Showing results by author "Stephen Bly" in All Categories

A life of peace and seclusion as the unknown Miss Denison. It's what Grace longed for even before her father banished her from Washington, DC. She just may have found it in Lordsburg, New Mexico - the small railroad town where people hide until the world stops looking. A place to send black sheep, skeletons in the closet, rebellious sons...and wayward daughters whose secrets could ruin a father's precious political career.

All Tap and Pepper Andrews want to do is settle down, buy a small ranch, get a few head of cattle, and start raising a family. But nothing is ever that easy for the ex-convict and his former dance-hall girl trying to break from the past. It seems no matter where they go or what they do, the past is already there ahead of them.

A simple trip into the prairie provides adventure and trouble. Soon Retta Barre is the talk of the wagon train. Her friends don't want to miss her next caper. And Retta certainly won't let them down.

Stuart Brannon's 40th birthday party turns into a real surprise with the arrival of an unexpected guest, a 12-year-old son he never knew he had! The boy also brings sad news that his mother, whom Brannon had befriended at Broken Arrow Crossing, is now dying in a Navajo camp. Brannon determines to bring her back to his ranch, but chooses to wait and see her with the boy before telling Littlefoot the truth of his outlaw parentage.

It's 1870. A fugitive from Yankee justice, Confederate veteran Sandy Thompson looks for peace and solitude in the expanses of the untamed West. His quest is complicated by his reluctant, low-down business partner and an orphaned Indian girl entrusted to his care. Somehow, together, the three drifters must find a home in a land where thieves, Yankees, vengeful Indians, and forces of nature constantly threaten their survival.

Creede of Old Montana follows the exploits and heartbreaks of Avery John Creede, an ex-cavalry soldier, as he tramps along the upper Missouri River in search of four army pals who didn't show up for a scheduled reunion. Throughout Creede's confrontations and adventures, three things remain constant: his courage, his rock-solid faith, and his wounded heart. He knows the first two will never change. And at 42, he's not sure the third ever will either.

Nathan Riggins heads out west to the Nevada desert to search for his parents after his grandmother died. He faces one danger after another: hostile Indians, a masked gunman, a blinding sandstorm, a rattlesnake. Now, he frantically hurried from one empty building to the next. Where was everyone? How could everybody in town just disappear? Then, a strange dog seems to adopt him and come to his rescue.

Nathan couldn't believe it. He, his dad, and his friend Colin were going on a cattle drive. But as they set out, the trip took unexpected turns. Nathan's dad had to leave them to hunt down an escaped crook. Then, Colin's friend Leah finagled her way along. When Pepper the cook hurt his foot and had to return to camp, the three kids were on their own. How would they round up cattle when they had never done it before? And how should they deal with the coyote family living beneath their cabin?

For only a dollar, Thunder is a terrific bargain! But, what does a boy do with a dangerous 2,500-pound buffalo that can break out of any corral ever built? Nathan Riggins has to find some way to keep Thunder from killing someone or being killed. He finally decides to donate his buffalo to the Carson City Zoo. But getting him there will be a problem. Thunder has already destroyed one rail car and damaged the train's engine. The railroad refuses to ship him again. The answer comes in a surprising way.

Pepper Paige is tired of her life as a dance-hall girl, and tired of fearing Jordan Beckett, a violent patron who has turned his attentions on her. When a stagecoach wrecks and an injured woman dies in her room, Pepper assumes her identity and leaves town.

Tap Andrews is tired of fighting every gun-toting bounty hunter crossing his path. He's innocent, and he sets out to Denver to prove it. Pepper Paige would go with him, but she just can't return to Denver and face her past. That is, until Carter Dillard reappears in her life. Pepper must strike a deal that once again forces her to face a past she'd much rather forget.

Tap Andrews has left his past behind. He's no longer a Wyoming lawman backing down any mobs, nor a Brand Inspector dodging rustler's bullets. He has loaded up the wagon and is moving the very pregnant Pepper and their 11-year-old ward to a seemingly perfect new family life in Montana.

Married life for Tap and Pepper isn't turning out quite the way they planned. The ranch is gone and they've moved to Cheyenne where Tap finds himself a job as acting marshal in a town that has little regard for the law. And it's not a pretty sight!

Retta Barre has never met a hero, except for the ones she reads about in her books. She does know they're strong and courageous. And handsome and pretty. Everything she's not. Her world doesn't expect much from her anyway. She's just a plain-looking 12-year-old who's more stubborn than brave. She owes what little strength she has to her dull daily chores on the Oregon trail. And yet, when her friends are missing, Retta doesn't think twice. She heads out to help them. She has no idea the danger that's about to come her way.

Onepenny is exactly the kind of horse Nathan has dreamed of owning - smart, loyal and easy to handle. What's more, this unusual horse with the spotted rump can do tricks. So, Nathan works out a trade with Onepenny's owner, Temple Cholach, and to his delight, the spotted horse becomes his. Before he can even show his parents his new horse, Nathan encounters a posse looking for a stagecoach robber who had ridden a spotted horse. It seems that Temple Cholach isn't the drifter he claimed to be.

It's 1954. In this Western cowboy novel, six Old West cowboys and a 10-year-old boy meet for a weekly cribbage game. While the old men spin tales of days gone by on the trail, a real-life adventure stirs around them. The boy with the red-straw cowboy hat, cap gun, and leather bullet belt with silver-painted wooden bullets remembers it well. Maybe he wasn't born 100 years too late.

The second son of Brazos Fortune, Samuel, is somewhat the lost sheep of the Fortune family. After he is run out of Texas, he ends up hiding out with his father and brother. Although he struggles to escape the consequences of his previous lifestyle, he refuses to talk about the past. Brazos has to deal with sending Samuel back to Texas to make amends or allowing him to have a new start in Dakota.

When locals threaten the lives and property of his family. Brazos abandons his Texas homestead for a new ranch in the West he has seen in a dream. It's a war against corrupt lawmen, wild outlaws, and bitter winter weather as Brazos wrestles with his newfound hunger for gold and the burning desire to be reunited with his family. He must test himself against the untamed frontier, confront the greedy miners who try his Christian convictions, and find the new home God showed him Beneath a Dakota Cross.

Stuart Brannon heads home to his Arizona Ranch, but he finds it occupied by interlopers from the Casa Verde Land Corporation claiming to hold a Spanish land grant on the property. Enraged, Brannon drives them off. Stuart is soon joined by several friends and neighbors in defending his home, including a contingent of soldiers tracking down a band of Apaches, and Miss Harriet Reed who makes her attraction to the ex-lawman obvious. They are soon under siege by Casa Verde's 50 hired gunmen and a cannon sent to take back the property.

In 1905, at 58 years old, legendary lawman Stuart Brannon - now a rancher and widower - had no intention of leaving his beloved Arizona Territory to attend the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition in Portland, Oregon, nor to participate in the celebrity golf tournament for the Willamette Orphan Farm. Even an emotional appeal from a longtime friend didn't persuade him. His life no longer consisted of bloodthirsty men to track down...people trying to kill him...lawless gangs preying on the innocent.