Ty's arms closed around Janna, lifting her off her feet. "The same thought occurred to me about every other step," he said roughly, "but worst of all was watching you stand in front of Zebra and knowing there wasn't a damn thing I could do if things went to hell." He held Janna hard and close, savoring the feel of her in his arms, her living warmth and resilience and the sweet rush of her breath against his neck. "God, little one, it's good to be alive and holding you."

A cool wind swirled down the plateau's face, trailing the sound of thunder behind. Reluctantly Ty released Janna and set her back on her feet. A moment later he fished the crumpled rain poncho from his backpack. Without a word he tugged the waterproof folds over Janna.

"That should do it," he said. "Now let's get off this exposed slope before lightning has better luck at killing us than that damn trail did."

With the casual strength that kept surprising Janna, Ty tossed her onto Zebra's back.

"Don't wait for me. Just get off the slope," Ty said to Janna. He stepped back and smacked Zebra lightly on her haunch. "Get to it, horse. And you keep your rider hair side up or I'll skin you for a sofa covering."

Zebra took to the path again with an eagerness that said more plainly than words that the mustang understood the danger of being caught out in the open during a storm. Lucifer was just as eager to see the last of the exposed trail leading from the foot of the plateau to the lowlands beyond, but his injury forced a slower pace. Limping heavily, the stallion started off down the rocky decline.

Out in the distance to the east, blue-black buttes and localized thunderstorms were intermixed with golden cataracts of light where sunshine poured through gaps between squall lines. Overhead, lightning played through the massed clouds and the wind increased in power.

By the time Lucifer and Ty reached the place where the plateau merged with the lower canyon lands beyond, the last luminous shafts of sunlight had slowly merged with the thunderstorm gathering overhead, leaving behind an odd, sourceless gloaming that made every feature of the land stand forth as though outlined in pale gold. The effect lasted for only a few minutes, until the first sweeping veils of rain came down, blending sky and land into one seamless whole. Lightning danced across the land on incandescent feet, while thunder rumbled behind its shimmering, elusive mistress.

"Well, son," Ty said, pulling his hat down tighter against the wind and pelting rain, "this cloud's silver lining is that no self-respecting renegade is going to be out chasing around in the rain."

If that fact cheered Lucifer, the horse didn't show it. He limped along with his ears half-laid-back in warning of his surly temper. Ty felt the same way himself. With luck the storm would turn out to be a small, fast-moving squall line. Without luck, the rain would last for hours. With bad luck, the slot leading into Janna's hidden canyon would be too deep with runoff water from the thunderstorm for them to enter and they would have to spend another night in the open.

Janna was worrying about the same thing. If she were alone, she would have hurried Zebra toward the miles-distant slot. But she wasn't alone, and despite Lucifer's best efforts, his shuffling, painful walk meant that it would be several hours before they reached the haven of her hidden canyon.

The rain quickly limited visibility to a few hundred yards, making scouting both impossible and unnecessary. Janna turned Zebra and retraced her steps until she saw Lucifer and Ty. She slid off Zebra arid fell into step beside Ty.

"Go ahead on to the canyon," he said. "No sense in you catching your death out in the rain."

"It will be dark an hour before you get to the slot. You'll miss it. Besides, you know how it is with misery. I was feeling like a little company."

Ty thought of objecting more forcefully to Janna's presence but didn't. Part of him agreed with her that he would have trouble finding the narrow slot in the dark in the rain, because the only other time he had been through it from this direction he had been more dead than alive. But the real reason he didn't object was that he enjoyed having Janna beside him, her fingers laced through his, their hands slowly warming with shared body heat.

"Janna?" Ty asked after a long time of rain and silence, voicing a thought that had been nagging at him for hours.

"Yes?"

"Why did you risk your life holding on to Lucifer in that ravine?"

"I didn't want Troon to get him again."

"But you heard the renegades. You had to figure that Troon was as good as dead. You could have let Lucifer go, but you didn't. You hung on despite the danger to yourself."

Janna said nothing.

"Sugar? Why?"

"I promised you a chance to gentle Lucifer," Janna said simply. "There would never be a better chance than in that small ravine."

Ty swore very softly. "I thought it was something crazy like that. Listen to me. You're free of that promise you made. Do you hear me? If Lucifer decides to take off in twelve different directions, that's my problem, not yours. You just get the hell out of the way where you won't get hurt." Ty waited but she said nothing. " Janna?"

"I heard you."

"Do I have your word that if Lucifer bolts or goes loco, you'll get out of the way instead of trying to help?"

"Ty-"

"Give me your word," he interrupted, "or so help me God I'll turn around right now and walk back to Wyoming and to hell with that damned black stud."

"But he's your future, the only way you'll get a chance to buy your silken-"

Ty interrupted with a burst of language that was both savage and obscene. It was a mile before Janna had the courage to break the silence that had followed.

"I promise," she said finally. "I don't understand why you won't let me help you, but-"

"You don't understand?" Ty demanded fiercely, cutting off Janna's words once more. "You must have a damned poor opinion of me if you think I'd build my dream on top of your dead body!"

"I never meant anything like that!" Janna said instantly, shocked that Ty had misunderstood her words. "I know you'd never do something that awful. You're much too kind and gentle and generous."

Ty's laughter was as harsh as his swearing had been, for he knew that a man who was kind or gentle or generous wouldn't have eased his violent hunger at the cost of Janna's innocence. But Ty had done just that and now she was no longer innocent… and worst of all, he couldn't bring himself to truly repent his action. The ecstasy he had known within Janna's body was too great, too consuming, to ever be repudiated.

If he had it to do all over again, he would no more be able to preserve Janna's virginity than he had been the first time. She was wildness and grace and elemental fire, and he was a man who had hungered a lifetime for all three without knowing it. She had sensed his needs, given herself to him and had required nothing of him in return. Not one damn thing.

And he felt the silken strands of her innocence and generosity twining more tightly around him with each moment, binding him.

"Do you do it on purpose?" Ty demanded angrily.

"What?"

"Give everything and ask nothing and thereby chain me to you tighter than any steel manacles could."

Janna felt as though she had been struck. The cold rain that had been making her miserable became her friend, for it hid the tears and disappointment she was too tired to conceal. When Ty had swept her up in his arms and held her as fiercely as she had held him, she had begun to hope that he cared more for her than simply as a sexual convenience. When he had held her hand and walked in companionable silence with her through the storm, she had been certain that he cared for her.

What she hadn't realized was that he would resent that caring, and her.