Kujo had only been in Montana for two days. After Bear and Duke’s visit to him in Colorado, he’d driven to San Antonio, where he’d spent a week filling out paperwork and convincing the trainers at Lackland he was fit to adopt Six, and that the dog and he were still a good match.

When he’d arrived at the kennels where the dogs were kept, he’d been hard pressed to keep his shit together. Since leaving the Army, he’d had nothing to do with dogs or the people who trained them. Nor had he been around men in uniform.

The range of feelings washing over him had kept him glued to the seat of his truck. He’d taken several minutes sitting in his pickup, gathering the courage he needed to face the very things he’d worked so hard to forget—the career he’d trained for, the dogs he’d loved and the only life he’d ever known.

When the sergeant in charge led him back to Six’s kennel, no amount of mental coaching prepared him for the rush of emotion that nearly brought him to his knees.

As they approached, Six sat at the back of the kennel, his tail curled beneath him, his shoulders slumped and the light completely drained from his eyes.

“He’s been like this since the people at his last foster home returned him,” the sergeant said. “Nobody can reach him. He’s non-responsive and completely shut down.” The man pointed to the full bowl at the corner of the cage. “He hasn’t eaten anything in three days.”

Kujo had to swallow hard several times before he could voice a command. When he finally could squeeze air past his vocal cords, all he could manage was, “Six, come.”

The dog’s ears twitched, and his nose lifted slightly as if sniffing the air.

Kujo waited, afraid to say anything for fear of revealing just how devastated he was by the appearance of the dog that had saved his life.

For a long moment, the dog sat, sniffing the air. Then he rose up onto all fours, his tail drooping, and took a step forward.

Kujo opened the gate, stepped inside and pulled out of his pocket the old tennis ball he’d kept with his gear all those years. He squatted on his haunches and repeated, “Six, come.”

Six sniffed the air, his ears now standing straight, his body tense. One step at a time, he eased toward Kujo, limping slightly.

“He took a hit from shrapnel on his last deployment,” the sergeant offered.

Kujo barely heard the man. His attention remained on the dog, his gaze meeting Six’s, silently urging him to close the distance between them.

When at last he did, Six sniffed at the ball, took it from Kujo’s hand, and then he collapsed against him, whining, wiggling and cuddling until the weight of his body pushed Kujo over, forcing him to sit on the concrete.

Since then, Six had stuck to him like flypaper, refusing to leave his side.

From San Antonio, he’d driven all through the night, stopping only to put gas in his truck and to let Six out to stretch and do his business. Normally, he would have kept Six in a crate, like he had when he’d been in training or transporting him. But he figured they were both retired. To hell with the crate.

Six lay on the seat behind Kujo and occasionally stuck his nose over Kujo’s shoulder and licked his face.

The dog had picked up bad habits over the years he’d been away from Kujo, but it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that he and Six were a team once again.

When he arrived in Eagle Rock, Montana in the foothills of the Crazy Mountains, Kujo had driven straight up to Hank Patterson’s house, introduced himself and asked if the job offer was still good.

Hank had welcomed him, given him a bed to sleep in for the night and briefed him the next morning about the work they were doing and his expectations of the people he hired to provide protective services.

At the moment, Hank was negotiating with a client who was coming to Montana in a few weeks and would need someone to work as a bodyguard. As all of his men were currently assigned, that job would be the one he’d assign Kujo. In the meantime, he could either stay with Hank, his wife and baby, or find a place of his own.

Kujo had gone out the next day and found a cabin in the mountains to rent. It wasn’t much more than one room with a bed, small kitchen area and an outhouse. He suspected it was someone’s old hunting cabin. The isolation suited him. The only drawback was the lack of telephone or cell phone reception. He figured he could rent the place for a few weeks while he waited for his assignment. It would give him time to acclimate to the town of Eagle Rock and the people in the community. Once a day, he’d visit town and check in with Hank.

The solitude would give him time to work with Six.

After moving into his cabin, Kujo had gone hiking in the mountains to work out the kinks of his long road trip, when Six had finally run ahead of him instead of clinging to his legs, refusing to leave his side.

The dog had separation anxiety from having been passed from one handler to the next, and then one foster home to the next. As far as Kujo was concerned, Six was now settled with his last owner. And Six seemed to know it. He’d finally left Kujo’s side and raced ahead on the mountain trail, circling back to make sure he was still there and then running ahead again.

When the dog hadn’t returned after a period of time Kujo was comfortable with, he’d picked up his pace, until he was jogging, trying to catch up to Six.

When he’d emerged from the tree line to find Six with a woman squatting next to him, he’d been both relieved and a little angry. And he’d taken his anger out on the woman.

