Large boulders and river rock lined the banks of the stream. Tristan had never cleared a footpath, so she picked her way, stepping over looming stones when she could, circling them when she couldn't. In her exhaustion, she no longer noticed her surroundings and scarcely heard the soothing whisper of the breeze in the cottonwoods. Her sense of awareness had become centered on one thing, making her feet move. It didn't matter that her stomach was cramping or that the muscles in her legs were quivering and aching. All she could allow herself to think about was the vegetable garden, because it was the only thing that would keep her and her baby alive next winter.

With that thought looming in her mind, Laura chose her footholds and started over another boulder. As she stepped onto the rock, the sole of her high-button shoe lost purchase. Waving her arms, she tried frantically to keep her balance. As she scrambled for another foothold, her legs shot out from under her and she pitched sideways into a crevice between the stones.

The next instant pain exploded in her temple, and everything went utterly black. The last sound that registered in her mind was the clanking of the empty bucket as it hit the rocks.

"Where the hell is the bitch?"

Francisco picked up the screaming infant and started to jostle him. He studied the dim cabin, recalling how protective the Cheney woman had been of her son. She wouldn't have wandered far. Yet his men couldn't find her.

"Did you check down by the creek?" he asked Parker.

"We spotted some tracks leading that way, but they petered out at the rocks. Johnson checked all along the banks. He didn't find a sign of her."

Francisco offered the newborn a grimy knuckle to suck. "Son of a bitch. Where could she have gone?" He stepped to the unshuttered window to peruse the sky. It was well over an hour past noon. Strike and flee, that was his motto. He couldn't remain here much longer, not without running a risk. "Did someone comb the hillside behind the house? She might have tried to hide."

Even as he said the words, Francisco doubted them. A woman who stood her ground with only a broom as a weapon wasn't likely to abandon her baby when she saw a group of riders approaching.

"No sign of her up on the hill, either." Parker swept off his hat to scratch his grizzled blond hair. "Strange. It's like she vanished."

Francisco thinned his lips. "A woman doesn't just vanish."

A thoughtful frown pleated his brow. Maybe he had misread the Cheney woman. What if she hadn't been lying to him about her neighbors? The thought made his guts knot. After hearing of her husband's death, she could have left the sleeping infant here while she went to beg assistance from her friends.

"Is her horse gone?"

"Nope," Parker assured him. "Both it and the mule are in the shed. Poorest excuse for a horse I've ever seen, and the mule isn't much better."

Francisco gazed thoughtfully at the can of oysters on the shelf. He could have sworn... Shaking his head, he came back to the moment. If the horse wasn't gone, it didn't seem likely that the Cheney woman could be at the neighbors'. There were no other spreads within easy walking distance, and he didn't think she would have wanted to leave her baby alone too long.

Think being the key word, however, he couldn't gamble that he was right. If she had gone to the neighbors, she might return at any moment. A lone, unarmed woman was one thing. But a woman with a man and three grown sons to back her up was quite another. In a skirmish, Francisco preferred to pick the spot so he and his men had an advantage. There was a wooded hillside behind this cabin and a thick line of trees along the creek, all of which would provide too much cover. He had no guarantee that one of the farmers might not survive a shootout to describe him. Francisco had many names to bandy about, but only one face, and he guarded it closely when he was up to no good. Thus far, that practice had always kept him a step ahead of the law.

Johnson stepped inside the low-ceilinged cabin. After glancing around, he spat tobacco juice on the dirt floor. "She ain't nowhere round close, that's fer sure. What we gonna do now, boss? Wait fer her, or what?"

"We cannot afford to wait." Francisco considered the situation for a moment. "If we take the baby, she will find a way to come after us."

Johnson gave him a blank look. "Yeah? So what're ya gettin' at?"

Francisco jostled the baby again. "Sometimes, amigo, you are so stupid, I wonder if you have brains or straw between those dirty ears of yours." He shifted the infant to his shoulder. "Use your head, yes?"

"But, Gonzales! If she gets help and follows us, we stand to get our asses shot off. Folks don't take kindly to baby stealers."

"We are over twenty strong," Francisco reminded him, "all of us quick with guns. The law in Denver has its hands full right now with the Indians. If she goes for help, the sheriff won't be able to spare her but one or two men, if that many. We can pick the spot for a confrontation. Are you saying you're afraid of a couple of dirt diggers, amigo?"

