Into The Lair 0f Los Rey Lobo: Wildes 0f The West (Half Breed Haven Book 9)

by A. M. Van Dorn

  "I'm Enrique Ruiz, and this is my family. That was our home until today when a man and woman arrived … amigos of Rey Lobo. These gringos set fire to our house. Besides our lives, this is all we escaped with," He lamented motioning towards the burlap bags that littered the ground.

  Tearfully, Mrs. Ruiz wailed, “There wasn’t even time to save my mother’s portrait. It was all I have left of her!”

  “How dreadful indeed! To think he is doing all this and for unknown reasons at that.”

  Lijuan agreed with what Honor Elizabeth had just said, but what she really took issue with was the apparent lack of defense. “Hasn’t any of your men folks around these parts talked about banding together and putting a stop to this?”

  This troubled Cassandra as well, “Yes, how many men does he have and where are they?”

  Kicking at a rock in frustration, Cody vented. "We don't know for sure. It seems to be the same pair destroying the properties by all accounts. Although some others have been seen, but a number I can't give you."

  "As for where those polecats are, we aren't hundred percent certain, but there's an old Spanish mission beyond the other side of the Sweetbriar Creek that divides the valley. Clear on the other side of The Rift. There are no settlements on the other side, but that's where the desperados have been seen coming from," Jocelyn informed them.

  "Back up a minute. The Rift? What's this?" Cassandra asked as gaining any, and all information was second nature to her in her detective work.

  “An old canyon that runs the width of the valley. Legend says it might have been made by an earthquake long ago. I don’t know. Anyway, we’re pretty sure that’s where Los Rey Lobo is operating from,” she answered.

  Cody drew close to Lijuan's horse and looked up at her, his eyes squinting from the glare of the overhead sun. "What you said before, Miss Lijuan, looking back on it now we should have banded together when this first started. But we didn't, and we've done paid the price. And I fear Bertram Stoddard is another one who has paid the ultimate price.

  “Who is that?”

  Shifting his head away from Lijuan, he now gazed up at Cassandra.

  “He was the closest thing this valley had to any sort of lawman. He’d been a deputy in his youth over in New Mexico. Anytime anyone had any problems they'd turn to him, and he'd set things right."

  Jocelyn's face took on a look of profound sadness. "A few days back when they dynamited the minister's church, he'd had enough and set out across the Sweetbriar to find Rey Lobo and confront him."

  Undisguised scorn in Lijuan’s voice accompanied the scowl on her face “Alone? No able-bodied men agreed to go with him?”

  Looking down, Cody was unable to meet her eyes. "We all begged him not to go. That he'd be throwing his life away, guess none of us wanted to throw ours away as well."

  “Sounds like a brave man,” was Cassandra’s solemn comment, but Lijuan wasn’t through.

  “Apparently, the exception to the rule in this here valley.”

  The Wildes gave Lijuan a great deal of latitude because Lijuan was Lijuan, and they were used to her often-caustic attitude. The adult Lijuan was a far cry from the mousy little girl she had once been. However, Honor Elizabeth felt for the Holmes’ who were not accustomed to the hellcat’s feistiness and didn’t appreciate the emasculation her sister was heaping on Cody.

  “You are not helping by being unkind, Lijuan. These people have clearly been through a lot!”

  Lifting his eyes from the ground, Cody looked up at her and smiled. It almost seemed as if he was seeing her for the first time. The man's eyes lingered on her, something that was not lost on Honor. For her part, she appreciated his attractiveness from his chestnut eyes to the deep dimples that formed when he had grinned at her. This was a well put together man in her opinion. At last, he spoke.

  “Thank you, ma’am. I appreciate your understanding, and it is true what we’ve been through. As for Mister Stoddard, I deeply regret he went on his own now. It’s been nearly two days gone by now, and we ain’t seen neither hide nor hair of him since. I’m afraid that Bert’s done for.”

  Angrily Ruiz kicked one of the burlap bags. “They must be stopped! They will be coming here next. It is certain!”

