Praise for the novels of BJ Daniels

  “Daniels is a perennial favorite, and I might go as far as to label her the cowboy whisperer.”

  —BookPage

  “Super read by an excellent writer. Recommended!”

  —Linda Lael Miller, #1 New York Times bestselling author, on Renegade’s Pride

  “BJ Daniels has [the] unique ability to astound with her mystery and suspense.”

  —Under the Covers Book Blog

  “The action will set you on edge.... Daniels has created a story that has suspense to spare.”

  —Fresh Fiction on Redemption

  “Romantic suspense that will keep readers guessing. If you like Longmire, this is the book for you.”

  —RT Book Reviews on Forsaken

  “Daniels is truly an expert at Western romantic suspense.”

  —RT Book Reviews on Atonement

  “Will keep readers on the edge of their chairs from beginning to end.”

  —Booklist on Forsaken

  “Truly amazing crime story for every amateur sleuth.”

  —Fresh Fiction on Mercy

  Dark Side of the River

  BJ Daniels

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  OAKLEY STAFFORD SPURRED her horse as she came bursting out of the ravine headed for the safety of the river bottom. Behind her she could hear the thunder of hooves, pounding as hard as her own blood. Only one rider, but he apparently was determined to catch her, to stop her. She knew that on horseback she could outrun him. That single rider, a cowboy who’d fallen in behind her as she came out of the ravine, wasn’t who she was worried about.

  The real trouble was in the sky behind her. The sound of a small-plane engine growing closer made her heart race. They were coming after her, determined to stop her at all costs. She was outnumbered and they had all the advantages. She could no longer hear the horse and rider behind her, but the sound of the plane’s engine was getting louder. It was flying low, coming up fast behind her.

  If it was the Piper Cub she’d seen earlier, one of the men had been shooting at coyotes from the open window behind the pilot. She knew she would make a much bigger target than a coyote. She was now easy prey.

  The dirt ahead of her was suddenly pocked as a bullet struck it. Dust rose next to her horse, making it shy to the right. Ahead she could see the cover of the thick cottonwoods that lined each side of the Powder River. Once under that dark canopy, at the least the pilot and his passenger wouldn’t have a clear shot at her. If they were the ones who’d just fired on her.

  But the cowboy on the horse behind her was also armed—and maybe even more dangerous. She’d seen him as she’d come racing out of the ravine, getting only a glimpse before she’d heard him shoot. Her only chance was to make it past the trees and the river to the county road...

  Spurring her horse, she leaned forward, urging the mare to go faster, desperate to reach the grove of cottonwoods. She heard the plane pull up and begin to circle, drowning out the sound of hooves behind her. But she knew he was still back there, determined to stop her.

  She couldn’t let him or the others catch her. They would kill her. She knew too much.

  * * *

  COOPER MCKENNA RESTED his arm out the open pickup window as he drove down the familiar county road. After being away this long, he was in no hurry to reach home. The late-June heat blew in along with grasshoppers that flew around the cab. Ahead, huge cottonwoods crowded both sides of the dirt road, making a shaded dark green tunnel. The sun pierced the green leaves to throw shadows across his path as he drove beneath them, the air in here cooler.

  Overhead, puffy white clouds floated in a sea of deep blue above the treetops. He caught only glimpses of the river that began in Wyoming and traveled more than one hundred and fifty miles to empty into the Yellowstone.

  Many claimed that the Powder River was a mile wide, an inch deep and ran uphill. The running joke was that it was too thick to drink and too thin to plow. Captain Clark of the Lewis and Clark Expedition had named it Redstone River. But the Native Americans called it Powder River because the black shores reminded them of gunpowder, and that had stuck.

  The river, the lifeblood of those who lived here, passed right through the heart of the McKenna Ranch. Just the sight of it felt like home. This was where he’d left his heart. After two years of being away, he’d shaken off the dust of the places he’d been, this country calling him home like a migrating bird after a long winter. He’d felt an ache for the familiar, yearning for the rocky bluffs, the spring green of the grasslands and, of course, the river that ran through it.

  He’d passed the ranch sign five miles back and still had another ten miles to go to reach the ranch house. The McKenna Ranch stretched as far as the eye could see, the county road cutting through the heart of it. His eyes were on the road ahead, but his thoughts were as dark as the shadows lurking in the trees.

  The deep ache in his chest wasn’t just for the land or for what he’d lost here. This place had broken his heart. Yet here he was, coming back. He smiled ruefully, knowing what kind of homecoming it could be. He was the middle son of Holden McKenna, a threat to his older brother, Treyton, the self-proclaimed rightful heir of the ranching empire the Holdens had built.

  Cooper was the black sheep, the rebel cowboy everyone believed was a killer. The worst part was, he thought they might be right.

  With a start, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye an instant before the horse and rider came flying out of the cottonwoods. The rider tumbled from the horse, going down hard in the middle of the road in front of the pickup.

