A Crow to Pluck

by Bob Giel

EX-mustanger Cope Worley met his wife E.J. late in life. They fell in love and he gave up chasing wild horses and settled down as a lawman in a quiet little town in New Mexico. It’s a good life, until one fateful evening when Cope chases a scared kid into a barn and takes a bullet. After he recovers, E.J. lays down a little law of her own—it’s her or the badge. Unwilling to face the prospect of a life without her, he agrees. Seeking greener pastures, they move to a small town in Texas and start over. He goes back to chasing horses instead of outlaws, and she sets up a stable to train and sell them. Their prospects never looked so bright. Until they cross paths with Lorenzo Cholla, that is.

Cholla is an outlaw on a mission to rob the local bank. Recruiting his gang from the dregs of the town itself, his masterfully-planned holdup goes off without a hitch… until he fires on a teller and accidentally cuts down E.J., instead. The crew escapes with the money, but in their ignorance, they’ve sown the seeds of their own destruction.

A devastated Cope rides out in pursuit, bent on killing the men who murdered his wife. One by one he runs them down, but no matter how much blood he sheds, the pain of his loss only seems to worsen. “It is mine to avenge; I will repay," sayeth the Lord. Is this the reason why? Is vengeance worth the cost if he becomes no better than the men he hunts?

In the end, to stop Cholla, Cope is forced to face his own misdeeds head-on and make a gut-wrenching decision that may well define him forever.

Published:
Publisher: Galway
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About the Author

Bob Giel was born in New York City and now lives in New Jersey. Throughout his life, he has spent time in the East and Midwest, but has never resided in any area that could be termed the West, a bit strange for someone who writes Westerns. However, having loved the Western Genre since he was a kid, he has absorbed so much of the period through books, movies and TV that he feels as if he has been there. The colors, sounds and images stay vividly enough in his mind that he can believe he has experienced them.

The grit and the determination of the people who carved a way of life out of the frontier have helped shape the way Bob lives his life. Because of that era, he keeps his word, he finishes what he starts and he is a true friend. While he was always interested in writing, life got in the way, that is, until he retired. With the decks cleared, he began writing and never looked back.