Black Rock Guardian

by Jenna Kernan

  Ty pressed a hand to his forehead as it sank in. Faras had seen him kissing Beth. So had Chino and Quinton and at least four other members of the Wolf Posse. Everyone in the roadhouse saw him leave with her, this two-faced woman who was on the opposite side of the law. His problems just got bigger than Antelope Lake. If the posse knew who and what she was, he was a dead man.

  “Good morning, Ty,” she said, taking a seat across from him and laying a file folder on the table between them. “How was your weekend?”

  Chapter Seven

  Ty faced the FBI field agent and realized that his dream girl had just become a nightmare. How could he be so stupid? And he was double stupid because he was staring at her mouth again while hot and cold flashes rippled over his skin. Even knowing she’d used him by making everyone in that bar think they spent the night together, she still made his senses buzz like a high-voltage electric line. But not enough to get himself killed.

  “What do you want?” he asked.

  He’d never pegged her as FBI. She was too sleek and sexy, with none of that stiff upright bearing or penchant for following rules. That kiss had definitely been against the rules, hadn’t it? If it wasn’t, it sure should have been. Memories of that kiss flashed, making his skin pucker and forming a cold knot in his stomach. He didn’t like being used, and that was what she had done. Played him like a harp.

  Their gazes met and locked. He expected a triumphant smile. Instead she narrowed her lovely green eyes and angled her head, studying him and waiting. For what? The explosion she expected? The tantrum of a criminal pressed against the bars of his cell?

  Sorry to disappoint.

  There was a power about her that still called to him and he wondered how his instincts had been so thoroughly foxed. Beth had slipped right under his radar because he’d only seen a strong, confident woman who walked on the wild side. Only Hemi had seen through her mask. His dog had smelled the gunpowder and machine oil that clung to her skin when Ty had smelled only orchids and spice.

  Worse still, she’d succeeded in connecting herself to him in front of everyone in that bar. Faras would be curious about her and he’d look into her background. Ty sure hoped her cover was tight or they were both dead.

  Bear Den cleared his throat. Ty didn’t look at him. The tribal police detective stood to the FBI agent’s left, and Tinnin moved to her right, resting his armpits on his crutches. Ty could hear him working his gum. All three blocked his path to the door that he knew was locked.

  He was the only one sitting. They’d placed him in a position of weakness. But he knew the game and kept his attention on this new threat.

  “I’m agent Beth Hoosay. I’m a member of the Apache tribe of Oklahoma and a field agent for the FBI assigned to a special task force here in Arizona.”

  “How’s the sled?” he asked, feeling off balance, but forcing himself to relax past the buzzing that was now in his ears. “Get it going?”

  “Just a starter motor, loose wire. Easy fix.”

  No doubt because she’d been the one to loosen it to begin with, he thought.

  “Your boss know the company you been keeping?” he asked. If he thought to embarrass her, he failed. Her smile widened and she looked pleased with herself.

  “A better question is, do you want your boss to know the company you’ve been keeping?”

  Ty shifted in his seat and then told himself to sit still.

  “Okay, points for you. Counting coup? You have coup sticks up there in Oklahoma, right?”

  “It’s on our great seal.” Beth opened the file she carried. “But that’s not all I’ve got.”

  She drew out a sheet of paper, laid it on the table and turned it toward him. “This is a transcript of a conversation recorded by Agent Luke Forrest on his phone. It is from the phone of Colt Redhorse, your brother, a phone given to him by Agent Forrest. It was used by Kacey Doka to call for help during her abduction.”

  He knew that because he’d been the one to tell her to call the FBI. That had been one of his stupider moves. But one that did help save her life.

  “The pertinent portion is right here.” She stretched out her arm and pointed with one well-manicured nail. “Do you recognize this conversation?”

  He glanced at the page and read:

  Kacey Doka: “They aren’t here yet.”

  Driver: “Look again.”

  Pause.

  Driver: “Exactly.”

  Kacey Doka: “Where’s Colt?”

