Meet Brooks and Keri from End of the Trail, the final story in the six book multi author Texas Trails series available from River North

Synopsis

Brooks Morgan left home 11 years earlier and is just too stubborn to return home.  In 1896 he pulls into the town of Shoofly to take refuge from a storm and befriends John Langston in the local cafe. A high stakes poker game ends with Brooks holding the deed to John’s ranch with one condition – Brooks must promise to take care of Keri. Brooks agrees, assuming that Keri is a horse.

Overcome by guilt, Brooks return to the cafe to give back the deed but finds John on the floor dead. Brooks heads off to take care of John’s ranch and is ambushed. With a noose around his neck, hands tied behind his back he offers a prayer up to God.  A stunning shot is delivered from the rifle of a lady on horseback that breaks the noose and frees Brooks. But could this lady – Keri – be an enemy, too?

Brooks

Brooks Morgan is six-feet tall with a medium build. He’s 26 and has brown hair and deep blue eyes. His most engaging feature is his charming smile and twinkling eyes.

Brooks resembles a young Robert Redford.

He is easy going, relaxed and loyal. His weaknesses are that he hides his pain behind a smile and a joke. He’s avoided responsibility until the day he wins a ranch in a poker game.

His main quirk is that he jokes around to avoid being serious.

My inspiration for Brooks’ character was my dad. He was a real teaser and joker and tried to avoid serious discussions. Brooks is a lot like him.

End of the Trail is the sixth book in the Texas Trails series. Brooks is the son of Riley and Annie Morgan, the hero and heroine of Long Trail Home. Brooks left home at the age of sixteen and hasn’t retuned in over a decade. He lands in a small Texas town to avoid a hail storm and meets an ailing, old man who hires him to be his caretaker. One night, Brooks wins Raven Creek Ranch from the man, but when he goes to claim it, he discovers a feisty female dressed in pants, toting a rifle, who claims the ranch is her inheritance. He isn’t leaving–but neither is she. And so the showdown begins.

Keri

Keri Langston is 18. She is 5’5″ and has sandy blond hair and blue-green eyes.

She resembles Emily Osment, sister of Haley Joel Osment.

Her strengths are her loyalty to her heritage. She’s honest and dependable. She’s an expert shot and horsewoman and can wrangle cattle. She’s loyal to Texas, but she despises the Georgia finishing school her uncle sent her to. She wants to be a ranch woman, not a prissy debutante. She can barely cook, and hates doing it, but she loves working the ranch.

I’m not sure this counts as a quirk, but Keri has grown up around men and acts more like a man that she does a woman.

I’ve always been a tomboy, so I tend to be drawn to those kinds of characters. Keri developed as a need for an opposite of Brooks, which creates some nice conflict. Where he’s happy-go-lucky, she’s dependable and has a good work ethic.

When Keri was four, her uncle rode into her life and took her away from her mother. She was angry at him for years and at her mother for not making a stink and letting her go. She doesn’t understand why she had to leave her mother and carries that pain into adulthood. When her uncle dies, she is certain that he left the ranch to her. But she feels betrayed once again when she finds out he gambled it away to a cocky drifter. No matter–she won’t leave the only home she’s known without a fight.

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