Only 04 - Only Love

freeze.
    Whip didn’t want to think about what would happen after that. He had found more than one man dead of cold or wandering around with no more brains than a bucket of sand, too numbed by cold even to think.
    The reckless trail went on, crossing and recrossing the creek as the deer bounded ahead. The signs of blood became more pronounced and frequent. One deer was tiring, struggling to keep up with its companions.
    The ravine gouged out by the creek became steeper and the way got more rough. Even the deer that weren’t wounded had a hard time of it. Despite having four agile feet apiece, there were signs that the animals slipped on the rough, snowy terrain almost as often as Shannon and Prettyface did.
    Abruptly Shannon’s tracks shortened from a full running stride to a complete halt. Spent shotgun shells poked up from the snow, telling their own story.
    Whip stood in the stirrups and looked around. He quickly sported the remains of the deer. Shannon had dressed it out with an efficiency that told Whip this part of hunting wasn’t new to her. What meat she couldn’t carry, she had strung up on arope over a high branch, keeping the venison beyond the reach of other predators.
    Well, Silent John was good for something, I guess. The hide itself won’t be worth much from all the buckshot holes, and a man will have to be real careful not to crack a tooth on stray chunks of lead, but the meat will fill an empty belly just fine.
    Shannon’s tracks aimed toward a notch just ahead, a side ravine that snaked up and over the shoulder of the mountain. Whip’s past explorations told him that the notch would open out into a steep forested slope about half a mile from the cabin. Except for having to cross a fork of Avalanche Creek several times getting through the notch, the trail was a handy shortcut back to the cabin for someone on foot.
    Whip wasn’t on foot.
    For a moment he was tempted to push as far up the notch as he could on horseback, just to ease the clammy fear in his gut that something had happened to Shannon.
    Don’t be a bigger fool than you already are , Whip advised himself harshly. The trail ahead is no worse than the one behind. There’s no point making Sugarfoot walk in ice water and take a chance of breaking a leg on those damned slippery rocks just to see Shannon’s tracks heading up and out of the notch.
    Yet Whip wanted very much to do just that. The uneasiness that had begun shortly after he started tracking Shannon had grown into flat-out fear.
    Common sense told Whip that Shannon was all right.
    Instinct whispered a different message, her voice calling wildly to him in the silence.
    Abruptly Whip reined Sugarfoot around and headed back down the ravine. Although he wassavagely uneasy, he didn’t hurry the big gelding as it picked its way over the uneven ground. He kept reminding himself that by the time he reached the cabin, Shannon would already be safe inside. There would be a cheerful fire and mint-scented water to wash in and fresh biscuits baking.
    But not for Whip.
    The thought did nothing to shorten the two miles back to the cabin.
    When Whip arrived, there was no smoke coming from the chimney, no scent of biscuits baking—and no tracks coming in from the direction of the notch. The uneasiness that had been riding Whip exploded into raw fear. He spun Sugarfoot around and examined the sparse, windswept forest where Shannon would have descended from the notch to the cabin.
    Nothing was moving.
    Whip yanked open the buckle on his saddlebags and pulled out a telescoping spyglass. He snapped it out to full length and held it up to his eye. Between spaces in the trees, snow gleamed whitely in the growing light.
    Not a single track marred the perfect snow.

17
    W HIP was nearly all the way to the notch itself before he found Shannon. She was in ice water up above her knees, pushing hard on a branch stuck between boulders in the creek.
    Suddenly there was a dry, cracking sound. The branch splintered and Shannon fell headlong into the small pool of water.
    Only then did Whip see what was wrong. Prettyface had slipped while scrambling across the stony creek. Somehow the dog had managed to wedge a hind foot between two boulders. The boulders were too heavy for Shannon to shift aside even an inch.
    From the looks of the broken branches thrown beyond the creek, she hadn’t had much luck finding a sturdy lever to help her free Prettyface.
    When Sugarfoot came to a plunging, snow-scattering