High Storm — Brian Garfield

While the blizzard raged outside, the cabin trembled, its beams creaking in the night. Thrown together by the storm and forced into each other’s company, seven men and a girl strained against the intimate confinement, their nerves rubbed raw. There were the saddlebags full of gold, hidden somewhere on the premises. There was the feud between the rancher and the homesteader, ready to break out anew at any moment. There was the matter of the buffalo gun, which had already killed a deputy and could be brought out to kill again. And, above all, there was the half-breed girl, fair game for men who believed in taking what they wanted, at the point of a gun, if necessary. Two, three days? No one knew how long the storm would last. And nobody knew how long human nerves could stand the strain. All that was certain was that trouble would come—and someone would die!