The Case of the Great Land Grab (Agent Thorn Book 1)

by Brandy Golden

  The Case of the Great Land Grab

  Agent Thorn, Book One

  By

  Brandy Golden

  ©2015 by Blushing Books® and Brandy Golden

  All rights reserved.

  No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

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  Golden, Brandy

  The Case of the Great Land Grab

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-68259-204-5

  Cover Art by ABCD Graphics & Design

  This book is intended for adults only. Spanking and other sexual activities represented in this book are fantasies only, intended for adults. Nothing in this book should be interpreted as Blushing Books' or the author's advocating any non-consensual spanking activity or the spanking of minors.

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  Table of Contents:

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  About the Author

  Ebook Offer

  Blushing Books Newsletter

  Blushing Books

  Chapter One

  Thorn had dropped what was left of his cheroot and ground it beneath the heal of his leather boot, his sharp gaze narrowing against the sun's glint when he spotted her...Callie Perkins. She was headed for the back alley door of the Silver Slipper, the same door Thorn was staking out. He stepped out of the shadow of the print shop across from the whorehouse to stop her, but he was too late.

  “Damnation,” he swore softly, “I told her to let me handle this. I'm going to blister her ass good, if she doesn't get herself killed.” He ran swiftly to the same door the object of his ire disappeared into and stepped inside, closing it silently behind him. Gun drawn, he padded on rabbit feet down the carpeted hallway, following the sound of the female shriek and the deeper protests of his quarry.

  The morning light was coming in through a window at the end of the darkened hallway and he flattened up against the wall beside the open doorway to get a grip on what was happening. He could hear Callie's strident, angry words.

  “You shot my Pa, you good for nothing gambler! Now I'm going to shoot you.”

  “Put the gun down, girlie,” came the deeper male tones of the man he was after, Henry Aikens. “What happened to your Pa was an accident, and I'm not the one who shot him. Besides, he was cheating!”

  Aikens’ voice was wheedling, but Thorn didn't hear any fear in it. That meant he had the upper hand on the girl and she didn't know it. He did hear the click of a gun though, and he threw himself around the doorway and into the girl, taking her to the floor with him as shots rang out. He rolled to the side and raised his pistol.

  He held the gun steadily on the naked man that stood there for a second, red spurting from the hole in his chest as he crumpled slowly to the floor. The gun Aikens held in his hand slipped from his nerveless fingers and landed with a thump on the carpet as the whore in the bed screamed again.

  Thorn jumped to his feet and gazed swiftly around, then kicked the gun away from the dead man. It paid to be careful, sometimes dead men came to life when you least expected it. Then he bent over and picked Callie up, setting her on her feet with a thump as she gasped like a fish out of water, trying to get the breath that had been knocked out of her.

  “You- you—” she sputtered, her face redder than his long underwear, her caramel curls fetchingly in disarray around her pretty face. If looks could kill, her blue eyes would have slashed him to ribbons in an instant.

  “What the devil are you doing here,” he snarled, cutting her off. “I told you to let me handle this! You damn near got yourself killed!”

  “Because I wanted to get him, that's why,” she replied, still trying to get her breath.

  “He almost got you and you don't even know if he killed your Pa!” Thorn's golden eyes flashed dangerously, his impatience barely controlled.

  “I don't care! He was there- he was in on it,” she snapped furiously. “And he accused my Pa of cheating! Pa never cheated at anything.”

  “A jury might not agree with you.”

  “A jury be damned. They aren't God! I saw him there!” Her small chin jutted out and Thorn had to admire her spunk. He was still going to blister her ass, even though she was right. Henry Aikens had been there when Samuel Perkins was killed... when a lot of other men were killed, too. It was his case. He was being paid to get to the bottom of it and this little hellion was getting in his way.

  “What's going on here, Thorn?”

  Thorn turned and saw Sheri
ff Holden standing there, his slate gray eyes guarded as he noted the dead man on the floor and the hysterical woman in the bed.

  “You got here mighty quick,” drawled Thorn and Holden had the grace to flush.

  “I was in the neighborhood,” he replied shortly. Crossing to the dead man, he kicked the bare foot with a grunt. “No great loss there.”