  Standing on the brake, Cooper was terrified he wouldn’t get stopped quickly enough on the narrow dirt road. As the pickup shuddered to a stop, he let out the breath he’d been holding before throwing the truck into Park and jumping out.

  Rounding the front of the pickup, he was relieved to see that he hadn’t hit the rider, who was lying on the ground just inches from his bumper, back to him. The horse, wild-eyed and spooked, had run up the road and stopped to look back.

  He spotted the brand. Stafford Ranch? What the hell was the rider doing on McKenna property with the bad blood between the families?

  “That was a nasty spill you took,” he said as the rider groaned. He knelt down, not adding that it had been a dumb-ass thing to do, riding out of the woods like that onto the county road. Picking up the fallen cowboy’s hat, he asked, “You all right?”

  He’d seen his share of cowboys hit the dirt, thrown from their horses for all kinds of reasons. He’d certainly had his share of unexpected dismounts. Cowboys usually just dusted themselves off, limped off to retrieve their horses and were on their way again.

  Another groan. This one had hit the ground pretty hard and wasn’t getting up. Cooper hoped he wasn’t too badly injured. As he leaned over the cowboy, shock rocketed through him as he saw the rider’s face.

  Oakley Stafford? He swore under his breath. He’d just assumed it was a cowboy who’d come busting out of the trees riding way too fast. He’d known Oakley and her older sister, Tilly, all of his life—even though their families had been feuding for years.

  So what the hell had she been doing riding a horse like that—let alone trespassing on the McKenna Ranch? There was no need for trespassing signs. Everyone knew the last place you wanted to get caught was on the McKenna or Stafford ranches without written permission.

  As far back as Cooper could remember, there had been a war going on between their two families. The only thing worse than finding a Stafford on the ranch was for a McKenna to be caught on Stafford land—the equally large ranch that bordered theirs.

  Oakley let out another groan of pain and rolled toward him. He’d been sure that she’d taken worse falls from a horse, so he hadn’t been too concerned that her injuries were serious—until he saw that she was bleeding.

  “Easy, take it easy,” he said as he tried to see where the blood was coming from without moving her too much. “How badly are you hurt?”

  Her eyelids fluttered. “Buttercup,” she managed to whisper as she grimaced in pain.

  He assumed that must be her horse. “Buttercup’s fine,” he assured her. “Where are you injured?”

  “No.” She tried to get up, letting out a cry before falling back in obvious agony. He realized she was hurt much worse than he’d originally thought. He couldn’t tell where the blood was coming from, but it had soaked into the front side of her shirt o
n through to her denim jacket. All he could think was that she must have hit something in the road when she’d fallen.

  “No. Buttercup.” She said it as if he just wasn’t getting it. He wasn’t. Her eyelids fluttered again, then closed, her head falling to the side.

  “Oakley? Oakley?” He pulled out his phone to call 911. As he did, he leaned over farther to see that even the back of her denim jacket was soaked with blood. Startled, he saw a perfectly round hole in the denim. He stared in shock. It made no sense, no sense at all. Oakley hadn’t gotten hurt falling off her horse.

  She’d been shot.

  CHAPTER TWO

  EVEN AS COOPER made the 911 call, he found himself looking toward the woods in the direction Oakley had exited at such speed. “Oakley Stafford’s been shot. I need an ambulance on the county road, about six miles into the McKenna Ranch. Please hurry. My name’s Cooper McKenna. Just...hurry.”

  As he disconnected, the hair quilled on the back of his neck as he peered into the thick cottonwoods now deep in shadow. How the hell had she gotten shot? Why? He remembered her flying out of the trees like she was airborne and onto the road as if...as if she was being chased. What had she been running from? Who? He felt his skin crawl at the thought that her would-be killer could still be in the dense stand of cottonwoods. Watching them? Waiting?

  Rising, he hurried around to his open driver’s-side door and pulled a T-shirt from his duffel, grabbed a roll of duct tape from under his pickup seat and returned to Oakley. He balled up his T-shirt, pressed it to the front where he could see a lump under the skin where the slug hadn’t exited. He duct-taped the T-shirt in place.

  The late-June afternoon was hot. Taking off his own denim jacket, he slipped it under her head. Then he took off the T-shirt he was wearing and pressed it against her left side in the back where the bullet had entered. As he did, he listened for any sound. He could hear crickets chirping somewhere deep in the grove. But it was another sound that made his skin crawl.

  Cooper realized he’d heard it earlier, the buzz of a small-airplane engine. The plane was growing closer. He stayed where he was, leaning against the front bumper of the pickup and keeping pressure on Oakley’s wound.

  The plane grew closer and closer, the sound louder and louder, until he felt the dark shadow of the Piper Cub pass over. The plane flew so low over the road that it barely missed the treetops. He tried to see the call numbers on the side, but only got a glimpse as the plane suddenly veered to the right and disappeared over the trees.

