Chapter 1
Sweetwater, Colorado
Spring 1866
Tamsin MacGreggor rose at first light and tiptoed across the bare, splintery floorboards to the washstand. The room was unheated and smelled of lye soap and tobacco. Shivering, she poured water from a pitcher into the cracked crockery basin.
Sweetwater, Colorado, hadn’t impressed her very much, but it was farther west than Denver. And the ugly boardinghouse room was cleaner and cheaper than the hotel in Wheaton, Nebraska, where she’d worked in a general store for two months. Best of all, she’d left Jack Cannon behind her.
Tamsin scrubbed her face, then rubbed her aching back. She was still tired, despite ten hours’ sleep. Sometimes it seemed as though she’d been weary since she left her home in Three Forks, Tennessee. There’d been so many small towns she couldn’t remember them all, most cold and muddy. She’d traveled by train when she could manage the expense of shipping her horses. The rest of the time she’d ridden them, stopping only when her funds ran low or the weather was too awful.
She’d have made faster progress if she hadn’t had to work her way across the country. Lawyer Crawshaw had been right when he’d said that Atwood had left her nothing but the two animals. She’d sold her mother’s jewelry and most of her own clothing and personal items for what little money she could get.
Now she was down to ninety-two dollars and sixty-three cents. There would be no more trains. From here to California, across desert, mountain, and plains, she would ride her horses. Heaven help them all if one of the animals broke a leg or pulled a tendon.
Randolph Crawshaw had laughed at her when she’d told him that she intended to take the mare and stallion to California to start a new life. The lawyer had scoffed that a gentlewoman, alone, in these lawless times since the war had ended, wouldn’t get as far as the Tennessee line with such valuable horseflesh.
“I guess I showed you, didn’t I, Randolph?” she declared as she twisted her carrot-colored hair into a sensible braid and tied her hat strings under her chin. One thing she hadn’t sold was her grandfather’s Navy Colt. And any man who tried to take Fancy or Dancer from her would have to come through a hail of lead to get them.
The small looking glass over the washstand was blackened with age. Tamsin didn’t bother to glance into it as she dressed. Years of rushing out in the darkness to aid a horse in distress had taught her to find her clothing and plait her thick hair by touch. Besides, a twenty-six-year-old woman, as tall and sturdy as she was, had no need of mirrors.
Tamsin had left her black widow’s garments behind in Tennessee. Her clothing was as sensible as her plain freckled face: a dark green wool skirt, divided for riding astride, a neat white shirt, and a short green jacket to match the skirt. Her russet boots were old but crafted of the finest leather with heels high enough for riding and low enough for comfortable walking.
She gathered her few belongings and stowed them in the saddlebags, then slid the heavy pistol into the holster hidden beneath her skirt. It was amazing how little a woman could get by with when it had to be carried on two horses. Her entire future, all her hopes and dreams, was wrapped up in those animals.
Thoroughbreds both, the stallion and mare were the results of her grandfather’s life as a breeder of champion racing stock. Surely, such speed and noble lines would be appreciated in California. And with luck and hard work, she intended to build another stable of purebred horses, one that no spendthrift husband would ever wrest away from her.
She hurried through breakfast, paid for her accommodations. Pausing for a moment on the uneven wooden walkway outside of the boardinghouse, she swung the saddlebags over one shoulder and looked carefully around.
Except for a farmer leading a workhorse into the smithy and a boy washing the window in front of a dry goods store, the muddy street was nearly deserted. A block down, she could see someone raking the dirt in front of the livery stable where she’d left Fancy and Dancer for the night.
It had rained sometime after midnight. Tamsin remembered hearing the rhythmic downpour against the tin roof. Yesterday’s choking dust was gone, replaced with brisk, fresh air. Fingers of fog hung over the town, but the golden rays piercing the clouds promised a fair day.
Then, to her left, she heard the creak of saddle leather. She glanced at the tall rider coming around the corner and quickly looked away when their eyes met.
“Morning, ma’am,” the big man said. He shifted his rifle to his other arm and touched his hat with one gloved finger.
Tamsin gasped as she took in the stranger and the two horses trailing behind him. Each animal carried a gruesome cargo, a dead man slung over the bloodstained saddle.
Muffling a cry of distress, she seized the doorknob, preparing to rush back into the boardinghouse. The quick glimpse she’d had of the ruffian was enough to convince her she didn’t wish to be on the same street with him.
A wide-brimmed hat had shaded stark features bronzed by sun and wind. His sensual mouth was a thin line, his sharply chiseled jawline unshaven. The broad shoulders, long legs, hard-muscled arms were barely concealed by the black calf-length leather coat.
