The Boot Hill Express: Special Edition HBH Version (Half Breed Haven Book 12) Read online

  HALF BREED HAVEN#12

  THE BOOT HILL EXPRESS

  (THE DANGER DOWN MEXICO WAY TRILOGY BOOK 3 OF 3)

  A HALF BREED HAVEN ADULT WESTERN

  By

  A.M. VAN DORN

  Copyright © 2019

  Cedar Ledge Publishing

  All Rights Reserved

  HALF BREED HAVEN IS THE COMPANION SERIES TO THE WILDES OF THE WEST SERIES. THE DIFFERENCE BEING THE WOTW SERIES IS TOLD FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A YOUNG WRITER ALLIE WHO BEFRIENDS AN AGED CATALINA WILDE IN 1913 AS SHE LEARNS ABOUT THE WILDES MANY ADVENTURES FROM OLD CATTIE.

  FOR THOSE READERS WHO PREFER THE WILDE SISTERS ESCAPADES EXCLUSIVELY WITHOUT THE 1913 INTERLUDES THIS SPECIAL EDITION IS EDITED TO FOCUS SOLELY ON THE 1870’S ADVENTURES OF THE SISTERS. FANS OF ALLIE, HER NEW LOVE LAWYER CONNOR KINCAID AND OLD CATTIE CAN STILL ENJOY FOLLOWING THEIR STORY IN THE FULL UNEDITED VERSION OF THIS STORY IN THE WILDES OF THE WEST #4

  BOOKS AVAILABLE IN THE WILDES OF THE WEST SERIES

  HALF BREED HAVEN #1: WILDE-FIRE

  HALF BREED HAVEN #2: IN DANGER’S SHADOW

  HALF BREED HAVEN #3: DARK RIVALS

  HALF BREED HAVEN #4: SILVER, GOLD & DECEPTION

  HALF BREED HAVEN #5: THE FORBIDDEN RANCH

  HALF BREED HAVEN #6: SING THE DEATH SONG

  HALF BREED HAVEN #7: DISASTER AT DEVIL’S CANYON

  HALF BREED HAVEN #8: RENEGADES AND REVENGE

  HALF BREED HAVEN #9: INTO THE LAIR OF LOS REY LOBO

  HALF BREED HAVEN #10: SPECIAL EDITION OF THE REAPER OF THE RIO SANGRE (HBH VERSIONS)

  HALF BREED HAVEN #11: THE TOWN OF NO RETURN (HBH VERSION)

  HALF BREED HAVEN #12: SPECIAL EDITION OF THE BOOT HILL EXPRESS (HBH VERSION)

  THE WILDES OF THE WEST #1: THE DAUGHTERS OF HALF BREED HAVEN

  THE WILDES OF THE WEST #2: THE REAPER OF THE RIO SANGRE

  (THE DANGER DOWN MEXICO WAY TRILOGY PART 1)

  THE WILDES OF THE WEST #3: THE TOWN OF NO RETURN

  (THE DANGER DOWN MEXICO WAY TRILOGY PART 2)

  THE WILDES OF THE WEST #4: THE BOOT HILL EXPRESS

  (THE DANGER DOWN MEXICO WAY TRILOGY PART 3)

  COMING SOON

  HALF BREED HAVEN #13: RIVER OF DEATH

  AND NEW SERIES:

  LINCOLN’S LAWMAN#1: HIGH SIERRA SHOWDOWN

  ALL AVAILABLE BOOKS CAN BE FOUND AT THIS LINK

  https://www.amazon.com/A.M.-Van-Dorn/e/B077GNX3GP/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1

  If you enjoy the Wilde family and their spicy adventures, join the Cedar Reader’s Mailing list and be alerted to new releases as well as receiving a free gift of a Wilde Family Adventure for further reading.

  Become a member at

  www.thewildesofthewest.com

  Author’s Note

  Thank you for joining the Wilde family on one of their adventures. Just a quick note regarding what you are about to read.

