The ground leveled at the top of the rise, and he urged the mare into an extended trot. Brandywine was a seasoned trail horse and as surefooted as a mountain goat. She was raw-boned and well muscled, possessing more sense than most of his friends and a heart that rivaled the size of Pikes Peak. He’d ridden her under some brutal conditions, both terrain and weather-wise, and the mare had always kept her head and come through for him. He trusted her with his life—and a good bit more than most people.
The leather saddle beneath him creaked softly as he took the horse down yet another steep incline. Behind him his mule Rebel Yell followed, his steel shoes clanking against the rocky ground.
The wind had picked up and was now coming from the west at a brisk clip. Jake figured he had another hour before heavy weather set in. November in the Colorado Rockies was unpredictable at best, particularly in the higher elevations. He’d gone on many a call-out, looking for weekend warriors who’d left eighty-degree temperatures in Denver wearing T-shirts and sneakers, hiked into the backcountry, and got caught in a snow storm without winter gear. Damn tourists. A little common sense went a long way in the mountains.
He traveled another fifty yards before realizing he’d lost the trail. Puzzled, he pulled up on the reins and backtracked. It wasn’t like him to miss something like that. Jake had been tracking since he was old enough to ride a horse—which was shortly after he’d learned to walk. From a long generation of horse and cattle ranchers, he was as comfortable on horseback as most folks were in their cars.
Fifty yards back, he picked up the tracks again. A sneaker imprint in moist soil. A trampled tuft of buffalo grass. A broken twig where the subject had brushed against it. Then suddenly nothing.
What the hell?
Remembering the corrections official’s warning that the subject could be armed, Jake scanned the immediate area, listening. It was so quiet he could hear the wind whisper through the pines. Beneath him, Brandywine grew restless, her bridle jangling as she tossed her head. The hairs on his nape prickled. It was too quiet. Why weren’t the birds chattering?
“Whoa, girl.” Wondering if his subject had doubled back, he realized he’d just made a rookie’s mistake. Damn.
Tugging on the reins, he nudged the mare’s sides with his heels, sending her quickly backward. Simultaneously he slid the Heckler & Koch .45 from his holster and swung it upward. Adrenaline cut through his gut when he saw a pair of dirty sneakers dangling from the branch of a lodgepole pine ten feet up.
“I’m a police officer.” He backed Brandywine to a safer distance. “Show me your hands.”
Two hands emerged, dirt-streaked but empty nonetheless.
“Come on down out of that tree, ma’am.”
Barely visible from the ground, she was perched precariously on a branch. Jake craned his neck to get a better look at her, hoping to gauge her frame of mind. The instant he made eye contact, the blood stalled in his veins. He’d never seen eyes that color. An intriguing mix of violet and midnight spun into velvet as soft as the mountain sky. Her hair was a jumble of brown streaked with blond. It fell in disarray over her shoulders, each strand curling as tight as a spring, too wild and unusual to be anything but natural.
Jake upheld his earlier opinion that she didn’t look like an escaped convict. The photograph the D.O.C. official had shown them that morning didn’t begin to do this lovely creature justice. From all appearances, neither did the psychological profile. She looked more rational than some people he’d run into in these parts. She even seemed a tad embarrassed at having been caught up in that tree. But, of course, she was the only blonde in prison grays around. Sitting ten feet above the ground on the branch of a lodgepole pine, she fit the bill.
“Ma’am, I’m a deputy sheriff with the Chaffee County Sheriff’s Department. I’d like for you to climb down before you get hurt,” he said. “Right now.”
“How do I know you’re really a cop?”
Her voice drifted down to him like smoke. Her accent held a hint of Appalachia. Jake wondered how in the world this lovely young woman had gotten herself into such terrible trouble with the law.
Unclipping his badge from his belt, he held it up for her to see. “Jake Madigan, Chaffee County Sheriff’s Office. Come on down. Now.”
