “We’re comin’ out, Jake!” someone shouted.
Jake managed to get to his feet while Little Jake continued screaming with tearful, pitiful sobs that Jeff suspected must be tearing at his grandfather’s heart.
“Little Jake!” a woman screamed. It was Jake’s daughter, Evie.
“Stay the hell back!” Jake yelled. “He’s okay!”
Jeff saw Evie’s husband, Brian, running up behind her. He grabbed her arm and held her back.
Everything quieted for a moment while the last two men inside the jail slowly stepped out, one wounded, the other still fine. The wounded one had a bleeding arm and wore an eye patch.
Marty Bryant, Jeff noted. He figured the other man to be Stu Forbes.
“Kick those guns off the boardwalk into the street!” Jake ordered, stumbling slightly.
Lloyd moved slowly closer, his other gun drawn and both guns aimed at the two men who’d stepped out of the jail.
“One wrong move, and you’ll join the others,” Lloyd told them.
“Pierce Henry!” Jake roared, quickly adding bullets to his guns. Blood poured down the side of his denim pants.
Lloyd looked over at his father. “Pa, let me handle the rest of this.”
“No!” Jake barked. “There’s one more! He’s a hired gun, so you let me take care of it!” He put one six-gun back into its holster but kept the other one drawn as he looked around.
“Damn it, Pa, you’re wounded!”
Jake paid no attention. “Come on out, Henry!” he roared. “You’re supposed to finish me off! Come on out and take care of business like a man! You either shoot me down the cowardly way—from cover—or come out and face me!”
“Shit!” Lloyd grumbled.
Everyone stood still, waiting. Jeff suspected Jake Harkner very much wanted the hired gun to step out. He even slipped his other gun back into its holster and put his arms out, daring the man to face him.
“Come out, Henry!”
Lloyd kept his guns aimed at the two men who’d given themselves up. Still shaking, and his ears ringing something awful from the boom of so many guns, Jeff rose from where he’d been crouched at the corner of the jail.
“Jeff!” Jake shouted to him. Jeff jumped in surprise.
“Sir?”
“Go inside the jail!” Jake ordered, his eyes still scanning the street. “If Sparky is okay, let him out while Lloyd keeps an eye on those two cowards near the door!”
Jeff wiped at sweat on his forehead and cautiously climbed up the steps. He eyed the two men standing near the door. Both of them looked ready to kill, and not far away, Lloyd Harkner stood with guns pointed at them. Jeff realized he could easily get hit in cross fire, especially if there was still someone armed inside. But Jake Harkner had given him an order, and he suspected it was best to follow it. Across the street, Little Jake continued screaming, and Jake moved right into the middle of the street, arms still held out. “Come on out, Henry!” he ordered again. “Let’s get this over with!”
Stu Forbes made a move and Jeff ducked as Lloyd’s gun exploded. A hole opened in Stu’s chest. He stumbled backward and Marty Bryant held his arms high and screamed, “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”
A terrified Jeff dashed inside and grabbed some keys from the wall, glad to see that Sheriff Sparks was indeed all right. His hands shaking, Jeff unlocked the cell door and the sheriff charged out, grabbing a shotgun on his way to the jail door, aiming it at Marty.
“Get your ass back inside!” he growled.
The man obeyed, and Jeff peered outside the jail door to see Lloyd lower his guns. He started toward his father.
“Stay there!” Jake ordered.
Just then a man stepped out from an alley, wearing a wide-brimmed hat and two fancy guns.
“This is the day you finally die, Harkner,” he called, stepping closer. “Today I get the reputation of being the man who drew on Jake Harkner and lived to tell about it.”
Lloyd walked past the jail door, a gun in each hand but not aimed.
“Can Jake take him?” Jeff asked quietly.
“Are you kidding?”
“He’s wounded—losing a lot of blood.”
“He’s also in a royal rage about Little Jake ending up in the middle of things,” Lloyd answered softly. “You don’t mess with my pa when he’s this angry.”
Pierce Henry walked closer, then stopped.
Jeff watched Jake, who did exactly as he’d told Jeff a man should do. He glared right at Henry’s eyes and not his hands. It happened so fast then that Jeff hardly realized guns had been drawn, other than he knew Henry drew first. He’d caught the split-second movement, but before the man’s gun was even fully drawn, Jake’s was out and fired. Henry stood there a moment, then wilted to the ground, a hole in his forehead.