Sheriff Daddy (Montana Daddies Book 10)

by Laylah Roberts

  Marisol. Rosalind’s niece. Georgina wondered if she should talk to her about the case. But if she’d seen anything of Saber or Tiger then she would have reported it.

  No, she had no reason to bring it up and cause her any grief. She decided to keep going. Except . . . urgh . . . her feet turned her towards the truck which Marisol was unlocking.

  “Hey, where we going?” Kiesha asked.

  “Just saying hello to Marisol.”

  Marisol had climbed up into the truck but hadn’t shut the door. Georgina waved a hand at her.

  “Marisol, hi, I don’t know if you remember me. I’m—”

  “You need to leave,” Marisol said harshly. Her face was pale as she glared down at Georgina.

  She came to a stop. That wasn’t what she was expecting.

  “Wow, that was rude,” Kiesha said.

  “Just go.”

  “I’m sorry to bother you,” Georgina said coolly. She hadn’t expected this. Marisol had helped with the case against her aunt. Georgina hadn’t had much to do with her, but she knew that the others on the task force had. They had said she was co-operative and sweet.

  “I don’t know if you remember me, I’m FBI Agent Georgina James. I was part of the task force that—”

  “Oh shit,” Marisol said. “Why didn’t you just go?”

  “Too late now,” a deep voice said.

  Georgina’s gaze moved to the back seat of the truck, where a man appeared. He’d been hidden in the shadows.

  Oh heck. Saber. His manic eyes moved from her to Kiesha.

  “Get in the truck. Now. Silently. Or this bitch gets it in the head.”

  He raised a gun to Marisol’s head.

  Fuck.

  “You’re in the back with me, FBI Agent James.”

  Ed was going to flip his lid.

  35

  Georgina eyed the gun that Saber held. Could she make a play for it? Try to take it off him?

  No. Too risky while they were driving. It could go off and hit Kiesha or Marisol.

  He’d made them drop all of their bags on the ground before they’d climbed in. Saber could barely stay still. His head moved around, his whole body practically trembled. He had to be on drugs.

  He looked thinner than he had in the photos she’d seen of him. And his clothes were grubby. He also stank, it quickly filled the cab of Marisol’s truck.

  “Dude, if you’re going to kidnap people, you could at least shower first, you know,” Kiesha told him.

  “Shut up, bitch! I don’t need you. If someone has to go first, it’s going to be you.” He swung the gun towards Kiesha, who was in the front passenger seat. She let out a squeak of terror that was echoed by Marisol.

  Georgina tensed, ready to wrestle the gun away from Kiesha’s head.

  “Where are we going, asshole?” she snapped.

  He turned towards her, the gun now aimed at her stomach. That was much better. Her jaw unclenched slightly. A tension headache was starting to form. Ed was going to be pissed that she was getting stressed again after all his hard work to make her relax.

  But she had good reason.

  “You’re going where the fuck I tell you to go. You’re going to tell me where my son is.”

  “I don’t know where Tiger is,” Georgina said calmly. “I thought he was with you.”

  “Bullshit!” he roared and kicked his foot into the back of Marisol’s seat, making her cry out.

  Kiesha gave the other woman a concerned glance as the truck swung across the road.

  “Watch where you’re going, you stupid bitch! I should have known you would betray us! You and that stupid bitch aunt of yours! Fucking betraying me. Do you know what happens to people who double-cross me? They get a bullet to the head.”

  “Hey! Asshole! She doesn’t know anything!” Georgina wanted his attention away from the two scared women in the front of the truck.

  He turned back to her. “Watch your mouth, FBI bitch.”

  “Your insults are so imaginative,” Kiesha said dryly.

  His gun moved to her.

  “Kiesha,” she warned. “Let me handle this.”

  “Nobody is handling anything! Someone is going to get me answers about where my son is or you’re all going to die.”

  “Why are you back now?” she asked. “It’s been months. And he hasn’t reappeared.”

  If Tiger wasn’t hiding out with his father, she figured that meant he was dead. But she wasn’t going to point that out to the lunatic holding a gun on them.