  Thorn studied him carefully. Sheriff Holden had seen the better side of fifty awhile back, but he was a good lawman, his body trim and well muscled, and with an intelligence to match. He ran the town of Potluck with an iron fist, for the most part. Still, Thorn rarely crossed anyone off his mental list of suspects until he was completely satisfied.

  The sheriff eyed Callie with obvious distaste. “What the devil are you doing in a whorehouse?”

  “I shot him,” replied Callie defensively. “This skunk shot my Pa.”

  “Well then, I guess you're entitled to the reward. Come by the jail and fill out the papers whenever you're ready,” he drawled. “But get the hell out of here. This is no place for a woman like you.”

  “Reward?” asked Callie eagerly. “How much?”

  “For Aikens, fifty dollars I believe it was.” He looked at Thorn with a question in his gray eyes.

  Thorn was pretty sure that he was the one who had shot the man, but he wasn't going to argue with her. Wasn't worth the effort if it kept her out of his way. He nodded imperceptibly at the sheriff, then took Callie's arm and pulled her towards the door.

  “What are you doing? Let go of me,” she protested, as he hustled her down the hallway and into the alley, heading for the hotel.

  “I'm seeing you back to the hotel.”

  “I don't want to go to the hotel, I want to go to the jail and collect my reward,” she sputtered.

  “You're going to collect something right now, only it isn't money,” replied Thorn caustically.

  “What the devil are you talking about?”

  “Don't curse, its unladylike, and you know exactly what I'm talking about. I warned you last night to stay out of my way.”

  Callie dug her boot heel into the soft instep of Thorn's foot, causing him to flinch. “I never claimed to be a lady and I don't take orders from you,” she flung back at him, jerking her arm out of his grasp. She turned to run, but Thorn grabbed her and slung her over his shoulder, his foot kicking open the door to the hotel.

  The woman at the front desk gaped in astonishment. “Why, Mr. Thorn, what are you doing?”

  “I'm about to dish out some just rewards, Martha,” he replied grimly, his square jaw set. “And I don't want to be disturbed, no matter what you hear. Got it?” He shot her a warning and she nodded, allowing herself the tiniest of smirks.

  “Put me down! You're loco! Put me down, I said!”

  The strident protests were given with boots accentuating the words in a place Thorn would rather not have visited by the pointed toes, so he retaliated with a some hefty spanks to the skirted backside.

  “Simmer down or you're going to regret it,” he snapped. He huffed just a bit, although Callie was not a big bundle. She was rambunctious though and that took extra effort to hang onto her and get her up the stairs at the same time.

  Callie screeched indignantly, renewing her efforts to get free. “You hit me! How dare you hit me!” She pummeled his back with both fists, causing him to grunt. “I don't know what you're planning on doing, mister, but whatever it is, you won't get away with it!” She raised her voice even higher. “Help, call the sheriff! Help!”

  “Need some help there, Thorn?” An amused chuckle came from a pair of lips Thorn hadn't heard from for several months and he looked up in surprised pleasure, his handsome features lighting up in a broad grin.

  “Son of a gun, if it isn't Boxcar! What are you doing here?” He stuck his right hand out to shake hands vigorously with the laughing, brown-eyed man in front of him.

  “I don't recall you ever having to haul your women off over your shoulder,” Boxcar replied amusedly. “Having a dry run?”

  “Put me down!” yelled Callie, who was very red in the face by this time and still struggling.

  “She's not my woman. She's trouble with a capital T,” growled Thorn, “and I'm about to teach her what happens to little girls who interfere with the law.”

  Boxcar's expression turned serious. “Not in your room. Take a look.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the door to Thorn's room.

  Thorn finally put the objecting Callie down. “Stand still and be quiet,” he ordered, then turned to the door of the room, drawing his gun at the same time. He stalked silently along the wall and saw that the small bit of paper he had placed in the door near the bottom was lying on the floor. That meant someone had been in his room- or was still in his room. Motioning Boxcar to the other side of the door, both men flattened against the wall. Thorn slid down the wall to kick his foot out and backwards, slamming the door open. The shotgun blast at short range peppered into the door jams and across the hall to blast a hole in the opposite wall.

  “Damnation,” muttered Thorn as he pushed his hat back with the barrel of his pistol. “Did you see that?”

  “Yes, I saw that. Seen it before, too. Good trick.” Boxcar flashed him a grin.

