Outlaws of the West #18

A gunslinger known as Black Colby abandons his violent reputation and rides out to find a place where he can live as an ordinary man, eventually settling on a ranch and earning the genuine friendship and respect of his small-town community—until ruthless outlaws threaten everything he's built. When the moment comes to choose between his new life and protecting the people who've welcomed him, Colby must decide whether picking up a gun one more time will destroy the man he's become.

Simpson finds himself cornered by Kleig and his gang of rustlers in a rocky hideout—trapped and outnumbered, with escape looking bleak. But when the swindlers grow impatient waiting for their shot, Simpson turns the tables with a clever bit of misdirection that leaves the whole crew caught off-guard. It's a tight, satisfying tale of one man outthinking the odds in the Old West.

Will Beider rides into Dogtown as a quiet stranger with a federal warrant, but his real mission runs deeper than just arresting the tyrannical Moose Keppler—the town needs its own lawman to stand against him. When Keppler's reign of intimidation threatens to crush the townspeople's spirit, Beider works to rally them behind a local candidate, setting the stage for a showdown that will determine whether Dogtown can reclaim itself. It's a tale of how one marshal's cunning matters less than building the courage in a community to fight back.

A nester with a deed to his land faces down a hired gunslinger sent to drive him off by a powerful boss, and though outmatched, he refuses to back down. After a brutal confrontation leaves him beaten, Nixon rallies his neighbors to stand together against future intimidation. Sometimes the real fight begins only after you've lost the first round.

A young trail hand named Kip Sanders gets his first taste of the big city when Frank Sutton's herd reaches the railhead in Prescott, Kansas, only to run afoul of the town's corrupt marshal and his hired thugs who prey on Texas drovers. What begins as wide-eyed excitement about seeing civilization turns into a clash between frontier justice and the brutal, rigged law of a cattle town. By story's end, Kip learns a hard lesson about the difference between dreams and reality.

Bud Waller keeps one step ahead of Ferrara, a determined marshal hunting him for theft, but when they finally collide in the mission village of Dos Robles, Waller's charm and easy smile work against him—the locals who've taken his side begin to see through his deceptions. In a tense cantina showdown, Waller discovers that his gift for talking his way out of trouble won't save him when the truth comes to light.