He didn’t want to admit to himself she’d awakened in him something he hadn’t felt in a long time. Attraction. When she’d given him just as much trouble as he’d given her, he couldn’t help but admire her gumption.

At first, he couldn’t understand why a lone woman would be out in the wilds of the mountains alone. But then he’d noticed she was probably packing a pistol beneath the leather jacket she wore. The telltale bulge around her waist had nothing to do with the gentle swell of her breasts above.

Her green eyes had sparkled when she’d been angry with him for being less than forthcoming with his reasons for being so high up on the trails, wandering the mountain, just him and his dog.

If he was still the same man he’d been before the explosion that got him medically boarded out of the Army, he might have teased her, or cajoled her into giving him her number.

But what good would that have done? He’d been out of the dating scene for three years. What woman wanted a washed-up Delta Force soldier with a limp? What did he have to offer to a relationship when all he’d done for the past three years was to bury himself in the woods, refusing to take part in life? All he had to show for all that lost time was a fixed-up cabin he couldn’t even call his own.

His friends had been right. He owed it to himself and Six to get on with his life. Patterson had given him the opportunity he needed to make a new start, hopefully doing work he was still cut out for.

Dating and women would have to wait on the backburner until he had something to offer in a relationship.

As he’d continued along the path through the woods, down into a valley and up to the top of the next ridge, he’d pushed himself physically. During his years in the Colorado Rockies, he’d climbed rocky hillsides, increasing his lung capacity and the muscles in his bum leg.

Deep in his heart, he’d harbored a dream of regaining enough of his old physical abilities to convince the medical board to reinstate him in the military.

He snorted and paused at the top of the ridge.

Like the Army would ever want a broken-down soldier among able-bodied men. He and Six had outlived their usefulness for the Army, their injuries sidelining them from doing the jobs they were trained to do. The sooner they both accepted their new normal, the sooner they could get on with the business of establishing new lives for themselves.

As he stood looking out over a valley, a movement caught his attention. Below him, something flashed and moved in a straight line along the valley floor.

He squinted, trying to make out what he was looking at. Finally, he realized the flying object was a drone, hovering in front of several caves in the side of a rocky escarpment.

At the moment he identified the drone, a shot rang out. The drone tilted sideways and then dropped out of the sky, crashing into a stand of trees.

An engine roared to life at the top of the ridge opposite from where he stood. A dark smudge moved across the terrain and away from the valley. It appeared to be an ATV much like the one the woman called Molly had been standing so close to when Kujo had confronted her about petting Six.

Another engine fired up from a different location, deeper in the valley.

Kujo assessed the scene. One vehicle turned around on the mountain trail, a second ATV raced upward to meet the other. He assumed they were working together, until he saw the rider of the lower vehicle stop and raise both arms as if aiming at the person on the other ATV.

All of the sudden, the rider on the upper ATV flew through the air and over the edge of what appeared to be a cliff.

Kujo tensed and started running across the ridgeline toward the scene of the accident. The second vehicle came to a halt, the rider leaped off and stood at the side of the trail, looking down and holding something in his hand.

What was he doing?

Kujo wished he had a pair of binoculars. He narrowed his eyes, focusing on the man standing at the edge of the cliff. As he moved closer, he could make out the shape of the object in the man’s hand.

It was a handgun.

Now running all out and doing his best to ignore pain flaring in his bum leg, Kujo knew he had to get to the driver who’d gone over the edge before the man with the weapon fired.

The sharp report of gunfire echoed off the hillsides. Five rounds were discharged before the man with the gun climbed onto his ATV and headed over the top of the hill, disappearing out of sight.

Kujo ran as fast as he could, Six by his side, but the rough terrain slowed his progress as he slipped and slid in the rocks and loose gravel. When he got to the point on the trail where the abandoned ATV had come to a halt against a tree trunk, he stopped, sucked in deep breaths, and stared over the edge.

When he peered downward, he couldn’t see signs of anyone below. At the bottom of the steep slope were several giant boulders.

Six sniffed the ATV, the ground, and then lifted his head. Before Kujo could stop him, he leaped over the edge and half-slid, half-loped down the slippery, steep hillside to where it bottomed out in front of the boulders. Then he ducked out of sight, behind the huge rocks.

Kujo waited for the dog to reappear. When he didn’t, Kujo had no choice but to follow.

He stepped over the edge and started slowly down the hill. But the ground was nothing but loose rocks and gravel. Once he started sliding, there was no stopping until he reached the bottom. At first, he skied, balancing on both feet. Eventually, he sat, using his bottom as a sled, taking him all the way to boulders.