Johnson fidgeted. "Hell no, I ain't afraid. But I thought the plan was to get the bitch, diddle her for a week or so, and then take her down to Mexico so we could sell her."

Francisco smiled slowly. "If she comes after us with a small volunteer posse, what is to stop us from doing just that? We will trade the baby to the Indians, just as we planned, and leave a very good trail for them to follow while we're at it."

Understanding finally dawned on the thin gringo's face. "And we'll snatch her?"

A cold glint came into Francisco's eyes. "That or kill her. She has seen my face, my friend, and that, I cannot let pass."

"She can't prove nothing. What's to say you took her kid?"

"She will have her suspicions. I prefer not to risk seeing her in a courtroom one day, called as a witness to identify me."

"How are we going to feed the brat without her along?"

Francisco curled a gentle hand over the newborn's silken head. "He won't be the first infant to survive for a couple of days on broth and a sugar tit."

Laura slowly opened her eyes and tried to focus, uncertain where she was. Pain. In her head, along her back, at her hip. She felt as if someone had bludgeoned her. As though she were lying in a box, walls of gray rose all around her. She stared at the rectangle of sky above her. The sun slanted at her, angry yellow in a nimbus of blinding white. Cottonwood leaves danced in flickering splendor against azure, the silvered limbs of the trees dipping and swaying gracefully. She could hear the creek gurgling near her somewhere.

With a muffled groan, she tried to turn her head. A hard surface butted her temple. She slid her gaze sideways. A rock. Slowly, her sense of reality returned. Lots of rocks. She was surrounded by them. How on earth?

Memory flooded back. She had been hauling water. Her shoe had slipped on a boulder. She had started to fall.

"Oh, dear God! Jonathan!"

Clenching her teeth against the agony of movement, Laura clawed at the rocks and scrambled to her feet. When she straightened, blood rushed to her head, and pain exploded in varying shades of black within her skull. She staggered and grabbed on to a boulder for support. How long had she lain here? Minutes, hours? From the position of the sun, she suspected the latter.

She made her way out of the rocks. Her baby. He might have choked. Or smothered in his blankets. Her sweet, helpless little baby!

When she reached the house, Laura nearly fell into the room in her haste. She was halfway across the packed dirt floor before the condition of the interior registered. The place had been ransacked, the camelback trunks emptied, the shelves swept clean. The burlap bags on the bed vomited straw.

"Jonathan!" She raced to the little crate that had served as his bed. When she saw it was empty, she clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle a scream. Gone? Whirling, she panned the room. Through parted fingers, she cried, "Jonathan?"

For a moment, she thought a bear must have come into the cabin, but then she saw that the damage had been wreaked methodically and that certain items were missing. Her hand mirror, the blanket from the bed, the can of oysters on the shelf. And her baby.

She steeled herself against a cold, crawling fear. Who in God's name would steal a child? Jagged little whimpers began coming up her throat. She gulped to stifle them and ran outside. Once in the yard, she started to run in one direction, then wheeled to go in another.

"Jonathan!" she screamed on the crest of a tearing sob. "Jonathan, where are you...?"

Only silence and the whisper of the afternoon breeze floated back to her. Her breath coming in shallow pants, she turned in a circle. Her gaze fell to the churned up earth. Horses had been here. A number of them. Hugging her waist, she staggered about the yard. Boot prints. The cuts of spurs. A picture of the Mexican's leering face flashed before her.

"Oh, God. Oh, God, help me."

Laura knew from experience that God only helped those who helped themselves. She made a conscious effort to pace her breathing and walked the yard in ever-widening circles. At last she spotted what she was searching for, hoofprints heading away from the cabin. She lifted her gaze in that direction. North, they had taken Jonathan north. Or was it northeast? Hoping to use the sun as a reference point, she anxiously searched the sky, silently damning herself for her own ignorance. The sun changed direction with the seasons. Didn't it? This wasn't Boston, for God's sake. There were no street signs. Why hadn't she demanded that Tristan teach her how to find her way out here?

