Skeeter Read online

  “I remember,” Dallas agreed. “We all have ours on file. I haven’t said anything yet, because I don’t trust Jones. She’s hiding something and I wanted to find out what it was before I told her about the blood test.”

  “You might want to get the girl tested right away,” Skeeter suggested. “If she’s Trace’s kid, you’ll have to call his parents. They will want to know they have a granddaughter.”

  Dallas nodded. “Yeah, they were pretty broken up about his death.”

  Skeeter tapped his fingers on the table. “I never told anyone about this before but the night Trace died, there was something off. It always bothered me. Not that his death didn’t, but the more I think about it the more I’m convinced it wasn’t the cartel who shot him.”

  Dallas snapped his head up and stared at Skeeter. “Who do you think it was then?”

  “I think it was Lelanie. I didn’t want to think it but...she had reason to shoot him. I was there when he told her to go away and it wasn’t pretty. He humiliated that poor girl.”

  Janice raised her brows at this theory.

  “Oh, shit,” Dallas swore softly.

  Chapter Four

  When the hour he gave expired and she wasn’t back yet, Dallas shook his head. Twenty minutes later, she still hadn’t returned; he issued a warrant to bring her in. He contacted the agents he sent with her and he growled at the fact she was taking her own sweet time.

  They finally returned almost an hour late but she came in with the girl and two pissed off officers.

  He allowed the girl to enter the interrogation office but stopped Calista and asked for her gun and her badge.

  Calista looked at him and frowned. “Why do you want my gun and my badge? I got her here didn’t I?”

  Dallas just held out his hand. When she went to walk around him, he stopped her by standing in front of the door and repeated his request for her gun and her badge. “I told you there would be consequences for any failure on your part to follow orders.”

  Calista looked into his eyes then slowly handed him her gun and her badge.

  Dallas nodded at the officers behind her, and told them to escort her to a holding cell. He then looked at her. “I gave you every opportunity I could. Now you have some questions of your own to answer. You crossed a very thin line here. One you put your own self into. Every action has consequences, and you’ll have to answer for yours.”

  “I haven’t done anything wrong!” she shouted. “I followed protocol, I protected the witness, I brought her mother’s rapist in to answer questions. You took his side all along. You subscribed to the good ole boy network all along. I hope he’s worth overlooking what he did seventeen years ago, Captain. I’m bringing charges against you for covering for him.” Her angry ranting became a snarling growl.

  The officer behind her motioned for her to move down the hall.

  Calista snapped at him, “Don’t you touch me.” Then she moved down to the holding cell area.

  Dallas watched her move away.

  One of the officers, Clayton Torres came up to him and stopped from entering the interrogation room behind him. “Captain, you might want to know what went down at that safe house.”

  Dallas paused and waited for him to explain.

  Torres cleared his throat and looked as if this was the last place he wanted to be.

  Dallas motioned for him to speak with a roll of his hand.

  Torres looked at his Captain and said, “After she got the girl packed up, we had to go get her from the bedroom, we heard her coaching the girl what to say, then the whole way back, she kept telling her shit like the fact she knew Franklin Howard was a dangerous man, that he hung out with bikers and they weren’t good people. The girl didn’t want to come here by the time she got done telling her all that.” Torres shook his head. “I’ve known Frank for ten years and he’s never been dangerous unless he was hunting you down for breaking the law. He would never do the things she told that girl about and if she is his kid, he would never hurt her like the way Officer Jones laid it out.”

  Dallas patted the other man’s shoulder. “I know that. For some reason, Jones has a distorted view of Frank and it got in the way of everything this office stands for. Franklin Howard is a good agent and we’re going to miss him when he retires. Jones has already made up her mind about him and that’s not what we do here.”

  “Good luck Captain, we did try to tell her to hurry up but she ignored us altogether.” He gave Dallas a nod.

  Dallas nodded back and turned to walk into the interrogation room. He paused then looked at the girl. “How are you doing, Mercy?”

