Read Online Dorothy Garlock by Leaving Whiskey Bend - Free Book Online Page B

curiosities. Once, when turning his squat body for yet another sharp instrument, he bumped against Chester’s leg, causing him to yelp in pain.
    “Stop yer complainin’,” the doctor admonished him, intent on his work. The last item he brought to the table was a long saw, its serrated teeth gleaming in the scant light coming in the room’s lone window.
    “What in the hell is that for?” Chester barked, recoiling from the tool.
    “Hold yer wad, son.” The doctor smiled, revealing brownish-yellow teeth that would not have looked out of place in a dog’s mouth. “If there’s one thing I done learned in all my years a doin’ this, it’s that a doctor ain’t worth his salt if he ain’t prepared for any and all problems that may arise.”
    “There better not be no—”
    “Shut your mouth.” The command was loud and harsh and louder when he said again, “If’n you hold yer tongue, it’ll be over before you know it.”
    The older man firmly pushed Chester until he lay flat on his back on the small cot. Snatching the whiskey bottle from the wounded man’s grasp, the doctor took a long draw, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
    “For courage.” He winked before offering the bottle back. “I reckon takin’ a slug or two more off a that bottle might do ya a bit of good, son. If nothin’ else, it’ll keep yer mouth from flappin’.”
    Chester took the man’s advice and a deep gulp of the amber fluid. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as Doc Jenkins selected a long knife from the table, holding the blade to the light. As he bent down toward the bullet wound in Chester’s leg, something that could have been glee filled the doctor’s face.
    “Just keep on a-drinkin’,” the doctor said. “This is gonna hurt a bit.”
    It was well into the night when Chester finally stumbled from the doctor’s room and into the saloon. All around him, men shouted and swore, swilling cheap beer and whiskey and covering the room with a blanket of cigar smoke. Here and there, a whore tried to interest a prospective client in her wares. All in all, it seemed to be just another ordinary night in Whiskey Bend. No one paid him any attention as he slowly, achingly made his way to the bar.
    Once he’d settled into a position that left him only
hideously
aching, he fished into his trousers for a coin and slapped it down onto the counter where it was quickly replaced by a bottle of whiskey. Greedily, he pulled out the stopper and drank as if he were a man dying of thirst. Even if it took all night, he swore that he would drown the pain.
    Try as he might, he couldn’t seem to forget the raw hurt he had felt with the first cut. From that moment, pain had been perched on his shoulder like a crow on a barn. He’d occasionally passed out, only to awaken long enough to slip into unconsciousness yet again. When he had last come to, he’d found himself alone, his leg crudely bandaged, and the bullet that had caused so much trouble lying harmlessly in a pan of blood.
    Squeezing his eyes shut when another bout of pain seized him, he downed the last of the drink and brought it down hard onto the bar. His leg still hurt like hell, but he did feel
better
.
    “’Nother?” the bartender asked.
    “Goddamn right.”
    Chester stared ahead, gazing deeply into the grime-streaked mirror that hung behind the bar. Through the dirt and dust, as well as the pain and alcohol that clouded his head, he could see the anger blazing in his eyes.
    Slowly, a thin smile curled the edges of his mouth.
    This raw anger, the fire that drove him, that threatened to consume him, would be very hard to quench. He had no idea where the two whores had taken Mary, but he was not a man without resources. It would take time and it would take favors, but he knew if he were persistent, he would find them. Then, sated by revenge and blood, he would be able to rest.
    Chester Remnick had never been a religious man. Still, it would take one hell of a fool