Cassidy Kane had the forger tied to a post inside the Copperline Saloon, and she still didn't know the one thing she'd bled for. The rope held. The man wept. But the man who'd cut the scar under her hat had ridden out of Duskfall days ago, and this forger was the last mouth that might say where. She pressed her thumb to the silver at her belt, cut from another man who ran. "South, north, a name," she said. "Give me one and I leave you your teeth." The forger only shook. He knew paper, not roads. Cassidy felt the trail going cold in her hands. The swinging doors creaked. A short, bearded man came in with a coiled rope at his hip and dust to his knees. He looked at the bound forger, then at Cassidy, and did not reach for a gun. "You're choking a well that's already dry," Cole Ryder said. "A rope brings a man back. Fear just makes him lie faster." "And you are?" "Tracking cattle thieves three days now. Nine head from an old rancher." He nodded at the forger. "I know his kind. He'll trade before he'll suffer. You just asked wrong." Before Cassidy could answer, a woman stepped through the doors behind him. Black hair, amber eyes, a revolver already in her hand. Cassidy's own hand dropped to her belt. "Easy," the woman said. Quiet, flat. "I want the same man you do. He rode through here yesterday." Cassidy Tempest holstered the gun to show her hands. "He stole my father's deed. Forty acres. Last thing I own from a dead man." She looked at the scar's edge under Cassidy Kane's hat and understood without asking. "He hurt you too." Two women hunting one thief. Cassidy Kane weighed it fast. "You saw which way he went." "West. Toward the mesas." Tempest got quieter. "Alone, he's faster than either of us. Together, he's caught." Cole knelt by the forger and loosened the rope one turn. "Tell the truth and I'll take you to a jail, not a grave." The forger gasped and talked. He'd sold the scarred man a fresh horse and a false name to ride under. West. A town past the black mesas. It matched Tempest's word. The trail was warm again. Cassidy Kane hauled the forger up. She had what her father needed and what she needed both. "Cole takes him in. We ride west." "We," Tempest said. Not a question. They led the forger out into the failing light. Two horses waited at the rail. But as Cassidy swung up, she saw dust rising on the west road already, moving away, fast. He hadn't stopped in that town. He was still running, and he'd gotten a full day ahead while she wrung a weeping man dry. The chase was on now, and she was behind.

The dust on the west road had already thinned when Cassidy Kane spurred her horse after it. The mare stumbled inside a mile. Her sides heaved. Foam flecked her neck. Cassidy pulled up and felt the truth in the animal's shaking legs. The scarred man had a full day's start and a fresh mount. She had a tired horse and a cold trail getting colder. Cassidy Tempest reined in beside her. She looked at the failing mare, then at the empty road. "You'll kill her before noon," she said. "Then you'll walk. He'll ride." "Then I walk." "No. We think." Tempest pointed west, where a fenced oval sat off the road. Weathered barriers ringed a track of packed dirt. A painted board hung over the gate. Men leaned on the rails, watching horses run. "A man who buys fast horses knows where fast horses are sold. So do racing men." Cole Ryder rode up behind them, the bound forger slumped across his saddle. He had stayed on to see the thief taken in, not just talked out of a chair. He studied the track and the row of stalls beside it. "A tired horse loses a race," Cole said. "A fresh one wins it. You don't need his trail. You need his kind of horse." They rode to the stalls. Weathered planks, open fronts, rails worn smooth. A wiry man forked hay to a bay inside one. Cassidy swung down and showed him silver from her belt. She described the scarred man and the horse he'd bought in Duskfall. The man kept forking hay. "Lots of men buy horses." Tempest stepped in close. Her voice dropped, flat and quiet. "He came through yesterday. He was in a hurry. A man in a hurry pays too much and remembers wrong." She set coin on the rail. "You remember right." The man looked at the coin. "One like that. Bought a second horse off me at dark. Paid double, no haggle. Wanted to ride through the night." He nodded south, away from the mesas. "Cut south. Said the mesa road was watched." South. Not west. The thief had doubled back to throw them. Cassidy's hand tightened on the rail. "He's got two horses now. He's faster, not slower." "He's faster on the wrong road for us," Tempest said. "But now we know the road." Cole loosened his lasso and looked at the mare. "Trade her here. Buy fresh. Chase a man on two horses with two rested ones, not one dead one." They bought two racing horses with the last of Cassidy's silver. The trail was warm again, but it bent south now, and the man had doubled his lead. Cassidy climbed onto the fresh horse and turned it away from the mesas. She was still behind. Now she knew exactly where.