Chapter 6
SIX
Gripping the door handle, Maren kept an eye on the passenger side-view mirror, checking to see if they were being followed.
Anxiousness cut through her like a toothy saw.
Someone had recognized her. Or rather, thought they’d recognized Opal, and had chased her and Colt down the street on the heels of a DEA arrest of one of Shadow’s dealers.
Now Shadow and his fellow criminals would wonder if Opal was cooperating with the feds.
Another reason for Shadow to want to eliminate Opal.
Better for the men to think she was Opal than for them to realize their mistake and go looking for her sister, who was out there somewhere, alone and defenseless. How scared she must be.
Helpless worry chomped through Maren. She wanted her sister home safe.
She shot a glance at Colt, behind the wheel of his unassuming truck. She was glad the two dogs were riding so well together with Haven crouched on the seat beside her and Rusk now sitting on the floor at her feet with her backpack.
“We need to find Vinnie, the witness,” she said, grasping for something tangible to help her find her sister. “He must know Opal didn’t really drown. He might know where she’d go.”
Maren hoped he’d have answers because she was at a loss.
For too long, Opal had cut Maren out of her life, kept her at a distance.
Despite being twins, Maren had no idea where her sister would seek refuge.
With their parents and uncle gone, they had no other family.
Not knowing whom her sister would turn to signaled how much they’d grown apart, and the lack of closeness between them filled Maren with sadness.
“Agreed.” Colt flicked on the blinker and headed the truck up the ramp for the freeway that would take them back to Colorado Springs. The truck ate up the miles.
Maren concentrated on her breathing as they drew closer to her hometown.
Colt’s cell phone rang, cutting into the silence. He hit the button on the steering wheel and connected the call. “Dawson, go.”
“Hey, Colt,” a disembodied voice echoed through the cab. “Henry Spares here.”
Haven’s ears twitched. Rusk’s head swiveled toward Colt.
“I wanted to follow up with you on that information you gave Daniel about Shadow having a rendezvous in the Aurora Park,” Henry said, his voice low and smooth.
“No one showed. But two undercover agents are staking out the park for the rest of the afternoon, just in case.”
Colt let out a heavy sigh that Maren felt in her chest. “Doubtful Shadow will show now. Not after realizing one of his gophers has been scooped up.”
“Roger that,” Henry said. “Your CI is securely ensconced in a safe house miles from Aurora.”
“Good.” Colt glanced at Maren. The speculation in his eyes had her curious. What was he thinking? She had a hard time reading him and that left her a bit off-kilter.
“See if you can get any more information out of him,” Colt said. “I think he told us everything he knew but I can’t be certain. He says he only saw Shadow with a mask on. But maybe he can describe the guy’s eyes. Not sure how helpful the description would be, but you never know.”
“On it,” the agent said. “I know a forensic artist who can work with such limited info.”
Ah. Good thinking on Colt’s part. Sometimes a little went a long way.
“We’re headed to Colorado Springs to look for the man who came forward as a witness to Opal Anderson’s death,” Colt told Henry before signing off.
“I’ll have Eva find us his address.” Maren pulled out her cell phone and dialed the task force’s main line.
Her call was answered on the fourth ring. “Eva Gomez,” the tech analyst said. “What can I help you with?”
“Eva, it’s Maren. I need the last-known address of a Vinnie Homer. I don’t have my sister’s case file with me so I can’t get it. I’m hoping you can help with this.”
“Of course,” Eva said. The clicking of keys on a keyboard clanged in Maren’s ears, making her realize she had a headache brewing. She pushed the speaker button so she could hold the phone at a distance.
“It says here he’s living in a homeless encampment,” Eva said.
“There are encampments all around the area.” Maren grimaced. “It’ll be like looking for a needle among a ton of haystacks.”
Eva made a noise of agreement. “Do you need a photo?”
“I do. Please text it to me,” Maren said.
“Done.”
Maren’s phone dinged with an incoming text.
“Let me know if you need anything else,” Eva said before clicking off.
“Sounds like we have our work cut out for us,” Colt said, pointing out the obvious.
“Just like everything else with my sister, nothing is easy,” Maren admitted. Something she didn’t voice often about her twin. “Opal always seemed to have a cloud hanging over her. Even when we were kids, she struggled with things that came much easier for me. I never understood why.”
“Everyone’s journey is different,” Colt said.
