In this Lucas Fume Western from the Spur Award-winning author of Vengeance at Sundown, no man is truly free until he puts his past—and his enemies—to rest. Lucas Fume has been exonerated of the murder charge that put him in prison seven years ago. But he isn’t free yet. Not while his friend, former slave Zeke Henry, remains a fugitive wrongly accused of assaulting Senator Barlow’s daughter, Celia. Lucas wouldn’t have his freedom or wealth—let alone his life—if it weren’t for Zeke. And he knows that the only way to clear his friend’s name is to prove the identity of Celia’s true attacker: Senator Barlow himself. Now Lucas has a plan to take on the powerful Senator—and his son John, aka Lanford Grips—once and for all. The only question is whether it will lead to freedom or the end of a noose.

Amanda Bartlett runs away from her abusive husband, and finds herself in the gold-mining town of Old Dry Diggings. It is 1851, the height of the gold rush in the Sierra Nevada. She faces the unfamiliar challenges of making her way in a male-dominated society, establishing herself as a school teacher, meeting exotic strangers, and finding possible romance. This delicate balancing act is threatened when her husband comes to town. She must elude discovery.

In a deserted western town, two drifters fight to stay alive The place is called Hangtown, and it’s as dead as a man with a noose cinched ‘round his neck. Josh Banks and Wage Carson rode here in search of work, but they found the settlement dried up and blown away—the silver mine empty and the population gone with it. Josh wants to take what supplies they can and move on out into the desert, but Wage has a grander idea. The town has been abandoned, and that makes it theirs to own. He elects Josh mayor, appoints himself sheriff, and the town is alive again. Welcome to Hangtown—population: 2. When a troop of painted ladies rides into their empty town, Wage’s plan starts to look pretty clever. But soldiers and gunmen follow close behind, and this two-man hamlet becomes the flashpoint for bloody conflict. Hangtown will be dead again soon, and if Wage and Josh don’t move quickly, it will take them with it.