Trouble With the Law (7 page)

He had to worry about the other agents on the ranch
now too.  Not only had he beaten the hell out of one to get a gun, he’d just shot another.  Trace glanced over at Carlos, and he was unconscious.  A bright red spot stained the front of his jean shirt, and there was a bullet hole in the center of the stain.  Trace had given up on religion a long time ago, but he prayed right then that the agent wouldn’t die. 

Nobody would believe he hadn’t intended to kill
Carlos any more than they believed he hadn’t intended to kill his partner Sean Collins three years ago.  Even Sean’s wife hadn't believed it.  Carrie knew Sean was his best friend, but she believed all the so-called evidence they’d planted on him.  When Trace got out, he intended to go see her to set the record straight.  He just hadn’t worked up the courage to face her yet.  And he’d been too busy helping the feds work on this case to take down Leland. 

He glanced back at
Carlos and wondered if he had a family, kids, like his partner did.  Guilt shot through him, but he held onto Ronnie’s legs so her limp body didn’t slide off of his shoulder, and walked through the door into the bright sunlight.  After his eyes adjusted, he looked around to make sure nobody was coming, then walked toward the shed where his bike was stashed.  He couldn’t let himself think about that right now.  He needed to get to his bike and get them the hell away from this ranch.

Miraculously, he made it to the shed without coming across anyone else
.  He saw several of the ranch hands standing by the big barn up near the house discussing something.  Balancing Ronnie’s weight, he opened the shed door and stepped inside the darkness. 

He patted her rear end
.  “Ronnie, wake up.”

She didn’t move
, so Trace eased her to the ground and took a deep breath.  How the hell was she going to ride a motorcycle if she was unconscious?  In the darkness, he searched through the piles of various supplies stacked against the wall.  A rope caught his attention, and he walked over to pull it out of the pile.  It was long enough to do the job, but he couldn’t take her on the bike naked.

Trace pulled his work shirt off, then lifted her shoulders and draped it around her
.  He put her bloody hands through the sleeves.  Those damned cuffs had cut her badly.  He wanted to go back to that holding pen and beat the shit out of Ray Brown again.  Abusing women was not something he could tolerate.  They’d kept him out of the holding pen when they had the illegal girls in there.  Thank god, or he probably would have found a way to let them all get away.  That wouldn’t have done the feds any good with their case.  And it probably would have gotten him killed.

Patting her cheeks again, Trace said a little louder
.  “Wake up, Red.  C’mon, I need you to help me, help you.”  He hoped parroting her words back to her would make her mad enough to wake up.  Penetrate the drugs he knew were in her system.  He felt her forehead and it was clammy.  Worry shot through him.  He couldn’t take her to the hospital, because they would ask too many questions.  Besides, he knew shortly Ray’s men would be out looking for them.  He’d bet the first place they’d look would be the hospital.

Trace buttoned up the shirt, then picked her up, pressing her front to his
chest.  He balanced her again, then looped the rope around her to lash her to him.  He tied off the rope, then grabbed her thighs and wrapped her legs around his waist.  It was tough, but he managed to throw his leg over his bike, and sit with her straddling him.  After he settled her in front of him, he walked the bike out of the shed.  At the corner of the barn, he saw several men walking down the gravel drive toward the holding pen and his heart sped up in his chest. 

Cranking the bike, he gunned it a couple times, then put his feet on the pegs and the bike shot forward
.  He wasn’t going to wait until they got to the holding pen and discovered the mess he left in there.  It was time to leave, and to do that he would have to pass those men on the road.  Armed men.  The three men were not FBI agents on assignment there either.  They were ex-convicts who would put a bullet in his back without blinking. 

