by Diane Kelly
“A Christmas bonus?” Merle chuckled without mirth. “Good one, Sara.”
“Rats.”
When our shift ended later that night, Christina texted me, Nick, and Aaron. Meet at HQ for update on bust.
Once again we convened in the Dallas PD’s conference room.
Christina informed us that DEA agents, working in conjunction with officers from the Texas Department of Public Safety, had pulled over the Stillwater Spirits delivery truck a few miles north of Denton, where there was less traffic than in Dallas and thus less potential for collateral damage should things go bad. The remote location also meant they’d be able to scrub the scene before news cameras would have time to arrive. The last thing anyone wanted was for the bust to make it onto the evening news. If Geils got wind of the arrest, he might hide evidence, make it harder for law enforcement to bring him down.
“Check this out,” Christina said, pushing buttons on her phone. “One of the DEA trainees recorded the bust on his phone.” She pulled up a video clip.
We crowded shoulder to shoulder and watched on the tiny screen as a DPS cruiser pulled the truck over. The state police officer ordered the driver to step out of the truck with his hands up. While the driver had initially complied, he took off running once additional law enforcement officers stepped out of the car.
The driver squeezed through some barbed wire and made it halfway across a cow pasture before a Brahma bull tearing up clover inside the fence spotted the intruder. While most bulls are castrated as calves and are nonaggressive, this particular bull was apparently used for breeding purposes and thus his pendulous ball bag was intact.
“Uh-oh.” Nick shook his head as he looked at the screen. “This can’t end well.”
The bull, having successfully knocked up each of the female cattle penned in the pasture with him, decided to put his remaining testosterone to use. Why not? The driver looked like a fun diversion from stud service.
The bull charged the delivery driver, hooked his horns under the guy’s legs, and sent him sailing into the air like a rag doll.
Aaron cringed. “That had to hurt.”
In the foreground, we noted the succeeding actions of the DEA agents and DPS troopers, which essentially involved them ROFLMAO, the F in this case standing for “freeway.” Heck, we were chuckling ourselves.
Despite a compound fracture in the arm that had broken his fall, the driver managed to get to his feet. He took off running again while the bull circled around and resumed his pursuit with a snort of renewed determination. The driver headed for the fence and performed an improvised high-jump maneuver, leaping backward over a gate only seconds before he would have been gored in the ass. The bull vectored off, slowed to a nut-swinging trot, then stopped to lift his tail and drop a load of cow patties.
The driver’s hard landing on the packed soil had knocked every air molecule from his lungs, and law enforcement quickly surrounded him as he lay in the dirt gasping for breath. The shaky clip showed him whipping a gun from the waistband of his jeans, but before he could get off a shot officers closed in and wrestled the gun from his hand, turning him over onto a pile of bovine droppings to cuff his hands behind him. He issued a string of particularly derogatory curses at the officers.
When the clip ended, Christina looked up. “The agents found three boxes in the truck packed solid with crystal meth.”
The driver was in deep shit, both figuratively and literally.
None of this made it onto the news, of course.
Christina went on to tell us that, once the driver was in custody, agents in Stillwater, Oklahoma, moved in on the company’s owner, with whom Nick had spoken on the phone not long ago when he’d called for a quote. “They snagged him as he pulled into his driveway after work.”
“Is he talking?” Aaron asked.
“Not a word,” Christina replied. “But they found over forty grand in cash in his car and seized his laptop and cell phone. His call history showed he’d made dozens of calls to the driver who was arrested but only occasional calls to his other drivers.”
At the behest of law enforcement, his bewildered wife phoned the owner’s administrative assistant to tell her the owner had decided to take tomorrow off from work. Stillwater Spirits would be closed Thursday through Sunday for the Thanksgiving holiday and weekend. Thus, the employees would be none the wiser about their employer’s arrest until the following Monday, by which time Theo, Don Geils, and perhaps some of the dancers and johns from the VIP room would likewise be in custody.
