Holt's Gamble Read Online Free PDF Page B

you."
    Holt grinned that charming grin and nodded. "I think we'd better slip around back and get my horse. I'll leave some money for Brown at the back of his shop. Let's go."
    Turning the corner of the smith shop, Holt caught the glint of moonlight off a steel blade, just before he felt the searing pain it wielded. He ducked instinctively, but the blade slid smoothly into the firm muscle of his shoulder, far from where its original aim intended.
    The force of the blow nearly knocked him off his feet and he slammed back against the wall behind him with a groan. He sucked a deep hissing breath between clenched teeth and squeezed his eyes shut against the white-hot intensity of the pain as his assailant withdrew the blade.
    John Talbot smiled in victory as the pain registered across Holt's sculpted features.
    "I'm disappointed in you, Mr. Holt," Talbot sneered. He pressed the blade cruelly against Holt's throat and drew a fine bead of blood from beneath its razor-sharp edge. "Somehow I hoped there would be more sport in it for me. Though I must admit, your escape through the window did delay me for a bit." Talbot smiled as he slipped Clay's gun out of its holster, and cocked it menacingly close to the taller man's ear.
    "Bring the girl, Kyle," he ordered, motioning toward the smith shop.
    Holt clutched his throbbing shoulder and, for the first time, noticed that Kyle Jessup held Kierin with one hand over her mouth and the other pinning her arms behind her back.
    Damn. How could he have been so careless? He'd walked right into it. Holt felt the cold steel barrel of his own gun pressed against his back as Talbot urged him forward.
    The sticky warmth spreading beneath Holt's fingers felt strangely incongruous to the numbing chill that now seeped into his body. He stumbled forward on legs which were oddly slow to respond to his command, toward the doorway of the smith shop. It wouldn't do, he thought grimly, to have one of the town's upstanding citizens caught in the act of murdering someone in the street.
    With renewed certainty, he knew that Talbot meant to kill them both. He could feel the strength draining from him as the crimson stain of his blood spread down his chest. Steeling his mind against the pain, Clay struggled to keep a clear head.
    The pungent smell of heated iron assaulted him as they moved into the warmth of the dimly lit shop. Scudder Brown's mouth gaped open in surprise as Holt was shoved inside, stumbling to the hard-packed dirt floor at the burly man's feet.
    "Mr. Talbot! What the hell—w-what's going on?" Brown looked anxiously at the bloody man lying on the ground.
    "Nothing that concerns you, Brown," Talbot said, tucking Holt's gun into the back waistband of his pants. "And if you know what's good for you, you'll forget this ever happened." Talbot glared menacingly at Brown who, despite his size, seemed to shrink under Talbot's scowling countenance.
    Brown backed up a step as he looked again at Holt, who was slowly getting to his feet. The frightened blacksmith shifted from one foot to the other and glanced uncertainly at Kierin.
    "Mr. Talbot, this ain't right," the huge man began bravely. "Whatever's goin' on here, I'm sure Sheriff Barker could straighten it all out. Why don't you let the girl go with me and we'll get the sheriff and bring him back here directly. He'll see that this fella's taken care of legal-like."
    John Talbot's face clouded dangerously and he took a step toward the blacksmith with fists clenched.
    "Have you forgotten, Brown," Talbot snarled, "that I own this shop? That without me, you and your family would have been out on the street." Talbot moved one step at a time closer to Brown's flushed face as he spoke, until Talbot's face was only inches from the other man's.
    "Don't you know I own you?" he ranted, grabbing a fistful of Brown's leather apron. Talbot's voice held the brittle edge of a man on the brink of losing control. Suddenly, he released Brown and took a step back. The saloon