by Lynde Lakes
A slow procession of ten solemn riders, on horses decorated with garlands of bluebonnets, followed his parents’ Cadillac. Riding tall in silver-trimmed saddles, the horsemen were decked out in dark western suits and shiny tooled boots. Behind the horses, twelve men marched on foot, strumming sad guitars, trailed by three drummers beating a mournful cadence. Alfonso, Tita, and Roberto followed them in a ranch truck. Twenty mounted vaqueros armed with rifles brought up the rear.
The procession ended at a family graveyard on a small rise of land about a mile from Matt’s house. Hundreds of bluebonnets decorated gates and arches. A small wooden stage had been erected and covered with a tent. Family, friends, and ranch hands filed into the rows of wooden benches set up in front of the stage. Women with mantillas of black lace covering their heads clutched rosaries and crossed themselves. A crowd of vaqueros stood at the back, hats in hand.
There were at least a hundred people there. Tita and Roberto took a seat beside Molly. In a whisper, Tita pointed out Parker’s pretty blonde wife and three stairstep sons. “Even though Parker and Bev’s divorce is almost final,” Tita said, “señor Matt will take care of those boys now like his own. He’s a good uncle. He’s already set up a college fund for them.”
Molly nodded. She wasn’t surprised. Matt was a caring man. Where were Bev and her children staying? And why wasn’t it at Matt’s house? She’d ask Tita later.
A Roman Catholic priest led the rosary. Later, those who wanted to speak came to the microphone. Vaqueros who had known Parker since he was a boy related poignant stories in a mixture of English and Spanish. One that touched Molly was a story about Parker at age ten when he’d climbed old windmill Carlita, certain he could fly. The vaquero ended his tale in a choked voice. “Now finally you can fly,” he said, “with the angels.”
Matt was the last to speak. He walked across the stage, his footfalls uneven, heavy, as though every step was an effort, pounding the unpainted wood planks with a hollow thud. He stood tall in front of the microphone. Sadness darkened his eyes, and he cleared his throat.
“Parker had strengths,” Matt said, “and weaknesses like all of us. He died because he refused to lift a hand against a brother. His murder will not go unpunished.” Matt lifted a powerful arm, fist closed. “Ride bolts of lightning in the night skies, big brother…” Matt’s voice broke. His wide shoulders trembled. After a moment, he swallowed, inhaled, then said, “Stay for the eight- count, mi hijo.”
Tears welled up in Molly’s eyes. She longed to race up onto the stage and hug Matt, to comfort him, but she held herself in check and waited until he joined her on the bench. Looking straight ahead, Molly slid her hand into Matt’s and held tight.
The priest raised his arms and everyone stood. While Parker’s casket was lowered into the ground with a slow drumbeat, a shadow fell across the grave, and Molly looked up into Ramon’s icy stare.
Chapter Ten
Stepping in front of Molly and the baby, Matt glared at Ramon. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Ramon gestured with his head. “Ask them.”
Edward Noble and Gordon Phillips, the FBI agents he’d sent to check on detective Arnie Kenner, gave stiff, index-finger salutes outward from their eyebrows. Both men had similar blend-into-the-crowd looks—dark hair, medium height with wiry builds. Matt had always thought they resembled each other enough to be brothers, or clones.
“What’s going on?”
We need to talk,” Noble said. “In private.”
Matt’s jaw tightened. He was in charge of the Del Fuego case, and he hadn’t called this meeting. Damn them, invading his ranch, disrupting his last moments with Parker. His sense of duty kept him from telling them all to go to hell. Instead, he gave a terse nod, then stepped away and asked Molly to go with his parents to the tent where food and drinks waited for those who’d come to pay their last respects. “I’ll be along shortly,” he promised, and gave her arm a squeeze.
Molly hugged her baby close, protectively. “I don’t want Ramon here.”
“I have to hear him out.”
Her eyes flashed. “Who are those other men?”
“FBI agents. I’ll fill you in later, I promise. Now go.”
She narrowed her eyes and glared at him. “Did you invite them here?”
“Hell, no. Have some faith in me, will you?” He knew what she was thinking—that he was going to hand her over to them.
