The mountain wind moved through the tall pines with a cold warning as Thomas knelt beside the dying woman his dog had found. Her dress was torn, her face bruised, her skin pale and cold. He carried her to his cabin, and as he lifted her, a small piece of paper slipped from her dress. It carried the official seal of the territorial marriage bureau. The name written on it made his heart stop — Victoria Powell, his promised bride, the stranger dying in his arms was the woman he had waited three months for, the woman he thought had abandoned him. But before he could process the truth, three armed men surrounded the cabin. They were hunting her. And now they were hunting him, too.
The mountain wind moved through the tall pines with a cold warning as Thomas knelt beside the dying woman his dog had found. Her dress was torn, her face bruised, her skin pale and cold. He carried her to his cabin, and as he lifted her, a small piece of paper slipped from her dress….
