Reaper's Salvation: A Last Riders Trilogy

by Jamie Begley

  “Jesus …,” Viper gave a loud, self-recriminating groan. “You don’t owe us any money.”

  “But I—”

  “Ginny, eat the cracker.” Gavin removed the Sprite from her hand to give her the cracker. “You can pay Viper back in installments.”

  Satisfied that Viper would listen to his brother, Ginny took the cracker. “Thank-you for your help, Mr. Beck.”

  “Anytime.” Desmond reached into his suit jacket, then handed her a card. No sooner had Ginny taken the card, it was snatched out of her hand to be replaced with the cracker.

  “That was rude.” Taking a small nibble of the cracker, she thought her stomach would revolt, but then it settled down enough for her to take another small bite. Her mouth hurt like heck, but the cracker was easing the nausea, so Ginny considered it a trade-off.

  Ginny thoughtfully stared down at the cracker in her hand. “Gavin?”

  “I haven’t gone anywhere.”

  Ginny ignored his attempt at humor. “Where did they take you after the guards took you away? Allerton said, when his men were done with me, that I would be reunited with you and my father. Did you see him? Was he being held against his will? Was my mother there? Did they want to leave with you?”

  The way she was sitting, Ginny wasn’t given a good view of Gavin’s face, yet she was able to feel his body tense under her.

  “Allerton said that he was going to reunite you with me and your father after his men were done with you?”

  Blocking the pain out as much as she could, Ginny used her bottom muscles, which were the only ones not hurting, to slightly turn so she could get a better look at him. The strange tenor in his voice was magnified on his face.

  “That’s what he said.”

  “Do you think, if I stood and sat you back down on your own, the pain would be too bad?” he asked solicitously.

  “You need to go to the restroom?” she inquired innocently.

  “No. There’s a motherfucker I need to finish off.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “Don’t let him.” Agent Collins appeared as if he was the one who was about to vomit at Gavin’s threat.

  Passing him the barf bag, Ginny dropped the cracker so she had a free hand to press Gavin back down into the seat. “You’ll be doing him a favor. What matters most to Allerton is his reputation. If we are able to destroy that, it will hurt more than anything you can do him.”

  Gavin looked back at her blandly, not swayed by her argument. “You have no idea how painful I can make his death.”

  “As painful as having him confess to what he did to the islanders? Or watching his bank balance dip to the negative when all the lawsuits come his way from misrepresenting his charity? Or watching everyone turn their backs on him when they discover how evil he is?”

  “I can’t do all that, but I can come close.”

  “Coming close doesn’t count. I want him to pay publicly for what he has done. I don’t want one person on Earth to be able to defend his actions.”

  “That’s a tall order. Allerton has enough money to spin his defense any way he wants.”

  “How can he spin it when I have him on tape bragging about what he’s done?”

  “You have it on tape?”

  Ginny gave him a cat-who-ate-the-canary grin. “Agent Collin’s does.” Looking at the man sitting next to Gavin, she had Agent Collins confirm what she was saying. “You said that you would tape any conversations between you and Allerton.”

  Agent Collins uncomfortably shared a glance with her, then Gavin, as if dreading what he was about to tell her. “The polygraph machine wasn’t on, which had one listening device attached when it was in use. His men took the another one I had attached to my badge,” he admitted, switching his gaze back to her, as if afraid she was going to freak out at him.

  “We have the video from behind the lobby desk,” Gavin asserted, “which had no sound. And now we know that the recorder on the polygraph and the one you had weren’t working, the only indictment you’re going to be able to charge him with is assault, with no audio to back you up.” Gavin started to rise again, but Ginny grabbed the arm rest to prevent him.

  “That’s okay,” Ginny assured him. “Mine was on.”

  “You had a tape recorder?” Gavin quizzed her.

  Both men gave her an astounded look.

  “I do.” Ginny started to raise her arm. “My bracelet …” As the words came out of her mouth, she remembered Allerton jerking it off her wrist. “We have to go back! Train!” Ginny screeched, about to tear herself out of Gavin’s arms, regardless of the amount of pain she caused herself.