He heard her sigh, then watched as she slid her feet along the branch, and moved toward the main trunk. “Okay. I’m coming. Just…wait a second. And put that gun away, will you? They make me nervous, especially when they’re pointed at me.”
Jake held the gun steady. “Be careful,” he said.
“Like you care.”
He arched a brow. “Well, I’d hate to have to haul you all the way back to Buena Vista with you screaming your head off because you broke your ankle jumping out of a gosh-darned tree.”
“Believe me, mister, at this point in my life a broken ankle would be the least of my problems.”
He wasn’t going to argue with that; she was definitely in serious trouble. Jake dismounted and ground-tied Brandywine. He looked up to see the woman set both feet on a lower branch. The branch would have been strong enough to support her weight—if it hadn’t been pecked full of holes by a persistent woodpecker. “Ma’am, you don’t want to put your weight on that branch.”
“Don’t tell me how to climb, cowboy. I’ve been climbing trees since I was three years old.”
“That may be true, ma’am, but—”
“I know what I’m do—”
The branch snapped with an audible crack! The woman yelped once, then crashed through a dozen smaller branches on her way down. Jake barely had time to holster his sidearm when a blur of blond hair and prison grays tumbled down and hit the ground with a thud hard enough to make his own spine ache.
“Easy,” he said, approaching her. “Just be still a moment.”
Lying sprawled on her side, she made an inaudible sound that sounded suspiciously like a curse, but she didn’t move.
Oh, hell. Just what he needed—an injured, obstinate and pretty-as-sin prisoner to haul down the mountain. What the hell was he doing volunteering for this stuff when he could be at home shoveling horse manure?
Jake knelt, set his hands firmly against her shoulder, trying not to notice when a mass of curly blond hair swept over his hand. “You all right?”
A grunt emanated from beneath that mass of hair. “Just let me…catch my…breath.”
“Can you move your toes for me?”
He looked down a stretch of leg that seemed to go on forever, saw her toes move beneath the canvas of her sneaker. “Yeah,” she said.
“What about your fingers?”
She wiggled her fingers. “Wow, that really hurt.”
Jake didn’t think she was seriously hurt. But his EMT training—and the ever-present threat of lawsuits against police departments by disgruntled suspects—told him it was always wise to rule out the serious stuff first. “Roll over for me, okay?”
Grunting with the effort, she rolled slowly onto her back. “Ow. Oh, Jeez.”
Jake’s heart rate spiked when he found himself looking down into violet eyes framed by thick, black lashes and a whole lot of attitude he had absolutely no desire to deal with. He’d had his fill of women with attitude and didn’t much like the idea of another helping—especially the con and liar variety.
“Anything hurt?” he asked.
“My hip hurts. And my elbow. Jeez, it feels like I landed on a rock.”
“You just got the wind knocked out of you,” he said.
“Yeah, well, I don’t know about you, but I just happen to be partial to keeping oxygen in my lungs. Makes breathing a hell of a lot easier.”
“You should have thought of that before you climbed that tree. That was a damn fool stunt.”
“For the record, I’m an expert on the damn fool bit, so you may as well get used to it.” Pulling a stick from her hair, she tossed it at him, then sat up.
The prison-issue jumpsuit didn’t do much for her figure, but Jake couldn
’t help but notice the body beneath it. She was long and athletic and the material fell over curves he was a fool for noticing at a moment like this.
“What the hell were you doing up in that tree, anyway?” he asked.
She gave him a that’s-a-really-stupid-question glare that was hot enough to melt snow. “Well, I wasn’t building a tree house.”
“Running from the law isn’t very smart. You always get caught sooner or later.”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I was thinking when you rode by the first time.”
Jake shoved down a rise of annoyance. He could do without the smart mouth. He could damn well do without the way he was responding to those eyes of hers. Eight years in the Marine Corps had taught him discipline, and he’d lived by that code ever since. Twelve years of law enforcement had taught him control, and he’d adopted that code into his personal life, as well. The ethics came from inside the man. Jake prided himself on all those things, characteristics that defined who he was. He wasn’t about to let a siren such as this lure him into the shallows so he could crash on the rocks and die a watery death.
