Bad Day for a Killing (Book Three of the Western Serial Killer Series) Read online

  Bad Day for a Killing

  Book Three of the Western Serial Killer Series

  Rita Hestand

  Bad Day for a Killing

  By

  Rita Hestand

  Bad Day for a Killing

  By Rita Hestand

  Copyright © by Rita Hestand 2014

  Smashwords Edition

  Bad Day for a Killing

  http://www.selfpubbookcovers.com/FantasyArt

  Illustrated cover

  All rights reserved

  Digital ISBN

  9781311740670

  Other books in this series:

  Better Off Without Her

  Good Day for a Hanging

  (more to come)

  License Notes

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. Please purchase an additional copy for each person you share with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

  Dedication:

  We all sin, we all do things we shouldn't do. But a serial killer might be a little extreme. However, I believe that every human being deep down wants to be good, to start with. When things go sour in life, sometimes the person jumps off the deep end of honor, respect, and morals.

  To all of you who want to make a better life for yourself, who want to do better, who strive to change things in their life, this book is dedicated.

  Perhaps I'm whimsical in thinking that man can change from bad to good, but we all know that the good can go bad. So anything is possible…with God!

  God bless you

  Rita Hestand

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  About the Author

  Rita's Other Books

  Hard Tack, Texas

  early 1880

  Chapter One

  It was a bad day for a killing, Rusty Peters surmised. The smoke from his gun curled through the silence of the morning like a whisper of a ghost. People began to gather about the body. Rusty stared at the dead man. The eyes of the dead man glared at him. He firmed his lips, adjusted his hat, and began to turn away. Ignoring the gnawing in his stomach.

  "Get someone to move his body to the undertaker." He uttered to his deputy who stood silently along the sidelines, and Rusty walked calmly back to his office. He slammed the door, shutting out the murmurings of the townspeople as they gathered in the street.

  Glancing about his office, he sighed as he slumped into his wooden chair, weary with the knowledge that again he had killed a man. No matter how many times it happened, it never felt right, even when justified. Plain and simple, he mulled the facts in his head, the man deserved no less. Still it settled like a rock in the pit of his stomach.

  He firmed his lips. His eyes drifted toward the window again, as a group of men hauled the body off. His deputy was among them. Some of the men were laughing, some were frowning, but there was no guilt in their faces. No, only he carried the guilt.

  He hung his head.

  A short skinny man with a bald head, and piercing brown eyes came rushing through the door. He spotted Rusty and without a word he laid the telegram on his desk. He paused a moment to make sure Rusty acknowledged it.

  Rusty glanced at the man. "Jonsey…" He acknowledged.

  The little man nodded, his expression tight and a bit confused. "For you Sheriff."

  "Thanks…" Rusty barely glanced at the piece of paper on his desk. His mind was still reeling on the man he'd just killed. Right now he had to find a way to relax. He'd just killed a man, for God's sake someone should have noticed, or cared. Someone should have reacted to it. No one did. Rusty reasoned in his mind that he could kill a man so easily and then worry on it so hard afterwards.

  Frustration surrounded him.

  He adjusted his bolero tie and took off his hat, hanging it on the nail behind his desk. Then with remarkable calm he took the paper in his hand and read it. He read the words, but the meaning slipped his mind.

  His mind flitted momentarily as he saw who the telegram was from.

  The words blurred. He wasn't sure why it blurred except when he reached up to wipe his eyes he found tears.

  He touched the tears, felt them between his fingers.

  Rusty Peters stared at the telegram in his hand once more, as though it were a snake. He waded it into a ball, his fist crushing it and threw it in the trash by his desk. Then as though thinking better of it, he reached in and pulled it out of the trash, spreading it on his desk so he could reread it.

  He skipped down from the one that sent it, to the message itself.

  His eyes blurred again. He felt a physical pain he couldn't explain, and yet he could if he thought on it very long. His anguish marred his face. His head bent, and a tear fell on his crisp white shirt that Chin Lee Wong had laundered fresh for him this morning. He shuffled his feet, leaned on one elbow for a long time and didn't move. He waded the paper up and chucked it in the trash again. He stared at it as though it might grow feet and get up and walk away on it's on. He rebuked the content. His frown wound around his heart like a choking rope.

  As he glanced out the window, he saw his reflection in the window. How had he evolved into this tight lipped gunslinger of a Sheriff? He had once been a brilliant doctor. Now he lived by his wits and the gun, and it had all began only a short while back. No one in this God-forsaken town knew what he had been, nor did they care. Why should they? I'm nothing but a paid killer to them!

  At one time he'd liked it that way. Now he wasn't as sure. His second thoughts haunted him.

  No one understood the effects of killing a man like he did. He'd once taken an oath to save lives, not take them. Now this…

  He'd never felt so isolated in his life. There wasn't one friend, one soul he could talk to about his troubles. So that left him alone and unsure of himself.

