How do you survive being shot and left for dead in the Chihuahuan Desert? By being found by a beautiful wildlife photographer willing to risk her life to save yours.
A bitter ex-cop fights for his life after he runs to the sound of gunfire on the Ri...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The cell phone rang on the bedside table. Dispatch this early? I haven't had breakfast. "Mendoza."
"Amos," the dispatcher said, "Sheriff wants to see you."
"Why?"
"No Idea. He just said 'Pronto.'"
"Copy that." He rubbed the back of his neck. "On my way." What's going on?
"Breakfast!" Yvonne called him back home.
Normally, the Mendoza family ate their first meal of the day together. He walked into the kitchen, laid two pieces of bacon on one piece of bread, folded it over, and wrapped it in a napkin.
His wife watched with a gaze of bewilderment. "You're not eating with us?"
"Sheriff wants to see me." He kissed Yvonne, sitting at the table with the children. "Sorry, babe. Wish me luck." He gazed at the children. "Kids, mind your mom." Then he kissed each of his children on the top of their heads as he left the kitchen.
He beat his record getting to work. Was something new with the doll case? He stopped in the open doorway to the sheriff's private office.
Sheriff Horace Keel waved. "Come in, Amos. Shut the door."
Shut the door. Son of a bitch. During his years with the department, two deputies had been called into the sheriff's office behind closed doors. They both left without badges.
Amos closed the heavy, oversized door. It had protected every Brewster County sheriff since 1887, less than a decade after his ancestors were ushered onto a reservation in New Mexico. His heart felt as heavy as the solid wood door and Amos swallowed as he heard the door click shut.
"Need to ask you something." Sheriff Keel nodded to one of two chairs in front of his desk. "Have a seat."
Sheriff Keel was a legend. Four terms in office. Sixteen years King of the county. The sheriff leaned back in his chair, clasping his hands behind his thick neck, and laid one boot heel up on his desk. How many sheriffs had done that over the years? How many trembling deputies had sat in this very chair, staring at a sheriff, wondering how the ax might fall?
Amos's stomach turned over, but he kept his face smooth as river rock. Maybe it was his ancestral DNA. He could do that. Don a smooth mask, even dull his gaze when his gut was churning.
"What's this I hear about you poking into homicide's business?" Sheriff Keel glowered at him.
"I wondered if the José Does were mules," Amos said.
Keel was a big, round, red-faced man and Amos couldn't be certain exactly where the sheriff's chin stopped and his neck began. Bushy brows. Thick handlebar mustache. Old timers said he was one hell of an investigator back in the day, but Amos wasn't fooled. Keel was a politician.
The sheriff took his boot off the desk, squinting at Amos as he leaned in, resting his forearms on the desk, his elbows out. "José Does? S. Plural? You've been looking into cases in other counties, too?"
It was a trick. He was testing his deputy. "Yes, sir," Amos said.
The sheriff bellowed. "Who the hell gave you the authority to do that?"
Everybody heard it. He knew damned good and well that as soon as dispatch told him the sheriff wanted him in his office, she'd whispered it to everybody who walked by. Gossips. Everybody she told whispered it to everybody they saw. Half the department huddled on the other side of the sheriff's thick door. And he'd be mad about it, too. Only he'd done the same.
If he was going out, he'd do it with his head up. He stood, forcing the sheriff to look up at him. "You did." His gaze was cutting. "You gave me the authority when you made me head of your narcotics division."
"Right. Narcotics. Those are homicides!"
"Like I said, Sheriff. I wondered if the homicides were related to drugs. You know about the drug doll. Maybe the victims were the ones who lost it. Got killed for it. I was trying to be thorough." Amos leaned on the sheriff's desk, his weight on the palms of his hands. He lowered his voice. "As a matter of fact, sir, I thought you'd say 'attaboy."
Sheriff Keel had been clicking his ink pen incessantly, stewing. "Did you find any drug connection?"
"Can't say one way or the other." Amos straightened his back, standing at attention. "Those files are mighty thin."
Sheriff Keel stood. He wasn't nearly as tall as Amos, so to meet his deputy's gaze, the sheriff was still forced to bend his fat neck back. "Well, then, I ain't saying 'attaboy. I'm saying mind your own business. Understood?"
"Yes sir." Amos nodded.
"All right then." The sheriff chunked his ink pen onto his desk and waved his arm. "Get the hell out of my office. Solve that drug doll case."
"Yessir," Amos said. I'm going to kill Mendocino Jones.
Not much later, Amos's cell phone rang. Hearing Mendocino's voice, Amos scoffed. "Speak of the devil." He intended his tone to sound as snide as it did.
"We need to talk."
"Damn right we do," Amos said. "I'll see you after work. I thought I was going to be fired a few minutes ago. I had to change pants when I left the sheriff's office."
"Why?"
"Two guesses. I'll see you after work."
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
