Like Hawke, Clint Jessup is running from his past. But Jessup's sins turned him hard and greedy—and he's willing to drain bone dry a town that's trying to build a future, if it puts an extra dollar in his pocket. The blood of a drifter named Mason Hawke is going to oil his money-making scheme. But it doesn't matter how many killers he sends Hawke's way, because the target plays by his own rules: draw first, shoot fast, and keep watching your back.
Robert Vaughan is a retired army officer and full-time novelist. His book Survival (under the pseudonym K.C. McKenna) won the Spur Award for best western novel (1994). He lives with his wife, Ruth, in Gulf Shores, Alabama.