“Are you alone?” Jake stood and stepped back.
She rolled her eyes. “You don’t think there’s anyone else stupid enough to go tromping through this godforsaken countryside for six hours with me, do you?”
“Stand up,” he said.
Grumbling, she struggled to her feet and began brushing the dust and dry grass from her jumpsuit.
Unable to help himself, Jake’s gaze swept the length of her. The instinctive need to do so surprised him—and disturbed him more than he wanted to admit. He wasn’t a gawker when it came to women, no matter how good they were to look at. He’d never had a problem with keeping his male tendencies in check. He wasn’t even sure why he was reacting to this woman now—but he was—and it was starting to tick him off.
“Lace your hands behind your head and turn around,” he said.
Sighing in annoyance, she reluctantly obeyed.
Only when her back was to him did Jake notice the tear in her jumpsuit. It started at her backside and stretched halfway down her thigh. The sight of velvety flesh and the white cotton panties beneath shouldn’t have made his mouth go dry, but it did, and for several long seconds he couldn’t take his eyes off that small, dangerous stretch of flesh.
She must have felt the draft because an instant later she craned her head around and spotted it. “Oh, great.” She lowered her hands. “My pants are ripped.”
“Put your hands up,” Jake said.
“Damn cheap—”
“Put ’em up, ma’am. Now.”
“But my pants are ripped and my—”
Jake cursed.
Compromising, she put one hand on her head, clutched the torn fabric together with her other.
He sighed. Well, wasn’t this a hell of a mess?
Easing his eyes away from the flesh in question, he looked her in the eye. If he’d thought her gaze would be any less mesmerizing than her thigh, he was mistaken. He felt its impact with the force of a hammer striking the head of a spike and driving it deep.
“Probably caught your pants on a branch on the way down,” he offered.
“No thanks to you.” Awkwardly she kept one hand behind her head, the other clutching the tear. “I need a safety pin.”
“Ma’am, I don’t have anything like that.”
“Yeah, you don’t look much like a safety pin kind of guy. I’m sure it would be totally stupid of me to ask if you have a needle and thread in that saddlebag of yours, wouldn’t it?”
Jake watched the color rise into her cheeks, felt his own discomfort grow. He wasn’t sure why her request bothered him, but it did. Probably because he couldn’t fault her for being modest, even if she was a criminal. “I’ve got some sutures we might could use. I’ll have a look in my pack as soon as I get you settled. Maybe we can rig something to get you by.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What do you mean by ‘settled’?”
Jake didn’t like the way the situation was shaping up. Procedure dictated he search her next. By no means did he want to get his hands anywhere near that body. Male officers normally didn’t search female prisoners, but during the briefing the team had been warned that this woman should be considered armed and dangerous. If he’d been in town, he could have radioed for a female officer to assist to do a quick preliminary search for weapons or drugs. But he wasn’t anywhere near a town, and there wasn’t a female officer within fifty miles, so he was going to have to do the deed himself.
Oh, boy.
The thought shouldn’t have rattled him; he’d searched plenty of prisoners before transporting them. Quick. Impersonal. Half the time he found something illegal. But for the first time in the course of his career, Jake felt as if he were out of his element. Man, he needed this like he needed a kick in the head by his mule.
“I’d like for you to step over to the tree and put your hands on the trunk for me,” he said.
She rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me you’re going to—”
“Ma’am, just do as I say.”
“I know the drill.” Clutching the material of her torn jumpsuit, she stalked over to the tree—and put her one free hand against it. Jake swore softly, but didn’t ask her to let go of the tear. He figured he’d be better off if he just didn’t think about that tear at all. He might be a cop, but he’d been cursed with the scourge of being a gentleman, as well. To this day he wasn’t sure if that was his saving grace or his fatal flaw.
