“He’s too pretty, and he’s always working. She’d be much better off with you.”
“I won’t be here very long though, just long enough to find out what’s going on.”
“You don’t think that Mr. Willis is behind everything?”
“I don’t know; it’s why I want to meet him.”
They continued walking back towards the ranch, and as they stepped around the final curve in the road, Tanner saw that they had visitors.
The Harvey brothers were back.
CHAPTER 10 - Friends with benefits
The Parker Ranch, September 1997
Claire had waved Cody in, not to go shopping, but because he had a visitor, and Cody’s visitor was so beautiful that Tanner envied the boy.
The girl’s name was Raven and it fit the dark-haired, dark-eyed beauty well.
Cody introduced Raven to Tanner and then the two of them headed upstairs to his room, as Claire watched them with disapproval registering on her face.
“What’s the matter, Mrs. Parker, you don’t like Cody’s girlfriend?” Tanner asked.
Claire turned and stared at him.
“That’s not his girlfriend, she’s Jimmy Kyle’s girl, the kid that quarterbacks the football team.”
Tanner grinned.
“So, ah, she and Cody are just friends, is that it?”
“No, that is not it. She sneaks over here to see him just for sex. I also had to end a friendship with someone I caught coming out of his room when I arrived back home unexpectedly, a grown woman in her thirties.”
Tanner’s grin widened as he ran a hand over his beard.
“The kid’s got game.”
“You find Cody’s sexual escapades amusing, Mr. Tanner?”
“A little, but mostly I envy him. Raven is very beautiful.”
The look of disapproval was back in Claire’s eyes, but this time it was aimed at Tanner.
“Men, all you care about is sex.”
Tanner looked at the baby in Claire’s arms. Baby James, who was conceived while she was married to McKay and sleeping with Frank Parker behind McKay’s back.
“Well now, Mrs. Parker, we can’t all be as pure as you.”
Claire caught his meaning and her cheeks reddened.
“Shouldn’t you be doing something? Or is my husband paying you to stand around and talk?”
“Your husband is paying me to keep you safe, because your ex-husband has gone off the rails.”
Claire bit her lower lip and then tossed her head to the right.
“Follow me to the kitchen, Mr. Tanner. I want to hear about this meeting you had with Andy.”
“I could go for a cup of java, and the name is just Tanner.”
***
They had coffee at the kitchen table while the baby sat in his high chair and gummed animal crackers.
Tanner relayed to Claire the story he had told her husband, Frank Parker, only he left out the part about McKay wanting the children dead.
When he was done speaking, he saw Claire shudder, and her hand shook as she lowered her mug of coffee atop the kitchen table.
“He must be mad. I cheated on him, but I never rubbed it in. Once I realized that I had fallen in love with Frank I asked Andy for a divorce.”
“What was his reaction at the time?”
Claire pointed at her face.
“He hit me. It closed my left eye and rendered me unconscious. I woke up in the hospital, and when I was discharged, I came here to live.”
“Parker should have killed McKay right then and there for laying a hand on you.”
Claire cocked her head and stared at him.
“Cody said the very same words at the time. You and my stepson are much alike; you think that violence is a cure-all for every problem.”
“It does solve many problems, but not all, and you never know when you’ll need a gun.”
“That’s ridiculous. No one needs a gun. If you ask me, there are too many people carrying them in this state.”
“Where are you from, Claire?”
“New York City, but I left there years ago.”
“Maybe, but it hasn’t left you.”
That made Claire smile.
“Where are you from, Tanner?”
“Here and there, my old man was a farm equipment salesman who never stayed in the same town for more than a year. Luckily for me, I like to travel.”
“Have you been a bodyguard for long?”
“Bodyguard?”
“That’s what you do, isn’t it?”
Tanner knew the truth would frighten her and only complicate matters. He himself wasn’t sure why he was guarding this family, other than the affinity he felt with Cody Parker.
“Yeah,” Tanner said. “That’s what I do. I keep people safe.”
And as if it were a reaction to his blatant lie, baby James threw up.
CHAPTER 11 - Round two
The Harvey brothers, Ernie and Rich, stepped from their pickup truck as Tanner and Romina approached the entrance of the Reyes Ranch.
Both men were bigger than Tanner was and each one outweighed him by thirty pounds. As they walked towards him, they stood with straight backs and their arms held out slightly from their sides, in a subconscious effort to appear as huge as they could.
Tanner told Romina to head to the barn and find Doc, so that the older man could return with the shotgun, but curiosity overcame the girl, and after walking just a few steps down the driveway, she turned to see what would happen next.
If the brothers had acquired new weapons since Tanner took their guns away, they didn’t display them, and by the sneers lighting their faces, Tanner could tell that they just wanted to kick his ass.
His gun was secured against the small of his back, but he decided to leave it there unless needed.
Ernie, the one with darker hair, came at him from the left, while Rich approached from the front. Tanner raised his hands up to shoulder height and took a step backwards, as he feigned being intimidated.
It worked, and after sharing a smug knowing look with each other, the brothers relaxed and sauntered towards Tanner, who still stood with his hands up, as if to say that he didn’t want any trouble.
