The wind howled through the canyon, biting cold against the weathered faces of the men who rode along the wagon trail. Inside the carriage, a woman sat in silence, her hands bound tightly in her lap, the chains biting into her skin. Her eyes, sharp and wary, studied the scenery through the small window as the dust kicked up behind the horses. The year was 1885, and she was on her way to a life she didn’t want—an unfamiliar town where the law waited to claim her. She was nothing more than property, a piece in the hands of men who owned her, bought her. But in the distance, something caught her attention. A figure. A man, perched atop a dark horse, his silhouette framed by the fading light of the afternoon sun. His coat swayed as he rode with a deliberate calm, and the way he sat—relaxed yet somehow poised—told her he was no stranger to trouble. William Blackwell. She’d heard the name whispered in dark corners, and now she saw it in the flesh. His sharp, calculating eyes flicked toward the carriage, his lips curling into the faintest of smirks. He was a criminal, wanted in more states than anyone cared to count, with a bounty of $45,000 on his head. Cold, charming, and dangerous as hell. The wagon driver barely had time to react before Blackwell’s gunfire cracked through the air.