  Driver: “Don’t know. High ground, I hope. He’s a hell of a good shot. But so are they.”

  * * *

  TY PUSHED THE page back. They had proof he’d driven Kacey. But he’d admitted that already and they had both his and Kacey Doka’s statements. They wouldn’t hang him on that, he hoped. But they might.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “Don’t you know?” asked Beth.

  He did not reply.

  “Well, then.” Agent Hoosay retrieved the page and substituted another. “This one might interest you.” She pointed. “Blood results from the shoot-out involving your brother Dr. Kee Redhorse at Antelope Lake five days ago. Somehow Dr. Redhorse managed to get two kidnap victims out of that house past two armed men, yet he was unarmed and both captors had handguns. This blood was found in the living room on broken glass. On the dock behind the house. On the boat that your brother used to escape and on the shore at the northeastern shore of the lake.”

  Ty did not look at the page. He preferred looking at Beth. She was so sure she had him boxed. Did she remember that a trapped animal is the most dangerous kind?

  “It’s your blood. We don’t need a sample because we obtained one with a warrant from your clinic. Perfect match. So we don’t need your brother Kee or Louisa Tah or former detective Ava Hood to verify your presence at Antelope Lake.”

  Ty propped an elbow on the table and splayed his hand over his jaw, studying her. He’d known she was beautiful at first sight. Her entrance at the roadhouse showed she had a confidence bordering on recklessness. She also knew how to ride a motorcycle, a beauty of a bike. He added smarts to her list of attributes and wondered what she’d do if he put his hand over the one beside the damning evidence.

  He wouldn’t, of course. They were adversaries from now on and he’d do well to remember it instead of noticing the way her eyes bordered on gray under the fluorescent lights.

  Bear Den spoke up. “You assisted Dr. Redhorse in rescuing Ava Hood and Louisa Tah.”

  “You here to give me my medal?”

  Bear Den’s smile showed how much he was enjoying this. Ty had been a burr under Bear Den’s saddle for years.

  “You were there and that is no crime. But how you knew where to find your brother and Dr. Hauser might be,” said Beth, the threat veiled in her soft, honeyed voice.

  “Yet I’m not under arrest,” he said.

  The FBI agent glanced to Tinnin. “Because you encouraged Kacey to call for backup and stayed to help her escape and you came to your brother Kee’s aid on Antelope Lake. Other circumstances, you’d be a hero, son.”

  Ty made a face and sat back in his chair. “My whole life has been other circumstances.”

  “Distinguished yourself in the US Marines,” added Tinnin.

  “After accepting a deal to serve in lieu of facing charges for armed robbery at eighteen,” Bear Den said.

  Jeez. Did the detective have his file memorized?

  Tinnin ignored Bear Den’s comment. “We know you’ve helped your brothers. We want you to help your tribe the same way.”

  “How exactly do you expect me to do that?”

  “First off, if you have any information on any criminal activity on this rez, you need to tell us now.”

  Ty thought of the meth lab operating on Deer Kill Meadow and kept his mouth shut.

  “Nothing
?” said Bear Den.

  “You didn’t call me in here to be a snitch. Tell me what you really want.”

  They told him and he laughed. “So. Take the deal or my tribe will turn me over to face federal charges. Question is, how likely is it that this deal of yours is going to get me killed?”

  Agent Hoosay sat back, draping an arm over the back of her chair. Now there was the woman he had met the other night, all danger and promise.

  “Now, I figured you for a risk-taker, Ty. I’m willing to take a chance on you if you’re willing to give us certain assurances.”

  “Be your trained monkey, you mean.”

  Her voice was almost a purr. “I prefer to think of you as a lapdog. My lapdog.”

  “The posse has tribal police outmanned and outgunned. And I know they drive better cars because I fix them. Plus they currently have very powerful friends.”

  “Victor Vitoli, Leonard Usov and the Kuznetsov crime organization.”

  “Ding, ding. Someone has been doing her homework.”

