by Vicki Tharp
He dropped his hand and Jenna continued walking.
She took the first available seat. He took the one next to her and glared at the man on the other side of her until the man took his drink to a table.
“Corona,” Moose said. “And a Scotch and soda.”
Sweat pricked out along her hairline. “Why are we here?”
“For a drink.”
“What’s the point? It costs you money. I drink your booze. I go back to my guy.”
“For now.”
“No. For always.” She said it like it was true and not a mere dream. Because that’s what it was, wasn’t it? A dream?
Some dreams come true.
Which was awful hard to consider when you were sipping Scotch and soda with a lieutenant of one of the most notorious Mexican cartels.
“Besides,” he said. “I have plenty of money.”
“Which I’m sure also means plenty of women. So, what do you want with me?”
The barman delivered the drinks. Moose twirled the frosty bottle in his hand, caught the corner of the label with his thumbnail, and took a long tug. “You’re not like other women.”
She didn’t know quite what to make of that. What she did know, was that she had the perfect opportunity to find out more about Kurt. She didn’t want to blow it. Her stomach rolled, and she gripped her glass tight to keep her hand from shaking. Here goes nothing. “Did you kill Kurt?”
He didn’t react. No surprise, no vehement denial. He took another sip of his beer. Maybe he didn’t remember who Kurt was.
She bobbed her chin toward the side of the bar where the parking lot lay. “The guy with the Mustang.”
“I know who Kurt was.”
“Doesn’t matter to me, mind you. Makes our cut bigger. But it matters to him.” She didn’t have to say who “him” was. “Better he knows up front than he finds out later.”
After a long pause, Moose said, “You wearing a wire?”
Thank you, Quinn. Jenna pulled one edge of her neckline over, then the other, then stood and gave him a slow spin. Her dress fit her form. Any wires would be visible. “Nowhere to hide one.”
That must have satisfied him, because he said, “Why do you think he was killed and didn’t die from an overdose?”
“A hunch,” she said. “Kurt rubbed some people the wrong way. Not a stretch that he’d push someone to their limit.”
Moose took another long sip of his beer, staring at Quinn’s reflection in the mirror behind the bar. “Wasn’t me.”
Jenna believed him.
Which surprised her more than the fact that he didn’t do it.
He hadn’t looked her in the eye and tried to convince her he wasn’t responsible. He was also completely relaxed. But he also didn’t deny that Kurt had been killed. He’d only denied that it wasn’t him that had done it.
“You’re a smart woman,” he said. “Smart enough to know that your boy will always be a small fish. Ditch him.”
“I prefer minnows to sharks.”
He gave her a toothy, great white grin and downed the last of his beer. Reaching into his pocket, he slapped a folded twenty on the bar and slid it over to her, a paper clip holding it together. “Then don’t be surprised when you’re swallowed whole.”
Moose got up and waved a hand at his boys. They jumped up and swam in his wake out the front door. Quinn was at her side before the door closed.
“You okay?” he asked. Concern and irritation and relief rolled off of him in hot waves.
She palmed the twenty, put it in her lap, and removed the paper clip. Three tiny sample baggies dropped out. The breath whooshed out of her lungs. This was all so real.
Quinn laid his hand over hers, trapping the samples between their hands, and linked their fingers. Jenna left the twenty on the bar to cover the drinks, and they left.
Even though they’d been given permission by the drug task force to take possession of the drugs, the good little girl in Jenna was freaking the heck out. She had samples. Of drugs. In her hand.
She glanced around the parking lot. Cop cars didn’t come zooming around the corner, sirens blaring. In fact, the lot was almost empty, and no one was on the street. No cars passed.
At the Mustang, Quinn slipped the drugs into his front pocket and held the passenger door open for her. After he climbed in, she said, “Holy moly. That was messed up.”
That got a tense chuckle out of Quinn.
She fumbled with her seat belt, and he reached across and buckled it for her, since she’d temporarily run out of properly working brain cells and couldn’t manage it herself.
“You were amazing,” Quinn said.
“I almost lost that game.”
“You almost won it, too.”
“I don’t want to be left alone with him again.”
“He creep you out?”
“No,” Jenna said. “That’s what was so creepy. If you ignore the fact that he’s the size of the Incredible Hulk, and part of a drug cartel, he’s a borderline regular guy, but when I asked him if he’d killed Kurt—”
“Whoa, back that shit up. You asked him if he killed Kurt? Are you fucking nuts?” His voice rose, grating like a revving engine about to throw a bearing.
She blew out a long breath, wiped the cold sweat from her brow. What had she been thinking? Was she crazy? Or temporarily insane? “He knew we knew Kurt. Knew he was dead. I thought I’d push that elephant off the table. Told him it didn’t matter to me, but it would to you.”
“Jesus Christ.” Quinn glanced all around them as if expecting the whole cartel to come gunning for them. Still no one on the street. Cartel or otherwise. “Well, what did he say?”
“He said it wasn’t him.” She unknotted her hands in her lap. “I believed him. But I think he knows who killed him.”
“What else did he say?”
“Basically, that I should dump you and be with him. Apparently, he has money.”
“Should we go back to the ranch and pack your bags?”
