Cherished
Authors: Jill Gregory
Tags: #fiction, #romance, #adventure, #historical romance, #sensuous, #western romance, #jill gregory
By Jill Gregory
Smashwords Edition, August 2011
Copyright 2011 © Jill Gregory
Formatted by
A Thirsty Mind
Cover Design by Marsha Canham
First published by Dell Publishing, 1991 All rights
reserved. No part of this may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without permission except in the case of brief
quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters,
places and incidents are either products of the author’s
imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events,
locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All
rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
without permission in writing from Jill Gregory.
To Rachel, who dares to dream and to dance—with
all my love forever
Table of Contents
Excerpt from Daisies in the Wind
Excerpt
from
When
the
Heart
Beckons
New Mexico Territory,
March 1873
Reese Kincaid was a liar, a coward, and a
murdering thief who had never earned an honest dollar in his life,
but there was one thing he was damned good at, and that was laying
an ambush. And as he laid out the ambush for Cole Rawdon, the
bounty hunter who had been making his life a living hell for the
past weeks, a demon light of joy sprang into his coal-black eyes.
Kincaid gazed around at the hard, grizzled faces of his gang in
triumph.
“There ain’t no way in hell Rawdon’s going to
ride out of this place alive,” he crowed.
His four companions and the redheaded whore,
Garnet, squirming on his lap, all chuckled happily.
The hideout cabin where they waited was a
squalid pesthole of a place, square-walled and dank. Filthy with
spittle and discarded coffee grounds and dead flies, it was
furnished with little more than a half-dozen roughly carved chairs
circling a scarred pine table. It reeked of sweat and tobacco and
whiskey—but no more so than did its six inhabitants. Everything in
the cabin, from the torn and grimy bedding scattered about the dirt
floor to the piles of unwashed dishes heaped on the table, all
encrusted with remnants of food and crawling with ants, looked as
foul and disreputable as the five men and one woman who waited with
such malicious glee for Cole Rawdon. Reese Kincaid felt even more
feverish anticipation than the others. He wanted Rawdon bad.
Rawdon had been pursuing Kincaid for weeks
now with the cold-blooded relentlessness and uncanny tracking
skills that had earned him a reputation among the bandits and
desperadoes of New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. Kincaid was
desperate and wily, a man much experienced at evading the law, but
even he recognized it was only sheer luck that had kept him one
step ahead of Cole Rawdon for this long. Now, though, things were
going to be different. The hunter was about to become the prey.
Kincaid had Rawdon right where he wanted him—or he would, soon as
the bounty hunter rode that paint horse of his into the canyon.
Rawdon knew about this cabin at the bottom of Stone Canyon—Garnet
had seen to that. Her girl friends in the saloon in Black Creek by
now had told him all about the snug little hideout seventy miles
from the town, and he was so eager for that reward money waiting
back in Tucson, and so damned sure of himself, that he’d be after
Kincaid like a thunderbolt.
Cole Rawdon was as fearless as he was
determined, and Kincaid knew it. That was the most frightening
thing about him. That and the fact that he was good with his gun.
Too damn good. Even though he was barely twenty-eight years old,
his reputation throughout the southwest territories was practically
a legend already. The hombre never missed. It was enough to make
anyone sweat bullets just to hear about it. But, Kincaid reflected
as he stroked Garnet’s lithe body with a filthy, callused hand and
ordered Ed to bring him more whiskey, he had the advantage now.
Brains and cunning would win out over guts and skill. There was no
way he could lose. Rawdon didn’t know that the rest of the gang was
here in the canyon, too, that they’d slipped in one by one over the
past few nights, after splitting up following the Tucson stagecoach
job last month. Now they were all back together again, just in time
to prepare a neat little welcome for Cole Rawdon.
Hell
,
Kincaid thought, his florid, heavy face flushed with pleasure as he
nuzzled the whore’s neck and then paused to inhale a deep swig of
whiskey,
I think I’ll kill him slow, one bullet at a time, each
fired about an hour apart and in a different place. And the last
one
, he decided with a grin,
will go right between his
eyes
.
The sun was just coming up outside the cabin
window, touching the sage-colored hills with a faint yellow-gray
light. Kincaid shoved Garnet away and pushed back his chair. Time
to get ready. He didn’t want any mistakes or any surprises. He
stood up, his blood heating with anticipation of the ambush ahead.
Barking out his orders, he sent each member of his gang stomping
off to take his assigned place.
Kincaid peered past the grime-streaked
curtain at the distant empty mesa overlooking the canyon. In stark
contrast to the squalid cabin, the mesa was quiet. Peaceful. Almost
eerily calm in the growing light of the new dawn. Up above, the sky
was turning blue as a mountain lake. Not a cloud to be seen. Birds
sang in the juniper tree outside the window.
Yep
, Reese
Kincaid thought, grinning out from beneath the dingy mane of brown
hair that hung over his face. It was going to be a real fine day
for a killing.
* * *
Cole Rawdon worked his way to the lip of
Stone Canyon with the stealth of an Indian. He had learned much
from Sun Eagle during the time he had spent with the Cheyenne, and
it had served him well in his present occupation. Though he was a
tall young man, with broad shoulders, and a well-muscled, powerful
frame, he had the ability to step as lightly as a feather when he
wished to remain undetected. He wished that now.
