Trouble With the Law (18 page)

Pumping a shell into the chamber, he said, “Show me your hands, then step inside.”

Large, rough-looking male hands, sprinkled with dark hair appeared through the doorway, then one booted foot and a long leg.  Finally, a tall man in combat fatigues stood there looking at him with unconcerned blue eyes and a stoic expression.  Across the man’s chest was strapped an assault weapon that could have taken him out, shredded the door, before he even opened it.

“Dave Logan,” he said gruffly, but didn’t make a move.

Trace lowered the shotgun and stuck out his hand.  “Trace Rooks.”

“Where’s Ronnie?” Dave
Logan asked instead of taking his hand.

Probably locked in her room to avoid him.
The last time he had seen her she was headed upstairs.  She had his cell phone, so although he’d warned her not to, she could very well be calling everyone in Texas. 

Trace shrugged. 
“She’s around here somewhere,” he said as he walked around him to lean the shotgun back in the corner.  When he stood again, Dave’s back was to him.  He was making hand signals to someone outside in the white van he saw parked there.  The side door slid open and two men filed out of the van, dressed similarly to Dave Logan.  Both were armed to the teeth, just like Dave.

“Expecting a war?” Trace asked with a snort.

Dave glanced at him then lifted a brow.  “I didn’t know what to expect.  Ronnie didn’t really give me good information.  She just said she needed help.  I’m here to help,” he replied evenly.  “I like to come prepared.”

“Obviously,” Trace said with a shake of his head.  The men stomped up on the front porch, but stopped at the door.  The placement of their hands on the weapons told him they knew what they were doing. 
They had military poker faces, neither smiled or spoke.

“Hey, Dave,” Ronnie said from behind him. 

She walked up beside him, and stuck her hand out to Logan.  He smiled and took it.  A smile for the Shark Lady?  He must not know her as well as Trace did or he wouldn’t be smiling.  He’d be heading back out that door and getting as far away from here as he could.

“Good to see you, Vee,” Dave said with a short laugh
then his eyes flitted to Trace and his smile faded.  “You doing okay, sugar?”

Vee again.  It looked like Conner Lucas wasn’t the only one who called her that. 
Was there a history there too?  Ugh, had Ronnie Winters slept with every man in Texas, including himself?  He could see her going for a tough guy like Dave Logan, but he couldn’t see Dave going for Veronica Winters.  That man would want a compliant woman, and that was not something that described the Shark Lady.

“Move that gun so I can give you a hug,” she said surprising the shit out of Trace.

His smile widened and Dave slid the gun to his back, then opened his arms.  Ronnie stepped forward and hugged him.  “Thanks for your help,” she said into his chest then stepped away.  “How is CeeCee doing?” she asked.

“Cecelia is doing fine, if she could stay away from bad boys.  I swear I’m running out of places to hide the bodies
,” he said with a shake of his head.

“Your sister is a good girl.  You need to give her some room to find herself.”

“Room hell, isn’t a continent’s space enough?” he asked.

“She’s out of the country?” Ronnie asked.

He huffed a breath.  “Yeah, despite everything I told her she joined the Army.  She has this idea she’s going to get trained and join my group.  I refused to train her, so she joined the damned Army.  Now they sent her to Afghanistan, and I’m worried shitless.”

“Sounds like she’s grown up to be my kind of woman,” Ronnie said with a smile.

“She’s
just
like you, unfortunately,” Dave replied.  “Hardheaded.  Obstinate.  Has to learn lessons the hard way.  Her tour is up in a few months, and I can’t wait until she gets back home.  I talked to Joel and she’s going to work at the R & R for a while when she gets out, but I know she’ll be pestering me to work for me.”

“You trying to distract her?’

“I sure as hell am not going to hire her,” Dave replied indignantly.  “She’ll welcome a rest when she gets home.  And you know she’s used to ranch work.  I think it’ll be good for her.  Definitely safer.”

