to freedom and finding it too far. “I...it...”
“Yes?” Ray asked, lifting his brows and affecting a look of interest.
“I’m not saying a thing without a lawyer.”
Ray smiled. “You have me confused with a law-abiding citizen. So let me explain.” Ray squatted on his haunches and grabbed Mr. Peck, lifting him by the front of his bloody shirt. “I’m Apache and on my reservation.” Ray showed him his empty hand. “I could kill you with this.
“Plus I have a criminal record and a bad temper. I’m not calling you a lawyer. So once again. Why, Mr. Peck, are you lying in Miss Hooke’s hallway?”
Mr. Peck started to cry. “Please. You got to let me go.”
Ray sighed and then shook his head. “No. I don’t.”
“I can pay you.”
“Pay me?” Ray snorted. “This lady is a friend of mine. You scared her. So it’s gone past money.” Ray lifted Andrew’s index finger and gave it a shake. “I expect a bank manager needs these.”
Peck tried and failed to recover his hand with a weak tug. When he reached with his opposite hand Ray slapped him in the forehead with the heel of one hand. Peck’s head thumped on the carpet and his hand fell away.
“I’m about to break this. Fair warning.”
“All right. I was looking for the money.”
The obvious question was what money, but Ray didn’t do obvious.
“Yeah. Me, too. Why do you think it’s here?”
Andrew’s mouth quirked and a little of the fear left his expression. His pale twitchy eyes reminded Ray of a rodent.
“He didn’t have much time between when he cashed the check and shot that man. Maybe twenty-four hours.” He pointed toward the kitchen. “She doesn’t seem to have it. Or she’s real smart. So I figured I’d start here.”
“And you chose a time when Ms. Hooke would find you. Why?”
“No. I thought she worked nights at the casino. Somebody at the bank said so.”
“She did. But her father used to watch her daughter. Now she’s alone so...”
Andrew absorbed that. “Oh, yeah. Right. So what do you say? Fifty-fifty?”
“How much we talking here, Andy?”
His mouth clamped shut and he sniffed. Ray selected which digit to break and Peck writhed and whined.
“Okay. Okay. It was two hundred thousand. A bank check. He asked for cash. We had to make him come back. I don’t keep that much on hand. So he came back, you know, the next day and the check was good. So I cashed it. And he walked right out of there with that money in a cardboard box. Just folded over the top flaps and tucked it under his arm.”
Two hundred thousand? No wonder Kenshaw Little Falcon thought Morgan and her girl needed protection.
“You cleared the check?” asked Ray.
Peck nodded. “Sure did, after the bank in Phoenix cleared the funds.”
How long had this twerp been watching Morgan, Ray wondered.
“Karl went away two months ago. Why now?” asked Ray.
“Because people are asking questions now. They’re after it, the money. So, I thought I’d better get moving. I’d asked Ms. Hooke personally on two separate occasions when she came into the bank if she needed help investing. She declined. Seemed kind of puzzled. I think she’s got it tucked in a mattress or something.” Peck coughed blood and sniffed. “Say, mind if I sit down?”
Ray ignored the request. “What people?”
“A detective from Darabee came back in February, the one that got shot.”
“Eli Casey?”
“Yes, so I figured he was out of the picture. But then a man came right to my church last Sunday morning and right during fellowship hour he asked me if I was the one who cashed the check for Karl in the amount of two hundred thousand dollars. I was so shocked I said, yes.” Peck moved his hand and sniffed. Blood continued to flow down his face and neck. “Can I get a paper towel or some ice?”
“No. Who was he, the one from church?”
“I never saw him before. He didn’t give me his name.”
“You tell him anything else?”
“I may have said that the daughter’s name was Morgan and she worked nights at the tribe’s casino.”
Last Sunday, Ray thought, the day before Kenshaw called him in to watch Morgan.
The sound of sirens reached him, still a ways off. He turned his head and then looked back at Peck, noting the moment he heard the approaching police.
“You called the cops?”
“You’re trespassing on sovereign land.”
“What about our deal?”
“Only deal I’ll make is that if I ever see you on tribal land again, I’ll break this.” He set Peck’s hand on his chest and gave it a little pat. “And, if I see you near Morgan or Lisa Hooke again, I’ll kill you.”
Peck trembled. Somehow the man sensed Ray wasn’t bluffing. He was surprised to recognize that he wasn’t making idle threats. He knew himself capable of killing this man for daring to touch Morgan. Why did this woman rouse every protective instinct in Ray’s body? That question troubled him more than this miserable excuse for a burglar.
And who was the man at the casino asking questions? Ray set his teeth as he realized the threat to Morgan may have only just begun.
Peck’s eyes widened. As Ray stood over him, the bank manager rose to his elbows.
“You want it for yourself. Did you find it already? Is it gone?”
“Yeah. Gone.” Ray made an exploding motion with both hands.
Ray left him to meet the police, passing Morgan and Lisa still sitting in the shabby white Honda with the windows rolled up and fogging. He noticed the gray duct tape securing the driver’s side mirror and shook his head. She needed someone to look after her.
Morgan looked up at him with big wide eyes and in that moment she didn’t look much older than her ten-year-old. He wondered two things simultaneously. How old had she been when she’d had Lisa and who was the bastard who left her all alone?
He gave Morgan a smile as he passed and belatedly noticed he had a bloody hoodie.
He