Tamsin had seen her share of desperate men since she started traveling west. This one reminded her of Jack Cannon. The polished rifle, and the gun belt visible where the stranger’s duster hung open, didn’t belong to a cowhand who had innocently stumbled upon two bodies.
The boardinghouse door opened and the widow Fremont peered into Tamsin’s face suspiciously. “You forget something?”
“No, no,” Tamsin assured her. “I just . . .” She motioned toward the horseman. “That man—He’s . . . He has two dead—”
“More business for the undertaker?” The widow sniffed. “Best you steer clear of him, Mrs. MacGreggor.” She emphasized the word Mrs. in an irritating manner. “That’s Ash Morgan. He’s a bounty hunter, a pistolero. If he’s bringing in dead men, like as not he made them that way. Morgan hunts outlaws for a living. He’s not to be trifled with.”
Tamsin suppressed a shiver, hoping California would prove more civilized than Nebraska and Colorado. “I assure you, Mrs. Fremont, I have no intention of trifling with this gun shark or any other gentleman in Sweetwater. I was startled by . . . by the bodies. I thought perhaps he might be a desperado.”
Mrs. Fremont sniffed again. “He claims to be on the side of law and order, but I’m not the judge of that.” She frowned. “Decent women don’t associate with his kind. Be seen with Ash Morgan and people will think you’re one of Maudine’s fancy pieces.”
“I wasn’t with him,” Tamsin replied. “I was standing on your boardwalk when he rode by and spoke to me. I don’t know him. I don’t care to know him. As I explained, I’m leaving town this morning.”
“Just as well. I run a decent place here. You be sure and tell any travelers you meet that I serve good grub and my beds are free of vermin.”
“I will certainly do that.” Seeing that the bounty hunter had turned off at the next corner, Tamsin lifted her skirts ankle high and stepped off the walk into the oozing wagon ruts. She was still unnerved by the terrible sight, but she’d not be deterred from her departure by a man like Morgan. Detouring around livestock droppings and mud puddles, she made it safely to the far side of the street.
The widow Fremont did provide excellent room and board for the cost, but her superior Philadelphia airs were infuriating. Mrs. Fremont might pass herself off as a lady here on the frontier, but she was obviously an uneducated, ill-bred woman. What made her assume that Tamsin intended to make the acquaintance of a gunfighter when she’d obviously been entering the boardinghouse to avoid him?
A small black terrier yipped loudly and ran behind an olive-skinned boy raking soiled straw away from the livery door. Tamsin smiled and bid the lad a good morning.
His dark, liquid eyes widened in surprise. For an instant, an odd expression flashed across his thin face. Then he darted away, followed by the still-barking dog.
Tamsin stepped inside the stable, taking a minute to let her eyes grow accustomed to the semidarkness. The air was heavy with the pungent scent of animals, fresh manure, and hay. Most women, she supposed, found such a place offensive. But she’d always felt at home amid the earthy smells and the familiar sounds of horses and the men who cared for them.
“Mr. Edwards,” she called. “I’ve come for—” She broke off in midsentence as she saw the empty stall where she’d tied Fancy and Dancer the night before.
Hope of heaven! Her stomach turned over as she went suddenly cold. Where were her animals? She ran to the box stall and stared at it as if she expected them to magically reappear.
“Mr. Edwards!” she shouted. “Where are my horses?”
She paced the length of the barn looking into each space. Where could they be? She’d given distinct orders that no one was to approach her animals. Fancy was sweet-natured enough, but Dancer—Dancer had nearly killed a groom who tried to put a saddle on him.
“Miz MacGreggor?”
Tamsin turned to face the stable owner. Edwards was bull-necked, shorter than she was, and heavily bearded. A middle-aged man wearing a battered star on his vest strode shoulder to shoulder beside Edwards.
“Where are my animals?” Tamsin demanded.
Edwards grimaced and shook his head. “Gone.” He shrugged and scratched his unwashed neck. “No idee where they could have got to,” he drawled. “Hoped maybe you’d come in early and picked them up.”
“Stolen?” She swallowed hard. “My horses have been stolen?” She glanced at the second man, noting his shoulder-length white-blond hair and handlebar mustache. “Are you the county sheriff? I need to—”
“That would be me,” he answered. “Sheriff Roy Walker.”
His pale eyes were bloodshot and slightly crossed, hardly a recommendation for an upholder of justice. Neither he nor Edwards smelled as though they had bathed in the last month. She barely conquered an urge to back away from them. Instead, she held her ground and tried to keep her emotions in check. “You’ve got to find my horses, Sheriff,” she urged. “They’re worth a fortune.”
