Convicted (Entangled Ignite) (19 page)

Trina rolled her eyes, mouthing words he hadn’t heard since he’d left the service. He’d have laughed, but she did have a loaded twin-barrel in her hands. Perverse, maybe, but if their lives weren’t in danger, this would probably rate as his best date ever.

He brought the radio back up. “That’s not happening. But since you’re here, why not tell me how you found me?”

“You’d be amazed what you can get out of a guy when you shatter his leg.”

Cade closed his eyes and counted. It didn’t do much for his growing rage, but it did keep him from storming out the door in a pointless explosion of bullets. “You’d have to do more than that to break Rick.”

Carter hesitated a few telling seconds. “It was worth a try. No, you’re the one who fucked up this time, deputy. Turns out all sheriff’s department vehicles have LoJack. We just had to find the signal. Trelane almost managed to get away with faking your death, I guess we just got lucky when we caught him blowing your house up.”

“Can’t have been too lucky, since there was a dead man inside.”

“Yeah, well, you win some you lose some, right?” Carter’s joviality could only mean one thing. He was buying time. Cade switched the cameras, finding men creeping carefully around the house. Trying to get toward the last, unchecked wall. “Come on out, Evigan. I got no reason to kill you. Yet.”

But there would be when they got in, Cade would make sure of that. “What happens if I come to the door?”

“Simple trade. You come out and tell me where Shana is, I’ll give you back your sack of shit best friend.”

Yeah, right
. “He alive?”

Another rough laugh. “Let’s put it this way. He sure as hell wishes he wasn’t.”

Shit
. Trina must have been thinking the same thing because she dropped her head back against the wall.

“You may want to hurry up. Not sure how much longer he’s gonna stay that way.”

Trina put a restraining hold on his arm. “You know he just wants you out there so he can shoot you, right?”

“No, he’s more hands-on than that. He’ll want to gut me.”

She gave him a sideways glare. “He’s not an idiot. You’re almost twice his size. No way he’d get close enough for you to hurt him.”

But Carter
was
prideful as all hell, and he still bristled at the knowledge that Cade had laid him out when they first met.

“Cade?” Trina turned fully his way, a note of nervousness in her voice.

He lifted the radio to his mouth. She was right to be nervous. “Let’s make a deal.”

“Cade, no.” Her hiss barely registered.

“I’ll come out, but you have to make it worth my while. Bring Trelane to the porch, then get your men back to the truck. I’ll talk to you, just you. Then we can all get out of this safe and sound.”

“What about your little friends underground? I’d hate to drop your man somewhere he won’t come back from.”

“Consider them disarmed. Unless someone breaks the rules. Then I’m blowing the shit out of you
and
your men.”

Long seconds ticked by while Carter seemed to consider it.

“He’s not gonna go for it,” Trina whispered, shaking her head.

Cade wasn’t sure, either. Normally, Carter’s club was more than forty members. For some reason, he’d come with less than ten and was now down to seven. This whole thing stunk of desperation. Whatever Shana took in that flash drive, Carter had to be counting on finding it to save him.

“Fine,” Carter barked suddenly. “Give us a few to drag this asshole up there.”

Trina gaped. “You’re seriously going to let him just drive away?”

“First priority is getting Rick back alive. After that, we’ll see.”

“We’ll see
what?
” Damn she was beautiful when she wanted to throw things at him.

He grasped her chin and pressed a fast kiss on her lips before snatching the rifle from her hands. “Watch the viewer, make sure they don’t try anything. If one of those guys moves or shows up on any view but the east, blow ‘em to kingdom come.”

“What about you?” There was still some worry on her face, the old worry, that he’d been too scarred by his past. Oddly enough, the painful memories weren’t blocking his survival instincts right now. He actually felt somewhat back in his element. Maybe because he understood what he was protecting. The lines had blurred too much before, watching friends he considered brothers die no matter how hard he fought for them. This time the lines were brutally clear. No one, especially not Frank Carter, was getting past them.

“I’m fine, I swear.”

They both heard the thump outside, likely Trelane getting dumped like a bag of bricks.

Trina eyed him grimly, blowing out a breath as she turned her face back to the viewer. He watched her shift from one view to the next before nodding at him. Field clear.

