Texas Outlaw

by James Patterson

  Ariana loses sight of them when she steps behind her neighbor’s house. She takes off running. She moves at the same pace she would if she was out for a morning run. If anyone sees her, they might not suspect anything is amiss. She doesn’t usually run in jeans and boots—and not at noontime on a summer day when the temperature is so high—but hopefully no one will notice anything unusual.

  A few blocks away, she arrives at the back of Tom and Jessica’s house. Her body is slick with sweat, her jeans and T-shirt sticking to her skin.

  She lets herself in the gate and approaches the outbuilding that houses Tom’s garage and Rory’s apartment. She creeps around the side next to the berry bushes and arrives at the garage bays. The Land Cruiser and Mustang sit inside. She checks the Land Cruiser, and sure enough the keys are in the ignition just like Rory said they would be.

  She fires up the engine, applies the clutch, shifts it into gear, and tries to ease the Cruiser forward. The engine stalls, and she has to start over. Everything about the vehicle is tough. There are no power brakes, so she feels like she’s working out her calf muscles pressing down on the pedal. And there’s no power steering, so she has to wrestle with the wheel.

  Finally, she pulls the Land Cruiser around the house and stops at the edge of the street. Not fifty yards away, Chief Harris’s cruiser is headed her way, with Rory in the passenger seat.

  “Oh, shit,” Ariana says, ducking down.

  After the cruiser passes, she peeks up over the dash. It begins to slow down as it approaches her house. Ariana puts the Land Cruiser in gear and turns onto the street, heading the other way.

  Her hands tremble as she shifts gears.

  She’s a fugitive.

  “Rory,” she says aloud, “I sure hope you know what the hell you’re doing.”

  Chapter 66

  CHIEF HARRIS ROLLS his police cruiser to a stop in front of Ariana’s house. Tom Aaron is on the sidewalk, engaged in an argument with the patrolman stationed out front.

  When we exit the car, Tom approaches the chief, hammering him with questions.

  “Chief, is it true that Detective Delgado is a suspect in the murder of Skip Barnes? Is she also a suspect in the death of Susan Snyder? Are you here to arrest her? What kind—”

  “Tom!” Harris says, practically shouting. “What the hell are you doing here? How did you hear about Ariana?”

  “So it is true,” Tom says, making a note.

  “You didn’t answer my question,” Harris says.

  “You haven’t answered mine.”

  Harris huffs. “Answer mine and I’ll answer yours.”

  “I’m a journalist,” Tom says. “I have my sources. You know I can’t reveal them.”

  Harris glares at me, accusing me without saying a word.

  “Don’t look at me,” I say, holding my hands up.

  It feels weird—wrong—to lie to a member of law enforcement, but compared to what I’ve already done, this is a small transgression.

  The chief turns back to Tom. “Yes, Ariana is a suspect in the murder of Skip Barnes. No, she is not a suspect in the death of Susan Snyder—which we still believe was accidental,” he adds.

  “Are you here to arrest Ariana?” Tom asks.

  The chief nods toward the point-and-shoot camera hanging around Tom’s neck.

  “Get your camera ready,” Harris says. “Maybe you’ll find out.”

  With that, Harris and I approach Ariana’s front door. He knocks forcefully. No noise comes from inside the house. It’s the kind of silence that feels like absence. You can tell no one’s home.

  “Shit,” Harris snaps, drawing his gun.

  “I’ll go around back,” I say, and before he can agree or disagree with my plan, I take off.

  A minute later, I hear Harris kick in the front door with a loud bang. The back door is unlocked, and I let myself in. Harris and I meet halfway in the house, in the living room where Ariana and I sat last night. When we’ve cleared every room and found no sign of her, Harris holsters his gun and stares at me.

  “Let me see your phone,” he sneers.

  “Why?”

  “I want to see if you warned her.”

  I hand over my cell. Not the burner phone—that one is hidden under the seat in my truck. He scrolls through my calls and texts, seeing the only call I made today was early in the morning.

  “Whose number is this?” he says.

