Blue Steele Box Sets 2 Read online

  The questions and revelations coming from the news reports filled my thoughts. I simply wanted to know the truth about how my father died and by whose hand. Until I knew the answers to those questions, I would never have peace. Although I found it difficult to accept that a fourteen-year-old boy could have ended my father’s life.

  Ramón and I drove back two days later. I stayed over at his place because of how late we had arrived home. When I checked my phone that morning, I found I had received more messages, both voice and text, from friends offering their condolences.

  Ramón handed me a cup of coffee.

  “How are you, Blue?”

  “I’m okay, but I didn’t sleep well, too many bad dreams.”

  “I know, you tossed and turned all night.”

  “I’m sorry, did I keep you awake?”

  “Not really, it’s just that I’m a light sleeper.”

  “I’m going back to my place today, and later on I’m going to check in with Ron and pick up some paper. I need to work, to take my mind off things.”

  Ramón held up his phone.

  “I may be working soon too. One of my contacts called and she has a likely candidate, but I won’t know if it’s a go until later today.”

  “Who’s the candidate?”

  “I don’t know, but she said he would be coming from the Ukraine.”

  “Why is there a delay?”

  “They’re being vetted; I don’t let just anyone into Santuario.”

  “Let me know if you go, but I’ll probably be out looking for a skip.”

  “I could be gone for days if the call comes in.”

  I put my cup down and sat on his lap. The nightgowns I had taken to my mama’s were still dirty and packed away, and so I was wearing one of Ramón’s T-shirts; it slid far up my thighs as I sat.

  “Have you showered yet?” I asked.

  “I did, but I volunteer to scrub your back for you.”

  I smiled. “My front may need some attention as well.”

  Ramón stood while still holding me, and up the stairs we went.

  I arrived home and found that a note had been slipped under my door from the landlord. After opening it, I read the bad news.

  My lease was being terminated in 90-days. The building would be demolished to make room for a “More Modern” apartment complex. Prices of the new units were more than double what I was paying, but I and the other tenants were being given the first opportunity to lease them.

  The letter asked that I reply as soon as possible to let the management know of my decision.

  I balled the paper up, tossed it in the trashcan, and began unpacking.

  Ramón did have to work the next day and told me that he wouldn’t be back for nearly a week. I used that time to try to return to the groove of daily living.

  During the months in between our time in Europe and the trip to my mama’s, I had begun working less and less. When I did work, I found my mind drifting back to my European adventure.

  Tracking down and killing Natalie Stone had been more self-defense than revenge, and while it was happening I felt out of my depth. Still, she had been a world-class terrorist with a network behind her. To go from that and back to chasing thousand-dollar bail skips was a bit of a letdown.

  I normally hunted the higher bounty criminals, but of late, they were rare, and so I found myself running down bail jumpers that were as challenging to find as a bear in the woods.

  I was bored while working, something that I hadn’t experienced in years. I began to wonder if a career change might not be in order. There was just one problem. Bounty hunting paid well, and I was very skilled at it. I also had set a goal for myself to accumulate enough to retire early and buy my own ranch.

  If I took the time to change careers, I would likely eat through some of my savings in the process and set myself back. Still, boredom was unnatural to me, and in my current profession, dangerous as well. I sighed and assured myself that the malaise I was feeling would pass, and then I went in search of my next skip.

  I drove an hour west of Fort Worth to a small farm where I thought I might find my skip.

  The skip’s name was Waylon Hanna; he was worth two-thousand dollars. Waylon had missed his court date for sentencing on an embezzlement charge. Coincidentally, it was two-thousand dollars that he was accused of stealing from an employer.

  I spotted Waylon as he was feeding the chickens. When he saw me walking toward him, he sent me a smile. He was about my height, but chubby, with a fat face. He was wearing a pair of faded blue overalls with muddy work boots.

  “Hey there, what’s your name, cutie?”

  “Waylon Hanna, my name is Blue Steele and I’ve come to take you back to Fort Worth.”

  He started to smile wider, as if he thought I was joking, but when I took out the handcuffs, the smile disappeared.

  Waylon dropped the feed bucket and started running. I gave chase amid squawking hens and roosters. I was almost close enough to grab him when he jumped a fence and landed into a pigpen.

  Now, I am hardly what you would call a girly-girl, but romping around in mud and pig excrement is not my idea of fun.

  As I stood by the fence hesitating, Waylon looked back at me and grinned.

  That did it. I wasn’t about to let a skip laugh at me.

  I grabbed a fence post with both hands and vaulted over it to land with a squish into the mud. It had rained hard in the area the night before and the mud inside the pen was deep. As usual, I was wearing boots, but the bottoms of my jeans were turning brown from the splatter. I was almost to the other side, when a piglet ran in front of me. I halted in mid-stride so as not to step on the tiny creature, as I did so, I lost my balance and fell face first into the mud.

  I laid there for a moment just reeling from the disgust, when the piglet came over and began licking my face.