Walker rocked back on his heels and peered down his long nose at her as if she were a suspicious character. “Not so fast, Miss MacGreggor. Got some questions of my own. You want to come down to the office and fill out a report?”
Tamsin drew herself up to her full height. “No, I do not. I want you to start looking for my animals. A bay thoroughbred stallion with black points, sixteen and a half hands, a chestnut mare with a white star on her forehead and one white stocking. She’s a thoroughbred as well, and she’s sixteen hands high. How many horses can there be that match that description?” She paused for breath and added, “It’s Mrs. MacGreggor, sir, not miss.”
“Mr. MacGreggor with you, is he?”
“No. He’s not. What of it?” She’d not tell them that Atwood was dead, drowned in a drunken stupor in four inches of water behind a house of ill repute.
The sheriff spat a wad of tobacco into the straw near her foot. “Not usual for a lady of means to be traveling these parts alone. ’Specially not with horses like you claim you lost.”
Tamsin knotted her gloved hands into fists and tried to hold her temper. “Not lost, Sheriff, stolen. Stolen from that stall—” She pointed. “Late last night or early this morning. And I want them back. It’s your job to—”
“Don’t be telling me my job, lady. You say you been robbed; there’s procedure to be followed. Things got to be done proper like. Don’t know how things is back where you come from but—”
“While you’re wasting time interrogating me, Sheriff, you’re letting the thief get farther and farther away.” Dismissing him with a withering glare, Tamsin turned her ire on Edwards. “As for you—I hold you responsible for this theft.”
The stableman shifted from one foot to the other and twisted his battered hat in his hand.
“Is this common?” she continued. “Do animals in your care regularly vanish?”
“Matter o’ fact, this ain’t the first time it happened,” Edwards admitted.
“No need to take on so,” the sheriff said. “You mind your manners and leave me to get to the bottom of this.”
She glanced from one to the other as a bad feeling washed through her. Something was wrong here, dreadfully wrong. Was it possible that Edwards and Walker had conspired to steal her horses? “Please,” she said, no longer caring what they thought of her. “I’ve got to get those animals back.”
Roy Walker tucked another plug of tobacco under his lip. “Do what we can for you,” he offered. “Soon as you fill out them papers.”
“Don’t get your hopes up,” Edwards said. “If they was stole, likely the horse thief is to hell and gone from here by now. Some bad hombres around, that’s certain, and old Roy here . . .” The livery owner gestured toward the sheriff. “He don’t have the greatest record for catching ’em.”
Studying the sorry pair, Tamsin’s intuition told her that this sheriff wasn’t to be trusted any more than Edwards. It was obvious that waiting for them to do something was a waste of time. If she was going to recover her horses, she’d have to find them herself.
Tamsin stepped back, lowered her eyes, and tried to look flustered. “Forgive me,” she said. “It’s just the shock of finding my mare and stallion gone. Naturally, I’ll cooperate in any way I can. Could I meet you in your office? Say, in an hour? I need to go back to the boardinghouse and . . .” She fumbled for some excuse. “I’m feeling a little faint, sir. I think I’d best lie down.”
“Good idee,” Edwards agreed.
Sheriff Walker nodded. “An hour, little lady. I’ll look over your bill of sale on them animals, and we’ll see what we can do for you.”
“I have every faith that you will,” she murmured. Lying son of a goat! If Walker wasn’t in on the thieving, she’d swallow his sack of chewing tobacco whole. With a small sound of distress and a foolish simper, she backed out of the stable.
Once out of the men’s sight, she shouldered her saddlebags and followed the alley to the back of the barn. As she’d hoped, the boy was there, leaning against a rail fence. He looked up warily as she approached him.
“My horses have been stolen,” she said.
He pretended not to hear. Instead, he crouched down and tossed a stick to the dog.
Tamsin fumbled in her skirt pocket and came up with a ten-dollar gold piece. She tilted the coin so that it gleamed in the sunlight. “You can have this if you tell me where they are.”
He ruffled the fur on the terrier’s back.
“I won’t say anything,” she promised. “Please help me.”
He reached for the money with a dirty hand. “Sam Steele trades in horses,” he whispered. “Some people say he don’t care whose.”
“Where?”
Sweat ran down the boy’s pockmarked face. “They’ll kill me if they find out I told.”
She held the coin just out of reach. “Where?” she repeated. “You can trust me.”
“ ’Bout four mile out of town. The Lazy S, first place on the right. You kin see the house from the road. But—” He licked his lower lip and glanced over his shoulder nervously. “Sam Steele’s a brother to Judge Henry Steele. Best you forget yer hosses and get away from here, ma’am. Worse kin happen to ya than get yer cayuses stole.”
