The sun was dropping low over the Chihuahuan Desert, turning the vast expanse of Texas scrub and rock into a canvas of bruised purple and burning gold. Nora adjusted her grip on the leather reins, feeling the steady, rhythmic shift of her buckskin horse, Dusty. Behind her, Martha rode a stout bay that had seen more miles than most men in the territory.
They weren't outlaws, and they weren't typical cowhands. They were drifters by choice, bound to no man and no master but the changing of the seasons. Nora had left a suffocating life in an Ohio parlor ten years ago. Martha had simply walked away from a burnt-out homestead in Kansas after the fever took her family. The trail had brought them together, two solitary souls finding a shared language in the creak of saddle leather and the vast, silent stretches of the American West. Saddle Tramp Women
"There's an abandoned line shack another two miles up by the dry creek," Nora said, squinting against the glare. "We'll make camp there. Plenty of grama grass for the horses." The sun was dropping low over the Chihuahuan