“Do you have any weapons or drugs or anything I should know about before I search you?” he asked.
“I don’t have anything on me, except a truckload of really bad luck.” She slapped her other hand against the tree.
Jake tried not to notice when the material parted, exposing a glimpse of her rear end and those white panties. Walking up behind her, he put his hand on her shoulder. “Spread your legs apart for me.”
She did, but it wasn’t far enough, and he nudged the insides of her sneakers with his booted foot. Making a small sound of annoyance, she spread her feet wider. He would search her just enough to make sure she didn’t have a gun or knife. Anything smaller than that, he would just have to deal with when and if the situation arose.
Starting at the top of her head, he ran his hands over her hair. It was so thick and curly, he had to squeeze it between his fingers to make sure she didn’t have anything hidden within that wild mass of curls. As impersonally as possible, Jake swept his hands down the front of her, beneath her arms, careful to check her pockets and out-of-the-way places for weapons sewn into the lining of the jumpsuit. He checked her waistband, hips, the outsides of her thighs, down her legs, even her ankles.
He tried not to notice the way she was shaking as his hands moved swiftly over her. Up until now she’d been holding her own. But there was always something demoralizing about the search that undid people. By the time he was finished, he’d broken a sweat and his own hands weren’t quite steady. He could tell they were both relieved when he stepped back.
“Okay,” he said. “You can turn around.”
She faced him then, but Jake didn’t miss that, for the first time since he’d discovered her hiding in the tree, she didn’t meet his gaze.
He pulled the cuffs from his belt. “Give me your hands.”
Surprising him, she offered her wrists. “Let’s just get this over with. I’m cold and starving and I just want to get warm.”
Jake wasn’t buying the sudden cooperation. Not from this woman who’d risked her life to escape, then covered an amazing amount of terrain that would have exhausted most men.
He looked down at her hands. They were small and soft-looking. A woman’s hands, he thought, only these hands were scratched and bruised. Her fingertips were red from the cold. He reminded himself that she was the one who’d gotten herself into this mess, not him. Still, he’d never been able to let someone suffer if it was within his power to stop it.
Cursin
g silently, he shoved the cuffs into his belt. “Hold on a minute. I’ve got an extra duster you can wear to keep the wind off you.”
“T-thanks.” Her teeth were chattering. “It’s getting colder.”
Pulling the radio from his belt to call for a chopper, Jake started toward Brandywine to get the duster. “RMSAR Homer Two, this is Coyote One. Do you read me? Over.”
Jake wasn’t so sure about the chopper. The winds had kicked up considerably in the past half hour. Once sustained winds reached forty knots, the Bell 412 would be grounded.
“This is Coyote One. RMSAR Homer Two, do you read me?”
“RMSAR Homer Two here, Coyote. You getting snowed on yet?”
“I’m about to. Homer, I’ve got a Ten-Twenty-Six. Expedite. Over.”
“Roger that. Eagle went back to her nest. What’s your Twenty?”
On reaching the horse, Jake glanced over his shoulder to check on his prisoner, but she was gone.
CHAPTER 2
Abby covered the ground at a reckless speed. She stumbled over rocks and brush, zigzagging around gully washers deep enough for a person to fall into and never climb out of. She had to hand it to Cowboy Cop. He’d been decent to her—which was a lot more than she could say for some of the law enforcement types she’d encountered in the past year—but she didn’t have any regrets about taking off. No matter how decent he’d been to her, she knew what the end result would be. There was no way in hell she going to spend the rest of her life in prison for a crime she hadn’t committed.
She’d only put twenty yards between them when she heard a shout behind her. Some cop cliché about stopping or he was going to shoot her. Abby didn’t stop. The curse that followed wasn’t cliché, but the temper behind it made her run even harder. She may have been duped a few times in her life, but she’d garnered some instincts over the years. She was savvy enough about human nature to know the man with the gunmetal eyes and slow drawl wasn’t going to shoot an unarmed woman in the back.