A Forever Kind of Hero

by Marie Ferrarella

  “No, not yet.” Garrett didn’t want egg on his face if this did turn out to be a false lead. He and Cassidy had already had words. He wasn’t about to be the reason twenty DEA agents swarmed the wrong house. “Let me check it out first, and then I’ll get back to you.”

  “Okay, partner.” Oscar sounded doubtful. “Just don’t do anything stupid.”

  “You got it, Mother.” Garrett rang off before Oscar had a chance to answer, then smiled to himself. He supposed that Oscar was as close to him as he’d allowed anyone to get in the last fifteen years. Since Andy had died.

  “Maybe Velasquez is finally going to get his, big brother,” Garrett murmured as he followed the windy, hilly road to the address Oscar had given him.

  He could see why Velasquez had chosen this location, however temporarily. From up here, his drivers could catch anyone coming from the opposite direction off guard, and force them over the side.

  Tension rode up the hill with him.

  There was another reason that the dealer had probably chosen the house, Garrett thought as he approached it. Perched at the top of the hill, it looked down at the affluent city below. The city beneath its feet. It fit in with the way Velasquez pictured himself—lording it over the rest of humanity.

  “What goes up, must come down,” Garrett murmured, relishing the dealer’s coming fall.

  Hiding the car behind a tangle of mesquite that grew tall and wild, he quickly made his way toward the house. Garrett was exposed, but he was counting on the fact that no one was looking his way at that moment. Luck had kept him alive this long.

  The house, running about six-thousand square feet, by Garrett’s guess, had gleaming white stucco walls and recessed windows, and looked at first to be a fortress. That was also in keeping with Velasquez’s image, he thought.

  There was an eene stillness surrounding the house. Not even the wind was stirring.

  The calm before the storm?

  Garrett knew his quarry well enough not to let his guard down, no matter how peaceful everything seemed. If Velasquez was here. So far, there was no evidence of anyone being around.

  There were no cars in the driveway, not even the trademark white stretch limousine. No loud music coming from the windows, opened now to let in the early evening air. Garrett knew Velasquez liked his music blaring and fast, just like his women.

  He saw no evidence of either.

  It was beginning to seem as though someone had given them the wrong address.

  Very slowly, like a soldier on patrol in enemy territory, Garrett made his way around to the perimeter of the house. Every foot was surrounded by tall saguaros, each with arms that were extended on either side like deadly green sentries. The hoary cacti spines looked more lethal than a moat filled with alligators.

  The cacti made looking through the windows difficult, but using a pair of miniature binoculars, he managed. And found that there was no one there.

  Something felt wrong.

  Garrett drew his gun out of his holster. In the distance, on the far side of the building, something shiny suddenly caught his eye. He couldn’t see what it was because of the shrubs that were in the way. Whatever gleamed was up high enough to be the hood of a car.

  Was he being watched and toyed with for Velasquez’s entertainment?

  A trickle of perspiration shimmied down his back.

  As Garrett came around to the front, he looked through the window and saw the body. Lean, dressed in black, the figure was sprawled out facedown on the pristine white sofa. It looked to be a man, but he couldn’t be sure.

  Garrett swallowed a curse. He needed to get inside the house.

  The garage and front door were the only accessible places. He opted for the garage. Still taking precautions, Garrett short-circuited the garage door opener, and let himself in. The cavernous area was completely deserted.

  Looks like Elvis has left the building, he thought, frustration eating away at him.

  Every nerve ending was sensitive, tense, as Garrett slowly made his way into the living room. And then stopped dead.

  There was a blonde bending over the body.

  Chapter 6

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Pressing two fingers against the teenager’s throat to find a pulse, Megan jerked her head up at the barked question. Finding the teenager had momentarily made her forget about the DEA agent she’d been tailing.

  She felt the faintest of flutters beneath her fingertips. Relief branched through her. At least the boy wasn’t dead. Yet.

