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       Chapter One

      The trail, narrow and steep, all but disappeared as it wrapped around the sheer mountain ledge. Good thing heights didn’t bother him, Gavin Powell thought as his horse’s hoof slipped and sent a shower of rocks tumbling to the ravine bottom forty feet below. He loosened his reins, giving the paint mare her head. She was small but sure-footed and carefully picked her way along the ledge with the concentration of a tightrope walker.

      This wasn’t a trail for novices—not one on which Gavin took the customers of his family’s riding stable. He’d discovered the trail as a teenager over fifteen years ago and rode it every now and then when he craved peace and solitude.

      Shaking his head, he chuckled dismally. Who’d have ever thought he’d need to retreat to this remote trail in order to find solitude? Not Gavin. Until a few years ago, their nearest neighbors had been fifteen miles down a single lane road that saw little traffic. Now, their nearest neighbors were at the end of the long drive leading from what little remained of Powell Ranch.

      All nine hundred of them.

      Gavin pushed away the thought. He’d come here to relax and unwind, not work himself into a sweat. Besides, if he was going to expend large amounts of mental and emotional energies, it would be on one of his many pressing personal problems, not something he was powerless to change.

      The mare abruptly stopped, balancing on a precipice no wider than her shoulders. Gavin had to tuck his left arm close to his side or rub the sleeve of his denim jacket against the rugged rock face.

      “Come on, Shasta.” He nudged the mare gently. “Now’s not the time to lose your courage.”

      She raised her head but remained rooted in place, her ears twitching slightly and her round eyes staring out across the ravine.

      Rather than nudge her again, Gavin reached for the binoculars he carried in his saddlebags, only to realize he’d forgotten to bring them along. Pushing back the brim of his cowboy hat, he squinted against the glaring noonday sun, searching the peaks and gullies. The mare obviously sensed something, and he trusted her instincts more than he trusted his own.

      All at once, she tensed and let out a shrill whinny, her sides quivering.

      “What do you see, girl?”

      Shasta snorted in reply.

      Gavin continued scanning the rugged mountain terrain. Just as he was ready to call it quits, he spotted movement across the ravine. A black shape traveled down the steep slope, zigzagging between towering saguaro cacti and prickly cholla. Too dark for a mule deer, too large for a coyote and too fast for a human, the shape could be only one thing.

      The wild mustang!

      He reached again for his saddlebags, but he’d forgotten his camera, too. Dammit. Well, he really didn’t need another picture. Especially one from such a far distance. He’d already taken dozens of the mustang, many of which he’d sent to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management when he’d first spotted the horse. All he’d received in response was a polite letter thanking him for the information and giving a weak assurance they would investigate the matter.

      That was June. It was now October.

      The BLM probably figured the horse was an escapee from one of the residents in Mustang Village, the community now occupying the land once belonging to Gavin’s family. Or that the horse had crossed over from the Indian reservation on the other side of the McDowell Mountains. The last wild mustangs left this part of Arizona more than sixty years ago, or so the stories his grandfather used to tell him went. As a teenager, his grandfather had rounded up wild mustangs. No way could this horse be one of them.

      But Gavin’s heart told him different. Maybe, by some miracle, one descendant had survived.

      Gavin was going to capture him. He’d made the decision two months ago when yet another phone call to the BLM yielded absolutely nothing. Even if the horse was simply an escapee, it was in danger from injuries, illness, ranchers not opposed to shooting a wild horse, and possibly predators, though mountain lions in this area were a rarity these days.

      He told himself his intentions were selfless—he was thinking only of the horse’s safety and well-being.

      Truthfully, Gavin wanted the horse for himself. As a tribute.

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