Alistair McIntyre - Shallow Creek

“But you came here instead?”

“Yes.”

“Now the whole posse is here, so I’m guessing you found something out.”

Spee grit her teeth, flexing the gentle curve of her jaw. “I found out who the shooter was.”

“Was? Did you kill him?”

“No, Scott Fisher and one of his goons did that for me when they found out I was onto him. His name was Josh Matthews. You know him?”

“The name is familiar,” Brendan said, not really sure. “But why kill him?”

“Because he led back to them.”

“He was part of the gang?”

Spee nodded.

“So what did you do that the police couldn’t? To find this guy, I mean,” Brendan asked.

The agent turned around in her seat, now looking out through the windshield. Her voice sounded lost in a distant place. “I had to do some things I’m not proud of.” She idly rubbed the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. “Maybe once this is all over, if you still care to know, I’ll tell you over a beer or six.”

Brendan had nothing to say to that. Spee put her elbow on the window ledge and rested her head against her hand. “I shot a video of Fisher killing Matthews and used that to convince him to become my CI.”

“CI?”

“Criminal informant,” Spee specified. “I played the part of his girlfriend to get close enough to work a deal out. A deal where he gave up your brother as the real boss.”

“That’s why I saw you at the bar.”

“That’s why you saw me at the bar.” She suddenly twisted back around to face him. “My sister’s killer is dead, but the shitheads he worked for stole my vengeance. His death has unlocked this drug investigation, and I’ll be damned if your brother walks away from all of this. My sister deserves more than that. Grant’s gang killed her, so he’s going down,” she spat. “So, Mr. Rhodes, this is personal for me, too.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Not too many people do.” Spee heaved a loaded sigh. “She wasn’t a local, so I’m sure nobody around here remembers her.”

Brendan thought about that for a minute. “Is it weird that the DEA would let you work on a case involving your own sister?” he asked.

Spee didn’t immediately answer. Brendan could hear the gears grinding between her ears before she spoke. “They don’t know about the video, or the direct connection to Natalie.”

“Wow, that’s impressive. You just told your boss a guy randomly signed up to be your CI?”

Spee’s laugh had little humor behind it. “All he knows is that I had a one-night stand with a guy, and that guy saw my badge and freaked, spilling his guts.”

“Hopefully you didn’t really sleep with that asshole.”

Spee’s face darkened, ending that particular conversation. Brendan sat quietly and watched Agent Tyson smoke next to the car. What made all these women share their innermost turmoil with him? First Michelle bared her soul, and her body, to him, and then Kim dropped a bomb about almost getting raped, and now this chick from the DEA had told him all about the dead sister she blames Grant for. Life would be less complicated if everyone kept their own crap to themselves. Did they think he didn’t have problems, too?

“Mr. Rhodes, Brendan,” Spee said, reaching out to him with her eyes. “Please just walk away from this. This is serious shit. There was a bloodbath outside town about nine months ago that we’re sure is linked to all of this. We found a bunch of dead guys we suspect were part of the Torres Cartel, and those gentlemen aren’t exactly pushovers, and they were massacred.

“This isn’t some game, so if not for your own safety, then at least give us room to operate and investigate. We can’t afford to let this case fall apart because you keep intervening.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Brendan said absently, staring at the back of the driver side headrest. “I want this finished, and you’re promising me you’re close to ending it.” He met her gaze. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

“You said that earlier.”

“Well, this time I mean it. I’m not a cop. This isn’t my job.”

The admission hurt more than he’d thought it would. Accepting failure wasn’t part of his DNA, and now he was going to walk off into the sunset and let someone else take care of his problem. She was probably right, though. What would be the best case outcome for him if he kept pursuing his brother? Killing Grant and then spending twenty years in prison for it?

“That’s right,” Spee said. “Leave it to us.”

Brendan nodded and waited while she got out of the car and opened his door. Finally facing the crossroads of whether or not to keep going, he made the difficult choice to let it go. He slid out of the car, ignored the two agents, and skulked off towards the main road.

As he reached the corner, he glanced back over his shoulder to see Spee watching him stoically beside her unmarked cruiser. The crackle of the radio broke her fixation and she ducked back into the car.

That was it then. It was over.

He turned the corner and strolled to the main street, hands dug deep into his pockets. When he reached the intersection, a familiar black Dodge pickup flew around the corner, heading up towards the back of the grocery store. He couldn’t be sure, but it looked like the truck that had followed him and Kim out to the park the other day, before that whole relationship had failed impressively. Apparently the DEA had kept better tabs on him than he’d thought.

His sullen march towards his truck progressed unimpeded, but thoughts of Kim and the story she’d entrusted to him plagued him every step of the way.

Chapter 40

A loud pounding from downstairs roused Brendan from his fitful sleep. Rubbing his eyes, he rolled over and grabbed the small alarm clock, begging the display to show a reasonable time.

Two A.M.

Muffled shouting traveled up the stairs to his room, and the owner of the voice was not happy. Brendan rolled out of bed, pulled on some jeans, and then slipped on a pair of sneakers. Before walking out of the room, he turned and grabbed a clean shirt off a hanger in the closet. As an afterthought, he pocketed his cell phone, which had been charging for the couple of hours he’d slept. He could hear his dad yelling as soon as he cracked the bedroom door open.

“You have no right to do this,” his father protested. “This is an illegal search and seizure. You just wait till the sheriff hears about this.”

From the landing at the top of the stairs, Brendan had no view of the front of the house. He quickly descended and made the U-turn that left him on the far side of the living room, looking at a big man wearing a vest with a DEA logo. The man took a break from screaming at his father when his eyes locked onto Brendan.

“Get him!”

Two guys clad in full SWAT gear charged around their leader and rushed Brendan. Fighting the instinct to lash out at the pair, he held his tongue, knelt down, and put his hands over his head. Judging by the way everyone was acting, he assumed this was what they wanted.

Sure enough, they wrestled his hands down, yanked them up behind his back hard enough to lift him to his feet, and then cuffed him tightly enough to cut into his flesh. As their commander strode towards him, having waited until Brendan was properly restrained, Brendan started to wonder what the hell his brother had done to him this time.

“Brendan Rhodes, you are under arrest in connection with the disappearance of Special Agents Casey Spee and Mario Tyson,” the DEA guy said, his face less than an inch from Brendan’s. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford one, one will be provided to you.”