  Cassandra's mind whirred as she considered everything that she had heard. "So, they operate from across the creek and beyond this rift thing. Okay. Well, at least Lijuan and I have a general direction to head in to find this scourge."

  Theatrically, as often was her nature, Honor Elizabeth put one hand up next to her ear. "Cassie, I either misheard, or you misspoke. I believe I should have been included in that number."

  “No oversight, Honor Elizabeth. If what these people say is true, then the Holmes family are next to lose their farmstead. That’s not going to happen with us in this valley. I need you to stay here and help defend the place, should this pair show up to destroy the farm."

  Honor Elizabeth looked like she was going to protest, but she knew there was no arguing with Cassandra's reasoning. It made sense, so she complied.

  "Very well, dear sister. This farm shall not fall this day if I have anything to say about it."

  Jocelyn Holmes was staring at her slack-jawed, unsure if she heard right. She looked at her brother, and he could only shrug. Finally, she addressed Cassandra.

  “You ladies … you all can really help us? Save our farm and stop Rey Lobo?”

  Cassandra climbed down from her horse and untied the wagon spoke strapped to Lily.

  “That is our intention, Miss Holmes, and the only thing it will cost you is three of these.” She smiled as she handed it to Cody. “Now, which direction is this creek?”

  In unison, the two Ruiz children who had remained silent, perhaps still in shock over the loss of the only home they ever knew, pointed in unison in the direction of the Sweetbriar."

  “Thanks, kids!” Cassandra turned and faced Cody. “Can you give us an idea of what the lay of the land is like beyond the creek heading to this old mission?”

  The carpenter stroked his chin for a moment and then spoke. "Other side of the Sweetbriar, you are going to come to some rolling hills immediately. On the other side of those hills, that's when you will be fixing to come upon The Rift."

  “Tell me more about this rift,” Cassie asked, raising one of her eyebrows.

  “Nastiest jagged canyon you ever did see!” Jocelyn piped in. “As said, runs the entire width of the valley!”

  Always the learned one, Honor hypothesized to the group that the legends might have been on target possibly having come from an earthquake in ancient times.

  Lijuan looked like she was swatting an imaginary fly as she waved her hand. “I don’t rightly care how it got there. I’m guessing there’s a way across it?”

  "That's right, ma'am," Cody said. "There's a bridge for crossing that them Spaniard missionaries built long ago. From what I'm told, the people that first settled here repaired it, and it's been kept up in decent shape ever since. There's some good hunting on the other side of the rift."

  Cassie was eager to hear more about the terrain and pressed him as to what they would find on the other side. Cody looked thoughtful telling her the last time he had been there was when they had first moved to the valley. He had gone exploring with new friends, but afterward, his parents had warned him away from ever going back. Still, he recalled the details.

  "Ma'am, you just got to go over another set of hills, and then the plain opens up, and you'll see the mission. Right out in the open. Beyond it is some more open terrain that quickly gives way to a thickly forested area that leads all the way to the far end of the valley."

  If she were a naturally pessimistic person, she would have been discouraged to find that the approach to the mission would not allow for any sneaking up on it. However, over her career, she had learned to improvise for whatever situations that didn't work in her favor, and by the time they reached the mission, she knew she would have done just that. She put her hand on Lijuan's shoulder
and smiled

  “C’mon, Lijuan. Onto the Sweetbriar!”

  Lijuan took a moment to fix Honor Elizabeth with a pointed stare and said,

  “You … be safe!”

  “Only if you two promise likewise!”

  Both sisters nodded as they gently prodded their horses sending them charging off deeper into the valley, as Honor Elizabeth watched until they shrank from view.

  CHAPTER 6

  At the edge of the creek, Catalina had taken shelter under a large tree whose sweeping arms provided her with plenty of shade from the Nevada sun bearing down on her. She sat cross-legged and was going through the travel bag she had fetched from their damaged wagon. As she searched for something particular, she idly thought back to the night before.