Fortunately, other than a sore tailbone, he arrived relatively unscathed and leaped to his feet to followed the direction Six had gone. Behind the boulders, he found a dark lump lying against the ground. Six stood over the mass, licking something.

As Kujo moved closer, dread knifed through him as he realized the lump of black was the woman who’d introduced herself as Molly, and Six was licking her face. Jesus, don’t let her be dead.

“Six, sit,” Kujo commanded.

Six gave the woman one last kiss and sat back on his haunches, his eager brown eyes shifting from Molly to Kujo. He let out a worried whine, and then waited for Kujo’s next command.

Molly laid still, not a muscle moved and her eyes were closed.

Kujo squatted next to her and felt for a pulse at the base of her throat. His gut clenched when he didn’t feel the reassuring thump of a heartbeat against his fingertips. He shifted his hand and let go a sigh of relief when he located the strong, steady rhythm. She was alive but had suffered quite a fall.

Although afraid to move her, he knew he couldn’t leave her where she was long enough to get off the mountain and call for help. Her attacker could return, or some scavenging animal might find her.

He shot a glance at Six. He could leave the dog and return with help, but he hadn’t been with Six long enough to know whether he’d stay until Kujo returned.

No, he couldn’t leave the woman. He touched her shoulder gently. “Molly.”

She didn’t respond.

He spoke louder. “Molly, wake up.”

She stirred and moaned.

“Molly, you have to tell me what hurts.”

For a long moment she didn’t respond, but then she whispered, “Everything.”

He chuckled. “Could you be more specific?”

“No,” she said.

He had to lean close to hear her response.

“Can you move your fingers and toes?” he asked. Kujo stared at her hand, lying on the rocks beside her face. The digits moved slightly. He glanced at her feet, but boots covered her toes. If she moved them, he couldn’t tell. “How did that feel?”

“Not bad,” she said. Still her eyes remained closed.

“Did you feel your toes?”

She started to nod, but winced and then stilled, emitting a pathetic whimper. “Head hurts.”

“Tell me if anything I touch causes you pain.” Kujo wrapped his hands around her arms and squeezed gently, moving from the shoulder down to her wrists. “Anything hurt?”

“No.”

“Could you feel my hands?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” He repeated the technique on the other side with the same reaction. Then he moved to her legs. Starting at her thighs he swept his hands down one leg. “Can you feel my hands?”

“Mmm.”

His lips quirked. “Is that a yes?”

“Yes. Feels good,” she said, and her eyes opened, rounded and then closed again. “Did I say that out loud?”

He let go of some of his tension in muted laughter. “Yes, but you probably won’t remember tomorrow, so don’t worry about it.”

“But you’ll remember,” she said, laying her arm across her eyes. “And you don’t like me.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“I could tell,” she said, her voice fading.

“Molly, do you think you can sit up?”

“Sure,” she said. As if to prove her words, she pushed herself to a sitting position with a little help from his arm supporting her.

“How’s the back? Any pain?”

“I feel like I was run through a rock tumbler.” She swayed and would have fallen over if he hadn’t placed his hand behind her and held her upright. “I’m all right,” she said. “I just need a little help standing.”

“Are you sure you can?”

She nodded and winced again, then pressed a hand to the back of her head. “I can do this.”

“If you’re sure.”

“Please, just help me stand so that I can assess the damage.” She gripped the front of his shirt.

He wrapped an arm around her back. “On three. One…two…three.” He stood, more or less pulling her up with him.

When she was upright, her fingers curled into his shirt, and she smiled. “See? I’m fine.” Then she passed out, going completely limp in his arms.

Molly almost slid back to the earth. If Kujo had not held on, she would have ended up back on the ground, possibly injuring herself even worse.

Six whimpered and leaned against Kujo’s leg.

“You don’t know the half of it, buddy. At least you don’t have to carry her back up the hill.”

He scooped her legs up and cradled her against his chest then emerged from behind the rocks. A quick evaluation of the slippery hillside had him formulating another plan. If he walked along the base of the hill, he’d come to a less vertical slope. Then he might stand a better chance of climbing while carrying an inert woman.

He started out, keeping a cautious watch out for the man who’d chased her down and shot at her after she’d fallen down the hill. If he showed up again, Kujo needed to be ready.

Something between him and her dug into his ribs, he glanced down and noticed the shoulder holster beneath her jacket and the 9-millimeter pistol.

He smiled. As he’d suspected, she’d come to the mountains packing. If the shooter returned, he could defend them. He wondered why she hadn’t stopped and set up a defensive position, instead of falling over a cliff. She must have been as surprised as he was by the attack. Only someone desperate to avoid being shot would have chosen throwing herself off a cliff as a viable alternative.

