Dance To The Devil's Tune
Lady Law & The Gunslinger Series
Book Two
by
Adrienne deWolfe
Bestselling, Award-winning Author
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ISBN: 978-1-61417-992-4
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Teaser
Letter to the Reader
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
You're Invited!
Meet the Author
Book List
"Looking for someone, mister?"
Sadie's voice was harsh when she surprised him, prowling through the dark hotel room.
Caught red-handed, Cass halted. "They call her the Devil's Daughter."
A moment passed. Then a light bloomed at her elbow. She lounged in an armchair, her chestnut mane spilling to her waist, lacy rosettes cascading from her breasts. The skimpy threads left little to his imagination. But what captivated Cass in that moment—what had always captivated Cass about Sadie—was the sensual fire burning in those hungry, tiger eyes.
"I got word you wanted me," he said.
"Lies."
He hiked an eyebrow.
"But since you made the trip," she added huskily, her trigger finger never wavering on her .32, "take off your clothes..."
Letter to the Reader
Thank you for reading my Lady Law & The Gunslinger series. Now I have a special invitation for you! I would love to take you "behind the scenes" so you can enjoy the books even more. You'll get to watch how the series evolves, from brainstorming a new villain's name to inventing sneaky spy gadgets. Ask questions about the writing process; share ideas for new scenes; and win some fun prizes too.
If you'd like to join my book family, please visit this link: http://wildtexasnights.com/join-my-romance-club/.
Happy Reading!
Adrienne deWolfe
Austin, Texas, USA
Chapter 1
Denver, CO
October, 1883
Pinwheels of light spun in the young woman's mind, blanking her memory, stealing her will.
One hour ago, she'd had a name. A conscience. A keen intellect and the heartfelt desire to save the world. But all that had changed the moment the clock chimed the midnight hour, and the music box with the enamel peacock began to play.
Now she was staring blankly at her reflection. The mirror hung in the master bedroom of the silver-mining tycoon she'd come to rob. If she'd still possessed the power to reason, she might have thought she looked a mess with her black curls spilling in a riot from her sealskin toque. She might have dusted powder across her chill-reddened nose or re-touched her lips with her favorite, strawberry balm. Certainly, she would have bemoaned the bloody smears on her indigo evening gown.
But her appearance no longer concerned her. Not since she'd found the attractively wrapped gift box, and the darling little novelty had mesmerized her with its tune.
Tripping the hidden latch behind the mirror, she swung the hinged, 24-karat frame away from the wall. Gaslight flickered over a numbered dial, protruding from the exposed safe. She tore off a leather glove and placed her ear against the cold steel. Listening for clicks, she turned the knob.
As a Pinkerton, she was more experienced at picking locks than cracking safes. Even so, she'd never set out to steal anything in her life—not until the vault finally swung open, and she stood staring at her prize. Nestled between several stacks of silver bullion, a heart-shaped ruby winked with a blood-red luster.
Ignoring neighboring emeralds, sapphires, and pearls, she snatched the walnut-sized gem she'd been induced to steal from Lt. Governor Horace Tabor, while he attended the theater with his family. In her haste to grab her rabbit-fur muff and close the vault's door, she forgot her glove.
Descending the circular staircase, she swept past the dead butler and two equally dead dogs before slipping through the kitchen door into the gardens. Touched by a surreal light, bare branches glimmered with frost in the crisp, Colorado night. The moon was beginning to set.
A spark of urgency quickened her feet. The carriage would be waiting.
He would be waiting.
Snowflakes tumbled across her hair and landed on her lashes. She never blinked. The pointy heels of her calfskin boots beat a steady tattoo as she marched across the cobblestones, looking neither left nor right. Puffs of steam curled above the dutiful horses in the street. Beyond them, a velvety, brassier-warmed blackness beckoned.
When she climbed through the open door of the carriage, he rapped the roof with his walking stick. The conveyance lurched forward. Ice crackled beneath its wheels. The sounds jarred her senses, but he murmured her name, caressing the word with a warm, buttery baritone.
All her awareness focused on him.
"Did you procure the Heart of Fire?"
She nodded, surrendering her plunder.
"Splendid. And the dossier?"
She raised her skirt to reveal ruffled bloomers and a large, plain envelope strapped above her knee. Without the slightest hesitation, she handed him three weeks worth of evidence she'd been compiling to indict him for coercion, burglary, and murder. No other copies existed.
"That's a good girl."
He settled into the shadows, his gloved hand resting atop the brass handle of his cane. He looked like he'd just come from the opera, with his silk top hat, Inverness cape, and polished black pumps. He smelled of lemongrass soap, Cleopatra Federal cigars, and cognac. The scents stirred something deep inside her, the memory of his taste. His touch. The insidiously sweet way his fingers had dipped between her thighs, working their dark magic.