  “My dad.”

  He thrusts the phone back to me and then gets in my face.

  “Did you have something to do with this?” he says, his teeth clenched. “You’re in some serious shit if you did.”

  Instead of answering, I say, “We better call the highway patrol. There aren’t but a handful of ways out of this part of the county. If we hurry, they can get roadblocks up.”

  He doesn’t stop glowering at me.

  “She could still be on foot,” I say, acting like his glare isn’t bothering me. “You ought to get your patrol officers doing sweeps around town. We’ve got work to do, Chief. Let’s get to it.”

  Finally, he looks away and storms out of the house. I follow, keeping back far enough that when Tom starts snapping pictures of the chief walking out looking furious, I won’t get in the frame.

  “Go home, Tom!” Harris roars, pointing his arm down the street toward Tom’s house.

  An hour later, back at the station, Harris and I have reported the fugitive to the highway patrol and the county sheriff’s office, and we’ve got the local patrol officers searching the Rio Lobo streets and neighborhoods. Harris took a break at one point to go into his office and make a private phone call. I assumed he was calling to update McCormack. Afterward, he seemed in better spirits, and I noticed out the window that suddenly several of McCormack’s trucks were driving up and down the road.

  I have a feeling that McCormack, or whoever Harris talked to, told him that this might be good news. Putting Ariana on trial would always have been problematic. It might have called attention to the crimes and could have blown up in their faces—whoever they are. But if McCormack’s men can find her before the police do, then Ariana might not live long enough to face trial.

  It dawns on me that we might have done exactly what they were hoping. Ariana fleeing arrest might have been part of their plan all along.

  Harris and I are talking by the front desk—pretending as if we trust each other and are on the same side—when Tom Aaron walks into the front lobby.

  “Go away, Tom!” Harris shouts. “I’m not telling you any more information.”

  “It’s not about the article,” Tom says, looking embarrassed. “I’m here to report a crime.”

  Harris frowns.

  “My Land Cruiser has been stolen.”

  This was always a part of the plan, a way for Tom to keep his involvement hidden. If Ariana took his vehicle and he never reported it, that would signal Tom’s involvement. But if he reports it stolen, that makes him look a little more innocent.

  Unfortunately, reporting the theft has its drawbacks for Ariana.

  Harris looks at me and can’t hide a grin.

  “Now we know what she’s driving,” he says.

  Chapter 67

  ARIANA SITS AT the bank of the river where she and Rory went swimming. It was only three days ago that she and Rory stripped off their clothes and dove in. Now, sitting under the same oak tree where Rory hung his gun belt, Ariana is cold, alone, and scared.

  She’s also ashamed. She took an oath to uphold the law. Now she’s broken it—both the law and her oath.

  It’s after midnight, and the desert air has grown cold. She thought about building a fire, but she didn’t want to risk anyone seeing it. It’s not unheard of for high schoolers to come out here and party or make out. There is no sense drawing attention to herself.

  But the darkness sure makes the experience of being a fugitive even more lonely. She didn’t think to pack herself a sleeping bag or change of clothes, not even a long-sleeved shirt. She did
n’t bring any food, either, and now her stomach rumbles.

  A beam of light cuts through the blackness, and Ariana spots a vehicle making its way toward her on the bumpy dirt road. She hides behind the tree and listens as the vehicle pulls up just on the other side of it.

  “Ariana!” a voice calls out. “It’s Rory.”

  She comes from around the tree, and Rory climbs out of his F-150. She throws her arms around him—she can’t help herself—and he holds her in a tight hug. She wants to sob into his chest, but she holds back the tears. This is Rory, the guy who thought she would make a good Texas Ranger. She doesn’t want to behave like a scared little girl.

  “I brought you some food,” he says. “Hungry?”

  “Starving.”

  The two of them sit down to eat in the same spot where they had lunch. Rory brought her a sandwich from the grocery store in town. She can tell on the first bite that he ordered the sandwich just the way she does. She’s surprised he could remember the specifics. That attention to detail must be what makes him a good detective.