Whipping through the tent, a hot breeze kicked up dust and spun mesquite leaves between them. Matt could have cut the hostile silence with a knife.
A pain throbbed in his head. “Come on, Molly. Don’t give me trouble now.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Later, then.” Her tone guaranteed it wasn’t a question. It was a promise.
He shook his head. Another time he might have laughed. He’d walked right into that one. That’s what came from dealing with a clever woman. “Just…trust me. Please.”
She hesitated, then spun away. Matt watched her to be sure she didn’t return. She walked between Victoria and Gavin to their Cadillac. They had asked her what was going on, but he hadn’t heard her answer.
Luke had been watching from a distance, out of earshot. He came up to Matt with a worried look on his face. “Is something wrong?”
“Everything’s under control.”
“Yeah? That’s what Parker said just before he walked off with Webb Viceman. Take care of yourself, bro.”
Matt nodded and patted Luke on the shoulder. Luke turned and jogged to his parents’ Cadillac. He paused, looked back, and gave Matt a long, meaningful look before he got into the back seat of the car with Molly and the baby.
Matt sighed. Was Luke that worried about him? Or just upset because he wasn’t in on things?
Matt drew himself up to his full height and, with his gut clenched tight in apprehension, walked out about ten yards across dry, rutting earth near a group of gnarled gum trees, faced the men. “How the hell did you get on the ranch without my security force stopping you?”
“Chopper.” Noble fumbled in the pocket of his beige western shirt and withdrew a pack of cigarettes. “Ramon showed us where we could land undetected.” Noble paused and lit a cigarette. He squinted as smoke curled into his eyes. “The rest was easy. Dressed like your vaqueros, we blended right in.”
Damn. Matt had told his men to watch for choppers, planes, and strangers. “Which sector?”
“Northeast corner of the west sector,” Noble said.
The guys in that section weren’t doing their jobs, and there would be hell to pay. “Okay. What gives?”
Noble blew out a puff of smoke. “Before we get to that, you need to know that Ramon’s one of us.”
Matt shook his head and glared at his former vaquero. “You’re FBI?”
Ramon nodded and looked down at his boots. Matt frowned. He’d treated the man like a friend, a confidant.
“The call Molly overheard was to me,” Noble said.
Adrenaline shot through Matt’s veins. “You bastards. You had Ramon watching me. Why?”
Noble took a final pull off his cigarette, then dropped it and crushed it with the heel of his boot. “Headquarters wants to be sure your relationship with the woman hasn’t become a problem.”
Matt flinched. “It hasn’t. So you can get your asses off my land.” He picked up a stone and threw it at a boulder about fifty feet away, pretending it was his FBI chief’s head. He nodded in sober satisfaction when the rock hit the boulder dead center.
“We’re taking Molly with us,” Noble said.
“The hell you are!”
“This isn’t up for negotiation. Del Fuego knows she’s here and will order a hit. He may contact some of your men, find a weak link, then hire the spineless SOB to do his dirty work.”
Matt leveled a look at Noble. “Maybe Ramon is the weak link. And I’ll be glad say it to the Judas’s face.”
Noble pulled two folded sheets of paper from his shirt pocket and handed them to Ma
tt. “We knew you’d be a hard sell.”
Matt scanned Ramon’s dossier, then glanced at him. “Okay. I’m impressed. But make him stay away from Molly and her baby. He’s spooked her.”
“She has more to be spooked about than Ramon,” Noble said. “Her detective friend Arnie Kenner was found in an abandoned warehouse with his throat slit from ear to ear. He’d been tortured first, so you can bet that whatever he knew, Del Fuego knows by now.”
Gordon Phillips, a somewhat tightlipped man, had let Noble do all the talking to this point and Matt was surprised when he piped up. “But we aren’t just the bearers of bad news,” he said. “We heard from the lab.”
A prick of resentment stiffened the hairs on the back of Matt’s neck. He had asked that lab technician to call him personally if they succeeded in extracting the data embedded in the coins. “And?”
“It’s Del Fuego’s books, all right,” Phillips said. “We have everything we need to turn up the heat on him and his men. As we speak, SWAT is organizing a raid on his villa.”
