Someone Like You (19 page)

As Mac approached, the two men glanced up. Rudy shifted toward the wall of their booth.

“Sheriff Kendrick, join us.”

“No, thanks.”

He kept his gaze on Rudy, watching for any kind of reaction. But Rudy was too smooth and practiced for that. He raised his eyebrows expectantly.

“What is it, Mac?” the mayor asked.

“Ask your friend.”

Rudy swirled his glass of iced tea and looked pleasantly baffled. “I have no idea why you're here.”

“The room above the barbershop is being used for gambling. I thought I'd find out what you know about it.”

“Nothing at all,” Rudy said smoothly.

Franklin frowned. “Sheriff, are you accusing Mr. Casaccio of something?”

Mac glared at him. “You got that right. Your friend here is bringing his dirty business to our town. Don't you get that? He's out for a buck and he doesn't care who or what gets destroyed in the process.”

Franklin frowned. “Those are pretty serious accusations. Do you have any evidence?”

“His employees are running the place.”

Rudy sipped his tea, then picked up a tortilla chip. “Interesting. Except for Mr. Smith—” he nodded at the small table next to the booth where the suit-clad body guard sat over a plate of enchiladas “—and the
driver of my car, I have no employees in town. I'm here strictly on holiday.”

Annoyance grew into anger. Mac turned to the mayor. “You can't be blind to this. Your town is being overrun by organized crime. Sure, now it's just a friendly game of poker, but then what? Can't you see this is already escalating?”

“Sheriff, you're accusing one of our leading citizens of some fairly serious charges. Do you have any evidence?”

Mac stared at the two of them. Was Franklin so deeply in Rudy's pockets that he refused to see the truth? Or did the man seriously think Rudy wouldn't destroy Los Lobos?

As for evidence, Mac knew there wasn't any. The people they'd arrested would claim to have never met Rudy Casaccio, much less worked for him. No doubt a very experienced, very expensive lawyer would show up to get them out on bail and when the time came for trial, the judge would dismiss all charges. He'd seen it hap pen before, but he never thought it would happen here.

“I'll find a way to nail you for this,” Mac said.

Rudy sighed. “And here I'd wanted to make a sizable contribution to your campaign. Aren't you running in November?”

“I don't need money from you.”

“Sometimes we don't know
what
we need, Sheriff. Just remember, I'm always willing to be a friend.”

“No, thanks.” Mac glanced at Franklin. “You're making a big mistake. He's taking you places you don't
want to go, and if you can't see that, you're a bigger idiot than I thought.”

With that, he turned on his heel and stalked out of the restaurant. Temper fueled him until he wanted to punch something. Anything. Dammit all to hell, this could
not
be happening.

Too angry to drive, he left the car by the restaurant. Let Rudy have to call the station to get it moved so he could get his limo out.

Two blocks later, Mac wasn't any closer to calming down. Why was he the only one who saw the truth about Rudy? Everyone else thought he was God's gift to Los Lobos. Jill was his friend, the mayor was his slave and even Bev was dating the guy. It didn't make sense. Was he the only one who—

“Hey, you. Sheriff.”

Mac turned toward the man on the corner. He stood across the street from the sheriff's office. Medium height, sandy-blond hair and mean-looking. Mac clenched his fists. He was more than in the mood for a fight.

“Is there a problem?” he asked, his voice thick with menace. Anyone with a brain would know to back away. This guy only moved closer.

“Yeah, there's a problem. You're the problem.” The man approached, stopping less than a foot in front of Mac. “Where do you get off bugging my wife?”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

Mac had heard all right, but it didn't mean anything. “What are you talking about?”

“You went to see my wife the other day. She didn't
tell me because she thought I'd be mad, and she was right about that.” The man leaned in close. “Keep your stinking hands off her.”

Mac could only think of one woman he'd visited in the past few days. “You're Kim Murphy's husband,” he said. “Andy.”

“That's right.”

Mac turned his back and headed for the office. “I don't have time to deal with you and your crap.”

He heard Andy run up behind him. “Come on, you coward pig,” Andy yelled. “Don't walk away from me.”

Mac couldn't believe it. He stopped and turned to face Andy. “You don't want to do this,” he said.

“I sure do. Where the hell do you get off talking to my wife? She's mine, you hear?”

“She's your
wife,
not your possession, you disgusting piece of shit. You have no right to treat her the way you do. If you're looking for a fight, go beat up on someone your own size.”

