Thief of Hearts - A Capital Affair

Spring 1870, Colorado TerritoryWilhelmina “Billie” Justice is not your typical young lady. She manages the Pleasantville Hotel, but it doesn’t turn much of a profit. To make extra money, she disguises herself as a young man and leads a double life as a skilled mountain guide.Born and raised in the nearby Rocky Mountains, Billie knows those mountains better than anyone – man or woman. Whenever someone unfamiliar with those mountains needs a guide, Billie Justice is the one who leads them there and ensures their safe return.Gaylord Pettigrew and his mother are searching for Mrs. Pettigrew’s long-lost older son, rumored to be living somewhere in those rugged mountains. The Pettigrews hire Billie, unaware that the young man is really the hotel manager, Wilhelmina Justice.Billie is not the only one with a secret. Ethan Dillon and Lillia St. Clair . . . known to Billie as the Pettigrews . . . are government operatives on a secret mission. They have been sent to the Colorado Territory to apprehend a former Confederate officer who is plotting to bring down the government.Billie is shot, and Ethan suspects the shooter is that renegade Confederate officer. Ethan discovers Billie’s true identity and insists she must come with them as they pursue the shooter because she’s the only one who can identify him.And if she’s to travel with the Pettigrews, what better way to hide in plain sight than to become Gaylord Pettigrew’s pretend bride?Thus begins a journey that takes Billie Justice from her beloved Colorado mountains, across the Great Plains, and on to the nation’s capital.Can she and Ethan work together to put an end to the plot against the nation? Or will Ethan Dillon steal her heart along the way?