From the Journal of Cassandra Wilde 1873

There sure as hell was no getting out the way I had come in! On the other side of that door that I had locked and barricaded shut with the criminal’s own desk, he was out there waiting for me with his stooges, their guns still smoking from their attempt to use my body to stop lead.

I remember looking around feeling that window was my only chance. Throwing it open, that option bit the dust almost immediately as a bunch of Driscoll’s thugs were charging up the very alley that I had hoped to use as my avenue of escape. At least I had the satisfaction of sending a number of them to Boot Hill.

It wasn’t long, though, after they tasted my lead that the moment came when I literally went from the frying pan into the fire. Even now as I write this I can hear the ignorant-sounding voice of who I am now sure was Driscoll’s chief henchman shouting.

“Driscoll says that blonde bitch can’t escape. Set fire to that end of the dance hall. Burn it down with her in it. There will be no evidence of how she died!”

I don’t know what was more chilling, the sound a few minutes later of the spare kerosene used to light the lamps in the dance hall splashing against the rear wall or the roar of the fire once one of them struck their Lucifer and set off the conflagration.

It really doesn’t matter I suppose. The office had just become a deathtrap, and I was about to burn to death inside this dance hall of doom.

I’d been in tight spots before, but this was as bad as it got. I’ll confess it sure didn’t seem fair. I was thinking of my new dark-haired lover who only a short time ago had left me quaking with pleasure as he explored my body with his hands, his lips … everything. In just the few hours that I had known Chris, he had been both a gentleman and the most accomplished of lovers, and someone I had grown to care for very much.

The passion he had shown me while at the same time being as tender as any woman would hope a lover could be even now as I write this it fills me with a longing for him that no outlet can ever assuage.

At the time though it seemed as if he was going to be the one mourning me when he returned to the town with the sheriff only to find that I was nothing more than a charred husk amid the ruins. The smoke pouring through the wall boards and the heat that was building before me did little to give me any confidence that I was ever to see my new lover again, let alone my father along with my two beloved brothers and, of course, my three sisters whom I loved more than life itself, and I knew my death would shatter them beyond all repair.

I couldn’t do that to them. I COULDN’T! There had to be a way out. I just had to find it!

Foreword

My name is Allie Mastluehr and in the spring of 1913, I stumbled upon some of the most remarkable but forgotten tales of the American Old West. These accounts were narrated to me in the desolate ruins of Cedar Ledge—a once mighty Arizona ranch—and I promise that everything I was told wasn’t the stuff of legend; it was one remarkable family’s real history, almost lost to the unforgiving winds of time.

I experienced a countless series of shocks as the ranch’s last inhabitant, old Cattie Wilde, relayed to me the true story of the heroics of her most improbable of mixed race families. She quickly immersed me in all the action, adventure, romance and family drama that came with being one quarter of the formidable foursome known to friends and foes alike as THE DAUGHTERS OF HALF BREED HAVEN. In short, I learned of this stunning multiracial quartet whose bravery, thirst for justice, and love for each other were matched only by their unbridled appetite for the most casual and sizzling encounters with the opposite (or in Catalina's case, the same) sex.

The fair skinned blonde Cassandra, along with the Mexican Catalina, mulatto Honor Elizabeth and Asian Lijuan, all half-sisters, were the proud daughters of Judge William Henry “Whip” Wilde. Along with their sibling, cavalry officer Dutch and his Indian love Bright Feather, and their youngest brother, the Yavapai brave Blue River, the WILDES OF THE WEST upheld the law and aided those in need amidst the pristine beauty and natural wonders that was their corner of 1870's Arizona and beyond.

Catalina has graciously made available to me all her family’s writing so that I may pen the definitive tale of this unique and exceptional family and the adversity they faced. The more I read of them, the greater my amazement and respect for them grows as I follow their adventures in vanquishing villains and bedding whatever conquest happen to come their way.

