His rich chuckle roamed over her. “I had my suspicions when you arched your sweet ass onto it. Your flush just confirmed it.”
“Sweet Lord.” She cranked up the air conditioning and focused on the road.
They slowed at the end of the two-rut road on the other side of the tracks three quiet minutes later. The front door hung wide. A dent the size of a large foot molded the rust-rimmed metal.
“Stay here.” Gannon pulled a pistol from the small of his back and bailed from the car before it stopped. His command brooked no argument while his departure offered no chance to reel him back.
He approached the trailer, using the structure for cover. Margo’s heart thumped in her throat. Her stomach looped itself into a balloon poodle. When he disappeared inside the house, she gripped the steering wheel for dear life and readied to mow down any foe who exited.
Ten seconds lasted longer than the Macy’s Day Parade. Finally, Gannon appeared in the doorway. His face was drawn but determined. “Medic.”
In all her years on the job, Margo had never worked on someone she knew. It was one of the perks of living in a small town worlds away from where she worked. Today, she’d have to work on someone she knew. Someone very important to the man she loved.
She centered her thoughts on gear and procedures and hurried to the door. Blood spatter decorated the far wall and speckled the floor. Gannon led her through a living room and kitchen. In the short hallway, a man lay prone on the worn laminate floor. His arms lay limply against both walls of the narrow space. Blood covered his face and hands. Skin split across several knuckles.
Margo couldn’t see more than broad facial features but identified Griffin by his scuffed cowboy boots. She dropped to her knees at his side. On his neck, she found two fingerprints smudged the blood. She tore open her bag and looked at Gannon.
“It’s there, steady, but breaths are shallow. Too shallow,” he supplied.
“Call an ambulance. I’ll get to work.”
He hung over her shoulder, not moving.
“Gannon, ambulance now.” She didn’t promise he’d be okay. There was no way to tell, not until she assessed him.
When Gannon moved down the hallway, Margo leaned over Griffin and tapped his shoulder with a gloved hand. “Griffin Lee. It’s Margo Foster. Can you hear me?”
A groan rumbled up his throat. “Ellis can.”
Relief supplied her hysterical laugh. “Yeah, probably,” she said more quietly. The next county over had probably heard her. She retrieved the penlight from her bag and looked into his eyes. The pupils were slow to respond to the light. “Can you tell me where you hurt?”
“Back. Chest,” Griffin wheezed.
Blood seeped from a cut on the top of his head. Since it didn’t pour, she cut open his shirt and then grabbed her stethoscope. Red and blue boot prints littered his torso.
“The ambulance will be here in fifteen.” Gannon knelt across from her.
Margo listened to the gurgle of air and liquid muddling Griffin’s every breath.
“No go.” She reached for Gannon’s phone. “He needs the HELO.”
Gannon handed her the phone without a word, but his pleading expression said enough.
“Broken ribs punctured the left lung, causing a hemothorax. Normally, I wouldn’t worry too much, but there are broken ribs on the right too. They can’t shift.” She didn’t complete the thought. Gannon was field trained. He’d know that if the other pleural space was breached outside of an operating room, the chances of his survival plummeted.
9
“Gannon?” Griffin lifted his head.
“I’m here.” Gannon ducked around Margo, who was barking orders through his phone, and knelt at his brother’s side. “Don’t move. We’re getting you help, but I need you to be still.” He eased Grif’s bloody head to the floor. “I thought Bobby Whitmire kicked my ass in junior high. You had to go and one-up me, huh?”
Gannon cracked the joke because he could hardly deal with the rage bubbling inside him. He should have dealt with the thugs looking for Grif before this happened.
Slick, weak fingers wrapped around his. “Stop. My fault, but I’m making it right.”
A smile stretched Gannon’s mouth. His brother had been changing. It was time he did too. This sucked, but Grif was right. Those walking targets hadn’t beaten the shit out of his brother because of anything Gannon had done or not done. Griffin finally took responsibility for his actions, which was a huge step on the road to mental recovery. It was time he did the same.