Leaning over Ronnie,
Trace twisted the throttle wide open.  The bike lurched and weaved, but he got control then streaked down the road toward the men.  When they saw him coming, they spread out across the road and whipped out their guns to level them at the bike.  Trace didn’t slow down, he leaned closer over Ronnie and the bike.  Gritting his teeth, he held the throttle wide open in a death grip.  When he got within firing range, a bullet pinged off of his exhaust pipe, and another whizzed past his ear.  The third guy looked to be having trouble with his weapon. Trace didn’t look too closely, and he didn’t slow down. He whizzed right past them, and they dove to the side of the road.  So did the two FBI agents who sauntered out of the biggest barn on the property right into his path. 

Trace
’s front wheel hit the paved road leading to the big house and ate up ground toward the gate.  Please let the gate be open, he prayed, as he rounded the end of the house.  His heart sank to his toes when he saw it was closed.  He looked behind him and saw the thugs scrambling toward the ranch truck parked by the holding pen.  Trace should have taken that damned truck, or at least disabled it, but he hadn’t been thinking.  And he hadn’t had time.  He didn’t have time to open the gate now, but he was going to have to do that.  No matter how difficult that would be with Ronnie on his lap.  If it was locked he was ten kinds of screwed. 

Trace skidded
the bike to a sideways stop at the gate, and tested the latch.  When it flipped he breathed a sigh of relief.  Pushing the gate hard, he walked the bike through the opening, then stopped long enough to shove it back shut.  That would at least slow them down a second, he thought, as he gunned the bike down the driveway toward the road.

What was it with nosy
, troublesome women, he wondered, gritting his teeth.  And what the hell was wrong with him thinking he had to save them all.  He'd barely salvaged things after rescuing Leigh Ann Baker.  He should have learned a lesson.  No, now he was saving the one strapped to his chest too.  A woman who had helped his daddy put him in prison.  By doing that he was also letting Leland off the hook.  His cover was blown to hell, and the feds investigation probably was too.  Trace was in a mess of trouble too because of how it all went down.  Susan Whitmore was not going to be happy, and would probably think he reneged on their deal.

But even though Ronnie Winters probably deserved what she would have gotten at that ranch, Trace couldn’t in good conscience let that happen to anyone.  Leaving her there would have made h
im no better than those men.  No better than his father.  Saving her was a big risk though.  He was taking a leap of faith that she wasn’t in his father’s pocket.  If she was, she would lead the bad guys right back to him.  Then he would be done.

If she was with Leland and the Diamond Bar crew, she had just learned a valuable lesson about lying with dogs.  That might make her think twice before she let them know where he was at least.
 

Trace
wondered what had brought her out to the ranch anyway.  Surely, she wasn’t still after information about Leigh Ann Baker.  Putting herself in that kind of danger to get that information was just stupid.  If Leland was looking for the information, he wouldn’t have sent her.  He would have just had Ray Brown torture it out of him.  Maybe she had just innocently wandered into a hornet’s nest, just like Leigh Ann had done.

Ronnie Winters coming out to that ranch
just didn’t make sense to him.

“Fuck,” he mumbled and held Ronnie tighter to him as he sped down the winding country road toward the interstate.

An hour later, her violent trembling was his first clue Ronnie was coming around.  Sweat poured off of her, soaking through his work shirt that she wore and plastering his t-shirt to his chest.  Her teeth started chattering, and he noticed her hair was soaking wet too.  He had to find somewhere for them to hide out until she came down.  He felt sure his buddy Seth would help him.  Seth was still a cop, but he knew that Trace had gotten a raw deal.  He was one of the only ones who kept trying to prove his innocence before the trial.  Who stayed in his court even when the evidence was mounting.  He trusted Seth.

At the last minute, he swung the bike off
an exit ramp in some podunk town, then swerved right at the end.  He surveyed the deserted looking road and drove on for about five more miles, but there wasn’t a soul or business in sight.  He had picked the wrong exit to find somewhere to stop, unless that was going to be in a hayfield. 

Ronnie started squirming in his arms and the bike swerved.
  “Be still,” he hissed loudly by her ear, as he fought to control the bike and hold her.  Trace squeezed his arm tighter around her, and she moaned.  Her body shook harder, practically vibrating his body too.  “Shh, we’ll stop in a minute and I’ll help you.”

