The mask came off, and I froze. I'd been expecting to see Anton, but the truth was almost more than I could bear. I knew the culprit. Better than I knew anybody still alive in the world.

And I didn't even have to view his whole face. All I needed to see was the grin he wore, like all the world was his plaything. My mind immediately brought me back to the last time I saw it. The moment that changed everything…

* * *

"Ace, it's time to go," I said, grabbing him by the sleeve of his old coat.

He clicked his tongue. Then he clicked the hammer on his revolver. "Not until he hands over his money roll."

I checked left, then right. Grass and dirt raced by as the train we were on rumbled across the earth. Its whistle echoed through the vast emptiness, interrupted only by gunshots pinging against steel. Ms. Mae was up front, making sure the conductor kept the wheels rolling.

"More rangers coming!" Big Davey shouted over to us. He aimed out the shattered window of the passenger cart, firing back through dust at the men on horses galloping alongside the locomotive. Train guards in the car ahead were locked in a stalemate with a couple of Scuttlers at the door: Hiram, Church, and Mac.

We were behind them in the passenger car. Mothers hugged their children close; husbands held their wives. One railroad employee stood in the corner, the front of his pants wet.

I didn't blame him.

We'd got what we came for, though: bonds belonging to a railroad magnate worth enough to get all us Scuttlers through the next year or more, clear and free. We'd gotten intel a big score would be on this particularly unassuming train, and it checked out. A massive win for us.

But as usual, Ace couldn't help himself. Just couldn't pass up a car filled with the rich.

He was like a goddamned raccoon, attracted to anything shiny. And there'd been a lot of that ripe for the plucking. Pearls, silver, watches, diamonds. Fat wallets. It was a great take until one stubborn man.

"Leave them, Ace. We gotta go!" I raised my voice.

Ace acted like I wasn't even there, nudging me aside to lean in and shove the hot barrel of his pistol right under the man's chin.

He winced, the man, tried to stay strong, brave. His wife was behind him, after all, clinging to his arm.

"Just give it to him," she sobbed.

But the man was mulish. Stupid, probably. He puffed out his chest and lifted his head, a bushy mustache donning his lip as proud as the redwoods out by the coast.

"No," he proclaimed. "Men like this can't be allowed to get their way. The West will be tamed. You, sir, are a fossil. A relic of days pa—"

Ace cracked him across the jaw with his gun. "That feel like a fossil to you!"

"Just take it, and let's go," I said.

But Ace didn't listen to me. Rarely listened to anyone anymore. He wouldn't take the man's wallet himself. No. That wasn't his style. He wanted this proud, plump, pomp fellow to surrender his own money. He wanted it tied with a bow.

Pure intimidation. When Ace left a crime scene, he liked to leave the victim's brains mottled too. Scared to go outside. To rat us out. It usually worked, but these days, he'd gotten even more headstrong about it.

Behind us, another man grunted—one of our crew taking a bullet. Big Davey helped him up into a seat, still firing blindly at the rangers.

"Crowley, we can't take much more!" Davey yelled.

"Don't tell me," I said.

I tugged on Ace harder, cursing up a storm I shouldn't ever repeat. It got him off balance, and that's when that silver-spoon-fed fool decided to fight against injustice, doing something to prove his stupidity. He lunged at Ace, grabbing for the gun.

They wrestled for a few seconds. The firearm went off, causing my ears to ring. When the struggling stopped by way of Ace clobbering the guy, the fella staggered upright. Then, he saw the error of his actions. His wife lay against the window, blood spreading across the glass and down the front of her yellow-and-pink flowered dress, a gaping hole in her chest.

Even Ace was momentarily stunned enough to let the man jump to his wife and cradle her limp head.

Innocents died in our line of work, of course. But usually, it was collateral damage. Distant, easy to shrug off, wrong as that may sound. But this… this was up close and personal, and completely unnecessary.

"Dumb bastard," Ace spat.

He could've put the man out of his misery. However, he holstered the gun instead. And this time, he reached into the man's back pocket all on his own, with no interference. Pulled out a wallet with a bit of cash in it. Maybe thirty bucks. Enough to buy a decent suit in exchange for an innocent life.

No need to intimidate anymore when the target's broken.

Of course, when the word got out about the murder, we'd later found out she was the cousin of "The Commodore" himself—the very same rich-ass magnate we'd just robbed. A Vanderbilt. The whole ordeal was what had pushed Ace to decide it was time for all of us to lay low south of the border after hiding out in the mountains where, you know, he put me down for not playing by his rules.

"That's it?" Ace said, pocketing it. "What a fucking waste."

He flung the wallet aside before ripping the bloody, gold necklace off the dead woman's neck for good measure. Her sobbing husband could do not a thing about it.

"That's a bit better," Ace said.