  At the Carson City bar, she had been chatting it up with the woman who had appeared to show an interest, trying to feel her out and see if there was promise there. Catalina prided herself on usually being able to spot another woman who was completely open to the idea of relations between the same sex or had just enough curiosity to take the plunge to give it a try. Catalina, of course, was always more than happy to guide a novice through the pleasures of intimacy with another female.

  Last night, however, she had not been able to get an accurate read on the woman. The moment came to make a pass at her when the lady had said she was going to go out back and smoke a cigarette since the proprietor of the establishment forbade women to smoke inside, as he considered it unladylike. Catalina had no interest in ever smoking cigarettes, but it was the perfect pretense to be alone with the woman, and she took her new acquaintance up on the invitation to join her.

  It was just her imagination that she could still feel the sting from the slap the woman had leveled across her face when Catalina had tried to kiss her in the back alley. As the woman had stormed off shouting that the Lord would smite Catalina down for her indiscretions, she had looked up and waited. When nothing happened, she returned to the bar and rejoined Cassandra and Honor Elizabeth for their night of drinking. It was possible, she reasoned, that the woman did have curiosity, but had lost her nerve when push had come to shove. She had encountered such situations before and knew she absolutely would again.

  Now Catalina’s hand fell on her drinking flask inside her bag, and she held it for a moment. It was her habit to drink a daily toast to her late mother with wine from the Corderro family vineyard. This habit, though, had recently come under scrutiny by Whip who worried too much that Catalina had picked up her Mexican family’s fondness for their own products. She had tried to laugh it off with him. No matter how much she drank, she always rebounded quickly, much like this morning when she had no hangover like the others. That hadn’t dissuaded her father. When he had been a lawyer back east in the years before he had joined the Navy, he said he had seen many lives ruined through drink.

  Her hand let go of the flask. Catalina loved her padre, but, in this case, she felt he worried unnecessarily. Finally, her hand fell on the bundle of letters, and she pulled them out of the bag. Catalina glanced in the direction of the cavalry camp beyond a grove of trees. She was waiting for Washburn to return with some type of picnic for the pair, but he had yet to return.

  Sighing, she looked down at the bundle of letters in her hand and untied the ribbon binding them together. Unlike her drinking, this she felt was genuine cause for concern. Her eyebrows drew together as she looked at them. How many of these were there now?

  Earlier in the year, she had come to Cassandra’s aid when she had placed herself in danger’s shadow and was on the run with a falsely accused convict. While helping Cassandra and the man, she had come into contact with the man’s impressionable and vivacious younger sister. As was her pleasure, she had seduced the young woman who had taken to the passion two women could share together like a moth to the flame.

  The woman had slept together several times when she had come to Cedar Ledge at Catalina’s invitation. However, she was a Wilde and not one to settle down with a steady partner. Only Honor Elizabeth had come close with her relationship with Quillan Dodge, the stagecoach driver, from Godspell, and those two were broken up more often than they were together. So, Catalina had moved onto her next conquest.

  Melinda Novak, however, seemed not ready to move on at all. Whereas Catalina usually didn’t have problems landing lovers unlike the night before that had ended in a slap, Melinda admitted she didn’t know the first thing about what it would take to seek out and lay with another woman outside of Catalina.

  The letters she had been getting usually were of the same nature. When was Cattie coming back to Godspell? When might she be invited to Half Breed Haven? Then there were the lurid fantasies Melinda would describe about what she would do if she were reunited with Catalina. That last letter she had received had even gone so far as hinting at the “L” word.

  Catalina slapped the letters against her knee in frustration. She had never intended for the girl to fall in love with her. It was just sex, after all, hot passionate sex, but just sex. Honor Elizabeth had warned her that one of these times she was going to introduce a woman to these forbidden pleasures and the woman was going to want more, much more than Catalina was willing to give. It seemed that day had come.

