The Texas Ranger

by Diana Palmer

  Josette nodded at Brannon and waited for Alice.

  "You working homicide now, Langley?" Alice teased as she lugged her bag up the steps.

  "You'd be surprised. Still cutting up people, I gather?"

  Alice laughed and hugged her. "It buys groceries. I see Brannon's here, too. He'll want me to jab in a thermometer in front of everybody"

  "For God's sake, Jones, put a sock in it!" Brannon said disgustedly.

  "No sense of humor," the coroner scoffed. "No wonder you never made captain."

  "I'm not old enough," he said curtly.

  "Excuses, excuses," she murmured, and shouldered past them, her mind already focusing on the task ahead.

  The deputy gave Brannon an amused look and followed Alice into the apartment.

  The apartment had been thoroughly ransacked. It looked as if a tornado had hit the contents of the sparsely furnished rooms. Everything the old lady had was emptied out or scattered. There, in the midst of it, the body lay under a sheet someone had brought out of the bedroom. Her shoes were visible where it didn't quite cover her feet. Josette remembered the woman's affection for her son, and her grief at his death. Maybe she was with him again, now. But she looked so vulnerable lying there like that, so helpless. It made her sad.

  Brannon and Josette were outside with the deputy and two sheriff's department crime-scene investigators, helping keep the curious away, when Alice came out and pulled them to one side.

  "You'll get a complete report after we finish the autopsy," she told them. "But from a preliminary standpoint, I can tell you definitely that she's been dead at least twenty-four hours, and that she was probably tortured before she was shot."

  "Cigarette burns," Josette guessed.

  "Right on."

  "Just a minute, Alice," Josette called over her shoulder as she went to the car to her purse. She drew out a handkerchief and opened it. "I found this on the pavement outside the apartment."

  "Hey, Bill!" Alice called to one of the civilian evidence technicians. "Come get this!"

  The technician came out, his hands in disposable gloves. He stripped them off and peered over Alice Jones's shoulder at what Josette had. She explained where she found it and gave a description of the visitors to them, adding the name of the neighbor who gave it to her and where she lived.

  Pulling an evidence bag from his pocket, the technician carefully eased it inside and closed the edges.

  "It's a long shot," Alice said, very professional now, "but in seven percent of the population, we can get a DNA profile from saliva traces. Cross your fingers."

  "They're crossed. Nice work, Josie," Brannon remarked.

  "Luck," she replied. "Pure luck. If her neighbor hadn't told me about it, I'd have walked right over it. I saw something else. It's an unusual brand of cigarettes."

  "I noticed." His face was flinty. "I want these people locked up. I can't imagine the sort of mentality it takes to torture a helpless old woman!"

  "The neighbor said they took a small box and a book, maybe a Bible, out of the apartment when they left. Mrs. Jennings knew something. We'll never know what."

  "And I have more news," he told her. "York knocked out an orderly and walked right out by the man we had guarding him in the hospital."

  "Oh, great!" Josette muttered. "That's just what we need, a hit man on the loose and a target we can't name still in danger." She glanced toward the apartment. "You don't suppose?"

  "The neighbor's description of the male visitor doesn't match York," Brannon said. His eyes narrowed. "But I checked the files. Jake Marsh always wears wing tips," he added with a determined look.

  "Does he have a wife or mistress?" she asked.

  Brannon lifted an eyebrow. "I hear he has two wives," he mused. "But nobody can prove it."

  "Mrs. Danton said the man had a nice-looking woman with him, in a fancy hat with a veil," she continued.

  "Not much to go on."

  "Yes. I know." Josette grimaced. "I guess somebody's told poor Mr. Holliman that his sister's dead."

  "Not yet," Brannon said. "I asked. I think you and I could handle that chore better than the deputies, because we know him. I'll clear it with them." He went to find the investigator in charge.

  "Did you notice that all the drawers were pulled out and the contents dumped?" Josette asked as she sat beside Brannon in his big SUV on the way to Mr. Holliman's house.

  "Yes."

