LONELY PLACES by Kaye Spencer writing as A.L.Debran –http://www.kayespencer.com
Lonely Places is a senusal western set in northeastern Colorado in the late 1880s.
Available at:
Cobblestone Press: http://www.cobblestone-press.com/catalog/books/lonelyplaces.htm
BLURB
Wounded and left to die on the Colorado plains, Elliotte Sorin is a woman with incomplete memories. Beau Hyatt saves her life and she vows that with this handsome brooding man she will never be alone again. As his gunfighter past intrudes into their lives, and his absences from her increase, her loneliness deepens.
She turns to Liam Mederi and finds endless love in his welcoming arms and smiling green eyes. Deadly jealousy rages when Beau questions the paternity of her unborn child and the two men meet in a violent confrontation that threatens to destroy more than one life.
EXCERPT
Chapter One
Wrapped in a worn and soiled wool blanket, she rode steadily into the night. She trusted the sorrel gelding to take her away from Greeley and into the obscurity of the vast eastern Colorado plains. The roan packhorse followed doggedly in their wake.
Fading in and out of twilight consciousness with pain and bone weary exhaustion, thoughts of the Man troubled her foggy mind. Is he dead? Is he still coming? Why didn’t I make sure he was dead when I had the chance? I shot him with his own pistol. Surely, he’s dead.
The cool night breeze ceased with the welcome daylight warmth that touched her face. Realizing the gentle sway of her ride had ceased, she opened her eyes to discover the horses standing at the edge of a river, drinking deeply. With a twinge of guilt, she knew she’d pushed the horses too hard. But getting as far away from the Man as fast as possible had been her first priority.
Turning her head to scan the area for shelter, she caught her breath at the sharp pain. She touched her neck and winced. Her wound needed cleaning and suturing, as did the one on her leg. Nudging the sorrel with her heels, they crossed the river.
It took all her energy to tether the horses, where they could reach water and graze, and to remove the saddle and packs. Slumping to the ground beside her packs, she wished for coffee and sleep. Feeling safe enough for the time being, but keeping her shotgun and revolver close at hand, she forced herself to build a small fire to heat water for coffee and for cleaning her wounds.
From a well-worn leather Gladstone bag, she took out a small cracked mirror and a pouch of suturing tools. Settling herself on the ground, she took what she needed from the pouch and dropped the items into the heating water. Leaning the mirror against a stick, she still had to hunch over and cock her head awkwardly to see the cut on her neck. Quickly dipping her fingers into the hot water, she snatched the needle and suturing thread.
Then with a deep breath, gritted teeth, and determination, she tied the first of many small sutures. Thirty minutes later, cursing and sweating from the pain, she washed the blood from the wounds one last time. With no binding cloth available, she tore the sleeves from her flannel shirt and wrapped both wounds. That done, she rested on the blanket, nauseous and shaking.
She watched her horses while sunlight seeped into her battered body, relaxing her. How long had it been? A year and a half? Two years? Though she’d lost track of the time, she could still hear his kind, soft voice as they visited in the lobby of a Chicago hotel while waiting out a blizzard.
She laid her head back, thinking of the green-eyed man she’d known for two snowbound days. She wondered if he was still in London studying law, or back home with his family. Family. She savored the word in her mind. He had family and she was alone. She blinked back tears. The worst part wasn’t that she’d never see him again. It wasn’t even that they didn’t know each other’s names. The worst was that they’d fallen in love. He’d asked her to go with him, marry him. They’d both wanted that, but she hadn’t gone, and now she’d never know if she’d made a mistake.
[Riding on later that night under the protection of the darkness”¦]
The increasing cloud cover gradually cast a milky pall over the stars and he huddled further into her coat and blanket. As she topped a rise from a dry creek bottom, she heard the report of the rifle, and her stomach turned with the sudden falling sensation. She grabbed the saddle horn and clamped her legs to keep her seat. The gelding stumbled down the slope and went to his knees in the deep, loose sand. The packhorse bolted up the opposite bank and into the darkness.