  She honestly didn't know what she was going to do about Melinda. Not writing back to her she had thought would end the letters coming her way, but it hadn't. They continued to arrive. Pretty and young Melinda Novak was now like those opium addicts Catalina had heard about … and she was the girl's addiction.

  When she saw Washburn approaching, she was thankful not to have to think about the situation with Melinda anymore and slid the letters back into the bag. Turning her thoughts back to Washburn, the more time she spent with the man, the more she liked him. Women would always be her real passion, but if there was a man that caught her fancy, she could get down with them just as quickly as her three sisters did.

  The gallant lieutenant apologized for the delay, saying it took the unit’s cook time to whip them up something he thought they would enjoy. After handing her a sack, he spread out a blanket that he carried under one arm. Catalina quickly pulled out the contents and the pair dug into the meal. The bacon was still warm that the cook, a man from Georgia called Tibbins according to Washburn, had cooked and put between slices of bread along with tomatoes and lettuce that they carried on their provisions for the trip.

  For a side, there were buttered biscuits and several squares of chocolate they had wrapped deep with a blanket to prevent it from melting during their journey. They'd washed it down with water from a pair of canteens that had been slung over their shoulders. After the last bit of food was gone, she had rifled through her bag and held out the flask, as it seemed appropriate for their impromptu date. He had tried to beg off at first, saying he was technically still on duty even though he and his men were enjoying some downtime. In the morning they would make the big push and travel through the day to get back to their fort by nightfall.

  Catalina had laughingly told him that one swig would not be hurting anything and he had obliged. Before taking a drink and passing it to him, she raised the flask in a toast.

  “To having the good fortune of bustin’ up our wagon wheel within a stone’s throw of the U.S. Army’s finest!” she took a long swallow as he thanked her and then he took one of his own and passed it back to her.

  Now they looked at each other across the blanket.

  “So, before we take that dip in the creek, why don’t you tell me a little about yourself? The way you four women carry yourselves, I get the feeling that there is a whole lot more to you … beyond … beyond …”

  “Beyond me being a Mexican, Cassie being white and all. Along with Honor bein’ a colored and Lijuan havin’ been born way over in China?

  “I hope you don’t think me rude for asking.”

  “Hell, no! You sure as sugar are right about there bein’ a lot more to us. You just sit back and let me tell you a story or two!”

 
CHAPTER 7

  Cassandra and Lijuan were at full gallop until Cassie, in the lead, held her hand up signaling them to come to a stop. They were on a small rise, and up ahead she could see a blue ribbon of water snaking its way through the landscape below. Beyond it, Cassandra was staring at a series of stubby hills that ran nearly to the edge of the Sweetbriar. Somewhere beyond them she knew awaited a man, who for an unknown reason, called himself the wolf king. She could only shake her head. Several the sidewinders she had gone up against over the years liked to give themselves grandiose names whether earned or not.

  Lijuan, on the other hand, was looking past the hills and could make out the ridgeline that made up the other end of the valley opposite of the one they had entered after leaving the cavalry encampment. Honestly, though, she wasn't really seeing them. Her mind was back in Carson City thinking about the hotelier. He had indeed been an excellent partner in satisfying her lust during their tryst.

  After it was over, and the sisters were about to depart, he had done what all the sisters’ conquests had done. Inquired when he might see her again. They always wanted more. Once was never enough. Some wanted to recreate the heights of passions they had just been awash in, while others had hopes of parlaying the fling into something more. As always, though, whether it was herself, Cattie, Honor, or Cassie they always went on their way never wishing to tether themselves down.

  Unaware she was having similar thoughts as Catalina this afternoon, Lijuan thought of how Honor Elizabeth, she supposed, had come the closest considering her on-again-off-again relationship with a man of color who owned a stagecoach franchise operating out of the town of Godspell. Once again, they were in the off stage and would remain that way until their paths crossed again, and their passion for each other landed them in the nearest bed. Still, Lijuan knew, Honor Elizabeth would never leave Cedar Ledge no matter how much her man wished it.