Loe raamatut: «The Lawmen of McCall Canyon»

Chapter One

The moment he took the turn to his ranch, Sheriff Egan McCall spotted the emergency lights flashing on the vehicle just ahead. He groaned. Then he cursed.

Even in the darkness, he recognized the old white truck. It was parked on the shoulder of the narrow country road, and the driver was definitely someone he didn’t want to see tonight. Or any other night for that matter.

Jordan Gentry.

Egan had only wanted to get home and get some sleep since he’d just pulled a twelve-hour shift and was bone tired. But sleeping anytime soon likely wasn’t going to happen if he had to deal with Jordan first.

What the heck was she doing out here anyway?

The only place on this road was the McCall Ranch, which meant Jordan had probably been going there to see him. That couldn’t be right, though. Jordan hadn’t spoken a word to him in two years, and Egan wanted it to stay that way.

He pulled to a stop behind her truck and dragged in a deep breath that he hoped would steel him up. He hated, too, that steeling up was even required when it came to Jordan. Once, she’d been his high school sweetheart, but that felt like a lifetime ago. Now she was just part of the nightmarish memories that he still hadn’t figured out a way to forget.

Egan got out, walking on the gravel shoulder to the driver’s side. Since the engine wasn’t running, he looked inside, expecting to see Jordan behind the wheel ready to complain about not being able to get her truck started. But both the headlights and emergency lights were on, so this couldn’t be about a dead battery. Maybe she was having engine trouble.

Jordan wasn’t there, though, in the cab of the truck. No one was. But Egan spotted something he definitely hadn’t wanted to see.

Blood.

It was on the seat. So were chunks of safety glass. The passenger-side window was completely shattered.

Egan turned around so he could see if Jordan was nearby. Maybe she’d tried to avoid running into an animal or something and had hit her head. Of course, that didn’t explain the broken window.

“Jordan?” he called out.

No response. There were deep ditches next to her truck and a fence just beyond that. But Egan didn’t see her.

He took out his phone, using it as a flashlight, and spotted more blood on the ground. Not a huge amount, but even a few drops were enough to concern him. He needed to call for an ambulance.

However, the sound stopped him from doing that.

It was a soft rustling noise at the front end of the truck. Egan drew his gun, and he stepped closer.

Jordan.

She was sitting on the ground, her back against the front fender of her truck, and she had her gun gripped in her right hand, her phone in her left. She turned, and thanks to the truck headlights, he had no trouble seeing the source of the blood. It was on the top of her shoulder, just to the side of her blond hair, and it was running down the sleeve of her shirt.

“Are you here to finish me off?” she asked.

Obviously, she was dazed and didn’t know what she was saying. Egan made that call to get an ambulance out there.

“What happened?” He went closer, peeling off his own shirt so he could wipe away some of the blood and see just how badly she was hurt.

“You” was all she said. She laughed. It was hoarse and weak, and it definitely wasn’t from humor. “I knew you hated me, but I never thought in a million years you’d try to kill me.”

Yeah, she was definitely talking crazy. Egan had a look at her wound and saw the gash on her shoulder. He eased her hair aside so he could see if there were other injuries, and she also had a bump on her head. She’d need stitches and might even have a concussion.

“What happened?” Egan repeated.

“You tried to kill me,” she said without hesitation.

Even though Jordan was hurt, it was still hard to keep the scowl off his face. He tapped his sheriff’s badge in case she’d forgotten that he was the law around here and not prone to murder attempts. “And why would I do that?”

There were tears in her pale green eyes when Jordan looked up at him. “Shanna.”

Everything inside Egan went still.

Shanna Sullivan. His late fiancée. Shanna was also the reason Jordan was no longer someone he wanted to see. Even now after nearly two years, he still felt the ache. It ate away at him, and sometimes, like now, the ache felt just as fresh as it had when Shanna had died less than an hour after a man had shot her.

He leaned in, sniffed Jordan’s breath to make sure she hadn’t been drinking. She hadn’t been. “Focus,” he demanded. “I didn’t try to kill you and neither did Shanna. She’s dead. So, what the hell happened here?”

