In the Texas desert, a soldier fights Rangers, Indians, and the woman he lovesDoña Anabel Cordero gallops across the moonlit desert, a tribe of Comanche warriors at her heels. She is the daughter of the country’s greatest bandit, who was cut down by the Texas Rangers against whom Doña Anabel has ...
Her bow digging into the deep green of the Atlantic, she shuddered briefly, and began again to climb. On deck, half the crew settled in for its watch while the other half made its way below for a few hours’ sleep. Two days had passed since the disastrous eruption of The Sleeping Giant and the des...
“The sea always wins.” The chairs within the councilroom had been cleared from the main floor and removed to the side walls to afford space for those dignitaries and their ladies who chose to dance to the strains of the Military Consort; the repertoire included a number of pavannes and ballads th...
The air, so still and silent the slightest sound was magnified, bit to the bone with its invigorating breath. Vance had been gone six weeks, not two, and there was little to show for his absence save a face strained and haggard from long hours on the trail. Beneath his fleece-lined buckskin coat ...
The padre always concluded his midweek liturgy by dispensing the contents of the poor box as fairly and judiciously as he could. But tonight there would be no mass. The disappointed families turned away from the church and filed toward the front gate. Ben McQueen rode through the gate and past th...
Thunder rumbled and rain beat against the shuttered windows, but a fire crackled in the hearth and the broad-beamed kitchen table was set with a pot of butter beans, hot coffee, sweet cream butter, and now fresh corn bread. “What are you thinking, old one,” Thalia asked as she worked her ample re...
Daniel sure didn’t feel new. He felt about as used as year-old moccasins. He kept to the back alleys away from the Green and the village center, taking an indirect route that was a few minutes longer but bound to attract less attention. The village had spent itself in celebration and everyone was...
Rianne insisted as Colleen turned from her reverie at the window, her movements slow and weighted with self-pity. “Now mark me well, Colleen McClagan,” said Rianne. “I’ve coddled and cradled you long enough. It’s been a month since you’ve closed yourself up in my house, pouting about and feeling ...
It was the Fourth of July and the good people of Springtown, Pennsylvania, had chosen to have a celebration despite how badly the nation was faring in its war with the British. Kit had traveled to the Springtown Fair with his mother Kate, his sister Hannah Louise, and Hannah’s two daughters. Thir...
It was to this diminutive merchant that Morgan turned. Capitano Jorge Rossi had repeated the one phrase he could say in English, Russian, French, Chinese, Spanish, and even Arabic. Beyond his statement of arrest he could converse only in Portuguese and French. Rossi would have cut a dashing figur...
LAFFITE called down from the quarterdeck to Kit standing at the port side, rifle cradled in the crook of his left arm. “Obregon’s ship is the Windthrift,” the buccaneer added. The schooner they had just passed bore the name Carib. Laffite studied it a moment, then dismissed his suspicions. Kit no...
She worked the latch and crossed the threshold and was standing just inside the doorway when her assailant made his move. Molly tried to swerve and push herself out of harm’s way but could not avoid the gun butt. It struck the side of her head, her right temple received a glancing blow. Stars exp...
Obedience, in her nightcap and bedclothes, was the first to notice the stranger standing in the bedroom doorway. “Heaven protect us,” the woman exclaimed as she pulled the comforter up to her double chin. Her eyes grew wide and her breath fluttered as she struggled to regain her composure. Her hu...
They had ridden most of the night to get there by morning. He’d been pushing his men hard for several days now and they deserved a rest. He’d give them the day. Word had reached him that Jesse McQueen had gathered the abolitionists at Buffalo Creek and was preparing to take them north. McQueen wa...
WAITING … WAITING … For the better part of an hour Tom had paced the confines of the stable, his shadow gliding past the stalls and flitting over the carriage and surrey that were Allyn Benedict’s personal conveyances. Sandcrane, lost in his own introspection, paid no heed to wagon or horse as he...
At last, after contending with raging streams, mudslides, fallen trees, and their own fatigue, the two men reached the city. The hour was late, the night dark. Estimo Sanchez, Don Raphael’s brother, was not in when their carriage discharged them in front of a great white house that lay like a jew...
She was sick with worry, the tension like an acid eating at her reserve. A knock at the door caused her to explode into action. She hurled it open, expecting Michael, and found Father Hillary. “Oh,” Kate said, spirits sagging. “Hum, I have had more cheerful greetings,” the priest replied. “But th...
San Felipe was burning. Black smoke rose upward into the April sky. On the first of the month the market should have been crowded with townspeople and farmers in for supplies or the plain socializing aspect of a trip into town. Mamacitas would be keeping a watch over their ripe and willing daught...
Eye-to-eye he considered the pitbucks separately, carefully, looking for signs of indecision or fear. When he came to Cat he lingered a moment longer until the thin, hot-blooded youth shrank back before the fierce stare. The killing of Butkis and the others left Cat totally unprepared. He had fea...