Slowly, nosing the gun out first, he opened the cabin door. As expected, Trelane, blood running down his face and just about everywhere else Cade could see, lay on the porch. No serious blood pools, though, which he decided to take as a positive sign. Directly in front of him stood the unlikely mastermind.

“Evigan.” For a small guy, he was definitely powerful, like a rabid pit bull, especially in one of his rages. But his strength wasn’t what made him dangerous. No, it was when you looked into his vicious, rat-like gaze and saw the mind working behind it. Today, he had the extra touch of a barely scabbed gash over his nose and deep purple bruising all over it. “I thought we were planning to play nice here.”

“I am. If I wasn’t, you’d be playing dead.” Really, really well.

Carter weighed that a moment before apparently deciding to disregard it. “Tell me where that bitch and my son are.”

Distasteful as it was to answer, Cade could keep a deal. “I have no idea whatsoever.”

Carter’s beady little eyes narrowed. “You fuckin’ with me?”

Not even if he begged. “I drove her down to Riverside. Where she went from there, I have no idea.”

“You… you…” Carter’s mottled color turned dark, nearly purple as he all but vibrated like a volcano about to go off. Roaring, he threw himself at Cade, grabbing the end of the rifle, trying to wrestle it out of Cade’s hands. Surprisingly, he just about did it, until Cade shoved the stock forward, unbalancing the smaller man and cracking him in the face with it. The skin on his forehead burst, blood splashing on the gun butt, but Carter didn’t let go.

Not until the ground beneath them literally rolled, sending them both sprawling and choking on the flying earth. Trying to clear his vision, another delayed crash split the air just before the door to the cabin opened and Trina stood there like an avenging angel of some kind. She’d put her pants back on, thank God, but both hands were extended out, each with a 9 mm, hunting for a possible target in the front yard. As the dust blew out of the way, all he could make out was the upside down truck with an uncomfortable number of bodies laid out in overturned earth and—hopefully—moaning all around it. He wasn’t sure. Both of his ears were still ringing.

He must have managed an incredulous look of his own though, because Trina simply hitched a shoulder. “They moved.”

Sure they did. Cade used the rifle still in his hand to roll himself back to his feet.

“You fucking bitch,” Carter groaned, staring bleary-eyed toward the yard. He wasn’t moving, though, not after having crashed through a 4x4 railing bar. It almost seemed unfair to go over there and pin him with the rifle to his neck, but Cade had never really cared too much about fair. He cared about right.

He leaned his weight onto the gun, making sure Carter wasn’t going anywhere. “Who’s your connection, Frank?”

“Fuck you.”

Cade heard the snick of the blade shuttling from the band on Carter’s wrist, just barely catching the man’s hand before he could sink it into Cade’s kidney. Instead, he arrowed it down into Carter’s own thigh. Carter screamed in pain, his body bowing awkwardly to one side. Cade noted the large smudge of blood on Carter’s flank, seeping through the shirt.

“I guess you didn’t hear me. How are you getting the drugs?”

Carter lurched up, face red and eyes bulging, but this time, Cade just dropped his weight entirely on the man’s wound and slammed the rifle across his chest again. When that didn’t settle the bastard, he reached back and twisted the short blade. The smaller man finally gave, dropping to the wood with a heavy thud and heavier panting breaths.

“Shana’s already in custody. Whatever she took from you, you’re not getting it back so you might as well tell me what it was before I start dragging this little pig sticker up to your balls.”

“Everything!” Carter finally yelled. “She took my records, my skims, my connections, my fucking bank accounts, all right? I can’t even set up my next pickup without that fucking thing. She has
everything
!”

“Skims?” Trina kept the guns out, but she did look down at the two of them. “You mean you’ve been shorting the payments to the Colombians? Are you out of your fucking mind?”

Frank nodded, panting and weak as Cade always knew him to be. Without the upper hand, he was nothing more than a mewling dog. “Three million, but I earned that shit!”

“Like hell you did. Who’s the buyer?” she yelled.

It took another slam from the rifle, but Carter finally coughed it up. “Blu-Wood, fuck!”

Cade frowned. “Blu-Wood the construction company? They make prefab houses or something, don’t they?”

“It’s a front,” Carter groaned. “It’s owned by the Scarapacci family.”

Well, there was the connection the feds were looking for.

