His mind whirled. Either he was completely out of his head, or she was real. “I…I thought you’d left.”

“Shh. We can’t talk now. There’s no time.”

He tried to make sense of where they were. Why he couldn’t move. Fighting the fog in his head, it finally dawned on him that he was bound with rope. “My…my boot.”

“What?”

“There’s an Arkansas toothpick. In my boot.”

“A toothpick won’t cut through these ropes,” she whispered.

“A knife. It’s a knife.”

“Oh.”

He felt her hand on his leg. “The other one.”

She drew the dagger from his boot, and the blade glinted in the moonlight angling through the tree branches. It seemed to take forever for her to saw through the thick rope, but at last, his hands pulled free.

He rubbed his numbed wrists as she tackled the rope at his ankles. A worrisome thought crossed his mind, and he silently cursed his uncle for putting it there in the first place. As much as he didn’t want to believe she was somehow involved in the recent surge of cattle thefts, he couldn’t think of a legitimate reason for her being there.

“How…how did you find me?” he asked, unable to keep the suspicion out of his voice.

She tossed a nod at the campfire below. “I’ll tell you later.” She cut through the last of the rope.

“Are they asleep?” he asked, moving his feet.

She nodded. “Some more than others.”

It took him a moment to absorb her meaning. “What…what did you do?” he asked, his voice hushed.

She answered beneath her breath. “Let’s just say one of the men had an unfortunate meeting with a rock.”

He stared at her. “You…you could have been hurt.”

In the faint moonlight, her misty eyes sparkled like two gems. “I wasn’t the one who got himself hog-tied.”

“You got me there.” Grimacing, he gingerly touched the back of head and felt an egg-size lump. Pulling his hand away, he reached for his hat and whispered, “I’m mighty obliged for what you did. Just don’t do anythin’ like that again.”

She pursed her lips, but even that small gesture made him forget his pounding head, forget everything but the memory of her sweet lips on his.

“Are you saying that next time, I should just leave you tied up?”

“There’s not gonna be a next time.” He was better suited for raising cattle than tracking down bad guys. Staggering to his feet, he swayed slightly.

She grabbed him by the arm. “You okay?”

He nodded and donned his hat. “Yeah.” She released his arm, and he reached for his gun. His holster was empty.

Together, they climbed to the top of the hill. The going was frustratingly slow. Partly because of the terrain, but mostly because he still felt woozy.

He spotted a dark hump. With a glance at her, he ambled over to have a look.

Well, what do you know? If it wasn’t Charlie Bunker, the man who had sworn up and down that he had mistaken Chase and Emily for a panther.