  “We aim to break up the posse for good, son,” said Tinnin. “And see that the Russian mob finds it too hot to continue operations up here.”

  Bear Den leaned in. “And we want the four remaining missing girls back.”

  Ty wanted that, too. But it was on the list of impossible things, like wanting to stay out of the gang or be invited to join Tribal Thunder, the warrior sect of the tribe’s medicine society. He’d thought he’d put that one to bed years ago, but here it was, popping up in his mind like burned toast. He added the even more far-fetched possibility of recovering his smashed and ruined reputation to the list. Impossible. Yeah. Sometimes you were just doomed to be disappointed.

  “What’s the deal?” asked Ty.

  “Your full cooperation in our investigation,” said Beth. “And in exchange we forgo pursuit of you in connection with our investigation.”

  Ty nodded. “What do you expect me to do, exactly?”

  “Introduce me to the Wolf Posse as your new girlfriend and give me your continued efforts to get me on the inside.”

  “No way.” Was she crazy? Did she even know what she’d have to do to join the posse?

  Bear Den smiled. Ty could see the pleasure he got in just imagining turning Ty over for federal prosecution.

  “I need to get on the inside,” said Beth.

  “Not by joining the posse, you don’t.”

  Tinnin interjected then. “What about just having you pose as Ty’s girlfriend? That will get you into the roadhouse and access to members of the posse.”

  Beth rolled her lips between her teeth and drummed her fingers. She didn’t seem like the kind of gal who would compromise.

  “We’ll start with that,” she said. Her eyes offered both challenge and promise. “So, Mr. Redhorse. Do you accept this arrangement?”

  Ty wondered just how realistic she wanted their relationship to be. Anticipation made his heart race. Attraction to this Fed was the most stupid reason of all to take the deal. “I accept.”

  Chapter Eight

  It was not until he breathed fresh air that Ty had a chance to wonder whether he had accepted their deal to prevent federal prosecution, or because accepting was the only way to get near Beth. He hoped it wasn’t the latter, because he liked to believe he was smarter than that.

  He spotted a vehicle as he drove out of the parking lot by the tribe’s headquarters with FBI agent Beth Hoosay. His eyes narrowed at the familiar black RAM pickup with the pencil-thin gold detailing. It was a truck with which he was acquainted because he’d had to do the detailing twice. Chino Aria hadn’t liked the first gold Ty used because he wanted the paint to sparkle. Pain in the ass, that was what he was. Chino was also dangerous, especially to women.

  Ty could think of only one reason that Chino would park his truck across the street from the police station and not be in it. The Feds had themselves another snitch. What did they have on Chino? Ty didn’t know but knew that the man was one of Faras’s enforcers. Ty’s list of sins was black, but Chino’s was blacker, as he inflicted pain and enjoyed it.

  “Hedging your bets?” he asked.

  “What?” asked the agent.

  “If I can figure it out, so can Faras. Chino is a nitwit, a dangerous one. Parking over there, at the diner, it’s a bad move. Any of the gang could see his truck.”

  “Chino wasn’t driving it,” said Beth.

  Ty frowned. Who would dare drive Chino’s truck? he wondered. Faras was the only answer he could come up with, but he would never come into the station. Faras was deadly and suspicious, but he would never cooperate with the police. Ty was certain.

  “Who, then?” Ty asked.

  Beth ignored the question.

  “You don’t have to worry about being spotted. Tinnin assigned an officer to watch for any of the known vehicles,” said Beth. “Besides, you parked at the clinic. Very smart.”

  She knew where he parked his GTO. He didn’t like that.

  “Where my brother Kee works,” said Ty.

  “Your younger brother, Jake, works at for the tribal police. It gives you a reason to park in their lot.”

  “That’s one of the things Faras likes about me—my family connections.” He didn’t say the rest, that Faras was a master at using those connections to keep Ty in line. “So, where to?”

  “Your place. I’m moving in.”

