At thirteen he had run away from home, a stowaway on the ship of one of his father's competitors. After two days at sea he was found and put to work scrubbing the galley and living quarters of the officers on board. When a disgustingly evil mate tried to rape him, he was to stab the man through the eye with a huge Bowie knife that seemed to disappear when it wasn't in his hand.
The captain had seen the knife before and was secretly pleased that the son of Captain Questor had found his way into his clutches. He made the lad his private cabin boy and spent long hours teaching him the trade of a buccaneer. The youngster spent three years in that position until one day, after a particularly nasty skirmish with a Queen's Navy vessel, he was promoted to mate. During the fighting he'd saved the captain's life and turned the guns of the galleon on the powder room while the crew fought on the decks. He was put in charge of training the men to fight. His skill with a blade was uncanny, and he had come to be a deadly shot with firearms of all sorts.
He had a strange habit of growling during combat like a jaguar from the jungles where the pirate Lords hid out and, like his father, his eyes would turn a strange blue when he was aroused in any fashion. Men learned to gauge his mood by those eyes and it saved the life of more than one of them when they angered him.
Two more years found the ship pulling into the piers of San Francisco, the destination his mother had been sailing to all those years ago when Captain Questor had taken a fancy to her, taken her from her family, and eventually made her his. The girl and the Captain were still together, true to their natures and their lust, locked for eternity in love.
The young man became a regular at the dockside bars and brothels and soon developed a reputation as a dangerous gun and a rabid womanizer. Unassuming, handsome, lithe and armed with a wicked sense of humor and a pair of Colts, he ran through the whores of the largest port on the West Coast like a hurricane, leaving broken hearts and bruised bodies behind.
As time passed and the young man grew into his height and weight he had already taken over two groups of bandits on the docks, and the surrounding gold mines. He had also begun to run in more refined circles and was often spotted at society parties and affairs courting the daughters and wives of the affluent. The day came when he was caught with the young wife of a political boss. After shooting him dead in his own home in self-defense, the young Questor was forced to flee San Francisco for parts unknown. There was much lamenting among the female population, but the men seemed glad to be rid of the scoundrel.
A man rode a black stallion into the east, looking back on the port just once, as a new chapter in his life unfolded...
The town of Dark River Landing had been established for only about 10 years. Here in New Mexico, things were slower than in California or the East. Originally the settlement had been a stopover for stagecoaches and the occasional Pony Express rider. More recently the railroad had brought new life to the small town. In the last couple of years the population had increased five fold and new stores, churches and schools had been added to the mix. Of course the river, the railway, and a rapidly growing town combined to also attract an influx of saloons and brothels. With them came the gamblers, the gunmen and the outlaws, in addition to the ranchers who brought their herds to Dark River Landing, loading them onto trains bound for slaughterhouses in California and Kansas City. Recently a few crop farmers had moved into the area and, in contrast to most cattle towns, they had been made welcome, as fresh vegetables and fruit were a rarity.
There was a modest town government with five members; a mayor and four councilmen who were mostly original settlers of the area. They owned stores and the livery stable, and two of them had massive ranches a little farther north on the river where they raised cattle and horses. The mayor was a likeable man. God fearing and dedicated to the town, he had built the original stagecoach stop, along with an inn that had grown over the years to become the finest hotel in this part of the country. He owned parts of several town businesses and, until the bank had been built, and had served as the financial guide for many of them. A proud father of three, his eldest son worked in the inn as the manager, the younger ran the railway station, and his daughter was usually to be found riding her white mare in the wilderness surrounding Dark River Landing.
She was an expert rider and had on more than one occasion loaned out her services to the local ranchers during branding and counting season. Good with a rope and a dead shot with a rifle, she was nevertheless the perfect image of womanhood. With her long black hair and hazel eyes that sparkled with a hint of fire, every young man for a hundred miles around had dreamt of wooing her, but she had not yet found a man who could hold her attention long enough to keep her.
As dusk settled, a dark figure on a magnificent black stallion rode into town. Dressed all in black, the rider wore his hat down low over his eyes, but those curious enough to look closely noted a hint of blue in his assessing stare and a sardonic smile on his lips. He stopped in front of the livery stables and, after completing arrangements for his horse, crossed the street and walked towards the hotel. A quick chat with the desk clerk and he was ensconced in a room on the second floor overlooking the main street. Moments later he left the hotel and walked in the direction of the railroad depot, turning into a saloon at the last moment. Heads lifted and eyes stared at the stranger, then the rumble of the patrons began again as he walked slowly to the bar. A couple of men noticed the way his colts hung low on his hips, one of them a quick-tempered cowboy from a ranch to the north and the other a deputy who kept to himself quietly in the shadows under the balcony.
"Whisky," the man said, and turned to survey the crowd, his eyes moving quickly and noticing everything.
Resting against the bar and sipping his whisky, the young man with the shielded eyes looked around and took it all in. He had a habit of noting the exits whenever he was indoors. He never knew when he might have to leave quickly and in a most unorthodox fashion. From his days running the bandit crews on the piers in San Francisco, to those of slipping in and out of bedroom windows, he had developed a sense of when it was time to get out while the getting was good. It had kept him out of jail so far, and probably kept a few people alive as he was not a good man to corner. He knew right from wrong, but he lived by his own standards and wasn't real partial to society's rules.
A girl walked down a long flight of stairs to the saloon floor. Blonde, pretty, and with dancing eyes, she had one of those walks that brought every man's eyes instantly to her. The young man was no exception, but he had a wry grin on his face instead of the adoring and lustful looks of most of the other men in the room. He'd seen her type a thousand times, had owned girls like her body and heart and used them for a moment's diversion. He suspected that this one would be no different.
The girl moved fluidly through the crowd of men, touching one on the shoulder, bending over to whisper in the ear of another and flashing a dazzling smile at yet another. Every man in the saloon watched her avidly. As she neared the piano, the young cowboy with the quick temper stepped in front of her saying, "Alice, why don't you just forget the singing and let's go back upstairs!"
