Prisoners of Love: Becky Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  About the Book

  Copyright

  A Note From Callie Hutton

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Prisoners of Love: Becky

  Callie Hutton

  About the Book

  Becky Davidson has been on her own since she was thirteen years old. The last three years, she has been traveling the country with Dr. Snodgrass who sells elixir for all sorts of medical problems. They are generally run out of town by the third or fourth day, but this time Dr. Snodgrass has disappeared with all the money, abandoning Becky in Dodge City.

  In jail for running a scam, Becky agrees to travel with three other female prisoners and Miss Nellie, a former brothel owner who is chaperoning them, on a wagon train to Santa Fe as a mail-order bride. As the journey begins, Becky is befriended by Mace Jensen, the Santa Fe County sheriff hired to escort the outlaws in skirts to Santa Fe.

  Once they arrive at their destination, the unlikely friendship between Becky and Mace flourishes as she works with him in the jailhouse, dodging every man Miss Nellie presents to her as a potential husband.

  Sheriff Jensen is the man Nellie wants, but he feels they would scandalize the town should they marry. He is a black man, and she a white woman. Can love overcome the problems the sheriff sees for them, or should he be sensible and let the woman he loves marry another man?

  Thank you for choosing to read Prisoners of Love: Becky. I love my fans, and as a special treat, I have something extra for you at the end of the story. Enjoy!

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Author.

  Author’s website: http://calliehutton.com/

  Cover design by Erin Dameron-Hill

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First Edition October, 2017

  A Note From Callie Hutton

  Becky is the third book in the Prisoners of Love – Mail-order Brides series. It’s always a thrill to start a new series and discover the stories of these heroes and heroines as I write each book. Who are these Mail-order Brides and how did they become Prisoners of Love? Let me tell you where each story begins…

  In 1877, at the height of craziness in Dodge City, Kansas, four women sit in jail, awaiting their fate. The marshal has no idea what to do with them, and certainly can’t let them back out on the streets. Too dangerous.

  He tells the women they have two choices. They can either join a wagon train headed to Santa Fe, New Mexico, as mail-order brides or be sent to the state prison. When the women agree to his plan, he hires a brothel owner whose business just burned to the ground to chaperone the ladies on the wagon train.

  A brothel owner as a chaperone? There’s bound to be trouble for Adelaide, Miranda, Cinnamon and Becky with Miss Nellie in charge.

  The series includes:

  Adelaide, Book 1

  Cinnamon, Book 2

  Becky, Book 3

  Miranda, Book 4 - Coming Soon

  Nellie, Book 5 - Coming Soon

  Prologue

  "Dodge is the Deadwood of Kansas; . . . her principal business is polygamy without the sanction of religion; her code of morals is the honor of thieves, and decency she knows not. . . The employment of many citizens is gambling, her virtue is prostitution, and her beverage is whisky. She is a merry town, and the only visible means of support of a great number of her citizens is jocularity." —Hays City Sentinel, 1877

  Dodge City, Kansas

  April, 1877

  Becky Davidson wrapped her hands around the jail cell bars, rested her head against the cool hardness, and wept. Things had been bleak in her twenty years of life, but she had finally reached the very bottom.

  Locked up in jail.

  Accused of running a scam. The amusing part of the sad tale was she never knew they were running a scam until she landed in jail.

  Dr. Snodgrass had picked her up on the side of the road four years ago when she was sixteen. She had just been fired from her job as a maid, and, with no family and nowhere to go, she’d started walking, hoping her shoes would last long enough for her to make it to the next town.

  The doctor had told her he sold medicinal liquids to cure all ills and said he needed a pretty assistant to work with him. She never thought of herself as pretty and admittedly had worried about her safety traveling with a stranger. He seemed nice. He had white hair—why that made him seem safe she had never worked out—her feet hurt like the devil, and her belly was empty. So, she took a chance.

  For four years they traveled from town to town, selling the medicinal liquid. The last town they landed in was Dodge City. That was where Dr. Snodgrass left her behind, escaping with all the money they had collected.

  To her amazement and horror, United States Marshal Dane Jones approached her in the lobby of the local hotel where she was trying to talk the desk clerk into letting her enter her room to retrieve her things. The innkeeper was holding them for payment due. Which, of course, she didn’t have.

  Marshal Jones had asked if she was Miss Becky Davidson, assistant to Dr. Snodgrass. When she confirmed that bit of information, he advised her she was under arrest for running a scam. So here she was, with three other women behind her, sitting on the hard cots the jail provided.

  Becky wiped her eyes and moved to one of the cots and dropped alongside a fellow prisoner.

  “Marshal, when you gonna let us the hell out of here?” A young saloon girl, one of her cellmates, ran her shoe across the bars of the cell, making enough racket to block out the sounds from outside.

  “Shut up, Cinnamon,” a man’s voice called. “The marshal left me in charge, and I ain’t letting you out until he says so.”