Yeah, Ronnie knew that
his sister had worked the family ranch until she graduated college. She must’ve joined the military as soon as she graduated.  Both Dave and his sister had been raised on the family ranch on the outskirts of Amarillo.  That ranch had been in their family for thirty years or more.  His father still worked it every day even though he had to be nearly seventy now.

Against all odds,
Ronnie and Dave had been friends in high school even though he was a few years older and they didn’t have a helluva lot in common.  Ronnie wondered if he felt sorry for her and her brother, and that’s why he invited them to their ranch so often.  Especially on holidays when her parents were off doing their own thing. 

His sister
Cecelia was a couple of years younger than Ronnie and had dated her younger brother Cade for a while.  Ronnie thought that might eventually go somewhere, but after his first year in college, Cade had joined the military and that was that.  That was too damned bad.

Ronnie shook her head to clear it.  “Thanks for coming
, Dave.  Ya’ll come on in and Trace can give you a rundown on what’s going on.”

Ronnie
turned and walked into the huge gathering room.  Trace followed Dave and his men into the gathering room.  He paced in front of the fireplace, and agitation practically buzzed around him like a force field.  Ronnie took a chair and looked at him.  “Trace why don’t you sit down so we can talk?” she urged.

He cast her a hot look, but he stopped pacing.  “I’m fine.”

“What are we doing here?” Dave asked.  He was leaned casually back against the sofa where he sat with his arm over the back.  His ankle rested on his knee, but his foot rocked impatiently where it hung over his knee.  The two men with him were quiet, sitting on the edge of the sofa near him.  The sofa was large, but so were the three men sitting there.  From arm to arm, it was all testosterone and bulky muscle.

Trace
sucked in a deep breath through his nose, then exhaled slowly, before looking at Dave.  “We’re rescuing between ten or more women who have been trafficked into Texas from Mexico.  They were supposed to be taken to the Diamond Bar ranch, before going to a Cantina in Houston,” Trace informed.

“But?” Dave asked.

“The Diamond Bar isn’t available now since the feds took them down.  Ray Brown usually met the Coyote at the drop off point, but now he won’t, because he’s on the run from the feds.  That means the women will either be killed or turned loose in the wilderness.  Either way they die if we don’t rescue them.”

“And Trace can’t tell the feds, because they think
he’s dead, and he doesn’t want the women turned over to INS,” Ronnie piped in with a glance at him.  “He thinks they will be shipped back to Mexico and they’ll wind up as prostitutes there too.”

Dave eased his leg down to the floor then leaned forward with his elbows on his thighs.  He frowned.  “And that’s our problem how?”

Every muscle in Trace’s big body bunched, and his hands fisted at his sides.  A muscle ticked at his jaw very near the scar on his left cheek.  “I didn’t invite you here, or ask for your help.  Ronnie did.  If it’s too much for you, just let me know.  I’ll take care of it.”

Dave laughed loudly
, and held up his hands.  “Whoa, Cowboy.  I just asked for an explanation before I send myself or my men into danger for nothing.  There’s no question that we can handle whatever we come across tonight.  I’m just questioning the necessity of it, that’s all.”

Ronnie let out the breath she’d been holding when Trace nodded and he relaxed. 

“I watched those women be herded in there for six months.  They were usually in bad shape when they got there and worse when they finally left. They were drugged, beaten and raped before they were sent to Houston.  I watched, because there wasn’t a damned thing I could do without compromising the investigation.  With this shipment, I can do something, and I’m going to,” Trace said gruffly.

“So what are you going to do with them
after
you rescue them?” Dave asked evenly.

“Bring them he—“ Trace started, but Ronnie cut him off. 

He was not bringing those women here if she could help it.  “I thought you could bring them back to Dallas with you…”

“Think again, sweetheart,” Dave said darkly with a twist of his lips.  “I am not getting pulled over on the way back home and arrested for human trafficking.”

