In Danger's Shadow: Cassandra Wilde Western Adventure (Half Breed Haven Book 2)
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The detective nodded to his colored driver who sat quietly on the bench seat of the fancy carriage she now remembered he traveled in. Her own father was well known for roving in his primary indulgence the wealth of Cedar Ledge afforded, a luxurious custom-built coach from the famed Ybarra Coachworks down in Mexico. O’Connell, however, was like a classless, mirror image of her beloved father.
As the morning sun shone down on them and he put his hand on the door to the carriage, Cassie tilted her head and put her hands on her hips. “Can I give you a piece of advice, O’Connell?”
The curling of his lips and the wrinkling of his nose told her immediately how well her advice was going to be received, but the man halted his boarding of the carriage and theatrically spread his arms open wide.
“What words of wisdom does one of the famed “Double W’s” have for me on this fine Arizona morning?” His Scottish accent did nothing to hide the sarcasm.
Cassie swallowed hard and felt her toes curling in her boots. She did not want to help the ignoramus, but she also didn’t want to see more young women fall victim to horrible degradation followed by death either.
“The horse.”
“The horse?” his voice was devoid of all emotion.
She rocked back on her heels and then massaged one of her temples before looking at him, her green eyes flashing. “Yes, the horse that he’s been using to get away. That can’t be just any horse. Every witness in the paper all remarked the same thing about it!”
The overweight detective brought his steepled index fingers up to his mouth and then pointed at her with them.
“What are they saying about it?”
Mother Mary, and Joseph! She nearly shouted out loud. According to Nate, he had been handed the assignment days ago, and that should have given him enough time to have done research on the case and pick up on what the papers were saying. She hoped she was conveying her annoyance at him when she untied Lily from the hitching post with short, curt movements while eying him with a rock steady gaze. It was a look she was known for, and Lijuan, with relish, always told her with that look she could be “one intimidating bitch.”
“Everyone was saying how fast that horse was. They’d never seen a mount with such speed. Even the one time when a deputy was nearby and able to give chase, he quickly fell behind until the killer got so far ahead of him with his captive they disappeared from view. That’s no ordinary horse!”
O’Connell pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed his eyes tight before returning his gaze up to her. She could tell he hated having to look up to her and she delighted in it.
“What are you trying to say, Miss Wilde?”
“Our killer here has got himself a race horse. Now you’ve got to start making inquiries nationwide on the telegraph, and try and find out if there are any exceptional ones that may have been retired from actual racing and have been sold to a private owner. My guess it came from back east somewhere. I’d start with the big ones like that new one, Pimlico Race Course in Maryland, I think is the name of it, or that big one in Saratoga Springs back in New York. Buying it closer to Arizona might lead to the slim chance of it being recognized. This guy is smart to have gotten away with what he has so far, and getting the swiftest horse, he could find has got to be one of the lynch pins of his entire plan!”
Cassandra knew she had hit a nerve as her one-time rival’s face became flush and mottled. The man was clutching his fists and she doubted he even realized that he was doing it. O’Connell was pissed that he had never even considered what she had pieced together and was embarrassed as well.
Showing no mercy, she proceeded on, intent on belittling him and hopefully giving him ammunition at the same time to solve the case. She stood tall, with her legs spread apart, and took her shot. “Another thing—accounts have him forcing the woman at gun point up on the back of an extra-long saddle to hold two and he’s got some type of handcuffs or manacles on either side of it that he locks the woman into place so she can’t jump off as he makes his escape. Assuming he’s really a dandy and not just dressing the part, he had to have that made somewhere not being able to do it himself. Again, it’s not going to be local but you need to … “
She got no further as cries echoed through the air followed by angry shouts. The pair spun around in the direction of the commotion from down the street. The last time Casandra could ever remember being for a complete loss of words was years earlier when she thought she had witnessed the murder of Honor Elizabeth who had thankfully managed to save herself when she had been hurled off a cliff. Now she was again.
Coming down the street was none other than the “Daylight Dandy” with a screaming victim on the back of the black mare from the newspaper accounts. The woman’s bonnet blew of her head and her long black hair trailed behind her whipping about.
“Holy shit! It’s him!” O’Connell was calling out even as she was drawing the twin pearl handled colts from her waist but by the time she had them raised the mare and its riders had already swept past them. In a maneuver that was pure lightning, Cassie used her forearm to knock O’Connell’s outstretched arm. He too had pulled weapon but the blow from Cassie caused his shot to veer to the left shattering one of the windows of his carriage. The driver gasped in surprise.
“You god damn bitch!” Spittle flew from O’Connell’s mouth as any pretense of civility dropped away.
“You can’t shoot at them, you ass!”
“You were going to!” he snarled back at her.
Cassie leaned into him face to face.
“That’s right, O’Connell. When they were approaching! Even when he was going past me I still could have drilled him, but once past you’d only hit the girl!” She spun away and mounted Lily.
