At the end of a bloody trail, Johnny Redd finds an incredible secret. While struggling with a bullet in his chest, he crawls along the ground until he finds himself surrounded by a maze of quaint carnival tarps. Inside is a world of color, costumes, false hair, nails, eyelashes -- and a man who dresses like a woman. It’s a world of trickery, deception, and lies. Johnny makes it just inside the tent when his strength fails and he faints dead away. When he awakes, he’s reminded of the bizarre reality that surrounds him. It’s that he learns he has been taken care of by a man – er. woman -- by the name of Frenchy Starr. The name rolls from the tongue of this fallen angel, this princess of darkness, this twilight queen. She’s a mystery, a dangerously beautiful mystery, and Johnny slowly becomes ensnared in the trap which she sets. After one night of incredible love, a jealous fan shoots Frenchy. Thinking her dead, Johnny’s heart is broken and he leaves in search of something to fill the hole she left in his heart. Enter Kit Dalton.

Carnival Cowboy

It was dark, and the closer they came to town, the more the wind seemed to croon a dirge of death beneath the distant clip-clop that echoed through the town.


The town was dark, not a soul on the street.


Even the saloon was dark, the outside door closed and locked.


The sheriff, who was lying on his cot, heard a distant clip-clop coming down the road.


He felt a chill. The slow movement of the hooves that thudded down the street sounded like danger on horseback. The sound was faint at first, and then got heavier as it got closer. Sometimes when a gunman, or any other cowboy that didn’t want to be seen, rode into town, he would sneak in under the cover of darkness. Knowing this might mean trouble, the sheriff got up, and swung his stocking feet over the bed, and onto the floor.


And then the sound stopped right in front of the door of his office.


Chapter 16