  People purposely dodged him when he walked the streets. He'd killed a man five minutes after coming to this town, the remembrance of that day vague. They had made him Sheriff for his deed. The shiny badge on his chest gave him a right to kill. And he had killed many. What the people didn't know is how he suffered after each killing.

  No longer saving lives, he took them in the blink of an eye. His mind didn't register the deaths, but the rightness in them.

  There was a rightness in them, he concluded, as his fist slammed against the desk.

  He sigh
ed heavily, his coffee cold, his jail empty, he stretched and yawned at the dawn's first light.

  He couldn't afford the luxury of worrying about the past. There were too many today's. And yet the past haunted him in the stillness of the day and night.

  He sighed heavily. Feeling sorry for myself won't get it done! I am what I am now, and I'll have to learn to live with it, for it cannot be changed.

  His eyes quickly focused on a man riding down the middle of the street. An ordinary man, one might think. Just a saddle tramp. But Rusty's instincts told him differently. Nothing remarkable about this man, and yet Rusty recognized the inner soul, almost instantly. He was a killer, and Rusty would probably tangle with him before he left town, like himself he wasn't a gun slinging killer. Rusty recognized that too. This man had a past that followed him, and no future ahead of him. Something in the man's facial expression spoke loudly.

  Rusty studied the man, probably in his late thirties, dirty clothed, unshaven, and his face…that was the telling factor. Regret, guilt, fear, and some strange hint of loneliness played across his unforgettable face. Not ugly, not handsome, but not at all ordinary at least to Rusty, the man was a study in human nature itself.

  Rusty knew loneliness could eat at a man faster than anything. He wondered what sadness had befallen the man. Kindred in spirit, he recognized that too.

  Spellbound, he watched him dismount his haggard horse and watched as he led his horse to the watering trough. Once satiated, he walked back to the hitching post and walked slowly into the saloon. Not as though he were looking forward to his next beer, like most, but as though it were a ritual. It was the way he walked into the saloon, almost hesitant that set him apart from others. He took no pleasure in his vice.

  How could he so quickly identify with a man like this?

  This man would be hard to kill. Not because of his skill with a gun, but rather his lack of it, and his innate lack of interest in life itself.

  And yet something was to be said for a man that cared for his horse first, Rusty mused. Through the darkness of evil, there was always a light…small and inconspicuous to the average observer.

  He sighed a little heavily, turning his thoughts back to the telegram and rubbing his chin, as though making a heavy decision. The note niggled in his head, like a throb that wouldn't go away. He could not return, and that inadvertently broke his heart. Another tear slipped down from the corner of his eye. He ignored it. If he could only forget for a little while.

  The past brought pain, he refused to dwell in it.

  What had brought Rusty to this lonely situation? What had marred the perfect life he once had? Yes, he had a lot in common with the man that just walked into the saloon. Loneliness recognized itself.

  His deputy, a young gun happy man with an ego to match his reputation marched into his office and tossed a pair of handcuffs on his desk. The deputy's arrogance stirred the air. His cheeks were dark with stubble, but his hair was neatly tailored under his hat that slightly crooked, and his clothes were well worn, but clean. "I took him to the morgue." Marty Sullivan remarked, pushing a strand of rather longish dark brown hair from his face.

  Rusty nodded. "Good."

  "Were there any posters on him?" Marty asked trying to control the excitement but failing. A smile flashed through his curiosity.

  "Yeah, he was wanted in Dallas County." Rusty said dully. "Cattle rustling."

  "I figured. You claimin' the reward?" Marty asked not withholding his interest.

  Rusty glanced up at him for a second before he answered. Then with some sarcasm he answered. "No, I'll be sending his widow in Pecos the money." Rusty sighed heavily.

  "He was married?" The question hung in the air, like dirty laundry.

  "Yeah, he had three kids. He was from Pecos, I wired the Sheriff there."

  "Why don't you just keep it? She'd never know." Marty asked with complete lack of regard.

  "I said she had three kids, Marty." Rusty looked into the greedy eyes of youth. "Cass Fletcher probably never sent a dime to support her or the kids. The least we can do is see she gets this. When something bad happens, there should be something good come from it in the end. Now, I want you to go over and take a gander at the stranger at the bar. Watch him and report back to me."

  Marty's eyes widened. "Stranger?"

  "Yeah, he just rode in. He's worth watchin'."

  "How do you know?"

  "I just do, now go on over."

  "Yes sir." Marty sighed with displeasure. "Want me to arrest him?"

  "Nope, just observe him. We don't have a thing to arrest him for, Marty, he just rode in. I'm trying to avoid trouble as much as I can. So don't go stirrin' any."

  "Observe?"