  Gavin tightened his arms around her waist. “Hell will freeze over before we go back there!”

  “I have to get my bracelet ….” Her mouth dropped open when she saw what was dangling from Gavin’s fingers. Snatching it from him, she inspected the damage. Finding what she was looking for, she gave him a bright smile. “Have I told you today how much I love you?”

  “A couple of times.”

  “Right. Just making sure.” Content, she took another sip of her Sprite. “Are there any crackers left?”

  “No, you ate both packs.”

  “Do you think there are any more where Mr. Beck got them from? I’m hungry.”

  If Gavin and Agent Collins were looking at her like she had a screw loose, Ginny was glad her back was turned away from the rest of the men on the plane.

  “I’m on it,” Ginny heard Mr. Beck call out.

  “Thank-you,” she called back, feeling a hand on the back of her head. “What are you doing?”

  “Checking you for a concussion. Did Allerton hit you on the head with that cane? You might need to get a CT scan when we get to Treepoint.”

  “I don’t need a CT scan. You’re being ridiculous.”

  “One second you’re screaming to go back to Sherguevil Island and the next, you’re wanting crackers. You don’t think that sounds strange?” Gavin tried to search for bumps on her head again.

  “That was before you showed me you had my bracelet. We don’t have to go back now.”

  “Here you go.” Desmond Beck moved in front of their seat to give her a handful of pre-packaged crackers.

  Ginny smiled her appreciation as she fumbled with the soda can to open a pack of crackers. She almost jumped out of her seat when she felt a stinging sensation on the back of her head.

  “Did you just pull my hair?”

  “Of course not. My ring must have accidently been caught in it.” Gavin gave her an innocent expression that she didn’t believe for a second.

  “That hurt.”

  “Did it? I’m sorry.”

  Ginny let Gavin take the crackers away, giving him a disbelieving glance as she did so.

  “Thank-you, Mr. Beck.”

  “No problem. Glad to help.”

  Ginny returned Mr. Beck’s smile as he started back down the aisle, only to feel the tug on her hair again.

  “You did that deliberately,” she hissed irritably at Gavin.

  “It was an accident.” Gavin dropped the crackers on her lap, leaving one in his hand to open for her as he took the can of soda.

  “Accident, my ass,” she said witheringly, opening the pack of crackers and starting to munch on one to keep from bickering with him where everyone on the plane could hear.

  “You were going to tell us why you changed your mind about going back to Sherguevil Island. I assume it has something to do with you getting Allerton’s confession?”

  “Oh …” Ginny frowned at him, swallowing the last of her cracker. “I forgot what we were talking about when you so rudely pulled my hair.”

  “Really? I thought you lost that train of the conversation when you were simpering over”—Gavin’s voice went sickly sweet—“Mr. Beck.”

  She narrowed her eyes on him. “So, you admit it wasn’t an accident?”

  “Ginny …,” he said warningly.

  “Okay, okay. We don’t have to go back bec
ause you have my bracelet.” She moved her eyes to her lap to where it laid among the crackers and picked it up. Using her fingers, she showed him the flower charm. “It’s a tape recorder. Isn’t it neat? I bought it online. I recorded every conservation with him including today in his office.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me you had it on you?”

  Ginny thought he would be happy instead, but he seemed offended.

  Hammer lifted the corner of his ice pack. “Why didn’t you tell me either?”

  “I’d like to hear the answer to that question myself,” Gavin added his own two cents in the mix.

  Ginny gave a long, drawn-out sigh. Men could be such dudes sometimes.

  “I didn’t tell either of you for the same reason I didn’t tell Gavin about the tape recorder or how Agent Collins and I were trying to gather proof to convict Allerton—to protect you all.”

  The relief on Agent Collins’ face was profound. Ginny started to smile at him, then decided she didn’t want to go bald.

