Book excerpt: The gunslinger. The rancher's daughter. They share the same dangerous secret – magic. Silas Vendine, mage and bounty hunter, sworn to protect the non-magical settlers of the Wildings, has followed a trail of strange magic to the remote town of Bitterbush Springs. There, he lands in the middle of a deadly feud – and discovers that a local rancher's daughter is hiding a dangerous secret. Lainie Banfrey has been taught all her life that wizards are unnatural creatures with no heart and no soul. If anyone finds out she has magical powers, she could end up on the wrong end of a hanging rope. But when a mysterious gunslinger shows up searching for a renegade mage, she can’t hide her power from him. Drawn to the handsome stranger’s magic – and to him, she agrees to help him in his hunt for the renegade whose strange, dark power could be the force behind the feud that has devastated Lainie’s family and brought her hometown to the edge of open warfare. While keeping their magic a secret – and falling for each other, in defiance of Silas’s duty and the strict laws of the Mage Council – Silas and Lainie must find the renegade mage and stop him before the dark and deadly power he commands destroys everyone who makes the Wildings their home. Join Silas and Lainie in an adventure filled with magic, danger, and romance and discover the wonders and mysteries of the Wildings in Beneath the Canyons, the first book in the epic fantasy-western series Daughter of the Wildings. Content Note: Language, violence, and mild to moderate sensual content.