She tucked the ten dollars into his hand. “Thank you.” “Yeah,” he said, flashing ebony eyes that seemed far too old for his face. “But I ain’t done you no favors, lady.”
Maybe not, she thought as he dashed away. She hoped he’d told the truth. If he hadn’t, she wouldn’t know where to start looking.
She retraced her steps to the front of the stable and was relieved to hear the murmur of voices inside. She couldn’t tell what they were saying, but she recognized Walker’s voice.
She’d told them she meant to return to the boardinghouse. Now she did just that. But when she reached the side street that the building was on, she kept going, circling around until she was once more behind the livery. The muddy ground was covered with horse tracks, far too many to make sense of until she saw one perfect impression.
In Nebraska, Tamsin had paid a smith to fit both animals with special shoes, studded to give them better footing on rocky ground. This print wasn’t large enough to belong to Dancer. It had to be Fancy’s trail. And where the mare went, the stud followed. Someone might have been tough enough to get him out of the barn, but they couldn’t stop him from going after his mate—not without killing him.
Tamsin took a deep breath and started down the road. Her belongings were heavy, but she had no intentions of leaving them behind. Once she got Fancy and Dancer back, she’d put Sweetwater behind her.
Tamsin guessed that she’d been walking for more than an hour when she reached the wooden gate with an oxbow suspended overhead. A large letter S, not upright but turned on its back, was burned into the weathered wood. Beneath the brand were the words SAMUEL STEELE, LAZY S.
Not certain of what she would find or what she would do if these people did have her missing animals, she backtracked a few hundred yards and hid her saddlebags in the bushes just off the road.
She was halfway up the lane to the sprawling log ranch house when a grizzled cowboy loped toward her on a black-and-white horse.
The man pulled in his mount, touching the brim of his slouch hat with a forefinger in greeting, but he didn’t smile. What she could see of his hair was sandy, streaked with gray. One cheek was covered with a purple birthmark. It was not a face to inspire confidence.
“You must be lost, woman. This here’s private property. You’re trespassin’.” He reined the piebald around so that they blocked her way. She noticed that the raw-boned gelding had one blue eye ringed in white, a feature she’d found linked to a nasty disposition in horses.
“Are you Mr. Steele?” she demanded with more courage than she felt. “I’ve important business with him.”
The cowboy scowled. “He expectin’ you?”
“Not exactly, but if you tell him that Mrs. MacGreggor is here, I know he’ll see me.”
“Nobody but Injuns and sodbusters walks out here, lady.” The horse bared his yellow teeth and chewed at the bit.
Tamsin caught the animal’s bridle by the headstall and ran an exploring hand over his neck. “Easy, easy boy,” she crooned. “There’s an infection here,” she said, glancing up at the rider. “It may be a splinter of wood or a thorn. You can feel the heat around the swelling. You’d best cut it out before it becomes serious.”
The cowboy’s eyes widened questioningly. “You think that’s what it is? I figured it for a bee sting.”
She shook her head and scratched under the piebald’s chin. The horse blew noisily through his lips but then visibly calmed under her touch. “I know horses.” She glanced toward the house. “I really need to talk with Mr. Steele.”
He shrugged. “Guess he can’t do no more than run you off. Ma’am,” he added respectfully. She let go of the bridle. He tapped the horse’s rump with the end of the reins and continued on down the rutted lane.
Tamsin hadn’t gone another hundred feet before she heard the screaming whinny and the thud of iron-shod hooves against a barn wall. Dancer! She would recognize his angry bellow anywhere. And if her stallion was there, Fancy must be with him.
Tamsin broke into a run, but as she neared the stables, she saw several men repairing a railing on the corral. One turned to stare at her, and she slowed to a dignified walk.
“Hey!” the cowboy shouted.
She ignored him and turned toward the house. A black gelding, hitched to a piano-box buggy with yellow wheels, stood near the front porch. The animal’s sides were streaked with sweat, and foam dripped from his mouth.
Tamsin circled the horse and carriage, stepped over a sleeping cat, and climbed the steps to the front porch. The door stood open. From inside came the sound of a man’s swearing.
“It’s not what you think, Sam,” a woman pleaded. “Henry—”
“Henry’s my brother and you’re my wife! You’ve been whoring with him behind my back!”
Tamsin heard a second man’s voice, an older man. “I warn you, Sam. It isn’t like that. Don’t do anything you’ll regret!”
A woman’s scream was followed by the crack of a gunshot. Glass shattered and the woman began to sob. “No! No! No!”
