The Lawman's Last Stand

by Vickie Taylor

  Ferrar looked nonplussed, though his eyes darkened a shade as he studied Shane. Another characteristic he had in common with Gigi. “You’re the man who was with my daughter,” he said, sitting.

  “That’s right.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I came to see for myself.”

  “See what?”

  “What a man who could kill his own daughter looks like up close.”

  Ferrar’s chest spasmed like he’d been struck. He recovered quickly enough, though. “Now you’ve seen,” he said quietly. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

  He almost managed to sound dignified, and for some reason that scraped at Shane’s last raw nerve. The man had no right to dignity.

  Shane stood, propped his fists on the table and loomed over Ferrar. “Tell me, John. How did it feel when you ordered the hit on her? What were you thinking about? Were you remembering how tiny she was when she was born? How cute she looked riding her first pony? Or were you thinking about how you were better off rid of her, just like you were when she was a little girl missing her dead mother and you sent her away to live with strangers?”

  Ferrar’s chest rattled as he breathed. “I did what I had to do.”

  Shane made a rude sound. “You had to rip your eight-year-old daughter’s heart out?”

  “I had to send her away.”

  “Why?” Shane asked.

  Ferrar reached for his back pocket, stopped as if suddenly remembering he didn’t have one, then used his sleeve to mop the beads of sweat from his forehead. No more linen handkerchiefs for John Ferrar.

  “I loved her mother very much,” he said. “When she died, grief ate me alive. What kind of life would that have been for a little girl, living in an old mausoleum of a house with a corpse for a father?”

  “But you were her family. The only family she had left.”

  Ferrar’s eyes dulled to matte blue. “Family is just people, Mr. Hightower. People who love each other, but still people. And people make mistakes.”

  Shane checked his fury. This wasn’t what he wanted to hear. He didn’t want to think of John Ferrar as anything other than a monster. “Is that what this is, now? All a big mistake?”

  “No. This is penance. I made my mistake twenty years ago when I sent my baby girl away. By the time I was ready to take her back, I found I—I didn’t know how. I’ve waited a long time to make that up to her. This is my chance.”

  Shane slammed his fist into the table so hard one of his knuckles split. He let the blood run. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  Heaving in a ragged breath, Ferrar raised his head. “Tell my daughter to pick up my calls. I need to talk to her.”

  At least now Shane knew that his phone calls weren’t the only ones left ringing. “You tried to kill her for God’s sake. Why would she talk to you?”

  Ferrar made a choking sound. “It’s important that I speak to her,” he said, his voice strangled.

  “Speak to me.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not? You’ve already signed a statement admitting you tried to kill her. All I want is to be able to tell her why. She deserves to know that at least, doesn’t she?”

  Still struggling for an even breath, Ferrar’s gaze darted around the room, at ceiling level, and settled on a small grate that Shane knew covered the sound and video recording equipment in the wall.

  Shane followed his gaze, a knot of apprehension tied up in his chest. “I told you this is an unofficial conversation. We’re not being taped. You can say what you want.”

  “You love my daughter, don’t you?” Ferrar asked out of the blue.

  Shane reeled backward. “Yes,” he admitted hoarsely when he’d found his balance, and his voice.

  “And yet you used her to get to me.”

  “Yes.” The frog in his throat had to be a great horny toad.

  Ferrar’s eyes shone with a feral gleam. “Then we’re not so different, the two of us.”

  “But I’m not her family,” Shane defended himself. “Not her blood.”

  “Blood doesn’t make a family, Hightower,” Ferrar said, his voice dropping to a surprisingly soft tone. “Love is what makes a family. And love is why we both did what we did. We had to keep her safe. Even if it meant giving her up.”

  Shane fell into his chair. There had been times, during his years with the DEA, when he’d fisted his hand in the shirt of some lowlife he was about to bust and hauled the man close so he could look down into his glazed eyes…and he’d wondered. Wondered if the man had known, way back when he’d lit his first joint or sold his first bag of little colored pills, how badly he was screwing up. Or that he would spend the rest of his life paying for that mistake.

