The Executioner’s Hood

Sheriff Jeff McQuede finds Durmont's highly respected judge, Phil Grayson, bludgeoned to death in his study, a black executioner's hood shoved over his head. Behind him on walls and in display cases is his Old West outlaw collection that includes a death mask, a hangman's noose, and a Peacemaker. The judge has many enemies, one, Darin Keefe, just released from prison after serving seven years for a crime involving a city scandal. Judge Grayson's best friend, John Harwood, was believed to have taken a bribe from Keefe Construction and to have committed suicide rather than face conviction. Has the killer singled out some rare item in this macabre collection to steal and left the rest behind, or is this a modern-day example of vigilante justice?

Loretta Jackson and Vickie Britton, sisters and co-authors, are drawn to out-of-the-way places, old mining towns, and vast rangelands where the legends and history of the past live on. Inspired by the rugged mountains of Wyoming and Colorado, they find the lonely, high country region a perfect setting for their novels. They are authors of the High Country Mystery Series: Murder in Black and White, Whispers of the Stones, and Stealer of Horses, also of an anthology A Deal on a Handshake that also features Wyoming sheriff, Jeff McQuede. They are authors of over forty novels, including the eight-book Ardis Cole Mystery Series, The Vanished Lady, and the Luck of the Draw Western Series: The Devil’s Game, The Fifth Ace, and The Wild Card, as well as the single Western title, Death comes in Pairs. Both writers live in Kansas; Loretta in Junction City, Vickie in Hutchinson.