Page 3 of Lone Star Wanted
“No,” he muttered, tacking on some profanity.
Cassidy stared at him and stared. “Shit,” she spat out, and then she groaned. “Get in the truck,” she ordered. “We need to talk. And you’re not going to like what I have to say.”
Kincade didn’t argue. He crossed the clearing, every step reminding him that his body had been through hell. He yanked open the passenger door and climbed in, the seat scorching hot against his skin even through his jeans.
Cassidy slid in behind the wheel, not looking at him right away. She fired up the engine, and the old truck rumbled to life. The A/C blasted from the vents, doing its best to cut through the stifling September air. Kincade leaned back, the seat digging into his spine, the sting of dried blood at his temple pulsing with each heartbeat.
She glanced over at him finally, her eyes sweeping the gash above his eyebrow. “How bad are you hurt?” she asked as she started the drive.
He reached up, fingers brushing the edge of the wound. “Not bad.”
That was a lie. His head was pounding, and his ribs felt like they’d been stomped by a bull. But he didn’t want to talk about injuries, not when Travis was missing.
She huffed. “I’m taking you to the hospital.”
He didn’t argue. Not because he wanted to go, but because he might actually need to. Still, it wasn’t the priority.
“You said I wasn’t going to like what you had to tell me,” he reminded her. “Let’s hear it.”
Cassidy exhaled hard and turned down a narrow road that curved past cattle fences and fields gone to dust. She reached onto the center console, picked up her phone, and tapped the screen. After a few swipes, she handed it over.
He took it. One glance at the screen, and his stomach dropped. It was an official APB. Fresh. Timestamps less than twelve hours old.
WANTED – TRAVIS PRESCOTT. Subject is considered armed and dangerous. Primary suspect in the homicide of Daniel Harlan, former County Prosecutor. Approach with caution. Use of force is authorized.
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Chapter Two
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Cassidy watched Kincade stare at the phone screen as if the words might rearrange themselves. “Why the hell does someone think Travis killed a county prosecutor?”
Cassidy didn’t answer right away. Didn’t have an answer that would make sense anyway.
“He’s not just a suspect,” she said, forcing the words through the tight muscles in her throat. “He’s their only one. They put out the bulletin statewide. Everyone with a badge is hunting for him.”
Kincade swore under his breath, the word sharp and raw. He dragged a hand down his face, then looked out the windshield. She’d expected anger. Maybe disbelief.
But what she saw was something worse.
Guilt.
Like part of him already felt he’d failed Travis.
She got that. Cassidy was feeling a crapload of guilt, too. Travis was her brother. Her protector. And now that the tables were turned, she hadn’t been able to protect him—not from the lies, not from the manhunt, and not from some trigger-happy cop itching to be the one to bring in a murder suspect.
The weight of that failure settled deep in her chest, coiled tight like barbed wire.
Cassidy kept one hand on the wheel, the other fisted in her lap. She didn’t add to the explanation she owed Kincade. Not yet. Not with everything building in her chest like a storm she didn’t know how to stop.
“Two nights ago, Travis called me,” Cassidy was finally able to say, her voice as steady as she could manage. “Said he had answers about Alisha.”
“Alisha,” Kincade repeated. Not a question. Of course, he knew who she was.
“Our cousin,” she provided, though he knew that, too. She just needed to say it to try to level out herself and the rest of what she had to tell him.
Cassidy gripped the wheel tighter. “She was murdered when she was seventeen. Strangled. Dumped in a field outside town. There were no witnesses. No weapon. Just a terrified teenager, Aaron Clegg, who cracked after hours of interrogation without a lawyer. He confessed to killing her, and the cops stopped looking at anyone or anything else.”