  “Look what you made me do,” I said, but he ignored me and kept licking.

  I got up, angrier than ever at Waylon and began running again. I was so coated in mud and gunk that it fell off me in chunks as I ran.

  Waylon had quite a lead, but as he ambled through the stable, I could see that the running had taken its toll on him. He was breathing through his open mouth. I ran harder to catch up and came even with him when he was just feet away from a pickup truck with a stack of red and blue poultry crates in its rear.

  He spun around to punch me and I kicked him in the groin. That took any remaining fight out of him.

  I placed the cuffs on Waylon as a man and woman drove in and parked near my truck. The man removed a shotgun from the rack in his vehicle and started toward me, as the woman scurried inside the house.

  “What are you doing to my cousin?”

  The man was holding the shotgun pointed at the ground.

  “I’m taking him into custody and bringing him back to Fort Worth.”

  He started to say, “Oh no you ain’t,” as he raised the weapon, but only got as far as the, “Oh no you a—” when I aimed my gun at his face.

  “Mister,” I said. “I will shoot you dead if you raise that shotgun another inch.”

  He stared at me with venom in his eyes, but he lowered the gun.

  “Good boy, now, I’m taking Waylon here with me and you will watch us leave. Make any attempt to stop us and I will shoot Waylon and then so help me I will kill you.”

  “You’re that Blue Steele, ain’t you?”

  I was surprised by the question, but nodded yes, as I did, he sat the shotgun on the ground beside him.

  “You shot my buddy Mickey in the knee a while back, Mickey Kyle. Hell, that dude still ain’t walkin’ right.”

  I remembered Mickey; he had called me a “Chippie,” or some such name.

  I nodded again, then herded Waylon toward my truck. Waylon made a plea for help, and his cousin laughed.

  “I like my knees just the way they are, Waylon.”

  I watched the man in my rear-view mirror as I drove away. He never made a move
for the gun.

  Waylon made a sniffling sound.

  “You stink, lady.”

  I ran my hand through my hair, gathered up a fistful of mud, and jammed it into his face.

  Chapter 3

  I stopped at one of those do-it-yourself car washes along the way and gave both my pickup and myself a quick cleaning. My clothes were still wet when I handed Waylon over to the cops, but I was relatively mud-free.

  When I arrived home, I went straight into the shower. After nearly an hour of scrubbing away grime I was myself again, at least outwardly, inside, I was now beyond bored and sick of what I was doing.

  A year ago, I would have called my friend Becca and laughed as I told her about what had happened, but now, now, it just saddened me.

  My father went after a brutal serial killer and lost his life in the process. Today, a man with a shotgun threatened me because I was taking his penny-ante crook of a cousin back to jail for minor thievery.

  The terrorist that Ramón and I took down, Natalie Stone, she had a price on her head of fifty-thousand Euros. It was money we couldn’t collect because of the way we ended her, but we did it, we played in the big leagues and won.

  Then, today, I was back to chasing skips through mud.

  The phone rang. It was Ramón.

  “Are you home?” I asked.

  “I am, and I’m hoping you will join me here.”

  I sighed. “I’m tired and I don’t think that I would be very good company, but tell me, did everything go all right?”

  “It went fine, and Santuario has three new residents, a small family.”

  “Ukrainians?”

  “Yes, but different ones, my original client didn’t pass the vetting process.”

  “Which means what?”

  “He lied about who he was.”

  “And the people you brought back, who vetted them?”

  “I did. The father saved my life and risked his own to do it.”

  I had been lying back on the sofa, but at those words, I sat up straight.

  “You didn’t tell me it would be dangerous.”

  “It shouldn’t have been, but as I said, the first man lied.”

  “I’m coming over.”

  “I thought you were tired?”

  “I want to see with my own eyes that you’re all right.”

  “I’m fine, Blue, really, not a scratch.”

  “You don’t want me to come over?”

  “I want you to never leave.”

  I smiled. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Come in the back way, I’ll be grilling steaks.”

  “Hey.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you too, Blue, now hurry.”

  I ended the call as I shook my head. Ramón and I had started as friends, became lovers, and now, now I loved him so much that it scared me a little. It was one of the reasons that I didn’t want to move in with him. Breaking up with someone was hard enough, breaking up and losing someone you thought was a keeper was devastating.

  It wasn’t that long ago that I thought my ex-boyfriend Gary and I would be forever. As we were headed in that direction, it all fell apart, just like every relationship I’ve ever had.

  In a way, even my daddy had left me, and the events of this week brought back all of those horrible feelings and memories of the days and weeks after his disappearance.

  I felt depression threatening to swallow me. Before it could get a grip, I grabbed my purse and headed out the door.

  The steaks were delicious and there was a salad to go with them. I also stopped at a bakery on the way to Ramón’s and bought a decadent chocolate cake for dessert.

  Some people drink or take narcotics, but my drug of choice is usually chocolate.