  Please be advised the Wilde siblings are all grownups, and therefore they engage in very adult escapades and situations that include their romantic encounters as well as the sudden violence that can occur in their continued fight against assorted bad guys of the Old West.

  So, in short, these stories are recommended for mature readers of 18+ years of age.

  With that said it’s time to saddle up and dive into the world of Half Breed Haven!

  A.M. VAN DORN

  Contact Information can be found at [email protected]

  or

  www.thewildesofthewest.com

  Table of Contents

  HALF BREED HAVEN #12 THE BOOT HILL EXPRESS

  Author’s Note

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  NATCHEZ, MEXICO

  Verde Abundante Valley

  Early Sumer 1873

  Cassandra Wilde was no stranger to sudden violence, but the swiftness of the attack surprised even her. From her position behind the open door to the six-foot safe she looked through the crack made by the hinges and down at Sheriff Santiago's body slumped over his desk, his hair matted with blood. Her heart felt heavy not knowing if the man was dead or alive. Making matters worse than that, his body had landed on top of her pair of six-shooters which had been laying on the desktop.

  How was this possible that she had been enjoying a few minutes of levity with the lawman as they bonded over weaponry even as a healthy dose of flirtation had begun to flow between them. It was not lost on her that the man had ordered his deputies to head over to the local cantina to fetch meals for the jail's prisoners even though it was too late for breakfast and too early for lunch. Clearly, the man had wished to be alone with Cassandra, and she had been absolutely fine with that.

  She had seen the genuine appreciation for the superb condition that she kept her weapons in as he turned them over in his hands. Attentively, he had listened to how they had long ago been a gift from her uncle the governor of the Arizona territory beyond the border. With a nod of his head, he had told her the silver plated twin pearl-handled Colt .45s looked immaculate as if the gunsmith had just completed them. Cassandra had thanked him and said to him that she took pride in the weapons.

  Santiago had laid them back on his desk next to her gun belt she had removed a short time earlier saying with pride of his own it was time to give her a look at what she had come to see, and he pivoted around to the tall safe that was only a couple feet from where the desk was. She had made no moves to retrieve her guns but instead watched him work the combination of the safe. A lack of action she had now come to regret.

  Cassandra had remarked that it looked like something that more often would be found in a bank and not a sheriff’s office. As he swung the door open, he had laughed that it had once been it a bank in Los Palmas, but it had been robbed so many times by the hive of outlaws that seemed to be drawn to the town like magnets that the bank finally gave up and closed. Through some judicious horse-trading, he had obtained the safe and used it to house his prized antique weaponry.

  From within the safe, Santiago had plucked out an ancient weapon, but it certainly didn't look like it. Just as her guns had appeared brand new, so did the old flintlock musket Santiago was holding, but to her, that was far more impressive. If it was what it appeared to be, it had to date back to the sixteenth century! In her amazement, she had asked if it belonged to the conquistadors that roamed the Southwest in the 1500s.

  “Si,” Sheriff Santiago had said, but not just any conquistadors either. It had belonged to a man named Valdez who was said to be the right-hand man of Pizzaro himself. It had passed down with extreme care through the generations through his descendants. That was until Santiago’s father had used the inher
itance from his grandfather who had earned it working a silver mine, long since played out, to buy it from the family who needed some quick cash. The family, he said, had been heading north for the gold rush of ’49 and needed some grubstake money.

  The sheriff had said that it still shot like a dream, and he offered her a chance to fire it. Beyond thrilled, Cassandra had eagerly accepted the invitation. He had just finished loading it with the musket ball and powder, also kept secure in the safe, and set it down on his desk, intending to retrieve another of his weapons for him to use. Then they would go down the street to an empty lot for target practice. Instead, all hell had broken loose thrusting Cassandra once more into another life and death situation. Gritting her teeth she thought how just a short while ago she had appeared to be on the way to perhaps landing her latest lover and now this!