  “Where’s the Land Cruiser?” Rory asks.

  She hid it in a canyon about a half mile away. It’s a little more out of sight than here, and she thought it was a good idea not to stay too close to it. When Rory texted her that she should sneak down the arroyo and steal Tom Aaron’s Land Cruiser—the keys would be in it—he’d asked her to meet him tonight at their place. He hadn’t been specific, but she’d known what he meant.

  Now he fills her in on the results of the lab tests, as well as all the efforts within a hundred miles of Rio Lobo to make sure she doesn’t escape.

  “You think they’ll come looking out here in the open space?” she asks.

  “I bet McCormack will send his men out here,” Rory says. “Tomorrow, during daylight, you’ll want to keep your head down.”

  The moonlight reflects on the water. Rory’s face is illuminated just enough to reveal the worry in his expression.

  “What have we done, Rory?”

  “We did what we had to.”

  “What are we going to do now?”

  She can’t hide the desperation in her voice. She can’t believe she’s in this situation.

  Rory tries to reassure her by saying he’s going to report to the station tomorrow like it’s business as usual. He’s going to keep investigating, and Ariana just needs to stay in hiding long enough for him to find a break in the case.

  “You know it’s just a matter of time before they try to get you out of the picture, don’t you?”

  “I hope they do,” he says. “That might give us the break we need. If McCormack sends some guys after me, like he did at my motel room, maybe I can capture one of them this time.”

  “That’s a dangerous game, Rory.”

  “I need something to convince a judge to give us a search warrant for the ranch. I’m sure we’d find something useful if we could just get out there and look around.”

  “I appreciate you saying we, Rory, but you’re on your own now.”

  “Just hang in there, Ariana. We’ll get through this.”

  Rory opens up the storage box on his truck and pulls out a sleeping bag for Ariana. Inside the cab of his truck, he has a grocery bag of canned goods and water bottles.

  “This ought to last you a couple of days,” he says, “but I plan on coming out again tomorrow night.”

  “Can you stay a little longer tonight?” Ariana asks, hating the sound of fear in her voice.

  They sit back down, and Ariana wraps the sleeping bag around her shoulders. She’s shivering, but she thinks it’s more from fear than the cold. Still, Rory scoots closer to her and puts an arm around her shoulders—to warm her or comfort her, or both. Being so near him makes her heart speed up and her stomach do flips. She leans her head into the crook of his neck. She can feel his stubble on her forehead. She wonders what he would do if she tried to kiss him.

  Would he kiss her back?

  She tried to maintain her professional distance from him when he first arrived in town, but the more she got to know him—as a detective and a man—the more she liked him.

  She tries to push away her feelings. He has a girlfriend. It wouldn’t be appropriate. But at a moment like this—with her whole world on the verge of collapse—who can say what’s appropriate and what isn’t?

  They might both be going to jail before this is all over.

  They might both be killed.

  If they’re going to die tomorrow, what harm would it do to kiss him today?

  Chapter 68

  I CAN FEEL Ariana’s warmth against my body, feel her hair on my cheek, smell her natural, intoxicating scent. I know our lives are in complete turmoil right now, but I can’t help but think about what it would be like to kiss her. I even picture us stripping down, like we did two days ago at this same spot, only this time we wouldn’t dive into the water. We would dive into each other, the moonlight dancing on our skin.

  I know I have a girlfriend, but not only does she seem a million miles away but our relationship seems like it happened a lifetime ago. I feel so incredibly distant from Willow, so removed.

  There’s no way Willow and I can survive her living in Nashville and me living in Texas. And if I’m finally honest with myself, there’s no way I’m moving to Tennessee to work in law enforcement there. I’m a Ranger. Texas is where I belong. As long as I can draw breath into my lungs, I want that air to be Texas air.

  The right thing to do is to tell Willow that I’m interested in someone else. I need to break things off before I start anything with Ariana. The problem is Ariana and I might be dead before I ever get that chance.