  But even as she thought it, she felt the flutter in his throat disappear. His pulse was gone. Damn.

  Megan quickly pushed the boy flat onto the sofa, then with one hand over the other she began to press hard on his chest.

  “Following you,” she said, looking in Garrett’s direction as he crossed to her.

  “Following me?” he echoed. “How can you be following me? You’re here ahead of me.”

  “Correction.” Pinching the boy’s nose, Megan breathed into his mouth. Something pungent and repelling assaulted her nose. What had he consumed? “I got here after you did.” Breathing out through her mouth, she forced air into his lungs again. “I just hit the living room before you did.”

  “I didn’t see anyone following me.”

  Was she part of this? he suddenly wondered. He looked at Megan in a completely different light. Was she just posing as a private investigator to throw him off, while she was actually part of the muck and slime that was Velasquez’s organization?

  But if that were true, what was her advantage? If Velasquez was onto him, he’d be dead by now.

  Working furiously over the teenager’s chest again, Megan shot Garrett an exasperated look. “You weren’t supposed to see me.”

  She caught his expression. Wichita was looking at her strangely, as if he didn’t believe her. As if he were having doubts about her altogether. The suspicion in his eyes was on the verge of turning into something ugly, but she didn’t have time to deal with that right now. She was losing a battle.

  “Live, damn you,” she cried, hitting the teenager’s chest with the flat of her hand.

  To her relief, she saw it respond ever so slightly. He was breathing on his own again. Her heart racing, Megan pushed her hair out of her eyes, and spared Garrett an annoyed look. A lot of help he’d turned out to be.

  The look on his face was still there.

  He thought she was one of them, she realized. Megan knew she had to share something with him in order to get back to level footing with the agent. Otherwise, it was hopeless.

  “I put a transponder in your car.”

  Garrett’s eyes narrowed. He’d watched her closely this morning. She hadn’t had the time to bug his car. “When?” he demanded.

  She slid onto the sofa beside the unconscious boy. Dressed all in black, he looked like a tall pipe cleaner A half-dead pipe cleaner.

  “When you gallantly picked up my shoulder bag, I put the device inside your trunk. I let you play hide-and-seek all by yourself in the airport parking lots, although I have to admit that you surprised me when you kept on going.” It hadn’t made any sense to her then, and it still didn’t. “Why didn’t you just fly here?”

  Unprepared for the extensive road trip, Megan had had to pull into a gas station before continuing. The traffic jam that engulfed her just before she crossed the California-Arizona line had caused her to lose his signal. She’d kept on traveling in good faith for more than half an hour before she picked it up again.

  Garrett wasn’t inclined to explain himself, but since she’d told him about the transmitter, he grudgingly made an exception.

  “Velasquez doesn’t fly. It increases chances of our paths crossing.” He frowned. “Never mind that now. You’re not supposed to be here. You’re impeding a federal investigation.”

  Dragging her hand through her hair, she looked at the unconscious boy.

  “Way I see it, I’m not impeding anything. I just saved his
life.” To prove it, she took Garrett’s fingers and pressed them against the boy’s neck, so he could feel the pulse for himself “It’s faint,” she said before he could comment. “We need to get him to hospital. Now.”

  Sliding his hand away from hers, Garrett turned toward the telephone on the coffee table. White—like everything else in the room—with a curved receiver, it was shaped to resemble an old-fashioned telephone, complete with rotary dial. Velasquez liked to surround himself with graceful things.

  Leaning over, Megan grabbed the cuff of his sleeve to stop him. “There isn’t time to wait for an ambulance to get here.”

  With his thumb over the teenager’s eyelid, Garrett raised it to see the bloodshot eye beneath. She was right. He would have realized it himself if seeing her here hadn’t completely thrown him. It looked as if the teenager had overdosed.

  Garrett let the lid drop. “Do you know what you’re talking about?”