  CHAPTER 1

  EARLIER

  As Cassandra Wilde walked down the dusty main street of Natchez, she halted her steps for a moment and looked back over her shoulder at the two-story rooming house on the left-hand side of the street. Behind one of those windows on the second floor, she was not sure which one, her youngest sister Catalina was having a very good time, of that she was very confident. She gave a tight-lipped grin at the notion because Cassandra knew it was something her sister needed. A casual tryst with one of her old girlfriends would go a long way in taking her mind off the strange pain that Cattie was dealing with.

  Yesterday when they had left the neighboring Rio Sangre Valley, she had started to show signs of being her old self. But she was far from recovered from the torment of being forced to mourn killing the very man they had come to the last of the trio of valleys just below the Arizona/Mexican border to stop. Victor Hernandez-Kelley of one of the oldest families in the valley had disguised himself as the marauding killer known as El Segador who Cassandra had come to know in English as The Reaper of the Rio Sangre. Attempting to take over the valley at the same time as punishing the other families he felt had slighted him, he had formed a gang and began his killing spree.

  Unaware the murderer was in their midst; the other heads of the old families had journeyed to Alamieda to seek out the help of Catalina whose exploits with her three sisters was well known even in the distant valley. Cassandra had gone along to help stop The Reaper as well. Things had become much more complicated as the more time Victor had spent with Catalina, the more he had transferred his long-ago unrequited love for her mother Mercedes onto her. Worse there had been something about him that had touched Catalina inside as he represented a window into the world that had surrounded the mother that she had never known, and she had developed feelings for the man.

  It had been devastating when they eventually unmasked Victor as The Reaper, and Catalina had been forced to kill him when he had threatened Cassandra’s life. Yesterday they had left all that behind them in body but not in mind. They hadn’t planned to return to Cedar Ledge, however; instead, they were searching for a horse and wagon they had rented and had lost when The Reaper and his men had chased them. They had no wish to return to Arizona without getting the wagon back to the men they had rented it from.

  Searching the area where El Segador had attacked them, they had failed to find it. Cassandra said the nearest towns to the ambush were Rancho Gordillo and Natchez that they had passed in the vicinity of on the way south. They temporarily had split up with Catalina going to visit her family’s vineyard to deliver the news of the tragedy that it was Victor who had brought his reign of terror to her uncle. He had been friends with the Reaper and his victims.

  In the meantime, she had searched Rancho Gordillo with no luck. When Catalina had rejoined her in Rancho Gordillo where they planned to stay the night, Cassandra had seen immediately the visit to the vineyards had done nothing to improve her spirits. It was only when Cassandra had spoken of how perhaps the next day they would find the wagon in Natchez, or at least someone who had knowledge of its whereabouts, that Catalina had brightened. For very personal reasons it had turned out.

  Natchez was the home to Natalia Vega, a young woman about the same age as Catalina who had worked harvesting grapes at the Corderro Crest Vineyards that thrived in the lands below the western wall of the Verde Abundante. Growing up their father Whip had allowed Catalina to spend her summers with his in-laws because had Mercedes lived, she would have wanted her family to be an essential part of the little girl's life. To this day Catalina retained an accent from all those summers she had lived in this valley along with occasionally slipping into Spanish without even realizing it. She had told Cassandra that the vineyard and the valley would always be part of her.

  A strong wind was at their backs as they crossed an old wooden bridge over the San Sidero River and rode towards Natchez. As they made their way, it had lifted Cassandra’s heart to hear her sister giggle as she told how Natalia had been one of her first flings after she had at long last stopped fighting the fact that she was attracted to women as well as men, if not more so. It did Cassandra good to hear her laugh, and anything that could put Victor out of Cattie’s mind was welcome as far as she was concerned. She had seen the brutally murdered victims of The Reaper’s reign of terror, and the world was a better place without him. Catalina had seen the man’s handiwork as well, but it was as if the man was two completely different men in one body—one good and one evil. Someone ought to write a book with a character like that; she had thought grimly. It would make gripping if not scary reading.

