For my sister Jennifer Eloise Wilkes,

       who always embraces an adventure

      Contents

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

       Copyright

      1

      Angela Taylor backed away until she came up against a wall of solid rock. She was trapped. She counted the odds. Six to one. Not good. She should have gotten off the road when she’d heard them coming. A woman walking alone was considered easy prey. She told herself to calm down, to breathe deeply. These no-good sidewinders didn’t know it, but there was more mettle in her little finger than most women had in their whole bodies. She wasn’t about to give up or give in. Her eyes narrowed, her stance widened, and her hands formed into fists. The six men surrounding her might eventually overwhelm her, but they would pay dearly before they did.

      “Say there, little lady,” one cowboy drawled, “you gonna cooperate, or not?”

      “I’m not.”

      “Ain’t hardly enough of her to go around,” another cowboy complained.

      “Don’t like that look on her face,” a third said. “Plain mean.”

      Another laughed. “You scared, Slim? One woman ain’t no match for—”

      Angel saw the cowboy’s mouth drop and his eyes go wide. At almost the same moment a large male hand clamped around her waist and she was jerked completely off her feet. She clawed and bit and kicked, but her captor didn’t let go. Angel could have wept when she realized that she’d been caught by such an old trick. There weren’t six cowboys. There were seven!

      Only this one apparently didn’t intend to share her with the others. And they weren’t too happy about it.

      “Hey, there! Where you goin’ with her?”

      “That girl belongs to all of us! You bring her back here!”

      “Hells bells! There’s a damned cave in that rock. Look out! He’s gettin’ away with her!”

      “Come on! Let’s go after him!”

      Angel would have screamed but she couldn’t breathe, the seventh man had such a tight hold on her. She struggled mightily in his arms but there was no question of escaping. The arm around her was thick with muscle. From the feel of the hard male body at her back, the rest of him was equally strong. Her feet hadn’t touched ground since he’d grabbed her. They were racing deeper and deeper into the cave, through a labyrinth of tunnels in the rock. It was pitch-black, and she had no idea how the cowboy was going to get them back out again.

      Suddenly they stopped. There was no sound except the man’s harsh breathing and her grunts as she struggled against his strength.

      Another fear, even deeper than that of the man, took hold of her. The dark. She was terrified of the dark. Abruptly she stopped struggling. Her breathing was tortured as fear overwhelmed her and held her paralyzed. Her eyes went wide, seeking the light.

      There was none.

      Angel whimpered, a pitiful, plaintive sound.

      “Be still,” the seventh man hissed.

      But she was in the grip of a terror more powerful than the threat of mere physical harm. The whimper became a low moan.

      The kidnapper’s hand clamped over her mouth just as one of the cowboys in pursuit passed close enough that she could smell a month’s worth of sweat and leather and horse. Angel felt relieved, then horrified as the sound of boots on stone faded into the distance. Better to face six men in the light than one in the dark.

      “You see anything?” one of the searching cowboys yelled to another.

      “Not a damned thing!”

      “We’ll never find them in the dark,” a third ranted.

      “I’m gettin’ outta here. This place is spooked,” another said.

      The voices moved away. They were giving up the hunt. Angel could still hear them. Voices carried in the dark.

      “We can’t let him get away with stealin’ her like that,” a cowboy grumbled.

      “Who said we’re gonna?”

      “What’s that you got there? Dynamite? What’re you gonna do with that?”

      “Blow them to Kingdom Come. Or leastwise trap ’em in there till Judgment Day.”

      “You can’t—”

      “Who’s gonna know? They ain’t gonna tell. ’Sides. It’ll serve ’em both right. If we can’t have her, nobody can.”

      “I ain’t so sure about this,” one cowboy said.

      By then it was too late. Several sticks of dynamite had been lit and tossed into the cave entrance.

      Angel only had a second to acknowledge the fact that they were doomed. Anger flared. She wasn’t ready to die trapped in the dark. She wrenched free and started running for the opening of the cave. She had to escape!

      She heard her captor swear low and mean as he chased her. He grunted with effort as he threw himself bodily at her. His forward motion forced her down hard as he covered her with his body.

      Mere seconds passed before the first explosion came, followed by a second and a third. The sound was deafening. The repercussions rocked the inside walls of the cave. Angel choked on the settling dust, but only a few pebble-sized rocks fell near them.

      “Where the hell did you think you were going?” the man asked as he sat up and brushed himself off.

      “I would think that was obvious.” Angel tried peering through the gloom. She coughed from the dust. “Do you think we can dig ourselves out of here?”