An assassin trying to kill Longarm is shot, and Longarm discovers that he is marked for death by a pack of outlaws operating out of the Phoenix branch of the United States Post Office

When Longarm arrives at the Sonora Desert, he walks into a den of dangers in a land where a meager existence scratched out from the land has ranchers and Indians ready to kill without much provocation

A Tucson gang is on fire, but Longarm turns up the heat! A gang of killer bandits are on a spree—hijacking gold and silver shipments and gunning down anyone who might get in their way. Longarm goes in to stick close to the wagon train owner—only to get even closer to Glorieta McCall, the saloon singer they call the Arizona Flame. As things heat up, what seems like a routine job quickly turns far more dangerous—and personal—than even the Marshal himself could imagine.

Color illustration of four superimposed vignettes: mans' head in profile smoking a cigarillo; man and woman embracing; man in western clothing firing a pistol in his proper right hand; cowboy on horseback driving a herd of white face cattle.

Longarm is outnumbered—and outgunned—on a ride straight to hell! Deputy U. S. Marshal Custis Long has had plenty of impossible missions. But his new undercover assignment riding shotgun for a robbery-plagued stagecoach line started at bad and quickly got worse. The gang he’s after has four stolen stashes and four dead guards notched on its belt…and is gunning to make him number five. And the beautiful blonde heiress he has to protect and the prissy city lady looking for excitement are only making Longarm’s job twice as hard… Now the marshal and a coach-full of innocent passengers are pinned down in a remote valley far from help. And with time running out, the only chance Longarm has is to outshoot and outmaneuver the vicious gang in the deadliest showdown of his career…

Color illustration of a man in white shirt, red headband, with black and red striped sarape around his shoulders; holds a gun in his proper right hand; in desert landscape.