  “Well, where did he go? He can’t just throw me in here and walk off. I demand to have my say.” She leaned against the door, gripping the bars. “And don’t call me Cinnamon.”

  “That’s your name, ain’t it? And there ain’t nothing to say that he’s gonna wanna hear from you. You hit the mayor over the head with a pitcher of beer.”

  “The old lecher deserved it!”

  “Shut up, girl. And settle down.”

  The girl, whose name was apparently Cinnamon—although she didn’t want to be called that—flounced over to the cot where a sweet, terrified-looking woman sat. She plopped her bottom on the cot, and, crossing her arms which pushed her breasts dangerously high, the saloon girl looked over at the woman sitting next to Becky. “What’re you in for?”

  “Vagrancy.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Having no job, no home, and no money.” The woman’s sad voice was soft, cultured to Becky’s way of thinking.

  “Well, hell, if you ain’t got no job, then there ain’t no way to have a home or money.” She adjusted the straps on her dress and tugged the neckline up. “My name’s Cinnamon O’Brien. But if you know what’s good for you, you’ll call me Mindy. What’s yours?”

  “Mrs. Adelaide Markham.”

  “You look like what my ma used to call a ‘good, God-fearing wom
an.’ How’d you end up with nothing?”

  Mrs. Markham cleared her throat. “My husband and little girl died of influenza. Gerald was a gunsmith, and since I didn’t know the first thing about guns, I couldn’t keep his business going.”

  “Family?”

  “I’m an only child, and my parents drowned right after Gerald and I were married. Their buggy went over the side of a bridge during a rainstorm.”

  Mindy reached across the small space separating the cots and touched her hand. “I’m so sorry, girl. You’ve had it hard, haven’t you?”

  Fighting the tears once again, Mrs. Markham merely nodded. “I left my house and came to Dodge City. I got a job as a waitress, but having no experience, I didn’t last long. When I got fired, I started living in an abandoned building. The owner told me I could stay if I, um…‘warmed his bed,’ as he put it. When I refused, he had the marshal arrest me for trespassing. He said he would drop the charges if I reconsidered.”

  “Damn men.” Mindy looked over at Becky. “What are y’all in for?”

  Becky shrugged. “I worked with Doctor Snodgrass, selling medicine out of his wagon. I thought it was real good stuff. But it turned out it was just water he colored with beet juice. He skipped town and left me here. People filed complaints, so the sheriff arrested me. I don’t know why since I never got any of the money. Dr. Snodgrass took it all.”

  “Damn men. What’s your name?”

  “Miss Becky Davidson.”

  Mindy gestured with her chin to the other woman. “What’s your story?”

  For a full minute, the girl just stared at them. Finally, she wrapped her arms around her middle and whispered, “I killed a man.”

  ***

  Dodge City Marshal Dane Jones stood next to Miss Nellie Ward, his arm draped casually over her shoulders as the two of them watched the notorious Miss Nellie’s brothel burn to the ground.

  With no one available to help put out the fire, Dane had made sure all the girls were out before he took up his position next to Miss Nellie. “Damn shame. You have the cleanest girls and the least watered-down whiskey in town.”

  A young whore wrapped in a silk robe walked up to them. “What are we gonna do now, Miss Ellie? Where will we sleep tonight?”

  “I guess the marshal here will have to put us all up in the jail.”

  “I ain’t going to no jail,” the young girl huffed. “Miss Margie at The Palace is always looking for girls. I’m going there to see if she can take me in.”

  “Me, too.” Two other whores joined the group, and before the last wall of the brothel had fallen in, all six of Miss Nellie’s girls had left her standing there with the marshal.

  “Well, ain’t that the living end.” Miss Nellie glared at their backs, her hands on her hips.

  Dane tucked a lock of hair behind Nellie’s ear. “Don’t worry. Once you get a new place set up, they’ll come back.”

  “No.” She sighed and shook her head. “I’m too old to start over, Marshal.”

  “Too old? Hell, woman, you’re not even forty.” Miss Nellie was not only still young-looking for her line of work, she was also a handsome woman with a fine figure who, in Dane’s opinion, didn’t need all the face paint she used.

  “I’ve been in this business since I was fourteen. There are days I feel older than the Widow Charles, and she must be seventy if she’s a day.”

  Dane turned to her and gave her a slow smile, his mind working furiously. She could be the solution to a problem he’d been wrestling with all day. He continued to stare at her, the idea forming in his mind sounding better all the time.

  “Marshal, I don’t know why you’re staring at me like that, but it’s making me mighty nervous.”

  His grin grew wider. “Miss Nellie, how fond of this town are you?”

  She narrowed her eyes. “Don’t make any difference to me where I plant my feet. In fact, Dodge City is getting too wild. Even for me. Why?”

  “I have four young women sitting in my jail right now.”

  “Four young women? In jail? Marshal Jones, are you crazy?”

  He hooked his thumbs in his gun belt and rocked back on his heels. “Probably, but I think I’ve come up with a solution on how to get rid of them and help you at the same time.”

