by Becky McGraw
“Where’s Trace?” he asked and his eyes darkened.
“I have no idea. He was gone when I got up this morning.”
“Well, he called me earlier to tell me he wasn’t dead, so I guess that means he has to be around here somewhere.”
“They found his bike?” Ronnie asked, assuming that’s why he had done that.
“Yeah, and it’s all over the news. They’re dragging the creek. I was down there when he called me. Thank god, he called me, or I would have had to kill him again when I found him.” Ronnie could hear the worry in his voice.
“Yeah, he came up with that plan on the way here last night. Evidently the men at the ranch put a bug or something on the bike, so he figured that would make them think he was dead. He said it would buy us time to figure things out.”
“Good thinking,” Seth said as he stepped inside and shut the door. He took the shotgun from her, and set it back in the corner. “And if you don’t figure things out, he has the opportunity to go off the grid.”
“Off the grid?” She repeated.
“Disappear,” Seth clarified. “If you don’t figure things out, he’s done. Between his parole violation, the fact he shot a federal officer, beat the crap out of another, then almost ran over two more at that ranch, he’s in deep shit. Not to mention the other man he shot at my sister’s house. And then there’s Ray Brown. If he gets off, Trace is as good as dead. Hell, his own daddy would probably put a bullet in him for screwing up his campaign funding at the ranch.”
Fear shot through Ronnie, then confusion. “When did all that happen?”
Seth’s eyebrows lifted. “You were with him, don’t you know?”
Her thoughts did a circle in her brain, then skidded to a stop. “All this happened when he saved me at the ranch?”
“All except for the one guy he shot at my sister’s house. He owes my sister some drywall work, and a new front door, by the way. She was pretty pissed.”
Good Lord. Trace was in more trouble than Ronnie realized. And it was her fault. Again. She groaned then turned to walk back toward the kitchen. Seth followed her, as she walked inside and picked up the saucer to slide the toast off into the trash can. “I’m going to help him figure this out, so he can get his life back.”
“He doesn’t have much of one these days.” There was accusation behind his words that Ronnie couldn’t miss.
“I was trying to help him.”
“You helped him right into another prison sentence. Probably in the federal pen this time,” Seth said then sighed. “This one he probably deserves for being so stupid.”
Ronnie rounded on him. “So you think him saving my life was stupid?”
“No. You going out there in the first place was stupid. He was working with the feds out there. They got him out of prison. You should have just stayed out of it,” Seth said gruffly.
“How the hell was I supposed to know that?” Ronnie demanded taking a step closer. “He wouldn’t talk to me when I went to see him in jail about Leigh Ann Baker’s disappearance.”
“That wasn’t your business, Veronica.”
Seth had a point. It wasn’t her business. But she had been trying to help both Joel and Trace. She had stepped into a situation that had nothing to do with her. And made things ten times worse for Trace Rooks. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry doesn’t fix things. What you need to do is find a concrete way to help him. Trace needs help.”
“It’s hard to help someone who doesn’t want your help.” Trace would not talk to her, even when his mind was distracted by sex. Something that wasn’t happening again. Ronnie was the one who had been distracted. She needed to step back from Trace Rooks and her attraction to him, or she wouldn’t be able to help him. She decided that last night while she tossed and turned all night.
“Let’s face it, he has no reason to trust you. To talk to you. Giving you information before didn’t do a damned thing but put him in jail.” Seth said.
Ronnie sighed, then said, “I’m trying to make up for that. Conner Lucas is helping me. He’s bringing the files from his trial out here tomorrow. We’re going to find out who set him up. He said something about his father being involved.” Something Seth said a minute ago poked her in the brain. “Wait a minute. You said Trace messed up Leland’s campaign funding out at that ranch. He’s involved out there?”
“He’s a silent partner in that ranch.”
“Really?” Ronnie said with a laugh.
“Yep. He’s knee deep in that shit out there. Human trafficking, drugs, you name it.”
