The Reckoning is the first in the series of Jess Williams Western novels written by Robert J. Thomas. Jess Williams is an ordinary young boy with a loving family, growing up in Black Creek, Kansas. That all changes when he comes home and finds his entire family brutally murdered. Forced to become a man overnight, he vows to avenge his family's savage deaths.

In this fast-paced Western, a gunslinger with a savage past reluctantly teams up with a young orphan girl to avenge the murder of the padre who saved them both. As Lobo hunts the seven killers, he will uncover long-buried secrets, help a good woman in a bad situation, and maybe even do something a surly loner like Lobo wouldn't have thought possible… fall in love.

"Doc" Hayes had experienced enough tragedy for several lifetimes, but he thought he had finally found his sanctuary amidst the rugged beauty of the Guadalupe mountain range. Together with his friend and business partner, Conor Byrne, a West Point graduate with a taste for adventure, Doc was the center of what he hoped would be a burgeoning frontier settlement. With the arrival of Kathleen Ryan, a young woman cloaked in secrets, unexpected trouble soon follows. And trouble often seems to have a way of begetting even more trouble.

Orphaned at fourteen, Hector “Heck” Martin heads west, determined to see the far country and make a man of himself. Along the way, he falls in love with bold and beautiful Hope Mullen. But Heck is too young and poor to marry, so he heads west again. During a three-year journey, Heck crosses thousands of miles, becomes a bareknuckle boxer, a mountain man, and an Indian fighter, and meets the likes of Kit Carson and Jim Bridger as he explores the gorgeous and deadly frontier.

Liz Archer had an ache inside after the Nolan clan slaughtered her fiancé and family. An ache only revenge could heal. She got help from Tate Gilmore, who taught her how to shoot like a man and make love like a woman. He called her Angel Eyes, because those huge baby blues would be the last thing the Nolans would ever see before she blew them all the way to hell!