  "Wouldn't you deduce that whatever they were looking for was small enough to fit in a drawer?" she persisted.

  He nodded slowly. "Good thinking."

  "I'm a trained investigator," she drawled.

  "And that's all you want out of life, is it?" Brannon asked carelessly. "To go on working in the criminal justice system until you can draw your pension?"

  She frowned. "What's wrong with that?"

  "You used to love kids," he recalled quietly. "I remember we'd go to the park and feed the pigeons some days during lunch. Parents would bring their children to swing on the swings, and you'd watch and smile and go dreamy."

  "You have to have sex to get children," Josette pointed out.

  "That's blunt."

  "It's the only language that works with you," she said. She glanced at him and folded her arms over the blue jacket she wore with a white blouse and patterned rayon skirt.

  "What's wrong with sex?"

  Josette shivered. Every time she thought about it, she saw herself as she was with that boy so long ago, or with Brannon. The things she'd let Brannon do to her were still shocking. And, even in memory, delicious.

  "I know your people were religious," he said gently. "But I'll remind you that sex is a big part of life. It's a beautiful experience between two people who care about each other."

  "If they're married."

  Brannon shook his head, laughing softly. "You've got to be the only woman I know who thinks so."

  "I was never one to follow the crowd, as you keep reminding me," she said idly, glancing out the window.

  "If you'd have that minor surgery, you could have sex with me," he said outrageously.

  Josette leaned back against the seat with her eyes closed. "Then you'd go on to your next conquest. You only want me because you can't have me."

  He laughed. "That's really funny."

  She turned her head toward him. "Why?"

  Brannon pulled onto the long, winding graveled road that led to Holliman's house and looked at her for a long moment before he accelerated. "Because I could have had you whenever I liked two years ago," he replied quietly.

  "That is a!"

  "If you're going to say 'lie,' save yourself the breath," he interrupted. "I was the one who pulled back on that last date," he reminded her bluntly. "You were begging me not to stop."

  Josette ground her teeth together. "Don't!" she groaned.

  "Why are you so ashamed?" he persisted. "Josette, we were two grown adults. You make it sound like a perversion that I made love to you."

  Her eyes closed in anguish.

  "You enjoyed me. I enjoyed you, too. I've never been so high on such innocent loveplay," he added gently.

  "Innocent!" she exclaimed, almost choking on the word.

  "Innocent," Brannon emphasized. "Surely you know?"

  Her face was like stone. She didn't meet his searching gaze, and she was even more tense than before.

  "You don't," he realized, scowling. "Why not?"

  "Because everyone in Jacobsville knew that I accused a boy of rape and he was acquitted because they said I lied about it," Josette replied tersely. "Nobody would come near me after that. I had a reputation. Even after we moved to San Antonio, there was a girl who had family in Jacobsville. She knew about it and told everyone."

  "God!" Brannon exclaimed. "I never realized!"

  "I didn't go to parties, because the boys either made fun of me or made insinuating remarks," she said huskily. "I didn't go to a single school function right up until graduation. Then when I went on to college, I though
t it would be all right, but there were people there who knew me from high school." Josette sighed audibly. "Until you started taking me out, I hadn't had a single date."

  He was floored. No wonder she'd reacted so strangely to his ardor that night. He'd literally swept her off her feet, given her no time to be shocked or hesitant. He'd aroused her and proceeded to undress her. She'd been in so deep that she never protested at all. And if it hadn't been for her shocking condition, he probably wouldn't have stopped at all, he admitted privately. He'd wanted her. He'd been prepared. There would have been no real risk.

  His hand smoothed absently over the steering wheel and he frowned, deep in thought.

  "I thought Gretchen would have told you," Josette said, puzzled by his silence.

  "We didn't talk about you after that night." Brannon replied. "Or before it." He drew in a long breath. "It's far too late to say I'm sorry. But I am. Deeply sorry."

  "You didn't know," she said. "It was a misunderstanding all around." She picked at the cuticle around her thumb. "Brannon, were yougoing to stop?" she asked.

  "No."

  Her intake of breath was latent with shock.

