Showing results by author "J.A. Johnstone" in All Categories

Smoke Jensen has met some down-and-dirty, murdering prairie scum over the years. But this time it's personal and it's bloody - and going to get bloodier. First, they stole 50 of the hundred horses Smoke delivered to his old friend Big Jim Conyers in Tarrant County, Texas. Then they stole 2,000 cattle from Big Jim...and killed him just for the fun of it. Now they're going to pay....

It starts as a happy reunion between Preacher and his fellow trappers in a peaceful Indian village. But it ends swiftly in death and destruction when a rival tribe attacks the village, slaughters some of Preacher’s Crow and mountain man friends, and carries off the women and children as prisoners.

In Texas's Big Bend country, every man has a price. For crime lord Harry Holland and his ruthless gang of cutthroats, that price is $20,000 - a ransom demand for the kidnapped daughter of a retired Army colonel. So far, neither the Army, the Rangers, nor bounty hunters have been able to penetrate Holland's guarded fortress.

For Smoke and his daughter, Denny, life on the Sugarloaf Ranch is more valuable than all the gold in the world. Which works out fine, since all the gold mines in Big Rock were squeezed dry years ago. Even so, that won't stop a pair of smooth-talking businessmen from trying to squeeze out a little more. One of them has developed a newfangled method for extracting gold-something called "hydraulics" - and he's bought up all the old mines to do it.

Conrad Browning is The Loner, a man on a mission, crossing the country — and crossing a lot of bad men — to rescue his kidnapped young twins. The trail has led him all the way to San Francisco’s perilous red light-district, where a crime lord is the proud father of newly adopted twins. The Loner knows his children when he sees them. But they’re hostage to a brutal, violent mob feud. Then, just when he needs it most, The Loner is no longer alone: He is joined by his own father, Frank Morgan — the most notorious gunman in the West.

Smoke Jensen looks forward to spending a quiet holiday with the family. But an unexpected arrival from south of the border has him reaching for his guns, defending his land - and risking everything he loves. Sally Jensen strikes up a friendship with a lovely Mexican woman - who turns out to be married to the mysterious stranger plotting to steal her ranch. Ace and Chance prepare to fight a gang of outlaws trying to kill the man who raised them - but they're going to need the help of the father they never knew.

Comanchero Cullen Brice has escaped from a Huntsville, Alabama, prison, where he was sentenced to hang. And he has sworn revenge against the man who killed his brother and put him behind bars, Texas Ranger Matt McCulloch. Freed from the hangman by his gang, Brice has kidnapped the lawman's daughter Cynthia along with other women and make tracks to the Texas Panhandle. Holing up in The Canyon of Weeping Women, the outlaws plan to sell their captives to Comanche raiders.

Captain Peter Joseph Kellerman was once a promising career soldier who’d proven his mettle in battle time and again. Now he’s fighting a battle with a whiskey bottle. He’s also in charge of Fort Benjamin Grierson, located west of hell, deep in Arizona Territory’s Mohawk Valley on the arid edge of the Yuma Desert. The men under his command aren’t fit to wear the uniform. Killers, thieves, and ravagers condemned to death but who’ve chosen to serve, holding down the hated Fort Misery.

The Buchanans are no strangers to hard times—or making hard choices. After losing a hefty number of livestock to a killer grizzly, Hunter Buchanan is forced to sell a dozen broncs down in Denver for some badly needed cash. Everything goes smoothly—until he's ambushed on the way home. The culprits are a murderous bunch of prairie rat outlaws, as dangerous as any Buchanan has ever tangled with. But Hunter is hell-bent on getting his money back. Even if means pursuing the thieves into Dakota Territory—where even deadlier dangers await.

Wagon trains carrying immigrants along the Oregon Trail are falling prey to outlaws. Most families surrender their valuables and goods peacefully, but anybody brave enough to resist gets a bullet. The gang's latest victim was a wagon master who sought to protect his charges only to die in the dust. With the blood of good men being spilled and families being terrorized, Preacher and Jamie MacCallister volunteer to escort the next wagon train. Their odyssey across the unforgiving territory takes them through violent storms and into the sights of hostile Indians.

