Find Angel! (A Frank Angel Western #1) Read Online Free PDF

your hog leg before you leave town,’
he said, and that was the end of the interview. Angel saw he was
dismissed from the gunfighter’s mind. Hickok’s eyes were already
monitoring everything moving on the street once more.
    He
headed down Texas Street towards the Longhorn and went in. It was
as crowded and noisy and smoky as the Alamo had been, and he had to
literally force a way through the crowd packed at the bar to ask
the bartender a question.
    The
bartender looked up and scanned the seething room with a practiced
eye. ‘Over there with the big cowboy,’ he said. ‘Gal with the red
dress on. Listen, wait … ’ he tried to restrain Angel but it was
too late, and the bartender shrugged. He tapped one of the barflies
on the shoulder and whispered something to him and the man nodded
quickly and went out through the batwings fast as Angel crossed the
room towards the table where the girl in the red dress was sitting.
A tall, black-haired cowboy was pawing her clumsily and she was
giggling. Angel pushed through until he was standing close to the
table.
    ‘ Excuse me,’ he said.
    The
cowboy looked up. He was drunk and his eyes were already smoky with
sexual anticipation. ‘Piss off,’ he growled.
    ‘ I
just wanted to ask … ’
    ‘ You
heard!’ snapped the cowboy. ‘Get out o’ here.’
    Angel
ignored him. ‘Your name Rosie?’ he asked. ‘Rosie
Russell?’
    The
girl looked up and simpered. ‘What if it is?’ she said.
    ‘ Like
to ask you a few questions,’ Angel said. ‘About some men …
’
    The
cowboy came up away from his chair in a lurching movement and
leaned forward on the table. His was two or three inches taller
than Angel’s almost six foot height, and his eyes were glowing now
with a liquor-hazed rage.
    ‘ Sonny, you want your ass broke ?’ he yelled.
    ‘ No,
sir,’ Angel said.
    ‘ Then
get the hell out o’ here afore I break it for you!’ growled the
cowboy. The girl pouted. Everyone in the place was watching the
exchange, ready for a fast dive out of range if trouble
broke.
    ‘ Aw,
c’mon, honey,’ she said to the cowboy. ‘He ain’t doin’ no harm.
He’s only a kid.’
    ‘ You
shut up an’ sit down here,’ the cowboy said. ‘An’ you do like I
told you, boy!’
    He
pushed the girl into her chair, and she gasped, the breath jarred
out of her by his roughness.
    ‘ That’s awful rude of you,’ Angel said mildly. He took two
smooth steps around the table and hit the cowboy solidly in the
middle. The man looked at him with bulging eyes, the breath
whooshing out of his lungs as he folded forward on the table. The
chair went over backwards away from him and the girl screamed. Men
pushed back away from the area as fast as they could, getting to
their feet and yelling as the big cowboy got his breath and then
with a roar of rage came over the table at the slim youngster in
front of him. Angel let him come and then hit him, a short lifting
hook made with the hand tipped backwards. The heel of his hand
caught the cowboy right under the jaw and snapped his head back,
mashing the snarling lips into a blood-sprayed mask. He went
sideways across the table, tipping it over to the filthy,
packed-dirt floor. A roar of animal rage escaped his broken mouth,
and he started to come up from the floor.
    Angel
let him get up off his knees before he moved again and then he
linked both his hands together and swung them from right to left,
just as if he was holding an axe in them. It was an awful blow and
it hit the cowboy on the side of his face where the jawbone hinges
in front of the ear. Everyone in the place heard the bone go, and
the cowboy screamed in agony, the side of his face suddenly slack
and old. He went down squirming in the wreckage of the table and
Angel stood watching him. Every trace of boyishness was gone from
his stance and the eyes were empty and cold. No one moved for a
moment, then Angel turned and spoke.
    ‘ It’s
over,’ he said. His chest was splattered with the