  "I'm sorry," he said. "That was much too blunt. But it was the truth, just the same. I was in over my head," he amended. "I'd wanted you for a long time. We were alone together in my apartment, and you were so responsive that I stopped thinking in terms of right or wrong. I hadn't planned to seduce you. But I lost control. I never had before."

  "Oh."

  "And I had company," he added solemnly. "Because you lost control, too, Josie. That's why you can't face what happened. You wanted me so badly that you were sobbing with sheer desire. You begged me not to stop, and I was so sick with realization of what you were and what I'd cost you that I couldn't think past getting out the door."

  Brannon stopped at a stop sign and turned to face her fully on the deserted stretch of road. "I compounded every error I'd already made by not explaining why I left. It wasn't only because I was ashamed of what I'd done to you. It was because I felt comfortable coming on to you in a purely sexual way, with your past. I should have been horsewhipped."

  "But it wasn't completely your fault," she said. "I" Josette averted her eyes and clutched her briefcase tightly on her lap. "I"

  "Wanted me," he said for her. "It's not a dirty word. Desire is the way God perpetuates the species. It isn't ugly."

  "It is." She choked. "It's ugly and it makes women act like prostitutes!"

  "Prostitutes sell their bodies, sweetheart," he said gently. "It's not the same thing. Not at all." He reached out and grasped one of her hands tightly in his. "I wanted very badly to make love to you that night. Not as a one-night stand, or a casual affair, either." Brannon smiled faintly. "It was hard for me to leave you, even to go home at night," he confessed. "I found the damnedest excuses to run into you, on campus, in town. I even started going to church, so that I could see you on Sundays."

  Her eyes widened with surprise.

  "You didn't notice," he mused. "Your father did. He was still uneasy about having you go out with me, thinking about you the way I did. But he seemed to realize later that it wasn't just physical with me. Or with you."

  She hesitated. "It wasn't?"

  His fingers tightened around hers. "Josie, you have some wonderful qualities," he said softly. "You have a heart as big as all outdoors. You're generous to a fault. You love people, and they react to you because they can see it in the way you look at them, the way you talk to them. You're honest, you hate lies, you never shirk a job because it might be hard or dangerous, and you're the best company I ever had. I even enjoyed going to the park with you, because I could watch you watching other people. And even then, it didn't dawn on me that what I felt was more than desire."

  "Was it?" she asked huskily.

  "You know that already," he said. "But you're hesitant to trust me, because you've been let down so badly. You accuse me of living in the past, but so are you. Until you can put away all that resentment and anger, there isn't any hope for a new relationship."

  She shifted restlessly. Her arm was uncomfortable, even in its sling. "What sort of relationship could we have?"

  He rubbed his thumb over her palm, sensitizing it. "Any sort you want," he said openly. "I want to be your lover. You know that. But I'll settle for whatever you feel comfortable giving me, even if it's only friendship."

  Her dark eyes softened on his face, curious and puzzled.

  "I'm not putting any pressure on you," he added. "But I'd like to get to know you again."

  Josette swallowed. "You live in San Antonio. I live in Austin."

  "You could work out of the D.A.'s office here," Brannon pointed out. "I know they have vacancies. Not a lot of people are standing in line for investigators' jobs here. Or I could work out of Victoria and you could get a job with the district attorney in Jacobs County and work out of Jacobsville."

  "That would be like acommitment."

  He nodded. "Yes. A commitment."

  Josette sighed. "What would you expect?"

  "Now, or eventually?"

  "Now."

  Brannon smiled. "A companion for the symphony and the opera and the ballet," he said. "We used to share a passion for those things."

  Her face brightened. "Yes. I enjoyed going out with you."

  "I enjoyed just being with you." He brought her hand to his mouth and kissed it hungrily, making her tingle all over. "I won't try to seduce you, either," he promised.

  "I'll have to think about it," Josette said after a minute. Her heart was racing. Her body was exploding with sensation and hope.

  He saw that expression in her eyes and smiled. "Take all the time you like."