A wagon train of pioneers is struggling Westward toward Oregon through the howling winter and a band of Arikara warriors are hot on their trail. Little do the Arikaras suspect that they're about to come face-to-face and gun-to-gun with a ferocious fight they never expected, courtesy of the wily mountain man called Preacher. As Preacher struggles to bring the settlers to safety, he learns the real reason they were attacked and begins to suspect that the secrets they've been keeping equal a worse kind of danger.

Jamie MacCallister remembers the —especially one brave frontiersman who died fighting there. Now the fallen veteran's granddaughter needs Jamie'sAlamo help. She's found a letter written by her grandfather with a map to the spot where Alamo legend Jim Bowie supposedly hid a fortune in silver and gold. Jamie never believed the story. Countless treasure hunters had scoured the area and come up empty handed. But his friend's granddaughter is convinced it's hidden where no one has ever dared to search-deep in the heart of Comanche country.

William W. Johnstone and J. A. Johnstone present Book 2 in the Man From Waco series.

Matt Cavanaugh was 9 years old when a band of outlaws slaughtered his family. Now Matt is 18, honed by hardship, schooled in the mountain ways and carrying the last name of the man who raised him: Smoke Jensen. With Smoke's wisdom, Matt's own courage and just enough money to start a life, Matt Jensen begins a relentless hunt for the outlaws who murdered his family in cold blood.

Flint Moran was fourteen years old when the Civil War ended. He was fifteen when his family bought a plot of land near Tinhorn, Texas. He was barely nineteen when he caught a pair of rustlers stealing cattle—and singlehandedly brought them to justice. How did a teenaged boy track down and capture two hardcase thieves without any help? That's what Tinhorn sheriff Buck Jackson wants to know. He can't help but be impressed by Flint's sharp eye and natural talent with a Henry rifle. So he offers to deputize the boy—tin badge, Colt Frontier Six-Shooter, and all—and Flint happily accepts.

Trapped in a remote cabin, surrounded by ruthless gunmen, Matt Jensen and his adoptive father Smoke Jensen join forces with their old friend, Preacher, in the greatest fight of their lives. A ruthless cattle baron has waged an all-out war against the peaceful native tribesmen who have become Preacher's friends. In a bloodthirsty bid for land, power, and wealth, the baron's drafted an army of professional killers to destroy the homesteaders - among them the Jensens are the only men brave enough to stand in his way.

Duff MacCallister fled the Scottish Highlands for a new world in Wyoming Territory. Betrothed to a good woman, Duff has the bad luck to be standing in the Chugwater Bank when a violent robbery explodes around him. With one man dead by Duff's gun, and another under arrest, a team of bandits swarms outside of town. As witnesses, Duff, a banker, and a beautiful barmaid are whisked into the town's hotel for safe-keeping as the outlaws threaten the defenseless town with a bloodbath if their fellow bandit isn't set free. Except no MacCallister has ever run from trouble.

It's the kind of job Luke Jensen hates. A millionaire mine owner is willing to pay $5,000 to the man who captures the half-breed outlaw Tom Eagle. Normally, Luke would turn down an offer like this-it smacks too much of being a hired gun. But when the millionaire tells him that Eagle is responsible for killing his son, Luke agrees to take on the job. Which means he'll have to take the road to hell itself - a.k.a. Hard Rock, Montana. Hard Rock is supposed to be a ghost town. But when Luke arrives, the ghosts are alive and well - and gunning for his hide.

Two drifters, flush with cash and looking to buy cattle, arrive in town—one nursing a bullet wound he claims he received accidentally when his friend was cleaning his gun. Jackson and Moran are suspicious but have no reason to challenge their story—until four more drifters show up looking for the first two. Moran may not be lightning quick when it comes to numbers, but reports say the Wells Fargo office was held up by six men. But Moran is going to need more bullets.

The Indians around Fort Laramie, Wyoming, are peaceful. Or so it has seemed - until killers ambush a detail of US soldiers and an officer's wife. One man, an ambitious cavalry officer, flees the carnage and lives to tell the story - his own story, an outright lie. When Duff MacCallister and a few brave men go after the attackers, they discover the officer's wife is very much alive and at the cold merciless hands of the sadistic warrior Yellow Hawk. To free the woman, Duff touches off a fierce battle.