Virginia Hull Welch

Crazy Woman Creek Virginia Hull Welch

James Rose rode into the unforgiving darkness of the Wyoming prairie one stormy night and did not return. When the rancher's horse is found tied to a tree on the banks of the icy North-East Creek three days later, his wife Lenora insists that her beloved can?t possibly be dead. He is too capable a horseman to slip and fall into a rushing creek. But everyone in the little town of Buffalo presumes he drowned. Not quite everyone. To Deputy Luke Davies, the beautiful widow?s account of the events of that night provokes more questions than answers. Why is she so sure her husband did not perish in the wilderness? Why is she vague about the events that happened just before he rode off? What is she hiding? And who has been sneaking onto her property at night to harass her, and why? Months pass; Rose's body doesn't surface. Lenora learns that the government will presume abandonment and confiscate her homestead if she cannot provide a certificate of death. But that?s only a part of her trial by fire. Once Lenora becomes the main suspect in the investigation, the town gossip mill turns from the missing rancher to the very attentive, very eligible young deputy and the lonely rancher?s wife. As wild stories of murder and madness circulate around Buffalo, Luke and Lenora realize their growing attraction for one another. But without a body, Luke is frustrated by desire and Lenora is tortured by doubt: Is she truly a widow, or is her angry husband trying to teach her a lesson as some believe? Crazy Woman Creek is an inspirational western romance set in Wyoming Territory, 1880.