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  Around him, the dark blue September sky contrasted with the green forests and brown rocks of the Idaho wilderness below. Normally, he loved this easy flight. He’d done it every year at the same time for longer than he wanted to admit. Now everything below him looked like a nightmare in the making, ready to reach out and tear him apart.

  The ridgeline loomed ahead, a wall of death. He wasn’t clearing that ridge.

  He forced himself to take a deep breath. Then, with shaking hands, he fought to get the plane into a very slow turn.

  Nothing wanted to move.

  The trees ahead filled everything in his sight.

  He kept fighting the controls, forcing the plane to turn by almost sheer will. It took every bit of his strength, as if the plane had a mind of its own and actually wanted to crash into the trees and rocks.

  Everything seemed to slow down.

  Finally, the trees were no longer growing threats filling his vision, but instead were flashing past the wing’s tip.

  He bet he didn’t miss the tops of the pines by more than a few feet.

  Somehow, between deep, sobbing breaths of oil-tainted air, he got the plane leveled and back over the deep valley, headed downstream. Sweat ran down his face and into his eyes as he tried the restart sequence.

  Nothing.

  With almost no control, no engine, no place to land but into trees and rocks, he was as good as dead.

  He pushed that thought away and grabbed the radio mike. “Mayday! Mayday!”

  Silence.

  No response from either the McCall or Cascade, Idaho airports.

  He clicked on the global positioning emergency beacon. At least Search and Rescue would find him quickly.

  Ahead, the narrow valley floor closed down tighter and tighter. He couldn’t be more than a thousand feet above the stream and dropping faster than he wanted to think about. It was taking every bit of his strength to keep the plane flying and not stalling.

  He wiped the sweat off his face with his sleeve and tried to get a good look at what lay ahead through the oil-smeared window. Sharp rocks and thick forests covered everything. At this speed, and without any real control, the plane would be torn apart on impact.

  “Need an opening,” he said. “Just give me an opening.” His voice sounded loud and strained in the silence of the cockpit.

  The valley narrowed ahead into a rock canyon, but over the edges of the rocks he could see a meadow beyond. If he could make the meadow, he might have a chance.

  He tried to focus on the open area where the sun was shining, pushing the plane past the dark shadows of the rock canyon and into the light.

  But he was dropping far too fast.

  He tried feathering the controls to keep the plane up, but nothing seemed to work. Instead of something responsive in his hand, it felt like he was pushing against a stuck handle and pedals.

  The rock walls now loomed ahead, a tiny opening leading to the sunshine beyond.

  It was going to take a lot of luck to fit the plane through that narrow canyon opening. And after thirty-three years of playing professional poker, he didn’t much believe in luck.

  Then, quicker than he realized possible, he was in the canyon, the rocks flashing past. Ahead, the meadow seemed to call to him, the bright sunshine a beacon.

  A tip of one wing caught the rock cliff face.

  Before Carson had time to react or even cover his head and face, the small plane slammed into the rock wall.

  ***

  Steven leaned against a tall pine in the shade, trying to stay cool, watching impassively as Carson Hill’s plane struggled to stay in the air.

  From Steven’s position on the top of the major ridgeline dividing the Cascade Valley from the central Idaho primitive area, he could see clear to the Middle Fork of the Salmon over thirty miles away. He had picked the spot just for that reason.

  The day had turned beautiful, almost hot. He had waited patiently for six hours, slowly drinking bottles of water, until the signal had come in from the device he had planted in Carson’s plane that told him Carson had started up his engine at the Scott airstrip deep inside the primitive area.

  Steven felt no emotion as Carson Hill’s six-seater Piper Cub barely escaped crashing into the hill below him. He simply watched as the plane drifted silently down the valley. Carson was full of all kinds of surprises. He shouldn’t have been able to make that turn, not with his engine gone and his controls damaged in the small explosion Steven had set off in the plane’s engine compartment.

  The hillside below Steven had been the intended crash sight. More than likely the crash would still kill Carson, but it wasn’t going to be close enough for Steven to retrieve Carson’s key.

  Steven shrugged. That was only a slight glitch in his plans. Too bad. He had wanted to take the key from Carson’s dead, mangled body. There would have been a nice justice to that. But there would be other keys to give him that pleasure. There had been ten players in that poker game. Nine keys.

  Steven dropped the small remote detonation device he had used to set off the explosion in Carson’s plane into a three-foot-deep hole he had dug while waiting, then quickly filled the hole back up, covering it with pine needles. No point in carrying the device back down the mountain with him. No one would find it here, and even if they did, it couldn’t be traced to him. He had left no detail to chance.

  He trusted no one.

  He had learned that lesson well.

  Carson’s key would survive the crash, and even with Carson dead, someone would have the key very shortly, then take Carson’s position in the game.

  If Steven had to kill that person, as well, so be it.

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Considered one of the most prolific writers working in modern fiction, USA Today bestselling writer Dean Wesley Smith published far more than a hundred novels in forty years, and hundreds of short stories across many genres.

  At the moment he produces novels in several major series, including the time travel Thunder Mountain novels set in the Old West, the galaxy-spanning Seeders Universe series, the urban fantasy Ghost of a Chance series, a superhero series starring Poker Boy, and a mystery series featuring the retired detectives of the Cold Poker Gang.

  His monthly magazine, Smith’s Monthly, which consists of only his own fiction, premiered in October 2013 and offers readers more than 70,000 words per issue, including a new and original novel every month.

  During his career, Dean also wrote a couple dozen Star Trek novels, the only two original Men in Black novels, Spider-Man and X-Men novels, plus novels set in gaming and television worlds. Writing with his wife Kristine Kathryn Rusch under the name Kathryn Wesley, he wrote the novel for the NBC miniseries The Tenth Kingdom and other books for Hallmark Hall of Fame movies.

  He wrote novels under dozens of pen names in the worlds of comic books and movies, including novelizations of almost a dozen films, from The Final Fantasy to Steel to Rundown.

  Dean also worked as a fiction editor off and on, starting at Pulphouse Publishing, then at VB Tech Journal, then Pocket Books, and now at WMG Publishing, where he and Kristine Kathryn Rusch serve as series editors for the acclaimed Fiction River anthology series.

  For more information about Dean’s books and ongoing projects, please visit his website at www.deanwesleysm
ith.com.

  Look for These Other Titles from Dean Wesley Smith

  Cold Poker Gang Series:

  Kill Game

  Cold Call

  Calling Dead

  Bad Beat

  Dead Hand

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  Copyright Information

  An Easy Shot

  Copyright © 2016 by Dean Wesley Smith

  First published as a serialized novel beginning March 2015 in Smith’s Monthly, WMG Publishing

  Published by WMG Publishing

  Cover and layout copyright © 2016 by WMG Publishing

  Cover art copyright © Fotoslaz/Dreamstime

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  EPILOGUE

  Dead Money sample chapter

  SECTION ONE

  PROLOGUE

  Newsletter Signup

  About the Author

  Look for These Other Titles from Dean Wesley Smith

  Copyright Information