  “I’ll take that.” Agent Collins reached out to take it from her.

  Ginny clutched it in her fist before he could. “You can have it after Gavin makes a copy of it for me.”

  “We can’t break the chain of custody.”

  “We can go to the sheriff’s office. Knox can make enough copies to make everyone happy,” Gavin suggested.

  “I’m okay with that,” Ginny acceded.

  Agent Collins looked at if his feelings were hurt. “You don’t trust me?”

  “I trust you. I just don’t trust that it won’t disappear before Allerton goes to court. It shouldn’t take long, should it, Gavin?”

  “No. Knox will have them on their way before they can finish a cup of coffee.”

  Ginny looked at him to see the disappointed expression on Gavin’s face. “What’s wrong?”

  “I was looking forward to dropping the fucker off in the middle of the ocean.”

  “My way is much better, you’ll see,” she consoled him.

  “Let’s see if you’ll still say that when I tell you what he meant about being reunited with your father and me.”

  “So tell me.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re still eating.”

  She lost her appetite at his grim reply. “Never mind, I don’t want to know.” Ginny stared down at the cracker in her hand as Gavin started to massage the back of her neck. “My father is dead, isn’t he?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “How long?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Then how can you be sure?”

  “That’s the part you don’t want to know.”

  Ginny looked toward Agent Collins. “Is he?”

  “We’ve had our suspicions that Jasper was no longer living.”

  “Then why didn’t you or one of the other agents I talked to tell me?”

  “We couldn’t say without a doubt that he was dead. We were hoping to corroborate that while we were on the island. Anytime I mentioned Jasper’s name to Mr. Allerton or Soleil, they would give me the run around about his location.”

  “Soleil knew then.” Ginny picked up the crackers to dump them in the barf bag. The pain in her arm was nothing in comparison to the pain at finding out Jasper was dead. There had been a tiny part of her that yearned for some type of relationship with her parents. When she met Soleil, though, she had known immediately that that wasn’t going to happen. Now it seemed it was no longer possible with Jasper either.

  Agent Collins looked away from her sympathetically. “I believe she does, yes.”

  Picking up the bracelet, she gave it back to Gavin. “You can keep it until you make a copy of the tape.”

  Gavin pocketed it for safekeeping.

  “I’m tired, Gavin.”

  “Then go to sleep. I’ll wake you when we’re about to land.”

  Ginny gingerly laid her head on his shoulder as Gavin continued to massage her neck, easing some of the strain. She couldn’t understand why she didn’t feel more euphoric. With the tape recording on her bracelet, and the tape from the lobby showing what had taken place in the office, everything Allerton had worked to distinguish himself as—a defender of humanity—would be demolished.

  Lifting drowsy lids, Ginny saw Agent Collins adjust himself uncomfortably in his seat.

  “I’m too old for this shit,” he grumbled, adjusting his tie. “When I get to the office, I’m retiring.”

  She instantly woke up. “You can’t!”

  Realizing she heard him, Agent Collins turned in her direction. “My retirement was in the works when I was asked to take this case. My body has had it. Not only that, but I failed to protect you and the men under my command. I’m more than ready to step down. I don’t have the heart for it anymore. Do you think, if I had the opportunity, I wouldn’t have done the same thing with that cane as Gavin did?”

  “You wouldn’t have,” Ginny disputed with surety.

  “Probably not,” he said wearily. “I would have shot him.”

  Ginny didn’t argue with him. She could kind of see him doing that.

  “See the case through, and if you still feel the same way, then retire. Hammer told me you were chosen for this case because you have integrity. Allerton will be counting on his money and prestige to buy himself out of reaping the justice he deserves. You have to be the firewall that prevents it from happening. If not you, then who else do you think will be able to say no to the money he can throw at them? I didn’t risk my life and Gavin’s just to see him walk away. Please … wait.” Ginny gave him an encouraging grin. “I’ll even spring for your retirement party if you do. I have a friend of mine I’ll introduce you to. You two would be perfect together,” she coaxed.