  We were seated out on the patio, and in the west, the sun was just going down.

  “Tell me about your day,” Ramón said.

  I told him about my adventure in the pigpen.

  “The thing licked you like a puppy?”

  “It was the size of a puppy, and just as cute.”

  “Talk about pearls before swine, you work too hard.”

  “Did you see Walter while you were in Santuario?”

  “Of course, and he asked about you.”

  “I should have gone with you.”

  “You’re welcome anytime; all I have is yours.”

  I stared over at him.

  “I thought you weren’t going to ask me to move in again.”

  Ramón made a face. “Was I that obvious?”

  “Yes, but I don’t mind, and the idea does appeal to me, it’s just…”

  “Just what?”

  “We really haven’t known each other that long, at least not as a couple.”

  Ramón sent me a small shrug.

  “I know what I feel for you and I’ve never felt it for anyone else. I want you around me every moment of the day; I make no apologies for that.”

  “I’m flattered, really, and I feel the same way, but I’m not ready to risk myself again, at least not yet.”

  “You’re talking about Gary?”

  “Yes, I mean, one minute we were engaged, and the next—”

  “—you were with me.”

  I leaned across the table. “Hey, you’re not some rebound love affair if that’s what you’re afraid of; I truly love you, so much that it scares me a little.”

  Ramón sighed. “You’re not the only one afraid, Blue, you own my heart, you know?”

  “I promise not to break it.”

  “This conversation is getting too intense, and I asked you here to relax.”

  I smiled at him. “I can stay the night.”

  “Excellent.”

  We carried the dishes inside, then snuggled on the sofa for a movie. As the TV came on, I saw a message crawl across the bottom of the screen. It stated there was a new development in what the pundits were calling “The Herd Thinner” case, just as my daddy had.

  We waited with the sound muted until the inane sitcom went off, and then watched the news break at the top of the hour.

  “Sources inside the investigation are claiming that Darrell Harker, grandnephew of Herd Thinner, Clayton Harker, is now wanted for murder. One of the three bodies recovered from the Harker property, that of seventeen-year-old, Melissa King, was found to have Darrell Harker’s DNA under her fingernails. In addition to that, his DNA has been linked to eight additional murders, murders that were committed in five different states. Sources say that Darrell Harker has now been dubbed “Protégée.” We’ll have much more on this developing story at eleven.”

  The news ended and I gazed over at Ramón with a shocked look on my face.

  “Is it possible that Darrell Harker murdered my daddy?”

  “It sounds like it.”

  “He was just a boy back then.”

  “Take it from someone who grew up in a gang, teenage boys make excellent killers.”

  “I need to know what’s really going on inside that investigation.”

  I grabbed my phone and searched my address book.

  “Who are you calling?”

  “Someone who might have the answers I need.”

  “You’re talking about Lawson, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “He’ll want something in return, those government types always do.”

  I stared at Ramón. “I know that.”

  Before I could dial, my phone rang. The caller ID was blank.

  “Speak of the devil.”

  “Lawson?”

  “He’s the only one I know who makes the caller ID come up blank.”

  Ramón laid his right hand atop of mine.

  “Whatever you decide to do, please think it over first.”

  I nodded in agreement and answered the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “This is Thomas Lawson, Miss Steele. I think we can help each other.”

  “What do you know that I don’t?” />
  “Not on the phone, at least, not that phone, it’s not secure.”

  “Can you come here?”

  “No, but you’ll receive a package containing a secure phone, you are still living in Mr. Acero’s home, yes?”

  “I don’t live… Ramón and I… I’ll be here. When is the phone being delivered?”

  “At any moment, and you only need to turn it on to reach me.”

  “How James Bond of you,”

  “Call me, Miss Steele, I have information you’ll want.”

  “Lawson.”

  “Yes?”

  “What will this cost me?”

  “Get the phone, and then we’ll talk, until then.”

  The conversation ended and the doorbell rang.

  Chapter 4

  The phone arrived in a package with an accompanying envelope that read, OPEN AFTER CALLING.

  I powered on the newly delivered cell phone and it automatically dialed a number. There were no digits showing upon the screen, only the sound of varying tones indicated that it was in the process of making a connection.

  Ramón was still in the living room, but I had moved to the kitchen to make the call. I told him that I would fill him in afterward. I wanted no distractions as I talked to Lawson. Ramón agreed, and was waiting for me to return.

  Lawson answered and I could hear that he sounded more relaxed.

  “Now we can talk, and first, how are you?”

  “I’m curious…and wary.”

  “Wary? Of me?”

  “Of what you represent,”

  “I think you would agree that I’m not your average government bureaucrat, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “And I did help you in Europe, no?”

  I relaxed. “How are you doing, Lawson?”

  “I am as usual quite busy, but in good health. Thank you for asking.”

  “What do you know about Darrell Harker, about Protégée?”

  “I suspect that it was he who murdered your father, and not his granduncle.”

  “Why do you say that?”