Pawnee Creek

A railroad conspiracy. A murdered landowner. A widow who refuses to be driven off her land. And a U.S. Marshal who knows exactly what happens when powerful men decide the law is optional.

When former U.S. Marshal Eldridge Sample boards a southbound train, he's looking for nothing more complicated than Texas.

Then two armed men threaten a widow and her children.

Eldridge steps in.

By the time the train reaches its destination, he's broken a nose, disarmed a knife fighter, and agreed to escort Wren Calloway and her two children to a piece of land she's never seen—a remote creek-bottom property near the small Texas settlement of Pawnee Creek.

He expects trouble.

He doesn't expect murder.

Wren's husband, Cole Calloway, died just weeks after purchasing the property. The official cause was a heart attack. But when Eldridge discovers a hidden strongbox beneath the floor of the cabin, he finds evidence pointing to something far more dangerous.

Cole had been involved in the expansion of the Texas and Pacific Railroad—and the acquisition of valuable land along its proposed route.

Landowners are being pressured to sell.

Some are being ruined by manufactured debts and fraudulent claims.

Others are dead.

Now someone wants the evidence Cole left behind.

And they'll kill again to get it.

With a ruthless railroad operative pulling strings, hired guns closing in, and corrupt land deals reaching into the highest levels of power, Eldridge must uncover the truth before Wren and her children become the next casualties.

But Pawnee Creek isn't just another case.

It's a place where everyone seems to know something they aren't saying.

A place where a quiet marshal watches everything.

A place where a widow has decided she isn't leaving.

And a place where Eldridge Sample may finally have to decide whether he's simply passing through—or whether he's found something worth staying to protect.

PAWNEE CREEK is a gritty Western thriller packed with action, gunfights, murder, railroad corruption, land fraud, frontier justice, family danger, and a relentless gunslinger-style hero who knows exactly when talking is over.

If you enjoy action-packed Westerns, historical Western thrillers, frontier mysteries, railroad conspiracies, lawman stories, vigilante justice, and gritty Old West adventures, you'll want to ride with Eldridge Sample into PAWNEE CREEK.