Prologue

Love Betrayed

It was a near-ludicrous contrast: Reese Adams, the six-foot, two-inch dusky-skinned half-breed youth squared off across the conference table facing a gaunt sallow-faced lawyer, thin strands of black hair pasted across his pale skull. The lawyer’s eyes, dark and sinister like the weasel the boy shot in his family’s chicken coop last Saturday, twitched and glanced down to the papers spread between himself and the boy — his target and victim — then flicked upward and bored into the boy’s confused eyes.

“You heard me right, Adams. Never! Never again, in any way whatsoever! Her family has removed her and forbidden her to ever contact you. These papers here,” and the lawyer pushed a clipped sheaf of legal documents towards the boy, “are a restraining order forbidding you to attempt any contact now and in future with Katherine Brewster, for any reason. If you violate this order the family has instructed me to seek prosecution for stalking and harassment against you to the fullest extent. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”

“No!” Reese protested. “I want to know why? Why would they do this? We’re in love, since ... since grade school. We’re going to be married later this spring. We’ve graduated. We’re going to college together. I’ve already paid this year’s fees for both of us! Just tell me, why?”

“Look at yourself in a mirror,” the lawyer snarled. “You’ll see well-enough why!”

Justice Betrayed

The blinding headlights of the black Escalade sprayed across their faces seconds before it slammed sideways into the side of their car. For a brief second they glimpsed the face of their killer, his eyes wild, unfocused, panicked. The heavier vehicle tore free and scraped past but it was too late. The Adams’ sedan, wrenched from its course, slammed into the guard cable and uprooted the support posts. It hung there for a brief instant, then plunged and rolled sixty feet down into the river.

The white-water torrent, pinched and raging through a boulder-choked narrows, shoved and tumbled their car downstream until it came to rest hidden under thick ice covering a dark, still pool. Hidden there, it would be weeks before rescue crews would find it and summon heavy equipment to winch it free and recover their bodies.

Donald “DJ” Brewster lifted his bleeding head from the steering wheel. He saw nothing in the darkness but his own dash lights. He hung at an awkward angle from his seat belt. The wrecked SUV rested at a sharp downward pitch, hanging from a tree stump halfway down the ditch bank. He choked on hot radiator fumes and his own blood. His head, face, and mouth hurt like hell. He tried to touch his face but he was trapped in the safety belt, hanging helpless.

“Oooh God!” he moaned. His high of the night was gone. That curve ... he’d forgotten that curve, doing 80 into a 45 mph curve, jerking the steering wheel and breaking into a skid. He knew he would die, would drown in the river when he skidded off the curve. But then they were there. Their car. His SUV slammed sideways into them, glanced off them, caromed back across the highway into the opposite ditch. It saved his life. It cost them theirs.

Somehow he pulled his cell phone from its dash mount. Somehow he was twice-lucky. He wasn’t too far into the canyon. The number rang. It was Todd Jenkins, their ranch manager.

The ambulance crew secured DJ’s gurney to the floor clamps, checked the IV drip, and began their silent run down-river to the valley clinic. Todd waited by the wreck for the deputy sheriff. He’d take a few moments to instruct the deputy. Then he’d drive to the clinic and instruct the night crew there.

Chief deputy Colin Rogers gathered the evidence, the half-empty liquor bottle, the beer bottles, and bagged them. He considered for a fleeting moment whether he should retain the evidence for some future bargaining chip. Then he thought better of it. Too damn risky. I’d only be hanging myself, he decided. He tossed the bag into his cruiser. Later, on another stretch of river, he’d throw the bottles into the rapids and they’d sink and be swept away. No evidence, no crime.

Later that evening, Todd whispered to the valley clinic’s ambulance crew EMT who tucked a wad of large bills into his pocket: “No blood sample, no report, no crime!”

Service Betrayed

It was written up as a routine patrol. “Yeah, right! A routine patrol,” Captain Reese Adams snarled. “There’s no such thing as ‘routine’ and we damn sure weren’t on any patrol!”

He twisted his head, a reflex move too late to avoid the spray of sand kicked into his face. Bullets slammed into the berm beside his head and punched into Corporal Evans beside him, shattering the young soldier’s head. It sprayed Reese with blood and brain matter. Reese scurried sideways, raised slightly, and fired answering three-round bursts. Nothing to see out there. They’re so damned well sheltered, rooftops and firing holes and walls. We’re screwed. He pulled a rag from his vest and wiped his face. Smeared it, truth told.

“Anderson,” he yelled. “Where in hell’s that air cover?”

“Five minutes, Cap!” Sgt. Anderson shouted back.

“Fast movers or gun ships?”

“One Apache. That’s all.”

“Shit, shit, shit!” Reese swore, choking it under his breath. “Okay. Hang tough. How’s Bailey?”

“Uhhh ... hangin’ on, Cap. Hangin’ on.”

‘Yeah, hangin’ on. Can’t yell out that a man’s dying when he can still hear,’ Reese knew.

“Doc’s workin’ on ‘im?” Reese yelled.

“No. Doc’s down.”

Moments passed. Enemy fire harassed them. Reese answered with more three-round bursts, knowing it was futile.

A sudden thump-thump of heavy blades and the snarl of a chin-mounted chain gun shattered the air above them, roaring past and rising up in a high-reaching arc, sliding around to circle and spray the buildings with devastating fire raking from side to side. Mud brick walls shattered and collapsed. Men screamed. Sporadic rifle fire blinked and vanished under the hell-fire assault. A dark figure in tattered rags raced from between walls, jumped a fallen heap, and darted toward the doorway of a small side building. The hovering gunship swung its snout like a cat spying a mouse hole and loosed a side-mounted missile that streaked out to chase the man through the door. A billowing orange ball expanded and shattered the structure apart, up and out, the roof collapsing down between crazily tilted walls.