Page 15 of Backtrack

“I’m gonna kill him,” Ricky Lee whispered.

Duvall chewed on his bottom lip. “You do that,” he said. “After we find the diamonds.”

“I don’t care about diamonds,” Ricky Lee said, his chin quivering. “I’m gonna find out who that squat little bastard is and …”

“And what?”

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“Look,” Duvall said. “Kill him and everything he loves. I don’t give a shit. There’s no way the boss lets us walk away empty-handed.”

“Millner doesn’t get to walk away at all.”

“This I know,” Duvall said. “And it chaps the hell outta me. Vince was my friend too.”

Ricky Lee was locked onto the scene across the highway. His face glowed crimson, remembering how the whole horrible mess had gone down.

Ricky Lee had taken up a position alongside the truck, ready todo his one job—take care of the guard on the passenger side. But he’d just stood there, staring, when the man bailed out armed with a shotgun. The guard raised the gun to fire, but a shot from the rear of the truck put him down. He toppled over, disappearing into the tall grass of a nearby ditch.

Ricky Lee turned to find Millner holding a shotgun of his own. Stunned by the boom of gunfire and the realization that Millner had just saved his life, Ricky Lee staggered to the rear of the truck, zombie-like.

The whole job wasn’t supposed to take more than two minutes from the time the truck pulled over. They were there almost five.

It was early, so only a few cars and trucks blew past. A farmer in a rusty old pickup gave them the stink eye. He’d looked like the kind of guy who might pull over down the road and start taking potshots with the .30-30 hanging in the back window of his truck. It seemed like an eternity before Duvall finally called it. They’d left empty-handed. Then the cop gunned down Millner. …

“… the diamonds,” Duvall said. He’d evidently been talking the whole time, but Ricky Lee hadn’t heard a word of it.

“What about the diamonds?”

“I’m saying they didn’t just disappear into thin air.” Duvall frowned at having to repeat himself. “They must have fallen out of the back when that dumb son of a bitch opened the door.” He gave a slow nod, like he was on to something. “I’ll bet you money one of those cops found the stones on the ground and shoved them in his pocket.”

“Cops …” Ricky Lee said, only half listening.

Duvall snapped his fingers. “Stay with me, kid.”

Ricky Lee turned abruptly in his seat and looked Duvall in the eye. “Don’t you do that,” he said. “My father used to snap at me like I was a dog. I didn’t like it then, and I’m damn sure not going to put up with it from you.”

Duvall raised his hands in surrender. He was not a small man, but he looked puny next to Ricky Lee. “Okay, okay. I didn’t mean anything by it. But I do need you to concentrate. First order of business is to find those diamonds. After that, you can chop that cop into itty-bitty pieces if you want. His name’s Cutter, by the way. Parker County Number 62. I heard it on the scanner while you were floating around in your own little world there. Who knows, maybe he’s the one who grabbed the diamonds.”

CHAPTER 6

PRESENT DAY

Shayna Hanford had to remind herself to shut her mouth every time she looked up at the ginormous ship docked at the Bell Street Cruise Terminal. She’d hardly ever set foot out of Van Zandt County, Texas, let alone come all the way to the West Coast. It was a little too easy for her to forget herself and gawk.

There were big changes on the horizon. That was for sure. She had a plan. It was well-thought-out and not too complicated—the best kind of plan.

Before today, she’d only ever seen a cruise ship in magazines or on TV. It never occurred to her how massive they were.The Polar Starloomed like a floating apartment building, a skyscraper on its side. Passengers in raincoats and fleece jackets lined the rail of the top deck. Others stood at private balconies, waving goodbye to downtown Seattle.

A Southern girl at heart, Shayna fought the urge to wave back from the pier. No reason to draw that kind of attention to herself. She shivered—more from excitement than the chill—and tried hard not to look like a gobsmacked tourist as she watched a tugboat maneuver the monster ship away from the docks. Her boyfriend was like the ship—big, ungainly. He sure as hell needed a ton of maneuvering. That made her the tugboat, short, slightly beamy, and very good at her job. As her daddy would have said, shewasthe brains of the outfit. Her Hollywood sunglasses, maroon tracksuit, and white Puma tennis shoes blended perfectly with the crowd that had just minutes before dropped luggage and then queued snakelike outside the Bell Street Terminal. Now, virtually alone in the shadow of the ship with her back to Anthony’s Pier 66 restaurant, she could have passed for some Russian mobster’s old lady.

A steady drizzle misted her big blond curls and roundish face. It didn’t matter. The hair was fake, and the rain cooled her off.

Men with forklifts and dollies were hustling back and forth like busy little ants loading luggage and supplies until moments before the ship’s hatches closed and it sailed off to far horizons.

Far horizons … Shayna liked the sound of that.

She’d spent almost every minute of her thirty-eight years in the great state of Texas, most of that within a hundred miles of Canton. Then, a chance website scroll about prison hookups had offered a way out, a light at the end of her extremely boring tunnel. It didn’t take her long to learn that prison relationships were better than having a dog. Put a little money on the guy’s commissary for ramen and Honey Buns, visit him as often as you wanted, have a great conversation with someone who was just so damned happy to see you—and then drive away unencumbered when you were done.