Tripp: Ride With Me Series

1. Tripp

Zipping my pants,I turned to look at the woman lying on the bed.

Last night—no, that would be early this morning—must have been one helluva celebration for a job well done. I had no idea where I was or why there was a half-naked woman lying on the bed. I was wearing shorts and a wife beater when I rolled from under the covers.

Confused, I scrubbed a hand over my beard. I didn’t normally sleep with clothes on if there was a woman in my bed.

Color me confused as hell.

That was it. No more alcohol for me.

I really need to get my head out of my ass and back into the game.

I’d just finished one job, time to move on and find another. The job? To keep a self-righteous prick from getting the life beat out of him; or worse. Yeah, it wasn’t a fun job for me, but it paid well. This little shit thought he was a big bad racer. Well, too bad for him, he’d aligned himself with some serious bad apples. The race in the desert last night had turned into a bloodbath.

I’d had the foresight to stop the kid before he left his hotel. He needed to see what he was dealing with. Vegas thugs were no better or worse than others. These jokers just seemed to be above the law. Maybe they had an inside person, or they were just damn lucky. Either way, I needed this kid to see what he was risking.

It hadn’t taken much to get him to agree to go with me, to keep an open mind. If he wanted to go out and be a reckless idiot after that, well, I’d done what I could. He was technically grown and would have to make his own choices sometimes.

We’d stayed back, up the hill from the race. I made him watch as car after car crashed or flipped for no apparent reason. The amount of alcohol and drug use in that environment blew my mind. After one spectacular crash, the driver’s crew got involved. Gunfire rang out through the open sky and bodies hit the dirt.

I’d done my part earlier and called the police. They just hadn’t gotten there in time to keep the firefight from happening. I’d climbed down off that hill, the rock crunching under my boots, and dragged the moron with me.

His daddy, a highly recognized man in his own right, had sent someone to pick him up and escort him to the private hangar of the airport. For my part, I’d received a wire transfer for ten thousand and two in cash. I needed travel money, after all. Being a man for hire, for a certain group of people, could be tiresome. The money though, that kept me going.

I made sure the woman was breathing; I didn’t need any dead bodies on my watch. It took a few minutes to gather up the rest of my things from the room and head out to my 1982 Jeep Cherokee. The trailer behind it had my 1980 Harley Davidson FXS 80 Lowrider Shovelhead on it. This bike and I had been through many things. It was my go-to when I was on a case. You’d think I would stand out, but nowadays everyone rides, so I’m just lost in the crowd. Same for my old Jeep.

If those wheels could talk.

I checked the straps on the trailer, the tarp was fully in place, no one had tampered with anything that I could see. Guess it paid to be at a hotel in the literal middle of nowhere Arizona. The bar across the street, I could have done without that. My head reminded me of that fact with every step I took.

“I’m too old for this shit,” I muttered.

I’d left Vegas late last night, heading toward Texas. It was time to catch up with old friends and honestly, to check on my son. It’s been about a year since I last laid eyes on him. Using the gas station just up the road, I filled my tank and the two gas cans on the trailer. I was about to head out across the desert and wanted to be prepared.

I checked my water supplies in the back of the Jeep. I had three cases of water, my rations bag was full, and my portable charger meant I had a fully functioning cooler. I went in to pay for my gas, snag a few cups of coffee to fill my thermos, and to get a big bag of ice to fill the cooler. This ice would still be here hours from now, most likely tomorrow.

I would be going through the hottest parts of the United States in the middle of the night, but it would still be hot in the morning. What people didn’t tell you when you made travel plans was, the desert in the day may be one hundred and ten degrees, but at night it dropped down to the fifties. You’re either burning in Satan’s playground or freezing your ass off. I preferred crossing Arizona at night. Unless I had to be out there in the daylight. Thankfully, this time, I wasn’t on a case.

I would however be crossing New Mexico during the day. That meant at times I would have to turn the air conditioning completely off and suffer to avoid killing my Jeep. Survival of the fittest. I’d been in worse places: Iraq, Egypt, the Saharra, the fucking Australian outback. Nothing beat that heat. It was like walking on the fucking sun with your bare feet.

Looking at my watch, I turned on the radio, letting the normality fill the night alongside me.

“What?” My voice was gruff as I sat up in the back of my Jeep, groggy as hell.

I looked around. It had been a long, exhausting night, and it took a minute to remember where I was.

I’d stopped early yesterday morning to grab a bite to eat and stretch my legs only to be stuck in Albuquerque until the flat I’d acquired was fixed. By the time I got to Santa Rosa, New Mexico, I decided to catch a few hours of shut-eye after eating. That meant that when I got up and was ready to roll again, I had to reroute myself to get around a big wreck. I’d decided to go down Hwy 84; it only added an hour to my trip. It beat sitting in the heat and traffic.

The traffic wasn’t too bad, but I did hit a few construction zones. They were slow going and annoyed the hell out of me, but I finally made it to Abilene. I stopped for gas and to find a place to eat. I was tired but fighting it. According to the GPS, I had about five hours to go.

