Prologue

A dry, dust-filled wind kicked up, blowing the woman’s skirt to twist around her legs, revealing dark bruises and welts. Her body trembled as the hangman looped the noose around her neck and fear gleamed in her eyes. Her skin was pale, her body trembling. Yet when she spoke, her voice was surprisingly strong. “I curse you and all the men who follow in your line. Your whispers shall be your glory and your downfall until recompense is made for the sin you commit against me and mine.”

Then the hangman jerked the lever, releasing the trap in the floor.

The woman’s eyes widened, and her body fell. Then jerked. She heard a crack, and the world went dark. Then suddenly there was light. She could see her body, dangling from the rope, see the people in the crowd—some horrified by the sight, others making a joke of it.

And she could see him, standing far in the back. There was no smile on his face. His skin was pale, his lips pressed together in a tight line. Perspiration left sheen on his skin, causing him to appear waxen.

A wisp of memory washed through her. She had so loved him. Loved to see his elegant brows drawn together when he was deep in thought, or see the light dance in his eyes when he was filled with merriment.

And his touch. By the saints how his touch had thrilled her. He’d transformed her from a child into a woman, whispering those magic words of seduction, weaving his spell with touch and word.

She had been his. Body and soul. It was all she’d wanted in life. And he had cast her aside. Called her a whore. Oh god, the shame of it. Her family had disowned her, sent her back East to be saved.

Saved. By a preacher more demon than saint. A man who took her as his wife and abused her every day of her life thereafter. She’d borne the whip and the brand and the rapes until her mind threatened to flee and leave her an empty shell.

Until miraculously, salvation had arrived. Some hidden strength had asserted itself in that moment when he raised the cane to her. As if in a dream, she watched the knife in her hand arc up and bury itself in the side of his neck. Watched as his eyes rounded, his mouth worked in spasms and his lifeblood spilled.

Then she had run. Taken the son she’d born of that unholy man and run, back to where it all started, back to the man who had set her on this path. She offered him forgiveness, offered him love. But he scorned her. Called her a whore, a demented whore whose worth was less than the silver dollar he tossed at her in payment for services she’d rendered all those years ago.

Nothing could console the grief that pierced her heart at his words, nor dampen the rage that flared. She snatched up the Winchester rifle he kept propped along the wall of his study. He shouted at her to put the gun down but what tenuous control she’d had on her mind was slipping away like mist in the morning sun.

As if in a dream she felt her finger tighten on the trigger, heard the shout from his young female servant who rushed into the room and saw the look of shock on the girl’s face as her chest exploded. The gun fell from her hands and her legs gave way.

Innocence had died and lay mere feet from her, eyes wide and sightless. Yet evil survived, towering over her, yelling for someone to fetch the sheriff.

She could see it all in her mind as she gazed over the scene, floating weightless above it all, no longer of substance. She knew her guilt and knew that beneath her crime was an innocence that had been stripped from her. There would be forgiveness for her. But not until the evil had been made to pay.