“My right boot,” Grif choked.
“Does it hurt?”
“Look.”
“If your ankle is broken, taking off your boot will only—”
“It’s what they came for.” Griffin’s blue gaze shifted toward his boots, begging Gannon to do the same.
He scrambled to his brother’s shoe and eased the thing off as carefully as he could.
“What are …” Margo rounded the corner and stalled.
Gannon pulled a ledger from Griffin’s boot. He had no idea how his brother’s lanky foot and the thick booklet both fit, but they did. Thank fuck. Gannon’s fingers shook with unfettered rage as he flipped through the roster of women and girls logged like cattle at a meat market. Codes, prices, and ages lined out each name. A thousand or more filled the pages.
“Did you—”
“No.” Griffin cut off his question. “I owed on games. Never knew about the girls. Went to pay last of my debt. Del Rio wasn’t in the office. In secret room, laughing while one of his guys …” Grif’s blood crusted eyes closed. He drew several hissed breaths. “They hurt her …. bad. The ledger was open on the desk.”
“You took it.” Gannon scooted back to his brother’s side. Pride and gratitude loosened the past’s hold. The time he’d spent with Grif over the last week revealed a side to his brother he’d never known. Maybe it had been hidden by Grif’s own hurts, or maybe it had developed over the years with his love for another. Love could do that, change a man.
“I don’t trust locals.” Griffin choked. “The feds weren’t listening. I didn’t want to get Elvin or Liana involved, or you. I’ve put you all through enough.”
“Grif.” Gannon placed their palms together and squeezed. For the first time in nearly twenty years, the warmth of their familial bond flowed between them. “You’ve just saved a lot of lives.” He tightened his grip on his brother. “You did well. A lot of good. You don’t have to worry about me. I can handle a shit ton these days, and I will rain down more hell on these rat fuckers than they can even imagine.”
“You’re not going after them, like”—Margo twisted her hands together—“a commando, are you?”
“I want to.” Damn it all, he wanted to. He wanted to thrash them one by one and watch the others try to run from him, but the kind of hell Base Branch could bring would hurt a lot longer and a lot worse than any bare-knuckle beating he could dispense. “But I’m not that guy anymore. I need my phone, Mar.”
She offered it over, along with an expression that reached around his chest and squeezed. He dialed the number for his DC headquarters and waited for the beep.
“Mike. Alpha. Romeo. Golf. Oscar. One. Nine. Nine. Eight.” Gannon spoke his call sign into the receiver.
“I love you.” Margo whispered the words. Her eyes brimmed with tears, happy ones.
While the operator confirmed his identity through voice recognition, he reached for her hand and lifted it to his mouth.
“This is Tucker. Ready to come back?” his commander barked.
“Not exactly, sir.”
Fighting was so much more fun than wrestling a cell phone on conference calls and virtual meetings.
Margo flew with Grif on the HELO. Gannon wanted to, but the small copter didn’t have as much room as the Blackhawks and Chinooks he flew in on a damn near weekly basis. She knew the crew and started briefing them before they lifted his brother onto the stretcher. He’d let them go and stayed behind, work
ing on clearance for the mission from his commander and background and satellite evidence from their tech squad.
Five hours after the chopper peeled through the clouds, Gannon waited for one final call from his commander before he headed to the hospital. He paced, needing to hear that all the pieces of the elaborate strike they’d planned were falling into place.
The rumble of an engine up the drive to Griffin’s trailer pulled Gannon from his caged animal routine. He ruled out Elvin, Liana, and Layla. They’d already headed to Dallas to meet Grif at the hospital. His boots carried him to the edge of the window in the bedroom. He looked outside without shifting the dingy curtain.
An unmarked police car turned sideways, blocking in Margo’s sporty car. Detective Sweeney exited the Town Car. His gaze scanned the trailer and surrounding area. The man twitched at the sound of a passing car on the highway. He walked closer with his hand planted firmly on the butt of his gun. A dog barked far off in the woods, causing Sweeney to jump.
Either this guy had made detective without a day of actual training, or he was guilty as true-born sin about something he’d done … or was about to do.
