Chapter Five

Hayes tried to tamp down the emotions coursing through him. A stormy mix of worry, dread, and anger. Owen was more than his boss. He was a mentor and friend, and Hayes wanted to annihilate anyone who had done this to him.

But he also wanted to keep Jemma safe.

And that’s why he couldn’t lose his head over this. He had to think and rethink every move they made.

“Is Owen alive?” Jemma asked. She was in the shaky mode again, and she’d lost way too much color in her face.

“According to Aiden, he is.” And through his earpiece Hayes could hear his brother having a conversation with someone. Maybe the EMTs. Maybe Owen’s partner, Ruby Maverick. “Owen was at the gated entrance to Duane’s school, and a sniper shot him when he lowered the window to speak into the intercom.”

She cursed, which had pretty much been Hayes’ initial reaction. “Let’s get out of here and check on him,” Jemma insisted.

Yeah, Hayes very much wanted to do both, but he went with the clearer-head approach. “Aiden, could you bring in a Kevlar vest and helmet?” he asked through the earpiece. “I want Jemma to use them while I get her back into the cruiser.”

“Give me just a minute,” was Aiden’s quick reply.

“Call one of your dad’s landlines and let him know you have to leave,” Hayes instructed. There was no need for Jemma to go back in and have another round with her stepmother. That would only delay the trip to check on Owen.

And delay getting her the hell out of this house.

After all, one of their key suspects, Cordelia, was under this very roof, and the woman might decide to try to finish off two of the last remaining deputies here and now.

Jemma nodded and rang her father as they made their way to the front door. “He’s not answering. He’s probably on one of the other lines,” she said a moment later, and his answering machine no doubt kicked in because she left him a message.

“And what about Duane? Will we go to the school and confront him?” she asked.

“Not yet. The CSIs will need to process the scene, and two operatives are on the way there to look for the shooter. Maybe they’ll capture him or at least give us the all clear. In the meantime, I’ll get Duane to come to the hotel for questioning. Cordelia’s son, too.” He wanted to hear what Brooks had to say.

Hayes stopped long enough to send the text to Molly so she could contact Duane and Brooks. Maybe neither man would give her a hassle about showing up for interviews, and if they did, well, Hayes was in a pisser of a mood and would give them a hassle right back.

Jemma and he stopped at the front door, and she looked up at him. “Have Aiden bring in two vests and helmets,” she insisted. “I want you wearing them as well.”

Hayes huffed. “I’m not the target. You are.”

“True, but you can’t convince me that if someone starts shooting at me, you won’t jump in front of me the way that you did last night in the parking lot of the police station.”

He frowned because she was right. “The helmets limit visibility,” Hayes grumbled. “I like to be able to check my surroundings.”

“Hard to check surroundings if a shooter blows off your head,” Jemma grumbled right back.

Knowing this was an argument he wouldn’t or shouldn’t win, he tapped his earpiece to turn on the audio to Aiden. “I need a second vest and helmet. You put on a set, too,” Hayes added, causing his brother to huff. “Satisfied?” he asked Jemma.

“About this, yes,” she answered, ignoring his sarcasm. “But I can’t say I’m pleased about much of anything else.”

He made a sound of agreement, and about a minute later, there was a knock at the door. “It’s me,” Aiden said.

Hayes opened the door, pleased that his brother had already donned the vest and helmet, and Aiden held out their gear. Jemma must have been trained on how to use the equipment during her time at the academy because she got both on without any hitches.

Once Hayes had put on his gear, he didn’t waste any time getting Jemma out of the house and into the cruiser. The helmets came off once they were inside since it was hard to drive or keep watch around them while wearing the damn things. Jemma and he tossed them on the seat between them before she drove off. However, they’d barely made it out of the driveway when his phone rang.

“It’s Ruby Maverick,” he relayed to Jemma, and he took the call on speaker. “Hayes,” he answered. “You’re on speaker, Ruby, and Deputy Salvetti is with me.”

“Good,” Ruby said. “I can tell Owen that you two are still joined at the hip,” she added in a muttered voice. “And speaking of Owen, he’s going to be all right with medical attention and some recovery time. With medical attention and some recovery time ,” she repeated.

In the background, Hayes could hear Owen, and his boss seemed to be objecting to something. That objection soon became crystal clear. “I’m not staying in the hospital,” Owen snarled.

“The man is hard-headed,” Ruby grumbled. “And he’s insisting that he get patched up so he can return to work.”

None of that surprised Hayes, and it also gave him a whole lot relief. If Owen was arguing with the medical folks and clamoring about returning to the job, then maybe that meant the injury wasn’t that serious. Well, hopefully it wasn’t.

“How is Owen?” Hayes asked Ruby, just in case Owen was downplaying his injury.

The woman huffed. “He has a gunshot wound to the shoulder and has lost some blood,” she said but didn’t get to add more before Owen called out.