  Mercy looked up at him and Dallas had to gasp.

  Her blue eyes stared back at him in confusion. “I thought I was going to meet my padre here. Senorita Jones told me he was here and he demanded my presence. She told me he was here to tell the world he wasn’t my father. So where is he?”

  Dallas frowned at her words. His lips tightened as he thought Calista Jones had a lot to answer for. Then he looked over at Frank and Janice. “Officer Jones thinks this man is your father.” He motioned toward Frank.

  Mercy looked over at the big man sitting opposite to her. Only the table separated them. She looked him over carefully. Then she shook her head. “No señor, this man is not my padre. Senorita Jones knew this. I have a picture and I pointed to the man my mama told me was my padre.” She dug through her little backpack and produced the picture. “See, this man is my papa.” She clearly pointed at Trace. “Is this man here?”

  Skeeter reached out and asked, “May I see the picture, please?”

  Mercy handed it over to him.

  He took it carefully, then turned it around to see himself and Trace standing together. With the desert behind and all around them, he remembered the day the picture was taken. He smiled slightly. “This was the day after we arrived in Mexico. Your mother took this picture in fact. She said she’d never met any handsome gringo’s before and she thought Trace, my partner, was so cute. She told him she wanted a picture of him to remember him for the rest of her life.” He shook his head. “Trace was a real charmer that way.”

  “Is that his name señor? Trace. Do you know his last name?” Mercy asked. “Mama always said she could not remember.”

  Skeeter nodded. “His name was Trace Coulier.” He shook his head. “I don’t think Trace ever told her his last name. I can’t remember if she ever asked him either.”

  Mercy shook her head, “She probably didn’t.” She sighed and looked back at the picture. “In Mexico, so many things are different than it is here. You have to work hard for enough dinero to pay your own way there. My mama had me very early but she loved me and said that she knew her life would be short. She told me to find a way and come to this country and to try and find my papa. She raised me to be a good girl, someone he could be proud of.” Then she frowned. “But señor, Senorita Jones told me his name was Franklin Howard, not this Trace Coulier you speak of. If his name is Trace Coulier then who is Franklin Howard?”

  Skeeter looked her in the eyes and said, “I’m Franklin Howard.”

  Mercy frowned and stared at him. Then after a long moment, she shook her head. “But you are not my padre. I look more like the other man in this picture than I do you.” She stared at him for a long time before she asked, “Does my padre not want to meet me? Is that why he didn’t come here today?”

  “I’m sure he would want to meet you,” Skeeter told her. “But he can’t meet you. He died before we could get out of Mexico seventeen years ago.”

  Mercy sat there and stared at him for the longest time. Slowly, tears began to escape her eyes and run down her cheeks. “My papa is dead? He died before I was even born? Are you sure, señor?”

  Skeeter nodded. “I carried his body back over the border. We were ambushed just as we got to the border. I made it across but Trace didn’t. Then I was pinned down for hours on the American side while he was on the Mexico side. I had to wait until just before dawn be
fore I could go back and get him. By the time I got to him, he was already gone. I’m sorry little one.”

  Mercy slumped in her chair. “So, I have no familia here? I am alone?”

  “No, little girl you’re not alone,” Skeeter told her. “If a blood test proves Trace is your father, then you have grandparents that I know would love to meet you.”

  Mercy raised her head. “I have abuelas?”

  Skeeter nodded. “Yes and I know they would love to meet you. They took your dad’s death very hard. They have been alone all these years too.”

  She frowned, “But Senorita Jones told me my father didn’t have any familia. She told me he was a biker and not a good man.”

  “She was mistaken. She thought you were talking about me being your dad,” Skeeter stated.

  Mercy shook her head. “No, she knew this man Trace was my padre. I told her his first name. It was all I had to tell her.”

  Skeeter looked over at Dallas and saw his lips were thinning with anger. Calista had set him up and laid the blame that belonged to Trace on his shoulders. She had lied to this girl the whole time.