Gannon silenced the incoming call from his commander the moment the phone vibrated and prayed he had the green light to act.
“Margo? Gannon Lee? It’s Detective Sweeney,” the man called out from inside the trailer. No knock. No announcement until it was too late.
The churning of Gannon’s rage, the thud of his heart, and the whoosh of his breaths settled into battle ready calm. He grabbed the ledger from the bed—where he’d been texting pictures of the laundry list of names from the ledger one page at a time—and walked slowly, decisively down the hallway.
“Gannon.” The officer shifted on his boots. His hand moved from his gun but not far away as it hooked into his waistband. “Where’s Miss Foster?”
“Why are you here, Detective?”
“I heard your brother got himself into some trouble.” The man straightened his shoulders. “I came to take your statements.”
“You didn’t think he might need an ambulance or techs to collect evidence?”
“Evidence?” Sweeney balked. “It was a misunderstanding among buddies. A tussle, nothing more. At least, that’s what I heard. But with your brother’s history, I wouldn’t be surprised if he threatened the guy against pressing charges.”
“Really.” Using the ledge, Gannon gestured to the sprays and drops of blood around them, letting Sweeney see it clearly. “It looks like more than a tussle between mates.”
“Well, now it does. Doesn’t it?” The detective’s gaze locked on the notebook for too long before finding his again. “I’ll need to take that with me.”
“This?” He turned the booklet over in his hand.
“Yes.”
“Why?” Sure, he could shoot Sweeney in less than a second. More than the man’s pain, Gannon wanted his intimate knowledge of the organization. Torture was fun and all, but it seldom revealed untainted information.
Sweeney scratched his nose. “You ask a lot of questions for a guy usually behind the interrogation table.”
“I was a kid.”
“And now?”
“I’m the man who’s going to help my brother take down an arm of the Sinaloa Cartel’s Stateside human trafficking ring.”
“I don’t think so.” Sweeney’s hand slipped from the waist of his pants and shifted to the grip of his gun.
“You sure you want to make this hard.” Gannon stepped forward.
“What’s hard?” The crooked cop laughed. The sound bordered on sinister and hysterical.
Gannon stilled.
“I’m going to make it really easy. Actually, you are.” He shrugged. “Gannon Lee attacked me. I had no choice but to fire. He threatened my life. With your reputation, no one will question me.”
“What about Margo?” He needed to get closer. More than half the living room stood between them.
“I’ll deal with her. She could need a little comfort. I know she’s been hung up on you for years. If she proves to be a problem, I’ll eliminate her. Either way, it won’t matter to you.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’ll be dead.” Sweeney wiped sweat from his brow and smiled. “No way some wrong-side-of-the-tracks piss-ants are going to screw me.” He drew and aimed at Gannon’s chest.
Still too far away, Gannon watched his trigger finger and calmed his urge to roll for cover. Everything in the trailer was too flimsy to stop a bullet.
“What’s your cut, Detective?”
“More than you’d make in a lifetime if you had a lifetime or a job.”
“But you still have a boss.” He shrugged, as though unimpressed.
“Not some backwoods chief who doesn’t know the difference between ground round or a filet mignon. Del Rio has houses on three continents.”
“And he’s not even the head dick.” Gannon grimaced. “So really, you take orders from a glorified errand boy.”
“Del Cruz might give me Rio’s job for killing you,” Sweeney snarled and flicked his gun. “Want to make this sporting? Take a run at me. See what you can get.”
He might have fallen for the trap twelve years ago. Now, he lay one of his own. “You want this book, right. The evidence?” Gannon shook the ledger in his left hand. Sweeney held his tongue, but his eyes hawked to the paper. “I give you the ledger. You give Margo and me one hundred thousand to leave town and never come back. Your boss will never have to know about the breach in his confidence.”
The detective’s gaze bounced back and forth between him and the book, calculating the angles. Too bad he only saw the ones Gannon wanted him to see.
“Take the book. What do I want with a bunch of random names anyway?” Gannon lifted his hand.