She blink
ed.
"We're almost there," he soothed.
He called himself Maestro, partly because musical novelties intrigued him, partly because he specialized in various forms of mind control. Since she'd stepped inside the cab, he hadn't taken his eyes from hers. He knew about the .32 concealed inside her muff; he knew if she found a path through the fog inside her brain, she wouldn't have hesitated to put a bullet through his black heart.
But he was confident in his power over her. He'd told her, once, that hoydens with popguns amused him, and he considered them his favorite sport. He'd also told her to kill anyone who might get in her way at Tabor's mansion.
And she had.
The carriage rolled onto 19th Street and stopped. At this late hour, the road was deserted. However, she barely noticed the world beyond the isinglass windows. She was entranced by the pocket watch he'd tugged from his vest. When he pressed the stem, the timepiece started playing a sweet melody from her childhood. Her lips curved softly as she listened.
He handed the novelty to her.
"Run along now." He pushed open the carriage door. "You know what to do."
Obediently, she stepped down to the wooden planks beneath the carriage. Freshly fallen snow crunched under her boots. Rushing river water glittered in the moonlight, not far below. The South Platte was close to flood stage.
The bite of winter air burned her lungs. She blinked again. But the mechanical melody was insistent:
"London bridges falling down,
Falling down, falling down..."
When she jumped into the river, the carriage rolled away.
* * *
Ten Days Later
Sometimes Lady Pinkertons tackled the most bizarre cases.
But no assignment could be more bizarre than this one, reflected veteran agent, Sadie Michelson. She was posing as a grieving, Italian contessa so she could get bilked by an American flim-flam artist at a traveling spook show.
Definitely a case for my memoirs, she thought, hoping an attempt at humor would distract her from the stench of copal incense and unwashed bodies, shouting Amen beneath the red-and-white circus tent.
Yes, she was freezing her bustle off in the middle of Denver's Jewell Park, where Brother Enoch Fowler and his more zealous camp followers had been parking their wagons since August. According to rumor, environmental complications, ranging from wildfires on the plains, to an avalanche in Raton Pass, had prevented Fowler's retreat to a warmer climate.
But Fowler wasn't one to question Divine Providence. The preacher happily continued his stage shows, humbugging the superstitious suckers of Mile High City—especially the nouveau riche. In fact, one of his assistants was leading the prayer service now, so Fowler could shear some wealthy lamb inside his private lair. Judging by the rest of the brassier-toting sheep beneath the Big Top—and the army of females in Puritan costumes, ladling out hot cider—nobody minded the chill.
Except Sadie.
She grimaced. Careful not to discharge the pistol strapped to her wrist, she flexed stiff fingers so she could fish a timepiece from her hand muff's lining.
Hallelujah. Show time.
Suspecting she looked like a lemon popsicle—because that's how she felt—she shook out the topaz velvet of her skirt and widened the gap between the lapels of her sable coat. The whole reason behind her contessa disguise was to bait a mysterious jewel thief, named Maestro, with the obscenely large emerald nesting between her breasts.
According to a preliminary report filed by Agent Araminta "Minx" Merripen, Maestro was relatively new to Denver and had received carte blanche entry into the richest homes. Minx had named Fowler her chief suspect. Three days later, her body had been found floating in the Platte. That's why Sadie believed Fowler was connected to Minx's death.
Eager to come face-to-face with her quarry, Sadie abandoned her rustic bench at the rear of the camp meeting. Adopting a regal mien, she skirted late arrivals, including a couple of arguing Italians, with a bawling infant, and a Mexican, who was leaning against a tent pole. The caballero appeared to be snoozing under his sombrero, the way his hat rested on the tip of his nose.
But Sadie quickly forgot the immigrants when she noticed the commotion at the registration table. She figured the sight of an Italian noblewoman, in an ankle-length fur, had flustered the two females with the plain muslin bonnets and conservative, gray gowns. Careful to hide her amusement, she watched the younger of these Puritan Throwbacks whisper in the ear of her bespectacled companion.
The older woman fled like a pack of hounds was at her heels.
Sadie halted and sized up the adolescent, whose badge proclaimed her to be Sister Rebekah. Not a single strand of hair could be seen beneath the waif's snow-white bonnet. She was pale and mousy-looking with unusually intense, dark eyes. An enormous wooden cross hung from a leather cord around her neck. That cord stretched nearly to her navel.
