Susanna stared at her father’s body on the floor, his life’s blood still pooling near his head. She’d murdered her own father, and even as she stepped slowly away from the horror, knew that there was more terror in her future. Soon, a man with a badge would come through that door, arrest her, and then they’d slide a black hood over her head, and she’d plunge into cold darkness before her receiving her final, eternal sentence.

Joe had been the last child chosen. An entire trainload of children heading west had already been chosen, including his sister and his two friends. They had been the final four children on the train and made a pact to meet 10 years later when they were all adults. The 10 years were over. Joe would finally be reunited with his sister and his friends, including his girlfriend when he was 11.

Pinkerton Agent Ben Gray was being sent to Denver for another all-to-common request for confirmation of marital infidelity. He didn’t mind because he’d be able to go and visit his brother, who unknown to him, had just found a rich deposit of gold in his mine near Leadville.

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.

Max could fix anything that had moving parts., but he couldn't fix what sent him to prison for five years. Now, he was back home and had to fix a lot more than machines, and found it was almost impossible to repair people that didn’t want to be fixed.

Private Jake Elliott was apprehensive as he walked to the commander’s office. He couldn’t think of a single transgression that would have attracted the major’s attention. When he left the command building 10 minutes later, he was still numbed by the short visit. Tomorrow, he would no longer be a cavalryman, but would be returning to the family ranch outside of Fort Benton in Montana Territory. But it was the reason he was being discharged before his enlistment expired that had been the biggest shock.

After the final battle of the Civil War, Confederate Sergeant Travis Kane rode his Yankee horse away from Palmito Ranch to return to his ranch in Uvalde County. As he began the two-hundred-and-fifty-mile ride across West Texas, Travis was grateful for surviving the long, bloody war without being wounded. But now that the fighting was over, his biggest concern was for his young wife because he hadn’t received a letter from Lillian in almost two years.

Sheriff Joe Brooks was talking to a young prisoner who gave him some incredibly bad news. Three notorious gangs of outlaws had merged into one large band big enough to take over entire towns in his sparsely populated county. It was when they began to terrorize his county that he had to act, and he’d have to take them on alone.

Kyle MacKenzie left Fort Omaha to head to do some scouting at Fort Sully in the Dakota Territory at the request of their new commander. He’d been riding west for a few hours with his packhorse in tow when he noticed a set of wagon tracks heading northwest that appeared to be just a couple of days old. It raised his curiosity, and as the tracks were going in the direction he was headed anyway, he followed.

Virgil Scott and his best friend Roy Sheffield left their horse ranch and were making one of their routine runs to Denver to deliver 32 horses. But the short trail drive proved to be anything but routine when late that first night, they were set upon by men wielding deadly clubs.

The great state of Texas is a land of opportunity. For outlaws. And horse thieves. And cattle rustlers. Not to mention bank robbers, train robbers, and anything-that-ain’t-nailed-down robbers. The state’s governor, Richard B. Hubbard, is at the end of his rope. He wants to clean up Texas once and for all—and he’s desperate enough to try something crazy: hire a man who can do what the Texas Rangers can’t. A man not tied down by a wife or children. Or rules. Who’s not afraid to go outside the law.

Will noticed that the numbers didn't add up when he was 11, but he didn't discover the truth of that mathematical problem until he was 17. For most of his young life, Will had known Pearl as his older sister, but only after the man who had acted as his father died did he learn that she was really his mother.

Yavapai County in Arizona Territory was bigger than Pennsylvania, and Sheriff Sam Hicks and his three deputies were the only law that most of its residents knew. When China Joe’s gang knocked off the huge cash shipment heading for Prescott, Sheriff Hicks left his office unsure if this would be his last job one way or the other. He knew he had to retire soon, he didn’t expect to be alive in six months, whether it was from a .44 or his failing heart.

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. He was immensely proud to be a Hogan, and his tough brothers were his heroes.

After twenty years of fighting; first the rebels and then the Apaches, Jonas was tired of it all and decided to return to his unfinished cabin to find the solace and peace that he craved. Yet once he’d returned the place to a livable condition, he realized that life wasn’t just about existing. He missed the camaraderie of the soldiers and he really wasn’t cut out for the life of a hermit. So, Jonas decided to return to his duties as an army scout at Fort Selden. The cabin would still be waiting for him when he was ready.