"You kidding?" I asked him, not even hiding my disdain.

He just shoved by me and said, "What are you waiting for?" while I was busy gawking. Then he shouted to the rest, "Let's go! We got what we came for!"

There were eight of us on the job, and we all converged by the doors where Big Davey already stood with Morrison cradled under the armpit.

"That's a lot of blood," Ace said, looking at Morrison's wound as if he hadn't just watched an innocent woman lose most of hers.

Me and Davey exchanged a look that said everything. Then we all jumped off the side of the train where the rangers weren't, tucking and rolling through the brush.

I won't lie and say jumping off a train feels good, but there're worse pains in the world. Besides, now that Mae was off-board, the conductor had already started the slow-down process in hopes of giving the rangers a leg up.

We all came to a stop, staying low while the mounted rangers kept chasing the screeching train. The delay with the Vanderbilt in the passenger cart left us a short distance off course.

Delay…

That's how disconnected from reality we were. Here I was, calling a woman's life a delay.

Everyone was panicked, eager to get on the move and disappear into the mountains to the west. Mountains where, at that time, I had no clue I'd die saving Rosa and her mama.

But not Ace. Flipping over, that was when I saw it. He held the woman’s necklace to his eyes, marveling as the sun made it sparkle, and he grinned. Ear to filthy ear.

***

"Ace?" I said softly.

I was stunned. He was two decades older and his face covered in blood, but I'd recognize that shit-eating grin anywhere.

"Needed a woman to do your job, Marshal?" he asked like he had no clue who I was. Then, I watched as that grin disappeared and terror filled his ice-blue eyes.

"Wait. I shot you," Ace said. Out of surprise, it seemed, he dropped to the ground. Or maybe I was just that damn frightening. Either way, he tried to crab-walk backward until Irish stopped him with a boot. "I watched you bleed out."

"Well, you didn't wait long enough," I said. "You never were a patient man."

Even all these years later, I found familiarity in despising him. The words just came to me as if no time had passed. It didn't matter how utterly dumbstruck I was that he was here.

Though, that did make me wonder…

What had happened to my dead body after I’d died? Had it rotted in the dirt for the flies and maggots? Or had I just up and disappeared until Shar chose me for my rebirth? My next memory after Ace pulled that trigger had been waking up roughly three years later, inside a cavern I called Steeple Rock due to its unique shape.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"There's no room for patience in the West," Ace said. "But you know that." There it was. That grin again, only this time with blood smeared across his teeth, I guess from smashing through that wall. "Twenty years, you've still been alive, and you never even came after me? I'm insulted."

"Your legend vanished. Haven't heard your name since," I lied. "Haven't thought of you once neither," I lied again. "Figured your sins caught up with you." That one was wishful thinking.

"I found a nice living down in Mexico City, just like I'd promised. The lawmen there, you just hand them some scratch, they look the other way. Fucking paradise."

"Sounds like hell."

"Ay, don't wanna break up the gas yer havin'," Irish chimed in, waving at me like I was far away. "But who's this gobshite, huh?"

"Guy I used to know,” I said. “Nobody anymore, it seems."

Ace spat a wad of bloody mucus at me, but it was so thick it just flipped back around onto his face. He didn't even bother to wipe it.

"What brought you back, Ace?” I asked. “No more foreign lands to conquer?"

"I outgrew them, just like I outgrew you."

"Right," I said.

We all looked over when we heard hooves way off in the distance. The Pinkertons were just a puff of dust on the horizon, but who they were was clear.

"You're with them, huh?" Ace asked. "When did you find their side of the law?"

"I serve a higher power than that."

“'Pride cometh before the—'" I kicked him in the ribs before he could finish the verse. Seemed wrong to let him. I'd lived a rotten life, but a man like Ace? Just stepping into a church should've set him ablaze.

"Why are you here?" I demanded.

"Thought that was obvious."

"Well, it ain't." I grabbed him and hauled him to his feet. "So, why? Start talking.”

He smiled. Didn’t speak. So, I did what any man in my position would do. I punched him in the gut.

“I said, start talking.”

Ace huffed and puffed a bit and that turned into a laugh. “You always were a—”

I never found out what I always was because I clobbered him again and knocked the wind out of him.

“I’m gonna let you catch your breath, and if the next thing you say ain’t an answer, it’s gonna be lights out for awhile,” I said.

“Fine, fine,” he said, voice not quite as strong or proud as it had just been. “It’s easy living south of the border, but I missed the challenge. The big scores. Vengeful sheriffs. Pinkertons galore."

"Those other banks… they weren't you. I would've recognized the stink of the Scuttlers."

"What the hell is a Scuttler?"

I blinked.

"Oh, right." He chuckled. "What a shit name for a bunch of shit people. Been through a lot of crews since you and Davey killed Hiram and I had to rebuild. You'll have to excuse me."

