Page 70 of Solid as Steele
“He’s leaving,” she said.
Owen shot to his feet to glance around the side of his truck then ducked back. “It’s a full-sized pickup. Light color. Maybe white. Plates are caked with dirt. It could be the same vehicle I saw idling outside the restaurant when I got the map. It was gone when we left.”
“Tovar and Leach both drive white trucks,” she said.
“So could be one of them.”
“Could be, but I’ll bet a search of the DMV records would reveal plenty of white trucks in the area. I once read it’s the number one color choice in pickups.” Pain shot up her arm, and she clutched it tighter so she didn’t cry out and raise Owen’s concern even higher.
“It’s possible.”
“Makes me shiver to think he could have been following us from the restaurant, and we didn’t know it.”
“Yeah, it’s unnerving.”
“I hope the deputy intercepts him on the road on the way in.”
“That could happen, but I suspect the shooter’s smart enough to know that we called this in and is probably traveling off-road by now.” He met her gaze. “I’ll call an ambulance for your arm.”
“Not necessary. It’s only a scratch and the bleeding seems to have stopped.”
“No need to be the hero here. I know what it’s like to take a bullet.”
She flashed her gaze up to him. “You do?”
“The cross tattoo.” He tapped his shoulder. “Got it to cover the wound. Reminds me that God protected me that day.”
“How did it happen?”
He took a long breath as if the story still troubled him. “Long story short, I served a warrant on a guy who had no priors for violence, and he didn’t want to go to jail. Plugged me in the shoulder before my partner took him down.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through that.”
“I didn’t think it was bad, but I ended up needing surgery.” He looked at her but she couldn’t make out his expression in the shadowy light. “Now I know we need to treat all gunshot wounds seriously. If you won’t let me call an ambulance, then I’ll drive you to the ER after the deputy arrives and releases us.”
“I—”
He flashed up his hand. “Save your breath. I’m taking you and that’s it. End of discussion.”
She wanted to argue, but what was the point? He’d made up his mind. She didn’t know a tremendous amount about him yet, but she knew when he decided to do something, he would follow through. Besides, he was right. She needed to have her arm looked at.
She’d been shot for goodness’ sake. As much as she wanted to pretend she hadn’t. To pretend she was shrewd enough to outsmart this evil villain and had strong skills to avoid danger. Sometimes danger came calling and there was nothing a person, even the most skilled in evasion tactics, could do about it and innocent people could die.
15
Owen wanted to punch the wall of the ER room. He should’ve been the one to take the bullet not Mackenzie. She had nothing to do with Cassie’s murder, other than she’d rented a house in the wrong location. He was in her debt for all the care she’d provided for him, and this was the way he repaid her? By not keeping her safe?
Unacceptable.
Well, he could help make up for that now by ensuring she got the best medical attention, and supporting her in her pain. He would do whatever it took to help her out.
His phone rang. Talk about bad timing. He wanted to ignore the call, but it could be about the investigation. He had to answer. “Detective Greer.”
“This is Ernie. You know, from the restaurant. I got your picture. Yeah, that’s the guy who was hassling the woman you showed me all right. No question.”
Tovar just shot to the top of Owen’s suspect list even if the guy was supposedly out of town and couldn’t have been shooting at him and Mackenzie at the house. But just because Urban said Tovar was out of town, didn’t mean he was. He could have driven through the night, pretending to his boss that he was still on the road so he had an alibi for the shooting. Would be easy enough to do, though it would break the driving laws.
And even if he didn’t shoot at them, didn’t mean he didn’t kill Cassie. Leach could be the shooter because he feared being arrested for Bussey’s murder.
