Guest Post by Jen Cudmore: "What are you hiding?"

What are you hiding?

There are just some things about our past that we prefer to keep hidden.

Mistakes we’ve made, horrors we’ve witnessed, or embarrassing situations we don’t want to remember. Just thinking about the past makes us shudder. Even though we’re different now, and hopefully better for it, those situations still haunt us from time to time.

And for some, the past looms larger and heavier.

But ultimately there is no guarantee the situation we want hidden will remain safe. And that’s exactly the issue with my newest story, The Lawmen of Clayton County: Willow Ridge.

Barrett Walcott is on the run from the law – and an outlaw who wants him dead.

He left his mother behind in California to escape the reputation of the thieving Walcott Brothers, yet trouble catches up with him in the Oregon Territory. Wounded and hiding, he befriends an Indian woman near Willow Ridge who offers him assistance. Yet he cannot let her know who he really is.

A twist of fate keeps him in Willow Ridge longer than he planned, and while he enjoys the people, the stolen money hidden in the livery’s loft keeps him from getting comfortable. He knows he’s endangering the town if lingers, and yet the people are begging him to stay.

Is redemption just a fantasy, or is it possible Barrett can be absolved of his sins and begin a new life?