I bet he thought bringing up Hiram would make me flinch, but I had no love for that man. Just because we were a crew, didn’t mean we were all friends. I drew my gun and shoved it right under Ace’s chin. Just like he did to that Vanderbilt lady all those years ago. He didn't even flinch.

"You with the Frozen Trio?" I asked.

"I'm with myself,” he said. “Same as always."

I shot off a round right by his ear. He squeezed his eyes tight and reeled. I knew that hurt him, and it took all my effort not to have pulled the trigger where my aim would've killed him. My mind couldn’t resolve how absolutely insane this was, but here he was. After two long decades worth of seeing his ugly mug every time I shut my eyes. The man who'd handed my soul off to Shar and the White Throne.

"I ain't gonna ask again, Ace!" I snarled. "How are you here? How did you know to hit Revelation today, of all days?"

One eye twitched, but he managed another smirk. My fist finally did the job of wiping it off his face. He went down again.

"How!"

He spat up another gob of blood. "You still hit like a girl, Crowley."

"Why don't ye say that to me," Irish said, stepping forward and twirling her knife.

I dropped to a knee beside him, grabbed his shirt with one hand and shot off another round by his other ear with the other.

"Okay, okay!" Ace covered his ears. "Jesus, Crowley. I can't answer you if I can't hear."

I ignored him. My shot kicked up dirt nearby, and my heart would have skipped a beat if it still pumped when I realized who I'd almost hit. So blinded by rage, I hadn't even seen Rosa creeping nearer. The dirt from the bullet even sprayed up and hit the bottom of her pants.

She didn't notice, just quietly crept forward until she was nearby me, staring down at Ace's face. Eyes narrow, brow furrowed. Teeth clenched.

How could I be so stupid? This was the man of her nightmares too. The one who tried to rape her mother right in front of her when she was just a girl. Who taught her that the world was a cruel, unforgiving place when she was far too young.

“James, is that…” she murmured, barely audible.

"Irish, do me a favor and get Rosa and the others away from here and safe at camp," I said, low and level.

"Aww, but I wanna see the show," she said.

"Irish, this might get ugly. It’s no sight for her eyes."

Irish hung her head, muttering, "I'm always missin' the fun." She took Rosa's hand and tried to get her to follow, but Rosa's feet were fixed. Frozen as if the Yeti had taken a run at her.

Bram arrived next to convince her.

"Let's get away from here, dear.”

Eventually, Rosa moved, but only when he pulled her along. Still, the entire time she kept staring at Ace, the gears in her head turning and piecing it together. She'd been young, but you'll always recognize your demons.

Irish hissed like a cat at some onlookers on their way by, scaring them off.

"That your girlfriend?" Ace asked with a chuckle. Then he whistled. "Whoo-wee, she is one fine cut of meat. Met a few like her down south if you know what I mean."

My hand shot out and clutched his jaw, squeezing until I could feel the bones ready to snap.

"You don't dare look at anyone but me, you hear?" I growled.

His eyes flitted her way on purpose, just to taunt me. So, I slammed his head against the packed dirt with almost enough force to knock him out cold.

He squeezed his eyelids as he recovered. "You used to be a lot more fun."

"Oh, trust me, I'm just getting started." That wasn't a lie. I was pissed. I was dealing with feelings and emotions that I’d thought were long gone but for the visions. But it was clear, they weren’t. I could’ve killed right then, right there. I even shoved the barrel of my gun into his mouth until he was gagging, just to get my point across. The dirt would look a lot better plastered with his brains. And with everything screaming through my mind, I almost did it until I felt Shar's presence, a resolute shudder splintering across my chest.

That redirected my anger enough, at least to take a beat. How had Shar allowed me to wind up here, in a reunion between all these ghosts of my past? Without even a warning, either. Nothing. My path led me here, same as theirs; all of us brought together once again by God or fate.

What sort of twisted game was I a pawn in?

"I'm gonna remove my gun from your mouth, and when I do, you're gonna start talking," I said. I could barely get my voice to project above a whisper, I was so focused on Ace. "Know in your heart that I would kill you and sleep like a fucking baby tonight."

I dragged the gun out, making sure the sight cut the roof of his mouth and banged against the back of his teeth. He exhaled and pulled himself up to a sitting position.

"I like you, Crowley," he said, calm as ever. "Always did. Makes me glad to think I'm where you got this edge, but either way, it suits you."

"Wasn't from you." I lied, and he knew I lied. I could tell by his smirk. The details of how I got to where I am today and what I am are irrelevant, but he was the instrument of my demise. He knew it.

"Talk," I told him.

"They came to me a few weeks back,” he said. “Guess everyone's calling them the Frozen Trio. Stupid name. Then again, I named you idiots the Scuttlers, and no one batted an eye."

