Carson actually grinned.
“And it would be nice if you stopped wearing that damned knife in public,” Cash told the younger man, indicating the huge Bowie knife strapped to his hip. “It makes people nervous.”
“Makes her nervous, you mean,” Carson replied, jerking his head toward Carlie.
“I don’t like knives,” she muttered under her breath.
“Men with guns walk around in here all the time, you don’t mind them,” Carson retorted.
“I’ve never seen a gunshot wound. I have seen the result of a knife fight.” She gave him a long look. “I had nightmares...”
He frowned. “When was this?”
She averted her eyes. “My father was attacked a few months ago by a man with a knife. We don’t know why. He was lucky, because it went in just at the waist and didn’t even nick a vital organ.”
“Who would attack a minister?” Hayes asked, shocked.
“We don’t know,” Carlie replied sadly. “Just some crazy guy, we think. Sometimes, I think the whole world’s gone mad.”
“It does seem so, from time to time,” Tank had to agree. “Did they catch the man?”
“Not yet,” Cash answered for her. “But we’re still looking.”
“I don’t like knives,” Carlie reiterated, glaring up at Carson. “Especially that sort.” She indicated the Bowie. “It’s scary.”
“I’ll start wearing a suit so I can conceal it from you,” Carson promised dryly.
“Why would you carry something that big?” Hayes wondered.
“Snakes,” Carson said, deadpan.
“Good luck going after a sidewinder with a knife,” Tank told him. “You’d get bitten before you could reach him with it.”
“Not if it was thrown,” Carson returned. He looked so confident that the others just shrugged and let the subject go.
“Do you remember anything else about the man?” Tank asked Carlie as he studied the sketch. “Anything you didn’t tell the police artist?”
She was thinking, hard. “I’m not sure. That’s basically what he looked like,” she added, nodding at the portrait. “He was very friendly. Personable. I remember he talked to me about sharks.”
“Sharks?” Tank probed.
“He said that they were misunderstood, that people just assumed they were dangerous. But that they really weren’t. It was just when they were hungry, they killed.”
“What an odd thing to say,” Hayes remarked.
“I thought so, too,” Carlie agreed. “He said that he liked to swim with them in the Caribbean, in the Bahamas.”
“Now that might be interesting,” Hayes said.
She laughed softly. “I’d forgotten, until just now.” She glared at Carson. “He reminds me of a shark. That’s why I thought of it.”
Carson’s eyebrows arched. “A shark? Me?”
“Dark and lithe and stealthy and dangerous,” she returned. “Attacks when you least expect it, from cover.”
“An apt description. Not of you,” Tank told Carson with a grin. “But it would fit the perpetrator.” His expression became grim. “He led me into an ambush that almost cost me my life. And he did it so easily, with such finesse, that I never suspected a thing. She’s right about his personality,” he added, alluding to Carlie. “He put me at ease the minute he walked into my office. He seemed just like one of the guys.”
“I got that impression, too,” Hayes said. “He put himself right in the middle of a drug bust.” He frowned. “Something else I remember, I had two armed deputies with me. They came up unexpectedly when they heard the call go out over the radio about a traffic stop involving narcotics.” He looked at Tank. “He was shocked to see them. That was just before the other feds showed up.”
“He might have been planning the same thing for you that he did for me,” Tank suggested.
“Yes, but there was no reason for him to want me dead.” Hayes tried to make sense of it. “He was in on the arrest. He went to my office with me and waited while I filed the report on my computer, along with a photo my deputy took at the scene of the arrest and one of all of us with the drug haul and the confiscated gold-plated weapons. I wasn’t the only law enforcement officer at the bust.”
“I don’t think he meant to kill you. Not then, anyway,” Carson interjected with narrowed eyes. He perched himself on the edge of Carlie’s desk, to her obvious dislike. “I think it was something that happened after both shootouts. Something connected, but apart from them.”
“He was obviously in with the drug cartel,” Hayes replied. He nodded slowly. “He was trying to protect his people from arrest. He failed in my case, but not in yours,” he told Tank.
“Yes, but he has no reason to come after me now,” Tank said slowly. “I haven’t even spoken about the case since I gave my last report, just before I resigned from the job.”
Cash Grier leaned against the wall, arms crossed, deep in thought. “Attempted assassination,” he said, nodding toward Hayes. “Kidnapping, for no apparent reason.” He glanced at Tank. “Armed assault, followed much later by stalking and surveillance. He’s after something that happened as a result of both shootings. Maybe not the shootings themselves at all.”
“What?” Hayes asked.
Cash shook his head. “I don’t know. But there is a feverish political race going on right now for a congressional seat vacated by the unexpected death of our senior Texas U.S. senator. There’s a special election coming, although someone will be appointed to fill out the rest of his term, which ends this year. There are rumors that the leading candidate has ties to the cartel over the border, and that at least one rival candidate has been blackmailed to quit the race.”
“I had heard about that,” Tank said. “You think there may be a connection?”
“There just may be,” Hayes said. “Especially if the man we remember could be part of the drug cartel.”
“We know he is,” Cash replied. “The problem would be proving his connection. If he’s close to the candidate, that might be enough incentive for him to get rid of any witnesses. Also, he was a rogue DEA agent, a mole. I’m sure he was passing sensitive information to his cronies.”
“Maybe somebody found him out,” Tank guessed.
“Yes,” Cash replied. “But who he is—that might be the heart of the problem. If we find out his identity, and it can link him to the cartel and the candidate for the Senate...”
“That would be a motive for murder,” Hayes agreed. “A very good one.”
“I HAVE A strange feeling that all this is somehow connected to that special election in the Senate race,” Cash said with narrowed eyes.
“So do I,” Carlie piped in.
Carson gave her a mocking look. “Now you’re psychic?” he drawled.
She smiled blithely. “If I was, you’d be wearing the hilt of that big knife in your mouth,” she said sweetly.
He lifted an eyebrow and gave her a look that made her blush. Her antagonism hit him on the raw and he retaliated. “Sorry,” he said. “But if that’s flirting, it won’t work. I like my women—” he gave her a cool stare “— prettier, and more physically perfect.”
Carlie’s face fell like a rock, although she didn’t lower her gaze. She gave him a belligerent stare.
“That was uncalled for,” Cash Grier said coldly to Carson. “Apologize. Right now.”
Carson seemed to realize that he’d stepped over a line. “Sorry,” he told Carlie with a face like stone. “He’s right. It was uncalled for.”
Carlie averted her eyes. She was painfully aware of her lack of attractions. Her sense of morality wouldn’t