Though I have only had the privilege of knowing Catalina, through her stories and the significant volume of diaries and journals mercifully saved by Cattie, the rest of the Wildes have become as alive to me as if they were standing before me as I write this. With the pages before me I turn my attention to …

Cassandra Wilde—The oldest and brilliant leader of as “tough as nails” group of women you would ever find. Once she had been the protégé of the first ever female Pinkerton. When needed most Cassie returned to the West with her two guns strapped to her waist. Using everything she had learned from her time with the fabled detective agency, she trained her younger sisters into being some of the most competent and dangerous women the West would ever know.

Together, the Wilde sisters could be nearly unstoppable, but whenever alone or in pairs, they still proved to be a force to be reckoned with.

This is one such story from the journal of Cassandra Wilde in which several unscrupulous villains would learn just how dangerous a lone Wilde sister could be as they faced off against Cassie when she placed her life and liberty…IN DANGER’S SHADOW

Prologue

Tucson

Arizona Territory

1873

Cassandra Wilde stretched her arms catlike and through her still sleepy eyes looked down at the man’s head resting comfortably between her pair of well-endowed naked breasts. She slowly drew one of her hands back and used it to rub the sleep from her eyes while allowing her right arm to dangle over the side of the bed. With her vision cleared she once again cast her gaze down at her companion.

The man was handsome, no question about that. His hair was a shaggy mop that was accompanied by a full beard of the same rich brown color. She remembered his eyes were a twinkling green, not as deep a shade as her own but they had been most inviting. In the throes of their passion all the sheets and blankets now lay strewn on the floor around the bed affording Cassandra a full view of the man’s nude body as he laid partially draped across her own. His muscles were everywhere, hard and firm and his thighs bulged with thickness while showing off contours that were pleasing to her eyes. Her lover’s endowment was hidden under him but she remembered it well. To borrow a phrase her sister Honor Elizabeth might have used, it had been “most impressive.”

Gently she pushed her head back into the pillow that it had been propped up on and took a deep breath to savor the moment. The memories of the night before danced through her head, the flashes of the pleasure both had enjoyed coming as rapidly as fire from a Gatling gun. Gently she brought one of her hands down on his head and ran her fingers through the thicket as the corners of her mouth turned upward. She could remember every bit of his performance that had sent her body quivering in waves of pleasure. There was one thing however that did giver her pause. Here she was, Cassandra Wilde, one time personal protégé of Kate Warne, the first ever female Pinkerton and of late a special undercover lawman for her uncle, the territorial governor and, with all her analytic detective skills for gathering every shred of information, she had not pursued getting the man’s name!

Upon her arrival last night, she had checked into the best hotel in the Arizona capital. Following the long ride from her family’s ranch she had unpacked her bag, drawn a nice hot bath and then had hurried off to get something to eat. At a local dining establishment making a bold claim through its name “Best In Barbecue,” she had enjoyed a fine meal of spareribs. They were delicious and she amused herself, for all she knew these could have come from cattle from the family ranch Cedar Ledge. As she ate she still felt a little guilty. Cassandra always had an open invitation to stay with her aunt and uncle, but when arriving for her assignments she rarely ever did.

She loved her father’s sister Constance, but she also knew what a proper woman Connie was, and she knew her aunt didn’t always approve of her and her sisters’ antics when it came to their drop-of-the-hat dalliances with the opposite sex. God knew she was dreading the day when Connie finally found out that her youngest sister Catalina’s casual encounters also extended to women.

It was for certain that Connie would not have approved of the marathon of sex she had just completed with the man nestled up next to her at this moment. She had met him just as she was leaving after finishing her ribs. He had been at another table and they had bumped in each other. The man apologized profusely and she had told him not to worry. He was adamant though saying he had been hurrying and should have watched where he was going. Again, she had told him to think nothing of it. Still he was apologetic explaining that he had been hurrying because he wanted to get down to the Texas Tornado before they closed the doors.

