Raven and the Cowboy: A Loveswept Historical Romance by Sandra Chastain Read Free Book Online

forward, making sure Tucker followed.
    The Mexican bandits had clearly been in search of another man besides Tucker. In fact, they’d made it sound as if the two men were partners. And they’d mentioned a treasure. That thought filled Raven’s heart with dread. She knew that Tucker was meant to take her to the keeper of the mountain, but now someone else seemed to know it too.
    Another half hour passed before the sound of rushing water reached Tucker’s ears. Never a man to make trouble where there was none, he’d hidden his anxiety by focusing on the mysterious woman in front of him, wondering how she’d taste, how she’d feel in his arms. He had lulled himself into a dreamlike state by the time Yank threaded his way through the rocks and stepped out onto the sandy bar along the river.
    The horses moved swiftly toward the water. “No! Wait!” Raven drew Onawa to a sudden stop. Yank, closebehind her, lowered his head and halted abruptly in his favorite trick of trying to dislodge Tucker.
    “Not this time, you bag of bones.” Tucker slid off the horse to the ground. But he hadn’t counted on Yank’s continued obstinacy. The Reb might try, but the big horse, determined to have the last word, lowered his head and butted Tucker forward, depositing him in the shallow waters of the Rio Grande.
    “Christ!” he roared, reaching for his hat as it skittered out of reach and started a merry rush downstream. “What in the west side of hell is wrong with you, horse?”
    The animal merely tossed his head and waited.
    Raven smothered a grin as she climbed down and led both animals to the water. She knelt down to drink, then sat back and studied the soft sand. She had to remain calm and give her mind a chance to understand. Sooner or later the spirits would speak to her. Uncertain, she started up the canyon, feeling the vibrant aura of the ground.
    She concentrated on the power that propelled her, stronger now. Someone had been there before them, perhaps the night before. Someone who’d been wounded. The path of his blood was only just visible in the slightly pink sand. Was that how the bandits had followed the trail? No, if the rain had washed most of the blood from the sand, it would have cleansed the rocky surface they had traveled.
    She heard Tucker splash out of the water behind her. She turned and watched him plant his wet Stetson on his head. He wiped the beads of water streaming down his face with the bandanna he’d worn around his neck.
    “Where is he?” she asked.
    “Who? Where’s who?”
    “The man you were traveling with.”
    Tucker blinked, then with an exaggerated motion,wiped the water from his ears. “What man? I may have hit my head, but I know I was alone—that is, until you came along.”
    “Whoever he is, he’s hurt.” She studied the shadows along the eastern side of the canyon. “And he’s hiding somewhere nearby, I think.”
    “How can you tell?” Tucker asked, but he wasn’t certain he wanted to know. The only man he knew to be hurt was the old prospector, and being in the same place with a man holding the secret to a treasure was not a healthy place to be at that moment.
    What he ought to do was get some rest, follow the river back to Colorado, and keep on going west. He’d heard that Oregon was opening up. Good horse country there. If he could come up with a stake, he could raise horses, cattle maybe.
    Cattle were a damned sight better than the pigs being raised on his father’s plantation back home. And it was time he stopped drifting.
    “Tucker, the men who were following us went on past, but we don’t know that the trail won’t lead them to a place where we can be seen. I think we’d better find your partner before they come back.”
    “He’s not my partner.” Tucker picked up Yank’s reins and followed the woman, who seemed to be reading some kind of map in the sand. “I never saw him before he came into the cantina yesterday to play poker.”
    “I see. And what about