Thanks for the ideas Axleonex. I did write some of them down. I've actually got about 6-7 Wordpad documents about the thing. I can lay down at night and [i]watch[/i] them in my head.

On another website I was interested in someone's idea that John and Lillie are related somehow. Whether she's a distant niece or something. Somehow, she falls into John's custody, and that's how they meet, but I don't know if that would work. What if Lillie was a runaway foster child? Her parents were killed by Bill, she hates being a foster child (weren't foster homes pretty common back then?), and she runs across John. Maybe she got into some trouble with a group of undesirables and she is rescued by John. What if John was her last known relative, she learnt that from the government when they tried to find her next custodial guardian, but they refused to send her to him since he was an outlaw? So she instead runs away from foster care to find him, is rescued by John, and voila! John is then charged with kidnapping, just another crime added onto his extensive list.

I really like the idea that John and Bill are both captured by a bounty hunter, thanks for sparking that idea in my head. Even though they hate each, and even though John has been on a warpath to kill him, they are forced to work together. This would really piss Lillie off, cause she's not old enough to understand that it's the best thing for their situation. I like that. The bounty hunter is after John to collect his bounty, then get paid by his employers for rescuing the 'kidnapped' Lillie, and he's more than eager to accept the bounty on Bill as well...

Okay, this is really starting to come together now!