  Both men peered inside the room and saw about what they expected- which was no one. Someone had rigged the shotgun to go off when the door opened, and it would have worked, if Thorn hadn't been prepared.

  He stepped carefully into the room, checking for any other traps. Finding nothing, he holstered his gun and grinned triumphantly at his old friend.

  “Uh...not to spoil your enthusiasm or anything, but your woman's gone,” said Boxcar unsympathetically, holstering his own six-shooter.

  “She's not my woman and I'm sure she went to collect her reward,” growled Thorn, “but I know I haven't seen the last of her. I reckon that girl is a pain in the ass and I aim to give her one when I catch up to her.” They were interrupted by a high-pitched shriek.

  “My wall! What happened to my wall?”

  Thorn stuck his head out into the hallway. “Just bill it to Wells Fargo, Martha. Someone tried to do me in, but he missed.” He shot her an engaging grin.

  Martha glared back at him. “Every time you come to town, something gets torn up in my hotel,” she declared. “I'm going to stop letting you stay here!”

  “Now, Martha, you wouldn't want me to stay at Fanny's, would you?”

  Fanny was the mistress of the Silver Slipper and the owner of Madame Fanny's boarding house. Martha didn't approve of her, or her immoral ways.

  Angrily, she picked up a piece of the wall and chucked it at Thorn, but he closed the door too quickly. With an unladylike curse, she turned and went to get the broom.

  Boxcar sat on the bed and propped himself up against the backboard, his black Stetson lying on the pillow beside him and his boots hanging off the edge of the bed. “So who's the filly? She was a pretty little thing.”

  “Her name is Callie Perkins and her father was killed in a poker game a few months ago.” He straddled the wooden chair and leaned his arms on the back to study his old friend. “So what brings you to Potluck? Are you working on a case?”

  “Actually, I am. It looks like someone is stirring up the Indians in the territory and the U.S. government wants me to check it out.” Boxcar took out a slim cheroot and lit it up. “What about you?” he asked as the smoke spiraled above the top of his brown wavy hair.

  “I'm on a case,” admitted Thorn. “Seems like too many landowners are winding up dead or selling out. Some of them have been raided several times by renegade Navajo and they aren't too happy about it, so they sell. The question is, where are the Indians getting the guns? A couple of the Wells Fargo stagecoaches have been held up by Indians carrying these guns, so they want to get to the bottom of it.”

  “Looks like our cases could be interconnected. Want to work together? It'll be like old times.” Boxcar grinned broadly and Thorn couldn't help but remember how he'd
gotten that nickname. He and Boxcar had been working on a case together back east and they had run to catch a train as it was leaving the station. Of course being young and broke all the time, they had hitched many a ride in the boxcars until that one fateful spring day.

  They were just getting off a car while it was coming into the station and Thaddeus's coat pocket had stuck on a heavy bolt, forcing him to run. “It's got me,” he had yelled as he ran, trying to keep from getting his jacket torn off him. Thorn had laughed pretty hard at the sight and started calling him Boxcar. The name had stuck. At the time, Thaddeus Worthington had not been impressed with the nickname, but after so many women had thought it intriguing, he decided he liked it after all.

  “I reckon it might be worth considering,” drawled Thorn. “I don't suppose you got any leads?”

  “Not really, just that Potluck is one of biggest towns around these parts, so I decided to start here.”

  “Well, my lead is dead now, thanks to Callie Perkins.” Thorn scowled as he remembered the overeager young woman to whom he still owed a good tanning. He had trailed Aikens through a couple of small towns, observing him as he played cards and systematically cleaned out the cattlemen with whom he played. As luck would have it, two of the men killed were landowners, one of them Callie's father. Now Callie was going to have a hard time hanging onto the Double J and hell-bent for revenge at the same time. Fifty dollars would come in mighty handy, even if the killer wasn't the one who had killed her father.

  “No other leads?” Boxcar stretched his long legs and yawned.

  “I was going to visit the Widow Clausen over in Sulfur Springs today. The bartender at the saloon told me she was selling out and going back east to live with her sister. Thought I’d start by finding out exactly who is buying these properties.” He inspected the shotgun carefully. “I reckon someone thinks I'm getting too close already.” He shrugged and set the gun down. “Right now, I'm ready for some breakfast. Are you coming?”