C.J. Petit

Laramie had just been hit by the Clayton gang, leaving Sheriff Joe Tate without any deputies to serve the entire county.

When the Northern Pacific had ceased operations at the start of the Panic of 73, Cap had been stranded with his survey crew in the middle of Montana Territory. Since then, he’d lived a hard, solitary life.

AJ Smith had finally achieved his Big Dream. He had his ranch, a good-sized herd, and a healthy bank account. He thought he had finally added the last, most important part of the dream when Hannah Jacobsen, recent widow and mother of two, moved in with her sister in the neighboring ranch.

Kyle raced away from the work camp with the posse’s bullets whizzing past his head. He had no idea why he was being pursued, but he wasn’t about to ask.

Ed's life changed that first day of September when that deadly twister had roared across his Texas ranch and destroyed his house. But what was much worse was that it had ripped his Bessie and their boys from him and destroyed much more than the wooden structure; it had destroyed his life.

Wade stood in the dark street and watched his home being eaten by the raging flames. It was as if it was a horrible nightmare because it couldn’t really be happening. He knew his parents had been trapped in their room where the fire had started, but there was nothing he could have done to help.

When Drew Campbell turned sixteen and had to leave St. Thomas Home for Boys, he knew he wasn’t fully prepared to face the world on his own. But he thought his years as a blacksmith’s apprentice would give him a start.

Joey couldn’t imagine a better 13th birthday. He’d been given his first pistol and now was going to join his six older brothers on tomorrow’s job. They were going to trust him with covering their escape after robbing the bank and he was determined to do it right....

No one had seen the innocuous rock on the long climb to the pass on the Oregon Trail, and when the last covered wagon in the long line rolled onto the lump of granite, it shouldn’t have made much of a difference, but it caused almost instant tragedy.

When aging cowboy Gus Matthews gets fired from Rocking-C ranch for laying out the mean-spirited, know-nothing foreman, he heads north for Oklahoma, where he finds work with the Aronsons, an elderly couple whose ranch has seen better days.

James Everett was desperate. When his daughter had been kidnapped, and he couldn’t raise enough money for the ransom demand, no one; not the law, not the Pinkertons, and not even the army would intervene to try and free her.

Grip was buried in one of his textbooks when his roommate entered and told him that the dean of students needed to speak to him.

Clara was angrier than she’d ever been before. But even her fury took second place to her deep frustration. They’d murdered her first husband as a warning to the others.

Ada was angry as she prepared to go to see Mike Bergman, knowing he was doing nothing less than trying to steal their silver mine, and even though she knew that she, Elsa and Bridgette had little chance of standing against him much longer, she wasn’t about to give in.

Erich had been treated as a freak of nature for as long as he could remember. When he was twelve, he was bigger than any fully grown man in Brainerd. His defense against the constant taunts was to retreat into a shell which marked him as a dimwitted giant.

Fifteen-year-old Joe Beck wasn’t listening as the minister eulogized his uncle but was already planning on what he would have to do as soon as they returned to the Quimby farm. He wasn’t welcome there even before his uncle had died and knew that his cousin John would soon order him to leave....

Bryn felt sickened as he felt the ground shake, knowing that one of the two shafts had collapsed. Now, he stood in the pump room and watched the two thrumming pumps as they pulled water out of the deep mines....

Mark Jordan was in no hurry to finish the long ride across Texas to reach his first assignment in Dallas. He was ashamed of himself for not standing up to his father and choosing his own career....

After leaving his job as sheriff of Boulder, Sam Brown decides to visit his sister and her family on their ranch south of Denver, but discovers them all gone. He searches to find them, and what he discovers becomes his mission....

Doctor Turnbull had estimated that Kyle's mother had six months to live - that was three months ago. He felt guilty for playing a game as she suffered back at their small excuse for a house....