In all her life, Laura had never felt so inadequate. Curling her hands into fists, she tried to sort fact from hysteria. Some men on horseback had been here. They had stolen her baby. She had to do something. But what? Chase them? Her mare was in as sorry shape as she was.

The mare! Terrified that she might find an empty stall, Laura raced to the lean-to barn. Her relief was so great when she saw the mare and mule that she nearly fell to her knees. Without the animals, she had no means of making it to Denver. But of course they were here. A swaybacked horse and an ancient mule? They weren't worth stealing. The only thing on the whole place worth taking had been Jonathan. And, of course, her mother's watch. Wheeling, she ran back to the cabin.

She paused inside the door to get her breath. Calm down. You have to think. Moving toward the bed, she saw that the stuffing of each burlap sack had been searched, which meant her mother's watch had probably been found. On the off chance that it hadn't, she sifted through the straw. Her one means of getting supplies for the coming winter was gone.

This can't be happening. I'm having a nightmare. That's all. Only, it wasn't a nightmare. Her gaze caught on the crock where she kept her savings. She checked inside and discovered that her three pennies had been overlooked by the thieves, not that the sum would help her much. Woodenly she stumbled to Jonathan's crate. Only one of his flannel blankets had been left. She reached to touch the softness. Her baby. She could almost feel the warmth of him clasped in her arms.

Nearly strangling on a sob, she clenched her fingers in the blanket. Pressing it to her face, she inhaled the sweet scent. As she tried to sort her thoughts, only one thing came clear. She had to get her son back, and to accomplish that, she was going to need help.

Chapter 3.

*Dusk was falling quickly three hours later when Laura hesitated on the uneven boardwalk. She gazed across Blake Street at the flank of keystone arches that fronted the Elephant Corral, a popular Denver saloon. A pole banner sporting a tusked elephant jutted from above the second-story windows, beyond which Laura assumed were rooms where a lonely man could rent a bed and the company of a sporting woman for the night. Tristan had returned home from Denver more than once smelling of perfume.

Down on the banks of Cherry Creek to her right, several well-armed soldiers from the First Colorado hooted with laughter at the antics of four pigs that had been caught rooting in some discarded brandy cherries. Laura couldn't decide who was acting silliest, the swine or the men, and it was certainly debatable who was the more intoxicated. To her right, a group of rifle-toting male civilians stood on a corner, passing a liquor flask.

Trying to gather enough courage to cross the street, Laura hunched her shoulders and hugged her jacket close against the nippy night wind that whistled along the avenue between the rows of buildings. Carried by the breeze, a white piece of paper skipped along a wagon wheel rut. She glimpsed large block print that read, PURGE COLORADO OF MURDERING SAVAGES.

Trouble with the Indians. As if she needed another complication. Grit blew in her eyes, and she blinked away tears, not at all certain they were caused by the sting. Why now, of all times? She needed help.

Desperately. But with a Cheyenne uprising threatening the town, the sheriff doubted she could find a single, God-fearing man, including him, who would leave his family or the citizens of Denver right now to help her.

Everyone she had approached thus far had been sympathetic. It was a terrible thing, her child being kidnapped. At any other time they would muster volunteers but at present, every able-bodied man was needed here. Surely she could understand.

Laura understood, all right. From the sheriff on down, every man she spoke with had implied the same thing. She had one hope of assistance, and that from a fellow who was anything but God-fearing. She stared at the saloon, wishing this nightmare away. But wishes were for fools and children, not grown women who knew better. She had to go in there, and the longer she stood here prevaricating, the more difficult it would be.

According to the sheriff, Deke Sheridan, the best tracker in the territory, had just ridden in from a cattle drive and could probably be found at the Elephant Corral, his preferred drinking establishment. "He's not the kind of gent I'd normally recommend to a lady," the lawman had apologized. "Raised by the Cheyenne, you know, and right now that doesn't make him too popular. From what I've heard, he feels a lot of loyalty to the Indians, and some folks wonder whose side he'll take in a fracas. His being so fast with a gun makes people uneasy about turning their backs on him. Not quite civilized, if you know what I mean."

A chill had run up Laura's spine upon hearing that. "Not quite civilized?" she repeated.

