even to Ryder, that he didn’t have to.
Perhaps it was that obvious. Ryder jammed a hand through his thick, dark, and still shower-damp hair.
“So no progress?”
“I’m running out of cigars,” Ryder said. “Is that progress?”
“Of a sort,” Boots said with another chuckle.
Ryder had to consider his words carefully. After all, he wasn’t supposed to be discussing his new “job” with anyone. But since Boots already knew about it—he’d been with Ryder when the men in the dark suits and the government-issue sunglasses had shown up in the first place—Ryder didn’t figure he was giving away any state secrets talking to him, as long as he was careful.
“It’s strange. To be out there, but…not to be. To have to hide.”
He’d managed to let Boots know how the trail he’d been following had led him to, of all places, his brother’s Bar None ranch.
“You don’t think he’s involved, do you?”
At the very thought of straight-arrow Clay being involved in anything illicit, Ryder had to smother a laugh. “No way in hell,” he said succinctly. “I’m the problem child in that family.”
“Were,” Boots said gently.
“You’d be hard-pressed to convince my brother of that, I’m guessing.”
“I won’t have to,” Boots said. “You will. Once you’re free of all this.”
This was old ground; Boots was determined that Ryder would reunite with his family, once this was all over. Ryder had tried to tell him Clay had washed his hands of him, and once Clay made up his mind, it took heaven and earth to change it. While Ryder believed in earth—at least the six feet of it he expected to be under before he was forty—heaven? No.
Somewhat to his surprise, Boots, a deeply religious man now, didn’t push it on him. He believed enough for both of them.
“I’ve got to get some sleep, if I’m going to go out and play spy again tonight.”
“You’re not playing,” Boots reminded him. “If this is for real, it could be dangerous.”
Ryder couldn’t quite imagine baby smugglers as armed and threatening.
As if he’d read his thoughts—Boots was good at that, even over the phone—the man chided him gently. “You’re not taking this seriously enough, Ryder. Don’t let the nature of the contraband fool you. There’s a lot of money at stake in this venture. Probably more per ounce than any you’ll ever come across.”
He’d never thought of it that way. He really had no idea how much it cost to buy a kid, and he hadn’t asked. Maybe he should. Because Boots was right; where there was money, there were men who would fight to get it and keep it.
“Something’s coming,” Boots said. “You watch your back.”
“You been talking to the Boss again?” Ryder teased; Boots spoke to God as if he were a poker buddy sometimes, making what he called “suggestions,” most of which of late seemed to involve the salvation of one Ryder Colton. And no matter how much Ryder tried to talk the old man out of it, Boots never gave up on him.
More than I can say for my brother, he thought as Boots ignored the jibe.
“More the other way around. Just a feeling, Ryder. Be watchful.”
With that Boots’s phone time was up, and the call ended.
That was what drove him craziest about Boots and his beliefs, Ryder thought; no matter what happened later, the man would nod wisely and say, “I told you.” If what happened was something good, it was straight from his God. If it was something bad, God’s intervention had lessened the blow.
Yet, Ryder thought as he pulled the thankfully room-darkening curtains of the small motel room closed, he couldn’t deny that the man’s pure, shining faith had had an effect on him. He’d fought it, resisted fiercely, but Boots’s quiet determination to save him from himself had made inroads.
He’d finally decided that the principles underlying Boots’s beliefs were good no matter what the foundation. And when Boots had laughed and told him he didn’t have to believe to live by them, the result was the same—Ryder had felt a sudden sense of relief he’d never known before. And in that moment he’d determined to give it a shot, for the sake of the man who had seen something in him worth saving, a man who would never see the outside again, but still found hope.
To his surprise he slept well, for nearly seven hours. More than enough to keep going. He got up, dressed, grabbed his last box of Little Travis cigars and headed out. He wasn’t hungry yet; Mrs. Sanchez’s hearty breakfast was still holding. So he headed instead to the local library branch.
It wasn’t as foreign territory to him as he supposed many might think, given his capacity for trouble. There had been times when he’d wanted information, and had wanted to get it without his big brother hanging over his shoulder. Esperanza’s tiny library was just that, tiny, and his presence would be noticed—and reported on to Clay within hours—so he’d avoided that. But there were other towns, other libraries, and he spread it around.
His official cell phone rang as he pulled into the parking lot of the library.
“You didn’t check in,” a stern voice said.
“I did,” Ryder countered. “I left a message. Not my fault you didn’t answer. I needed sleep.”
His alternate handler—an agent named Gibson—apparently decided to let it go. “Developments?”
I’m about out of cigars and my ass is tired of sitting all night in the dark, waiting for nothing, he thought. But he knew better than to bitch, at this guy in particular. He was a little more human, and sometimes even unbent enough to commiserate with the frustration Ryder felt. Ryder didn’t want to blow that.
“Nothing. No movement, no sign of movement, and nobody who shouldn’t be around. They go lights out around here early, and it stays that way.”
Work started very early on a ranch, and Clay Colton was serious about work. Ryder had chosen to ignore his brother’s work ethic and this had always been the biggest bone of contention between the two brothers.
That, and the fact that Ryder had been born for trouble.
“The biggest thing that’s happened around here is people keep getting married,” Ryder said. “The sheriff, his brother…”
Ryder clammed up before he let slip something that gave him away. It wouldn’t do to mention that he knew his ex-sister-in-law was back on the ranch, or the even bigger shock of learning that his little sister had married some overtense suit.
As far as his handlers knew, he had no family. None of them really wanted to claim him, so he’d done the same. On anything that had required listing next of kin, he’d put “None.” And that’s how it would stay. For all he knew, that’s why they’d picked him for this job. Maybe Boots was right, and this was more potentially dangerous than he’d realized.
Not
