Forty-Four
The family’s private plane touched down in Austin. Brock quickly climbed down the stairs and hobbled over to a Dodge Ram truck, where one of his former ranch hands was waiting behind the wheel. Brock thought he might have broken a bone or something in his ankle in the fall from the warehouse back in El Paso. He had for sure separated his shoulder. Both hurt like hell right now. But he couldn’t do a damn thing about it until he finally ended this whole thing. He’d taken a handful of Advil on the plane and chased it down with a glass of bourbon, trying to carefully walk the line between numbing the pain while still functioning at a high level. But he was buzzing a little more than he wanted right now.
“You look like hell, Brock,” said the driver.
“You’re going to look the same if you don’t get this damn truck moving.”
The guy grinned and stomped on the gas, and they began to exit the airport property. Brock pulled out his phone and made a call to the driver’s brother, Judd. Both guys used to work for him on the ranch but had moved to Austin a couple of years ago to pursue rodeo full-time.
“Yeah, I’m here,” Judd answered.
“You still on them?” Brock asked.
“Yep. They just parked a block off Sixth Street.”
“Don’t let them out of your sight, Judd. I’ll be there shortly.”
“You got it.”
Brock hung up. When he’d been informed earlier that Cole and Lisa Shipley had come back to Austin, he had speculated a few possible reasons: One, they had stored money somewhere and needed to return to get it. Two, they wanted to see family before he or the FBI caught up with them. Or three—and this was the most dangerous—they were going to try to figure out who’d really killed Candace McGee thirteen years ago and see if they could somehow exonerate themselves.
Brock obviously couldn’t allow that to happen. He’d immediately recruited help around town. Several guys in the capital city owed the family favors, and he was calling them all in right now. He’d sent them out to monitor various people around town he suspected Cole might try to find. Brock had a short list of people who had been closely associated with Candace McGee years ago, and whom they’d monitored for a brief time in the aftermath of the woman’s death. Just to make sure none of them knew more than they should or caused any trouble. No one did. One person on the list was Candace McGee’s sister, Hailey. She had been easy to find. They’d struck gold by trailing her only minutes ago. Judd had followed the Shipleys from the Tex-Mex restaurant.
The guys out there helping him were to follow and nothing else.
They weren’t killers. That was his job.
Brock made another quick call. It was immediately answered.
“You better have good news for me.”
“We have eyes on them. I’m headed to them right now.”
“Good. Finish this tonight, Brock. I can’t sit in front of a national audience tomorrow with this damn thing hanging out there and dominating my mind.”