The sheriff shrugged. "He's the best we've got to offer. Look on the bright side, Mrs. Cheney. There's not a man in this whole territory who can hold a candle to him when it comes to sniffing out a trail. And given his Cheyenne background, he's one of the few white men I know who can ride around out there right now without fear of losing his scalp."

Recalling the conversation, Laura shivered again. Raised by Indians and not quite civilized? What about her scalp? Or wasn't that a consideration? The sheriff said a family named Huntgate had been massacred by Cheyennes only three days ago southeast of Denver. Their mutilated bodies had been displayed over at the post office in an attempt to shock people into taking retaliatory action. Now she was being advised to seek the aid of a man rumored to be more loyal to the Cheyenne than the whites?

"Mind you, when he's here in town, it seems to me trouble finds him instead of the other way around," the sheriff had assured her. "Could be that folks are doing him a disservice with the ugly talk. Feelings are running kind of high around here against anyone associated with the Cheyenne."

Somehow Laura didn't find that very comforting.

A drunk staggered from the saloon into the street. The sound of rowdy voices and laughter trailed out behind him from the dimly lit saloon. She dug her fingernails into the velvet nap of her jacket. It looked to her as if half the able-bodied men in Denver were busy getting drunk and disorderly. If the Cheyennes did attack, they'd certainly have easy pickings.

"Hey there, honeybee! What you doin' out here all alone?"

The deep voice startled Laura, and she whirled to confront two men who had somehow approached from the left without her hearing them. As they drew near, the stench of whiskey and sour sweat blasted her in the face. Before she could move, the smaller of the two grabbed her arm.

"Well, now, aren't you a pretty little surprise."

Frightened, Laura tried to break free. "Unhand me, sirrah!"

"Hey. No need to be unfriendly," the taller one said. "If there's trouble later tonight, you'll be mighty glad of our acquaintance." He patted the gun on his hip. "You can bet them Huntgate females learned firsthand why white women prefer death to capture by Indians. Thanks to fellows like me and Gerald, you gals here in Denver don't have to worry."

At the moment, the biggest threat to Laura's peace of mind didn't come from savages. With a violent twist of her body, she wrenched away and stumbled off the boardwalk into the street. As she retreated toward the saloon, she straightened her jacket and tried not to look intimidated. When she had put enough distance between herself and the men to feel safe, she turned her back on them and ran.

The sound of male laughter and catcalls coming from inside the saloon grew louder as she gained the opposite boardwalk, but Laura didn't allow herself time to worry about it. As dangerous as he might be, Deke Sheridan was the only hope she had.

As she pushed open the door of the Elephant Corral, three intoxicated men spilled out over the threshold. She executed a quick sidestep. With a ribald laugh, one of the men clamped an arm around her waist and spun her in a clumsy dance step. Before Laura could extricate herself from his rib-crushing hold, he twirled her into the arms of a companion. Already light-headed from recent childbirth and the blow to her temple, she was as intent on warding off dizziness as she was their groping hands.

"She's as drunk as we are!" one man noted with a laugh.

Laura twisted her face aside to evade wet lips, feeling as though she might be sick. To her surprise and great relief, the man holding her relaxed his arms. She staggered free and grasped the doorframe for balance. Before another of the men had an opportunity to grab her, she escaped inside.

A saloon... Laura had envisioned such places. Paintings of naked women. Half-dressed dance girls slinking about and singing ballads. Men slavering over them. Gambling and drunkenness and all manner of wickedness.

The Elephant Corral was nothing like she had pictured. There was a lewd portrait of a hurdy-gurdy girl hanging above the bar, but that was the only similarity. The dancing girls inside were provocatively but fully clothed, and, for the moment at least, no one was singing or seemed to be frothing at the mouth. To her right, two miners had their upper bodies angled over a tabletop to compete at arm wrestling, and they were surrounded by spectators placing bets. As for gaming tables, she could see the dim outlines of them in the far corners of the room, all encircled by patrons, but the clouds of cigar smoke and an oily kerosene haze nearly obscured them.

Feeling horribly out of place, she peered through the lantern lit gloom and searched for a man who looked uncivilized, no easy task for a woman from Boston who was accustomed to seeing gentlemen turned out in frock coats, matching trousers, and brocade satin vests. Big and dark, the sheriff had said when describing Sheridan. She searched for a burly giant with a matted black beard and an Indian feather stuck in his hair. Someone unkempt and lice-infested, the sort whose bear-hide jacket probably had fleas.