  "That's right. That means just watch him. Understand?"

  "Alright, I'll….observe." Marty frowned accentuating the last word as though it soured on his stomach, and reached for his gun. He made sure it was loaded and ready.

  "Don't get in any fight with him. He's not a gunslinger. We have nothing on this man."

  "How will I know him? I mean, is he carryin' fancy guns or something? If he ain't a gunslinger, why are we watchin' him?"

  "He's carryin' guilt on his back, like a smokin' gun. And he'll be more quiet than most. He's not the kind to bring attention to himself. He's worth watching."

  "Yeah…but what are we watchin' him for?" Marty frowned.

  "I want to know why he's here, and if he's staying." Rusty informed him as he eyed the young deputy. "If he's moving on, then there will be no trouble. If he's staying, then I'll know more about him before he finds a place to stay." Rusty replied.

  "Want me to suggest he move on?" Marty smiled.

  "No…just observe. That's all, and report back to me in a couple of hours." Rusty informed him.

  "Who is he?"

  "Don't know. That's what I want to find out."

  "Alright. I'll be back."

  Rusty nodded. Marty needed to stay busy with something, this was as good as anything, Rusty decided. The stranger had done nothing, but he wondered if Marty would pick up anything from the man. If he would see the danger in the man.

  He watched Marty cross the street to the saloon and pushed his hat back on his head. He didn't like Marty's cocky attitude, but he was a good gun, and one thing he needed was a good back up. He tolerated his boastful disposition most of the time, but today was not a good day. Observing the stranger would get him out of his hair for a while. He didn't aim to tangle with the stranger unless it became necessary, but Marty needed something to do.

  Rusty refused to dwell on the telegram either. That life was over. Although he'd always carry it with him. His life had changed, and so had his circumstance. No use revisiting the past.

  He looked at the wire from the Sheriff of Pecos. As he wrote out the circumstances of the death of Cass, he instructed that the widow be paid the reward. He'd mail that today. One thing he knew, Cass might not have been a good person, but that didn't reflect on his wife and children, and in the end, Cass had managed unknowingly to do the right thing for them. He smiled to himself.

  He heard the music from the saloon, his eyes scanned the streets. It was quiet except for the playing of the old piano. Ben Fletcher was the man on the piano and Rusty was eased by the music coming from the saloon every day. It was a quiet balm, to his unquiet life.

  The door flew open and little Frankie walked in. His feet shuffled slowly as Frankie was endowed with a clubbed foot from birth. But one look in Frankie's gleaming eyes and Rusty knew he'd come for his day's reward, a licorice stick that Rusty kept on his desk just for Frankie.

  "Hello Frankie. How is your day?" Rusty asked.

  Frankie smiled. "It's good Mr. Rusty."

  Rusty smiled, Frankie was the only one in town that got away with calling Rusty by name. To the town folk he was Sheriff, as though Sheriff were a name, Rusty thought ironically.

  "Have you done your chores for the day?" Rusty asked.

  "Yes sir."
r />   "Have you minded your Ma?"

  "Yes sir."

  "Have you been a good boy?" Rusty smiled.

  "Yes sir…I think so…sir"

  "Good, then you've earned your licorice stick. Good boy." Rusty handed him the stick from the jar on his desk and Frankie bit into it immediately with a beaming smile. He bit off a big piece and stuffed it in the corner of his mouth. Rusty smiled knowing he was imitating some of the cowboys he'd seen chewing tobacco.

  "There's a stranger in town." Frankie's voice was muffled by the huge lump of candy in his jaw, but he stared at the Sheriff very seriously.

  "I know Frankie. But its best you stay clear of him until we find out who he is and what he wants. Do you understand?"

  Frankie twisted his head. "I guess so. Is he a bad man?"

  "I don't know. That's what I aim to find out."

  Frankie nodded. "He don't look bad. He looks kinda sad to me. He's just standin' at the end of the bar, drinkin' his milk." Frankie commented, moving the huge lump in his jaw to the other side of his mouth.

  Rusty glanced at him. "Milk? How do you know?"

  "I peeked under the door."

  "Well, no more of that. A saloon is not a place for young boys." Rusty commanded. "I'm sure you're mother has already pointed that out for you, hasn't she?"

  Frankie frowned. "Yes sir. You want the licorice back?"

  "No, you've earned that. Besides, you already have it all sticky. Wouldn't be much good to me now." Rusty smiled and noted that smiling had become almost a painful act with him these days. "But you mind your mother, you hear?"

  "What you gonna do with him?"

  "I don't know, watch him I guess." Rusty mumbled.

  "Mr. Rusty, my Ma wonders why you ain't married." Frankie blurted out of the blue.

  "What?" Rusty frowned at him.

  Frankie looked down at the floor as though he'd said something very wrong. "Why ain't you married?"