  Something occurred to her. Those few times she’d had a feeling of being watched, had it been him? But would he have been watching her?

  “I thought you would have gone back to Texas. Don’t you have ties to the Devil’s Kings?” she asked.

  “Shut the fuck up,” he snarled. “Up here on the right, traitor.” He kicked at Marisol’s seat again. The truck swerved across the road. “Learn to fucking drive, you cunt!”

  Marisol whimpered.

  They turned onto an old, rough road. One that obviously hadn’t been used in a while. Or whoever lived on it, didn’t want people using it so they kept it in a state of disrepair. Please let someone live down here. Someone who might see them and call the cops.

  She should have stayed at the cabin. But then, if she had, Marisol would be on her own with this maniac. No, better she was here. Of all of them, she had a chance of getting them out of here alive.

  “This road leads to the old Jones place,” Kiesha said. “Is this where you’ve been hiding out? What? And just waiting to grab Marisol? You know that place is haunted right?”

  “Shut up, you cunt.”

  Georgina wished she would heed Saber’s warning. He was on edge. “Took a long time to get you alone, bitch,” he said to Marisol as she pulled up outside a dilapidated two-story wooden home. It looked like it hadn’t been lived in for years. And yeah, she could well believe it was haunted.

  “All of you, get the fuck out and don’t try to run. Or she gets a bullet in her head first.” He gestured towards Kiesha. “After all, I don’t need her.”

  At that chilling reminder, they all got out and were silent as he herded them into the house then into the kitchen. There were few things inside. A blanket and pillow in one room. She guessed that was where he was camping out.

  Something occurred to her as they walked through the house and into the kitchen. “How have you been surviving? How long have you been staying here?”

  “None of your business, bitch.”

  “You’ve been the one robbing houses around here, haven’t you?” she guessed.

  He shoved her and she slid onto her hands and knees. The other two women gasped.

  “Stay back or she gets it,” he roared.

  She turned and tried to get back up, but he backhanded her, sending her flying to the floor again.

  Fuck. She wanted to fight back. But she made herself stay still. That manic look on his face told her that it wouldn’t take much for him to open fire. And she didn’t want the other two women getting hurt. So she lay there until he kicked her. “Get up. You’re all going into the basement. I have something to do. Then I’ll be back for answers.”

  He grinned. And she had a feeling she didn’t want to know how he was planning on getting those answers.

  Fuck.

  36

  Ed rang Georgie’s phone again. It went to voicemail. Why wasn’t she answering?

  “Sheriff!” Jace appeared in the doorway to his office. He was manning the phones while Kiesha was MIA.

  “What is it?”

  “Just got a call from Gigi.”

  “Something wrong at the ranch?” Gigi lived on Sanctuary ranch with her man, Macca.

  “No, she’s in the parking lot behind the ice cream shop. You need to get over there. She said that Marisol has gone missing.”

  Fuck, he grabbed his jacket and rushed out. “Call Sanctuary Ranch, let them know. And get Ranger over there as well.”

  “On it.”r />
  He pulled up behind the ice cream shop. Gigi was standing there. Rob, the owner of the ice cream shop, had his arm around her and there were about five other people standing around. They all stood next to an empty parking spot. He frowned as he spotted the shopping bags scattered on the ground.

  “Gigi?” he asked, coming closer.

  “Oh, Ed, thank goodness you’re here.” She stepped towards him. She was shaking. “Marisol, I think she’s gone missing.”

  “Okay, sweetheart. Calm down. You’re going to make yourself sick.” He helped her over to his truck and opened the passenger door. Then he grabbed a blanket that he kept in the back. He wrapped it around her. “What happened? Where was Marisol when you last saw her?”

  “We’ve been shopping in town. We were just leaving and heading towards the truck, but I had to go to the bathroom. I called out to her that I’d be a moment. But then I got waylaid by Mrs. Western who was telling me about what happened to Matilda and the naked pee-pee robber.”

  He winced at that nickname. That poor guy was never going to live that down. Turned out he hadn’t been attempting to break into Melanie’s place but trying to leave. Seemed he’d spent a good night with Melanie and he’d decided to sleep in while she went to work. However, she’d forgotten to warn him about Linus, her guard dog. Who didn’t like men much. And who had stood on the other side of the bedroom door, growling at him every time he tried to leave.