That had gotten Cassie’s attention. Everyone in the Tucson area knew of the Texas Tornado. It had been founded by two brothers and their sister who had moved from the bar’s namesake, and their operation was one of the most popular saloons in the town. It catered to a far more upscale crowd, than the usual rough and tumble types of the West. The beer was always cold, the liquor top shelf and the whores were labeled as “Ladies of the Evening” and were a cut above the rest recruited from across the southwest by the sister, so she had heard. To keep the atmosphere enjoyable only a certain number of people were allowed in at a given time and that dovetailed with what the man had been saying about hurrying.

Cassie was fully aware that her meeting with the governor of the territory, who also happened to be her uncle Nathanial, was in late morning, still she thought she should probably get some rest but on a whim, she asked if he would like some company. Why not she had asked inwardly? He appeared to be alone, there was no wedding band on his finger, and his dashing good looks accompanied by his wide shoulders and tall, six-foot frame enticed her.

The man’s eyes instantly took on their sparkle and gleamed with interest as he quickly agreed. It wasn’t a surprise to Cassie. She wasn’t being conceited, just honest. Like the rest of the Wilde sisters, she had a top-heavy hourglass figure that drew attention without fail. Her goldenrod hair and murky green eyes only cemented her beauty and increased her appeal to the men of the West. This man in the restaurant was no different. Cassie had introduced herself to him, and he had just been giving her his name when a waitress had an unfortunate accident a few tables away. The crash of her entire tray full of ribs drowned out the man as he was saying his name. The commotion following the mishap had sidetracked her from asking him to repeat his name as they hurried off towards the Texas Tornado.

The saloon had been as fun as she imagined. It crackled with an energy as the men and women in the bar enjoyed all it had to offer. Cards were played, whiskey was drunk, and men were properly laid in the upstairs above the bustling bar area. The pair was greatly enjoying themselves, and their flirting had only intensified. At her suggestion, they called it an early night and she invited him back to her room.

He, of course, had a look of surprise on his face. How could he understand that Cassie and the other Wildes, Lijuan, Honor Elizabeth, and Catalina, had long ago made a vow. If they wanted something or someone, they went for it! None of their mothers had lived past a young age to truly enjoy all life had to offer, and the quartet of half-sisters had pledged they would never let that happen to them. The handsome man that she had learned was a silver miner passing through Arizona on his way to Mexico after having made a successful strike up in Leadville, Colorado, may not have known her reasons, but he had leaned toward her, his eyes aglow saying he would be delighted.

Once back in the room the pair lost little time stripping each other down until they were as naked as the day they had come into the world. Cassie had tugged him toward the bed, looking over her shoulder with a wry smile as she watched his soldier rise to attention at its full nine-inch length. It was without a doubt going to be a good night.

It really had been she thought now as she lay there. Her eyes travelled over to the ornate clock on the mantle above the fireplace. There was still a good hour before her meeting with Nathanial Duvalier. There was time, she thought as a slow smile built upon her face. Should she wake him? She was just about to use her hand that was still enmeshed in his hair to do just that when she halted.

As much fun as it would be, there was a part of her that gave her pause. She didn’t know this man’s name and deep in the throes of passion the night before as he was thrusting himself deep inside of her, he had shouted out her name as Kathy. It was pretty close she thought, but telling. They were both using each other, and there was nothing wrong with that, but it had been such a long time since she had been with a man where she actually had some type of genuine feeling for her playmate. That was not what she was going to get here, and she knew it. No, perhaps she should just send him on his way.

Yes, that is what she needed to do. It was time to start getting focused on why she was here. Her uncle had a new assignment for her. On the ride from Alamieda she felt certain she knew what it must be. The very capital itself had recently been under a reign of terror from a man who could only have pure evil in his heart and yet the press had given him the frothy nickname of the “Daylight Dandy.” This, she had learned, was because the man, while wearing a hood that concealed his features always was dressed in immaculate clothing while he carried out his heinous crimes of kidnapping young women in broad daylight from the streets and racing off with them only for them to turn up later, nude, battered, and dead. Surely her uncle had brought her here to help put a stop to the terror.

