Read Online Holt's Gamble by Barbara Ankrum - Free Book Online Page B

dress from her bag, and put Holt's buckskin shirt aside until she could wash the blood from it. She looked at her red dress one last time before stuffing it into a corner. With a disgusted frown, she decided to dispose of it as soon as she could.
    Outside the wagon, she found Jacob backing a pair of yoked oxen up to the wagon.
    "How is he?" Jacob asked from his place between the two animals.
    "Better. He woke up and took some broth. That's a good sign, I think."
    Jacob nodded silently with a relieved grin on his face and ran the back of his hand across his sweaty brow.
    "Don't 'spect I could'a done any better by him myself. I'm obliged to you for stayin' with him last night—not runnin' off when you had the chance."
    Strangely, Kierin realized that the thought of leaving Holt alone last night had been the farthest thing from her mind. In fact, it hadn't even occurred to her. Jacob's words simply served to remind her of the harsh reality of her situation—that Holt owned her. Once they left Independence, she faced the prospect of years of indenture to him. That fact was now hopelessly entangled with the ragged emotions that warred within her—the ones she had never meant to let loose, the ones that had allowed her to come to care for him.
    Kierin laid a hand on the oxen's smooth meaty haunch and bent to thread the trace through the yoke as Jacob was doing on the other side. She kept her gaze directed down at her work, but could feel Jacob's eyes on her. Finally, she looked up to find that he had stopped his task and leaned one arm across the animal's rump. With the other, he was wiping the back of his neck with a bandanna. But his eyes were no longer on her. They were fixed on some distant point behind her and he straightened suddenly as if he'd been burned.
    "Oh Lord," he murmured, climbing up behind the team onto the wagon's tongue. He reached into the jockey box below the benched wooden seat and pulled out his rifle.
    Her heart jumped to her throat. "What is it, Jacob? What's wrong?"
    Jacob's fluid motion never stopped as he jumped down from the wagon, catching her arm and propelling her to the back of the wagon before she could protest.
    "Posse," was the only word he uttered before he pushed her toward the tailgate and left her there.
    Kierin heard the thundering of hoof beats before she spotted the cloud of dust kicked up by their horses as the sheriff and his posse galloped up to the train's encampment.

 
     
     
    Chapter 4

     
    Kierin's pulse echoed the thunderous rumble of hoof beats as the posse approached the lead wagon. She'd recognized the sheriff and at least two of Talbot's men before she had scrambled up into the safety of Holt's wagon. She cautiously lifted the canvas cover and peeked out as the cloud of dust settled around the riders, whose horses pranced nervously at the abrupt stop.
    From her hiding place, Kierin watched as a tall, strongly built man stepped out from behind the team of oxen at the lead wagon and spoke to the sheriff. The tall man swept his hat casually from his head, swiped at his brow with the back of his sleeve, and replaced the hat again, covering his sun-bleached hair. His stance gave him an air of authority and Kierin guessed he must be the train's leader. A chill ran through her as she waited for him to turn and point in her direction, knowing full well the sheriff had secured Holt's name from Talbot's men.
    Seconds ticked by. She forgot to breathe as she clutched the smooth planked side of the wagon. The men were too far away for her to hear the words that passed between them, but after interminable moments, the blond man finally shook his head, turned, and pointed downriver.
    The sheriff yanked his mount around and galloped away from the encampment with the others. The clods of dirt kicked up from beneath the hooves of the posse's horses pelted the standing wagons and scattered the curious onlookers who had ventured from their own work to see what had caused the stir. Had she