  The poor guy’s clothes had been downstairs. Apparently, they’d started there. Along with his phone. So he’d decided to leave by going over the balcony. Why he hadn’t borrowed something from Melanie’s wardrobe rather than go out naked, Ed had no idea.

  “When I finally made it out here, the truck was gone and so was Marisol.”

  He frowned. That wasn’t like Marisol. She wouldn’t just leave Gigi.

  “Are those shopping bags Marisol’s?” he asked.

  “She only had one bag. I don’t know whose they are.”

  “All right. Stay here, Gigi. Jace has called the ranch. We’ll find her.”

  She nodded, still trembling. He looked around and then gestured at Sammy, who worked at the diner. “Come stay with Gigi, Sammy?”

  The other woman nodded, walking over to talk quietly to Gigi.

  Ranger pulled up and Ed quickly briefed him. “I’m going to check the shopping bags, Gigi says they aren’t hers or Marisol’s. Can you talk to everyone here? See if anyone saw anything. Also, check to see if there’s camera footage.”

  Ranger nodded. He was a man of few words.

  Ed walked to the bags and instantly spotted something that sent dread rushing through him. Kiesha’s enormous handbag. The one she went nowhere without. That she wouldn’t leave behind under any circumstances.

  Unless it was life and death.

  Fuck.

  “When do you think he’s coming back?” Marisol asked nervously.

  They were stuck in a dark basement. She’d already tried the door, but it was surprisingly solid. The light switch didn’t work, she was guessing that the power was cut off. It was so dark that she couldn’t even see the other two women.

  “I don’t know,” Georgie answered as she tried to search around with her hands. She put her fingers into something squishy.

  Gross. Gross. Gross.

  “But we have to try and get out of here.”

  “You know I wasn’t joking when they said this place is haunted. There was a murder-suicide here thirty years ago. Nobody comes out here. Nobody.”

  Okay, first things first. Calm Kiesha down.

  “Kiesha, we’re going to be fine. There’s no such things as ghosts.” She managed to make her way over to the other woman. Grabbing her hand and Marisol’s, the three of them sat. Funny, she’d thought if anyone was going to panic, it would be Marisol. Kiesha seemed to have the ability to cope with anything.

  “Right, deep slow breaths, okay?” Georgie told the other woman soothingly. “I’m going to get you out of here. We’ll all be fine.”

  “Sorry. Sorry. I just have this fear of basements and ghosts and spiders. Which is silly since I used to be a ghost hunter. I just had too many encounters with evil ghosts, you know?”

  A ghost hunter?

  Okay, she wasn’t going to touch that one.

  “I’m an FBI agent, I’m used to dealing with high-pressure situations. I am going to figure this out.”

  Except she wasn’t good at dealing with high-pressure. Not at all. Even now, she could feel her own panic bubbling in her stomach.

  You got this. You have to. They’re relying on you.

  “Gigi will report me missing. She’ll call Linc and the sheriff, everyone will be looking for us,” Marisol reassured Kiesha.

  “Right,” Georgie added. “And Ed will tear this town apart looking for us. You know that.”

  “Yeah. He will. He won’t let anything happen to you. To any of us.” The strength was coming back to her voice.

  “Oh, I just remembered something,” Marisol said. “There’s a GPS tracker on the truck. They’ll be able to track us with that.”

  Unless it had been removed. Or he’d used a jammer. Would he know how to do that?

  Who was she kidding? Saber was a career criminal. Of course he did. But she didn’t say that to Marisol. Still, she wasn’t going to rely on them being rescued.

  “We should still come up with a plan. Just in case.”

  “Ed wanted me to wear a tracker but I refused. He bought me a necklace and everything,” Kiesha said. “Why didn’t I listen to him?”

  “He did?” she asked, startled.

  “Yeah. Haven’t you realized by now that he’s the ultimate caveman. Totally OTT protective. That’s what I yelled at him. I won’t do that again. I’m putting that necklace on as soon as I get home.”