“I’m fine,” his boss insisted. “Tell Hayes and Jemma to get back to the inn and question the hell out of Duane. The man’s heading there now, and I want to know if he gave the order to one of his fuckwits to shoot me.”

Ruby sighed. “Hayes and Jemma, I’m guessing you heard that?”

“Yes,” they answered in unison, and Jemma took the turn that would get them back to the inn.

“No, I’m not giving you your phone,” Ruby snapped to Owen. “They’re trying to clean and examine that gunshot wound along with determining if you have any bone or nerve damage. They don’t need you holding your phone while they’re doing that. I can relay anything you need me to say.” Hayes heard some mutterings, and then several moments later, Ruby spoke again. “He’s worried about Jemma and wants to know how her interview went with her stepmother.”

Hayes was worried about Jemma, too. “Joined at the hip,” he repeated. “I’ll keep her safe. As for the interview, it went about as expected. Cordelia denied murdering anyone and whined a lot about being harassed. The next step will be to bring in her spawn, Brooks, and listen to him whine while Jemma and I try to figure out if he’s a lying assed killer.”

Another sigh from Ruby. “All right. I’ll relay all of that to Owen.”

“What about the scene of the shooting at the school?” Hayes asked her. “Who’s managing that?”

“The county CSIs and two members of my forensic team who’ll assist them. I’m also sending out several of my operatives to provide security to the responders and help assist in finding the shooter. They should all be in place by now, and we might have some preliminary info soon.”

Good. Ruby’s team, Maverick Ops, was just as solid as Strike Force, and if the shooter was long gone or well hidden somewhere on the grounds, the operatives might still be able to locate the SOB.

“Do the CSIs and forensic team have authority to search the school or Duane’s residence?” Hayes pressed.

Ruby sighed. “Not yet, but I’m working on it.” In the background, he heard Owen arguing, probably with the medical folks. He also heard Ruby’s sigh. “Gotta go. I’ll let you know about the search of the school and any updates on Owen’s condition,” Ruby tacked onto that before she issued a goodbye and ended the call.

Jemma released a long, slow breath, and Hayes figured it was one of relief. If Owen could argue with his personal partner and the hospital staff, then his injuries probably weren’t life threatening. Still, someone had tried to kill him, and that someone likely wasn’t just giving up on either Owen or Jemma.

Hayes fired glances around when Jemma pulled into the parking lot of the inn. No signs of a sniper, but Owen had likely been on the lookout for the same thing right before someone had shot him.

And that brought him to something he’d been thinking about.

“If Duane is our killer, it seems stupid of him to try to eliminate Owen so close to home,” Hayes said.

“I agree.” It was a quick agreement, too, which meant Jemma had probably been giving it some thought as well. “It’s possible that he has a rogue student, one doing his bidding.”

Yeah, and that meant they had dozens of suspects what with Duane’s current students and his former ones. Of course, Duane could have been playing around with a reverse psychology angle and personally took that shot at Owen. Maybe that was something Jemma and he could figure out in the interview.

Jemma was frowning when she pulled to a stop in front of the inn, and as he’d just done, she started glancing around. Looking for a killer.

“How far can a sniper shoot?” she asked.

Hayes drew in a long breath. “That depends on a lot of factors,” he settled for saying.

Clearly, that wasn’t the answer she wanted because she huffed. “How far could you shoot if you were trying to take me out?”

He really didn’t want to imagine Jemma in the sights of his weapon or anyone else’s. Still, it was a valid question. “About six-thousand feet,” he said.

“More like seventy-five-hundred,” Aiden muttered through the earpiece. “He took out a drone at that distance.”

“I got lucky,” Hayes grumbled.

“Seven thousand, five hundred,” she repeated, seemingly accepting that as his norm rather than anything to do with luck or ideal conditions. Which it had been. “If you were setting up the shot, where would you be right now?”

Hell. He really hated playing this what-if speculation, but Hayes had already scoped out the spots for the best sniper positions. He pointed to the left of the inn where there was a side garden with a weird assed mix of sculpted animal hedges and some milky-eyed marble statues that would have seemed more at home, well, anywhere else but here in small-town Texas.

“I’d set up beyond that,” he said, pointing to the wall of massive live oak trees. “Not toward the front of those. Not where I could be seen or detected by the drone. I’d go further back, and I’d climb up about eight feet or so where I’d still have a decent line of sight.”

Once Owen had more manpower in place, those woods would be searched because it was indeed a vulnerable point.

Her gaze swept over that area, and Hayes wasn’t immune to the fear he could see in her eyes. Hell, he wasn’t immune to anything when it came to Jemma, and he soon proved that to himself by doing something totally assed stupid.

He leaned in, and sighing, he pulled her into his arms.