I glared at him.

"The big one, Otaktay—stupid name too—together, we had a whole plan to rob Dufaux and his town for all its worth," he went on.

"Lies."

"Why would I lie? Them three feather-heads were supposed to hit the bank with us today. A score for the ages, thwarting rich men and Pinkertons alike, showing the world that money’s meant to be in people’s hands, not locked up in vault. We had it all planned. But look around. Red cowards left me high and dry. I hope you find them and scalp 'em."

"All three are native?" I asked, translating his crude, offensive language.

"Yeah, so?"

"Hey!" Cecil shouted as he, Dale, Sheriff Gutierrez, and some other men in badges arrived, late to the party as usual.

I watched Ace flinch, ready to bolt like a scared rabbit. It was his nature to avoid lawmen. I got my gun on him first so he couldn't go anywhere until he was completely surrounded.

Deputies spread out to keep civilians away—who, now that the shooting stopped, were getting closer and closer. Some vendors and entertainers even started to clean up their stalls so the festival could continue.

A couple bounty hunter-looking types who'd been at the shootout arrived too, including the one I’d punched, sporting a fresh bruise. They eyed me, disappointed since they thought they'd missed out on a bounty. Though I'm sure there were countless towns around still willing to collect on Ace's many bounties. People from families like the Vanderbilt’s aren’t ever forgotten.

Cecil hopped down from his ride and Sheriff Gutierrez from his white stallion. They practically fought to get to us first. Cecil won. He grabbed Ace by the arm and pulled his wrists back to cuff them.

"Nice job, Mr. Crowley," Dale said. "The others got away from us, but I knew you'd catch him."

I gave him a nod of approval as I ran my hands through my hair, noticing for the first time my hat was missing.

So, all three of the Frozen Trio were natives. I wasn't sure why it mattered, but it did. It bolstered my belief that these were folks Dufaux had wronged. The Yeti, transformed as he was now, was native too. Huh. What had Ace called him—Otaktay? Now, maybe they found each other all from different tribes done dirty by Dufaux's expansion. But in my heart, I could feel it… this was some sort of family affair, about more than money or hurt feelings. I was reminded of that gentle kiss on the forehead the woman gave the Mind-drifter back in Elkhart.

I tried to recall Dufaux's words about Revelation’s other founder and their kinship, but there was just too much going on around me to think straight.

"You're under arrest," Gutierrez said to Ace.

"Yeah, no shit," Ace replied, chuckling.

"He say anything?" Cecil addressed me, holding his injured side.

I ignored him and kept thinking.

Whenever Otaktay had approached Ace, he was either still human or so early on he didn't look like a beast yet. Otherwise Ace wouldn’t mentioned his rough appearance with some manner of insult. Assuming Ace wasn't lying, which was a tall order. Fibs spewed from the man's mouth like milk from a cow. It's how he got men to follow him so easily. Probably how he built a whole new crew for this job, most of which now lay dead in the square.

"Cat got your tongue, Crowley?" Ace said.

I rushed back to him, ignoring Cecil's protests.

"Where are the outlaws?" I asked, grabbing him by his collar.

"How should I know?" Ace said. "I told you they didn't show. Left us high and dry. You can't never trust an Injun, 'specially not a squaw."

“Where are they!?” I brought my arm back to swing, but it never came forward. I turned to find Dale holding me back from walloping Ace once more.

“Let the law be the law, Mr. Crowley,” he said.

I grimaced, but brought my arm down.

“That’s right,” Ace said. “Listen to the little pussy.”

Dale looked me sidelong in the eye, then he offered a slight nod before turning his back to me. I took it as a sign.

I pushed Gutierrez aside, kicked Ace over, and pressed my boot to his throat. And there was that stupid grin again.

The bastard was enjoying this more than ever. And even if he didn't actually know anything, all I wanted from him in that moment was to be afraid. He deserved it. I deserved to see it.

But Ace would eat a bullet just to spite me and win a standoff. He'd smile all the way down to the depths of Hell and give Lucifer himself the middle finger.

"Get off him before I put you down," Gutierrez said, weapon out and aimed at me. "You caught him, so I'll forgive last night's transgression. But make no mistake, I'm the law here."

I considered pulling my gun on Gutierrez in return, but he'd probably shoot me and open a new can of worms.

"Oh, drop the act, Gutierrez," Cecil groaned. "You've got about as much power here as a mouse. And you." He stepped to get a clear view of me. "We've come this far. He's no use to us dead."

I growled but removed my boot.

Ace chuckled. "Always the good little soldier."

My boot returned, quick as a whip to his chin. Struck him so hard it knocked him out cold this time, leaving his eyes fluttering around behind his eyelids.

"Feel better?" Cecil asked.

I wish I could say I did, but it still felt like we'd lost.

All I had were more questions.