“How are you going to catch him if he’s riding a race horse like you seem to think?” He sneered at her.
“I know Tucson! Make yourself useful and go round up the undertaker. He’s going to have a fresh corpse coming his way!”
With Lily’s hooves thundering beneath her she thought how she had shouted the truth, and that was going to be her only chance of stopping the man. The Dandy was charging down the street that she knew made a U-turn and looped back to run behind all the buildings including the mission. In fact, as she had sat in one of the plush chairs in her uncle’s office while she listened in disappointment to her being denied the case, she had looked down a couple times at the very street.
At the first alley, she came to she jerked Lily’s reins and guided the horse down the narrow alleyway between the buildings, intent on cutting out onto the street to be in front of the Dandy who, by now, should have been coming off the curve of the U shape and onto the street.
A surprise however awaited her in that very alley. Cassie jerked her head back, the muscles in her body growing rigid at the sight in front of her. For whatever reason two men were in the process of transferring several barrels of water from one building to another. Both structures were identical to each other and for a fleeting second, she recalled the buildings were known as the Tucson Twins.
There was no stopping as the two men’s mouths fell agape and Cassie delivered a hard slap to Lilly’s right haunch and shouted “Heyahh!!” She felt her hat fly off from her head as horse and rider rose into the air to clear the three water barrels resting single file across the alley. Due to the nature of the buildings being cookie cutter versions of each other both had open doors between the two that provided an additional gauntlet for the airborne duo.
Like threading a needle, they passed between two doors with perhaps less than an inch separating the Trotter’s flanks from the edges of the doors. Cassie was about to breathe a sigh of relief when one of Lily’s hooves caught the edge of a barrel on their downward trajectory. For a terrifying moment, she thought they were going to tumble leaving Cassandra to face either the life-ending fate of having herself crushed to jelly under Lily’s weight or careening headlong into the side of one of the twins, snapping her neck instantly.
Cassie had timed it well—she was out in the middle of the street, and half a block away, the Daylight Dandy was charging straight at her, his hostage no longer screaming but having fallen silent in terror as the gap between them closed.
In the split second that she saw him, he saw her, too. Yanking his revolver from its holster, he pointed the gun at her and fired. Cassie felt the whiz of air as the bullet grazed her hair. She had cleared leather with one of her Colts in that same split second and had fired at the Dandy, but her bullet went wild. They exchanged another shot, but the uneven, potholed street played havoc with their ability to make kill shots, and again the bullets missed each other.
The black mare was twenty feet away, more or less, when Cassie made the instant decision to turn Lily into a sweeping arc and bring herself up alongside the mare. The man was at a slight disadvantage, being right-handed, which necessitated him reaching across himself to shoot. Cassandra had no such disadvantage, as the one quirk all six of the Wilde children shared was they were all ambidextrous. Cassie held Lily back so that she was just slightly behind the Dandy, putting him at an even greater disadvantage. He attempted to shoot her again over his shoulder but it was hopeless so instead he concentrated on making the escape.
She caught the eye of the hapless girl whose ashen face and pallid skin testified to her terror. Cassie spied her wrists secured in severe looking manacles and felt a deep fury. Still she had to give assurance to the woman so she borrowed from her younger sister Catalina and winked and smiled at the girl in an effort to convey a message of, “Don’t worry, I’ll get you out of this,” to her.
Cassie considered just shooting the man in the back of the head as she rode along beside him for a couple of seconds. Whatever she was going to do, she had to do it quickly, because at any second Lilly would fall behind the suspected racehorse. Instantly, she decided it might be even better if she just arrested him and turned him over to the authorities and let him have his day in court and give the families the satisfaction of watching a judge pound a gavel and call for a gallows to be erected. A public hanging would be better justice than a bullet in head while on the run.
The Daylight Dandy had other plans, however, and they didn’t include being taken down by a woman vigilante. Just as Cassie, coaxed more speed from Lily and reached out with one of her guns in hand to cold-cock him one, he put spurs to the mare and she spurted ahead of them just enough to nearly throw Cassie off balance. Angered, she urged Lily on, dismissing any thoughts of a fair trial for this evil man. She was not letting him get away to kill that poor girl. When the hostage looked around at Cassie, Cassie waved her arm, motioning the girl to lean away from her captor. When she had a clear shot, Cassie took careful aim and squeezed the trigger just as one of Lily’s hooves dropped into a rut in the street.
The bullet missed its mark in the back of the man’s head but did manage to pass cleanly through his neck shredding his jugular vein. His body jerked forward briefly before slumping with blood cascading from his neck wound with vigor. A second later the Dandy hit the ground, rolled a couple times before coming to rest with dirt caking his fine kidnapping attire.
Cassie urged Lily alongside the black mare and grabbed the reins in an attempt to slow her down. The mare, aware that her master was no longer in present and in control, did slow her mad dash enough for Cassie to drop her reins and bring Lily to a halt and dismount. She quickly draped the reins over a hitching rail and then walked over to the other horse. Cassandra approached the mare carefully, who by this time was walking in circles, snorting and chuffing in confusion.
