Thu, Oct 27, 1988
In the late 1800's, a female music hall singer/dancer knows she's dying, so she sends her four young children from the big cities of the east coast to the western frontier, where her estranged brother, Ethan Cord, lives as a gunfighter in a town named Paradise, which is anything but. Shootings in the streets and rowdy bar brawls are no atmosphere for little children, so Ethan, with the help of a beautiful female banker, makes a home on the outskirts of town. He tries to face up to his new-found responsibilities as a single father, even resolving to hang up his guns and become a rancher, but his past as a wanted man keeps intruding into his new life.
Thu, Dec 15, 1988
It's near Christmas. Claire brought her mother's angel with them from St Louis intending to carry on her mother's tradition of placing it on the town tree, only Paradise doesn't have a town tree - or any decorations. Ethan had treated the younger boys to a trip to Carson City, but coming home the bridge was washed out. In order to make it home in time for Christmas they have to cross the desert, where they find a mother and newborn baby.
Thu, Dec 29, 1988
The "travelling social club" arrives back in Paradise. Ethan knew the owner and her little girl in his past. The owner has arranged for her now 14 year old daughter to end her childhood that night and join the family business, but things become complicated when Claire strikes up a friendship and Joseph falls for her.