Page 109 of Backtrack

“Of course it did,” Leo snapped—again, way too casual for his own good. He’d have to face Ricky again at some point. Soon. “And I would have done one, too, but you seemed to have the logistics all worked out. I trusted you.”

“He’s got a point,” Shayna said, hoping to keep Ricky from pinching her cousin’s head off the next time the two men met. “We’ve been working off your information. You’re the one who told us Cutter was married to Joellen. You can’t really blame us for—”

Ricky waved that away. “It was my best guess,” he said.

“What else are you guessing about?” Leo asked. “You’ve told us a dozen times you, and I’m quoting here, youknow for a fact that Cutter has the diamonds. You just guessing about that, too?”

“He’s got the diamonds!” Ricky puffed up like a deviled snake. “Let me get this straight. Cutter and Joellen have split the sheets and now he’s taken up with the Hawaiian gal?” He glared at Shayna, daring her to correct him.

She did not.

“Deputy Lola Teariki,” Leo said. “I’m thinking she’s his partner. But get this. It took some digging, but I was able to find out that Arliss Cutter’s married to his brother’s widow.”

“His dead brother’s wife?” Shayna shook her head, dumbfounded. “And he’s sharing the honeymoon suite with Miss Lola? That’s messed up …”

“This new wife,” Ricky said. “She lives in Alaska?”

“Anchorage,” Leo said. “According to the borough tax records. Her name’s Miriam. She didn’t even have to change her surname. Probably why we missed it until now.”

“We can use this,” Ricky said, pacing again. “I’ll show this guy what it feels like to lose someone important to you. We can start with the ex-wife, then his partner, and work our way to Ms. Miriam.”

“What are you talking about?” Leo asked. “Start doing what?”

Shayna had had enough. “I gotta tell you, sugar, I’m with Leo on this one. You don’t know this Arliss Cutter from Adam. Are you trying to find the diamonds or just make him pay for his grandaddy’s sins?”

“You can get an answer to most any question if you let a box cutter do the talking.”

“A box cutter?” Shayna stifled a chuckle. “That marshal looks like the kind of dude who’d shoot first and then shoot some more if you come at him like that.”

Ricky shrugged. “I say bring it on. He’s just a supersize version of his grandpa. It’ll do my heart good to end him when the time comes.”

“End him?” Shayna snapped her fingers in front of Ricky’s face to keep his attention. “You’re still forgetting about the diamonds.”

“I haven’t forgotten a damned thing. I just have other priorities.”

“Well, it seems to me that fifteen million in diamonds would be tippy top on your priorities.”

Ricky’s eyes clouded over, gray like a storm. It was a sure sign Shayna needed to change tactics or risk an explosion. If he’d been a normal guy, she would have reached out and touched him—his hand or his arm—but he had this thing about personal space. He had to be the one to initiate. In prison, if someone got close, they were about to stab him.

Instead, she let her head tilt to one side, unthreatening. “All I’m saying, sugar, is that we can do both. We get our hands on the diamonds, and you get your revenge on all of old man Cutter’s descendants. But it has to be in that order. You kill Arliss Cutter too soon—or, worse yet, whack someone important to him so he comes after us—and we are all royally screwed. We need him to tell us where the diamonds are.” She kept her voice low and calm. “He does know where they are? Right?”

“I told you, I know for a fact he—”

There was that phrase again. It was like a trigger.

“How?” Shayna said, throwing caution to the wind. “Howdo you know? What are those facts you think you know?”

“The grandfather was always carving on a hunk of wood,” Ricky said. “This marshal is always carving on a hunk of wood. Could be old man Cutter hid the diamonds in one of his carvings and gave it to the grandson—”

“Holy shit!” Shayna’s hand shot to the top of her head. She held the phone closer to her lips. “Could be?Are you getting all this, Leo?” Then, to Ricky, “Do you even hear yourself? Maybe he put the diamonds in a hunk of wood? That’s a guess! Not a fact!” She took a step closer to Pink. “The longer I am involved with this goat rope, the more I doubt Arliss Cutter even knows there were any diamonds to begin with.”

“Shayna, I—”

“Oh no you don’t, Ricky Lee Pink,” she snapped, building up a head of steam. “Don’t youShayname! Your tiny little brain is carrying around so much hate for some dead old man that you’ve invented this fantasy and attached it to the stolen diamonds. Do you even understand whatknow for a factmeans? It means you have evidence, not some horseshit fever dream of revenge againstsomebody who had the gall to be born the grandson of the man who killed your friend. Well, boo-hoo-hoo. We’ve all had friends get killed.”

“Cutter’s wife was sick,” Pink said, the whine evident in his voice. “He needed the money. It made sense that—”

“That is the stupidest shit show I—”