Cassie took hold of the reins and spoke softly to the bewildered mare. She led her over to the edge of the street and looped the reins over the same hitching post that Lily was tethered to. Then she turned her attention to the girl who still sat astride the mare. She gave the woman a look of assurance and carefully stretched out the chain to the left manacle and shot it with her gun. Quickly she repeated the same on the other side. Next, she reached her hand up to help her dismount. Trembling, the girl took the proffered hand and, with some awkwardness, managed to get down without showing too much of her petticoats.
“Th-th-thank you, ma’am,” the girl stammered. “I’m right grateful to you for this. I was sure I was going to die.”
“You would have.” Cassie told her. “You do know who that man was, yes?”
“N-no ma’am … unless, unless … was he …?”
“The Daylight Dandy. Indeed, he was. The woman’s eyes blinked wildly. She had just come to Tucson the night before to fight for her community against the railroad, but even in her remote little town everyone had heard about the fiend that had a bad habit of kidnapping girls, raping them, and then killing them.
Cassie gripped her shoulder and informed her solemnly. “You’re the only one to live to tell the tale of being snatched by him.”
The girl blanched as Cassandra’s words hit home. As the reality of her brush with death hit her, she fainted dead away. Cassie caught her as she was sinking to the ground. An older man and his wife standing nearby saw the girl sag and came over to help. He scooped her up and carried her over to the sidewalk and laid her down on a wooden bench that sat up against the outside wall of a dressmaker’s shop. Cassie followed and asked them to do their best for her.
Frightened bystanders were keeping back still uncertain as to what was going on leaving the Dandy lying solitary in the street, but Cassandra knew that wouldn’t last for long. She trotted over and knelt beside the bloody mess that had been the violator and murderer of five young women. With no hesitation, she yanked the fine silk mask he wore off his head.
It wasn’t like in the books she read where a murderer’s identify was revealed. The face with the glossy eyes staring up at her meant nothing. He was a handsome man but just a man, she had no idea who he was. All she knew was he was a killer but there was something she did want to know. She leaned until her lips were near the dying man’s ears.
“Why? Why did you do what you’ve done?”
The man used the last of his energy to form a small smile.
“I … liked the way they smelled …” Were his dying words as Cassandra rose to her feet in disgust. A sick bastard if there ever was one. How many more where there like him in the world?
She didn’t have long to ponder as her predictions came true. She stepped away as a crowd began to gather. Approaching down the street and seemingly out of nowhere a judge and a sheriff strode over to where the dead man lay in the dust of the street. The sheriff bent over and felt for a pulse on the man’s neck, but there was none. When he had caught sight of who the shooter was, having met Cassandra on a previous occasion, he knew the man would be dead but he had to check just the same.
The sheriff made no move to approach her. He knew she worked undercover and respected the fact that she wouldn’t want to be caught up in the spectacle that was sure to follow the death of the Daylight Dandy.
He was correct, because in short order all of Tucson suddenly seemed to be swarming about the Dandy’s fallen corpse. Cassie had no intention of sticking around. She would not be giving interviews to Hearst reporters or any others. There were many undercover jobs in her future like the one she was now to do in Leland Gulch and it wouldn’t do to have her name and picture out there for all to see. The papers would simply have to write their story leaving her as an “unidentified woman” who felled the Dandy.
She took a final moment to check and see if the hostage was okay and she left her in the embrace of the elderly couple that was doing their best to comfort her after her harrowing ordeal as she had come to. Cassie nodded at the woman who whispered a silent “thank you” to her. Back on Lily she was just about to turn the horse back into an alley when she saw O’Con
nell pull up and leap out of the carriage. The pair locked eyes, and her mouth spread into a satisfied grin.
“You can reach me at Cedar Ledge the next time you need me to do your job for you. Give my best to Allan the next time you speak.” She didn’t need to see his reddening face, so she turned away and disappeared down the alley like a blonde phantom.
PART ONE
* * *
The Dance Hall of Doom
CHAPTER ONE
* * *
Leland Gulch
Arizona Territory
Cassandra rode through the outskirts of Leland Gulch with a steely look of grim determination. She was there for some dirty business, but no one knew that, of course. After leaving Tucson she had joined up with a caravan and now found herself riding behind a stagecoach, a couple of Conestoga wagons, and a few lone riders like herself. The convoy slowed as they passed a cemetery. A little black fence bordered the place of rest for so many, but it wasn’t high enough not to see that there were two men in it, shoveling dirt into a grave. They stopped to look at Cassandra before tipping their hats and smiling in their most customary way.
“Afternoon Miss, welcome to Leland Gulch,” the taller of the two said politely.
“Good afternoon to you nice gentlemen,” Cassandra responded as she drew Lily to a halt, “It’s a sad business you’re doing. I hope the person went gently,” she said sincerely. This question turned out to unexpectedly to pay off in dividends.