The Texas Ranger

“You mean, Silvia has a bright political future ahead,” Simon murmured dryly. “She tells him what to wear and how to stand, for God’s sake. She’s the real power behind his success and you know it. Amazing insight, for a woman so young, with no real education.”

Brannon shrugged. “Bib’s not a self-starter,” he admitted. “Silvia’s been his guardian angel from the beginning.”

“I suppose so, even if he did rob the cradle when he married her.” He leaned back. “As I said earlier, I want this case solved quickly,” he added. “We’ve already been in the public eye too often because we have a Texan in the White House. We don’t need to be the focus of any more media investigations of our justice system.”

“I agree. I’ll do what I can.”

“You’ll work with Josette,” Simon added firmly. “Whether or not you have to grit your teeth. You both know this case inside out. You can solve it.” If you don’t kill each other first, Simon thought.

Brannon waited for the elevator in the hall, leaning against the wall to observe a silk plant. There was a fine film of dust on it, and one petal was missing from the artificial rose. He wondered why the artificial flowers and plants in government office buildings never seemed to get dusted.

The sound of the elevator arriving diverted his attention. He straightened up just as the doors slid open to admit a single occupant to the floor.

Big dark brown eyes met his and went even darker with accusation and resentment in an oval face that had not even a touch of makeup. Her long blond hair was in a tight braided bun atop her head. She wore no jewelry except for a simple silver-and-turquoise cross suspended from a silver chain. Her shoes were gray, to match the neat, if outdated, suit she wore with a simple pink blouse. She was only twenty-four, but there were lines in that ordinary face, visible even through the big, gold-framed glasses she wore. His heart ached just at the sight of her.

Her full mouth parted on a shocked breath, as if she hadn’t expected to see him. Certainly he’d hoped to get out of the building without running into her. Her gaze dropped to the badge on his shirt pocket.

“I heard you were back working for the Rangers, in San Antonio,” Josette Langley said. Her face lifted as if with some effort and he noticed that her slender hands were clenched on the stack of files she was carrying. They were working hands; her short fingernails showed no polish, no professional manicure.

He shoved his hands into his pockets and clenched them as he looked down at her. She was only medium height. Her head came up to his nose. He remembered her dark eyes twinkling, her full lips parted and gasping with joy as they danced together at one of her college parties so long ago. He remembered the softness of her eyes when she smiled at him, the feel of her sweet, bare body warm and close in his arms, the innocence of her mouth when he kissed it for the first time, the feverish response of her body to his ardent caresses…

“Simon says he’s assigned you to this case,” he said curtly, refusing to permit his mind to look back in time.

She nodded. “That’s right. I usually do liaison work, but I know more about Dale Jennings than most of the other investigators.”

“Of course you do,” he drawled with venomous sarcasm.

“Here we go again,” she said with resignation. “Well, don’t stand on ceremony, Brannon, get it off your chest. I tell lies, I damage careers…maybe I cause computer crashes, but the jury’s still out on that one.”

He felt disoriented. He’d expected her to bite her lip and look tormented, as she had two years ago when he’d glared at her in court during Jennings’s trial. He reminded himself that she should be tormented. She’d led him on without a qualm, when she knew she couldn’t be intimate with a man. And her public accusations could have landed Bib Webb in jail. But this was a different Josette, a strong and cool woman who didn’t back down.

“I’ll need whatever information you have on Jennings,” he said abruptly.

“No problem. I’ll send it to the San Antonio office by overnight delivery before I leave the office today,” she said. She indicated the stack of files. “In fact, I’ve just been downstairs copying the information so that I could do that.” She smiled with forced pleasantry. “Unless you’d rather lug it back on the plane?”

“I wouldn’t. How very efficient you’ve become, Miss Langley.”

“Haven’t I, though?” she replied pertly. “Look out, Brannon. One of these days I may be state attorney general myself, and wouldn’t that tie a knot in your ego? Now, if you’ll excuse me?”

Josette turned and started to walk away. The elevator had departed while they were talking. It was on the tenth floor. He pushed the down button viciously.

“Did Jennings have any family?” he asked abruptly.

She turned to look at him. “He has a mother who’s a semi-invalid. She’s on disability and she has a bad heart. Just recently she lost her home because of some scam she fell for. She was supposed to be evicted this week.” Her dark eyes narrowed. “Her husband is long dead and she has no other children. She and Dale were very close. It goes without saying that her son served two years in prison for a crime he never committed while the real culprit escaped justice and inherited the fortune he needed to finance a senate campaign…!”

“Not another word,” Brannon said in a soft, deep tone that made chills run down her spine.

“Or else what?” Josette challenged with uplifted eyebrows and a cool smile. When he didn’t reply, she shrugged. “I hope someone had the decency to inform Mrs. Jennings of her son’s death. Just so that she won’t have to find out on the six o’clock news with footage of the coroner’s office carrying him off in a body bag.”

