Page 28 of Deadly Evidence
“You must be that new hand at the Triple R,” she said, standing in front of him and watching as he savored a long swallow. “First time in town?”
“Since I hired on.”
She extended her hand. “Trinidad Fuentes. My husband Juan is out back somewhere.”
“Brady Coleman.” He raised a brow. “There sure must not be much action around here. One look and everyone figures they know who I am. I ’d think you’d have a regular parade of strangers crossing the river and heading through here on their way north.”
She tipped back her head and laughed. “Not so easy nowadays. With the old sheriff, there was a lot. Now—Ramon keeps pretty good tabs on what’s happening. After just threemonths, I think the word is spreading. The illegals and the drug runners, they give this town a wider berth.”
The hinges of the front door squealed. Sunlight and a blast of hot, dry air poured inside, silhouetting a stocky man in a Western hat.
Trinidad stiffened, and a sixth sense told Brady that this guy was no ordinary, Saturday night rowdy. He turned his back to the door and lowered his voice. “Who is that?”
Trinidad sucked in a low breath. “Trouble.”
“Got a name?”
She hesitated, then grabbed a bar cloth and began scrubbing at the gleaming bar. “He isn’t around here much, and Efrain is all I know. With some guys, it’s better not to ask. Comprende?”
Brady nodded. “Last thing I want is trouble.”
The man called out the name of a beer, and Brady heard him settle into a creaky chair at a table in the far corner of the room.
“Then watch out for this one—big scar on his jaw, mean look in his eye.” She bustled down to the beer taps and drew a tall glass, took it to the newcomer, then disappeared into the kitchen.
Brady waited until long after the man left, then strolled to the men’s room and pulled out his cell phone.
Efrain.A common enough name, but one that might turn up in a records search or trigger someone’s memory at the El Paso DEA office when matched with this town.
Any lead, however small, was worth a try.
CHAPTER FIVE
Mia carefully sidestepped something disgusting on the ground and halted beneath the shade of a willow.
Mojo ambled over to her side and flopped at her feet, looking up at her with soulful eyes before heaving a sigh and resting a golden muzzle on her outstretched legs.
On the other side of the corral fence, Vicente patiently flipped a Navajo blanket over a young horse’s back, legs, and neck, as he crooned softly to the wild-eyed creature.
Talking, Mia noted with irritation, a lot more to the horse than he’d ever talked toher.The first night, he’d disappeared soon after the neighboring rancher brought her out.
The following days, he’d worked from dawn until long after dark cooking, training horses in this corral, or doing something with the cows somewhere out in the vast reaches of the ranch.
His own granddaughter obviously ranked low on his list of priorities. “His loss,” Mia muttered under her breath, batting away a persistent fly.
It wasn’t even like he was some lofty rich guy looking down on her. He was just a farmhand, wasting his life on a ranch in the middle of nowhere.
And even Lacey, like Vicente, had totally ignored her for the past four days.
Annoyed, she adjusted her broad-brimmed straw hat and watched the action going on in the corral.
Lacey sat perched on the fence along the opposite side, watching Dante hold the colt’s lead rope as it tried to dance away from the waving blanket.
He methodically rubbed its neck and head to steady it, and Mia found herself mesmerized by the constant, almost gentle movement of his long fingers.
Tall and muscular, with an indolent sort of grace, Dante was so different, so...dangerouslooking, compared to the soft city boys she knew back home.
She found herself watching him all the time—drawn to the air of mystery about him.