She touched her fingers to her head and looked at the blood that was on the sleeve of her shirt. “I...uh, was driving to your place to talk to you, and someone started to pass me. At least I thought that’s what he was doing, but then he shot me. Someone driving a blue pickup identical to yours.”

Egan pulled back his shoulders. He hoped like the devil that none of that was true. He definitely didn’t want someone firing shots into a vehicle. Especially someone who might be posing as him. But then he reminded himself that Jordan hadn’t made much sense with anything else she’d said.

He had another look at that gash on her shoulder. It was possibly a deep graze from a bullet. Possibly. But it could have also happened if she’d hit her head and shoulder on the steering wheel. Of course, her accusation would mesh with the broken window. Not with anything else, though.

“After he shot me, my truck stalled. I couldn’t get it started,” she continued a moment later. “So, I got out to try to fix it. That’s when I passed out and landed here on the ground.”

Egan didn’t bother to tell her it’d been stupid to try to do engine repairs while injured. “You should have called nine-one-one.”

Despite being dazed, she managed to give him a flat look. “Right. Call the local cops when I thought it was a local cop who shot me. I called someone from San Antonio PD instead.”

He supposed that wasn’t really a surprise about her not wanting to alert the locals. After all, Jordan lived in San Antonio, where she’d once been a cop. She almost certainly still had friends on the force there. But it was a long drive, nearly an hour, from San Antonio to McCall Canyon, and it’d likely be a while before her friend made it out here.

“And your cop friend in San Antonio didn’t convince you to call me?” Egan asked.

“No.” Again, she didn’t hesitate. “Not after everything that’s happened.”

She was talking about Shanna now. Specifically, Shanna’s murder. But Egan had no intention of getting into that with Jordan tonight.

“Come on,” he said, helping her to her feet. In case she was still thinking he would try to kill her, he took her gun and put it in the back waistband of his jeans. “We can wait in my truck until the ambulance gets here.” Which should be in about only twenty minutes or so.

If Jordan was right about having been shot, Egan didn’t want them to be out in the open in case the shooter returned. Of course, he doubted that would happen. The bullet—if it was indeed a bullet—had probably come from someone out hunting.

“Hold my shirt against your shoulder to slow down the bleeding,” Egan instructed.

Jordan went stiff when he tried to get her moving, and she looked at him as if debating if she could trust him.

Egan cursed again. “I don’t know what you think happened here, but I didn’t shoot you. I have no reason to kill you.”

“Yes, you do.” She lifted the side of her top to show him something he didn’t need to see. The scar. The one from her surgery two years ago.

“So?” he snapped. “Did you think I’d forgotten you had a kidney transplant?” It wasn’t a question because there was no way he could have not remembered that. After all, the donor kidney had come from Shanna.

Hell. More memories came. Jordan had been shot that day, too. The bullet had gone through her side and damaged both her kidneys. It’d been somewhat of a miracle that Shanna had been a match. Of course, that miracle came with a huge price tag since Shanna was dead.

“No. I didn’t think you’d forgotten at all.” She swallowed hard. “In fact, that’s why I thought you wanted me dead.”

“You’re not making sense.” He hooked his arm around her waist and forced her to get moving again.

He helped her into his truck, and she winced when she pressed his shirt against her head. Egan considered just driving her to the hospital, but the ambulance could arrive soon, and he could hand her off to the medics while staying behind to have a look at her vehicle. Specifically, that window. He wanted to see if the damage had indeed been caused by a bullet, and if so, then he could call out a CSI team.

“Yes, I am making sense,” Jordan snarled. “Two of the recipients are already dead, and I think I’m next.”

“Recipients?” he questioned.

She looked up at him. “You hadn’t heard?”

No. But Egan was 1,000 percent sure he wasn’t going to like what Jordan was about to say next.

“Breanna Culver, who got Shanna’s liver. Cordell Minter, who got one of her lungs. They’re both dead. Murdered.” Jordan’s last word didn’t have much sound. It was mostly breath.

Hell. If that was true...well, Egan didn’t want to go there just yet. “It could be a coincidence.” Though it would be an eerie one. “You’re positive they were murdered?” he challenged.