When she finally spotted a feather, it wasn't attached to greasy hair as she anticipated, but neatly tucked into a hatband of cobalt trade beads that encircled the crown of a dusty John B. Stetson. She froze and studied the owner of the tan-colored hat carefully. He stood at the bar, one foot propped on the boot rail, his manner suggesting he was oblivious to the hoots and catcalls coming from the arm-wrestling table behind him. Definitely tall and dark, she decided, but the word uncivilized did him an injustice. Lean yet well muscled, with a subtle air of tension about him, he would be better described as dangerous.

He wore tight denim jeans and a blue chambray shirt, the usual garb for a cowboy, but there the comparison ended. Tucked behind his ears, his mahogany hair hung in a thick, gleaming curtain to his shoulders. Instead of the usual leather belt, he wore an Indian-patterned, scarlet sash at his waist and a gun belt slung low over one hip, the holster anchored with buckskin thongs at his thigh. The sleeves had been torn from his shirt, leaving the armholes ragged to reveal sun-burnished and powerfully roped arms.

Though she studied him in profile, she could see that his collar hung open to reveal a bronzed chest with two medallions nestled in the deep cleavage of muscle, one a crudely fashioned disk with a heathen symbol of some sort etched upon its face, the other a sunburst of bear claws. On his feet, he wore knee-high moccasins that sported layers of long fringe from calf to ankle.

The way her luck had been running, there was no question in Laura's mind that he was Deke Sheridan. An absurd blend of savage and white man, he had Indian written all over him, and was obviously proud of it. Feeling paralyzed, she stood there gaping at him, too intimidated to go closer, yet knowing she must. Uncivilized? He probably ate bloody raw meat for breakfast.

As she took a hesitant step toward him, she noticed a large, rust-colored dog curled at his feet. Its massive head at rest on broad paws, the beast looked as unfriendly as its master. Clamped between its wicked looking teeth was a deer foreleg, hide and sinew dangling at the severed knee joint. Laura's stomach lurched, and she missed a step. Another man standing at the bar turned and spied her. Ignoring his come-hither grin, she walked straight by him.

"Mr. Sheridan?" At her approach, the dog dropped the deer leg and snarled, its loose jowls glistening with drool. Laura ignored the warning, convinced the animal wouldn't be allowed in a public place if it were truly vicious. "Pardon me. Are you Mr. Sheridan?"

With a bottle of Mon'gehela whiskey partway to his lips, the owner of the tan Stetson turned to regard her with a gaze as clear as ice shards, barely tinted with blue. Laura didn't know if it was the cast of his sun-darkened skin striking a contrast or if his irises actually lacked pigment. Spiked at the corners with weathered lines and fringed with luxurious sable lashes, his eyes looked as though they had once been a brilliant blue and the sun had bleached them to an unnerving tarnished silver. She knew it was probably her imagination, but she felt stripped by his steady regard, not in a physical way, but emotionally, as if he gazed into her instead of at her. The dog snarled again.

"Who's askin'?" he demanded in a silky voice.

Too rattled to think straight, she replied, "I am, obviously."

Never taking his eyes from her, he put the whiskey bottle to his mouth again, took a long swallow, then wiped his lips with the back of his hand. The lower contours of his face shadowed by a day's growth of beard, his was an arresting countenance, the cheekbones high, the cord of tendon pronounced along his squared jaw. Sharply cut and blatantly masculine, his features had the appearance of chiseled walnut. The high bridge of his nose sported a knot where an old break hadn't mended correctly.

"You got a name," he finally asked, "or do I just call you 'obviously'?"

Laura decided he must be drunk. "I'm Mrs. Laura Cheney."

His gaze flicked downward. "Hello, Mrs. Laura Cheney." With a notable lack of enthusiasm, he added, "Pleased to meet ya."

Laura knew she was a sight. She hadn't taken time to bathe or change her clothing before setting out for Denver. Her skirt was caked with dry mud, her hands were filthy, and God only knew what her hair was doing. Naturally curly, it had an irritating way of defying a braid at the best of times, and this wasn't one of her better moments.

"Well, are you or aren't you?" she pressed.