Brannon’s heart jumped. He hadn’t asked if anyone was going to call Jennings’s next of kin. Damn it, he should have been more efficient. Whatever Jennings had done, his mother wasn’t a criminal.

“I’ll make sure of it,” he said abruptly.

Her eyes softened, just a little, as she matched the memory of that lean, formidable face against the man she’d first known so many years ago. It made her sad to realize what his opinion of her must have been, even at the beginning. He wouldn’t have walked off without a goodbye if there had been any feeling in him for her. He’d hated her the night they’d broken up. He’d hated her more when she accused his friend Webb of being behind Garner’s murder. Probably he still hated her. She didn’t care.

“Thanks,” she said and turned away.

“Have you come across any clue in those files that would point to a potential execution?” he asked deliberately.

Josette came back to face him at once. “You think somebody put out a contract on him,” she said confidently, her voice deliberately lowered.

Brannon nodded. “It was a professional job, not some drive-by shooting or a gang-related conflict. He was on work detail and escaped, apparently with help from some unknown accomplice, made his way to San Antonio, and ended up with a single gunshot wound to the back of the head at point-blank range, just around the corner from our most notorious mobster’s nightclub.”

“But what would be the motive?” she asked curiously. “He was in prison, out of the way. Why would somebody break him out just to kill him? They could have done that at the prison.”

“I don’t know,” he had to admit. “That’s what I have to find out.”

“Poor Dale,” she said heavily. “And his poor mother…!”

“What’s in those files?” he asked, deliberately changing the subject.

“Background checks on all the people who called and wrote to him before his escape, and dossiers on mob figures he was rumored to be connected with,” she said. “We’ll speak to these people, of course, and the police are going to canvas the area where he was found to see if they can turn up any witnesses.”

“Which they won’t find, if it was professional.”

“I know.”

“Why did you choose law enforcement for a career?” he asked unexpectedly.

Her dark eyes narrowed on his face. “Because there are so many innocent people convicted of crimes,” Josette said deliberately. “And so many guilty people go free.”

Brannon stiffened at the innuendo. “Jennings was a mobster and he had a record,” he reminded her.

“He had a felony battery conviction, and first offender status,” she corrected. “He was just a teenager at the time. He got drunk, got into a fight and got arrested. He didn’t even go to jail. After a year’s probation, he was turned loose. But that, and his connection with Jake Marsh, went against him when he was arrested for Garner’s murder.”

“He was cold sober when Garner drowned,” he countered. “They did a breath-analyzer test on him and it registered zilch. Jennings had opportunity and the means—Garner was elderly and couldn’t swim. Being knocked over the head and pushed in the lake in that condition would have been instantly fatal, especially where he went off the pier. It’s twenty-feet deep there.”

“Where’s the motive?” she persisted.

“Garner owed him money, he said, and he couldn’t get his check,” Brannon replied with a cold smile. “Garner had fired him, and they’d already had one argument. They may have argued on the pier. Your memory of the events was questioned. You were drunk, I believe?” he chided.

Josette was still ashamed to admit that she’d been stupid enough to drink spiked punch. Not being used to hard liquor, the vodka had made her disoriented and weak. When she was fifteen, she’d unknowingly been given LSD in her soft drink and almost ended up raped. These days she never took a drink unless she was completely confident of where it had come from. “I wasn’t totally sober,” she admitted in a guilt-ridden tone. “But, then, neither were most of the people at that party. Silvia said she saw Mr. Garner at his car before she took me home and even waved at him. I didn’t see that. She said it was because I was drunk.”

“You didn’t say that at the trial,” he reminded her.

“I didn’t have time to say much at the trial,” she replied. “I was immediately suppoenaed as a prosecution witness because I hadn’t seen Dale or Mrs. Webb at the time Garner was allegedly murdered, which was before she took me home, not after! And I didn’t see Henry Garner at his car as we left. I tried to point out that Dale hadn’t had a blackjack in his car when we arrived. But the prosecuting attorney took me apart, with your helpful suggestions about bringing up my testimony at the rape trial when I was fifteen,” she added pointedly and saw his eyelids flinch. “He destroyed me on the witness stand. I heard later that you and Bib Webb told him about the rape trial. I thought you wanted to help me.” She managed a bitter smile. “You taught me how to dance. You were friends with my father. When I went to college in San Antonio, you were always around. We went out for months together, before Mr. Garner…died.” She drew in a long breath. It hurt to remember how Marc had been with her. She’d thought they were in love. She certainly had been. What a joke! “But none of that mattered, did it? You believed that I lied to implicate Bib Webb. You never doubted it.”

“Bib Webb is one of the most decent human beings I know,” Brannon said icily, refusing to face a truth that he knew for certain now about her credibility.