Trace’s lips tasted salty after he kissed her hair
.  Ronnie was in bad shape, and needed to be in bed somewhere until the drugs wore off.  A roadside pull off with picnic tables caught his eye down the road, and relief shot through him.  Trace pulled the bike off the road and stopped near one of the tables. 

Ronnie wiggled in his arms
.  “Hold still for a second, Red.”

Trace worked at the knot on the rope and managed to get it untied
and she slumped against him.  He caught her with his arm, so she didn’t slide off the bike then threw his leg over the seat to stand.  He lifted her in his arms and carried her to the picnic table where he gently laid her on the bench. 

She immediately wrapped her arms around her shivering body, and Trace took that as a good sign.  She was at least conscious now. 
He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket to call Seth Copeland.  He hadn’t spoken to his friend since he went to jail, so he hoped he would help him now.

“Copeland,” Seth answered shortly
.  Trace could hear wariness in his voice.  Probably because his cell phone was a throwaway that didn’t register a name.

“Hey pretty boy, this is Rooks
.  I need your help.”

“What the hell have you gotten yourself into now?” Seth growled then huffed out a breath
.  “ I heard you got out, but haven’t heard from you.  Figures you’d only call me when you needed something.”

Trace hesitated a minute, then said, “I mean
t to call you, but I’ve been, um, involved in something.”

“Sounds like it, if you need my help.”

“I was working with the feds at the Diamond Bar Ranch.” Trace knew he shouldn’t be saying that out loud anywhere, and looked over his shoulder like someone was out there in the boonies listening.  But he trusted Seth, and his friend was still a detective.  Trace knew he could and would keep things to himself.

“Interesting
.  So, why do you need help if you’re with the feds?” There was wariness in his friend’s voice and it set Trace’s teeth on edge too.

“C’mon man
.  Don’t be pissy with me.  I’m in a fix and need somewhere to hide out for a few days.  Just meet me somewhere and I’ll tell you what’s going on.”

“This have something to do with the call we just got from
the ranch? Two FBI agents are down and some perp is too?”

Oh, shit
.  “What did you hear?”

“Something about
an FBI undercover op being blown to hell.  They’re doing an early takedown.  That woman Susan Whatshername from Dallas isn’t a happy camper.  She called the Chief and almost ripped his ass off.”

“Carlos got sho
t that’s why she isn’t happy.” Carlos didn’t just get shot.  Trace had shot him, accidentally of course, but Trace was sure that didn’t make a difference to Susan.

“Who the hell is Carlos?” Seth asked.

“An agent on assignment there.  And her boyfriend.” Trace was sure that Susan would want to put a bullet in him for that too.

“Who shot him?”

“I did,” Trace admitted with a sigh.  “I was taking down a bad guy and he was standing behind him.  Bullet went through, and hit him in the chest.  I hope he was wearing a vest, but I don’t think so.  There was blood, but I couldn’t stop to help.”

“Why the hell not?” Seth asked angrily.

“Because I have Ronnie Winters with me and they drugged her.  They were about to rape her, so I got her out of there.”

“Ronnie Winters? The Shark Lady?” Seth said with a snort.

“Yeah, she came out there nosing around, and Ray Brown stripped her naked and chained her up.  It was a bad scene.”

“Hell, I’d have liked to be there,” Seth said with a laugh
.  “That woman has balls of steel under those mini-skirts she wears.  I always wanted to see them.”

A growl escaped Trace
.  “Cut it out, Seth.  Just help me.”

Seth sighed
.  “Meet me at the bullpen.  You can stay with my sister for a few days.  But you better not cause trouble for her.”

“I won’t
.  If shit goes south, I’ll leave.” It looked like that was the only direction things were headed.  Trace just hoped he could buy himself a couple of days to get Ronnie back on her feet.  He’d figure out then if he could leave her on her own and run, or if she would have to go with him.