  Shane knew.

  He knew he’d screwed up royally. Richly. Only he wasn’t the one who was going to pay for his mistake. Gigi was.

  He looked up slowly. “It’s not over, is it?” he asked her father. “My God. You didn’t do it.”

  Ferrar glanced around the room nervously. “I love my daughter, Hightower. Love her enough to give up my freedom—my life—for her. But it might not be enough. Do you understand?”

  “I understand.”

  Shane was out of the building and in his car in less than thirty seconds. It was a six-hour drive to Utah. He could make it in three and a half, running his Mustang flat out. In the meanwhile, he’d call Bailey and send him to Gigi’s house.

  Her father’s confession had bought Gigi time. Shane just prayed it had bought her enough.

  Gigi packed a couple of apples and a granola bar along with bottled water in her canvas backpack. She had to get away from the phone. Away from the memories of Phoenix and the voices that reached across the wires from there to here.

  Shane had called three times last night. She hadn’t answered any of them. Hearing his voice on the recorder hurt enough; she couldn’t imagine the pain actually speaking to him would cause.

  Her father had called ten times or more. He’d blatantly admitted he’d bribed the guards for phone privileges and didn’t know how many more chances he could buy, probably as a way to goad her into picking up. His disregard for the system, the law, anyone’s rules but his, only made him that much more repulsive to her.

  Finally, she’d unplugged the phone.

  But even that wasn’t enough. She had to get out. Away. Where she didn’t have to look at it. Where she didn’t have to think about it. Them. Shane and her father.

  Somewhere away from the temptation to pick up the phone and let them both back into her life, to admit how much she missed them.

  Her backpack hefted over her shoulder, she turned to the door, ready for a brisk hike in the mountains to clear her mind.

  Just as she turned the doorknob, a car pulled in the drive. She forced herself to relax, taking seconds to uncoil the muscles that had stiffened at the sight of the strange car. Her reaction was understandable, she told herself, with all that had happened recently. But she didn’t need to be afraid anymore.

  District Attorney Branson sauntered to the house, a lazy smile on his too perfect face. “Julia,” he called.

  “Mr. Branson. What are you doing here?”

  “I came to check on my favorite witness.”

  “Then you wasted a trip. I’m not your witness anymore. You don’t need one. You’ve got a signed confession.”

  “Guilty as charged.” He reached the front stoop and kept coming. “May I come in?”

  He rested his hand on the small of her back in a touch more intimate than she was comfortable with, and steered her through the door and into the living room.

  She turned inside the entryway. “I was on my way out.”

  “So I see.” He lifted the pack from her shoulder and set it on the floor.

  She jerked, about to protest, but something in his gray eyes stopped her. “Mr. Branson…” Her voice trailed off on the last syllable. She cleared her throat and continued. “What are you really doing here?”r />
  “I was worried about you.” He stroked her jaw.

  Gigi couldn’t suppress her shudder. His steel eyes shimmered threateningly, like a knife, reflecting the light as it fell to the throat.

  Adrenaline coursed through her bloodstream. “No need to worry. The danger is over now.” She raised her chin and poured her heart into her voice to keep it from breaking. “The case is closed.”

  “Yes, I suppose. But that isn’t what I was worried about. You seemed upset when you left Phoenix. I wanted to be sure you were all right. I know this has all been hard on you, and I thought you might like some company—someone who understands, to talk it out with.”

  “You?”

  His smile reminded her of a barracuda. “I don’t have to be back in New York for a few days. Maybe we could…get to know each other.”

  Gigi forced oxygen in and out of her lungs. He was just being nice. He’d treated her decently in New York. More than decently. The way a few of his touches had lingered, the way his stares had weighed on her, she’d thought once that he was trying to seduce her, but she’d never been sure.

  He raised his hand again, this time to tuck a curl behind her ear. His fingers caressed the sensitive skin behind her earlobe. Fire flared, white-hot flames, in his pale eyes.