Jordan’s forehead bunched up. “Yes. Their organs were...missing. The organs they got from Shanna.”

Egan felt as if someone had punched him. “If that’s true, why didn’t someone tell me?”

“Because I only made the connection today. I knew the names of the recipients. I got them because, well, I don’t know why exactly. Maybe I wanted to know who else was alive because of Shanna. I thought it would give me some peace.”

Egan’s mind was reeling, but he wanted to tell her that she didn’t deserve peace. Neither of them did. “You’re positive about those two people? Positive they were murdered and their organs taken?”

She nodded and motioned to her head. “And now this. Someone shot me.”

No way could he just accept all of this just yet. “Your injury could have been a prank gone wrong. Or a hunter. It could have even been caused by a rock going through the window. A rock that maybe a passing truck kicked up from the road.”

Her expression let him know she wasn’t buying any of this. “What about the break-in at my house?”

He was clueless about that, too, but then he hadn’t kept up with Jordan.

“I was supposed to be home,” she continued. “But I’d left only about five minutes before to go into San Antonio to meet one of my old criminal informants. I wanted to ask him about the other two deaths. Anyway, while I was gone, someone broke in and set fire to the place.”

Again, that didn’t mean anyone was trying to murder her—though the “coincidences” were stacking up.

“That means there are only three of us left,” Jordan added a moment later. “Tori Judd, Irene Adair. And me.”

Egan hadn’t known the names of the people who’d gotten Shanna’s organs. He hadn’t wanted to know. But was it possible someone was going after these people. And if so, why?

One name instantly came to mind. Drew Paxton.

The man who’d put a lethal bullet in Shanna. A bullet that Drew had fired during a botched hostage situation that had killed Shanna.

“Drew Paxton is in jail on death row,” Egan heard himself mumble.

Jordan made a sound of agreement even though Egan hadn’t been talking to her. “And he hasn’t had any unusual visitors. You know, the kind of visitors he could have hired to kill people.”

Egan was well aware of that because while he hadn’t kept tabs on Jordan, he had done just that with Drew. It wasn’t a morbid curiosity, either. Shanna had been Drew’s parole officer, and the snake had developed a fixation on her. So much so that he’d broken into Shanna’s house in San Antonio and taken her hostage.

Jordan had been one of the responding officers. A hostage negotiator. And she’d failed big-time. So had Egan. Because he hadn’t been able to save Shanna, and he’d lost the woman he loved.

“I ruled out Drew because all of his calls and correspondence are carefully monitored,” Jordan said a moment later. “And that’s why I thought you might be doing this. I thought maybe you’d snapped or something.”

Egan had come close to doing just that, but even if he had snapped, he wouldn’t have gone after the people who’d gotten Shanna’s organs. He would have gone after Drew.

And maybe Jordan.

But he hadn’t snapped. And wouldn’t. However, there were a couple of things that didn’t fit here.

“If you thought I’d gone crazy, why were you heading out to the ranch?” Egan asked. “Weren’t you afraid I’d gun you down once you got there?” Egan didn’t bother to take the sarcasm out of his voice.

“I was going to see your brother, Court. I called dispatch, and they said you were still at work so I thought I could talk to Court alone.”

Court was at the ranch all right, and his brother was not only a deputy sheriff, he would have also been more open to having a conversation with Jordan. Court probably didn’t have the raw nerves that Egan still had about Shanna’s death. Plus, Court and Jordan had been friends once, too.

“Look, I dismissed all of this at first,” Jordan continued. “I’m a private investigator these days, and I know how to look at things objectively. Most things anyway,” she added in a mumble.

Egan figured that was meant for him. Maybe Jordan hadn’t been able to get past the hurt and emotions of Shanna’s death, either, and that was why she’d thought Egan might be a killer.

“Have you been keeping an eye on Drew’s brother, Kirk?” Egan asked.

Jordan nodded. Then, hesitated. “Well, as much as I can. He’s a cattle broker, and he travels a lot. And yeah, he’s still riled that his brother is on death row. He could be willing to play into Drew’s sick fantasies of making sure every part of Shanna is dead.”