The same things that Dave Logan had told her. Well, not that Leland was involved in the ranch. “Do the feds have evidence that Leland was involved?”
“Not now. Trace blew their operation to hell. They had to do the takedown early, and only got evidence on Ray Brown. And he’s on the loose. The rest of the guys they arrested were minor players. They don’t know anything.”
So that meant to bring Leland down, Ronnie had to prove he set Trace up at the first trial. He had probably been just as slick then, and it was going to take some deep digging to prove his involvement there. Or they had to get evidence that he was involved at the ranch. But if the feds couldn’t get it, she highly doubted they could. If the agents raked the guys they caught over the coals, it was not likely they would talk either. They were probably too scared to go against Leland.
“His mother knows it all, but she doesn’t have to talk, because she’s married to Leland. The feds have tried to talk to her, but so far she’s kept her mouth shut. She’s divorcing Leland now, so I’m sure if Leland pissed her off enough she would. That would be a big break in the ranch situation at least. I don’t think Allison would have sat back and watched him put her son in jail.”
Maybe if she knew Leland had done that she would be mad enough to talk. Ronnie was going to find the proof, then she was going to talk to Allison Rooks. She couldn’t wait until Conner brought those files. Maybe she would call him and see if he could get them together sooner than tomorrow. “I’m going to do everything I can to help, Seth. I know I did wrong by Trace and I want to fix things.”
“Why?” Seth asked leaning back against the granite counter top to cross his arms.
“Why what?” she asked.
“Why do you want to help him? You’re the Shark Lady. You don’t have a conscience, remember? D.A.s hide under their tables, and judges quake in their robes when you step into a courtroom.”
Ronnie snorted. “That’s bullshit. I just do my job. And I didn’t do a very good job in Trace’s case. I want to make up for it.”
“Ah, I see.”
“See what?”
“Your ego is bruised because you lost a case,” Seth said with a chuckle.
“I didn’t lose,” Ronnie countered angrily.
“Sure you did. You may have lost on purpose, but you still lost.”
He had a point. And it burned. At the time, her reason for working out that plea deal seemed reasonable. She’d never looked at it like losing. She was just doing what she had to do. Now that she knew the full ramifications of that decision, not so much. “I was up for a promotion, and Carl Duncan and Seemus Nichols put pressure on me to work with Judge Jennings and the prosecutor on a plea deal,” she explained.
Those two men are where she would start her investigation when she got the files from Trace’s trial. There was a reason for that pressure. She’d start there and work her way backwards to Judge Jennings then Leland. If she lost her job in the process, Ronnie was well-established enough now that she could open her own practice. Somehow she didn’t think the other partner in the firm, Joe Timmons, would back them if what she suspected turned out to be true. He was straight-laced and ethical.
His eyes narrowed. “Now, that’s the Shark Lady I know and despise,” he said sarcastically.
Ronnie enjoyed the fact that she was feared in legal circles. She took pride in her reputation. It gave her leverage to get things done when nobody else c
ould. But Seth Copeland made her sound cold and calculating. No conscience? Was that how everyone saw her? Had she taken the Shark Lady persona too far?
Being a woman in a man’s world, Ronnie had to be hard to be taken seriously, but she was a woman too. And although nobody evidently realized it, she had feelings. “Just help me help him, Seth. Whatever you can do would be appreciated. I really do feel bad about what happened to him and want to fix things.” Ronnie walked to the phone on the wall and picked it up. “I’m going to see if I can speed things along. Why don’t you go see if you can find Trace?” she suggested as she dialed Conner’s number. “Make sure he isn’t lost in the woods or something. I haven’t seen him this morning.”
Seth sighed. “Trace is one of my best friends, but I’m walking a fine line here helping him, Ronnie.”
Ronnie snorted then rolled her eyes. What did this man want, a Boy Scout Badge? She was damned sure if he was in a similar situation, Trace wouldn’t hesitate to help him. “Just help him. Use your pole for balance to walk it, if you have to.”