There was truth in his statement. “Tell me why bringing down Shadow is so personal for you.”
Colt gripped the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turned white. Maren wondered what nerve she’d hit.
“When I was sixteen, my eighteen-year-old cousin got hooked on drugs. Back then, crack cocaine and heroin were the most prevalent drugs on the street.”
Maren’s heart contracted with empathy. “I’m sorry to hear that. It must’ve been difficult for you and your family.”
“Devastating,” Colt said. “No matter how much we tried to intervene, he couldn’t shake the addiction.”
Maren sucked in a breath. She sensed there was a tragic ending to the story but she charged ahead. “Was he ever able to beat it?”
She waited, her breath stalled in her lungs, hoping his cousin had tamed the addiction because she needed to hope that Opal could tame hers.
“No.” Colt’s voice was soft and filled with anguish. “I found him in his parents’ backyard. A needle stuck in his arm. He’d overdosed on tainted heroin.”
Even though she’d expected that outcome, grief for him and his family made her heart ache. Unable to stop herself, she reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. The muscles beneath her palm were rock-hard. There was a solidity to him that she found appealing. “I’m so sad that happened to you.”
He released his right hand from the steering wheel and placed it over hers on his shoulder. The warmth of his skin on hers rippled through her. His touch was sure, yet gentle. Comforting, despite the fact she was supposed to be comforting him.
“Thank you. I swore that day I was going to do everything I could to stop the drugs from flowing into my city,” he said.
“As soon as I graduated from college, I entered the police academy. I was on the job for eight years with the Denver PD before moving to the DEA. Then two years ago I trained to have Rusk,” he said. “He’s been the best partner.”
Maren released his shoulder, but he kept her from slipping her hand away with a slight squeeze before he let go and re-gripped the steering wheel.
She folded her hands in her lap, but the warmth of his touch remained imprinted on her skin.
Haven, tucked in the space between them on the bench seat, rested her snout on her hands.
“There’s something both comforting and thrilling about a working dog as a partner.” She smoothed her hand over Haven’s short fur.
“True,” Colt said. “Rusk kept me from going dark when the whole thing with Rebecca blew up.”
With her other hand, she scratched Rusk behind the ears where he sat at her feet.
For a long moment, they were both quiet.
“I get why you went into law enforcement,” she stated softly, her heart aching for his loss. “But surely Shadow wasn’t active when you were sixteen?”
No matter how strong, capable and brave Colt may have been at the beginning of his career, filled with aspirations of removing drugs from the street so people like his cousin wouldn’t lose their way, she hated to think of him going up against someone as notorious and dangerous as Shadow alone.
Even with the backing of the DEA, he was on a one-man-and-dog crusade.
She was determined to make sure they all survived.
* * *
Colt sighed. Going down this road would be painful.
But he couldn’t shy away from the truth.
That wouldn’t serve any purpose. Better to face it all head-on.
“No, he wasn’t active when my cousin was alive.
I didn’t come across Shadow until a few years ago.
He’s why I became a K-9 handler. I needed a partner to sniff out drugs. ”
“To stop him.”
“In short, yes.” For a second, Colt contemplated leaving the story unfinished, but they were partners now.
She needed to understand. And for some reason, he felt compelled to explain.
“I was mentoring a teen, Tony, through my church on my days off. Good kid but from a chaotic home. Tony swore up and down to me that he wasn’t using, yet I saw the signs.
He’d come to our meetings jittery and his eyes glassy. ”
The memory stung. “Yet, when I searched through his things, I came up empty. His parents were negligent in caring for him, being addicted themselves, but without a warrant, I couldn’t search their home.
One day, Tony didn’t show up. Later, I learned he’d fled when a patrol officer saw him buying drugs off a known dealer.
The dealer was arrested but Tony ran into traffic and was hit by a car. ”
Grief was a chain Colt wore around his neck. With each death, the burden grew heavier. “If I had had Rusk with me back then, maybe Tony wouldn’t be dead.”
“You can’t know that for sure,” Maren said. “Was Shadow the dealer?”
The anger that had spurred him on rose, burning in his chest. “Even back then, Shadow kept out of sight. But he was the supplier and boss of the dealer. The dealer died in a jail cell waiting for his arraignment.”
Maren made a distressed sound that had both dogs shifting closer to her. “You think he had the dealer killed.”
“I do. Though how, I don’t know.” The not knowing kept him up at night.