were the same age and had been friends throughout high school. They had been like brother and sister.
Despite the differences between Pierce and Roxanne, Pierce couldn’t deny Tuck’s request to have Roxanne as one of Julia’s bridesmaids.
He’d told himself that he’d be fine seeing her again, but he’d been wrong. Time hadn’t healed old wounds, as his mother always liked to say. Nothing could cure death. Roxanne had made it clear that when her brother had died, she wanted nothing more to do with Pierce. No wedding, no future…nothing. Even though he knew it was no more than he deserved, it still made his gut twist just to think about it.
All the old feelings he’d had for her hadn’t waned one bit. No amount of dating or bedding other women would wipe Roxanne from his mind. He’d barely even tried, the wounds to his heart still too fresh. He told himself he preferred to be alone. No, he deserved to be alone.
Truth was, no woman measured up to Roxanne and he’d failed her so completely, the damage could never be healed.
At the approaching thunder of hooves, Cetan pranced to the side.
Pierce pulled back on the reins, but the stallion would have none of it. His competitive spirit wouldn’t let another horse catch up or move ahead of him. He arched his back, kicked his hind legs into the air and would have thrown a less experienced rider.
Accustomed to surprising mood swings in the horses he’d tamed from the wild herds of the canyons, Pierce rode out the rough bucking and brought Cetan to a halt.
Roxanne approached with a hint of a smirk curling the corners of her lips.
Pierce’s back teeth ground together. When she pulled in beside him, he eased control on Cetan’s reins and let the stallion take the lead in a steady trot. Pierce didn’t speak or acknowledge her presence. He was afraid of what he might say. Yet, he kept an eye on Roxanne, just in case. She was hurt, and she was in danger. Even though she hated him, he knew he couldn’t live with himself unless he kept her safe.
ROXANNE’S GAZE BORED into Pierce’s back. She should have ridden with Dante and Tuck in the truck. But she knew where she was most comfortable. When trouble struck the badlands of North Dakota, Roxanne preferred to be in the saddle. Besides, she was more likely to find Sweet Jessie and her foal off the beaten path, and they were her priority right now.
The fact that she had been injured, along with Sweet Jessie, wasn’t something Roxanne let herself think about. She didn’t know why anyone would choose to target her—or if he would try to attack her again—but sitting around and thinking about it would drive her crazy. With all the problems she’d been having with the ranch and her finances, the thought of another disaster in her life threatened to crack her self-control. The only way she knew to deal with the strain was to focus on something else—a problem she could fix.
Checking on the horses fit the bill, even if it meant riding with her ex-fiancé.
She’d avoided Pierce since her brother’s death. The only time she saw him was from a distance when they happened to be in Medora, the small town where she purchased supplies. She had noticed that Pierce hadn’t been home much since the explosion, and why should he? His work with the FBI kept him busy. Just like it had kept Mason busy when Pierce had lured him into that danger-filled world.
A booming clap of thunder shook the earth and air around her. The mare beneath her skittered sideways, tossing her head in the air with a frightened whinny.
Roxanne glanced at the incoming storm, doubt tugging at her gut. Maybe they should have waited until the following day to be out on the prairie. With no trees within sight, that left the two horses and riders as the tallest spires within miles—lightning rods for what looked like a nasty storm about to break over the landscape. Easy targets for a determined shooter, should he choose to return. But no, she wasn’t letting herself think about that now. She’d set a mission for herself, and she wasn’t going home until it was completed.
A flash of lightning snaked across the sky, followed closely by an answering rumble. Sassy pulled against the reins and swung back toward the barn and shelter from the oncoming storm.
Roxanne struggled to turn the horse in the direction Pierce and his stallion rode. They had to get to the watering hole and find Sweet Jessie and her foal before wolves or two-legged snakes claimed their lives. The rain would wash away the horse tracks…and the tracks of the dirt bike the Thunder Horse brothers would use to try to track down her shooter.
Ahead, Pierce sat tall in the saddle, his shoulders broad, his dark Lakota hair hanging down just below his collar, straight, thick and jet-black. The cowboy hat on his head shielded his eyes from what little light shone around the approaching cloud bank. Every time Pierce glanced behind him, Roxanne’s heart flipped, stuttered and burst into a frantic pattering.
Damn the man. He’d always had that effect on her. When would she ever get over him? No man had ever captured her heart or imagination like Pierce Thunder Horse.
The truck with two of the other Thunder Horse brothers passed them, followed soon by the four-wheeler. They honked and swung wide of Pierce and Roxanne, kicking up a cloud of dust from the dry prairie floor.
Roxanne settled into a bone-jarring canter, slow enough to conserve the horse’s energy. If they had to go down into the canyon to find Sweet Jessie and her foal, the rain would make the trail even more dangerous than it already was.
Sassy would need all her strength for a coordinated and sure-footed descent.
As they neared the watering hole, Roxanne let out a sigh, half-relieved when she didn’t find the wild mare’s body in the dirt. The wound mustn’t have been too bad, if she was able to get up and leave the area. Still, Roxanne wanted to gauge for herself.
Pierce paused briefly at the watering hole to check for hoofprints and tire tracks, and to compare notes with his brothers.
Roxanne urged her mare slowly toward the canyon’s rim, her gaze darting right and left as well as scanning the ground. Having been shot at once made her paranoid. Every noise caused her to jump. She tried to force herself to focus. The brothers were taking care of the shooter—Roxanne’s job was to take care of the wild horses. She couldn’t let herself get distracted from that. If she did, she’d be reminded how vulnerable and frightened she felt at the thought of a gunman on her trail.
Sweet Jessie had been shot by the pond. The herd had to have been close by at the time of the shooting. Noise from the gunshot would have sent them into the canyon to hide.
In the dirt leading away from the watering hole, Roxanne discovered a trail of dark brown dots. Dried blood and hoofprints. At first they headed for the canyon, but the prints veered south before reaching the canyon’s edge. Unfortunately, where Sweet Jessie’s prints headed south, another, smaller set of hoofprints led directly to the canyon.
“The foal and mare are separated.” Roxanne glanced across at Pierce as he came abreast. “The little one won’t stand a chance if she doesn’t find her mother soon.”
At the edge of the gorge, Roxanne paused, searching for the trailhead where the horses would have dropped down into the canyon below.
“Are you trying to get shot again?” Pierce angled his horse in front of hers. “You’re exposed here on the edge of the canyon. If someone wanted to shoot you once, wouldn’t you think they might be interested in shooting at you again?”
“And