Trina dropped her guns entirely. “You know what? Let him go.”

“What? Why?”

“Because that bastard is planning to go state’s evidence and I’m not going to watch decent agents die protecting his ass from the fucking mob and a bunch of pissed off Colombians. He made his bed, let him die in it.”

Cade looked down at the vaguely smiling visage of Frank Carter, wishing he could do just that. Instead, he crashed his fist into the man’s face and had to settle for the less satisfying crunch of bone as he sent him into unconsciousness. “He won’t get it. They’ll break those records, get to that shed Shana was talking about. He’ll be lucky to get life instead of the electric chair once this town is done with him.” Cade wiped his brow. “What about the others?”

“Five by the truck, I don’t see them getting up anytime soon. The last two showed up by the north wall. I think they’re paint stripes now.” She didn’t sound the least bit sorry about it.

He got up, that much at least settled and headed back to Rick. “Get my kit.”

Trina ran back into the cabin while he knelt in front of his friend.

Rick watched him through one badly swollen eye. “Sorry I got you into this mess.” The words were mumbled through swollen, battered lips.

“Not yet, you’re not,” Cade said, carefully taking stock. It wasn’t good. “Your arm’s definitely broken. Your hand looks pretty fucked up, too. At least three fingers snapped. Probably the cheekbone, too. Shit, kid, what’d they work you over with, a lead pipe?”

“Aluminum bats. And a car.”

Which led to the internal bleeding question Cade was already moving to check. Rick’s loud groan and discolored abdomen didn’t bode well. “We need a life flight.”

Rick’s hand gripped Cade’s, not hard, but with urgency. “You really got Shana out?”

He nodded. “She’s safe. The boy, too.”

Rick’s eye closed, relief in his struggled release of breath. “I’d hoped. Knew if anyone had got her out, it was you. When I found out about Red Dog… Couldn’t drag you in farther. I’m sorry.”

“Make it up to me and don’t die, okay?” Cade took the kit Trina arrived with and sent her back in for the transceiver. “You live and you can be the best man at our wedding.”

Trina handed him the device, waiting precious seconds while he called in on the emergency frequency. Then she handed him a pair of latex gloves. “Just so you know, that’s a crappy way to propose, Evigan.”

“Hey, I let you blow up my cabin, got you your case settled, and even got you a weaseling snitch desperate to tell you whatever you want to hear.” He snapped them on, already looking for the best place to start. “That’s the best proposal a cop ever gave, period.”

She grumbled, but he saw the smile on her face as she donned her own gloves. He decided to take it for a yes.

Rick made a surprisingly derisive noise. “Could you get back to saving my life, please? Before you two make me want to kill myself.”

“Oh, you’ll live,” Trina declared, though the tremor in her voice undermined her crankiness. She looked nervously back to Cade.

Provided they could get him to the hospital and find out what all the injuries were, Cade had to believe his friend would come out of it okay. For now, they had to keep hope going.

Trina went back to her pep talk. “There’s no way you get to die and leave me feeling guilty for thinking the worst of you.”

“It’s fair. Thought the worst of you for years.” Rick’s better eye opened again, training on her. “Tried to get you out. I didn’t leave you there, Katy. I never meant to leave you there.”

Cade forced himself to ignore Trina’s reassurances. He was busy stabilizing Rick’s neck with a stiff collar from the kit. He didn’t have much for the obvious breaks. He considered an injection for the pain, but with the internal bleeding, who knew what kind of damage that might cause. Emergency dispatch came back with a twenty-minute ETA, then all he could do was swear. Repeatedly.

“Could be worse,” Rick noted dryly. “You could be on undocumented property, surrounded by uncuffed, possibly dead murderers and who knows how many illegal weapons.”

They looked around at the mess on the grounds.

“Yeah, that’s gonna be a problem,” Trina agreed.

“Told you you had rage issues,” Cade murmured.

“Not helping, Evigan.”

Rick sighed and closed his eye again. “Fuck it, let the state police sort it out.”

She bit her lip. “Got any plastic slip-ties? I can secure them while you keep an eye on Rick.”

“And who will keep an eye on the rest of them while you’re stringing them up like fish? You stay here, I’ll check on them.” If he happened to forget to check if any were breathing, who would blame him?