We? None of this would be possible without Molly. Phillips was talking like the Feds were the big heroes. “Until Del Fuego is in custody, Molly stays with me,” Matt growled.
“We have our orders.” He handed Matt a written directive with his chief’s seal. “And now you have yours.”
Matt cursed under his breath. Just because he was in semi-retired status, they thought they could pull his strings like he was a damned puppet. “I need time to explain this to Molly.”
“There isn’t time. The clock’s ticking.”
“Make time. If Molly isn’t handled with sensitivity, she could drop back into her amnesia fog—maybe this time permanently. Remember, she was an eyewitness when Del Fuego killed a Fed in cold blood. You want to risk losing her testimony?”
****
Molly fought anger and confusion at seeing Ramon on the ranch. To suppress her emotions, she clutched Luke’s arm. Under the shade of the tented area, mourners had gathered in little groups to share refreshments and express their grief. Luke introduced Molly to Parker’s wife, Beverly, and their children.
“I’m so sorry about Parker—” Molly searched for more to say, but nothing came to mind. Bev shed no tears, but her eyes were red-rimmed and empty looking. She carried her youngest son on one hip, and the other two clung to the skirt of her simple black dress. The boys appeared to be about a year apart in age. Molly guessed between two and four years old. Their sad brown eyes, big as quarters stared at her. She wanted to hug them close. How awful to lose their daddy—even a daddy who might not have always been there for them. Whatever their father’s faults had been, he was gone—taken from them forever. Molly’s heart clenched with mourning.
Luke led Molly away to meet other mourners. She found it difficult to do more than nod with the image of the children’s sorrowful eyes still fresh in her mind.
The hair on her nape rippled. She felt someone’s gaze boring into her back. She turned and met the stony glare of a young blonde woman with a toddler on her hip. Who was she—and why was that murderous look in her eyes? Molly was about to ask Luke about the woman when his father called him away.
Alone, and feeling like a cowgirl without a horse in this corral of strangers, Molly headed for Tita who stood by the punch bowl sipping something from a paper cup. Molly took a deep breath then asked, “Who’s that woman over there?”
“Which woman?” Tita asked.
“The pretty blonde.”
“Oh,” Tita said, “then you haven’t met Connie Lou?” Tita grabbed her arm. “Well, we’ll fix that.”
“No!” Molly said.
Tita dragged her right up to the young woman and introduced her. She recognized the name, Connie Lou. Oh, God, this was Luke’s soon-to-be ex-spouse. Did the woman think—
“Oh,” Connie Lou said. “You’re Matt’s wife?”
Molly nodded. The lie was growing. She hated it, but she had to lie to keep her baby safe.
Connie Lou’s blue eyes grew wide. “Lemme get this straight. You ain’t with Luke?”
“Heavens, no,” Molly said. “We’re in-laws. Nothing else.”
Hostility drained from Connie Lou’s expression, and she smiled. “Well, I’m right proud to meet you,” she said, pumping Molly’s arm. “Right proud. Alicia’s eighteen months. How old’s your little girl?”
“Almost four months.” Molly smiled at Sara Jane and kissed her forehead.
While Molly and Connie Lou talked about babies and motherhood, Connie Lou kept glancing over at Luke, who was now deep in conversation with his father, Gavin. Gavin looked flushed, his eyes glassy. Matt had been so worried about him.
“Excuse me,” Molly said. She handed Sara Jane to Tita and went for a glass of cold water for Gavin. When Molly returned, Connie Lou had left to talk to Bev. Tita and Victoria sat on folding chairs at the edge of the tented area, darting worried looks at Luke and Gavin who stood away from the crowd.
Father and son glared at each other and waved their arms. Molly hoped Luke wasn’t upsetting the old man. Gavin Ryan was a grouch, but considering he’d just buried his son, she figured Luke should cut him some slack.
When she got within earshot, she slowed to let them finish their conversation before approaching.
“Instead of finding Parker’s killer, Matt is fooling around with Molly,” Gavin complained. “We have to get him back on track.”
