Cherished by Jill Gregory Read Free Book Online

them
targets of men like the one she had encountered today, Cole Rawdon.
Cole Rawdon, a bounty hunter, would have shot Tommy—or Wade—if he
had found them. He hunted human beings for a living, tracked them
down like animals, for a monetary reward. She shivered as his image
swam into her mind’s eye.
    She quickly banished it. She didn’t want to
think about him, she didn’t want to remember. He had killed a man
and shown no remorse. He had frightened her, made her faint, and
then ridden off without a backward glance to see how she fared.
    Juliana clenched her hands together,
realizing with a cold, hard knot of fear that the man who had run
into her today was no better than the men who had killed her
parents in their store. He represented violence, death—and
ruthlessness. He was a loathsome animal who would hunt down Wade
and Tommy without a moment’s hesitation if he only knew where to
look.
    She prayed to heaven he never would. For
something told her that Cole Rawdon got what he went after. She
prayed he would never set his sights on Wade and Tommy, and that no
other bloodthirsty bounty hunter or posse would either. With urgent
desperation pounding in her heart, Juliana knew she had to get to
them first.
    For the remainder of the drive she struggled
to put all thoughts of the bounty hunter and the ugly scene in town
out of her mind, and to think of how she could most effectively
search for her brothers. Her determination mounted as each mile
passed. No longer did she want merely to find her brothers, but to
save them. To save them from their own perilous course in life, and
from the brutality of men like Cole Rawdon.
    Just as the pale blue mist of dusk began its
descent over the mountains, she saw, up ahead, the enormous
lantern-lit yard and corrals of the Twin Oaks ranch.
    Suddenly, a chill touched her. The skin at
the back of her neck prickled. She didn’t know why. The two-story
stone ranch house and surrounding buildings looked beautiful
silhouetted against the twilit mountains that rose against a
purpling sky. Rolling and majestic beneath the looming shadow of
the Rockies, the Twin Oaks ranch and environs were an impressive
sight, one that should have filled her with delight and relief. The
long journey was over. Refreshment and hospitality and festivity
awaited. But she had to fight the sudden urge to beg Uncle Edward
to have Mueller turn the buckboard around and head back toward
town.
    Why?
    Nerves, Juliana told herself, irritated.
Stupid, foolish jitters, like the ones that had made her faint.
Nonsense feelings, to be subdued and controlled.
    Cole Rawdon would have called it something
else.
Instinct
. The kind of instinct he used every day to
stay alive. He would have been right.
3
    Tucked away in the foothills of the Rockies,
John Breen’s Twin Oaks ranch was a magnificent monument to the man
who had built it and the center from which he ran his empire.
Stretching over more than 250,000 acres, Twin Oaks was well stocked
with horses, cattle, men, guns, and enough food and provisions to
supply an army outpost for months. The sheds, barns, corrals,
cookhouse, bunkhouse, and other buildings were immaculately
maintained and run with hard-nosed efficiency, like all the rest of
John Breen’s business endeavors, from his mines and lumber mills to
his railroad holdings. But it was the sprawling ranch house, with
its gardens and white-columned verandah, sparkling like a jewel
beneath the jagged hills and purple-shrouded mesas, that was his
special pride and joy. The house was the showpiece of Denver—as
luxurious and grand within as any New York mansion—complete with
paintings, books, flocked wallpaper, Turkish carpets, and mahogany
furniture. The only thing lacking, John Breen felt—had felt for
quite some time—was a mistress to preside over Twin Oaks. A woman,
the perfect woman—the one he chose to be his wife—would complement
and adorn the house more than any accessory or painting he could
purchase from