The Rattler Unfurls (Hahmood The Killer Book 3)

A Kingdom Under Siege. A Killer on the Run.

Cattle baron Emmanuel Cooper built his empire from nothing—but the open range is no longer free. As greedy land-grabbers close in on his territory, Cooper turns to the one man with a chance of keeping his legacy—and his daughter—alive.

Hahmood has a reputation for surviving where others fall. But escorting Cooper’s daughter to safety means crossing a frontier riddled with liars, double-crossers, and cold-blooded killers. Outnumbered and hunted, Hahmood will have to rely on raw instinct and unshakable grit to make it through.

The Rattler Unfurls is the third book in the Hahmood the Killer series by Stuart G. Yates—a tense, unforgiving Western where trust is rare, and survival rides on the draw.

Start the journey today and ride deep into the heart of frontier danger.

Excerpt from the book

Two men sat in the dreary, smoke-filled office of a large red-bricked building on the main street of Cheyenne. It was a busy place, with secretaries and functionaries moving through the many corridors, papers and documents under their arms. The railroad was expanding and all sorts of engineering and surveying notices needed to be finalized and agreed upon. Most pressing were water rights. The Union Pacific was greedy for water. Coal it had, but cutting through the vastness of the plains meant there had to be an abundance of watering halts, and often such sites were in private hands.

It was this, among other things, that the two men were discussing on that hot, sultry morning.

“I don’t want a repeat of the horrors of the Rock Springs riots last year. Tensions are running high right across the territory!”

“But that was over coal and Chinese, Governor. This is nothing like that.”

“It’s still small-holders encroaching on land that is not their own, and this will only lead to trouble.”

“Well…” The other man leaned back in his chair, which creaked dangerously. He was a big man, his ponderous belly hanging over the top of his straining trousers. His red, glistening cheeks and bulbous, broken-veined nose told of a weakness for drink—and lots of it. Right now, he puffed ferociously on a thick, stinking cigar. His eyes narrowed. “This man you have sought out, he comes with a good reputation?”

“From what I can gather, he is amongst the very best. He went up against Canning and won…”

The big man with the cigar peered at the man opposite through a cloud of smoke. “Canning? But he is one of the biggest landowners around these—”

“Was,” corrected the governor. “He won’t be for much longer. Unbeknownst to him, his land is already being divvied up between various others. Not sod-busters, you understand. People of influence, wealthy businessmen from out East. So, as you can appreciate, the idea of others coming in to upset the apple cart does not bode well for my ambitions for this territory to reach statehood. Nothing sticks in my craw more than freebooters taking advantage of another man’s success.”

“So why bring in this enforcer now?”

“Having a man like that looking over your shoulder…” He shook his head. “I’d rather have him with me than against me.” Sighing, he stood up and crossed to the window. He lost himself in thought for a moment. “There are other things. The Bristol is flexing its muscles already, fighting off those damned sod-busters. Things are becoming heated, shall we say.”

“But I thought that was what we wanted? To dissuade any other land-grabbers from trying to muscle in? Haven’t you always said that if they were to pay then we would allow it?”

“Bristol doesn’t agree. They’re going out on a limb, hiring their own muscle, using your own words, to dissuade the land-grabbers.”