Now that evidence had been seized to prove that Guys & Dolls was a stop on the crystal meth underground railroad, the next step would be verifying the stash on its way in.
“You were right about Valley Produce,” Christina said to me. “The meth was wrapped in clear plastic bags bearing their logo.”
I lifted my fists and pumped them in victory. After my beat-down in court yesterday, I needed this win. Nick gave me a congratulatory shoulder squeeze.
Now that we were certain Valley Produce was the source of the drugs, DEA agents planned to use the same tactic for the upcoming delivery from the fruit and vegetable supplier, which was scheduled a day later than usual this week due to the Thanksgiving holiday. In the case of Valley Produce, however, once the DEA had verified there were drugs on the truck, they’d let the shipment be delivered to Guys & Dolls so the drugs would later be found on the club’s premises. Of course they’d have an agent join the driver in the truck to make sure the driver didn’t warn Geils.
“Everything’s falling into place,” Christina said.
And my trigger finger wasn’t feeling itchy at all.
chapter thirty-nine
Stuff This
Unfortunately, while things seemed to be falling into place in our case against Don Geils, things were also falling at my parents’ house back in Nacogdoches, namely my father. He and my brothers had been trimming trees Tuesday afternoon when he’d insisted on climbing a ladder to take a few more limbs off an oddly shaped oak. One foot of the ladder had sunk into the soft soil, sending the ladder toppling over and taking my father and his chain saw with it. Luckily, my father had managed to toss the chain saw away before he fell on the darn thing and trimmed off one of his own limbs.
Mom called me early Wednesday morning with the news. “I told your father not to get up on that ladder, but did that stubborn old fool listen to me?”
“I’m gonna go with no.”
I supposed I couldn’t fault Dad. There were many times I didn’t heed my mother’s warnings, either, like the time she told me not to take my car out in the snow and I’d slid off the road or the time she’d told me not to go into the barn with “that bad boy” Clint Gaffinger. He’d performed a fairly thorough and not entirely unpleasant gynecological exam on a fifteen-year-old me. On the bright side, he hadn’t billed me for it.
“You father’s back is out now,” Mom said. “He’s laid up in bed. So much for his plans to cook the turkey outside in his fryer.”
“Do you already have the turkey?” I asked.
“No,” she replied. “He’d planned to get it today. He wanted to pick it out himself.”
I’d figured as much. “Let me bring the turkey, then,” I said. “It’s the least I can do since you’re doing most of the cooking. I’ll even get up early tomorrow to stick it in the oven.”
I might as well learn how to cook sometime, huh? Besides, how hard could it be to roast a turkey? You just needed to remember to pull out the icky bag of innards and baste it occasionally so it didn’t dry out, right? Oh, and to thaw it first so it didn’t turn out both burned and frozen like the turkey Bernice had made for Merle an untold number of years ago.
“I’ll take you up on that offer,” Mom said. “That’ll give me more time to get the house ready.”
God help us all when Mom decorated for the holidays. Every square inch of spare space on a counter, shelf, or table would be covered with some type of decoration, not to mention the decorat
ions she’d use to cover the porch and in the yard. Though I enjoyed the festive atmosphere, I’d never enjoyed the hours of hard labor it took to lug the decorations down from the attic or the additional hours and muscle strain it took to lug them back up once the holidays were over.
“See you tonight,” I told her.
“Can’t wait, hon.”
Although Wednesday was not an official federal government holiday, everyone in the office sneaked out by late afternoon, including Lu and Viola. On my drive home from the office, I swung by my neighborhood grocery store and rummaged through the waist-high freezer for the biggest turkey I could find. Good thing I’d been working out more than usual. That frozen sucker was heavy as heck. Thanks to genetic engineering, this turkey’s breast could rival Dolly Parton’s.
In the checkout line, I grabbed the latest issue of Cosmo. Might as well start boning up on the latest bedroom tips, huh? The drive to Nacogdoches would give me plenty of reading time. I grabbed a copy of Southern Living, too, to use as a cover.