“You don’t have to worry,” Luke said. “Family always comes first with Matt. You know that.” Luke’s voice took on the self-important tone of a man who wanted to prove to his father that he was privy to secret information. “Matt brought Molly and the baby here as bait to catch Parker’s killer.”
Molly’s pulse thundered in her ears. With trembling hands, she stepped forward and thrust the glass of water into Gavin’s fingers. Then, she faced Luke. “Is that true?”
Luke paled and looked at his father, then back at Molly. “I didn’t mean for you to hear that.” He swallowed. “But don’t worry. Matt has everything under control.”
Everything under control. Matt thought he could control the situation—any situation. That was the reason for the extra heavy protection. But how could she even for one moment think he’d use her baby as bait? He loved Sara Jane, didn’t he?
Molly closed her eyes. Dear, God. She’d come here of her own free will, knowing the danger, but wanting to give support to the man she loved.
Luke shifted his weight. His tanned skin had a greenish cast. “Look, I—” He paused. “I gotta go. I need some time by myself. It’s been a helluva day.” He took off through the crowd as if coyotes were nipping at his heels.
“He likes to go to the barn when he’s upset,” Gavin said.
Molly nodded. Fighting simmering anger, she pivoted, marched over to where Tita was seated, and lifted Sara Jane from the woman’s arms. “I’m sorry, I have to leave. Now.”
“What’s wrong, Señora?”
Molly kept moving. Her throat was raw. “I’ll explain later.”
She strode from the shade of the tent in the direction of the ranch house, about a mile away. Thank goodness for her boots. She wouldn’t have gotten very far in high heels. She shifted the weight of the baby in her arms.
Wait a minute. Why should she believe Luke? Because there was no reason for him to lie. Didn’t the excess security prove something was up? “Bait, can you imagine?” she grumbled to Sara Jane. “He brought us here as bait.”
Four guards immediately mounted their horses and followed Molly, clopping along behind her. She darted a glance at them. Sure, he’d hired enough security to keep her and the baby safe. But the plentiful protection didn’t make up for being used.
She had to leave. But how? Slipping away from this many men wouldn’t be easy. Besides, where would she go? Oh, God. She had to think this through, and not act rashly. What was best for Sara Jane?
Matt had told her that Del Fuego was into baby selling and she understood the concept of risk
ing a few people for a safer world for the greater society. But damn Matt, he’d vowed to tell her the truth, the whole truth—and hiding his plan to use her baby for bait was a deadly betrayal.
Molly followed the dirt lane. Her arms ached from Sara Jane’s weight, but she clutched her baby tighter to her breast. When she stomped past a gum tree, a flock of black birds took flight. She wished she, too, had wings to fly her baby to safety.
Horses’ hooves clomped behind Molly. It struck her odd that her bodyguards rode horses while she walked with a baby in her arms across a mile or so of barren ground under a blazing Texas sun. Something was wrong with this picture. Well, she could fix that. Molly stopped, and a guard came alongside.
She looked up into the weathered face and forced a smile. “How about a ride?”
He grinned, showing crooked, tobacco-stained teeth with two gaping holes in the front, and nodded. Before he could dismount to help her get on, the sound of an engine stopped him. He and the other bodyguards reined their horses aside, clearing the road for the shiny red truck coming up on them fast, spewing a cloud of dust in its wake.
Matt skidded to a stop and jumped from the truck without turning off the motor. From his radio, a woman’s twangy voice belted out a song about every day being a winding road. Molly’s lips twisted into a smirk. How appropriate. Lately, the road of her life had been not only winding but also had been full of treacherous potholes.
“What the hell are you doing?” Matt grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her around to face him. His eyes were as fierce as the Texas heat.
Molly’s hold on her baby tightened, and she gritted her teeth. “Leave me alone.”
“Are you crazy? Walking out here in this broiling temperature and exposing Sara Jane?”
She glared at him. “Isn’t that what you wanted? To use us as bait?”
His eyes darkened. “Where’d you get such a lame-brained idea?”
“You should’ve told me what you were up to. I would risk my life for you—for society—but not my baby’s life. Never my baby’s life.”