  “Everything’s going to be all right,” she soothed. “But I need you to keep it together for me.”

  “The full force of JSI will be looking for us,” Marisol added. “They won’t rest until they find us.”

  Marisol lived on Sanctuary Ranch, which was owned by the Jensens. Clint Jensen ran the ranch, while his brother, Kent ran Jensen Security International.

  “Saber is insane to kidnap you,” Georgie muttered. “Anyone else notice how on edge he was? And why didn’t he head back to the Devil’s Kings? Why is he here looking for Tiger?”

  “You mean the fact that he was acting like a lunatic on steroids? Yeah, I noticed,” Kiesha said dryly.

  Okay, she was sounding more like herself.

  “Maybe I should tell him the truth? About what happened to Tiger?” Marisol asked.

  “You know what happened to Tiger?” Georgie asked sharply.

  “Um, well, not exactly,” she said carefully. “But I have an idea. Only telling him the truth could be a really bad idea. For everyone.”

  Georgie rubbed at her jaw, moving it from side to side, aware that she was clenching it tight. “And you never told anyone?”

  “Not quite.”

  “Does Ed know?” Georgina asked sharply. Did he know and he hadn’t told her?

  “No. No, Ed doesn’t know.”

  She breathed out a sigh of relief.

  “Dude, you do remember she’s an FBI agent, right?” Kiesha said cautiously. “And you withheld information.”

  “I’m in trouble?” Marisol asked.

  Shoot. Fudge.

  “Don’t tell me anymore. We didn’t have this conversation.” She let out a breath. “Just . . . I’m guessing he’s dead, right? Otherwise, he would have turned up like a bad smell.”

  “I think so.”

  “Right. Okay. Shoot. We cannot tell Saber that. Okay? If he finds out that Tiger is dead, it will send him over the edge. So you do not know anything about his son. Got me?” She was probably being a bit harsh. But darn it. Marisol had held things back. Probably to protect whoever had taken out Tiger. But Georgina wasn’t in a forgiving mood right then.

  “All right,” Marisol said
quietly. “There’s just one more problem.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’m a diabetic.”

  “Oh. Shit,” Kiesha said, jumping to her feet. “Here, sit. Shit. Crap.”

  “It’s all right. I mean, I’m okay right now. Luckily, I have a pump for my insulin and I carry glucose tabs in my pocket. But I don’t know how long I can go without eating before it starts affecting me.”

  Fudge. They were in trouble.

  37

  “What have you got, Ed?” Linc stormed into the room. “Where the hell are they?”

  Behind him were Macca, Kent, and Jed. Macca immediately veered off to where Gigi was sitting with Sammy. Gigi shot to her feet with a cry, throwing herself at him. He gathered her close, murmuring quietly to her.

  Ed looked over at a frantic Linc. “We’ll find them. I promise.”

  “How the fuck did this happen?” Linc snapped. “She was coming into town for some shopping and she was fucking taken?”

  “I’m so sorry, Linc,” Gigi cried. “I should have stayed with her.”

  Linc’s face softened as he turned towards the distraught woman. “This isn’t your fault, Gigi.” He looked over at Macca. “Take her home, man.”

  Macca nodded. “I’ll come back and help search.”

  Linc shook his head. “No, Gigi needs you. Stay with her. We got this.”

  Macca swung Gigi up in his arms and carried her out.

  “What have you got?” Kent asked him.

  “Just about to watch the video footage from the parking lot,” Ed told them, gesturing for them to stand behind Jimmy’s chair. “Any ideas who would want to kidnap Marisol?”

  Linc grunted as though he’d been physically hit. “Fuck, no.”

  “We have a GPS chip on all of our vehicles,” Kent told him. “But the signal has been jammed somehow.”

  Fuck it. Ed nodded. “Jimmy, play the video.”

  Jimmy hit play and they all watched the black and white feed. There was Marisol. She climbed into the truck. Georgina and Kiesha headed towards her. Then they appeared to talk before Kiesha and Georgina dropped all their bags and climbed into the truck. Marisol took off, driving.