James Axler – Way of the Wolf

In that moment he knew that their trap had suddenly turned deadly again.

J.B. KEPT HIS HANDS raised as he looked across the barrel of Anna’s blaster. He didn’t say anything. Words weren’t his forte. But he figured Mildred would be mighty angry if he got himself killed, especially since he’d turned down the offer of a roll in the hay to get his business with the gunsmith taken care of first. If it came down to it, he’d see the young woman before him dead before he allowed himself to get killed.

“Are you really J. B. Dix?” the man asked roughly.

“Yeah.”

“The one rode with the Trader in the Shens on War Wag One?”

“Can’t say there was ever any other.”

“Saw you once, a long time ago, but the light’s bad and my eyes aren’t what they was.”

“Hoping your good sense is. If I have to, I reckon I’m going to find out how good your girl here is. I’m not a man to sit for long under the barrel of a blaster. Comes time to shit or get off the pot.”

Anna rolled the blaster’s hammer back with her thumb. “You’re about two pounds’ pressure away from death right now, mister. I wouldn’t go getting all puffed up about your situation and how bastard tough you are.”

J.B. let a smile cross his face, as cold and hard as the drawn blaster in front of him. “You’re just pushing me that much closer to taking the decision out of your hands. I got no backup in me when it comes to taking a hand in gunplay.”

“Put that blaster away,” Tinker Phillips ordered.

“Don’t know that that’s a good idea,” Anna said. She kept her eyes locked on J.B.

“Long as you live under my roof,” Phillips said, “you’re going to be bound by my word. You don’t holster that piece, I’ll chill you and bury you myself.”

With practiced efficiency, the woman lowered the hammer and twirled the blaster on her finger in a flashy display. The weapon found leather and snugged in tight. “Another time mebbe, Mr. Dix.”

“Not if I have a choice,” J.B. replied. “Be a shame to chill a woman who seems to know so much about firearms.”

She looked amused.

“Okay if I put my arms down?” J.B. asked. “I’m losing feeling in my fingers.”

“Go ahead,” Phillips said.

J.B. lowered his arms but continued to move slowly.

At the other end of the room, a section of the wall popped forward and dropped into grooves on the floor and across the ceiling. As it slid to the side, it revealed a doorway beyond. A hunchbacked old man stood in the doorway, looking like he was carrying a pack on his back because of the deformity. But he carried an oiled MAC-11 in a gnarled fist that looked two sizes too big for the rest of his body. With his bent-over position, the man was barely five feet tall.

“Tinker Phillips?” J.B. asked.

“That’s me.” Phillips’s face was covered by gray hair and a thick gray beard that didn’t quite disguise the scarring that had eroded his features. “People tell me I’m an ugly old bastard to my face, but that don’t mean I take kindly to it.”

“Didn’t come here to look at you,” J.B. said.

Phillips seemed taken aback for a moment by the bald-faced statement, then he cackled. “Damn, but some of Trader must have rubbed off on you. That old fucker was pure mean through and through. Man couldn’t handle what he had to say ought not ask him what was on his mind.”

“I’ve got a line of credit,” J.B. said. “Put up by Kirkland. Wanted to see what I could get for it.” He was conscious of Anna falling into place at his back.

Phillips hung the MAC-11 in a specialty holster at his right side. He spit at his feet, then rubbed it away. “Kirkland’s a smart man, but he’s got the conscience of a rabid dog.”

“You’re the first person in Hazard I’ve heard speak out against him.”

“That’s because you haven’t talked to everybody in our happy little ville.” Phillips turned and walked into the room beyond. “Come on in and sit a spell.”