Definitely a sick fantasy. And riled was putting it mildly for the way Kirk felt about his brother. Kirk thought Egan had provoked Drew into that hostage standoff. Kirk wasn’t exactly specific about how Egan had managed to do that, but he blamed Egan for the situation. Maybe Kirk had decided to spread the blame around now and include Jordan. And those other recipients.

Still...

“What’s the name and number of the SAPD officer who investigated the break-in and fire at your house?” he asked.

She paused several moments as if she might not tell him. That whole lack-of-trusting-him thing might be playing into this, but Jordan finally handed him her phone. “It’s Christian Abrams. He’s not the cop I contacted to come out here, but his number is in my recent calls.”

It was. In fact, Jordan had called the man three times in the past two hours. And there were six missed calls from Christian to Jordan. It did make Egan wonder, though, why she hadn’t phoned this guy after she had gotten injured. Or taken any of those six calls.

While Egan kept watch for the ambulance, he pressed Christian’s number, and he answered right away. “Where the hell are you, Jordan?” the cop snarled.

“I’m not Jordan. I’m Egan McCall.”

“The sheriff over in McCall Canyon,” Christian said after a short pause, and Egan didn’t think it was his imagination there was some venom in the man’s tone. “Jordan went to you after all. I told her that wasn’t a good idea.”

Egan skipped right over that and went to the reason he’d wanted to speak to the man. “Is someone trying to kill Jordan?”

Christian certainly didn’t jump to answer that. “Is she there with you? Can she hear this?”

The answer to both of those was yes. Egan hadn’t put the call on speaker, but the cop’s voice was carrying in the truck. Jordan would almost certainly be able to hear him. But that wasn’t what Egan said because he didn’t want this guy clamming up.

“She can’t hear us,” Egan lied.

“Good. Because I don’t want to alienate her. Jordan needs friends right now. The right friends.”

Again, judging from the tone, Christian didn’t think Egan fell into that category. “Did someone really break into her house and try to kill her?” Egan pressed.

“Yes, but Jordan has this notion—no, it’s an obsession now—with connecting anything that’s happening to her friend’s murder. Did she tell you that she thinks someone is killing organ recipients?”

“She mentioned it.”

“Well, I don’t think it’s true,” Christian concluded. “I think Jordan’s feeling so overwhelmed with guilt from her friend’s death that she’s seeing bogeymen who just aren’t there.”

Jordan’s eyes narrowed, and she looked ready to snatch the phone from him, but Egan waved her off.

“You’ve investigated the two deaths?” Egan asked Christian.

“Yes, and I’m just not seeing what Jordan’s seeing. One of the victims was mangled and burned so bad in a car accident that it was hard to tell if she had missing organs or not. The other was dumped in the woods, and animals had ravaged the body.”

As gruesome as that was, Egan actually felt some relief. Maybe this wasn’t connected to Shanna after all. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on his part. It sickened him, though, to think that Jordan might be right, that Drew did indeed want any living part of Shanna dead.

“Look, just tell her to come home, and I’ll talk this out with her,” Christian continued. “Or better yet, tell me where she is, and I’ll come and get her. I care for her. A lot. I want to make sure she gets the help she needs.”

This time, Jordan did grab the phone, and she hit the end-call button. She opened her mouth, no doubt to try to convince him that she wasn’t “obsessed” as Christian had claimed. But the approaching headlights stopped her.

The vehicle wasn’t coming from town but rather from the direction of the ranch. If it was Court or one of the hands, they would stop when they spotted his truck, and Egan would have to explain why Jordan was with him.

Too bad he wasn’t sure of the answer himself.

As the headlights got closer, Egan felt his chest tighten. That was because it was a blue truck. Identical to his. And there wasn’t another vehicle like it on the ranch. Plus, this vehicle had the same license plate number. Since Egan’s plate was legit, this one had to be a fake.

“It’s him.” Jordan reached for his jeans. No doubt to try to get to her gun. But it was too late.

The bullet crashed through the windshield of Egan’s truck.