Spirit's Song by Madeline Baker Page A

ahead. He had roused them from bed just after dawn that morning. He had looked after the horses while she prepared breakfast, if beans and hardtack could be considered breakfast. And now they were riding across a seemingly endless prairie of gently waving grass beneath a brassy blue sky. The sun was warm on her back. The horse had an easy rolling gait. If she hadn’t been in such dire circumstances, she might have enjoyed the ride.
    “You on the run, too?”
    Kaylynn sat up, startled to realize she had been dozing, her forehead resting against Ravenhawk’s back. “What?”
    “You sleeping back there?” There was a faint note of amusement in his voice.
    It was, she thought, a very nice voice, for a criminal. Deep and rich.
    He glanced over his shoulder. “You are still back there, aren’t you?”
    “Yes, of course,” she snapped. “Where would I go?”
    “No need to bite my head off, sweetheart.”
    She glared at him. “I really don’t feel like making small talk, Mr. Hawk. And don’t call me sweetheart.”
    “Ravenhawk. It’s all one word. No mister.”
    She stared at him, not knowing what to say.
    “So, do you wanna tell me your name? Sweetheart.”
    “No.”
    Ravenhawk laughed softly, then faced forward again. He had more important things to worry about than the woman riding behind him. He tugged on the cuff that shackled his right hand to the saddle horn. He’d be in a hell of a fix if the horse went down. He glared at Yellow Thunder’s back. Damn the man. The bounty hunter was as persistent as a wolf on the scent of blood.
    Damn! He never should have robbed that bank. There had only been a couple hundred dollars in the vault, hardly worth the risk involved. But he’d needed a stake. He was tired of drifting, tired of wandering aimlessly from one place to another, looking for… He grunted softly. He didn’t know what the hell he was looking for. He’d been a restless wind ever since he could remember, always wanting to see what was beyond the next rise, always looking, searching, never finding whatever it was he was looking for.
    He wasn’t content living with the whites; he wasn’t content living with the Lakota. He had ties to both worlds, and didn’t feel at home in either. Hell, he’d never felt at home anywhere.
    The girl shifted behind him. He stared down at her hands, locked around his waist. Women had never been a problem for him. He’d had more than his share. He didn’t know why they liked him, but they did. All but this one. She looked at him like he was less than the dirt beneath her feet. He wondered what crime she had committed. At first, he had thought she was Yellow Thunder’s woman, but after last night it was obvious she wasn’t staying with the bounty hunter of her own free will, and he wondered how long she had been Yellow Thunder’s prisoner, and if he ever used her to keep warm on long cold nights. The thought of the bounty hunter pawing at the woman bothered him more than it should have.
    They rode all that day, stopping only once to rest the horses.
    Kaylynn groaned softly as she slid from the back of the Appaloosa. Her legs felt like rubber as she walked over and sat down in the shade of a thornberry bush. Sitting on the back of the horse, with nothing between her and sweating horseflesh, left her feeling sticky and dirty and itchy. She gnawed at the jerky the bounty hunter had given her and for a moment she closed her eyes, remembering Mrs. Moseley’s succulent roast beef and whipped potatoes swimming in rich brown gravy. If she ever made it back to her parents’ home again, she was never, ever going to leave.
    She watched the two men. Ravenhawk squatted near the water hole, filling a canteen. Yellow Thunder stood near his horse, idly scratching the roan’s ears as he stared into the distance. She wondered what he was thinking. She had never met a man as hard and cold as the bounty hunter. Merciless was the word that came to mind. She wondered how he had gotten