She tried to kick free of the saddle, but took the impact of the next three bullets in rapid succession. Another shot and the gelding collapsed, pinning her under his inert body.
Out of the cold blustery darkness, the Man loomed above her. The deadly barrel of his rifle hovered over her face. “Now we’re even. A life for a life.” His words were cold and venomous.
She knew what he meant. The regret for the deaths of his daughter and grandchild hounded her, but she didn’t want to die. Yanking the revolver from her coat pocket, she swung it on him. Pulling the trigger as fast as she could, she emptied the weapon. Then the blinding flash and deafening crack of a shot from his rifle, and her world went black.
* * * * *
When Beau Hyatt stepped out of the line shack, the diffused brightness of the cloud-covered sunrise on the snow-covered prairie greeted him. There was no breeze, not a whisper of air. He surveyed the rolling landscape and inhaled the cold, crisp air as he saddled his horse and swung into the saddle, glad that the snowfall hadn’t turned into a blizzard overnight.
An hour later, he started down a ravine and pulled up sharply. Damn it. I’ll get myself killed if I’m not more careful. Ahead of him, a packhorse stood over an unmoving horse on the ground. The packhorse nickered and whinnied, glad to see someone. A distant, answering whinny reached his ear. He cocked his head toward the sound, but heard nothing more.
He sat the gray a comfortable and cautious twenty feet away and contemplated the scene. He took in the dead horse with the gear still in place, the packhorse with the lead line dragging, and that there was another over the hill. Slight movement by the dead horse caught his eye.
He frowned and looked around. He stepped down, dropped the reins to ground tie his mount, and walked to the horses. The free side of a blanket trapped under the dead horse flapped in the growing breeze. Squatting on his heels, he lifted an edge of the blanket and snow scattered around him in a swirling gust. He expected to find a body beneath the blanket, but discovering it was a woman caught him completely off guard.
He hesitated. Staying out of other peoples’ business had kept him alive. He stuck his neck out for few people, especially strangers, female or not. Scenes of his life with another woman passed through his mind, but he forced them away.
With an uncharacteristically sympathetic decision, he un-cinched the saddle and pulled the woman, along with the saddle, from under the horse. Once more, he hesitated. If he tried to save her life, his own would be forever changed.
He took off a glove and slipped a bare hand inside her coat. Cool, but warm enough. Her face, ears, and fingers were pink. Matted brown hair stuck to her face with bloody ice crystals and dirt. There was no telling how long she’d been there, but he knew the blanket and the warmth from the dead horse had kept her from freezing.
Grabbing his glove, he stared at his hand. Blood. He pulled her coat open and found her clothing stiff with dried blood while fresh blood trickled from an injury high on her chest or shoulder. Checking further, he found three holes in her coat: two in the upper left shoulder and one on the same side midway down her back.
Antsy and wary, he rocked back on his heels and studied his surroundings, analyzing the situation. No sign of self-defense. The holes in her coat entered from the back. He figured the horse had taken a shot to the flank and had gone down with her still in the saddle.
“Who are you? Why the hell are you out here all alone?” The wind shifted, moving the hair, and a puff of snow hit his face. Time to go. Can’t fix her up out here. Throwing her saddle over the top of the packs on the roan, he took notice of the weapon in the scabbard. A Loomis short barrel 12-gauge shotgun.
He took up the lead line and threw a quick wrap around the saddle horn. Turning back to the woman, his boot hit a solid object. The grip of a handgun poked up through the snow. Grabbing it, he broke it open and found only empty bullet casings. She had tried to defend herself.
He stuffed the revolver in his gun belt, then picked up the woman and mounted the gray. He settled her across the saddle in front of him and held her securely against his body. The snow was falling again and the temperature was dropping.
As they traveled, he studied the woman’s dirt and blood smudged face. A crusted, livid gash on the side of her head appeared to be the source of the dried blood on her face and in her hair. He was still curious about the shotgun. “Why didn’t you use it?”
0 COMMENTS
Cherokee
14 years agoOh wow, I love this cover as well as the blurb, not to mention the characters names…looking forward to reading this one
hugs, Cherokee