That gave both of them a jolt of…something. Shock, yeah, there was some of that. But there was a hell of a lot more, and he felt the heat creep into her body. When she eased back, he could see that same heat in her eyes, too.

“I’ll bet you’re regretting that,” she muttered. She was still so close to him that her breath brushed against his mouth. Almost a kiss, and that, too, generated a whopping amount of that lust.

“Big time,” he admitted.

But that was sort of a lie. He regretted tearing down a barrier or two between them, but no way he could regret that kick of lust. It had packed a wallop, and that was saying something since it had been merely a peck.

“Full disclosure here,” he heard Aiden say through the earpiece. “I can see and hear what you two are doing.”

Hayes looked behind them and realized that was true. His brother had parked directly behind them so he had a clear line of vision, and Hayes hadn’t turned off the earpiece. Cursing that, and the hug that barely qualified as a hug, Hayes grabbed his helmet. Jemma took hers too, and once they had on the protective gear, they got out to hurry inside the inn.

“You have a visitor inside,” Declan called out to them. “I searched him, and he was armed. I’m holding onto his weapon until he’s ready to leave.”

“Is it Duane?” Hayes asked.

“No. A guy named Royce Bolton. He insisted that Jemma would want to see him. Kick his ass for me if that’s not the case.”

Jemma groaned softly, an indication that she might indeed not want to see this guy. Hayes geared himself up for that possible ass-kicking as she threw open the inn door.

Molly, the Strike Force tech, was now at the reception desk, and she wasn’t alone. There was a beefy forty-something-year-old man standing next to her, and despite Declan’s assurance that he’d taken their visitor’s weapon, Hayes had already moved to step in front of Jemma before the man even spoke.

“Jemma,” he greeted. There was warmth and concern in his voice and expression, but Hayes didn’t see her doling out either of those things in return.

“Royce,” she acknowledged as she took off her helmet. There was something there. Something that made her uneasy, which meant it automatically made Hayes uneasy, too. “Hayes Brodie, this is Royce Bolton, a former Outlaw Ridge dispatcher. Royce is a PI now and has an agency in San Antonio.”

Hayes removed his own helmet as well, and he shook the man’s hand when he offered it. Definitely not a weak grip or a long one. Royce quickly pulled back his hand and shifted his attention back to Jemma.

“I drove straight here when I heard the godawful news about the murders,” Royce said, his forehead bunching up. “Jemma, what the hell’s going on?”

“We’re in the process of sorting things out. The investigation is ongoing,” Jemma replied.

Royce shook his head. “I want to help. How can I help?” he amended.

“Right now, there’s nothing you can do,” Jemma said. “Owen Striker and Ruby Maverick have been generous with their manpower and equipment, so we have everything we need.”

That wasn’t close to the truth about them having what they needed, but Hayes was still glad she’d turned this man down. He had a bad feeling about him, though he had to admit that feeling was all because of Jemma’s reaction.

Royce pulled back his shoulders ever so slightly. “I could man the desk here,” he offered. “Screen visitors. Take calls, that sort of thing.”

Jemma gave him a thin smile that was in no way genuine. “Thanks, but we’ve got that part under control.”

“Even with Owen being shot?” Royce pressed.

“Yes, even with that.” It had a don’t call us, we’ll call you kind of vibe to it, but it seemed to take Royce a couple of seconds to pick up on it.

Royce’s mouth tightened, and he nodded. “All right. Just let me know if there’s anything I can do. The offer still stands.” He tipped his head in farewell to the three of them and then headed out.

“What the hell was that about?” Hayes asked her, watching the man leave.

She opened her mouth but then shook her head. “Later,” Jemma muttered, turning to Molly. “Any updates?” she asked the tech.

“Duane’s on his way in,” Molly relayed to them. “I haven’t been able to get in touch with Brooks.”

Jemma nodded, muttered a thanks, as she took out the phones that she’d collected at her family’s estate. “I’m hoping you can get these to a lab,” Jemma explained. “One belongs to my father, Stefano Salvetti, and the other to his wife, Cordelia. I’m looking for…” She stopped. “…well, anything that could be related to the murders.”

“Of course,” Molly said, using the form at the desk to log in the evidence. “I’ll have a courier pick them up right away. And we’re getting extra help any minute now, and Jesse and Ryker are on their way here,” she said referring to fellow operatives, Jesse McCain and Ryker Caldwell. She paused, her gaze shifting to Hayes, and there was worry in her eyes. “Have you heard anything about how Owen’s doing?”

“My guess is that he’ll be fine,” Hayes let her know, hoping that was the truth. “In fact, I suspect he’ll be back in soon unless Ruby can convince him to stay put at the hospital.”

That lessened some of the worry in Molly’s eyes, and with the phones now in her possession, Hayes needed to get moving on some other things.

“I want to call Brooks,” he reminded Jemma.