  When he looked up the road, he saw that the plane must have spooked Oakley’s horse. It was no longer standing a dozen yards away. It had either run into the trees or on up the road. He knew he shouldn’t be so worried about the horse. But he kept thinking of Oakley’s urgent expression and the one word she’d uttered before she’d passed out. Buttercup. He was convinced she’d been worried about her horse.

  As the buzz of the plane engine died off, he heard another sound. This one brought comfort. Sirens. He checked Oakley’s pulse, half-afraid they would arrive too late. With relief, he felt it. As the sound of the sirens grew louder, he found himself feeling jumpy. He pulled out his phone and quickly took photos of the scene with his free hand, including the tracks coming out of the trees and Oakley lying in front of his pickup.

  He wasn’t sure what exactly had made him nervous. Maybe it was the memory of being in a position a lot like this before. Only that time, the cops believed that the woman had been murdered and he was the only suspect.

  Here he was again with a woman’s blood on him, no one else in sight and his guns in the pickup he was leaning against. He had an inherent distrust of the law since he knew how they could jump to conclusions.

  As the ambulance roared up in a cloud of dust, he pocketed his phone. A sheriff’s patrol SUV pulled up behind it, but Cooper paid the cruiser little attention. He was anxious for the EMTs who jumped out to get to Oakley quickly.

  “She’s been shot,” he told them as the two techs pushing a gurney hurried to her. “She also took a tumble when she fell off her horse. I didn’t move her but secured the injury to prevent blood loss best I could.”

  “Shot?” Cooper turned to find a young deputy sheriff had joined them. “You shoot her?”

  “No,” he said irritably. He moved to help the EMTs load Oakley into the back of the ambulance and felt a hand clamp down on his bare shoulder.

  “You aren’t going anywhere.”

  “I wasn’t planning to,” he said, turning back to the deputy as he tried not to lose his temper. The deputy’s name tag on the new-looking uniform read Ty Dodson. “You want to hear what happened, or do you want to just make it up as you go?”

  The deputy’s jaw tightened as he pulled out his notebook and pen.

  “You have a gun in that pickup of yours?”

  Cooper swore. “Yes, I have legal weapons, but I didn’t shoot her. I was coming down the road and she came riding out of the trees as if someone was chasing her. If you look over there, you’ll see her horse’s tracks.”

  “She was on horseback?” He glanced around. “So where’s her horse?”

  “A plane came over and spooked it worse than it was already. I think it might have gone on up the road. I’m not sure.” He’d seen that same skeptical look on an officer of the law’s face a few too many times and groaned inwardly.

  “As I was saying, she came flying out of that grove of cottonwoods onto the road and fell off her horse. I hit my brakes... I thought at first that she’d been riding too fast and had just been unseated from her horse. But when I got the truck stopped and jumped out, I saw that she was bleeding and that it was Oakley Stafford and that she’d been shot.”

  “You recognized her? That how you know her name?”

  “I know her.” Cooper didn’t mention that he recognized the brand on her horse first before he’d knelt down beside her and, leaning over her, had finally gotten a look at her face.

  “You say she came riding out of those trees.” The deputy glanced in that direction. “Isn’t that McKenna Ranch property?”

  “You know it is,” he said, trying not to roll his eyes.

  The fact that a Stafford had been on the McKenna Ranch brought up all kinds of questions—and problems.

  “That’s when I realized that she’d been shot.”

  “Who do you think shot her?”

  “I have no idea, but she was shot in the back.” He could feel the deputy’s intent, suspicious gaze on him.

  “Let’s see those guns of yours.” Dodson started toward the pickup.

  “How about we give the sheriff a call.”

  The deputy stopped and looked back. “Why would we do that?”

  “I guess I’d just feel better if we did.”

  Turning, the deputy came back to stand within inches of him. “You know, I don’t think I caught your name.”

  “You never asked. It’s Cooper. Cooper McKenna.”

  The deputy’s gaze flipped up from his notebook to bore into him. “McKenna?”

  “It’s just my last name.”

  “Right. And you just happened to be driving down this road that goes to the McKenna Ranch.”

  Cooper said nothing. “Just call the sheriff. He knows me.”

  “I’m going to do you one better. I’m going to take you to see him. I haven’t been in Powder Crossing long, but I know about the bad blood between the Staffords and the McKennas. I’m going to have to take you in.”

  “You’re arresting me? On what grounds?” He quickly backed off. “Look, I need to find her horse and make sure it’s safe. She was worried about her horse.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I’ll get a shirt out of my pickup. Then I’ll go find her horse and bring it down to the sheriff’s department. Call your boss—”

  The deputy had his hand on the weapon at his hip. “You aren’t going to give me any trouble, are you, McKenna?”

  * * *

  HOLDEN MCKENNA KNEW why the sheriff had called him so quickly. A Stafford woman being shot on his ranch? He rubbed the back of his neck, at a loss for words for a moment. “You’re sure Oakley was shot?” It wasn’t that he’d misheard. He just couldn’t believe it.