Silo Brant was not a man to leave a job half-done. He wanted the water at Cold Springs, and he now had a legal excuse to use violence to get it.

Night fell over the Dragoon borderlands not with a gentle fade, but like an iron door slamming shut. The unbearable heat of the afternoon vanished, replaced by a bitter, mountain-blown cold that made the dry mesquite crackle in the darkness.

Corvin did not sleep in his cabin. Years of scouting in hostiles-controlled territory had taught him that a stone house with a timber door was nothing more than a wooden coffin if men came with fire and rifles in the middle of the night.

Instead, he took his Winchester, a leather canteen, and a heavy wool blanket, laying up on a high limestone ledge fifty yards above his house. From this vantage point, he could see the entire yard, the well, and the white, moonlit ribbon of the northern trail.

By two o'clock in the morning, the valley was drowned in the pale, blue light of a full moon. The wind whispered through the yucca stalks with a dry, papery hiss.

Then, down in the canyon below his perimeter wall, a single iron horseshoe struck stone.

Corvin was instantly awake, his thumb silently pulling back the hammer of his Winchester. He flattened his body against the cold limestone rock, peering over the edge into the flooded moonlight.

Three figures were moving through the mesquite brush near his eastern corral fence. They were on foot, leaving their horses tethered in the dry wash half a mile back. They carried long-barreled rifles and walked with the hunched, deliberate stealth of men intent on murder.

Brant had not waited for the territorial marshal. He had sent his killers under the cover of darkness to finish the job, clear out the lone rancher, and claim that "hostile Apaches" had wiped out the homestead.

Corvin lined up the sights of his rifle on the lead figure—a thick-set man wearing a flat-brimmed beaver hat. His finger tightened on the steel trigger.

Before he could squeeze, a shadow detached itself from the solid granite wall behind the three men.

It did not move like a human being. It moved like a slide of dark rock, soundless and terrifyingly fast.

The tall Apache woman emerged from the moonlight directly behind the last gunman in line. In the pale blue light, her colossal frame looked monstrous. She did not use a gun. She reached forward with broad, powerful arms, her massive hands clamping onto the man's head and chin. With a sickening, sudden twist of her wrists, there was a sharp CRACK that echoed through the silent canyon like a snapping dry branch.

The gunman went instantly limp, dropping into the brush without letting out a single scream.

Before the other two men realized their rear guard had vanished, the giant woman was already upon them. She swung a heavy, jagged piece of granite she held in her right fist, striking the second gunman square in the side of the head. The blow carried enough force to shatter his skull through his thick felt hat. He collapsed face-first into the dirt, his rifle clattering against the rocks.

The lead gunman—the man in the flat-brimmed beaver hat—spun around, his eyes wild with terror as he raised his carbine. "What the—"

He never finished the sentence. The Apache woman closed the distance in a single explosive leap. Her massive hand clamped over the muzzle of his rifle, wrenching the hot steel barrel aside as it discharged into the dirt with a deafening BOOM.

With her other fist, she struck him hard in the chest. The impact sounded like a sledgehammer hitting a wooden barrel. The man was lifted off his feet, his ribs shattering instantly under the sheer weight of her blow, and slammed violently against the granite face of the ridge. He slid into the dirt, coughing blood, his weapon dropping from his useless fingers.

Silence descended upon the canyon once more, broken only by the harsh, heavy gasps of the three dying men in the dust.

Corvin stood up slowly on his ledge, his Winchester still held in both hands, his mouth slightly open in sheer astonishment. In less than fifteen seconds, without firing a single shot, this lone, unarmed woman had dismantled three seasoned border killers as if they were dry twigs.

The giant woman turned slowly toward the high ledge where Corvin stood.

The moonlight caught her face. The dried blood on her temple was fresh again, a thin red line running down her cheekbone from the physical exertion. Her silver-concho belt gleamed brightly against her buckskin dress. Her liquid black eyes locked onto Corvin’s face in the darkness.

She did not speak. She stepped over the body of the last gunman, reached down, and effortlessly picked up his heavy lever-action carbine, along with two leather cartridge belts from the dead men.

She swung the belts over her massive shoulder, looked up at Corvin one last time with that unyielding, chiseling gaze, and retreated into the dark, jagged mouth of the northern canyon.

Corvin lowered his rifle, his knuckles white against the dark walnut stock.

"My God," he whispered to the freezing night air. "She wasn't running away from them. She was hunting them."