Had they been paying attention, the Harvey brothers might have noticed that the fingers of Tanner’s hands were straight and pressed together with the thumbs tucked in, and they might have had a chance to block his first blows.
As the men crowded in on him, and Ernie was about to take hold of his shirt, Tanner jabbed his stiff fingers into the men’s throats.
Ernie got the worst of it, as he was closer. He stumbled backwards while clutching his neck with both hands, as a raspy, guttural moan fell from his lips.
The blow hurt Rich, but after coughing once and moving away from Tanner, he was red-faced with fury and came charging in.
Tanner waited until he was almost upon him and then dropped flat to the ground. Unable to halt his forward momentum, Rich tripped over Tanner and came down hard on his right knee.
He then spent the next thirty seconds hissing through his teeth in pain, as he rocked on the ground clutching his leg, with his bare knee showing. The knee was scraped and bloody beneath the torn fabric of his twill pants.
Tanner walked over and looked down at Ernie, who was lying on his back atop the street and gasping for breath. His face was a bright pink and he gazed back at Tanner with frightened eyes.
“Can’t... breathe,”
Tanner called to Rich, who was just rising up from the ground.
“Your brother needs a doctor.”
Concern lit Rich’s face and he hobbled over with the bad knee to check out his brother.
“Oh shit, what did you do to him?”
“I taught him to never fuck with me again.”
Rich glared at Tanner, but then, his gaze grew less harsh.
“I need help, with this knee, I’ll never get him in the truck by myself.”
Tanner reached down and grabbed Ernie
beneath the left arm, and after Rich took his right, they dragged the wheezing, red-faced thug to the truck and piled him atop the passenger seat.
As Rich started the engine, Tanner removed the gun from his back and pointed it at Rich’s face.
“Come at me again, or do anything to the Reyes family and I will kill both of you.”
Rich nodded as he stared at the gun, which Tanner had taken from him in their first encounter. After Tanner stepped back, Rich put the truck in gear, hung a U-turn, and sped off.
Romina ran to Tanner with a big grin showing and hugged him.
“That was awesome!”
“Thanks for getting Doc.”
“Oh, you didn’t need him, you kicked both their asses.”
“It would have been a different story if they knew what they were doing, but they’re used to everyone being intimidated by their size.”
“But you weren’t, right?”
“No, I was. They’re both bigger than I am. It’s why I asked you to get Doc.”
Romina looked abashed.
“I should have gotten him, and I’m sorry, but I just couldn’t not watch.”
Tanner pointed towards the driveway entrance.
“C’mon, you’ve got to get ready for school.”
***
Once at the house and inside the kitchen, Romina recounted Tanner’s fight with the Harvey brothers over breakfast, and did so in a very theatrical manner, which caused Maria and Doc to laugh, while Javier listened with an expression that said he found the tale to be a tall one.
“It sounds like you got lucky, Tanner,” Javier said. “If either one of them had landed a punch on you the fight would have been over.”
“That’s why I made sure that they didn’t,” Tanner said.
After grunting, Javier grabbed a motorcycle helmet from atop the counter and went off to ride his bike, a Harley.
As everyone else rose from the table, Maria walked over and kissed Tanner on the cheek.
“Thank you for protecting my daughter. I don’t know what they would have done if she were alone.”
“You’re welcome, but we’ve spent enough time being on the defensive.”
“What do you mean?”
“I want to talk to Chuck Willis, and I want you to come with me. Maybe we can keep things from escalating.”
Maria’s eyes grew fiery.
“That man just sent thugs to my home. I may not be able to control my temper.”
“I still think you should talk, also, I want to get a feel for him.”
Romina walked over and smiled up at Tanner.
“Are you going to kick his ass too?”
Tanner looked at her and then at Maria.
“I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you safe, count on it.”
CHAPTER 12 - Pablo
Stark, Texas, September 1997
At the McKay Ranch, three of the hands watched as Jack Sheer drove away, headed for Mexico.
The three men all went by nicknames, and they were Slim, who was slim, Pug, who had a wrinkled face like a pug, and Okie, who was from Oklahoma. Okie was the biggest of the three and the other two followed him around.
Okie pointed at Sheer’s departing truck.
“Jack’s going off to find someone who’ll fix McKay’s problem.”
“What problem?” Slim said. “Having too much money?”
“I’m talking about that slut ex-wife of his. Everybody knows the man wants her dead.”
Pug’s wrinkles relaxed as he smiled.
“I miss seeing that girl around here, she was fine as hell.”
Okie spit tobacco juice into the dirt before he spoke.
“She was a slut, sleeping around with Parker behind McKay’s back, and I’ll tell you boys, McKay will pay a pretty penny to see her dead.”
Slim narrowed his eyes.
“What are you saying, Okie, you want to kill her?”
“Think about it. Somebody is gonna whack her for McKay sooner or later, and if we did it, no one would suspect. When we bring McKay proof that she’s dead, he’ll pay us, and I bet he pays us good.”
Slim shook his head.
“I know we beat them two fags to death that time we was drunk in Dallas, but I never killed a woman.”
“Hell, I’ll kill her,” Pug said. “What we do is, we steal a van, wear masks, and grab her while she’s out somewhere.”