Cole Turner left the Rocking T that morning to spend a couple of days with his brother and niece in Garden City. It was supposed to be a time of relaxation after having spent a few days moving those cattle to market. Any thought of quiet time vanished when he opened the door to his brother’s house.

Sheriff Jed Morgan thinks his life is about to get a lot quieter when he gets voted out of office in a bought-and-paid for election rigged by his family’s long-time nemesis Arnie Williams. But when the new railroad comes to town and Jed’s neighbors, the Crawfords at the Bar C ranch, have their water poisoned and Arnie Williams’ hands try to stampede their cattle, Jed begins to find that his lawman days were far from over.

Mattie Foster had made a terrible mistake. She had left Missouri and come to Green River, Wyoming to find her father; a father who was not the man that she even knew. Now, she was being held by two men against her will. The man who was determined to find her was a rancher. A rancher with a debt to repay.

Mack Smith had left his shop in Pueblo and was just an hour or so from reaching his brother’s ranch for his annual visit when he felt the bullet slam into his head, and when his eyes finally opened, he found himself flat on his back on the bottom of a ravine. What the hell had happened? He was only a gunsmith, not a gunfighter.

Rachel looked down at her husband’s dead body, the long knife protruding from his gut. She knew she’d be hanged or shot if she stayed in Missoula, so she’d have to run. But where could she go? The only place that came to mind was the hidden valley northwest of town. It was owned by a loner named Marsh Anderson, whom she had never met. She was going to have to bet her life that he wouldn’t turn her in to the sheriff, the brother of her dead husband.

He never looked back as he made his way through the gaslit streets without a penny in his pockets and no place to sleep. He should have been crushed by his desperation, but it was his anger and hate that drove him. He would use the one skill he had learned in those empty years that he now left behind him. He would enter the world of bareknuckle fighting and have to face older, stronger men to make his way in this hard world. He may be nothing, but he wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

Joe had been the last child chosen. An entire trainload of children heading west had already been chosen, including his sister and his two friends. They had been the final four children on the train and made a pact to meet 10 years later when they were all adults. The 10 years were over. Joe would finally be reunited with his sister and his friends, including his girlfriend when he was 11.

This was supposed to be a journey to find his dream of starting his own spread. As he left the Bar L just northwest of Cheyenne and rode south into Colorado, Conn already knew where he wanted to build his ranch and had enough money to buy the land and get it started. It was just a hundred mile ride through open country. What could possibly go wrong?

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. Just seconds later, the wagon plunged over the edge of the narrow trail, then began its deadly, tumbling roll into the abyss, spewing its contents as it fell to its destruction. Her precious children had been trapped inside, and Rebecca could only watch in horror. Her children had been her life, and now she had nothing.

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.

Doc Holt listened to the boys at the other end of the bunkhouse as they joked about the night’s excitement, and he felt sick. What they were doing bothered him. Why they were doing it bothered him. But most of all, why he wasn’t doing anything to stop it bothered him.

Captain Stan Murray was finally being mustered out of the army after all of the administrative snafus that had left him in Montana Territory long after the conclusion of the War Between the States. As he began his long journey, he wasn’t going home to Michigan. He had to cross hundreds of miles of hostile Indian Territory to reach Cheyenne City in Wyoming Territory to try and find the girl that he hadn’t seen in almost ten years. She was probably married and had three children by now, but he knew he had to at least know.

When the postal inspector in Carson City discovered a counterfeit one-dollar bill, he notified the Secret Service. That was why they’d been created just a decade earlier. Secret Service Agent Sean Brady was assigned to the case and prepared to make the day-long train ride from Ogden to start his investigation. Before he left, he was presented with a minor mystery by the Union Pacific freight manager that had nothing to do with counterfeiting.

The Witch's medicine was bad. She must be killed. But she ran before they could act. She ran across the Dakota prairie until she could run no more. She turned and faced the oncoming warriors. She had no hope, yet she would defy them until the end. Then, came the thunder.

Toby took the conductor’s hand as he stepped from the train in the dark night unsure of why his mother had sent him away. The conductor had his travel bag in his hand and Toby looked at the shadowy, unlit buildings as he was led down the street. After five minutes, the conductor guided him to a bench on the boardwalk of the sleeping town, then left his bag on the bench with him. “Now, son, I gotta leave you here. You stay there until the sheriff comes and he’ll find your aunt for you. Okay?”