C.J. Petit

Eleven-year-old Axel Nielsen and his ten-year-old girlfriend Elsa Johannsen were happily chatting as they walked away from Winfield, Kansas’ one-room school. But their cheery conversation quickly ended when they saw Elsa’s father striding towards them with a somber look on his face.

Ted Shepard had seen many deaths over his ten years as a bounty hunter and then as a United States Deputy Marshal, but none had come close to affecting him as much as this one. He didn't know if he could go on any longer and sunk into an almost suicidal depression.

Will thought the job to Robinson, New Mexico was going to be a simple determination of whether it was worthwhile for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad to build a spur to the town.

Lee Ryan knew horses. He had his herd and his ranch. He even had his eye on a redheaded lass that would make everything perfect. The only thing that stood in the way of having everything he ever wanted was, of all things, hay.

Tabby rode out of the Slant 6 after having spent more than four years working on the big spread. He wasn’t mad or even disappointed. It was just the way of life for a cowhand.

Zack's eighteenth birthday was tomorrow, but he wasn’t expecting a party. He needed to get away from the family cattle ranch as fast as he could. There was nothing for him at his home, and he'd prefer facing the unknown to staying.

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.

Gabe Owens had been assigned to investigate a case of timber poaching near Missoula in Montana Territory that could have been handled by a less experienced agent of the railroad, but the case had changed dramatically after the apparent murder of the station manager.

They came out of the sun and through the dust cloud created by the herd, firing their Winchesters and killing the men who were moving the cattle to Abilene. Each man fell just minutes after the attack began, and the stampeding cattle finished the job that the rustlers’ .44s had started.

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.

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....

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.

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.

Sergeant Ellis White had the Yankee colonel in the crosshairs of the Amadon telescopic sight on the J.F. Brown sniper rifle and knew his index finger just had to squeeze the trigger, but he paused.

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....

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?

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....

Lemhi County Sheriff Mitch Ward wasn’t pleased after capturing notorious gang leader Ace Carr. There were two reasons for his displeasure. He’d only been able to find the gang’s boss, so he knew that the other four members of his gang were probably still in his county.

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.