  “Why do I think I’m not going to like this?” she groused as he took her by the elbow and hustled her in the direction of the jailhouse.

  Chapter One

  Becky stared through the bars at Marshal Jones and a woman who was obviously not in a line of work suitable for refined ladies. She couldn’t believe her ears. The marshal had just announced the four prisoners would be joining a wagon train to Santa Fe where they would become mail-order brides.

  “Marshal, suppose we don’t want to be mail-order brides?” Mrs. Markham’s face had turned frighteningly pale.

  Becky would like more than anything to find a husband. Someone to take care of her in exchange for her taking care of him. Then she would know she was sleeping in the same bed, in the same house, in the same town every night. Meals would be on a regular basis, as well.

  From the time she’d been a young girl, still secure in the love of her parents, she dreamed of being a wife and having her own home. She would sew curtains, plant flowers, always have fresh bread on the counter, and a hot meal for her husband at the end of the day.

  “Weren’t you listening, girl? I said if you don’t join the wagon train and head to Santa Fe to hitch up with a husband, I’ll leave you sitting here until the circuit judge sobers up and arrives in town. I don’t know where the hell he is right now. It could be months before we see his sorry face.”

  None of the women seemed too thrilled to be roped into marriage this way, and the poor woman, Adelaide, who said she’d lost a little girl, looked like she was about to pass out.

  Miss Miranda, the girl who had killed a man, was the first to speak up. “I’m willing.”

  That was no surprise since she was in for murder. Slowly, the other two nodded their agreement to the marshal. When he swung his gaze to Becky, she chewed her lip for a bit and thought about sitting in jail for heaven knew how long compared to possibly having her dream life. “All right.”

  The next morning Becky rolled out of bed and walked to the window of the Dodge City hotel room the marshal had rented for the women. She’d shared a bed with the saloon girl all night. After Mindy had removed her makeup and changed from the scanty outfit into a calico dress their chaperone had given her, she looked young and innocent.

  They hadn’t spoken much, except for Mindy to tell her that her mother was a whore, and she had no intention of ever earning a living that way. Somewhat taken aback at how casually Mindy had told her that, Becky soon realized she was being tested.

  Just as Becky had learned to tell everyone she met that she was only Dr. Snodgrass’s assistant, not anything else. She assumed Mindy did the same thing. It was easier to avoid condemnation if you were the one to bring it out into the open.

  Once they were up and dressed, Mindy receive a note that a gentleman was calling for her downstairs. Becky found her way to Miss Nellie’s room and knocked on the door. She was surprised when the former madam opened the door. She was outfitted in a brown-and-white striped dress with her hair braided and wrapped around her head. No one would ever guess she’d been a brothel owner.

  “Miss Nellie, do you suppose the marshal can go with me to the Boswick Hotel and get my things? I don’t have all that much, but they won’t give it to me because Dr. Snodgrass didn’t take care of the bill before he left. And I don’t have any money to pay for the room.”

  Miss Nellie offered her a warm smile like one a person would expect to receive from a favorite teacher. “You poor dear. I’ll tell you what. I’ll walk with you over to the marshal’s office and ask him myself.” She stepped out in the hall and closed the bedroom door behind her. She took Becky’s arm and winked. “He owes me.”

  Miss Nellie chatted about the townspeople as they walked the
distance from their hotel to the sheriff’s office. Seeing as how Miss Nellie had lived in Dodge City for a long time, she knew everyone and every piece of gossip. “I’ll tell you what, missy. Get a man out of his pants and into bed, and he’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  Becky blushed at the woman’s openness but was forced to admit this trip to Santa Fe with Miss Nellie as a chaperone was going to be quite interesting.

  The jailhouse was noisier than a saloon on Saturday night. Marshal Jones stood talking to a large Negro man. Shouts came from the back of the jail where prisoners had taken the space the ladies had occupied the day before.

  The caramel-colored man pushed the brim of his hat back with his thumb and rested his hands on his hips. “Marshal, hauling these varmints down to Santa Fe won’t even have me working up a sweat. You just keep ’em here overnight, and I’ll be back for ’em in the morning.”

  The marshal shook his head. “I’m telling you this plan of yours is too dangerous. There are families traveling on that wagon train. If you lose control of any one of these men, someone could get hurt.”

  The Negro man smiled, turning his features into the handsomest Becky had ever seen. “I ain’t never lost a prisoner in my entire career, sir. And I’m not about to lose one now. If it eases your mind any, they will be traveling in a military wagon, with bars.” He tugged the brim of his hat back down. “Now, I’ll be on my way to get something to eat since I’ve been living on spit and sunshine while I tracked those three. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  When he turned to leave, his eyes lit up at Miss Nellie and Becky standing at the door. His piercing blue eyes were quite a contrast to his brown skin. Becky sucked in a breath as he approached them, his hat now in his hand. “Good morning, ladies. I hope I didn’t use any language that offended you. I didn’t see you standing there.”