Guardian Ranger (Shadow Agents #2)(15)

How much should he reveal? How much did the sheriff already know? It was hard to get a good read on the man.

“It’s about Cale Lane, isn’t it?” Wyatt dropped his voice and edged closer. “Veronica was right. Something has happened to him.”

Not to him so much. With the sheriff’s question, Gunner knew how to play the case now. “We are in town following up on Cale’s disappearance.”

Wyatt grunted. “I knew Veronica wouldn’t give up. She called you in, didn’t she?”

“Yes,” Sydney said. “She got our attention.”

Well, Gunner knew that the lady had certainly gotten Jasper’s attention.

Wyatt glanced over his shoulder at the charred remains of his station. “What Cale does, it’s dangerous. He knows the risks that he takes, but I don’t think Veronica ever really understood just how deadly his job could be.”

Gunner frowned as he got what Wyatt was saying and what he wasn’t saying. “He asked you to cover for him.” A hunch.

Wyatt gave a grim nod and cut his eyes back to Gunner. “Said he’d be gone longer this time. That the money—it was enough for him to get out of the business.”

The sheriff hadn’t cared that Cale was a hired gun?

“Don’t look that way,” Wyatt said, voice fierce. “He was working for Uncle Sam. Same as you. Same as me...back before the shooting.”

Wyatt had done mercenary work, too?

“Cale said he’d be gone longer, that the case was big. I thought he was just still working the job. I didn’t realize—” He broke off and shook his head. “Cale Lane is my best friend. Do you really think I’d turn my back on him if I thought he was in trouble?”

It didn’t matter what he thought. It only mattered what the evidence showed. All of their evidence was currently showing that Cale was the killer who’d taken out three EOD agents—and that he was quite possibly the man who’d shot the two suspects last night.

“I want you to tell me everything you know about Cale Lane,” Gunner said. “Every. Single. Thing.”

Because if they were going to catch Cale before the man killed again, then they had to get inside his mind.

To catch a killer, you had to think like one.





Chapter Four

“Why isn’t anyone else here?”

Veronica jumped and spun around, her heart racing. Jasper stood in the kitchen doorway, wearing a pair of faded jeans that clung low on his waist.

And nothing else.

His chest rippled with muscles. His shoulders filled that doorway, and Veronica had to yank her jaw off the floor.

“Veronica? Why’s the ranch deserted?”

“B-because it’s not a working ranch.” Not yet. But Cale had talked about changing that. “Cale and I—we bought it for the privacy.” The isolation. “We have a few horses, and someone comes in to tend to them, but...”

But it was just her.

Alone with Jasper.

“Where do you work?” he asked as his gaze swept over her.

Like him, she was dressed in old jeans, but she also had on a T-shirt. He needed a shirt. Her gaze kept falling to his chest. “My office is down the hallway. Third door.”

“You do all your work from the ranch?”

She nodded. “I’ve got a satellite connection for the internet—that connection is all I need.” She built websites for doctors, lawyers, schools, writers. Anyone who needed the sites designed and maintained.

And she did it without having to rush to the city or having to face off with clients.

She had a partner in Dallas who took care of the PR and marketing end of things. Kelly booked the clients, found out just what they needed, and Veronica did the building and website coding part of the business.

It was a deal that worked well for them both.

“You shouldn’t be out here alone.” Now Jasper sounded angry.

“I’ve got a security system.” One that she would not be forgetting to activate ever again. “I’m perfectly safe.”

“Out here by yourself? In the middle of nowhere? If you needed help, who would get to you before you were dead?”

Now, that was a brutal jab she hadn’t seen coming.

He stalked toward her. “Who would get to you,” he demanded, voice lowering, “if you needed help right now?”

Her hands were behind her. Curling around the counter. “I’m not as defenseless as you seem to think.” He was trying to scare her. She got that.

“Aren’t you?” Jasper pressed.

She grabbed the knife that she’d just used and yanked it in front of her. “No, I’m not.”

He smiled, and she had the impression that she’d actually surprised him.

She doubted that much surprised Jasper.

But then the crazy man grabbed the knife. No, he grabbed her hand as it held the knife’s handle. “Having a weapon and being willing to use it are two different things.” His breath blew lightly over her. “Would you be willing to kill?”

No. “I’m not looking to kill anyone.”

“What if someone wants to kill you?” He lifted her hand to the counter. She dropped the knife. “Gunner called me,” Jasper told her. “He can’t reveal everything about the case, but those two men who were shot last night? They were hired thugs. Their prints came back and matched to a Billy Ferrell and Chuck Trout. They’ve got a dozen charges on them in Dallas. B and E, assault...”