  Brannon dropped her hand and moved back onto the road toward Holliman's. It felt like a new beginning. He hoped that this time he wouldn't foul things up.

  Chapter Twelve

  » ^ «

  Mr. Holliman was waiting for them on the ramshackle front porch when they drove up. He smiled as they approached him, until he got a close look at their faces.

  "Something's happened, hasn't it?" he asked uncertainly, and his expression tautened.

  "Yes. I'm sorry to have to tell you that your sister's been killed," Brannon said straight out.

  "Been killed?" The old man just stood and stared at them for a minute. "Killed? How?"

  "Shot," Brannon said, without going into details. "We don't know who did it. Her apartment was ransacked, so we know the perpetrator was looking for something. Two items were removed, but we don't know if they found what they were looking for or hoped to find it in the items. We assume that it was something of Dale Jennings's that they thought she had. We're investigating."

  Mr. Holliman sat down in his chair on the porch, heavily. "I'll have to make arrangements" He looked up. "Is she at the hospital?"

  "Yes. The medical examiner will have to do an autopsy, and evidence will go to the state crime lab for analysis. When the autopsy is finished, they'll make arrangements to release her to a funeral home. You can call Alice Jones at the medical examiner's office. She'll tell you what you need to know."

  "I'll do that, and get in touch with the funeral home," he said, lifting his head. "Two funerals in less than a week is a little more than I bargained for." He sighed. "That makes me the last of my family," he murmured sadly. "The very last one"

  "Is there anything we can do?" Josette asked, interrupting him gently.

  "Yes." The old man's watery eyes glittered. "You can get her murderer for me," he said coldly. "You can make sure he's punished. Because ten to one whoever killed her also killed my nephew!"

  Brannon dropped Josette off at the D.A.'s office. She paused in the open door with the engine running and looked back at him.

  "I've been thinking," she said, explaining her silence on the way back. "What if Jennings had a safe-deposit box?"

  He nodded slowly. "That's possible. I'll look into it. Call you later."

  "Okay."


  "One more little thing," Brannon added softly.

  Her eyebrows lifted and she smiled. "Yes?"

  He leaned toward her. "If you feel sick, or dizzy, get someone to drive you back to my apartment and phone me. I don't want you out of that office alone, for any reason. We're still short one hit man."

  York, he meant. Josette stared at him with an odd little smile. He was very protective. She shouldn't like that. But she did. "Okay."

  He smiled back at her. "And don't go adventuring."

  She moved her wounded arm gingerly. "Too soon for that. See you."

  She closed the door and watched him drive away before she went inside to report their progress. She was introduced to Grier, who invited her into his office.

  Cash Grier was thirty-eight, tall and lean-faced, with black eyes and long, black hair that he wore in a ponytail. He wore jeans and a black T-shirt under an unconstructed denim jacket, and black boots. Josette was quietly amused at the thought of him as a sort of reversed Texas Ranger. Unlike his colleagues, he didn't like a white hat and conventional haircuts. He was certainly nothing like the conservative detective Josette had pictured. Grier had perfect white teeth, which he displayed only briefly when they were introduced, and a manner that was to the point and professional. He was the computer expert, and within two minutes Josette would have put him on a par with Phil Douglas in Simon Hart's office. Grier knew his job.

  "Sandra Gates is responsible for getting Jennings transferred to a state prison, and onto a work detail," he said at once. "I've tracked down every connection she's made in the past three months, including forays into her account at the bank," he added. "She gets paid a flat fee for her software, mid-four figures. But she's got fifty grand in her savings account, and it was all deposited at once, the day Jennings was killed."

  "Bingo!" Josette said, smiling. "Can you prove it?"

  "I can," he said. "And in fact, I've put together enough evidence for a warrant. There's just one small hitch."

  "Which is?"

  "She flew the coop," Grier said, leaning back in his chair, his black eyes under heavy dark brows steady and impatient. "She went to the bank and drew out her money, got a cab to the airport and went to Argentina. Your guy Phil Douglas tracked her there. But we can't extradite her from there."