Midnight Crossing (Josie Gray Mysteries #5)(58)

He pointed across the pasture to the toolshed behind Josie’s house. “So the driver stops the car and a passenger gets out. The person is walking around, searching for the women. Maybe the women see a flashlight getting closer to the toolshed, and they panic. They leave the toolshed and take off running behind your house toward the pasture. The driver moves down the road to directly where we’re standing in the pasture and stops. Maybe even turns the car to point the headlights into the pasture here, trying to illuminate the women.”

“Exactly. So they stop running parallel to the road, and they take off toward Dell’s place,” she said.

“And Renata is shot in the back,” Otto said.

“Isabella hears the gunshot and runs out of the beam of the headlights and escapes into the night.” Josie scanned the pasture, pointing to the stakes where the dead body was. “Then the shooter freaks out and wants to get rid of the gun immediately. He flings it as far as he can and it lands here.”

“Pretty stupid move,” he said.

“Look at our suspects. Assuming we have two people, we’re looking at Josh and Ryan. One’s basically a kid, and the other an idiot.”

Otto cocked his head. “Ryan said he only went one time. Maybe he was telling the truth. It could have been Josh and Macey.”

Josie nodded. “I like it. Macey’s the driver. I can see Josh flinging the gun in a panic.”

“What did Isabella say when Marta asked her about what happened out here?” he said.

“She’d just opened up at the trauma center. She hadn’t provided a lot of details. Marta planned on talking to her again. And then Josh took off with her.”

“So we need to get back with Isabella again.”

“Assuming she’ll talk with us. We didn’t exactly provide the security that we told her she’d get,” she said.

For a few more minutes, they threw around ideas about other ways the shooting could have gone down, but Josh and Ryan, or Josh and Macey, made the most sense.

Josie walked Otto back out to the road where his jeep was parked. He got inside and talked to her through the open window.

“What are you going to do?” he asked.

“Right now I’m going to hope like hell you and Marta can connect those two morons to Caroline Moss and get me out of this mess.”

He offered a slight smile. “I’d like to go talk to the mayor. I think I can get him to reconsider.”

“I don’t want you to do that. I’ll work from behind the scenes for a day or so and see what shakes out. For now, get the prints from the gun and the ballistics and keep me posted.”

“You got it, Chief.” He waved good-bye and took off.

*

Josie retrieved a pair of creek shoes from the back of her jeep and whistled for Chester, who ambled off the porch where he’d been napping away the hottest part of the day. He followed her across the road and they walked on public land for a quarter mile and then down to the Rio Grande, where she took off her boots and slipped on the mesh creek shoes to protect her feet. She kept her pistol in her shorts pocket. She’d given her duty gun to Moss, but her backup pistol was her own property.

She waded into the river with Chester, who was happy to cool his paws and belly. Josie walked along the rocky side of the river in thigh-high water scouting for signs of illegal crossing, keeping Nick’s admonition to be watchful in her mind. She thought about the kayaks that she and Nick had found a few miles upriver. The Mexicans had clearly been using them to cross into Texas. She and Nick had found trash and pop cans along the bank on the U.S. side, and followed foot tracks up to the paved road. That had been several months ago. Since then, Josie had kept a closer eye on the area. The Medrano Cartel had a vast network of narcos who would stop at nothing in their efforts to push their cocaine, heroin, pot, and meth northward.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket with a text from Nick saying he was on his way home from town and did she need anything. She responded, Nothing but you, and meant it more than he could have known.

When she and Chester reached the driveway, Nick was already there and pulled her in for a hug and kissed the top of her head. She held on too long, and he finally pulled his head back to get a look at her. His expression changed to worry when he saw the tears in her eyes.

“What’s wrong?”

“It was just a bad day.” She sniffed, embarrassed at her reaction.

“Why are you home so early?”

She took in a chest full of air and blew it out slowly, forcing herself to stop the emotion. Avoiding eye contact, she said, “Mayor Moss took my gun and badge.”

He pulled back from her and placed his hands on her arms. “What happened?”

She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling sick with the memory of the conversation. “I was ready to go to the prosecutor over Caroline. She’s behind the transportation ring that funneled through Artemis. Or she’s at least a major player. I went to Moss to warn him.”

“Why would you go to him about that?” He gave her a look like she’d lost her mind.

“Would you not expect the same treatment? When you’re in law enforcement, you at least have the decency to give your fellow officers a heads-up before you destroy their world. You know how it is for a cop, or a lawyer, or anyone in the public eye. Imagine serving as mayor of the city and finding out after the fact that the local police were going after your wife. People expect anyone in the public eye to be above reproach.”