Cassie readied herself to wake the man and make her apologies for asking him to hurry up and leave when at that moment he shifted in his sleep and rolled over and she saw he was fully erect. Was he dreaming about her? It was possible. Oh, what the hell she thought imaging the grief Lijuan would have given her for ignoring such a clear invitation. With her hand in his hair she shook his head and reached down with the other and took a firm grip on his tool and slowly began to jerk it.

He began to mumble some incoherent words in his sleep as Cassie’s hand continued to roam up and down his erect cock. Her movements were precise as her lips curled into a vixen-like grin as his mumbling gave way to a soft-moan that escaped her handsome partner’s lips while his face was crunching up slightly. She chuckled, her other hand busying itself in playing with the messy hair on top of his head. “Wake up.” she whispered, her mouth close to his neck. As if coaxed by her spell, his eyes finally fluttered open. The haze of dreaminess was quickly replaced by pure lust as his vision took in the blonde beauty working on him, especially enjoying the gentle swing on her large breasts.

“‘Morning. Not to sound like my school marm sister with her big words and all but you're an insatiable one, aren't you?” he whispered back, voice deeper than she recalled from the night before. Cassie grinned as she too had a sister that was forever showing off her vocabulary much to her other sister Catalina’s annoyance as she didn’t always get their meaning. Pushing thoughts of Honor Elizabeth and Cattie aside she curled her lips into a smile.

“Seems so,” she breathed, before challenging him. “We don't have much time, I have places to be. Are you game?”

“I’ve got to catch the stage for Mexico so you're not alone but let’s do this!” he enthused as Cassie lowered herself down, and with her golden hair spread on either side of his thighs, she took almost the entire length of his cock in and she began to suck him gently while one hand remained on his muscular chest, her fingers enjoying the feel of the expanse of thick hair that adorned it. His eyes widened and the upturned corners of his mouth signaled the delight written on his face.

The miner gazed at her beholding the voluptuous figure of the woman giving him pleasure. His eyes were still foggy as a result of the whiskey he’d downed the night before and he contented himself to lay there enjoying the waves of pleasure that was flooding his entire being. The feeling of the soft wet walls of her mouth and the saliva lubricating the glans of his penis sent ripples of sensations into his brain, and he sat up in bed as and slipped his hands into her mussed up golden hair, gently grasping the sides of her head.

He began to thrust deeply into her mouth and she squirmed with the pleasure his good size cock was bringing her. It was mutual as the sight of her big breasts and hard nipples dangling between his legs made him want to fuck her desperately. He removed his dick from her mouth and in one swift movement he turned her with her back lying on the bed with her face staring up at him in anticipation. She looked so sexy and beautiful with her huge breasts, narrow waist giving way to curvy hips and her pussy with its lush tangle of hair resembling spun gold from that fairy tale he had heard as child in Boulder,

With one hand, he began to knead one of her breasts and his free hand was running down her side, teasing her as it gripped her smooth thigh.” He was unbearably slow, but somewhat still attentive as he listened to all of those breathless whimpers of need that escaped her. He kissed her bare skin, nibbling on her neck as his fingers finally entered her hotness. With a certain amount of cheer, he asked her. “Just how long have you been ready for me, hm? Have you been playing alone?”

She shook her head, as her eyes crinkled with mirth because he had no idea that attending to herself was seldom something she nor any of her sisters for that matter often needed to do given the frequency of their love ‘em and leave ‘em escapades with the willing men of the west. When it came to the Wildes their allure had the effect of rendering men color blind to their different races without fail. All that was forgotten within moments as he slowly removed his fingers and began probing her with the tip of his engorged pleasure maker. Her toes curled, and her hands gripped his back as he did so.

With a lick of his lips he entered her wet pussy with one long thrust and their tongues locked in a frantic kiss as they moaned hungrily in lust for each other. Cassie using her palms on the mattress to propel her pelvis towards him began to receive his cock vigorously. He reached down with one hand while the other continued to prop him up and grabbed one of her rocking breasts; the weight of it filling his hands He began to squeeze firmly as he angled his cock to every corner of her pussy. They were a sweaty mess of lust and passion as their bodies worked on reaching heaven once more.

