A Good Day to Die Read Online Free

Richmond fell and Dixie folded in ’65, Quantrill and his men received no amnesty. They were wanted outlaws with a price on their heads. On the dodge, plying the gunman’s trade, Johnny Cross worked his way back to Hangtree County, where he wasn’t wanted for anything—yet.
    A dangerous place, the county was one of the most violent locales on the frontier. Trouble came frequently and fast, and Johnny was in his element. He and Luke crossed trails and teamed up. A mysterious stranger named Sam Heller—a damned Yankee but a first-class fighting man—roped them into bucking a murderous outlaw gang. 1
    When the gunsmoke cleared, Johnny and Luke had come out of it with whole skins and a nice chunk of reward money.
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    Johnny and Luke saddled up and pointed their horses east along the Hangtree Trail, heading into town to blow off some steam after working hard during the week. Hangtown was a couple hours ride from the ranch, but then, Texas was big. Every place in Texas was a fair piece away from everywhere else.
    They rode out in the morning, when it was still cool. Texas in late June got hot early and stayed that way long after sundown. The Hangtree Trail was a dirt road stretching east-west across the county. It had rained the night before, washing things clean and wetting down the dust. The sky was cloudless blue, the grass and trees bright green.
    Luke Pettigrew was long and lean. War wounds left him hollow-eyed, sunken-cheeked and gaunt. He was starting to fill out, but there was still something of a half-starved wolf about him. Tufts of gray-brown hair stuck out on the sides of his head under his hat, and the sharp tips of canine teeth showed over the edge of his lips.
    He was mounted on a big bay horse, a rifle fixed to the right-hand side of the saddle and a crutch on the left. He was good with a rifle, fair with a pistol. A sawed-off shotgun hung in a holster on his right hip, for when the fighting got up close and personal.
    Johnny Cross was of medium height, athletic, and compactly knit. He had black hair and hazel eyes that sometimes looked brown, sometimes yellow, depending on the light and his moods. He was clean shaven, something of a rarity when most men wore beards or mustaches.
    When he’d been with Quantrill, he lived rough in the field, going weeks, months without a shave, haircut, or bath and wearing the same clothes night and day until they began coming apart, shredding off his body. These days, he set a high value on bathing, shaving, and clean clothes. His nature was fastidious, catlike even.
    He wore a flat-crowned black hat, a dark broadcloth jacket, and a gray button-down shirt. His black denim pants hung over his army-issue boots. A pair of hip-holstered Colt .44s showed beneath his jacket. A lightweight pistol was tucked away in one of his jacket pockets, a carbine was tucked into his saddle scabbard, and a couple more pistols were stashed in his saddlebags.
    Riding with Quantrill had taught him the value of having plenty of firepower where he could get to it fast. Returning to Hangtree had firmed up that belief.
    Ahead lay a low ridge running north-south, cut at right angles by the Hangtree Trail. Hangtown lay just east of the rise.
    North of the trail rose the Hanging Tree, a towering dead oak, silver-gray and lightning-blasted. It had broken limbs sticking out from its sides. At its foot, lay black, sticklike crosses, slanting wooden grave markers, and weedy mounds of Boot Hill, burial place of the poor, the lost, and the damned.
    South of the trail, the rise was topped by a white-painted wooden church with a bell tower topped by an obelisk-shaped steeple. Nearby was the churchyard cemetery, neat and well kept.
    Johnny and Luke crested the ridge. On the far side, the trail dipped and ran east into Hangtown. Once in town, the road became Trail Street, the main drag. It was paralleled on the north by Commerce Street, south by Mace Street.
    At the east end of Trail