PART 2 — THE WOODEN HORSE THAT LED HER INTO THE MOUNTAINS
“No.”

Morgan Teague looked more tired than dangerous now, but Kate had known him long enough to understand that tired men could be the most unpredictable.

“That’s supposed to warn you about the men I’m riding with,” he said.

Kate glanced at the other three outlaws.

The broad man watched her with open hostility. The gambler had stopped smiling. The young man looked as though he wanted to be anywhere else in the world.

Kate pulled out a chair and sat near the door.

“If you’re warning me, Morgan, you might start by telling me why you robbed Abel.”

Morgan returned to his stew.

“I already told you.”

“You told me a story about money that supposedly belonged to you.”

“Then perhaps you should ask Abel why he kept it.”

“I intend to.”

“Good.”

He took another spoonful of stew.

“Then perhaps you’ll finally hear the truth.”

Kate wanted to demand more, but she could see that Morgan had closed himself off. His jaw was tight, and the hand resting beside his bowl curled into a fist whenever she mentioned Abel.

She had learned a long time ago that pushing a frightened animal into a corner only made it more dangerous.

So she waited.

The station keeper brought her a cup of coffee. She thanked him, kept her revolver within reach, and settled into a chair where she could see both the front door and the window.

She did not sleep.

The men eventually retired to the back room, leaving one lamp burning on the table. The station keeper snored behind a thin partition.

Outside, the wind moved through the pines.

Kate watched the shadows until the eastern sky began to pale.

Then she heard the creak of leather.

A horse stamped in the corral.

Someone whispered.

Kate rose, crossed to the window, and peered through a narrow gap in the curtains.

The four men were saddling their horses.

Morgan stood beside Abel’s sorrel, checking the cinch with practiced hands.

Kate reached for her rifle and hurried to the door.

By the time she stepped outside, the men were already riding away through the trees.

“Morgan!”

He turned in the saddle.

For one second, she thought he might come back.

Instead, he lifted a hand in a gesture that could have been farewell or apology.

Then the forest swallowed them.

Kate swore under her breath and ran to the corral.

Ranger was still there.

So was her saddle.

But something had been left on the ground beside it.

A tiny wooden horse.

She picked it up.

The carving was crude, with one uneven leg and a crooked mane. A small notch had been cut beneath its belly, exactly where a child might hold it while playing.

Kate knew that horse.

Morgan had carved it for her when she was eight years old. She had carried it everywhere for months, until Abel finally built a little shelf for it above the fireplace.

It had stood there for twenty-three years.

Until the night the gold was stolen.

Kate closed her fist around the wooden horse.

Morgan had taken Abel’s money, but he had returned this small piece of her childhood.

Why?

Was it an apology?

A warning?

Or a message that he knew something she did not?

She mounted Ranger and followed the trail.

By late morning, the track entered rough timber. The outlaws were no longer riding carelessly. They crossed shallow creeks, passed over exposed rock, and doubled back through dense patches of pine.

They were trying to hide their trail.

Kate followed anyway.

A fresh scrape on a moss-covered stone told her where one horse had slipped. Broken sage revealed where another had cut too close to a bend. A patch of warm manure beneath a thin crust of snow told her they had passed less than an hour earlier.

At noon, she found a biscuit lying in the grass.

She crouched beside it.

The bread was still relatively fresh, and the birds had not touched it.

The young man had dropped it.

He was nervous, careless, and probably inexperienced.

Kate smiled without humor.

Four outlaws might be able to fool a sheriff who expected them to ride south.

They could not fool a cowgirl who had spent eleven years reading trails across the Idaho country.

The trail climbed steadily.

By midafternoon, Kate reached a ridge overlooking a broad, grassy slope. A thousand sheep scattered across the hillside, their white backs moving like drifting clouds.

Beside a canvas-topped sheep wagon stood a tall man holding a rifle.

Two dogs watched her approach.

The man had a sunburned face, weathered hands, and the calm posture of someone who had once spent years in a saddle. His coat was patched at the elbows, but his rifle was clean, and his eyes missed very little.

They moved from Kate’s face to her rope, her boots, and finally the Diamond Outfit brand on her saddle.

“You’re a long way from the roundup,” he said.

“So are the men I’m following.”

His expression changed slightly.

“How many?”

“Four.”

“Armed?”

“Very.”

“Friends of yours?”

“Not the kind I’d choose.”

One of the dogs moved closer, sniffing Ranger’s stirrup before returning to its master’s side.

The man lowered his rifle a fraction.

“What’s your name?”

“Kate Ingram.”

He studied her.

“Ingram?”

“My father is Abel Ingram.”

At that, the man went very still.

The wind swept across the hillside, carrying the distant bleating of sheep.

Then the stranger looked toward the timbered ridge behind her.

“Those four men,” he said slowly. “One of them riding a sorrel mare?”

“Yes.”

“And one of them named Morgan Teague?”

Kate’s hand tightened around the reins.

“You know him?”

The man didn’t answer immediately.

Instead, he walked to the sheep wagon and pulled a folded paper from beneath a tin cup. It was old, creased, and marked with a faded seal.

He studied it for a moment before looking back at Kate.

“I’ve been waiting eighteen years for someone from your family to come looking for this.”

Kate stared at the paper.

“What is it?”

“Proof.”

“Proof of what?”

He glanced toward the mountains.

“Proof that the money those men stole may not be the real reason they’re riding north.”

Kate felt the cold settle beneath her ribs.

“Then tell me what is.”

The shepherd folded the paper and tucked it into his coat.

“Not out here.”

He nodded toward a narrow trail disappearing into the pines.

“If Morgan Teague is involved, you need to understand something before you follow him any farther.”

“What?”

The man’s expression darkened.

“Your father wasn’t the only person who lost everything eighteen years ago.”

Kate looked at the wooden horse in her palm.

Then at the trail ahead.

For the first time since leaving the ranch, she wondered whether she was chasing four thieves—or walking straight into a secret that had been waiting for her since childhood.