The Judas Horse

Jim Bannister is a wanted man; hunted across the West for a murder he did not commit, with a twelve-thousand-dollar reward on his head. His greatest danger is the distinctive Tepee-branded bay he rides: a Judas horse that can betray his identity to every bounty hunter with a spyglass and a gun. 

When a rifle bullet wounds the animal high in the Colorado mountains, Bannister seeks help at an isolated homestead. There he finds Nan Wickman alone with her baby, anxiously awaiting a husband who should have returned hours ago. But Nan recognises Bannister—and captures him with his own revolver. Before she can decide what to do with her dangerous prisoner, three Block R riders arrive carrying Johnny Wickman's battered body. Their brutal foreman, Tom Musgrave, claims Johnny is a cattle thief. Bannister soon discovers that Musgrave's accusations are part of a far more sinister scheme involving stolen cattle, a divided family and a ruthless gang of freebooters led by the deadly Amos Cotton. 

Bannister has every reason to ride on. The law wants him hanged, bounty hunters are closing in, and his treacherous horse has already marked him for death. But abandoning Nan and Johnny would leave them defenseless against men determined to destroy them. To save the Wickmans, Bannister must face impossible odds—knowing that every gunfight, every stranger and every mile of open country could be his last. 

A gripping tale of betrayal, vengeance and violent frontier justice, The Judas Horse is a hard-riding Jim Bannister Western packed with ambushes, outlaw treachery and blazing six-gun action.