Chapter Fifteen #3
“Cash. Sorry for dropping by unannounced. It worked so well for that other guy. Thought I’d try it too.” There was something off in his voice. He’d tried to disguise his tension with a snarky comment, but it hadn’t worked.
“Funny man. See you in a few,” Cash said before disconnecting. He opened the gate with his app, and they waited for Burke to make the long drive down to the ranch.
“This can’t be good, right?” Nick asked.
“He’s never just shown up before, so I’m not optimistic.”
Burke pulled up to them and stopped. He killed the engine and stepped out of his truck. “Gentlemen,” he said with a tip of his white Stetson.
“Evening,” Cash replied.
Nick nodded at the sheriff. “Burke.”
The sheriff smirked at Nick’s lukewarm welcome before meeting Cash’s gaze.
Burke’s brow furrowed, and Cash suspected he had bad news to deliver.
He knew where all his people were, so this must have something to do with the prior incident.
When Burke glanced at Nick but still didn’t speak, Cash figured out what made him uneasy.
“Nick already told me about his phone call to his friend at the FBI and the conversation you guys had at the diner on Tuesday,” Cash told him.
Boots crunched on gravel, and Cash turned to find Rueben walking from his cabin. His steps faltered when his gaze landed on Burke. Rue’s dark eyes widened, and his lips curved into a smile.
“Well, isn’t this a surprise,” Rue said as he veered in their direction. “Is the good sheriff joining us for poker night? If so, I’ll need to put on something a little nicer.”
“Poker?” Burke quirked a brow.
Cash rolled his eyes at his friend. “There’s no money involved. Otherwise, Rueben wouldn’t have said anything.”
“I wouldn’t count on that,” Rue said. “I made an awful criminal.”
Burke laughed and hooked a thumb toward Rueben. “I like him.”
“I like you too, handsome,” Rueben said. “I hope you’re still here when I get back.” Rue winked and headed toward Cash’s truck.
Burke turned sideways and watched him go. Rue looked over his shoulder and caught the sheriff in the act. Cash had never seen Rue give such a lurid smile, and he felt kind of dirty for seeing it now. He glanced over at Nick, who was getting a kick out of the exchange.
“What just happened?” Burke asked when Rueben drove off with a little wave out the window.
Nick sighed and shook his head. “The good people elected this guy as their top law officer in the county?” He tsked a few times. “That’s what the young kids call flirting, Burke.”
“Flirting?” The sheriff looked over his shoulder at the truck. “With me?”
So Rueben hadn’t been joking about the handcuffs and other things he mentioned. “Yeah, flirting,” Cash said.
“Huh. Interesting.” Burke glanced over his shoulder one last time, but the black truck had already disappeared into the pines.
He shook his head as if to clear his thoughts and fixed his attention on Cash.
“So Nick told you about my friend at DHS who is working on cutting-edge technology in facial recognition?”
“He did,” Cash replied. As a software creator, the notion intrigued him.
Cash was also someone who worked to exonerate people who had been wrongfully convicted by junk science.
And these kinds of advances worried him a lot, especially since they were likely powered by AI.
“I take it you have some images to show us?”
“I do,” Burke replied.
“Let’s all go inside so we can get comfortable.”
Cash led them into the house, made introductions between Burke and Patsy, then led them into his office. Burke and Nick both declined something to drink, but Cash grabbed a bottle of Modelo. He took them over to the seating area next to the fireplace since it was more comfortable.
Burke pulled out his phone, tapped on the screen, and handed the device to Cash.
“Swipe right to see the various photographs. It starts with a current photo of Samuel Jeremiah taken off the internet. There are several images of him younger with different hairstyles and different hair colors. Look to see if anything jumps out at you.”
Cash’s hand shook a little when he started, but he settled down when none of the images of Samuel Jeremiah looked familiar.
He must’ve flipped through a dozen or more photos before the first warning bell went off.
Cash stopped on the computer-generated image of Samuel in his midtwenties, clean-shaven with black hair.
The features didn’t match his memory one hundred percent, but it was close enough that Cash couldn’t ignore it.
Acid churned in his stomach, and he stared down at Burke’s phone.
He was stuck in the past, in a situation he’d never asked to be in and didn’t know how to get out of.
Cash had done the right thing. He’d gone to the police and told them about his unplanned involvement.
Cash had thought he was giving a buddy a ride to the convenience store to get milk for his toddler.
He hadn’t known Mike had a gun hidden in his coat or that he’d stick it in the clerk’s face and rob him.
Cash hadn’t known until Mike pulled the money out of his coat pocket back at his apartment.
He’d been too stunned to say much, but he’d refused the money Mike tried to give him.
Cash had made an excuse to leave the house and avoided Mike for a few days while he figured out what to do.
He’d decided to do the right thing, and it altered the course of his life.
The cops arrested Mike, but they charged Cash too.
They hadn’t believed he was an unwitting accomplice, and nothing Cash said could convince them.
The public defender worked out a deal where Cash only served a year.
The aggravated robbery hadn’t been Mike’s first offense, so he got sent away for two decades.
And for a long time, Cash had clung to the adage that no good deed goes unpunished.
He had done the right thing and gone to the police, and they’d turned against him.
Durrell Padgett and a life of good deeds had helped Cash gain a more positive outlook.
But his past had risen from the dead to wreak havoc again.
Nick squatted down next to him. “What’s wrong, Saint?”
Cash forced his gaze away from the image to look into the eyes he loved so much. “Mike Carson.”
Nick settled his hand on the back of Cash’s neck. “He died during a prison fight.”
Cash nodded and showed him the phone. “This guy looks just like him. It can’t be a coincidence.”
“Fuck,” Nick said.
“Who is Mike Carson?” Burke asked.
Cash was too rattled to talk, so Nick answered for him. He’d been honest with Burke about his past, but he’d never mentioned Mike by name. There’d been no reason to…until now.
Burke met Cash’s gaze and echoed Nick’s sentiment. “Fuck.”