  If I don’t kiss her now—or soon—I might never be able to.

  But still, it doesn’t feel right. Willow deserves better.

  “I should go,” I say.

  She sits up and looks at me, her big eyes as beautiful in the moonlight as they are in the daylight.

  “You’re probably right,” she says. “You better go before we do something we might regret.”

  I stare at her, take in what she’s saying. She does like me the way I like her.

  “When this is all over,” I say, “I’m going to sit down with Willow and—”

  She shakes her head and interrupts me. “Don’t tell me,” she says. “Let’s just focus on getting out of this mess. If we’re not dead or in jail when this is all over, then we can talk about it.”

  I lean forward and kiss her gently on the forehead.

  “Take care of yourself,” I say. “I’ll try to visit again tomorrow night.”

  To get back to town, I take a meandering route. I did the same thing when I drove out to the open space. At that time, I didn’t want to be followed. Now I want to misdirect anyone who might spot me on the road. I end up coming back into town from the opposite direction of the open space. I pass a patrol car and one of McCormack’s trucks, and I feel certain that the people inside are immediately calling their bosses to report where they saw me driving.

  I tell myself that I’ll need to have an excuse ready for Harris tomorrow. My explanation will be simple: I couldn’t sleep, so I wanted to drive around looking as well.

  He won’t believe it, but hopefully my misdirection won’t tip my hand that Ariana is out in the open space.

  When I finally climb the stairs to my apartment, it’s not far from dawn. I’m dog tired, having hardly slept in days, and I crash down on the bed still wearing my clothes and boots. I tell myself that I’ll just rest for a moment before getting undressed, but before I can get up, I’m adrift in a sea of blackness.

  Out of the darkness comes a dream.

  I’m back in the bank. This time, the robbers are Gareth McCormack and his father. And this time they take a hostage. It’s Ariana. Carson holds his gun to her head while Gareth, up on the bank counter, aims the AR-15 at me.

  When he opens fire, I jerk awake in a cold sweat.

  Bright daylight floods in from the window. My mouth is dry,
as if I’m hungover. I feel like I can still hear the bang, bang, bang of the rifle, but then I realize it’s someone pounding on my door.

  “Rory,” Jessica Aaron calls, her voice tense. “Open up. I want to talk to you. You had no right to rope Tom into your troubles.”

  Chapter 69

  AS I OPEN the door, Tom is running up the stairs to intercept Jessica.

  “Now, Jess,” he says, “leave Rory alone. It was my choice. If you want to be mad at someone, it should be me.”

  She ignores him and scowls at me. But there’s something in what she sees that takes some of the anger out of her expression.

  “You look like hell,” she says to me. “Did you sleep in those clothes?”

  “It’s been a rough couple of days,” I tell her. “I’m sorry about asking Tom to get involved. I just didn’t know what else to do.”

  She exhales loudly. It seems she came here ready to fight, but my apology preempted her. More than that, my haggard appearance—which I’m certain includes puffy eyes, unshaven cheeks, unwashed hair—seems to give her a level of understanding of the pressure I’m under that no words could convey.

  “Come in,” I say. “We can talk if you’d like.”

  “No,” she says. “You get yourself cleaned up and ready for the day. Then come down and I’ll make you breakfast. We’ll talk there.”

  As she walks back down the stairs, Tom says softly, “Sorry. I had to tell her. We don’t keep secrets from each other.”

  “I would never ask you to lie to your wife,” I say, thinking about what I’m keeping from Willow.

  I take a quick shower, run a razor over my stubble, and put on clean clothes. I pin my star to my shirt, wrap my gun belt around my waist, and position my Stetson on my head. I was groggy when I woke up, but now I’m awake and ready.

  I’ve got to get to work and get this case solved. No one else is going to do it. The responsibility falls on my shoulders.

  When I walk into Tom and Jessica’s house, Jessica sets a plate of huevos rancheros on the table and tells me to sit. I didn’t realize how hungry I was until I saw the food. I brought Ariana a sandwich last night, but I forgot to eat dinner myself.