Andy's eyes brightened with temper. “You volunteering? Because I'm happy to take you on.”

Mac shook his head. “You and what army? You're a bully. You wouldn't dare hit someone who would fight back. You might get hurt. You're the kind of man who gets his kicks beating up on defenseless women. You're disgusting.”

Color darkened Andy's face. “She's my wife, which is the same as saying she's my dog. I'll do anything I want to her and you can't stop me.”

Mac felt his control slip. He tried to grab it, then
figured what the hell. He punched Andy square on the jaw. The man staggered a few steps and shot out his fist, but Mac avoided it easily. Two more well-placed blows and the whole thing was over. Andy knelt on the asphalt, holding his nose and groaning. Mac stood over him, un touched and knowing he'd just made a really big mistake.

Seconds later the front doors of the sheriff's office banged open and everyone on duty poured into the street.

“What happened?” Wilma asked. “You got in a fight?”

Mac glanced from his bleeding knuckles to Andy's battered face. His stomach balled into a knot.

Andy staggered to his feet. “He jumped me. He can't do that, even if he's the sheriff. He just beat the crap out of me and I want him arrested and thrown in jail.”

J
ILL HAD BARELY FINISHED
her brief conversation with Riley Whitefield when the phone rang again.

“Law offices,” she said.

“Jill? It's Wilma. You need to get down here right away. Mac was just in a fistfight and the guy wants to press charges.”

Still clutching the phone, Jill stood and grabbed her purse. “What? Wilma, you're not making sense.
Mac
was in a fight?”

“Oh, yeah. He cracked the guy good. I'm not saying he didn't deserve it, but he sure doesn't need the trouble. Not now.”

Jill wasn't sure which “he” they were talking about, but she decided it didn't matter.

“I'll be right there. Don't let Mac leave until I get there.”

“Don't worry. He's not going anywhere for a while. We have to figure out how to keep from arresting him.” With that, the older woman hung up.

“Arresting him?” Jill repeated as she raced to the front of the office and quickly locked the door. “They can't do that.”

Arrest Mac? Not only would that seriously impact his ability to do his job, what about the custody issues
with Emily? There were some basic requirements put in place by the courts and one of them was to stay out of trouble. Getting arrested could fall into that category.

She had the BMW with her, so the trip across town took less than ten minutes. She parked and rushed inside to find the place in bedlam. Deputies were standing around talking about how Mac had done the right thing. Mac sat on the corner of a desk with a bag of ice wrapped around his knuckles. Wilma hovered over him, clucking like a mother hen, and in a back office, a man gestured wildly while blood trickled from his nose.

“Not good,” Jill muttered under her breath. She might specialize in corporate law, but she knew enough about how the world worked to suspect Mac was in a truck load of trouble.

“What happened?” she asked as she pushed through the deputies and approached Mac. “Are you okay?”

He looked at her and she was relieved to see he wasn't hurt. Well, except for his knuckles.

Mac's dark blue eyes seemed filled with pain, but not the physical kind. “I'm completely screwed,” he muttered.

“Not necessarily. He punched you first, right?”

Wilma shooed the deputies away, while Mac shrugged and said, “I'm not sure he got a punch off.”

The girly part of her was pleased her man was such a good fighter. The lawyer part winced.

“Tell me what happened. Start from the beginning.”

Mac explained about Andy approaching him and how he'd told him to stay away from Kim.

“He said she was his wife, which was the same as saying she was his dog and he could do anything he wanted.”

“Then he threatened you,” Jill said, trying to get it all straight.

“No, he threatened me before. I punched him after the dog comment.”

“But he did threaten you.”

“Sure.”

“At least that's something.”

Mac glanced back at the rear office where Andy held a cloth to his nose. “Someone get him out of here. Take him to the hospital.”

D.J. moved closer. “You think that's a good idea, boss? Should we just take him home and let him cool off?”

Jill knew what the deputy was thinking. A trip to the hospital meant paperwork, which could later be used as evidence.

Mac narrowed his gaze. “Take him to the hospital now. Then have someone drive him home. We'll get his car to him later. In the meantime, send someone to his house to get Kim out of there for a few hours. She can't be around when he's released from the hospital. He'll want to take his pain out on someone and I don't want that to be her.”