  He had to wonder why she lied and why she seemed to hate him so much. He looked over at Janice and she had the same kind of fire in her eyes as well.

  Dallas walked over to Mercy and sat down beside her. “Mercy, we’ll get this sorted out. But I think before we contact your grandparents, we should make sure that Trace really was your father. We do that with a DNA test. Do you have any objections to that?”

  “I think before we do anything, we need to get a guardian Ad litem set up,” Janice told him. She turned to Mercy and explained, “A guardian will represent your best interest. He or she will be your legal representative, so we make sure you are protected in everything we do.”

  “Who are you?” Mercy asked timidly.

  “I’m an attorney sweetheart.” Janice smiled softly. “Officer Jones accused Franklin of being your father and I’m here to help him.”

  “Could you help me too?” Mercy asked.

  Janice shook her head. “I’m so sorry but that would be a conflict of interest to the courts.”

  Mercy began to shake. “Do we have to go to the courts? I don’t have any dinero to pay judges. Will they throw me in carcel if I can’t pay them?”

  “No Mercy, they won’t throw you in jail,” Skeeter insisted gently. “You aren’t in any trouble and we don’t pay the judges here. Here, we go to court to get justice and the case is argued on its own merits. We don’t pay the judges in America, that is against the law here.”

  “Anyone can do this deal?” Mercy asked softly. “Even me? I did come here ilegalmente.”

  Janice leaned forward and patted the girl’s hand. “Yes sweetheart, everyone is treated the same here. But I still think we should get you a guardian. So they will fight for your rights.”

  Dallas cleared his throat. “We should probably do a blood test first though. We need to establish who your father really is.”

  Mercy frowned. “Senorita Jones didn’t tell me this part.”

  “Officer Jones was wrong in not doing so,” Dallas assured her.

  “When she arrived with the two officers, I thought she was going to arrest me,” Mercy whispered. “She was very, enfadado how do you say, pissed off?”

  “I’m sure she was.” Janice nodded.

  “She told me not to talk to you. She told me to let her do all the speaking. She was there to protect me. She told me all I had to do was keep my mouth shut and let her speak for me.”

  “Officer Jones overstepped her bounds here.” Dallas looked at the girl and asked, “Mercy, do you trust us to do the right thing here?”

  Mercy looked from one to the other and finally at Janice. “I thought I could trust Senorita Jones. I was afraid of her but I thought I could trust her.”

  Janice frowned. “Why were you afraid of her? Did she do anything to you while you were with her?”

  Mercy shook her head. “She didn’t hurt me if that’s what you are asking. She was molesta...Um pushy, does that make sense to you? She was just too intensa’, you know?”

  “Did she ever tell you why?” Dallas wanted to know.

  Mercy shook her head. “She did say once that she knew men like my padre before. She said he used my mother and threw her away like yesterday’s garbage. Then she would look at me like she hated my very existencia. But I don’t think it was me she was seeing. I think it was someone else.” She shook her head. “I feel very bad for her daughter. With a mama like her, that child, she will not know love.”

  Skeeter frowned. “Jones has a daughter?”

  “Si señor, she has a young daughter about my age. She said her name was Zoey.”

  Skeeter looked over at Dallas and it became clear at least to his mind why Calista Jones hated him so much. Someone in her past had treated her badly and now, she was after any man who reminded her of him.

  Dallas cleared his throat and nodded. He would get to the bottom of this mess and soon. But for now, they had things to do. Holding out his hand he said, “Come with me child, let's get you tested, and move on from there.” Looking over at Janice he said, “Can you arrange everything with the guardian side of this?”

  “I can and will right away.” She nodded. When they left, Janice looked over at Skeeter. “Why didn’t you tell her the whole truth about her father?”

  Skeeter sighed. “She didn’t need to know. She didn’t need to know her own father threw her away before she was even born. Trace turned his back on her and her mother. I’m hoping her grandparents won’t do the same. Maybe we should have waited to find out before we told her about them.”