Tamsin stood motionless, not sure if she should go inside or turn and run. Then the three burst through the door onto the porch.
The woman, a petite blonde in her mid-thirties, bore the imprint of a man’s hand across her cheek. Her eyes were swollen with tears, and her elaborately coiffured hair was disheveled. She clung to the arm of a muscular man with shoulder-length brown hair and a drooping mustache.
“Sam, please,” she begged. “It’s not true.”
Cursing, he backhanded his wife and drove a clenched fist into the belly of the man Tamsin supposed must be Henry.
The blow rocked the middle-aged gentleman in white shirt and waistcoat, and he doubled up, clutching his stomach. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
“Get the hell off my place, Henry! If I ever lay eyes on you again, I’ll blow you to hell!”
Henry staggered back and steadied himself against a porch post. “Come with me, Sarah,” he urged. “It’s over. You don’t need to stay with him anymore.”
“I warn you, I’ll kill you.” Sam’s face darkened with rage. “I’ll kill the both of—”
“Not if I kill you first!” Henry flung back.
Then, for the first time, Sam caught sight of Tamsin. “Who are you?” he demanded. “What the hell are you doing on my spread?”
She blanched. “I’m Tamsin MacGreggor,” she managed. “And I’ve come for my horses. A mare and a stallion, thoroughbreds, stolen last night from the livery in Sweetwater.”
“You’re out of your mind,” Sam grated.
“Am I?” she dared. “Let’s take a look in your barn.”
Henry wiped the blood from his chin and stared at Tamsin. She caught a whiff of hair lotion from his too black, obviously dyed hair.
“I’ve got two thoroughbreds in my stable,” Sam admitted. “Bought and paid for from a dealer yesterday. I don’t know who the hell you are, woman, or what your game is. But if you’re calling me a horse thief, you belong in a madhouse.”
“No! They’re mine,” Tamsin insisted. “I bred them both, back in Tennessee. I—”
“Get the hell off the Lazy S,” Sam ordered. “Broom! Willy!”
The two cowboys, who’d been mending the fence, came on the run. A third man in a farrier’s apron followed, still carrying his hammer. “Yeah, boss?” the first man said.
“See these two off my land,” Sam ordered. “If they come back, you’re fired.”
“The judge, too?” The tall cowboy who had spoken first looked uncertain.
Sam nodded. “You heard me, Broom.” Sam seized his wife by the shoulders and pushed her roughly back inside the house.
“Keep your hands off her,” Henry said.
“She’s mine, brother. I’ll do with her as I please.”
Tamsin turned toward Henry. “If you’re a judge, you’ve got to help me.”
He scowled at her. “I’d advise you to get back where you came from. Accusing a man like Sam of stealing can get you in more trouble than you can imagine.”
The man Sam had called Broom held up his hands. “I’m havin’ no part of this, boss. You want Judge Henry throwed out of here, you do it yerself.”
“Damn you, Broom,” Sam snapped. “You can get off the Lazy S as well.”
The tall cowboy’s weathered tan flushed beet-red. “You can’t do that, Mr. Steele. I worked for your father since you were both mites. Who else is gonna hire me with my gimpy leg?”
“You heard me,” the rancher replied. “You haven’t been worth your keep in years. Get the hell off this spread.”
“Not without my pay,” Broom said. “I’m owed—”
“You’re owed shit. You don’t follow my orders, you’re fired!” Sam advanced on Tamsin with a clenched fist. “I warned you to git off the Lazy S, woman.”
She took a step backward. “I’m going.”
Broom took a swing at Sam, and the rancher hit him hard in the face. The cowboy got in a weak punch to Sam’s chest, but the younger man’s return blow caught him full on the nose. Blood spurted as Broom went down on one knee. Sam followed up with a vicious kick to the midsection.
Broom groaned and sank to the ground. “You bastard,” he managed. “I’ll get you for this.”
Sam kicked him once more before glancing at the second cowhand and the man with the hammer. Swiftly, they moved toward Henry.
Swearing, the judge retreated to his buggy. “You’ll regret this, Sam,” he warned. “I’ll be back, and we’ll settle this for once and all.”
Tamsin touched Henry’s arm. “I’m on foot,” she said. “Could you at least give me a ride back to town?”
He scowled at her. “Get back the same way you got here.” The judge slapped his lines over the horse’s rump and drove away without looking back.
Sam gave Tamsin a shove. “Get moving,” he warned.
She winced as she heard Dancer’s angry whinny from the barn. “I’m going,” she repeated. But I’ll be back, too, she vowed silently. You can count on it.