Sweeney’s gaze followed.
“Here.” He tossed the ledger into the air, overshooting Sweeney’s head.
Sweeney lurched to catch the book.
Gannon lunged.
Three shots echoed through the trailer and out into the dying daylight.
10
“Margo, darling, if you keep that up, you’re going to wear the skin off them.” Ms. Layla settled her hands over Margo’s, stilling her incessant wringing. The older woman’s light caramel skin siphoned what warmth she’d created with chaffing. Ice-cold fingers shocked her from her own world back into the small waiting room with Elvin, Layla, and Liana. No one had spoken for so long; she’d almost forgotten they were there.
Elvin sat in the corner chair, thick arms crossed over his chest and a scowl on his full cheeks. Liana sat across from him, glaring. Stray tears cut the edge off her anger.
The sweet woman’s gaze jumped from her lover to her daughter and back to Margo. Her brow pinched in desperation. She worried for her daughter and her disgruntled lover.
“He’ll be fine,” Ms. Layla whispered and withdrew her hand.
Margo wondered who she meant. Elvin or Griffin? At the moment, she didn’t care about either man. Elvin would have to get over his shit. Griffin was in the best hands, and she expected him to make a full recovery, but Gannon …
She’d expected him at the hospital hours ago, before Griffin went into surgery. Every time she called his number, it clicked straight to voicemail. With each unanswered call, her blood pressure rose. If she didn’t feel responsible for Griffin’s well-being and slightly paranoid in light of the trafficking ring business, she’d have left a long time ago, but Gannon had entrusted his brother to her.
It didn’t stop the battle. War raged, using her heart as a battering ram.
The opaque waiting room door opened. Every person in the room shot to their feet. Margo ran forward but skidded to a halt.
Dane stood in the doorway, searching the room. When his gaze found her, he let loose a long breath. “I came as soon as I could. Lexi’s still buried in—”
“Paperwork,” she supplied.
The rest of the room took their seats and resumed their silent
standoff.
“Yeah.” He stepped into the room and grabbed her shoulder. “How well do you know this guy? Are y’all a thing?” His brow quirked. “Because you look like shit … like I’d look if Lex were in here.”
“No.” Margo didn’t care what she looked like. All she cared about was getting to Gannon or getting him to her. “I need you to get Jax and go to this address now.” She grabbed her phone and typed out Griffin’s address. “Look for Gannon Lee. If you find him and he hits you, I’m sorry, but it’s the chance you have to take.”
“Do I?” Dane mumbled.
“Yes, you do.” She shoved her phone in her pocket and glared at Dane. “If he’s not at that address, look at my house.”
“If he’s not there?” he asked.
Pain as sharp and as accurate as a surgeon’s scalpel carved a lead line in her heart. The tissue split just a little. Tears squeezed from her eyes.
“Try the police station. Look all over Combine if you have to.” Desperation clung to her words.
“I wouldn’t recommend the police station,” Gannon mused.
Margo practically shoved Dane aside in her desire to see past him, to see … Blood coated Gannon’s shirt. It was too much to be Griffin’s. Too fresh to be … Her stomach lurched.
“It’s not mine.” Gannon’s mouth pulled to the left. “Well, most of it isn’t.” His gaze lowered to his split knuckles.
Forgetting every protocol she’d learned about dealing with blood, Margo launched herself at Gannon. Her arms shot wide. She tackled him with a bear hug. Strong, sure arms wrapped around her and held her close. The floor vanished beneath her feet.
“Thank you.” Gannon breathed the words into her hair almost like they weren’t meant for her.
She said her own thanks, pressed her cheek to his, and reveled in the warmth, the life, the love.
“Gannon, what’s going on?” Elvin’s deep voice cut into their steeped reunion. Gannon pulled back and brushed his mouth across her hair. The older man continued, “Did you know about this?” He gestured at Liana and through the door toward the operating room.
Dallas Fire & Rescue: Relentlessly Mine (Kindle Worlds Novella) (Base Branch Series Book 11) Page 7