“Dave—“

“No,” he said flatly.  “You’ll have to figure something else out.  As much as I love you, Ronnie, I’m not taking that chance
,” Dave added with a shake of his head.

Ronnie heard the seriousness in his voice
, saw it in his handsome face.  She knew her friend long enough to know he was not going to change his mind.  She purposely hadn’t told Dave what tonight was about, because she thought she could convince him to help once he was here.  It looked like that wasn’t going to happen.  Damn.

“I understand.”

Trace stopped pacing and faced Dave with his hands on his hips.  “Just stay here with Ronnie to make sure she’s safe and loan me your van.  I’ll handle it.”

“Oh, hell no you’re not!
” Ronnie shouted and stood.  “You don’t speak Spanish and I’m going with you!  That was our deal.”

Trace’s angry, determined eyes swung to hers.  “If your
friend
helped.  He’s not willing to do that, so I’m going alone,” Trace said.

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t help,” Dave corrected.  “There’s just a limit to the help I’m willing to give.  I’m not hauling those women five hours back to Dallas with me.  I’ll go with you, but Ronnie is staying here with Caleb.”
  He glanced at the man on the far end of the sofa and he nodded.

Anger shot through her
.  Ronnie stepped around the chair to face the men who were trying to manage her.  “You don’t speak Spanish either, Dave.  And you ought to know me well enough to know I don’t take well to being told what to do.  I’m going,” she said firmly.

“I speak some Spanish,” the man beside Dave inserted shortly
.  Those were the first words he’d spoken since they got there.

In rapid fire Spanish, Ronnie told
him she thought he was a nutless, badly-dressed deaf mute with more ammunition in his weapon than in his dick.  His eyebrows lifted, his eyes widened, but he didn’t reply.  Because it was obvious he had no idea what she’d just said.  Ronnie laughed smugly.

Trace looked down at her with a smirk, and folded his arms over his chest. 
With a glance at Dave he said, “I guess the
lady
is going with us?”  That gave her pause.  Did
he
understand what she’d said?  Had Trace lied to her about not speaking Spanish?  The thought made laughter bubble in her chest.

“
Don’t guess we have much choice do we?”  Dave replied with a smirk. 

“Damn right I’m going with you,” she said
as if that were a given.  Secretly she was relieved that she’d proven her point, because she knew these guys could physically keep her from going otherwise. And they were as stubborn as she was.

The two men, her friend and Trace, were a lot alike in their mannerisms she noticed suddenly.  And their attitudes
were alike too.  Too much testosterone and too little thought behind their words and decisions most of the time.  It was infuriating much of the time, but a turn on too.  They stood up to her when other men cowered. 

At least
that was a turn on where Trace Rooks was concerned.  She’d never felt like that about Dave, but she knew a helluva lot of women who did feel that way about him.  Trace reminded her of Dave, had the same good qualities, but he had that something that was missing with Dave for her.  Sex appeal on steroids.  It poured off of him like rainwater off a tin roof.  And she was drenched by it every time she got near him.

“You’ll need to find some better clothing,” Trace said as his eyes slid down her body to her toes.  She had on the only thing she could find.  Too short and tight shorts with a too tight tank top.  Her wardrobe consisted of what Conner’s sister accidentally left behind in her room.  The only thing not too small were the Ked tennis shoes she found in the closet.  Those couldn’t belong to
Rilee, because like everything else about her, her feet were petite too.  Ronnie had just been thankful to find them yesterday.

“I don’t have anything else
,” she said folding her arms over her chest where his eyes seemed to be glued.

“I saw some smaller sized camo in the room I’m in.  Go in there and see if you can find something.  We’re going to get the weapons together and come up with a plan.”

Ronnie snorted, but shoved up to her feet.  “Yes, sir,” she said snapping off a smart salute.  “Anything else, general?”

“Yeah, lose the attitude,” Trace growled and Dave and the other two men chuckled.