At my town house, I made sure my cats had plenty of food and water to last a couple of days and hastily packed a suitcase. Nick came by in his pickup to fetch me.
He grabbed the Cosmopolitan from me as I went to stash it in my purse. He pointed to the cover. “Please tell me you bought this for ‘Six Sex Moves That Will Drive Your Man Wild.’”
“It sure as heck wasn’t for the Katy Perry interview.”
He grinned as I snatched the magazine back out of his hands.
Nick carried my suitcase out to his truck and returned for the turkey. “Holy cow,” he said, when he pulled the enormous bird from my fridge. “Is this a turkey or an ostrich? I think I got a hernia lifting the darn thing.”
“That’s not going to get in the way of our plans for Saturday night, is it?”
“Hell, no.” His amber eyes flashed. “Nothing’s going to get in the way of that.”
While Nick carried the turkey to his truck, I locked up my town house. Heading down the driveway, I noticed a silver rattletrap SUV with tinted windows drive slowly by. The back window had been removed to allow long pool-cleaning tools to stick out, including one with a blue nylon net on the end for removing leaves and bugs and the occasional skinny-dipping frog. It was an odd vehicle for my neighborhood of town houses. Our backyards were postage-stamp-sized, barely big enough for a barbecue grill let alone a swimming pool.
We drove on to Nick’s mother’s house, where Nick and I loaded his oversized fishing cooler with various side dishes and a foil-covered pan full of his mother’s stuffing. Bonnie had made several pies, too, including a strawberry-rhubarb that smelled divine. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to resist it the entire three-and-a-half-hour drive to Nacogdoches. I might have to sneak a fork into my purse and steal a bite or two along the way.
Nick caught me lusting after the pie. “We better stick the pies up front with you, Mom,” he said, handing them over to Bonnie. “Tara’s drooling all over herself.”
I put my fists on my hips. “Tattletale.”
After stashing the cooler in the trunk of his mother’s Impala, Nick climbed into the driver’s seat and I took a spot in the back with Nutty, the turkey lying in a deep roasting pan on the floorboard. Bonnie sat up front with her son.
The late afternoon was cool but sunny. As we headed away from Dallas, Nick pushed the button to ease the sunroof open. Nutty lifted his nose to scent the air. After a few seconds of sucking in car exhaust, he settled his graying muzzle onto my thigh for a snooze. I gave him a nice scratch behind the ears to help him settle in.
Nick, Bonnie, and I talked as we made our way to Nacogdoches, reminiscing about our favorite Thanksgiving memories, commenting on the heavy holiday traffic on Interstate 20, singing along with Dwight Yoakam’s latest CD. Bonnie had packed sandwiches and we ate those for dinner as we drove. When I finished my sandwich, I opened my Cosmo, disguised inside Southern Living, and read up on the latest tips for pleasing a man in bed. The first four tips sounded like fun, the fifth one was a little too gross for my taste, and the sixth was simply out of the question. I suppose every girl has to set her own limits, huh?
I looked up after reading the article, my eyes meeting Nick’s in the rearview mirror. He crooked a brow in question. I quirked mine in reply. Just you wait and see.
In a deep sleep beside me, Nutty released a slow anal hiss.
“Oh, Lord!” I rolled down my window and waved the magazines to clear the air.
Nick cut his eyes to his mother. “I told you not to give him cheese.”
“I am not going to deny that poor old dog a little pleasure,” she replied. “Nutty’s not going to be around much longer.”
“Hush,” Nick replied. “That dog is going to live forever.”
By this time the night was completely dark. Nick turned off the interstate and onto Highway 259 for the final stretch before we’d reach Nacogdoches. While there had been a good deal of traffic on I-20, the two-lane highway we were now driving on was virtually empty.
The sides of the road were lined with pine trees, though all we could see was darkness and the occasional light of a house tucked into the thicket. I’d loved growing up in the East Texas Piney Woods, exploring the forest, chasing squirrels, losing myself in the lush green world. Unlike Dallas, which seemed to be in constant motion, the woods were peaceful and quiet and still. Someday I’d love to own a weekend cabin on one of the many area lakes.
