Poisoned Dollars (Byron James Westerns Book 1)

A Past That Won’t Stay Buried

Byron James has traded bullets for books, settling into a quiet life as a school teacher in a small Kansas town. But peace is short-lived when the ghosts of his violent past come calling. Once a Civil War hero turned cowboy, James made one fateful decision that cost him everything—and someone hasn’t forgotten. When a former student forces him into hiding stolen money and threatens his wife’s life, James is pushed to the edge.

Torn between justice and vengeance, pursued by a relentless U.S. Marshal, and hunted by men who never forgave his past sins, James must navigate a world where violence is never far behind. Poisoned Dollars is a raw, compelling Western that sets the stage for the Byron James series—a story of redemption, danger, and the high cost of survival.

Start the journey with Poisoned Dollars—a gripping Western where no one escapes the past.

Excerpt from the book

The Visit

The day Byron James tramped the short walk from his home to the schoolhouse started like any other. A schoolteacher, each day he rose at exactly the same time, ate the breakfast his wife Amy prepared for him and got himself ready. Beside him, Amy put the finishing touches to her hair. She too was a schoolteacher, her charges being the very youngest. They worked together in the town’s one-room schoolhouse, lived together in their small cabin home, and always took the time to smile at one another.

Dressed in a charcoal grey suit, with matching waistcoat, James sweltered with the heat. Uncompromising in his calling, his attitude towards teaching was that his was a higher calling, a duty towards the children in his care. Heat proved a nuisance, but it would never deter him from what he knew was right. He was fifty-eight years of age and he was tired. Those happy, smiling faces that greeted him every morning, however, sustained him and kept him young and enthusiastic.

Little clouds of dust burst over his boots as he strode across the dry, impacted ground, baked hard by an unrelenting sun. He always arrived early, to prepare himself and his teaching area for the day to come. Amy would arrive much later. This was their routine and it remained unchanging. Almost eight years had gone by in the blink of an eye. Nothing much changed.

Until that day.

He climbed the few steps to the main entrance and, as his hand curled around the handle, someone moved to his right. He gave a jump, turned and gasped.

“‘Mornin’, Mr James.”

The owner of the voice—long, languid, grizzled face and burnished skin—wore two guns at his hip, the belt stuffed with cartridges. His black hat hung down the man’s back, suspended by a black drawstring. His clothes—sweat-streaked shirt, dust-spattered pants and boots barely holding together—were all black.

“I’m sorry,” said James, recovering from his initial shock, “I don’t think I know you.”

“Sure you do,” said the man, reaching slowly into his shirt pocket to bring out a small leather pouch. He idly rolled himself a smoke. “Name’s Reynes. John Reynes. I was a pupil of yours about a dozen or so years back. Used to chase pretty Pauline Upton around the classroom with a board ruler. Used to spank her pert little ass with it when I caught up with her. ‘Member you catchin’ me out back where you whupped me real good. My old pa came up to complain and when you told him why you whupped me, hell, he went and did it all over again!” Chuckling to himself, Reynes lit up his smoke and drew it in. “Remember now?”

James did remember. That incident and a good many others Reynes featured in. “You were quite a scoundrel.”

“Yes, I was,” Reynes said, laughing, the smoke exploding from his mouth.

“So, what can I do for you?”

The smile seemed to freeze on Reynes’s mouth. He took a quick look around, pulled in one more lungful of smoke, then threw away the remains of the cigarette. “We should go inside, Mr James. Wouldn’t want anyone ear-wiggin’.”

Frowning, James opened up the schoolhouse door using the heavy key he always kept in his inside breast pocket and gestured for Reynes to enter.