Code of the Wolf. Susan Krinard

      He didn’t know who Zora was, but this wasn’t the time to ask. He was too busy keeping an eye on Serenity, who had pulled her rifle from its scabbard and moved to a point where she could see around the rocks to the lip of the arroyo. “How do you know Leroy is there?” she asked.

      He couldn’t very well tell her the truth. “I saw one of them stick his head up,” he said. He didn’t tell her that he smelled blood. He hoped it belonged to one of the gang.

      “I have to find Bonnie,” she said. “Zora can take care of herself. But Bonnie—”

      Her voice broke. She was sick with worry, and there was little Jacob could do to reassure her. “Miss Maguire struck me as a lady who can take care of herself, too,” he said. “They may have the men pinned in the arroyo.” He adjusted his gun belt. “Let’s just hope your friends don’t shoot at me when I—”

      “You don’t have to worry,” she said. Her face was as hard as one of the granite peaks rising above them. “I’m going out there myself.”

      “Don’t be stupid,” he said. “They’ll shoot you down as soon as you stick your head out. I know how to get around them. You cover me.”

      Before she could protest, he was running around the rocks, crouched low and ready to shoot. He heard Serenity’s feet crunch on the gritty earth behind him. He prayed she was only getting into position to shoot if one of Leroy’s gang spotted him.

      They didn’t see him until he was within a few feet of the arroyo, and then only because someone out of his sight nearly got him in the leg. He half fell into the arroyo, twisting like a cat so that he landed on his feet and was firing before his boots touched ground.

      There were four horses and three men crowded between the steep walls of the arroyo—Leroy, Hunsaker and Silas—and two bodies sprawled behind them, one male and one female. The man was Stroud, clearly dead, and the woman was Bonnie Maguire. She was lying on her stomach, very still, but breathing.

      Leroy was heavily bandaged, but he wasn’t as badly hurt as Jacob had hoped when he’d seen the outlaw shot. Leroy’s eyes blazed with a very personal hatred.

      Three guns aimed at Jacob. He got Leroy in the bad shoulder again and watched the man go down before the first bullet grazed his own arm. He twisted out of the path of two more bullets and fired again.

      His shot missed, but someone else’s didn’t. Hunsaker fell with a cry. The horses shied and squealed. Hoofbeats pounded at the edge of the arroyo.

      Serenity had ignored his warning.

      “Go back!” he ordered.

      “You’d better give up!” Serenity shouted from her position somewhere above them. “You’re outnumbered!”

      Silas looked wildly toward Jacob and aimed his revolver at the female body at his feet. “Tell her if anyone shoots again, I’ll kill this bitch!”

      Jacob lowered his gun. “Serenity!” he called. “Can you hear me?”

      “I hear you. Are you all right?”

      “Yes.” The slight wound on his arm was already healing, and he was too worried to feel much pain. “Don’t shoot, and tell your friend to hold her fire. They’ve got Bonnie.”

      Neither Silas nor Leroy heard Serenity’s soft wail, but it tore at Jacob’s heart. He swallowed a growl and faced the two men who remained.

      “I warn you,” he said, “if you hurt the woman, you’ll never get out of here alive.”