Hang on for the Ride

Three can be a real crowd, particularly when you're crammed into a cellar full of preserves in mason jars, down in dark so black you can't see your own hand in front of your face, and when you try, you end up bumping into somebody's unmentionables. But when that cellar door stands between you and certain death at the claws of a giant, rabid hound, well, then you thank the Good Lord for that cramped cellar and the two beating hearts on either side of you.

"You think it's gone, Cal?" Big Yap whispered at length. There hadn't been a sound on the other side of the door for a good ten minutes.

"Only one way to find out," Coyote Cal said in a low tone. His thick-muscled frame shifted in the dark.

"Let's give it another minute or few," said Donna the Witch Jamison. "Just to be sure."

"Last time I checked, you ain't the hero in this story," Big Yap muttered. "What Cal says goes, and if he says it's time to open— "

"Enough playful banter," said Cal. His hand slid toward the Colt holstered at his side. "Brace yourselves."

(You can read the rest of this story at The Western Online.)