Cole spotted the lookout man first, crouched
in a high crevice of rock north of the canyon’s entrance, a rifle
in his hands. The rough, handsome planes of the bounty hunter’s
face showed no emotion, but a grim smile just touched the edges of
his lips. It never reached his eyes. Since he could move about more
silently on foot, he had left his horse, Arrow, tied in a grassy
dell well out of sight and hearing. Now he slowly crept upward and
across the ledge of rock, toward the lookout. His movements were
lithe and graceful; he was more like a shadow slipping among the
rocks than a man. His hard young features were set with
single-minded purpose, and his remarkable vivid eyes shone with
cold blue fire as he made his way toward the man watching the
canyon entrance from high above.
Cole came upon him from behind, and quick as
a flash had one powerful arm around the man’s neck. The lookout
never stood a chance against his larger, stronger unseen foe. When
his victim had slumped into unconsciousness, Cole trussed him
efficiently and then moved on, with no wasted time or movement.
Always he was listening, watching. It was these incredible
abilities at keen perception combined with razor-sharp reaction
that had kept him alive all these years in the wildest, most savage
regions of the frontier. Only once had he been caught unawares, a
long time ago. But he’d been little more than a kid then, seventeen
years old, green and foolish. He’d been lonely and stupid enough to
trust another human being—a mistake he would never make again. That
one time had taught him well—never to trust any man, or any woman.
Ever.
Of course, Jess Burrows and Liza White were
both dead now. But the lessons of greed and betrayal they had
taught Cole would be with him forever. He’d never forget the way a
beautiful woman could lie and deceive, smiling all the while, or
the way a man who said he was a friend could shoot you in the back
and leave you for dead in the scorched heart of the desert, without
blinking an eye. He ought to thank them. They had tried to kill
him, but they had only made him stronger. They had taught him to
stand alone, to steer clear of all entanglements with others of his
species. They had taught him what it took to survive.
And now they were the ones dead and buried,
Cole reflected, scanning the desolate cliffs and boulders with a
practiced eye. And he was still here, too ornery to bid the world
adiós
until he’d sent a
few more no-good hombres to hell first.
By the time the sun had come full up in the
sapphire sky, he had found and knocked cold two more of Kincaid’s
men.
There were no more to be found, none that he
could see anywhere around the steep walls of the canyon. That meant
the fourth member of the gang, Ed Weeks, was holed up in the cabin
with Kincaid, probably posted near a window. Rawdon got his horse,
and headed for the entrance without wasting further time. Two
against one, considering the circumstances, were fair odds.
Ed Weeks grinned when he saw the lean,
sun-bronzed bounty hunter ride toward the clearing. Murphy, Burr,
and Slade would be right behind him, hemming Rawdon in. He cocked
his Remington revolver and stuck it out the window. Ed had an
impulsive, fun-loving nature. He always liked to be the one to get
things rolling, but he knew Kincaid would be mad as fire if he
jumped the gun. Squinting against the glare of the rising sun, he
waited and watched as the bounty hunter took cover behind a
boulder.
Won’t do you no good, Rawdon
, Ed chuckled to
himself. Then he waited for the fun to start.
Crouched behind the boulder, with just the
tip of his Stetson showing, Cole scanned the cabin and its
surroundings with a keen, sweeping glance. When he was satisfied
with his assessment of the layout, he moved on to the next step of
the hunt. It was a well-worn, all too familiar process. He’d give
Kincaid a chance to turn himself in alive. He doubted if the outlaw
would take advantage of it. It didn’t matter to Cole, though,
either way. The reward would be turned over to him whether the
fugitive was brought back dead or alive.
“Kincaid!” he roared.
An instant later the cabin door opened and
Reese Kincaid stepped outside into the light.
“Howdy, Rawdon.”
The outlaw was one of those big, clumsy men
who swagger when they walk, and he swaggered now across the patchy
grass of the clearing. His gut stuck out beneath his plaid shirt,
and his gunbelt, slung tight across heavy hips, emphasized his huge
girth. Even from this distance, Cole could smell the foul stench of
his greasy, sweat-soaked clothes, though the girl who slithered out
of the cabin after him, clad only in a dirty chemise, appeared not
to notice or care. She was watching Kincaid with proud, possessive
eyes, and she giggled when he yelled for the bounty hunter to show
himself.
But when Cole stood up and strode forward,
Garnet gasped. She hadn’t expected anyone as handsome, nonchalant,
and yet deadly-looking as the black-haired bounty hunter who came
forward with easy strides and perfect composure. His thick midnight
hair just reached his shirt collar, glinting like coal in the
bright light of midday. Beneath his hat, she saw eyes the color of
sapphires, but so cold, so merciless, they filled her with sudden
terror. He had wide shoulders and a broad, muscular chest beneath
his shirt and leather vest. His stomach was flat and lean.
Tight-fitting trousers encased powerful thighs and legs, and were
tucked into calf-leather boots. A gunbelt with a polished silver
and turquoise buckle that was the only adornment he wore completed
his attire—except for the big pair of silver-handled .44 Colts he
wore with the ease of a man wholly comfortable with killing. Garnet
had seen a great many rough men in her day—gamblers, outlaws,
drifters, and cowhands—but there was something about this one that
made her shiver and hug her bare arms about herself. Handsome
devil, that’s what he was. And both words equally fit: Cole Rawdon
was undeniably, stunningly, irresistibly handsome. And yet there
was a look about him, something in the hard, cold planes of his
bronzed face, that told her he was as tough and mean as the devil
himself.
Handsome devil
, Garnet whispered to herself, and
fought the urge to dart back into the cabin and run for cover.