“I think you have one of those too,” Seth grumbled as he turned and walked away.
A lot of men thought that. But none of them would ever find out.
Including Seth Copeland.
***
Trace walked out of the woods and saw Seth’s personal truck parked near the front of the house. Seth walked around the side of the house and Trace waved. They met halfway, and shook hands. “Well, look who’s back from the dead,” Seth said sarcastically.
Trace could hear the tinge of anger behind his friend’s words. He should have called him before this morning to tell him what the plan was. They found the bike last night, and Trace knew his buddy was probably upset until he found out he was actually alive.
“I don’t know. That would almost be preferable to being cooped up in that house with Ronnie Winters,” Trace replied with a dry laugh.
“Yeah, I don’t envy you there.” Seth glanced back at the house warily. “Why don’t you just leave her here, and we’ll find you somewhere else to hide out?”
“Maybe when Ray is captured. She should be safe then, as long as Leland doesn’t know she was at that ranch. And if I keep her close she can’t tell anyone I’m alive.”
“If you stay here, they’ll probably find you. With Ronnie getting everyone and his brother involved in this mess it’s pretty much a certainty someone will catch wind of it,” Seth said with a shake his head. “But it’s your funeral, man.”
Trace knew that. Staying here, letting Ronnie get all those people involved, made him a sitting duck. Why Ronnie couldn’t get that Trace didn’t know.
“I need your help.” Trace had one more thing to worry about too. Those girls.
Seth groaned. “Those four words always get me into trouble.”
“And they probably will this time too. We need to come up with a plan to intercept that shipment of women at the drop off point tomorrow night. And figure out what to do with them.”
“What shipment of women?” Seth asked sharply.
“The one that was supposed to arrive at the Diamond Bar ranch tomorrow night. The Coyote won’t have anywhere to take them now. He’ll kill them if we don’t intercede.”
“Just give me the particulars and I’ll turn it over to the feds.”
“No, they will just turn the women over to INS or ICE and they’ll be shipped back to Mexico and wind up on the streets there. They’d be no better off than they were if Ray sent them to the Cantina in Houston. I’m not letting that happen to this group.”
Seth sighed. “What do you have in mind?”
“I found another cabin in the woods. It’s smaller, but would hold ten women who are used to living like they’ve been living,” Trace said and huffed a breath. “There’s enough food in that house to last all of us for a week or so. That will give us time to figure out something.”
“You’re betting on having this resolved in a week?” Seth asked incredulously. “And you want to add human trafficking to your charges? That’s what’s gonna happen, buddy. I see the writing on the wall!” Seth shouted then started pacing. “You’ve got to get over this white knight complex, man. You don’t wear a badge anymore. Saving the world is not on your shoulders!”
Anger shot through Trace, then sadness. “I’m well aware I don’t wear a badge.”
Seth turned and looked at him with sympathy in his eyes. “I know, man. I’m sorry.”
“There’s an international organization I heard about I’m going to contact to come and get the women. They will train them for skilled labor before they send them back to Mexico. At least they’ll have a fighting chance to survive then. I can help this group, Seth.”
“You need to be helping yourself, Trace.”
“Helping them will help me regain my sanity. I’ve watched what they were put through at that ranch for six months.” Watching the things those assholes made those women suffer through had about driven him crazy. Maybe doing this would help him deal with the guilt he carried around for not interceding before. “Are you going to help me?”
Seth ran a hand over his face and sighed. “I want to help you. I really do. But I can’t. I have to work tonight and tomorrow night. Probably every night until Ray Brown is located. They’ll probably have me out at that creek looking for your body too.”
“I’m sorry for putting you in this position.” Trace knew his friend was putting his job on the line helping him with anything. Add rescuing a group of illegals to the mix, and Trace knew he was asking too much. But he needed help. Those women needed help.
“I’m here because I want to be. And you know I’d help you tonight if I thought I could pull it off. But I can’t. And you can’t do it by yourself though. You should really think about this before you leap, Trace.”
