C.J. Petit

Axel, Ella and her parents boarded their Denver-bound train. And as it was the first time that they’d experienced the incredible speed of riding the rails, his fiancée and his future in-laws were anxiously waiting for the engineer to open the locomotive’s throttle.

Wade stood in the dark street and watched his home being eaten by the raging flames. It was as if it was a horrible nightmare because it couldn’t really be happening. He knew his parents had been trapped in their room where the fire had started, but there was nothing he could have done to help.

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.

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.

After finally crossing the South Platte River, the wagon train headed north toward Lodge Pole Cree where they expected to find another set of ruts leading west to Oregon....

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.

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....

Before the wagons left the Laramie Plains, a quiet epidemic began infecting some of the settlers. It was a disease without a cure and threatened to create havoc among the families....

Joe and Faith were miles ahead of the long line of wagons as they ascended Cheyenne Pass. They knew that when they passed over the summit, the Laramie Plains would spread out before them....

Rhody Jones, the first mate of the schooner, Vivienne, walked from the docks into the streets of New Orleans. He’d been dismissed by the captain after the ship had barely survived the incredible battering from a powerful hurricane.

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.

The days of unrelenting rain had kept the wagon train from moving for almost a week, and the folks were getting frustrated and angry....

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 would use the one skill he had learned in those empty years that he now left behind 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.

Bounty hunters were generally viewed as little better than the men they hunted. Ted Shepard usually didn't pay any mind to what others thought. He was good at what he did. But now, he was trailing a body to his hometown of Wilmore. He might change his mind.

Laramie had just been hit by the Clayton gang, leaving Sheriff Joe Tate without any deputies to serve the entire county.

Joe and Faith were comfortable living in Idaho City. They had a nice home, and hoped to raise Sam and Katie in the town even after the gold was gone. But those expectations were dashed when a sequence of unrelated events forced them to leave Idaho Territory.

Sixteen-year-old Henry was ejected from the enormous St. Martin ranch and told never to return, or he would be shot on sight. He vowed to return and seek revenge against the entire family....

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....

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.