She shrugged. “Maybe in the morning.” She glanced at his lips, then back up to his eyes. “We’ve got some things we need to do tonight.”
His eyes brightened. And she knew where his mind had gone. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. We’ve got a hot date with a hooker.”
* * * *
On their way to meet up with Agent Soto, Quinn eyed his rearview mirror with great frequency, making sure no one followed. He took side roads, and backtracked, and only when he was certain they were alone did he dare drive to the address St. John had given them.
“You sure this is the right place?” Jenna asked as they pulled into the vacant parking lot of a convenience store that had gone out of business.
“This is the right address.”
If the other side of the tracks had an other side of the tracks, this area would be it. The occasional car drove by. Some fast, like they’d realized they were in a bad part of town and wanted to zip out of there lickety-split. Others drove by slower as if they were looking for something. Drugs? Hookers? A few blocks up, a group of three people hung out at the corner. One of the few corners that had a working streetlight.
Near the corner, a tricked-out lowrider, windows down and music blaring, pulled out of a motel where a dilapidated sign boasted that the establishment had cable TV and room rates listed by the hour. The car stopped at the corner, and someone leaned against the passenger door and exchanged something through the open window.
“Did we just see a drug deal go down?” Jenna whispered.
“I think so. And you don’t have to whisper. They can’t hear you.”
“I know,” she said a little louder, but not by much. “Wait, look.”
She pointed as the lowrider stopped at the corner opposite them and Agent Soto slipped out of the car. The man driving
yelled at her through the window, but his words were lost under the deep bass vibrating the Mustang’s windows.
Soto shot the driver the finger with both barrels, and the car sped off in a cloud of smoke and burning rubber. Soto yelled, “Asshole!” as a parting shot as the driver screeched around the next corner.
“I think that’s our cue,” Quinn said. He started the engine and pulled up to the corner until Jenna’s window was next to Soto.
Soto wore the same outfit from earlier that afternoon. She rested her forearms on the window and leaned in.
“Who was that?” Jenna asked.
“My pimp.”
Pimp? Guess they had to make that undercover stuff look real. Jenna made a choking noise, and Quinn wondered if she’d swallowed her tongue.
“Agent Washington, to the rest of the world. How’d it go?”
Difficult to say “good,” so Quinn settled on, “Got the samples.” He started to reach into his pocket, and Soto waved him off.
“You can give them to me at the hotel. I’ll debrief you there.” She opened the door and squeezed into the back. Quite the feat in a two-door car. Soto pointed to the motel a few blocks up.
Quinn chuckled. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Gotta make it look real,” Soto said.
“Anyone going to believe Quinn picked you up with me in the car?”
“Oh, sweetheart.” Soto laughed. “You’d be surprised. The girlfriend, the wife, wanting to fulfill her man’s fantasies. Happens all the time.”
“Eww,” Jenna said.
“Hmm, that’s not such a bad—”
Jenna bopped Quinn on the arm. But there was a smile on her face.
“Aw, c’mon, babe.” Quinn laid on the country-twang accent as thick and smooth as creamy peanut butter. “Don’tcha wanna make my wildest dreams come true?”
“Don’t knock it ’til you try it,” Soto was quick to add.
Jenna waved her hand toward the motel. “You, drive. And you”—Jenna glanced over her shoulder at Agent Soto in the middle seat—“don’t encourage him.”
As instructed, Quinn parked in front of the end room of the motel near a couple of older pickup trucks and a newer BMW. Apparently the establishment catered to all kinds of clients.
Quinn got out and helped Agent Soto out of the backseat. She looped her arm around his and went up on her tippy toes to lay a sloppy, wet one on him, tongue and all, laughing and grinning at him like he was the love child of Idris Elba and Michael Bloomberg.
His face went slack, and Soto said, “Work with me here.”
Quinn’s focus snapped back and he leaned down and kissed her, snagging Jenna by the arm as she walked by. Together the three of them stumbled into the motel room. As soon as the door closed, Soto peeled herself off of him and double-checked that the curtains weren’t gapped.
One of the bedside table lights was on. Soto went around and turned on the other one, as well as the fluorescent in front of the sink and mirror.
“Have a seat,” she instructed Quinn and Jenna, indicating the two-top table in front of the window.
Soto sat on the edge of the bed. The mattress sagged and groaned even though she maxed out at a buck-twenty, tops.
“Nice place you got here,” Jenna said. “Eighties retro floral. Unexpected, but a nice touch.”
Soto was careful not to touch the bedspread with her hands. “Not sure if it’s been washed since they bought it. I hope you two are current on your shots.”
“Anybody else coming?” Jenna asked.
“No. For now, all contact with the task force will be through me. Call or text anytime. But we don’t want you going into the sheriff’s office until we give you the okay. We don’t want to take a chance on someone seeing you there.” Soto held out her hand. “Samples?”
Quinn gladly forked them over. Soto examined the three bags. “Looks like heroin, coke, and crystal meth. I’ll run these to the lab.”
“Will you be able to tell if the heroin was from the same supply that was found in Kurt?”
“Possibly. But it still won’t tell us if his death was accidental, intentional, or murder.”