“I'll take care of Kim,” Wilma said as she collected her purse from her desk drawer. “I used to know her mother before she moved to L.A. I'll go over for a visit.”

“See if you can convince her to spend the night
some where else.” Mac removed the ice and flexed his hand. “Otherwise he's going to beat the crap out of her.”

Jill was afraid he was right. “You didn't have a choice,” she said.

He glared at her. “Sure I did. There's always a choice. But I had a hell of a morning and then this guy showed up, looking for a fight. So I gave it to him.”

“He deserved it.”

“You think that's what the district attorney is going to say on Monday morning when Andy wants to press charges? I don't.”

Jill wanted to stamp her foot in frustration. “So Andy gets to treat his pregnant wife like a punching bag, even break a few bones and that's fine, but when you teach him a lesson, you get in trouble.”

Mac stared at her. “It's not that simple.”

“I know. It's just not fair.” She moved close and took his hand in hers. The knuckles were split and swollen. “You clocked him good.”

“I had a lot of practice when I was a kid. I guess that's something a guy doesn't forget how to do.”

“I'm sorry,” she said as she touched his shoulder. “Can I do anything?”

“Get me the name of a good lawyer.”

“You think it's going to go that far?”

“I haven't a clue. But I do know the second Hollis Bass finds out, there's going to be hell to pay.”

Jill's eyes widened. The social worker. She'd forgotten about him. “He already thinks cops make lousy fathers and that you have an anger-control issue.”

“Thanks for reminding me.”

“Oh, Mac, this could be bad.”

“I know.” He turned away and stared out the window. “The thing is, I have no one to blame but myself. I should have walked away. Now the joint-custody agreement is at risk. And for what?”

She felt sick to her stomach. “Is there anything I can do?”

He smiled, but not in a humorous way. “I think you've done enough already.”

She didn't like the sound of that. “What do you mean?”

“Just that your out-of-town friend, the one who is only here looking for a good time, seems to have brought his old ways along.”

Oh, God. What had Rudy done? She braced herself. “Meaning?”

“I closed down a tidy gambling club this morning. It was very nice. Bar, craps table, the whole thing. Of course no one working there claims to know Rudy, but you and I have been around the block a few times. We know who's responsible.”

He turned cold eyes on her. “Unless you want to convince me that I have it all wrong and that Rudy has changed.”

She didn't know what to say. She couldn't think, couldn't speak. This wasn't happening.

“It's a real bummer, too,” Mac continued. “Because Rudy offered me a sizable contribution to my campaign. Not that I expect to be running. What with the mayor in Rudy's back pocket, I would say my chances of reelec
tion are close to zero.” He stood. “Good to know that Rudy's a changed man, because I'd hate to meet up with him when he was still breaking the law.”

With that he walked toward his office. Jill watched him go. She felt cold inside. Cold and sad. She and Mac were to have spent the afternoon together. Hard to believe that everything could change for the worst in such a short period of time.

 

J
ILL ARRIVED
at her office on Monday shortly after nine. She felt as if she'd been run over by a big truck. Everything inside of her hurt and she couldn't say why.

Okay, lack of sleep had something to do with it. She'd spent most of the previous night pacing. And maybe not eating contributed to her situation. She hadn't been able to choke down a bite since Saturday morning.

Adding to her being out of sorts was the fact that she hadn't seen Mac, either. While she'd spent most of Sun day spying out her front window, she'd never seen his truck or his sheriff's car parked in his driveway. Had he and Emily left town? Had Mac's ex-wife found out about the fight and taken the girl away and had Mac disappeared who knows where?

Rudy was also missing in action, which annoyed the hell out of her. When she'd returned home Saturday, she'd found a note from her aunt saying she and Rudy had taken off for San Francisco for the rest of the weekend, and that Jill wasn't to worry. Jill had paged Rudy, but he hadn't bothered getting in touch with her.

He'd probably figured out that she was very unhappy with him. How dare he tell her he was just in town for
some R and R, only to set up an illegal gambling operation. She might not want to spend the rest of her life in Los Lobos, but by God she wasn't going to stand by and watch Rudy destroy the town.

Plus, he'd betrayed her. As much as she wanted to, she couldn't ignore that hard truth. She'd known Rudy for nearly three years and, in all that time, he'd been completely aboveboard with her. There hadn't been a hint of illegal activity. The businesses she dealt with were squeaky-clean enough to be models of what to do to stay on the right side of the law.