“I’ll find someone else to help. You just forget you know I’m alive, or where I’m at. That will be help enough.” Trace dragged his eyes away. “I’m sorry about Sarah’s house by the way. Did Ray and his men get out of there before you arrived? I heard the sirens when we left.”
“They were all gone by the time we got there. The report was written as a breaking and entering, and a possible gunshot wound to an unknown victim by an unnamed shooter. They don’t know anything except that a witness reported two men throwing someone in the back of a pickup and taking off. The witness didn’t mention a motorcycle.”
Well that was good news. At least there hadn’t been witnesses who saw Trace, Ronnie and Conner leaving. “Thanks, man.”
“I’m adding it to your tab. When this is over you owe Sarah a new door and some free labor.”
“I’ll be her slave,” Trace said with a laugh then sobered. “Tell her I said thanks.”
“Carrie came by while we were there. You know she lives right down the street.”
“Yeah, I know.” Sean’s widow was one of Sarah’s friends. “How’s she doing?”
“She’s definitely not like she used to be. The kids aren’t doing good either.”
Guilt slammed down on Trace’s shoulders like a lead curtain. His knees almost crumbled. Trace should have gone by there. He just didn’t want to make things worse.
“What’s wrong with them?” he asked not really wanting to hear what Seth had to say, but needing to know. He had to help Carrie if he could.
“Sarah says since Chris hit puberty, he’s hanging out with a bad crowd. She says Carrie just can’t control him. Her daughter Izzy is upset and thinks it’s her job to take care of both of them.”
Trace groaned. “Do you think it would help if I went by there? I could talk to him.”
“You’re dead remember?” Seth reminded.
“Fuck,” Trace replied, shoving a hand through his hair.
“I think Carrie is moving to the country soon. Her daddy has a ranch out in the boonies. I guess she thinks if she changes his environment, Chris will get better. I think she needs to figure out how to get over losing Sean. That might help all of them.”<
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Emotion surged up inside of Trace. The night he shot his partner had changed all of their lives forever. It had been an accident, hell he wasn’t even sure it was his bullet that killed Sean, but Carrie believed that. The trumped up evidence that sent him to jail convinced her that he had turned on his best friend in the worst possible way.
Sean had been his best friend way longer than they’d been on the force together. They’d gone to high school together. Trace was the best man at their wedding. Carrie should have known better. But she blamed him. She couldn’t blame him any more than he blamed himself though. Trace shouldn’t have pulled his gun in the first place, but when the leader of the gang had called Sean by name, his real name, and pulled his gun, Trace knew things were about to get ugly for them. He hit his target, the kingpin of the ring, but that started a riot of bullets which left half of the gang and his partner dead.
Then they found the cocaine and enough money to choke a horse in his locker, and said Trace killed Sean because he was a bad cop. Said he was with the drug dealers, and Sean was going to turn him in, so he gave Sean up as a Narc to the gang. Bullshit. If Trace had money like that he wouldn’t have been living in that squatty apartment where they found more drugs, guns and money.
With all those bullets flying around, how the Coroner pinpointed a bullet from his service revolver as the one that killed Sean, Trace didn’t know. The bullet went through his partners body, the caliber just happened to be the same.
Trace wasn’t stupid. If what they said was true, he wouldn’t have started a gun battle to kill his friend, he would have done it and disposed of his body somewhere nobody would have ever found it. And if he had drugs and money, the last place he would stash it would be his locker at the Amarillo Police Station, or his apartment.
None of it made sense to him. Even three years after his partner’s death.
Leland had done a good job of setting him up, after he confronted his father about the evidence he and Sean had uncovered that pointed to him as the financial backer for the ring. After Trace showed his hand, his father greased the right palms, the drug dealers who testified against him, the judge who sentenced him, the attorney who represented him, even the warden who housed him. Putting an ex-cop in general population was not standard operating procedure for a prison. Trace even suspected his father had paid those convicts who had attacked him in prison to kill him.