  Janice laid her hand on his arm. “All the same, she needed to know. Whether they can accept her or not, that’s on them. What are you going to do if they don’t accept her?”

  Skeeter shrugged. “Then I guess I play daddy until she’s old enough to be on her own huh? I can’t just leave her out in the cold. That goes against everything I was ever taught growing up and I won’t do that to her.”

  Janice smiled. “Good. I knew you were a good man.”

  Skeeter snorted. “I don’t know about the good part but I am a man. I don't do harm to a child or a woman.”

  Chapter Five

  Dallas led Mercy to Infirmary and turned her over to the nurse.

  As she drew the blood, she needed for the test Mercy wouldn’t allow herself to take her eyes off Dallas. She didn’t even wince as the needle penetrated her arm.

  When she was finished and Dallas was walking her back to the interrogation room she dared to ask, “What will happen now? Will I be placed in a cage somewhere until I can go to this court of yours?”

  Dallas frowned and stopped to look at her. “What are you talking about? What cage?”

  “Senorita Jones said that if she turned me over to you, you would put me in a cage until we got to court and that it could take weeks to get an appointment to see the judge. I don’t want to live in a cage. I can’t go back to living like that.”

  Dallas pulled her to a stop. “Child, we will never put you in a cage. Or a cell as they are called here. You haven’t done anything wrong.”

  “But Senor, I did do wrong, I came across the border without going through the right channels.” She frowned. “At least I think that’s how Senorita Jones said it. Here that is against the law. She told me that.”

  Dallas narrowed his lips. Calista Jones had a lot to answer for. He ushered her back into the room with Skeeter and Janice.

  Skeeter smiled gently at the girl while she nodded at him shyly.

  Dallas looked over at Skeeter and told him, “Calista told the girl we would be putting her in a cell while she waits for the results of the test.”

  Skeeter growled. “What. The. Ever. Loving. Hell?” He turned his head to look at Mercy.

  Her head was hanging and drops of her tears were hitting the table.

  Janice reached out and grabbed her hand as she put an arm around her
small shoulders. “Oh honey, that isn’t going to happen. Not on my watch.”

  “Not on mine either,” Skeeter assured her. “We may have to wait here in town for a few days but you’ll be staying with us at a hotel, you will not be put in a cell.” He turned to Dallas, “Can you release her to my custody? I’ll make sure she doesn’t get into trouble.”

  “We can make sure she gets in touch with her guardian as well,” Janice added.

  Dallas nodded. “We should have the test back in the next day or two. Once we have her test done we’ll pull your test and Trace’s then we can compare the two.”

  “What about Jones?” Janice asked. “I don’t think it would be wise to let her know where Mercy is. She’s got something against Frank and I don’t want her around Mercy. Whatever her issues are she doesn’t need to scare this little girl any longer.”

  “Don’t worry about Calista Jones,” Dallas drawled. “I’ll keep her here until the test comes back. She has some serious questions to answer.”

  Mercy lifted her head. “What about Zoey? If her mom doesn’t come home, she’ll be all alone. She’s only seventeen.”

  Skeeter groaned and closed his eyes.

  Janice chuckled and laid her arm on his shoulder. “She can come with us until we get this mess straightened out. I’m sure it won’t be more than one night.”

  Dallas got to his feet. “Frank, come with me for a minute will you?”

  Skeeter stared at the other man then rose to his feet and exited the room with him. “What’s up?”

  Dallas just shook his head. “I’m very much hoping I’m wrong here but do you know your blood type?”

  Skeeter nodded. “I’m O positive.” He snorted, “The blood bank loves me because I’m a universal donor. Why?”

  “Because that’s not what the blood test in your file says.” Dallas tightened his lips. Slowly shaking his head, he told him, “We’d better do a test on you as well, so there is no doubt.”

  Skeeter glared at him a moment then snarled, “Let me guess, according to my file I have B negative blood type right?”