Had he been playing her for a fool? Okay, so she wasn't technically his lawyer anymore, but hadn't he told her he would bring his business to her when she got settled? She'd been counting on that three million in billing to put a smile on her new employer's face. It looked as if that wasn't going to be happening. It had been one thing to represent Rudy when, to the best of her knowledge, he'd been completely legit. Now that she knew firsthand about illegal activities, she didn't want to have anything to do with him.

She got out of her car and walked to the front door. Okay, technically she didn't know
firsthand
, but she knew Mac wouldn't lie, which meant—

The door was open. Jill had a brief thought that some one had broken into the office before she realized she could smell coffee and hear someone humming. Had Tina decided to show up at a decent time?

Jill stepped inside. Sure enough her assistant/secretary/receptionist was already behind her desk and hard at work. Papers spit out of the computer printer, the
copy machine zipped back and forth fast enough to make the entire stand shake and, surprise of surprises, the “to be filed” box was empty.

“Morning,” Tina said cheerfully as Jill carefully stepped into the office.

Had aliens descended and abducted Tina, only to put a perky look-alike in her place?

“Morning. What time did you get here?”

“Eight. My husband's staying home with the kids this morning, so I thought I'd get an early start.”

Jill didn't know what to say. As she crossed toward her own office, she noticed several packing boxes and—her breath caught in her throat—fish filling the boxes. Fish that were no longer on the walls. There was a serious absence of fish.

“You're taking them down?” she asked, trying to sound casual and not at all as if she wanted to break out some rusty cheerleading routines and root for the home team.

“Yeah. I called Mrs. Dixon yesterday and she's ready to have us take them down and bring them to her.”

“Fine by me,” Jill said as she walked into her office and came to a complete stop.

Here there were almost no fish and the netting was gone, too. Aliens, she told herself. It had to be aliens. Or a cult.

She put down her purse and returned to the reception area. “Okay, I'm still leaving. I have a couple of inter views lined up and I've already turned down two offers.”

Tina smiled. “I know. It's really a shame you have to go. You've done so much for the town.”

Her smile was sincere, her pupils weren't dilated and there weren't any scales or horns sticking out anywhere Jill could see. So what was up?

“Oh, you have a FedEx package on your desk.”

“Thanks.” Jill walked back into her office, then returned to stand by Tina's desk. “Okay. I can't stand it. You're being nice. What is it? Do you want a raise?”

“Well, sure. I wouldn't say no.” Tina smiled. Then her humor faded. “But that's not the reason. I heard what happened. You talked to Mac and he gave Andy a taste of his own medicine. Someone should have done that years ago.”

So that's what this was about. Revenge on a bully. Jill thought about mentioning that Mac was in some serious trouble for what he'd done. He could lose his job and his daughter.

“The whole town is talking about it,” Tina continued. “Everyone is really happy.”

“It's too bad no one bothered to intervene before,” Jill told her. “Andy's been using his wife as a punching bag for a lot of years.”

Tina sighed. “I know. It's just…”

“Right. No one wanted to get involved.”

Mac had, she thought glumly. But in the wrong way.

“I'll be in my office,” she said.

“Oh, you have an appointment at nine-thirty. Riley Whitefield will be in to talk about his uncle's will.”

That was fast, Jill thought as she moved toward her
desk. It had been a long time since she'd last seen Los Lobos's favorite bad boy and the guy who had broken Gracie's heart. She wondered how time had treated him and what he would say when he found out about the terms of his uncle's will.

 

“I
DON'T HAVE A CHOICE
,” John Goodwin said. It was only nine in the morning, but the Los Lobos district attorney had already discarded his suit jacket, loosened his tie and rolled up the sleeves of his long-sleeved white shirt. “I'm sorry, Mac.”

“Me, too.” Mac slouched in the chair and reminded himself he'd started the trouble with Andy Murphy and it looked as if he was going to have to see it through.

“I'm not saying I don't agree with you,” John told him. “I do. I think Murphy's a bastard. But with his wife unwilling to press charges and no one else coming for ward as a witness to the beatings, my hands are tied. He wants to file charges and I can't ignore that. I'll go as slow as I can. We'll need to do a thorough investigation. But the best I can do is buy you time.”

“I appreciate that.”

John, a big bear of a man, slapped a file on his already overflowing desk. “You'll need a lawyer. Get a good one. I can give you some recommendations.”