  Ty smiled and gave her the kind of predatory look that made most women adjust their clothing to cover up. Beth met his stare with one of her own, cold and dangerous. The woman gave him the chills in all the right and wrong places and both at the same time.

  “I don’t think Hemi will like having another female around the place.”

  “She’ll get used to me. I’m good with animals.”

  “Ought to make things easier on us both, then,” he said.

  She laughed and then glanced out the window. The music of her mirth made him want to hear it again.

  “You grow up on the rez up there in Oklahoma?” he asked.

  “No. I’m just on the tribal rolls. My mother’s a member, so I’m entitled to membership, too.” She pressed her lips together and her eyes shifted and narrowed. What was making her angry? A memory of the tribe, her mother? Ty’s instincts said there was something back there that nettled.

  “They have a blood requirement?”

  She shot him a glance that seemed laced with poison. Was it because his question implied she would not meet most tribal requirements? If so, perhaps he had just found a chink in her armor.

  “The requirement is one sixteenth Oklahoma Apache unless you have a parent enrolled. I meet either prerequisite.”

  Yup, she was prickly as a cholla cactus and all signs of humor had fled from her features.

  “I’ve never lived anywhere but here,” said Ty.

  “You’ve been out there, though. US Marines.”

  She could read, he thought, and realized that she also would know why he joined. Some of the reasons anyway. Now he was frowning, too. Back then, he had tried going to the police. But his mother would not press charges and he was too young to do it. All he’d managed was to get protective services out to their place, which scared Jake and Colt so much he’d never done it again. He didn’t want his father hitting his mother, but he also didn’t want his brothers separated through the foster-care system. Jake had called soon afterward, though, still believing in the system that had let them down. That had been one particularly bad night after Ty had tried and failed to defeat his father. It had been satisfying seeing his father loaded into Tinnin’s patrol car. But he’d been out in less than twenty-four hours. Ty had learned an important lesson that day. He’d learned that bones took longer to heal than it took to get out of jail after assaulting your wife.

  Beth spoke again, prompting confirmation. “Distinguished y
ourself in Iraq. Isn’t that right?”

  “Yeah, I was a jarhead,” said Ty. Back then he’d considered reenlistment. But he couldn’t because his family needed him here. Ty had come back home when Colt received his psych discharge.

  “Ever think of leaving the rez?” she asked.

  “Sometimes.”

  She cast him a puzzled look. Had she ever felt trapped?

  “Why the FBI?” he asked as they left the main community and the river behind and headed toward Koun’nde.

  “Oh, well, I’ll give you the official version first.” She cleared her throat and raised her chin a notch. “Growing up in Oklahoma after the bombing that put us on the map, I felt a need to protect our nation from threats both domestic and foreign.”

  Now he was even more curious. Was she really trying to save the world? Her smile seemed to challenge, as if asking if he swallowed that tale.

  “The unofficial version?” he asked.

  She faced forward again, gazing out the windshield as they passed the river and the ongoing reconstruction of the destroyed dam.

  No answer, he thought, was still an answer. What part of her past dogged her?

  “I have to stop and get my dog.”

  “At your mother’s?”

  She knew his mother. Likely knew more about him than he did. He didn’t like it, the advantage she had over him. He wondered if Jake could find out anything about her with his databases. Did his brother have anyone up there in Oklahoma who he could ask for information on Beth? But the Oklahoma Apache tribe was not like this rez. The tribe was huge and a conglomeration of many Apache people. Oklahoma City was huge as well. If Ty was going to learn anything about his opponent, he’d have to get the information from the source.

  Ty never liked handling explosives, and Beth seemed more dangerous than the IEDs back in the sandbox. If she blew their cover, he’d be dead. If she blew the arrest, he’d be dead. That didn’t scare him as much as knowing that when a bomb detonates, it was indiscriminate with collateral damage. Jake and Kee were here, in close range. His mother and her new husband and his little sister, Abbie, were all so very close. And each one was a weapon to use against him. He’d stayed as long as his presence served to keep them safe. When that changed, he’d take off.