Marshal Tate rode into Black Hollow at dusk, the dying sun painting the town blood-red. The air was brittle, high plains wind snapping at shuttered windows. By the saloon, a boy no older than fifteen leaned against the hitching post, cradling a rifle too big for him. Tate tipped his hat, but the boy only stared.<\/p>\n
Inside, the buzz dimmed when Tate entered. Johnny Greaves sat at a corner table, nursing whiskey. His pistol rested in plain view. “Marshal.” Greaves’s voice was cool, the word heavy. <\/p>\n
“Johnny. Came to take you in.” <\/p>\n
Greaves smirked, shaking his head. “Ain’t justice what you want, Tate. You want me to pay for those homesteads. You want revenge.” <\/p>\n
“Justice,” Tate replied, his hand brushing his holster, “don’t come with a smile.” <\/p>\n
Silence stretched before Greaves stood. “Then let\u2019s settle it.” <\/p>\n
Outside, the boy still waited, watching as two figures faced off under the crimson sky. A single shot echoed. By nightfall, the saloon was silent again, and the marshal\u2019s badge lay forgotten in the dirt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Justice don\u2019t come with a smile.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":707,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_wp_convertkit_post_meta":{"form":"-1","landing_page":"0","tag":"0","restrict_content":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiction","category-western"],"_wp_attached_file":null,"_wp_attachment_metadata":null,"_thumbnail_id":"707","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storyisinfinite.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}