Clearly once I hit Dallas, I was done for.

The loud siren went off again, and I jerked.

Oh, the cell had woken me up. Waking with a jolt either had me ready to fight or confused as fuck. Guess it was door number two this morning.

I heard a voice, faint. My cell was in my hand. Who was talking to me?

“What?” I called out as I scrubbed a hand over my face. My jaw cracked as I yawned. Fuck, I needed coffee.

“Tripp, man, you there?”

It took a second, but then it registered what was going on. I knew that voice.

“Scooter?”

“Yeah, man, look, we have a problem.”

“What? You okay?”

“I’m okay. It’s Casey.”

“Casey…” I was awake for sure now. “What happened?”

“She’s been no contact for over twenty-four hours. That’s not normal. Especially not now.”

I crawled over the seat, landing with a thump. “Fuck.” I jostled myself and tossed the boot I’d sat on into the floorboard.

“Man, what the hell are you doing?”

“Waking up, asshole. What time is it anyway?”

“Depends on where you’re at.”

I scrubbed a hand over my face and started the Jeep. The cool air that slapped me in the face was welcome. “I’m on the way to see my boy. Made it to the south end of Dallas sometime early this morning. I drove for about sixteen hours and just couldn’t go any further.”

“Damn, man. Then it’s just a little after 8:00am here.”

I’d only been asleep for about six hours. I’d gone longer and done worse on less sleep. I pulled my map back up on my phone and found my exact location. I plugged in the address I had for Phoenix and hit start. At first, I was confused as hell. Then I realized I’d hit walking instead of driving. I shook myself, blinking to wake up fully.

Who in their right mind would walk to anywhere in this state. Was that a real option?

“Are you alright to drive?”

“Yeah. I’m leaving here, heading to Burke. The GPS says it’s about three hours from where I am.” I looked around at the truck stop parking lot. “Where are you now? Where is Casey?”

“In Diboll. I’m back now for good. I moved in with Casey, we are just outside of Burke.”

“Okay. Okay, good.”

I wanted to ask more, but the man knew me well. “I came back to help her out. She’s working as a PI now, so she’s gone quite a bit. She needed me to help out around the house.”

“The last time I was there—it’s been three years or so. She was working on herself then. But I only got to see here that one night, then I had to get back to Vegas.”

“Yeah, after I left to find myself, she got—She’s a different person now. And she’s why I’m calling you, man. I’m worried. You’re the only one I know to call.”

I knew my old friend well. There was something that he wasn’t telling me. Maybe that was for the best. As it was now, I planned on getting down there as fast as I could. Thinking logically, I tried to reassure him. “If she’s on a case, she could be in a situation where she can’t make a call. That isn’t inherently a bad thing. I’ve had that come up a few times in the last few months myself.”

“Trust me when I tell you, she always calls to check in anytime she is gone. There’s been no exception to that since I got back here. No matter the time of day or night, she lets us know where she is and if she’s okay.”

“Okay. We’ll figure it out when I get there.”

The last time I’d seen Casey was a night I thought about often. I’d been out drinking my sorrows away when she walked into the bar. Her eyes had been puffy, her cheeks red. That night ended with me waking up in a bed alone, the sheets cold and my heart broken. I hadn’t earned her trust back. That was my fault. I’d left her when she needed me most. I would rectify that. I’d get to her and make sure she really was okay.

“You there, man?”

“Yeah, just thinking. Meet me in Burke, at the Sheriff’s Office.”

“You know how I feel about cops, man.”

“I do, but listen, if she is missing, we will need their help. I’m not licensed to work in Texas. There is only so much I can do. I’ll call Phoenix; he’s licensed to work in the state. But still, I need to tell them I am here and why. It’s a courtesy.”

“All right. Fine. I need to make sure she’s okay. She has to be okay.” He let out a frustrated grunt. “They won’t tell me where she was going or what she was working on.”

“Leave that to me. I know people, and those people know people. Trust me, brother. We will get to the bottom of this even if I have to call in every favor owed to me.”

“Okay, thanks. I’ll meet you there.”

“See you in a few hours.” When the call ended, I cursed. “Where are you, sweetheart?”

I hit the speed dial for my kid and waited for him to answer. When it went to voicemail, I hung up, waited a minute, and called again. The third time I left a message.

“Kid, we have a problem. If you get this in the next couple of hours, call me. If not, meet me at the Burke Sheriff’s Office in about three hours. Give or take. It’s important.”

I ended the call, tossed my cell onto the seat, and put the old Jeep in drive. I needed gas and coffee. Once the tank was full, I hurried into the truck stop, took a much-needed, piss and grabbed three large coffees. They had a small deli, so I grabbed three bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches and headed back out to the pumps.

With everything settled into its right place, I started the Jeep back up and pulled out onto the access road. Three hours or so and I would be in Burke.

I tried to call Casey, but the number I had was no longer in service. My gut was doing that thing again. Something wasn’t right; I definitely needed to hurry.