Lake of Fire by Linda Jacobs Page B

for such a small prize? The tall blond man who had ridden away from the stagecoach leaped to mind. Might a person who would kill Angus Spiner and get virtually nothing but her pistol and her mother’s cameo also commit such an atrocity?
    She surveyed the area again, noting that Cord was also edgy. “Do you suppose that outlaw … ?”
    He spat onto the pine straw underfoot. “If not him, then the same kind of scum.”
    Suddenly, Laura’s nostrils were assailed with a newodor that was far viler than the dead before them, like a mixture of rancid grease and vomit. She gagged. Cord whirled away. “Bear!”
    She didn’t see one. Lodgepole grew thick to the canyon’s edge, and none of the trees were thick enough to hide a large animal. But Cord must have recognized the stench, and the poachers’ leavings were excellent bait for large predators.
    As she ran behind Dante, he caught the scent and whinnied. She looked underneath his belly and saw Cord about ten feet away with his back to her, his Colt drawn.
    A low growling and the bear lumbered into her line of view. Big and shaggy, the grizzly padded toward Cord on broad paws studded with claws at least four inches long.
    Dante reared. The grizzly took a look at the horse and appeared to decide the man was more interesting.
    Cord raised the Colt and fired into the air.
    Rather than retreat, the grizzly lumbered toward him.
    He fired again, this time into the animal.
    It didn’t even flinch, but came on. Before Cord could get off another shot, a swipe of paw sent the Colt tumbling.
    Cord dropped to the ground and curled into a ball, his arms over his head. “Mount up, Laura!” he shouted. “Ride!”
    Dante danced and plunged. Laura reached for the reins, but the stallion rolled his eyes and tossed hishead. As she struggled with the horse, her hand fell onto Cord’s 1886 Winchester, sheathed in its scabbard behind the saddle.
    Laura pulled the long gun free and ran out from behind Dante.
    The grizzly swiped a paw at Cord’s back, covered by thin cotton.
    “Over here!” Laura screamed.
    The bear looked at her, and then pulled up onto its hind legs to a height of at least seven feet. Clearly a huge male, he opened his mouth with a curl of snout and roared.
    Raising the rifle to her shoulder, she fired. The gun kicked viciously, and her thumb caught her nose. Nearly blinded by instant, painful tears, she jacked another round into the chamber and fired again.
    The bear fell to all fours and lumbered toward her, covering ground at an astonishing pace. She fought the impulse to drop the Winchester and flee. She’d heard a bear could outrun the fastest horse.
    “Shoot him again!” Cord leaped to his feet and scrambled for his Colt.
    Laura lined up the sights and wavered; she might kill Cord with a wild shot. While she hesitated, the bear rushed her.
    Cord darted left.
    She stood her ground, firing. The grizzly hit like a train, throwing the rifle up into the air and her onto her back. A vile greasy smell filled her head as she was crushed by dead weight.
    With the air knocked out of her, she heard a shout.
    “Dante!”
    A rough shambling of hooves, more commands. “Back. No, go again.”
    Was it her fate to die in this rough land? Each attempt at breath refused to lift her lungs against the weight pressing her into the earth.
    “Dante. Pull.”
    The sharp tone cut into her fading consciousness. If this were her end, how much better here than in some Chicago drawing room where every move and word was measured?
    Then, as though no time had passed, or a thousand years, Laura opened her eyes and looked into sun radiating through the trees. It reminded her of a painting her mother had pointed out in her white leather Bible when Laura was small. Had the sky been any different back when Baby Moses floated in the bulrushes beneath rays of shining light?
    Something touched her arm. “God, Laura …”
    Cord knelt beside her on the litter of pine needles, his bronzed face pinched