As he kissed her long and slow, only to tear her head away to breathe when he finally hit her sweet spot. Cassandra keened in want as he continued his rhythm…fast and strong. Her lover like her, was panting and their moans echoed in the room. She grabbed at his neck French kissing him as his pace picked up even further. Only their sounds of pleasure could be heard, and maybe the creaking of the bed. She felt high, her whimpers grew louder as she neared her moment of release.

“Fuck, you're tight.” he groaned before she finally came undone. All she saw was white as his face contorted with pleasure as her eyes rolled back in her head while his jammed shut. Pulling out all stops once more he increased the motion of his dick deep inside her and she knew she was teetering on the edge of a multiple orgasm as her vagina walls began to contract against his throbbing cock. Cassie’s arms shot away from her body, one knocking over an unlit fancy kerosene lantern on the night stand and it barely registered on her. Deep inside she could also feel the muscles of his cock contract and with a mighty show of self-control he pulled out and she watched breathlessly as he shot an impressive load all over her taut belly.

They rode out the aftershock before crumbling on the bed in a sweaty, exhausted but satisfied mess. With a deep satisfied sigh, she thought how she was really going to have to bust ass now to draw another bath and still make it to her mission assignment on time.

***

As they exited the front doors of the hotel the pair exchanged the briefest of kisses on the lips. They both had expressed their thanks for the wonderful time they had shared and went their separate ways. Cassie had glanced back over her shoulder in time to see him disappear into a crowd of people. On the way, down from the room the miner had extended her an invitation to see him if she was ever in Leadville.

Cassie had used that as an opportunity to get his name without having to admit to him that despite spending the night together and being brought to multiple orgasms she had no idea what to call him. Cassie asked him to write down his full name and address so she would have no problem finding him. Stopping at the front desk he had secured a pen and slip of paper and did as she asked. As he wrote she tucked her still damp hair from her hasty bath up into the rounded flat brimmed hat all the sisters wore except Honor Elizabeth.

Retrieving her horse, the Missouri Trotter she had named Lily, from the nearby livery Cassie continued on her way wondering why she hadn’t just outright asked him again what his name was when she had missed it due to the tray falling. Perhaps it was the part of her that enjoyed a little mystery. Lord knows she loved her detective work and the mysteries that came with it. Cassie relished in the undercover assignments she was given, because she took no small amount of pride at the success she had achieved in the man’s world of law enforcement. So many she had gone up against her had no clue what resided behind the facades she would employ such a pretending to be a brainless debutante or a simple school marm. They almost never suspected her and in the end, it had been many a bad man’s down fall as Cassie and her sisters liked to say, “A Wilde always gets her man one way or another.”

Soon she was drawing close to where her uncle ran Arizona from a one-time Spanish mission that had been converted into his headquarters. The territory, with its shifting of the capital from Prescott to Tucson, had no official base of operations, and the legislature was even known to hold meetings in a saloon, but Nathanial Duvalier had long ago chosen the mission for his office. As she drew closer to the old church, she paused Lily for a moment and plucked the paper from her pocket.

She thought of how in the unlikely event she ever was in Leadville she would look him up, but that was the only way they would ever meet again. Cassandra had made no return invitation for him to stop at Cedar Ledge. Her father was well aware of his four-daughters’ sexual adventuring but it was not something to be discussed and only on the rarest occasion, out of respect for Judge William Henry “Whip” Wilde, would they ever bring one of their men into the grand two story “L” shaped ranch house they called home.

Idly she caught sight of her destination and quickly unfolded and scanned the paper. So, her recent carnal bliss was courtesy of one Rory Russell. I thank youRory Russell, she thought. Cassandra sincerely meant it, but as she brought her horse to a stop by a hitching post he was already fading from her mind like they always did. Would there ever be one that didn’t? That was her last thought on the matter as she swept it from her mind. The gears in her head were already turning towards the matter of the “Daylight Dandy” killer. She had been following the stories in the press and she had developed one prominent lead that she had identified as something to look into that so far, the authorities had probably missed.