Headlights shone behind us and I saw Nick glance at the approaching vehicle in his rearview mirror. “That driver is coming up awfully fast.”
I turned around to look. Sure enough, the car was quickly gaining on us. Unfortunately, given that the woods stood so close to the highway, there was no shoulder where Nick could pull over to the let the car pass. The driver would have to wait until we rounded the curve and entered a passing zone before he’d be able to ease by us.
The car zipped up behind and turned his headlights from low to high beam, filling the Impala with light and nearly blinding Nick.
Nick squinted and looked ahead, trying to keep his focus on the road. “What the hell does this doofus think he’s doing?”
Bonnie turned around, shielding her eyes with her hand. “Think he might be drunk?”
I pulled out my phone, ready to dial 911 if the ass didn’t back off.
The car whipped to the side and came up next to us. It was a silver, rattletrap SUV with a blue net on a pole sticking out the back.
The same SUV I’d seen earlier in my neighborhood.
The SUV swerved at us, trying to force us off the road. Bonnie screamed, Nick cursed, and I dialed 911, trying to communicate both with Nick and the dispatcher at the same time.
“I’m IRS Special Agent Tara Holloway,” I said into the phone. “My partner and I have been tailed. Someone is trying to run us off the road.”
“You’re a whosie whatsit?” she asked.
Holy guacamole! Someone was trying to force us into a deadly head-on collision with a loblolly pine. There was no time to give this woman a lesson on IRS criminal law enforcement! I decided to make it easy on both of us. “I’m a federal agent.”
When she asked for our location I couldn’t provide a mile marker but I was able to do some quick mental computations and advise her we were approximately ten miles south of the interstate. She promised to have local law enforcement en route ASAP. I wasn’t much reassured, though. Whatever was happening here wouldn’t go on long. This guy seemed hell-bent on putting an end to us. Either he’d force us off the road and into a tree, or we’d slow down and he’d likely try to take us out another way.
I reached into my purse, grabbed my Glock, and slid a clip into it. So much for getting through a case without having to use my gun.
Problem was, I had no idea who had tailed us. Had Geils figured out we were undercover agents and sent one of his goons after us? I supposed it was possible, though I didn’t recognize the car as belonging to anyone from the club. Was the guy someh
ow related to the Tennis Racketeers? I had my doubts about that, too. The SUV looked like a blue-collar vehicle, not the type to be driven by the country club crowd. Maybe the guy was after Nick. In addition to the investigation at Guys & Dolls, he was also working a case against a man who sold and installed underground storm shelters. Maybe the pool cleaner had met the storm shelter salesman on a home site.
Nick whipped the steering wheel, trying to avoid both the SUV and the trees. The Impala’s erratic movements woke Nutty, who struggled to a stand on the seat, putting himself directly in my line of fire. Luckily, when Nick swerved in the other direction to avoid the SUV, the dog slid across the seat and I pulled myself forward and over, effectively changing places with him.
I unrolled the window and took aim at the SUV’s tires. Before I could pull the trigger, though, Nick floored the gas pedal and roared past the car. At that point, it would have been far easier to simply shoot out the windshield, but then I’d risk killing the guy. The Lobo would be upset enough that I’d drawn my gun—again!—but if I actually killed someone I knew I’d come under extreme scrutiny, not only from the higher-ups at the IRS but also from the public. The attorney in the Tennis Racketeers trial had already painted me as a trigger-happy shoot-’em-up agent, and Trish had been happy to detail my humiliation on the news. I wasn’t sure I could fire my gun again without incurring some serious repercussions.
As the guy tried to pull up next to us again, Nick weaved side to side across both lanes, blocking him. It was an effective strategy. Unless the SUV was next to us, the driver couldn’t force us off the road.
“Where’d you learn to drive like this?” I asked.
“Smokey and the Bandit,” he replied.
“He must’ve watched that show a hundred times with his father,” Bonnie said. “They plumb near wore out the videotape.”