  “I’m too old. I’ve missed my chance. No woman would want an old fart like me.”

  “Aw … that’s not true,” she insisted. “You’re not old. I would date you”—Ginny ignored Gavin going rigid under her—“if I didn’t love Gavin so much.” Giving the agent a sweet smile to show she meant it, she felt another hair parting from her scalp.

  “Stop that! It hurts,” she hissed up at Gavin.

  “Purely an accident. Besides, there is no way that hurt you.”

  “How do you know? You’re not the one who’s getting his hair plucked out one hair at a time. Pure my butt, it does hurt …,” she add plaintively. “I’m tender-headed.”

  “No, you’re not.” Dissing her with a hiss of air, Ginny saw red.

  “How would you know? It’s not your head that’s getting snatched bald—”

  Gavin leaned his head forward so he could look her dead in the eyes with an expression she recognized instantly. It was the one that said he could tear her apart in seconds when they were having sex, when he would roughly grab her hair to tilt her head back and she would melt into the flames of his ….

  Ginny cleared her throat. “Never mind.” She snapped her mouth shut as she caught Agent Collins’ amused gaze.

  “You don’t want to finish what you were saying?” Gavin prompted.

  There was no way she was going to let him one-up her. She had her dignity to uphold.

  Leaning her head back on Gavin’s shoulder as if she was going back to sleep, she painfully raised an arm over the top of her hair.

  “Mr. Beck … would you mind bringing me another soda?”

  Chapter Thirty

  Smothering a yawn, Ginny sat in Viper’s SUV as she waited with Gavin for Viper to come out of the sheriff’s office. As soon as they’d landed, Knox had been waiting for them at the airport to transport Allerton back to his holding cell. Viper and the federal agents followed Knox straight to the sheriff’s office to have copies of the recorder made. The others on board had taken off in Shade’s and Cash’s vehicles.

  “I still say we should stop by Dr. Price’s office and have him check you out.”

  “No, I just want to go home.” Ginny put an end to that suggestion. “I’m sore. I
’ll be fine in a couple of days.”

  “Don’t you think we have something to discuss?”

  “Like what?”

  “About where we’re going to be staying.”

  Her heart plunged. She had assumed he would be staying with her at Silas’s house. Was this it? The great send-off? Was Taylor still at the club? Was that why he wanted to get rid of her?

  “Ginny … are you listening to me?”

  She quit fiddling with her bracelet that Gavin had hooked back around her wrist after he removed the flower tape recorder.

  “I’m listening. I … assumed that you would be staying with me at Silas’s. Are you not wanting to? Are you still angry because I smiled at Mr. Beck? I’m sorry. I was teasing you for being jealous.”

  “I was not jealous.” Interrupting her flurry of questions, Gavin waved back at Greer as he came out of the sheriff’s office.

  “You were—” Ginny broke off when there was a tapping on the window, she pressed the electronic button to roll the window down.

  “What’s up?” Greer said.

  “Not much. Waiting for Viper so he can drive me home,” Ginny told him.

  “Viper said that fucker whining in the jail cell beat the hell out of you. You okay?”

  “Yes, other than being sore. I’ll be fine in a couple of days.”

  “Then you’re doing better than the twat waffle in the cell. He’s crying for a doctor.”

  Greer’s gaze went to Gavin. “Boy, I’m disappointed in you. If that fucker had taken a cane to my wife, I’d have blown his hand clean off.”

  Ginny didn’t doubt he would have. Greer was bloodthirsty as hell when came to defending women. Truth to tell, all the Porter men were. The other men in town would cross the road rather than take a chance on getting on their bad side.

  “He’s not my husband,” Ginny quickly corrected his misunderstanding.

  “I would have, but Ginny stopped me.”

  Her hackles came back at Gavin agreeing with Greer’s violent dismemberment of Allerton.

  “Take a piece of my advice. When it comes to shootin’ someone, what the wife don’t know don’t hurt her none.”