Cassandra eagerly tied up Lily outside the mission, paying no mind to the fancy carriage with the glass windows parked in front of the building. If she had she would have recognized it and been filled with apprehension. Instead she swept through the cathedral area, its pews long since removed and headed for the staircase that would take her to the second level where the Governor maintained his control over the expansive section of the Southwest of the United States known as the Arizona Territory. The oldest of the Wildes was ready to dive headlong into the matter of putting a killer out of business, but Cassandra had no idea that an hour later she would emerge from her meeting dejected.

***

On the edge of town in the rear of what was once one of the finest homes in Tucson, the man known as the “Daylight Dandy” was hard at work preparing for his “outing” as he liked to call it. With calm, deliberate strokes, he brushed the hide of a midnight black mare that had allowed him to get away with his savagery. Casually he tossed the brush into a bucket on the ground and scooped up a handful of feed. With disinterest, he watched as the horse quickly chewed up the oats with its mouth twitching in a circular motion. By this time the horse seemed to know that if it performed well it could expect an extra-large portion after their run. He had paid a pretty penny for her back east in Saratoga, New York, but she had been worth every penny.

With the grooming and feeding complete, the man hoisted the special saddle he had commissioned in the back country of Louisiana where no questions were asked, up on the animal’s back and secured it underneath its belly. Carefully he checked it and found everything was secure including the two special manacles that protruded from each side of the saddle, tethered by three strong links of chain. Satisfied, the man ran his fingers through his closely cropped blond hair before leaving the horse behind as it chuffed and stomped one of its hooves. He briefly paused to gaze into an old mirror he had hung on a support beam and fastidiously knotted his silk tie before he swung the door open and took in the view.

The first thing he saw as always was the charred remains of the manor house as it had been known. Almost a decade ago it had been put to torch during a daring raid by the Yavapai renegade, Black Hawk, and his band of warriors known far and wide as The Omegas due to their vow to fight to the last man to rid Arizona of all white settlers. The man did not know if the warrior would ever achieve that goal but he had done a number on the Carlyle family that had lived here. The stories of their massacre were still routinely used to frighten the school children, he had heard. Black Hawk was still out there to this day, and it seemed as if none would ever be able to stop him.

None of this mattered to the man of course. He was just thankful that house had been at the end of a long driveway and none ever ventured up it to the ruins. It had made the perfect hiding place from which to strike. He methods were always the same. Grab the girl, speed off to the edge of town leaving any who tried to pursue him in his wake, have his fun with the girl, her shrieks always giving him a release of pleasure that he could not begin to describe followed by the quick snap of her neck. That was unless the young woman proved exceptionally difficult to deal with. If she was, she would not have the mercy of a quick death as the cigarette burns on their bodies among other things would attest. So far five women had fallen victim to him, and now the time was ripe for the sixth.

As he went about returning to the inside of the stable and leading the mare out, he thought about earlier after breakfast when he had been scouting the streets of Tucson looking for his next plaything. Just over an hour ago he had spotted a young woman on a street corner. A fetching thing she was. Long, lush brunette hair spilling out from underneath her bonnet that hung down over breasts that seemed to be ready to burst free from her dress. He had looked into her warm brown eyes as he collected the pamphlet from her. Drawing close he had inhaled her scent and felt the shifting movement below his waist as he thanked her with a smile. As he had walked away she called out to him to give her cause much consideration.

Now as he closed the door to the stable he caught sight of the crumpled pamphlet laying on the planks where he had discarded it earlier. It had something to do with the plight of a community of Mexicans that had resettled to Arizona but were being forced off their land to make way for a spur line of the Trans-Southwestern Railroad. The killer didn’t give a damn about any of that; hell, his family held stock in the railroad. All that mattered was she was most likely going to still be there when he went boldly charging down the Tucson street and snatched her.

