The Soldier's Mission

His brother’s silence told Paco Buddy was processing this. His older brother would understand and take action. “Can you talk?”

“Negative.”

“Will you call me?”

“Yes. Just go to Wíago and stay with him. Call me when you hear anything from the doctors. Or I’ll call you when I get things straight here.”

“Got it. I’m on my way to the hospital.”

Paco turned toward Laura. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Where are we going?”

He didn’t explain. He had enough to think about without having to report every detail to her. Seeing the distress in her eyes, he gently lifted her up. “You’ll be okay. This has become official now.”

She followed him without protest. Getting an argument from her would have eased Paco’s mind even if he didn’t want to hear it. She might be going into shock and that was the last thing he needed right now.

“Do you think the sheriff believed us?” she asked.

“I mean, he didn’t take me away. I thought he’d take me into custody after I told him what I’d witnessed and what happened.” She didn’t finish, didn’t state the obvious.

Paco did a scan of the road and the desert, careful to shield her by keeping her behind him. “I explained things to the sheriff. Self-defense. He’s a good friend of my grandfather’s and for that reason he trusted me and he’ll keep a lid on this for as long as possible. We both gave a statement and we’ve been cleared for travel.”

“Cleared?”

He shoved her into his truck and closed the door. Once he was inside and feeling confident that they weren’t being watched, he turned to her. “CHAIM clearance. For your safety, you’re in my custody until we figure this out. The sheriff knows how to reach me if he needs to talk to us. We always alert the locals when we’re on a case.”

“Oh, of course.”

Paco didn’t like her quietness but he let it ride for now while he watched the long, flat road and did a couple of quick searches of the desert on either side. When they turned off the dusty lane to his trailer, he slowed the truck.

“I live there,” he explained, pointing to the tiny white home on wheels. “I need to get some equipment and then we’re going to your hotel room to check it out.”

“All right.” She studied the travel trailer, her gaze moving between the RV and his face. “That’s not very big.”

“I don’t need much space.” Except the emotional kind, he thought, refusing to elaborate out loud.

She went silent again.

“Stay right here while I get some things,” he told her. Then he handed her a loaded handgun he kept in the glove compartment, removing the safety before he handed it to her. “Use this if you have to.”

Before she could protest, Paco was out the door and running toward the trailer.

Laura sat staring down at the gun. She’s just shot and killed a man and now she was holding a gun. What had become of her life, of her plans to help Luke Martinez?

Paco.

The man frightened her as much as he intrigued her. He was all muscle and male, all mad and mysterious. Not the kind of man to whom she was attracted. No, she went more for the button-down, preppy type. But then, that type hadn’t exactly been working out for her lately, come to think of it. Her last boyfriend hadn’t taken their break-up very well. And why was she even thinking along those lines anyway? She’d come here on a mission of mercy, her faith intact, her concern real.

And now, in the span of less than two hours, she’d been shot at and she’d killed a man. And she still didn’t understand who these people wanted to kill—her or Paco.

She looked out across the Painted Desert toward the mountains. They looked misty and solid as they hunched in watercolor shades of orange and mauve like sleeping giants off in the distance, the saguaros and fan palms stark and scattered across the arid vastness.

Who was out there?

Laura felt a chill in spite of the rising heat. She had to get out of this truck. She didn’t want Luke to be alone. And she didn’t want to be alone. They should stick together. She opened the door and hurried around to the back of the tiny trailer, her gaze taking in the canvas covered tented porch, a small grill and one lonely scarred lawn chair.

He didn’t need much space.

Except the desolate emptiness of a desert.

What had she gotten herself into?

Paco whirled when he heard footfalls on the rickety steps, his gun trained on the door.

“I told you to stay in the truck,” he shouted, relief washing over him. Relief followed by remorse. Laura was standing with one foot inside the door and the other one lowered on the steps, her gun shaking in her tiny hand.

“I was worried about you,” she said, her gaze sweeping the cramped kitchen. Lowering the gun to the step, she asked, “Are you always this messy?”

“I didn’t do this, sweetheart,” he replied, disgust making him harsh as he looked over the ruin of his home. Someone had gone through ever nook and cranny, without regard for clothing, dishes or paperwork.

“Apparently, I had a visitor this morning.” He touched a hand to something on the counter. “And they left yet another one of your business cards.”

She stepped away. “What? But why?”

At least that shocked her out of her fear again. Good. She needed to clear her head because they were just getting started with this thing.

“Good question,” he replied as he strapped on knives and guns, tugging weapons in his boots and underneath his shirt. “Either you have a fan, or someone is stalking you.”

She looked up at him then, her eyes coloring to a deep blue. “Oh, no. No, it can’t be.”

She fell back and turned to sit on the metal step. Paco quickly slid out the door and hopped around her then turned to face her. “Talk to me, beautiful.”

Laura put her head down in her hands. “I dated a guy for a few months, a while back. On the surface, he was a successful nice guy who said all the right things. But after a few months, things got weird and I broke it off. He started harassing me and I had to take out a restraining order. But he stopped bothering me about a month ago.”

Paco leaned down, one hand reaching to lift her head up. “Define ‘weird.’”

“After we broke up, he’d still call me and text me all day and night. He got really angry when I didn’t call him right back. I got a funny feeling—instincts I guess. I told him to quit pestering me. He didn’t take that very well. When he turned violent, I knew I’d made a big mistake. I think he suffered from paranoid delusional disorder.”

“Did he hurt you? Hit you?”

She looked away. “He slapped me once.”

Paco couldn’t tolerate men who hit women. “And?”

“And I reminded him that we were over, he left a note on my apartment door, threatening me, calling me a tease.” She looked up at Paco. “I never teased him or led him on about anything. I thought we were having a friendly relationship that might turn into something else. It didn’t turn into anything but…creepy. I told him he needed help. I even offered to find him a therapist, since I certainly couldn’t deal with him.”

“You think this might be the guy?”