Okie smiled in agreement.
“Once we have her, we can take her out to that old well we found and dump her body in there.”
Okie looked at Slim.
“Are you in? Either we all do this, or none of us, because one man has to drive and run interference while the other two grab her.”
Slim nibbled at his lower lip, but then nodded.
“Yeah, I’m in, but listen, before we kill her... I say we fuck her.”
Both Okie and Pug looked at Slim as if he were stupid.
“Well, hell yes we’ll fuck her,” Pug said. “Anything else would be a goddamn shame.”
***
At the Parker Ranch, Cody watched with growing curiosity as his eleven-year-old twin sisters walked towards the barn carrying food and a quart of milk.
He had just entered the kitchen when he caught sight of them through the window, their braided blond ponytails bouncing along behind them as they rushed along, while still dressed in their pajamas, robes, and slippers.
Cody followed, but walked around to the side door, where he placed an ear to it, and heard the girls talking to someone. He entered the barn and realized that the girls were up in the loft.
Cody climbed the ladder as quietly as he could. When he raised his head up above floor level and then continued up, the girls spun around, with Jill dropping the milk bottle, which thankfully didn’t break after landing in straw.
There was a Mexican boy with them. He was a little older than Cody was and wearing clothes that weren’t much more than rags. He looked as if someone had recently given him a beating. Faded bruises covered his arms and face, while his left eye was puffy.
Cody saw the boy swallow hard, and he also saw the fear in his eyes.
“What’s going on here?”
Jill came over and took her brother’s hand.
“This is Pablo, Cody. We found him hiding in here a few days ago, and look, somebody beat him up.”
“Why didn’t you say something about him?”
“Tonya said we should, but we were afraid. We thought that Daddy or Claire might make him leave the ranch.”
Cody walked closer and saw Pablo cringe as he if were expecting violence.
“Hey, Pablo, my name is Cody and I won’t hurt you.”
“Neither will I,” said a voice from behind, and when Cody turned his head, he saw Tanner climbing up from the ladder.
Pablo said something in Spanish and Cody shook his head.
“I speak a little Spanish, Pablo, but I don’t know what you said.”
“He said that he didn’t mean any harm and he’ll leave,” Tanner said, and then he spoke to Pablo in Spanish, was answered, and after going back and forth several times, Tanner translated for Cody.
“He came across the border five days ago after both his parents drowned on their fishing boat, and from what he says, it sounds like some of McKay’s men gave him that beating after they caught him hiding in a tool shed.”
Cody looked Pablo over and winced.
“We better have a doctor look at him; he might have broken ribs and I don’t like the look of that eye.”
“One more thing,” Tanner said. “He’s scared, and said that all he wants to do is go and... he begged not to be hurt again.”
Little Jill wiped away a tear and took Pablo’s hand.
“Nobody will hurt you, right Cody?”
Cody smiled at Pablo, as he spoke to Tanner.
“Tell him everything’s cool and that he can stay.”
Tanner relayed the message and Cody watched, as Pablo visibly relaxed.
Jill and Jessie hugged their brother about the waist.
“He can really stay? What if Daddy wants him gone?” Jessie said.
“I’ll handle, Daddy, but once he’s well, Pablo goes to work; we can use another hand anyway.”
Cody sent the girls back to the house to get dressed, and then he and Tanner followed with Pablo, after the boy had eaten the food the girls had given him.
They were taking him to the house so that he could get clean and change into some of Cody’s clothes, as the boy was nearly his height.
Frank and Claire were entering the kitchen the same time that Tanner and Cody were bringing Pablo in through the back door, and they stopped in their tracks and stared at them.
“Who’s he?” Frank said, as he pointed at Pablo.
“His name is Pablo, Dad. He came across the border and had the bad luck of hiding out on McKay’s ranch, some of his men beat him up like this.”
Claire handed baby James to his father and went over to look at Pablo’s wounds.
When she spoke to him in Spanish and he answered, Cody raised an eyebrow in surprise.
“Where did you learn to speak Spanish?”
“In New York, my parents had a Spanish maid and I grew up with her daughters, they were Puerto Rican, not Mexican, but we can understand each other.”
She spoke to Pablo again and Cody saw Claire’s gaze darken with sorrow.
“He’s all alone, his parents are dead.”
“Yeah, he told Tanner that, he speaks Spanish too.”
Claire looked back at her husband.
“You must have something he can do on the ranch, no?”
Frank sighed.
“He’s a sorry looking thing, but yeah, we’ll keep him fed and he can sleep in the other guest room for now, but how bad off is he?”
Claire spoke to Pablo again.
“He says he’s sore, but that nothing was broken and he can see out of that swollen eye, he’s probably right about being okay, if he had internal injuries, he wouldn’t have an appetite.”
Frank looked at his son.
“He’s all yours, Cody. See that he gets straightened out. We’ll find a job for him around here after he heals up.”
Pablo still looked apprehensive, but when Claire translated, he bowed his head repeatedly towards Frank while saying, “Gracias.”
The TANNER Series - Books 4-6 (Tanner Box Set Book 2) Page 16