It was going to be a fine day for his proclivity, he thought. Later after his demons had been satisfied under the cover of darkness, he would return into Tucson and back to this stable and retrieve his everyday horse that had been in the stall next to the mare. How long before he would go after his next girl he did not know, all he cared about was the here and now and what pleasure he was going to have with the doe-eyed beauty once she was at his mercy. As he galloped away down the long drive way the one thing he could never have counted on when he had awoken that morning with murder on his mind was the arrival of one quarter of The Daughters of Half Breed Haven.

***

For the second time that morning Cassie emerged from a building in the company of a man but in this instance, she had derived nary a bit of pleasure at being in his company. They turned and faced each other and Cassie had to look down at the short, rotund man with his ginger beard now more gray than anything else.

Casper O’Connell was well known to her. The man had briefly headed up the Philadelphia Pinkerton office of which she had been employed before returning to Arizona when her father had suffered a near fatal accident at the hands of a pair of criminals out to plunder riches from the family’s sprawling five hundred square mile ranch.

During that time, she had clashed with the man who felt women had no place in the Pinkertons and that had included Kate Warne who had been Cassie’s mentor. Unfortunately for O’Connell, to Allan Pinkerton the “Double W’s” he liked to call Warne and Wilde were two of his favorite and best agents, so there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it despite being a childhood friends from Pinkerton’s days as a youth in Scotland. To Cassie’s relief the man had left for the southwest to head up a branch Pinkerton had wanted to establish in Arizona.

They had encountered each other a few times over the years and their interactions were always the same. Challenging tones, forced laughter, and enough arm-crossing to surpass even that of her sister Lijuan, an action that was her most notable tick. This meeting had been no different. The man’s eyes narrowed as he gave her a hard smile.

“Don’t hold this against the governor … oh, I’m sorry … your uncle.” The man punctuated his final two words with a quick, disgusted snort. Cassie’s eyes narrowed into a harsh squint. She was well aware the man thought she would be unemployed without her family’s connections. Cassandra Wilde after all was a woman doing a man’s job according to what she had heard through the Pinkerton grapevine back in the day.

“Don’t worry. I won’t. I know full well your presence here was foisted on him. It was clear that he wanted the best person on the job but he had little choice,” she shot back at him with a slight tilt to her head.

It was true but that didn’t take the sting out of it she had to admit to herself. Upon arriving for the meeting with her uncle Nate she had been taken aback to find O’Connell in his office. After a one hundred times, more formal greeting than she usually received by Nathanial due to the Pinkerton’s presence, the governor had got down to explaining the situation.

Cassandra had been right. He had called upon her to help with the brazen murders of women being snatched off the streets of Tucson in broad daylight only to be brutalized and found dead hours later. However last night a group of the Arizona territory legislators had convened with him unexpectedly. Ambushed was more like it she had thought when she found out why. The last victim had been the younger sister of one of the territory’s most prominent legislators. Vowing revenge, he wanted the Daylight Dandy caught and he and his fellow friends on the legislature had days earlier telegraphed Allan Pinkerton in Chicago to see if his agency would take the case since the local law had failed to make any headway. Pinkerton had dispatched his key man in the Southwest, O’Connell, to assume the investigation.

From the way Nathaniel had kept his hands folded on his lap and his even tone of voice, she knew he was not a happy man about the situation. He knew Cassie’s skills better than anyone but even the Governor, it seemed, could be overruled when a cadre of men as powerful as the ones that wanted the Pinkertons were intent on calling the shots.

He had tried to make it up to her with another assignment. It was an important one, she had been advised. Cassie agreed when she learned that a fellow undercover lawman had gone silent now for some time while investigating suspected illegal activities in a distant town. He needed Cassie to get over there right away and find out what had become of him. It was not a flashy high-profile case like the “Daylight Dandy,” but she cared nothing for that. Her concern was for the missing lawman; however, she couldn’t help resenting the smug presence of Casper O’Connell.

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.

Instead her faithful mount of many years landed with all four hooves on the dirt of the alley way, wobbled for a moment and bolted forward as the pair shot clear of the alley, the stunned shouts of the workmen quickly falling behind them.

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’Connell 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.