Renegade-Elaine Barbieri

Renegade
Elaine Barbieri
Leisure, Jul 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780843963656

In 1866 Samantha Rigg obsesses over her vendetta to avenge the murder of her father, a Pinkerton agent. She pleads with Alan Pinkerton to hire her, but he says no out of fear for her life as her attitude is dangerous and besides she lacks experience; he begs her to grieve but move on.

Refusing to end her avenger’s quest, Samantha travels to Texas to go after a deadly bank robber. She believes rancher Matt Stait is posing as a rancher to conceal he is a killer. Samantha obtains work as a saloon girl so she can go undercover seeking proof of her assertion. However, she never anticipated falling in love with the man she suspects is the cold blooded murderer of her dad; nor he would likewise expect to be attracted to her.

Renegade is an entertaining western romantic mystery due to the dangerous tango between the feisty intrepid woman obsessed with justice for her late dad and the “outlaw-rancher” she believes in spite of her seditious heart in her gut is his killer. That relationship irony makes for an enjoyable Americana romance as each distrusts love as much as they do the target of their deep affection.

Harriet Klausner