  Since it was phrased as a question rather than an accusation, Megan took no offense. “I’ve had a course in EMS—Emergency Medical Services,” she clarified when he merely looked at her. Unable to resist, she added, “And I usually know what I’m talking about. It looks like he partied just a little too much.”

  “Or that’s what they want anyone who happens to find him to think.”

  By “they,” Megan knew he was talking about the drug ring. A sense of urgency pervaded Megan. She had to find Kathy before anything happened to the girl.

  On her feet, Megan struggled to get her shoulder under the teenager’s arm. He had a good six inches on her, if not more, and all of it was dead weight. She glared at Garrett “You could try helping.”

  “I figured you were just going to throw him over your shoulder and fly out of here.” In his opinion, the woman had a definite superhero complex.

  Before she could retort, he moved her aside and picked the boy up in his arms as easily as if he were picking up a pile of clothes. The boy lay just as limply in his arms.

  Megan grabbed her purse and hurried after them. She knew Garrett was not about to slow down for her benefit.

  But when he came to the front door, he had to stop. It was closed. Megan reached around him to get the doorknob, brushing against his midsection as she did so.

  Their eyes met for less than a second. Just long enough for each to acknowledge that contact with the other was noted. And felt.

  She opened the door for him, stepping back. “Has he done this before? Velasquez, I mean.”

  Garrett didn’t even look at her. The woman had been privy to more than he’d wanted her to be as it was. Instead, carrying the teenager in his arms, he strode to his car. Her question brought a volley of statistics crowding into his mind. “More than once. With anyone who’s outlived their usefulness.”

  “He doesn’t look as if he’s had enough time to outlive anything.”

  “He has if he’s eighteen and had nothing else to offer Velasquez beyond his age.”

  Though Megan thought of herself as fairly hardened, the situation was beginning to get to her. If the boy died, it would be such a pathetic waste. And Wichita was talking as matter-of-factly as if he were reciting some formula out of a textbook.

  Megan threw open the passenger door for Garrett. “Do all DEA people talk in sound bites?”

  Garrett deposited the boy in the front seat, then strapped him in before answering.

  “When Velasquez’s couriers turn eighteen, they become a liability to him. They can be tried as adults. That leaves the door open to plea bargaining and testimonies in exchange for immunity—areas he doesn’t want to risk leaving open.” Garrett closed the door. “Unless they’ve worked their way into the organization and can contribute in other ways, he gets rid of them. My guess is this one’s just eighteen—” he looked at the unconscious teenager through the windshield “—or he managed to cross Velasquez somehow.”

  She supposed that now was the time to share a little information. Before it came to light on its own.

  “Your first guess wins.” Garrett looked at her sharply. She gestured at the boy. “Let me introduce you to Joe Stafford—Kathy’s boyfriend. I saw his picture in his brother’s house.” She frowned, rethinking the logistics, then glanced over toward where she’d hidden her vehicle. “Maybe we should put him in my car.”

  The kid was staying right where he was. Garrett wouldn’t put it past Megan to try to lose him once the kid was transferred to her car. “Why, because you took a course in EMS?”

  If he was thinking of intimidating her with that dark look he was aiming at her, he was going to have to do a whole lot better than that, she thought.

  “No, because you might try to lose me now that you know where the transponder is.”

  The accusation, because it was dead-on, made him smile. “The thought crossed my mind.” But he had a bigger problem at the moment than wanting to shake her loose. “But right now, I’m going to have more trouble finding a hospital—”

  Megan knew when to grab an opportunity. “No problem. You follow me.”

  His eyes narrowed dubiously. “You’re familiar with the area?”

  “Absolutely.”

  All she needed, Megan thought hurrying away, was enough time to get into her car and look at the map before she turned the vehicle around. Hospitals were clearly indicated on the grid pages, and she always kept maps of all the surrounding states in the trunk of her car.

  “I’ll pull the car around.” She tossed the words over her shoulder as she hurried away. “Wait for me.”

  He didn’t want to, but at the moment he had no other choice.

