The Spy Wore Spurs

“In there.” She jerked her head, hating the way the morning was turning out. She might have been able to stand up against Ryder in regards to Esperanza, but no way could she stand up against the six of them.

Game over.

She watched as they tried hard not to laugh at Ryder’s appearance in the overalls. But there was a lot of smirking going on as they helped him to the door.

He stopped in the threshold. “I appreciate the help, Grace.”

She didn’t say you’re welcome, just stood there with her arms crossed.

“I had a gun,” he said then.

Fine. She stepped to the hall table and pulled open the top drawer, then handed him his gun belt.

He left with a nod, followed by one of his buddies—built like a tank—who was escorting Esperanza. Half of the man’s left eyebrow was missing, giving him a fierce appearance. Esperanza looked about ready to faint.

The rest of the men inspected Grace’s living room as if they were undecided whether to leave or pull out a search warrant.

Twinky padded in from the direction of the kitchen; the Viking gave her a careful look.

Grace rolled her eyes. “What? You want to frisk the cat?”

The man’s startling blue eyes cut to her and he coughed. His face remained impassive, but he might have been trying to cover up a laugh. The others strode out and he walked after them.

She followed after Esperanza and gave the crying woman a hug. “Lo siento,” she whispered into her ear. I’m sorry. “I will do whatever I can to help. I’m going to look for your family, okay?”

And maybe Esperanza understood, because she slipped a folded-up piece of paper into Grace’s hands, careful so nobody would see the furtive maneuver, her red-rimmed eyes hanging on Grace’s face, begging. She looked as miserable as a person could be, but followed the men without resisting. Then she disappeared in the back of one of the vehicles, no longer visible behind the tinted window.

“I do appreciate what you did for me,” Ryder said again as he got into the passenger seat of the same vehicle.

Grace turned her back on him, marched inside the house, then slammed the door behind her.

Only then did she open the piece of paper.

Two little kids smiled at her from the photograph, a boy and a girl, their eyes laughing into the camera. Their parents stood behind them, a world of love in their eyes as they looked at their children. She turned the photo over. Paco, Esperanza, Miguel y Rosita.

Miguel was maybe two inches taller than his twin, his arms protectively around his little sister.

She had a picture in that same pose with Tommy, although the age difference had been bigger between them.

She glanced at the brass urn on the mantel and her heart constricted.

What if Ryder didn’t fulfill his promise?

Children, even American children, fell through the cracks every single day. What if nobody went to look for Rosita and Miguel?

She squared her shoulders. Somebody would, she decided.

Chapter Three

Ryder took notes at the SDDU’s new satellite site as Esperanza Molinero repeated her story. Raymund, better known as Ray, Armstrong, sat with them. The two of them were senior team members, based on length of service in the SDDU. The rest of the men busied themselves elsewhere so as not to overwhelm her and make her feel threatened.

“Did the guide bring a whole group or you alone?” he asked in Spanish.

“I sold my wedding ring so he would bring me. I came alone. I sold my bicycle and our furniture. Even the kitchen table Paco made me as a wedding gift. Where will my Paco eat when he comes home?”

Ray exchanged a look with Ryder that said he didn’t expect that issue to come up. Something Ryder had considered, as well. The man should have called his wife by now, got word back to her. If he hadn’t, he was possibly dead, or in some other bad trouble.

“Was your husband a drug mule? Did anyone give him any suspicious packages to take to the U.S. with him?” Ray asked, sliding lower in his chair, trying to look as small and nonthreatening as he could, a challenge for a big chunk of Viking like him. The blood of his marauding ancestors ran thick in his veins, there was no mistaking it. Mostly, it was an advantage, but not today. Esperanza eyed him warily.

Fresh tears welled in her eyes. “My Paco was a good man. An honest man.”

“The kids were given backpacks of school supplies from the so-called company representative,” Ryder put in, repeating what she’d told him at the ranch.

Ray asked Esperanza about that; she insisted that the bags contained nothing but notebooks and pencils. She looked confused, probably not understanding why they were asking her about the bags instead of her kids.

“Of course, she wouldn’t have checked the padding,” Ray said in English.

Ryder nodded. Exactly.

“You’re sure about his name?” He wanted to get back to the human trafficking. The same man who brought her over might be the guide for the terrorists, in the not-too-distant future.

“Dave,” the woman said then struggled with the next word. “Snebl.”

“Where did you cross?”

“I couldn’t see in the dark. We walked for a long time together. When he saw the storm, he said he was leaving. I gave him everything I had, all the rest of my money, my bag. But he turned around. He told me to keep walking.”

She was lucky he didn’t hurt her. Robbing people who came across the border was a common racket. If their guide didn’t do it, then one of the groups who made a living from robbing illegal immigrants did. The men and women usually brought their most valuable possessions with them to start a new life. The hits could be lucrative, and the victims couldn’t turn to the police, so the robbers nearly always got away with it.

Ryder shifted in his seat. His job was to defend his country and if he saw anyone breaking the law, do something about it. Either you broke the law or you didn’t. He preferred to look at things in black-and-white. He hated shades of gray.

He was a soldier. He got a command, he carried it out. There was no evaluation of the mission, no second-guessing his superior officer. That was how the army, where he’d started out, worked, as did his current team the SDDU, Special Designation Defense Unit, a top secret commando team.

But nothing seemed clear-cut here. The land along the border was its own universe. Some of the people he’d met were clearly criminals, others victims, some both at the same time. Motivations were complicated.

He thought of Grace Cordero—the definition of complicated. A smart man would leave that attractive bundle of trouble well alone. Like he was going to do. To get a good head start, he put Grace from his mind and focused on the woman in front of him.

“Please,” she begged them. “Help me.”

He did feel sorry for Esperanza. She didn’t cross the border with criminal intent, she didn’t want to stay and live off taxpayer’s money. She was looking for her husband and children because the authorities had failed her.

Yet, what she’d done was illegal.

He had no choice but to take her to border patrol and send her back home. No choice at all, even if a sharp-eyed beauty called Grace Cordero would hate him for it.

She didn’t believe in the system.

He did. He’d sworn to defend it.