"Buona sera," Sadie greeted in her best Italian accent. 'Finally,' she thought, 'those grueling language lessons with my childhood opera coach are paying off.' "I am the Contessa di Montaldeo. I am scheduled to meet with Brother Enoch—"
"You're late."
Sadie hiked an eyebrow. Was it her imagination, or was Rebekah glaring at her as if she were the devil's own handmaiden?
"Mi scusi," Sadie said politely, "but the clock on your table says—"
"The clock's wrong. Sister Abigail gave your appointment to someone else."
A muscle ticked in Sadie's jaw. Sister Abigail was the near-sighted woman, whom Rebekah had sent scurrying into the crowd. Sadie had no way to verify the waif's claim.
"Very well," Sadie bit out, "schedule me for the next available appointment."
"We're filled."
"Tomorrow, then."
Rebekah hiked her chin and shook her head, two sure signs she was lying.
"Next week?" Sadie persisted to confirm her suspicion.
"Come if you like, but we won't be here."
"And why is that?"
"Too much snow."
Sadie struggled with her notoriously short temper. Rebekah's lie wasn't the only reason why Sadie's patience was stretched thin. The Rocky Mountain News had sabotaged her plan to gain credibility among Denver's privileged class. Despite the effusive assurances of the editor, her elaborately concocted story about the contessa's adventures as a tourist had been relegated to a footnote in the morning edition. The editor had used the rest of the society column to praise the "lyrical virtuosity" of a Sicilian soprano, who'd stolen Sadie's thunder by debuting at Tabor's Grand Opera House last night.
Is it any wonder Rebekah doesn't know I'm supposed to be traveling with a fortune in jewels, any one of which would put the Heart of Fire to shame?
"Signorina," Sadie said in reasonable tones, "surely we can come to an arrangement." Deliberately, she fingered her ostentatious gold and platinum collar, which weighed as much as the monstrosity was worth. She didn't enjoy lugging the necklace around Denver like an ox's yoke, but if diamonds and emeralds were to be the seeds of Maestro's destruction, then so be it. "I must be leaving for California soon," she improvised, "to inspect my dear, departed Luigi's vineyards. I have heard how Brother Enoch speaks to spirits, how he gives comfort to the living. It is a dreadful imposition, I am sure, but I was hoping he might make an exception for me. I must consult with my beloved conte and ask him how to invest—"
"Go away," Rebekah snapped. "I don't like you."
Sadie blinked. She was so stunned by this rebuff, she wondered if Rebekah had remembered her from some previous encounter.
But Sadie quickly assured herself their acquaintance was impossible. In her pre-Pinkerton days, she'd never performed her bawdy songs in a venue where children were allowed.
Besides, two nights ago, she'd altered her appearance, dyeing her hair a deep, dark chestnut to look more Italian. Even her lover, William "Cass" Cassidy, would have looked twice to recognize her now.
"I am grieved to hear that, signorina," Sadie said dryly.
"But the facts remain: the clock is not wrong, and I am not late. Now then. I am willing to overlook this unfortunate misunderstanding and tell Brother Enoch how helpful you've been to correct it. Or, if you prefer, I can distress him with the news that Sister Rebekah is an ill-mannered guttersnipe, who offends his paying customers."
Well, that stoked the fire in those burning, black eyes. Rebekah clutched her cross with two white-knuckled fists. "It would serve you right if I did take you to see Papa right now."
Papa? Sadie frowned. According to Fowler's Pinkerton dossier, he was supposed to be a bachelor: never married and no children.
"Signorina Fowler." Sadie locked stares with the brat. "I am not known for my patience. I demand that you point the way to—"
"Grazie, carino," purred a female voice in dulcet Italian, somewhere to Sadie's rear. "How kind you are to ask. Of course, I shall autograph your opera program."
Sadie's heart nearly stalled. In the reflection of the clock face, she glimpsed a sloe-eyed, dark-haired beauty in a low-cut, scarlet gown, which was embroidered with tiny black treble clefs. The woman's companion, a gentleman wearing a cleric's collar, gallantly held aloft a tent flap for her convenience.
Holy crap! Fowler's entering the Big Top with Dolce LaRocca!
Sadie wasn't the only one who recognized the international singing sensation. A cry went up from the Italian immigrants with the bawling infant. Soon, their shout was sweeping like wildfire through the tent:
"It's Dolce!"
"I love you, Dolce!"
"Bless my baby, Dolce!"
The next thing Sadie knew, a swarm of euphoric admirers was rushing the entrance. They knelt, cap in hand, to kiss Dolce's hem or beg her blessing for sundry possessions, ranging from medicine bottles and crutches, to knitting needles and Bowie knives.
Dance to the Devil's Tune (Lady Law & The Gunslinger Series, Book 2) Page 1