Retribution, C.B Cooper [best book reader txt] 📗

El Paso, pulled his gun and fired, striking the youngest Dean boy in the chest.
The mother had screamed, then unloaded both barrels in the Kids direction. Ignoring Ned's own screams to stand down, the men drew and fired, aerating her like a seive.
Then there was the girl…

With a deep sigh of regret, Ned pulled the .45 from his side and began walking across the yard towards the boy.
Travis Dean knelt in the dirt and weeds, sobbing. In his arms he cradled the lifeless body of his little brother, rocking him gently back and forth.
The boy's own grief disguised his foot steps as Ned walked towards him. He didnt even know he was there. That was good, because Ned didnt think he could stomach doing the dirty deed if he had to look the boy in the eye.
Ned Black hung his head, closing his eyes for a moment. When he looked back he raised the pistol, arm straight out, and pointed the barrel at the back of Travis’s head.
The loud bark of the gun was followed by an eery silence, as the boy stiffened, then slowly toppled over, his arms still wrapped tightly around his little brother, in an eternal embrace.


Ned stormed across the ranch's wide yard toward lighted windows of the bunkhouse. From inside he could hear the loud obnoxious voices and crazed laughter of the hired gunmen, whoopin’ it up after a long day spent killing innocent people. Bastards.

Ned was fuming mad, the meeting he’d just had with his boss had clenched it. Unconscionable prick.

Mr. King hadn’t even batted an eye when Ned had told him of the situation over at the Dean ranch, instead he was only concered with covering it up. “We need to make it look like an accident. I trust you’ll take care of it, Ned.”
He’d stay on till the end of the month to draw his wages, then he gonna get gone from there.
In the mean time, he needed to get some shut eye if he was going to make the Dean farm before daylight. He going to have to set fire to the cabin, that way it’d look like an accident, although, even that was going to look fishy after the fire at the Thompson’s. Oh well, he’d let Mr. King worry about that, as far as he was concered, this would be his final act as a Bar-D-Bar employee.
Pushing the door open, he entered the coyotes den, and was met with silent, insolent stares. Walking over to his bunk, he grabbed up his bedroll and headed back out the door without a word. As soon as the door slammed shut behind him, the ruckus inside resumed.
That night, he bedded down in the hayloft of the barn.
Ned was awakened sometime later by a noise coming from beneath him. Carefully crawling to the opening of the loft port, he watched, straining his eyes to see in the dark. A figure moved below, heading for the barn doors, and exited.
Crouching, he ran quietly to the loft doors, easing the left side open a crack. In the moonlit yard below, he watched the figure make it’s way to the bunkhouse, drop an armload of something underneath one of the paned windows, then head back towards the barn.
Black stayed where he was, watching the figure make trip after trip to the bunkhouse, always keeping to the outskirts where the shadows were ink black. Before long, it became apparent, that someone was carrying arm loads of dry hay, piling it thick, all around the building.
In the moonlight cast apon the grounds, he watched as the stranger took one more turn around the bunkhouse, this time dousing the hay with liquid, kerosene, and stopping at each window to draw the storm shutters closed and throw the latches. Standing before the building, the man struck a match, and tossed it.
The dry hay, sprinkled with excelerant, ignited with a loud Woosh, the flames quickly spreading, each side racing to beat the other to the back.
In the bright orange-yellow light, cast from the fire, Ned recognized the stranger.
As impossible as it seemed, Travis Dean stood, illuminated by flames of the the fire, his somber features hidden behind a dark mask of dried blood.
Within minutes, the flames had climbed up the sides of the building, igniting the roof, the desperate screams of the trapped men inside rising above the roar of the fire.
The bunkhouse doors suddenly burst open with a crack, the first man out falling into the hay, bursting into flames. Behind him, others spilled out, opting to rush the wall of fire.
The Dean boy raised the rifle to his shoulder and began firing.
Ned as at a cross roads. Should he defend the men he worked with, or side with the boy.
A movement from the big house caught his attention. “Well, the fats in the fire now, boys.” he mumbled, grabbing the rifle by his side.
Ned jacked a shell into the chamber and drew a bead.
For the second time that day, he pulled the trigger, watching the head snap back, then the body swayed, and tumbled.
Travis had threw the empty rifle down, then, grabbing his pistol, he continued cutting the men down as they boiled out of the burning building.
He seen the blossom of fire from the hay loft doors, just as he caught the sound, his head snapping around.
He watched Mr. King tumble down the wide steps behind him, landing in a heap at the bottom.
He looked back to the barn. Someone was up there.
The yard was eerily quiet, only the sounds of the fire remained, popping and crackling as it consumed the tinder dry building.
Taking off, Travis sprinted through the smoke.
Ned waited up in the loft until the eastern sky started to lighten, then quietly climbed down the ladder. After he had lost sight of the boy, he hadn’t seen or heard him again. Reaching the last rung, he turned, and came face to face with the muzzel of a gun.
Travis Dean had him dead to rights. “Did you work for Mr. King?”
The jig was up. “Yes.”
“Did you kill him.”
“Yep.”
“Why?”
Ned shrugged, “Seemed like the thing to do at the time.”
Even though the boy was speaking, his eyes were almost empty. Hollow. “Were you at my farm earlier?”
This was it, time to figure out what he was made of. He could either try to lie his ass off, or, just come clean and tell the boy the truth.
Ned decided to cowboy up. “Yes, I was.” he admitted.
He seen it in the boys eyes, a vague shifting. It was as if a small glimmer of hope just vanished. Winked out.
"I reckon we got business to take care of then." Travis slowly eared back on the hammer. “This is for my brother. Happy Birthday, Henry.”

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Publication Date: 07-07-2010

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