back. With an inner hunger that food wouldn't quell, he knew that it was too late to search for tracks. Either he'd guessed right and Cannon was headed for his uncle's or he'd lost them entirely.
Lost her forever.
The trail he'd followed since he'd left Sweetwater had become fainter and fainter, ending in the charred remains of a house, burned out like his own hopes.
For hours Ash had tried to think of a rational plan to get Tamsin away from Cannon without putting her life in jeopardy. So far, he had none. All he could think was that if he'd been with her when Jack came to break Boone out of the county jail, Jack would be dead and the young deputy alive. Most of all, Tamsin would be safe.
He'd made the wrong choice when he'd decided to follow Henry, and guilt plagued him with the throbbing agony of a broken tooth. He'd sworn to take care of Tamsin, and he'd let her down as much as he had Becky. If he didn't get Tamsin back alive… But that wasn't a possibility he could let himself consider.
It seemed that he'd been a loner most of his life, grasping at something shining and having it slip away… his daddy's hand… Aunt Jane's warm kitchen… the acres he'd cut out of raw Colorado land. He'd never wanted much, a sense of justice and a place to share with someone who cared whether or not he came home at night.
He'd let rigid duty and an old code keep him from seeing that Tamsin MacGreggor glittered brightest until she'd slipped through his fingers.
Circling ahead of Cannon's gang and arriving at Leon's first would give Ash an advantage. When he'd gone there before, he'd stuffed the chimney so that if they lit a fire, the house would fill with smoke.
That idea was no longer an option. Jack held Tamsin hostage. Ash couldn't let them reach the cabin. Cannon wouldn't hesitate to trade Tamsin's life for his own. Worse, he might kill her out of pure spite if he found out who was chasing him.
The odds were still in Jack's favor. Walker had seen four outlaws, but Ash wasn't sure that there hadn't been another. In three of his earlier robberies, Jack had put a shooter on a high spot. And Jack Cannon was a man who liked to perfect a scheme and stay with it.
By midmorning, both of Ash's horses were thirsty and showing the effects of a hard ride. He stopped long enough to let them drink the contents of the two canteens he'd brought with him, saving none for himself. When they finished, he remounted and rode until the sun was high overhead.
When he topped a high bluff, he edged the horses into the shade of a grove of pines and used his spyglass to search the valley.
Far below he saw four horses and riders following a game trail. One animal carried double. Ash's heart leapt in his chest. Tamsin was alive, and he had time to right the wrong he'd done her.
He scanned ahead of the leader, then right and left, hunting for a scout. He located the fifth man, his horse plainly played out, lagging several hundred yards behind the others.
Ash stroked Shiloh's sweaty neck and murmured to him softly. The roan's sides were damp, and he was breathing hard. Tamsin's stud was fresher, but the route Ash figured to take down this ridge hill was fit more for mountain goats than horses. When push came to shove, he had to put more trust in the stocky gelding's agility than in the racehorse's speed.
An hour later, still riding Shiloh, Ash got within range of the fifth gunman. 'Stand,' Ash ordered the weary horse as he slid his rifle from its sheath.
'Lord, forgive me,' he whispered. He took careful aim, leading his target, and squeezed off a perfect shot. The crack was still echoing through the valley when the pistolero dropped.
Tamsin clung to the outlaw in an exhausted daze. She'd ridden all night and into the day without a drop of water or a morsel of food. Jack had slapped her hard enough to make her ears ring when she hadn't dismounted fast enough a few hours back.
When his horse had begun to tire from carrying two, he'd ordered her up behind Billy, a man cut from the same devil mold. Billy never spoke a single word to her, but his flat amber eyes watched her from a compassion-less face. Touching the desperado, putting her arms around his waist, made her skin crawl.
Each hour took her closer to nightfall, a time when she knew Jack would call a halt to his ride. And if Ash didn't come before then, Jack had promised her that he would have her in every way that a man could violate a woman.
And he had promised the others that they could use her in turn…
So Tamsin had watched and waited as her strength slipped away, knowing that if she made her move too soon, she would pay the ultimate price.
She had no doubt that Ash would come after her. She knew it in every drop of blood, in her bones, and in the far corners of her soul.
If only he didn't come too late.
The sound of the rifle shot wrenched Tamsin from her trance. She released her grip on the bandit's waist, slid off the horse's rump, and hit the ground running.
Billy cursed and yanked his horse away.
'Catch her!' Jack yelled.
Bullets whined past her head, but she didn't stop. Without looking back, she dived into a clump of thick brush and clawed her way through the tangle.
Jack shouted and Boone laughed. Horses snorted and spurs jingled as one of them leapt out of the saddle mount and tried to force his way into the bushes after her.
Briars tore at Tamsin's hair and clothes, but she pressed on, heedless of the pain. A pistol fired again, behind her.
Something stung her arm, and she cried out as the force knocked her down. Shocked, she realized that she'd been hit. Blood soaked her sleeve, but strangely, she felt numbness rather than pain.
She got up and staggered out the far side of the thicket. Shielded by scrub pines from her pursuers, she dashed down a narrow, rocky ravine.
'Get her, you fools!' Jack yelled.
Sparks of color spiraled in front of Tamsin's eyes. The ground beneath her feet seemed to be shifting, and sounds echoed in her head. She kept running, dodging from one clump of cover to another.
Ash heard the shots and turned Shiloh loose. Leaping into Dancer's saddle, he whipped the bay stallion into a flat-out run.
Tamsin had made it as far as a gully that cut into the wooded hillside. Ash reined the stud to a trot as he zigzagged through the stunted pines, dodging boulders and leaping rocks and fallen logs.
'Ash!' He could tell from Tamsin's scream that she was still running, but hopelessness rang in every shrill note.
'Where do you think you're goin', bitch?'
The hard thud of a man's fist hitting human flesh followed.
Tamsin gasped in pain, then began to sob.
A few yards away, another man uttered a scornful guffaw. 'Save a little for me, Billy.'
Ash heard cloth rip.
Tamsin's shriek of fear sliced through him.
The stallion burst through the cover of trees into the glaring sunlight. Ash saw Tamsin on the ground ahead, struggling with a man while another jeered and urged his partner on.
The startled
Tamsin's assailant let go of her and went for his own Colt. Ash jacked another shell into the rifle chamber, but didn't fire for fear of hitting Tamsin. Fiercely, she clung to her assailant's arm, spoiling his aim.
The first shot went wild, almost shattering Ash's rifle stock and sending chips of wood and metal flying. Ash felt the sting of a dozen hornets, but it took all his skill and concentration to stay in the saddle as the squealing stallion fought the bit and reared.
Ash launched himself out of the saddle. He hit the earth and rolled, coming up on his feet to see Tamsin clinging like a burr to the outlaw's back.
Dancer plunged past, and his left rear hoof caught Cannon's man in the knee. He staggered back just as Ash drove his fist into the man's midsection.