  This time, she was sure. He definitely wanted to seduce her. The question was, did she want to be seduced?

  At the moment, she hurt so bad it was hard to know what she wanted. She knew only that she wanted.

  He cupped his hand around the back of her neck, and for a fraction of a second, she swayed into the support. Paul Branson’s head lowered slowly to hers, his mouth open and wet. She didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Couldn’t.

  Her brain commanded her hands to push him away.

  Before she could, the front door crashed open. Shane surged through like a host of demons and skidded to a halt at the entrance to the living room. His face was flushed. His eyes burned like he had a fever.

  Gigi skittered backward as Shane’s hot stare burned a path from her to Branson and back.

  “Well, isn’t this awkward?” the D.A. said, straightening his collar.

  “What are you doing here, Branson?”

  “I should think that’s obvious. I came to comfort Julia after her ordeal.”

  “Comfort, hell,” Shane growled.

  Gigi stepped between the two men before the testosterone in the room reached an explosive level. “What are you doing here, Shane?”

  He glanced her way. “You didn’t answer the phone,” he said, as if that explained everything.

  “Maybe you should take the hint,” Branson piped in. “She doesn’t want to talk to you.”

  “Where’s Bailey?” Shane asked, taking the conversation in yet another direction and leaving her in the dust.

  “Who?” she asked, frowning.

  “The damn state trooper I sent to keep an eye on you. I just talked to him on the cell phone fifteen minutes ago, he was in his car down the block. Now he’s gone.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Shane looked to Branson. “What did you do to him?”

  Branson rocked onto his toes and back as if he were enjoying himself mightily. “Why, I coldcocked him and dragged him into the bushes, of course. What did you expect I’d done to him?”

  For a moment, Gigi thought Branson was making a bad joke. When she realized he was serious, her heart went still. “You—you what?”

  “Don’t worry. He’ll have quite a headache in the morning, but he’ll live.” Branson put on an exaggerated sigh, shaking his head at Shane. “It’s really a pity you showed up, Hightower. I did have high hopes for an enjoyable evening with Ms. Ferrar. Until I had to kill her, of course.”

  He reached inside his jacket. In the same instant, Shane dived toward her, knocking her to the floor. Something whizzed past her ear, and she recognized it as a bullet even before the gun’s retort blasted across the room.

  Shane never stopped moving. He rolled to a squat and tackled Paul Branson at the knees, shoving the gun up with one hand, as the D.A. rounded the couch. The two men grappled on the floor like pro wrestlers. Except this event was all too real.

  Shane’s grip slipped from Paul’s wrist and the butt of the pistol swung toward Shane’s skull. Shane twisted his neck back just in time to prevent a crushing blow. The gun glanced off his temple. Blood splashed over both men.

  Shane found new purchase on Branson’s gun hand. “Run Gigi,” he grunted.

  Gigi scrambled toward the door on hands and knees. Behind her, the sounds of thrashing and thumping told her the fight continued.

  She stopped in the entryway and looked over her shoulder. Shane still had hold of Branson’s gun hand, but the pair had rolled until Branson was on top of Shane, his forearm crushing Shane’s throat. Shane’s complexion had changed color, from angry red to violent purple.

  She could no more leave him than the mountains could leave Utah.

  Why had he come here? Why didn’t he bring a gun? God, he couldn’t. He didn’t have one anymore, and he’d given hers back to her. Her pack.

  She crabbed across the entryway and snagged her pack, relieved at the hard lump in the outer pocket. The Taurus was still there, right where he’d put it.

  She yanked the zipper back and closed her hand around the pistol. Turning and shouting all at once, she pointed the weapon at the tangled mass of males grunting and gouging on the floor.

  “Stop it!” she shouted. “Now.”

  The fray continued.

  She fired a shot into the ceiling. The shot thundered through the room and the recoil of the gun kicked her arm backward. At least now she knew how it felt to fire it with the bullets in it. Her arm was numb.

  She quickly brought the pistol level again.