His leg ached with the additional weight, but he trudged onward, slowly climbing through the trees and boulders. At a point when the slope grew steeper, he stopped and laid her over his shoulder, freeing one of his arms to better balance himself as he climbed. By the time he reached the old mining road, he was breathing hard, and his legs felt like they were on fire. Before he stepped out of the shadows, he checked both directions, held his breath and listened for the sound of an ATV engine.

He heard nothing but the wind stirring the lodge pole pines. Kujo and Six backtracked along the trail. Having walked more than five miles into the mountains, he knew he couldn’t carry the woman all the way back. He had to get her out on the four-wheeler she’d ridden.

The ATV was wedged against the trunk of a tree. Though the handlebar was bent, the vehicle appeared to be intact.

He laid Molly on the ground, dragged the ATV away from the tree and hit the starter switch. The engine turned over and died. Kujo hit it again, and the motor roared to life. Shifting into neutral, he set the brake and returned to Molly’s prone body.

Six stood guard beside her, refusing to move until Kujo lifted her into his arms and carried her to the ATV. How he was going to drive the ATV and hold onto the woman was an entirely different challenge. He straddled the seat and draped her body over his arm, resting her bottom across his thighs. It wasn’t the most efficient way to get a person out of the mountains, but it would have to do.

Now, where to take her?

She had to have come up from one of the roads leading to the highway.

Unfamiliar with the trails, his best bet would be to take her back to his cabin, load her into his truck and drive her into Eagle Rock and the nearest medical facility.

Balancing Molly against his chest, Kujo shifted the ATV into gear and set off at a sedate pace back the way from which he’d come.

The five miles back to the cabin took over an hour. Six trotted alongside with his uneven gait. By the time he reached the cabin, Kujo’s arms ached with the effort of maneuvering the four-wheeler and keeping Molly from slipping off his lap.

Six climbed the porch and flopped down, tongue lolling. He didn’t move as Kujo dismounted the ATV and carried Molly toward the truck.

When he arrived there, he stood her against the truck, his body pressed to hers to hold her in place, and fumbled with the handle.

“Where are we?” she asked, blinking her eyes open.

“At my cabin about to get into a truck to take you to the hospital.” He opened the door and would have laid her on the front passenger seat, but her hand shot out to grip the truck’s door, blocking him from sliding her into the truck.

“No.”

Tired, achy and past cranky, Kujo frowned down at the woman in his arms. “You need to see a doctor. You could have a concussion, maybe even swelling on your brain. And lord knows if you’ve suffered any spinal cord injuries.”

“Don’t take me to town.”

“Why?”

Her head lolled against his chest, and she closed her eyes again.

“Molly, I need an answer.”

“Please, don’t take me to town.”

“Where else would I take you?”

“I don’t know. But if the man who shot at me finds out I didn’t die, he might not be happy about it.”

“All the more reason to get you to a hospital, and then call the sheriff to report what happened.”

She gripped his shirt. “Please, don’t.”

“I don’t understand. A man shot at you. Do you want to ignore that fact? What if he targets another person?”

“I can’t let him know he wasn’t successful. It’s better if he thinks I’m dead.”

“I’m taking you to the doctor. You’re delirious and not making any sense.” He started to slide toward the open door again, but her hand on the doorframe put a crimp in his effort. “Woman, you’ve been a thorn in my side since we met.”

“You’re not a bundle of happiness, yourself,” she whispered with her eyes still closed. Then she opened them and stared up into his gaze.

Those green orbs pierced him to the heart.

“Please.”

Well, damn. When she put it that way, with the plea in her eyes as well as in her voice, how could he say no?

He sighed. “Where do you want me to take you?”

“Can’t go back to my room in Eagle Rock,” she mumbled. Then she shot a glance toward the old hunting cabin and the surrounding wilderness. “This place looks deserted. How about here?”

Kujo shook his head. “No way.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Because it’s my place, and I don’t share it with women.”

“For a couple days?” she pleaded, her voice fading as her body seemed to lose all the muscles holding it together. “I promise not to be a pain—”

“Sweetheart, it’s too late for that kind of promise. You’ve been nothing but a giant pain in my ass since I ran into you on the ridge earlier.”

Since she’d already passed out again, he had no choice. Lifting her in his arms, he marched across the clearing to the porch steps and climbed up to where Six lay, taking it all in as if he’d known all along the woman wasn’t going anywhere.

“Traitor,” Kujo said as he kicked the door to the cabin open and carried Molly inside.

Six slipped inside before the door swung shut.