First published in 1982.

Penniless, nineteen-year-old Tucker Houston was fiercely independent, determined to find a better life for herself and her blind fellow orphan in the rich new lands of the West. She brazenly told a few fibs to land a job as a schoolteacher and soon found herself in a wagon train of mail-order brides bound for California. Leading them all was wagon master Lucas Steele, black-haired, hard-muscled, and drawn to Tucker's fire. Soon, in spite of herself, proud Tucker surrendered to the wild abandon, the raging hungers she found in Lucas's powerful arms. But then another man joined the wagon traina ruthless, savage man who would stop at nothing to satisfy his lust for Tucker. And she discovered what price she would have to pay to keep her tender love with Lucas alive.