  The men had split apart, Shane swiping blood from his eyes with one hand while grabbing blindly for Branson with the other, Branson backpeddling out of his reach. Before she could sort out one man from the other, Branson had his gun up again, leveled at Shane.

  “Drop it!” Branson commanded, his gaze flicking across her then back to Shane. “Or I’ll kill him.”

  “You drop it!” she answered, the barrel of her weapon pointed square at his chest.

  Shane lurched forward, furiously blinking blood out of his eyes. “Stay put, Hightower.”

  “You shoot him and you’ll be dead before he hits the ground, Branson,” she said.

  Branson spared her a glance. “Then maybe I should take you out first.”

  “You move that gun toward her and I’ll be on you before you can get a bullet out of the barrel,” Shane warned.

  “Well, well.” Branson’s head swiveled back and forth between Gigi and Shane. “It looks like we have quite a little standoff.”

  Gigi flexed her grip on the pistol’s handle. “Will someone please tell me what is going on?”

  After a moment of heavy silence, Shane spoke up. “You were right about someone inside the investigation being crooked. Only it wasn’t in the police department or any of the DOJ’s agencies like we thought. It had to be someone higher to have access to information about me. To track me back to Bill.”

  “There’s very little about anyone that a New York D.A. can’t find out, one way or another.”

  “So you were on the crook’s payroll all along?”

  “Is that what you think?” Branson laughed crazily. “I’m not on anybody’s payroll, you idiot. I am the payroll.”

  Gigi flinched. “You…”

  “All that money being cleaned at Ferrar Industries had to come from somewhere,” he said gleefully.

  Gigi tightened her grip on the gun. She knew he was trying to distract her. “So you killed Uncle Ben because he was going to expose your operation.”

  Another short bark of laughter escaped from Branson. “Poor bastard had no idea that when he called the D.A.’s office to turn over evidence he was calling the very man he was looking to bring down.”


  “So you played along, set up a meet and used it to kill him,” Shane concluded.

  Gigi frowned. “But an assistant district attorney was killed, too.”

  Branson raised his eyebrows and chuckled gleefully. “One of my best moves, don’t you think? It made for a splashier headline, and all that press coverage just a few weeks before the election didn’t hurt, you know?”

  “You sacrificed one of your own for a few votes?” Shane snarled.

  “I wasn’t doing so well in the polls until I raised that public outrage at the loss of one of my dear, dedicated coworkers. Besides,” Branson added, his voice going flat, “someone had to make sure Ben Carlisle had the book before all the shooting started. I couldn’t risk taking him out until I was sure he had it with him.”

  “The book incriminated you,” Shane said.

  Branson shrugged. “Carlisle was a fanatic about record-keeping. I never could break him of that ugly habit.”

  Shane shook his head in disgust. “Not a bad plan, except for one thing. You didn’t plan on a witness. You were going to get rid of the book, weren’t you? Pretend it didn’t exist. But Gigi saw it. That’s why you had her taken into protective custody, even though she never saw the killer—so you could keep her from talking about it. You even leaked the story of an eyewitness to the press so you could legitimize her murder. How many extra votes did that get you, huh, Branson?”

  Branson’s face pulled into a scowl. “I didn’t care that she saw it. Or talked about it. I had an imitation all made up and ready to go. One that pointed the finger at her father instead of me. I couldn’t be sure of all those votes unless I brought the killer to justice now, could I? Otherwise I’d look like a fool.”

  “Then why kill her? Especially now that her father has confessed.”

  “Because sooner or later, even with her father’s confession, I’d have to produce the book. And when I did, she would know it was a fake.”

  “How?”

  “Tell him.” Hatred drilled from Branson’s eyes into her. “Tell him what you left behind on the book, before I switched it for the imitation, that I couldn’t reproduce.”

  Gigi searched her mind for the details of that night. Details she might have forgotten, or thought unimportant. Painful as it was, she relived it step by step. Like a movie, frame by frame. The shots. The blood. The bodies. Checking for pulses and finding none.