She nodded and took out her own phone. “I’ll do that,” she said as they made their way back into the temporary office.

With Owen gone and no visitors, that left the place empty except for Reed, who was still at one of the desks, having a phone conversation. From what Hayes could hear, it was with someone setting up security.

Jemma pressed in Brooks’ number, but the call went straight to voicemail. She left a terse message for him to come into the inn right away.

Hayes decided to add a little incentive for Brooks to respond. He texted a friend in San Antonio PD and requested that uniformed officers go to Brooks’ place of business and residence to deliver a message in person that he was needed for questioning about the murders in Outlaw Ridge.

With that task done, Hayes was ready to start chasing down reports on…hell, all their damn crime scenes. There were plenty of them, and maybe one would reveal something they could use to catch this SOB killer.

“About Royce,” Jemma muttered, following him to one of the desks. That got his attention, and while he booted up a laptop, he stared at her, waiting. “Shortly after I became a deputy, he asked me out a couple of times. I turned him down, but he kept pushing. I finally had to threaten to report him to the sheriff.”

Hayes cursed. Yeah, he’d been right about something being off about that asshole. “Did Royce back off?”

She nodded. “But by then, Sheriff Bonetti had gotten wind of what was happening, and he told Royce to leave me alone. It was awkward between Royce and me until he left about four months ago to become a PI.”

Four months. Plenty of time to set up the murders and the attacks. But being rejected didn’t seem like a big enough motive to kill this many people. Still, he’d give Royce a harder look, and Hayes started that process by putting the man’s name in the database that Owen’s tech team had set up for the operatives to do deep dives on anyone connected to a mission. However, he didn’t get far in the search because he heard Aiden through the earpiece.

“Duane’s here,” Aiden announced. “I’m frisking him now. And surprise, surprise, he’s armed. I’ll hold onto these two Sigs and the Bowie knife while he’s in the inn.” There was some grumbling and cursing in the background. No doubt from Duane. “Yeah, just consider me a human metal detector and security checkpoint.”

It was no great shock that Duane would object to being disarmed, but Hayes didn’t care a rat’s ass about the man’s displeasure. Having an unarmed suspect was the easiest way to keep Jemma safe.

With Jemma right on his heels, Hayes went back into reception so that he could greet Duane. He’d never met the man, but he realized he’d seen him around Outlaw Ridge. Duane was in his early forties and clearly worked out a lot since his biceps were straining against his olive green tee.

The wannabe soldier vibe was all over the guy from his buzz-cut hair and pseudo-Army uniform of that t-shirt and fatigue pants with combat boots. He propped his hands on his hips and aimed a scowl at Jemma.

“I don’t appreciate being ordered in here by a bunch of civilians and a rookie with criminal ties,” Duane snarled.

Hayes huffed and was about to intercede, but Jemma spoke before he could do that.

“And I don’t appreciate someone shooting the new sheriff,” Jemma fired back. “A shooting that took place at your school. Yes, I definitely want to interrogate you about that since you have means and motive to go along with the legal trifecta of opportunity. And while those three things together aren’t enough for an arrest, they’re plenty enough to order you in for an interview. Even by a rookie.”

Duane’s dark brown eyes went to slits. “I didn’t have anything to do with that shooting. Neither did any of my students or instructors. Funny that you should be so interested in justice when it’s one of your own, but you couldn’t be bothered with it when it was one of my students.”

Now wasn’t the time for that particular trip down memory lane. Especially since it would just result in more hostility from Duane. Then again, that hostility could be the motive for the massacre.

“Where were you when Owen was shot?” she asked.

Duane rolled his eyes. “At firearms training with five students who’ll vouch I was there.”

“So, you were at the scene of the shooting,” Jemma concluded. “With five students who would likely say anything you tell them to say.” She paused only for a second. “Will you voluntarily consent to a gunshot residue test, or do I need to get a warrant for that?”

“You’ll have to get a warrant, not just for that but for any search of my school or property. I’m not cooperating with anything connected to you or this so-called police department,” he spat out. “Are we done here?”

Jemma gave him a flat look. “Not even close. We can do the interview in the dining room after I Mirandize you.” Which she preceded to do.

That didn’t improve Duane’s expression. “You’re really going through with this witch hunt?”

“I’m really going through with this interview ,” she confirmed.

Muttering some profanity, Duane took out his phone. “Then, you’ll have to wait until my lawyer gets here. Oh, and I’ll be filing a complaint with the state district attorney. No way in hell should the Rattler’s daughter be questioning anyone about anything.”

Jemma merely tapped her badge to remind him of her authority. It caused Duane’s scowl to deepen, and he turned his back to them to make that call. Just as Hayes heard Aiden say something through the earpiece. Something Hayes didn’t want to hear.

“Hell,” Aiden spat out, “we’ve got trouble.”