  Catalina had finished her story by saying their summer of passion had come to an end when her uncle Hector had fired the woman. While she may have been an overachiever in a bedroom, her work ethic out in the hot fields of grapes had been the opposite. The girl had returned to her home in Natchez, and the last time Catalina had seen her years ago she was clerking at the feed store.

  That had been exactly where the pair had found her when they had ridden into Natchez. Vega had thrown her arms around Catalina in pure delight when they had entered the store. From what Cassandra could tell, the ensuing years had not altered the woman’s purported work ethic, and she had told the owner she was taking the rest of the day off. The bespectacled older man had nodded meekly and hadn’t protested. Cassandra didn’t need to be the detective that she was to know the pretty young thing had the man eating out her hand. Not that she could blame him as Señorita Vega was quite the fetching young woman.

  Introductions had been made, and Catalina said she was hoping she could “catch up” with Natalia. The look that passed between the two telegraphed exactly what catching up would mean. Diplomatically, Cassandra had excused herself as the pair of giggling beauties had hurried off in the direction of the rooming house on the main street where Natalia Vega said that she lived. Pleased that Catalina would find some happiness on this trip down in Mexico, she had been quite content to be left to her own devices.

  It wasn’t like there hadn’t been plenty to do. The women had tethered their horses in front of the feed store, so Cassandra had elected to do a quick sweep of the town on foot hoping to perhaps spot the wagon if someone had found it and brought it back to the town. If she didn’t see it, then she would check the livery. It’s possible if someone had found the wagon and the horse that had been pulling it, they might have sold the cart to someone and perhaps sold the animal to the town's livery.

  Before she went to the livery; however, she was eager to stop by the sheriff's office. A couple of days back when they had been on their journey to the Rio Sangre just outside of Natchez, they had chanced upon Sheriff Santiago. He had been alongside the road where he was conducting target practice, and the pair had stopped to say hello. Two things had caught Cassandra’s attention meeting the man. First was that it was no ordinary six-shooter he was firing with but rather some type of antique gun. The second thing was how handsome the Mexican man was with his soulful eyes, neatly cropped black hair, and a sturdy frame that must have set plenty a señorita’s hearts a-thumping.

  Striking up a conversation Cassa
ndra and the sheriff had immediately bonded over their love for firearms. It turned out the man was shooting a two-hundred-year-old blunderbuss that he said was favored by the pirates plying the Gulf of Mexico. The business in the Rio Sangre was urgent, and they had to move on, but the sheriff graciously had invited them to stop in again on their way back, and he would show her some more of the antique guns that he collected.

  When she had arrived at the Natchez sheriff’s office, she had found a ritzy looking black carriage parked in front of it. The horse tasked with pulling it was of a fine stock with strong looking legs that she suspected didn’t tire easily. Cassandra had just been approaching the door when a smiling Santiago suddenly slipped out into the sunlight. He had seen her through the window as she was walking up and had been delighted. Holding his hat in both of his hands in front of him he had been apologetic, asking her if she might come back in a little while as he was right in the middle of tying up some important business.

  Cassandra, of course, had said that she understood and to think nothing of it. She would be more than happy to return later, as this would give her a chance to check out the livery and see if the owner had recently come into possession of a new horse. Unfortunately, Mister Lopez, the proprietor, could only shrug his shoulders and tell her that no one had come to him with a horse to sell in many a day. With that done she had returned to the main street and had begun walking back towards the sheriff’s office when she had taken her glance up at the second story of the rooming house with thoughts of Catalina and her friend Natalia “catching up.”

  Now her eyes were straight ahead as she walked. Around her, the street bustled with Mexican families going about their business. A stray dog was running down the street yelping, and Cassandra had done a double take to see that a cat was chasing it! How that came about she had no idea, but the cat made her think about Mister Muffins back at Cedar Ledge, and Mister Muffins had put her mind on Lijuan who owned the large orange tabby.