  Megan pulled into an empty space in the hospital’s emergency room parking lot less than twenty minutes later. Yanking up the hand brake, she was almost out of the vehicle before it had a chance to come to a full stop. Along the way, she’d had enough time to worry about the consequences if Joe died. Right now, he was her best lead.

  She was at the passenger side when Garrett pulled up in the space next to hers. Anxiously, she peered at the boy’s face. His eyes were shut, and he looked completely lifeless. She stared at the shallow chest for signs of movement.

  “Is he still alive?” she demanded.

  “Just barely.” Garrett cut the engine. He would rather have called the paramedics to tend to the kid, but grudgingly had to admit that Megan had been right. The extra time it would have taken for them to arrive would probably have cost the boy his life.

  Megan had Joe unbuckled by the time Garrett rounded the hood. He easily swept the boy into his arms. “Let’s go.”

  Nodding, she turned and ran ahead, bursting in so quickly that the edges of the electronic doors brushed against her arms before they were fully retracted. Paying no attention, Megan grabbed hold of the first nurse she came across, stopping the woman in her tracks.

  Surprised, the nurse instinctively tugged to break Megan’s hold on her arm. Megan’s hand tightened.

  “We’ve got a teenager who ODed on drugs. He needs treatment—or he’s not going to make it. We need a doctor. Now.” Authority rang in her voice as she barked out the words.

  The nurse only hesitated long enough to look at the boy in Garrett’s arms before hurrying off to get the doctor on call.

  Garrett could only shake his head. Maybe it was a good thing that for now, Megan had aligned herself with him. “Are you this good about getting a table in a crowded restaurant?”

  The question coaxed out half a smile. “Only when I’m starving.”

  Amused by her answer, he found himself thinking that he wanted to be around when that happened.

  Within moments, the nurse returned with a doctor and several other people in her wake, including an official-looking woman holding a clipboard and more than a few papers in her hands.

  “We’re not sure what he took, but more than likely it’s cocaine,” Garrett told the doctor.

  Smooth-faced, the resident in the white lab coat looked too young to shave. Garrett wondered if he was getting too old
for this job, or if it had just prematurely aged him.

  “We’ll take it from here,” The resident turned to give instructions to the orderlies, who had brought a gurney over with them.

  The woman with the clipboard caught their attention. “I’m going to need some information,” she informed them, as capable hands took Joe from Garrett and placed the teenager on a gurney. With a penetrating look, she glanced from Garrett to Megan, temporarily withholding judgment. “Which of you is the patient’s next of kin?”

  “Neither of us,” Megan snapped before Garrett had a chance to answer. She hated red tape, even though it seemed to be as much a part of life as breathing. With effort, she softened her tone. “We found him. We’re with the DEA.” Knowing she probably had less than a second before Wichita challenged her with the truth, Megan turned to him suddenly. “Don’t just stand there, Wichita. Show the woman your ID.”

  More astounded than annoyed, Garrett produced his ID for the administrator, then took over. He had no intention of being run over by an overenergized blonde with a killer body and an even deadlier tongue.

  “The boy’s a potential witness in an ongoing investigation. We found him less than half an hour ago, and he’s apparently been drugged and left to die. I need to question him when he regains consciousness,” Garrett emphasized.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Megan’s face. She looked annoyed about being left out. Good.

  The hospital administrator pursed her lips uncertainly. “Then the government will be paying for his care?”

  Garrett understood the bottom line more than anyone. It always came down to that. Money. “It’ll be taken care of.”

  The woman nodded, though not entirely placated. “As long as you sign for it.” She turned a page. “I’ll need a name.”

  Megan interceded, picking up the ball again. “Joe Stafford.” It took her only a second to recall Joe’s address. “Last known address was 1782 Bigford Road in Bedford, California.”

  Writing quickly, the administrator filled in the top form, then gave it to Garrett to sign. She looked far from satisfied, but for now she appeared willing to retreat. Tucking the clipboard under her arm, she indicated the swinging blue doors to her left