The retired army sergeant who trained her had said something on their first morning together: If you ever become proud of being fast, Miss Marsh, quit carrying a gun. Speed is only useful when it buys you enough time to make the right decision.
Colette had hated him for saying it. At the time, she had not wanted right decisions; she had wanted a name, a road, and permission to hate the man waiting at its end. She had sold thirty head of cattle to pay Sergeant Gideon Vale. For eight months, he taught her to draw with either hand, to reload without dropping her eyes, and to read the smallest preparation for violence.
The four-gun rig had been his final lesson: not four weapons for four victims, but four choices. One long-barreled Colt for the open street, one at the opposite hip in case either arm failed, and two shorter Colts beneath the coat for tight rooms and awkward angles. Each revolver carried five cartridges, leaving the chamber beneath the hammer empty while she rode.
A second gun does not make you twice as dangerous, Vale had warned her. It gives you one more answer when the first answer fails.
Now, blood warmed Colette's sleeve. Her first answer had already failed.
Four of Bragg's men abandoned the porch: two crashed through the saloon doors, and two ran toward the livery and the water tower beyond it. Bragg disappeared into the alley beside the building. He had not fired a shot. That troubled Colette more than if he had emptied a cylinder at her.
Rafe lay alive beneath the porch rail. The second man lay dead inside the saloon entrance. Four gunmen remained in the fight; Bragg remained somewhere outside it.
Colette pressed two fingers against the furrow in her arm. The bullet had passed through coat and skin, but missed the bone. Her hand still closed; her fingers still obeyed. For the moment, that was enough.
The saloon doors settled behind the dead man. Somewhere inside, a bottle rolled across wood, then stopped. Colette looked toward the windows along the street. Faces vanished behind curtains. The townspeople had watched Bragg's gang rule Hollow Creek for more than a year. They had learned the frontier's safest lesson: when powerful men reach for guns, ordinary people survive by becoming invisible.
Colette could not blame them. She had lived by a different form of hiding for eight months: she had concealed grief beneath discipline until even she mistook one for the other.
A hammer clicked inside the saloon. The time for reflection ended. She moved.
The saloon swallowed Colette in tobacco smoke, lamp oil, and sour beer. Wet sawdust shifted beneath her boots. Afternoon light entered through three bullet holes in the wall, thin and bright as needles.
One outlaw crouched behind the bar; the other waited behind an overturned table near the stairs. Colette knew their positions because neither man had learned how loudly fear breathed. She moved behind a support post. A shot tore splinters from the wood beside her cheek. She did not answer.
The man behind the bar fired again, lower this time. Colette drew the Colt from her left hip. She leaned out on the side he did not expect and saw his elbow rise above the bar. Her shot struck the upper arm and knocked him sideways into a shelf of bottles. Glass collapsed around him. He stayed down, cursing, his gun beyond his reach.
The man behind the table charged. Colette's wounded arm slowed her turn; her right-hand revolver caught against the post. For one dangerous second, the barrel pointed at nothing. The outlaw saw it. His mouth opened in triumph.
Then Colette's right hand released the trapped weapon. Her left crossed her body and drew the short Colt beneath her shoulder. The muzzle met him less than six feet away.
He froze. His gun was still down by his leg. He could raise it and gamble his life against the distance; Colette could see him making the calculation.
"Do not," she said.