"Bill Mayfield had talked his younger brother, Rob, into selling the family farm after their mother died, with a promise they would leave Texas. He said they were going to New Orleans and enjoy the good life. He failed to mention that their trip involved a detour to a place called Cool Water, where he planned to collect a large sum of money he felt he had been cheated out of...even if he had to take it at gun-point. It was a journey they might not...

Cattle Rustlers, Native American migration, a stage hold-up, a deadly blizzard, guns, horses, cowboys, ranching... what more could you ask for? Oh yeah, there's also romance. Scratching a living out of the unforgiving landscape of the Dakota Badlands was tough enough. But now she had lost a daughter and a husband, and was trying to run a cattle ranch with her four semi-grown sons. When Phillip Denning showed up looking for work, she didn't know...