Maddie Jennings possessed a unique skill exploited by her father. As a scam artist, he used his daughter’s talent for reading people. Her job—profile the mark for honesty. When her father’s fortunes improve, he enrolls her in Miss Emma Willard’s School for Young Ladies where she begins a progressive education in both academics and society. For two years, Maddie thrives under the tutelage of those who encourage her to challenge the culture’s views of acceptable work for women. This happy life ends when her father unexpectedly withdraws her, taking her with him on a desperate flight from deadly repercussions for a scam gone wrong.

Maddie soon realizes she and her father are being pursued by both the Pinkerton Agency and the vindictive Sicilian family, but she knows little more of her father’s most recent crime. When a heart attack takes his life at a small station in Idaho Territory, she must change her identity, take the money, and run for her life. On the north-bound train to Ketchum, Maddie meets a young doctor, David Reynolds, who is also running from something-a woman he can never possess.  Maddie, now trapped in her false identity by the indiscretions of her father,  can neither afford to reveal her true nature nor allow her attraction to the doctor to distract her from the need to simply survive.

This is a stand-alone novel and the fourth in a series called The Sawtooth Range.