Guardian Ranger (Shadow Agents #2)(7)

The scream of the siren was nearly upon them. The flashing lights from the sheriff’s car illuminated the scene. The fact that Jasper was holding a weapon meant he could expect a loud—

Brakes squealed. The sheriff jumped from his car and yelled, “Drop your weapon! Get away from the woman!”

Only the woman in question wasn’t exactly trying to get away from him. Veronica positioned her body in front of Jasper’s. “He saved me! Wyatt, stop! Jasper isn’t the bad guy!”

Oh, if she only knew.

But Jasper knew how to play the game. He dropped his weapon, one of his weapons, anyway, and put his hands up.

“Two men tried to kidnap me!” Veronica rushed to explain. “This guy over here...” She jerked her thumb to the man on the ground. “And another guy. They forced me off the road. Jasper stopped them before they could drive away with me!”

“Another guy?” the sheriff repeated. Jasper couldn’t tell much about the man; he was behind the lights, and his body was covered by the darkness. “What guy?”

“This guy,” came Gunner’s familiar voice as he walked out of the darkness. The perp was in front of him, taking slow, sullen steps.

The sheriff swore and jerked his gun toward Gunner. This was probably as much excitement he’d ever seen out on that highway. Pulling over drunks versus catching kidnappers.

Yeah, the normal routine had just been blown away.

“Easy,” Gunner said to the sheriff, voice deadly soft. “I’ve got the man subdued.”

The perp’s hands were behind his back, and Jasper had no doubt they were cuffed.

“Who are you?” the sheriff demanded, his gaze locked on Gunner—or what he could see of Gunner.

“I’m a federal agent,” Gunner said, flashing his ID very, very fast. Mostly because it wasn’t legit. Sure, they were federal agents, but they didn’t exactly carry around ID that would ever tie them back to the EOD.

“You an agent, too?” the sheriff asked as he swung his attention back to Jasper.

“No, he’s a friend of mine,” Veronica said before Jasper could respond. It was a good thing that she was so quick to reply. It saved Jasper from having to tell a lie in front of her.

The sheriff began to slowly lower his gun. “I don’t understand. I was just patrolling a few miles away... What the hell is going on here?”

“That’s what I’d like to know.” Jasper glanced at Gunner’s prisoner. The man’s body was stiff, angry. Did the guy think he was tough?

Jasper had broken plenty of tough targets in his time.

This guy would fall, too, and Jasper would find out just why the men had been after Veronica.

*

IT WASN’T HER first time at the small sheriff’s station in Whiskey Ridge, Texas. But it was the first time that she’d been afraid of the men who stood in the nine-by-twelve-foot cell.

Veronica edged back, deliberately placing her body close to Jasper’s. He was talking to his buddy, the guy who was some kind of federal agent. The man—Gunner something—said that he’d been on his way to meet Jasper for a drink when he got the call about the attack on the road.

Wyatt was pacing nervously in front of the prisoners. His hair, short and black, jutted out at odd angles, the result of him running desperate fingers over his head. He kept casting worried looks at Veronica every few minutes, and he’d already asked at least a dozen times, “Sure you’re all right?”

Other than a few bruises, she was fine.

Things could have been much worse, and she knew it.

“You got a permit for that weapon?” Wyatt demanded of Jasper. Wyatt’s dark eyes had narrowed.

Jasper nodded.

Veronica’s hands fisted. “I don’t think that’s the priority here.” She knew Wyatt was a by-the-book guy, but didn’t an attempted kidnapping trump a weapons charge?

Wyatt flushed, but held his ground. “Those guys aren’t talking.” His thumb jerked over his shoulder toward the cell. “Not a damn word. I’m running their prints, so we should at least know who the hell they are soon.”

She risked a look at the men and found them both glaring at her. The town’s doc had come in and patched up the injured man. The bullet had gone straight through his shoulder. Easy in and out. But the concussion he’d received when his head slammed into the trunk had him dazed.

“Those were some damn fine shots,” Wyatt said, but the words weren’t a compliment. They reeked of suspicion. “One blast to the shoulder, two shots that both hit the tires of a moving vehicle.”

“The vehicle wasn’t exactly moving fast,” Jasper murmured. “The driver was just pulling off when I made the hits.”

She just remembered the smell of burnt rubber. The squeal of tires. The thunder of the shots. Veronica cut her gaze back to the sheriff.

Wyatt was frowning. His face wasn’t as hard as Jasper’s. His features were softer, rounder, with a few more lines around the eyes. He was good-looking, when he wasn’t sweating bullets—which he was doing right then.

But despite his sweat and tension, Wyatt’s stare was knowing as it lingered on Jasper. “You’re real comfortable with a gun.”

She didn’t like where this was going. “That’s because he’s a former army ranger. He served in the military with...with Cale.”