“Murder,” Jenna said, her tone leaving no doubt that she believed it.
“Jenna?” Soto drew the word out the same way dog owners did when asking the dog with the stuffing coming out of its mouth who’d chewed up the couch.
With guilty, puppy-dog eyes, Jenna glanced over at Quinn.
“Tell her,” he said.
She dug at the piece of fake-wood, plastic-laminate peeling up from the edge of the table and blew out a breath. “I asked Moose if he’d killed Kurt.”
Soto didn’t yell or scream or tell Jenna what a dumbass move that was. She digested Jenna’s answer, her fingers toying with oversized gold hoops dangling from her ears. Then she nodded her head as if she’d come to some internal consensus. “Okay, well, not how I would have approached it.” Soto’s eyes locked on Jenna. “At all. But you can’t take it back now. What did he say?”
“Only that it wasn’t him.”
“What’s your gut tell you? You believe him?”
“Yeah,” Jenna said. “I do. I’m not an expert at these things, but after spending so much time with the horses, you learn to read body language. Humans aren’t so different.”
“So, now what?” Quinn asked.
“Wait for the lab results. Stay away from anywhere you might run into Moose for the time being. The task force will be working on strategies in the meantime.”
Quinn and Jenna left, the car ride home quiet as they both processed everything that had happened that day. He pulled under the Lazy S’s arch and eased the Mustang down the dirt road so the shocks wouldn’t shake his spleen loose.
The day had been long and stressful, but the low-level buzz of adrenaline in his veins left him awake and a little twitchy. As they approached the big house, Quinn asked, “Want to stop by my cabin for a drink? I found a bottle of whiskey hidden in the top cupboard in Kurt’s cabin. Unopened.”
Jenna scrunched up her face. “Not sure if that’s bad or good. Knowing he’d bought it or knowing he hadn’t had the chance to drink it.”
“Or he could have decided he wasn’t going to drink it. We don’t know. No sense in beating yourself up about it. He was a grown man. He had problems, but he was still responsible for his own actions. That isn’t on you. You were the program director, not his keeper.”
“Yeah,” she said at last.
“Yeah, you believe me? Or yeah, you want a drink?”
“Both, I guess.”
They pulled in at the cabin, his headlights sweeping over Sidney as she walked up the road.
They climbed out, then sat on the top step of the porch waiting for her to reach them.
“How’d it go?” she asked.
“Okay,” Jenna said. “Got the drug samples, now we have to wait for the testing.”
“Good.” Sidney didn’t act like she was thinking of leaving anytime soon.
Quinn liked her—she was a nice person and a terrific horse trainer—but right then, he wanted a glass of whiskey that he didn’t have to pour down a drain or pretend to drink. And he wanted to do that alone.
Well, alone…with Jenna.
“Something you needed?” Quinn finally asked.
“Yeah, well, Boomer and I have decided we don’t want Pepita riding the bus for the time being. The idea of El Verdugo being back in the area has her a bit freaked out, though she tries to act like it doesn’t. I don’t expect there’ll be a problem, but I don’t want to take any chances.”
“Sure,” Jenna said. “What can we do to help?”
“Tomorrow, she’s supposed to go to her friend Tarkin’s house after school to work on a project. His mom is picking them up, but I need someone to pick Pepita up afterward. I’
ve got that 4-H class I have to teach in Alpine that night, and Boomer is tied up, as well.”
“I’ll pick her up, no problem.”
“You sure? I’d ask Mac, but she’s still not feeling well.”
A quick smile flashed across Jenna’s face before she managed to hide it.
“I’m sure.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it. I’ll leave you two to it.”
They said their good-byes, and Quinn helped Jenna to her feet. The cabin was stuffy from being closed up all day. Jenna went for the windows and Quinn went straight for the booze. He pulled down two coffee mugs and poured a couple of fingers in each. Glenfiddich. At least if Kurt had been going to drink, it would have been the good stuff.
“Out there.” He bobbed his chin toward the door. “What was that smile all about?”
“What smile?” Jenna boosted herself up onto the counter, and he handed her a mug.
“The one where Sidney told you that Mac wasn’t feeling well and you smiled. Don’t deny it. You secretly have it in for her?” he teased.
“No, nothing like that. Mac’s fantastic and p—”
Quinn nudged her knees open with his hip and stepped between them. “Spit it out.”
She tossed back a mouthful of whiskey. Coughed. Sputtered. “Wow.” She waved a hand in front of her face. “What is that stuff, five hundred proof?”
“Close enough.” Quinn took the mug from her hand. “Stop procrastinating. Mac’s amazing and…?”
“Pregnant.”
“Wow, no shit? What does your dad think?”
“He doesn’t know yet.”
“Not something you can hide forever.”
“That’s what I told her. She’s just trying to wrap her head around the idea first. At least that’s the line she fed me.”
He stared at Jenna’s hand that she’d unconsciously laid across her abdomen when she’d said “pregnant.” He put his hand on top of hers. And for the first time in his life, wondered what it would feel like to know his baby was growing inside the body of the woman whom he loved. What it would feel like to watch her belly grow, to feel his baby kick against his hand…
