Showing results by author "Steven F. Havill" in All Categories

To most people, hat pins are vestiges of the past, used now only by elderly ladies who don't leave home without a hat. But recently, the notion store in Posadas County has been doing a good business selling hat pins to teenage girls. Following a "cat fight" over a boy, one of the girls, Carmen Acosta, had been suspended from school. But Carmen's friends are still around. So Deena, Carmen's rival, wants something with which to defend herself.

Posadas County, New Mexico, is in the news. NightZone, a mammoth astronomy theme park, is bringing in jobs, media, and such new infrastructure as a slick narrow-gauge railway to transport tourists from the village of Posadas to the tramway running up the mesa to the project's site. And the Posadas High School girls' volleyball team is on a hot winning streak, exciting everyone. But more news, not good, breaks.

The disappearance of a young camper atop Cat Mesa convinces Undersheriff Bill Gastner and Estelle Reyes-Guzman that the boy has been spirited away.

Sheriff Martin Holman of the Posadas County Sheriff's Department didn't like flying, much less at night, with bad weather. So why he took a plane ride over a nearby mesa under those dangerous conditions is a question as disturbing as why somebody shot the pilot dead from the ground - causing the plane to crash. Undersheriff Bill Gastner, a 60-something warhorse just months away from retirement, now has a murder on his hands.

The rugged Cat Mesa country north of the village of Posadas is hosting the first annual Posadas 100, a cycle-cross bicycle race that promises to attract more than 140 competitors. Despite enough injuries during the pre-race practice to promise a spectacular and dangerous race, Undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman has even more pressing concerns on her mind.

What do you do when you inherit $330 million after taxes? If you're New Mexico rancher Miles Waddell, you build a dream. A flat-topped mesa and a third of a billion dollars equals Nightzone Zone, an astronomy-based theme park, complete with giant radio telescope, a bank of smaller scopes linked to a theater, five-star dining in a restaurant with retracting dome ceiling, a hotel/resort, tram car access, and a narrow gauge steam locomotive to carry tourists to the mesa top. Glorious. And too ambitious for many residents of Posadas County.

Gifted 15-year-old Francisco Guzman has become an internationally renowned concert pianist, touring the world under the auspices of his music conservatory. That gives his mother, Posadas County Undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman, plenty of reason to worry - and that's magnified when she learns that he's in Mexico's crime-ridden Mazatlan for a concert series where he may be the target for scam artists and kidnappers.

When a county employee is found shot to death in sun-drenched daylight while sitting in his county road grader, Undersheriff Bill Gastner is faced with puzzling questions. The simplest explanation - that an errant bullet from a careless target shooter's rifle blew out Larry Zipoli's brains - is soon discarded as inconsistencies surface. The fatal bullet shows no rifling marks, an investigation reveals that the shooter walked directly toward the road grader, in full view of the victim - who did nothing to defend himself.

Former Posadas County Sheriff Bill Gastner, now a New Mexico Livestock Inspector, is enjoying a day on Herb Torrances. But Bill soon finds himself ferrying a broken cowpuncher in the back of his SUV, headed out to meet an ambulance.

Aging Undersheriff Bill Gastner's vacation is interrupted by the dead body of a young woman, apparently thrown from a moving car. Other murders convince the Undersheriff to lend a hand.

Posadas County, sitting along New Mexico's southern border, has enjoyed a surge in visitors, jobs, and prosperity since rancher Miles Waddell used much of his inherited half billion to create an internationally renowned astronomy complex atop Torrance Mesa. Passion, not profit, drives Waddell. Yet benefits include a narrow-gauge train linking the village of Posadas to NightZone. But a ripple of unease is felt across the county with the arrival of developer - no, speculator - Kyle Thompson.

A reporter for the Posadas Register barely survives a night-time patrol with one of Undersheriff Bill Gastner's deputies, and the investigation points to a young woman known for her thrill-seeking.

Good cops have no use for coincidence. When a driver slams his pickup truck—twice—into a tandem bike being ridden by Carlos Guzman and his fiancée, Tasha, in Briones, California, it's more than a simple hit-and-run; the driver clearly intended to harm them. Undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman gets the call with the news of her son's accident and wastes no time racing to his side. She is greeted by Police Captain Eddie Mitchell, formerly of Posadas County, who allows Estelle to "consult" on the investigation—but only to a point.

A well-seasoned 69, Sheriff Bill Gastner knows his Posadas, New Mexico, territory as well as he understands the foibles of the human condition. So when a backhoe crushes a man to death, it's more instinct than fact that leaves him feeling there is more to this "accident" than meets the eye.

Undersheriff Bill Gastner knows that the dead bodies on Reuben Fuentes' ranch cannot point to the old man. Gastner summons former deputy Estelle Reyes for help.

Undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman is always busy, but more so now than ever. The sheriff is still not completely recovered from his stay in the hospital, and she is recovering from a hospital stay herself. After a long day at work, Estelle is happy to clear off her desk and drive home, where her beloved family waits. She hears her cell phone ringing as she pulls into the driveway. A truck has gone off the road and the driver's body found near the wreck.

One blizzardy New Mexico night, Posadas County Deputy Pasquale picks up a toddler scooting his Scamper along the shoulder of State 56. Yes, it's horrifying - a child apparently dumped out of a truck by his father. Nearly as horrifying is what unrolls while Christmas approaches after dad Darrell Fisher's arrest: a request arrives from the US Forest Service to locate a missing range tech and his unit last reported headed for nearby Stinkin' Springs, and the brutal murder of Constance Suarez in the border town of Regál, population 37.

Bill Gastner, the reluctant sheriff of Posadas County, New Mexico, anticipates his last few days in office will be uneventful. That is, until local teen Matt Baca drives drunkenly into the back of Gastner's cruiser and flees into the night. His eventual capture turns tragic when the boy becomes irrationally violent and takes a fatal tumble into oncoming traffic. Adding to the tragedy, Matt's father is found dead in his tiny kitchen. Is this all a terrible coincidence, or is something more sinister afoot?

It's 1986. Undersheriff Bill Gastner is enjoying his usual insomnia alone inside his old adobe when jolted by a horrendous noise. Dreading what he will find, he hastens to the nearby interstate exit where a violent crash has occurred. Three teens are dead. The first deputy to join him at the scene is rookie Robert Torrez, the department's newest hire. Before Gastner can head him off, Torrez sees that the dead boy is his spirited younger brother. But were the three dead kids running from someone - or something - rather than speeding?

New Mexico Undersheriff Bill Gastner is presented with a case that appears to have brought big-time crime, including drug gangs, into Posadas County.