Smooth-Talking Texan Page 15

  “You’re trying to get him to confess and testify against the others, so that you will have a case.”

  “Is that all you think I’m interested in?” Quinn asked, his voice deadly quiet. “Making a case? You think this is just another notch on the belt for me?”

  Lisa saw the anger in his still face and, behind it, lurking in his eyes, the hurt. She drew a calming breath. “No. Of course not. Look, let’s both calm down. I know that you are concerned for Benny. And that you care about that poor boy who was killed. But you act as if I am trying to hurt him. I’m not. I have a duty to give him the best legal protection I can. And I would not be doing that if I ignored one of the basic tenets of the law. What kind of lawyer would I be if I broke client confidentiality just because I like you and trust you?”

  “Benny could be in danger. Miguel Sanchez was in and out of that house, just like Benny. I’m guessing that either there’s some sort of drug war going on between them and another gang or within this gang. Or the drug ring decided for some reason that this kid was a liability. What if they decide that Benny is a liability to them, too?”

  “Let me point out that if that is true, if this young man’s confederates are the ones who killed him, then every time you pull Benny in, you are endangering him. What if it makes them suspicious? What if they decide that Benny broke down and confessed something to you?”

  “You think that doesn’t worry me?” he asked. “But I want to give Benny a chance to get out of this. And I have to solve the case. I can’t let these crimes continue. You say you have a duty to Benny. But I have a duty to the people of this county. I have to stop this, and I think Benny is my best chance of doing so. And you know as well as I that if Benny would just tell me what’s going on, turn state’s evidence, I could take him into protective custody so that the others can’t hurt him. You can make a deal for him with the prosecutor, and he could come out with little to no time.”

  “If he is involved and if that’s in Benny’s best interests, then I will do so,” Lisa replied. “But it’s my client’s decision. Are you making him an offer?”

  “I can’t guarantee him anything,” Quinn replied tersely. “That’s for the D.A. to decide. But if he can blow this case open, as I suspect he can, then I’m sure Keith Cavanaugh will deal with him. We can’t do anything for him, though, unless he tells us what’s going on. And I sure as hell can’t put him anyplace safe until I can find him! I have to know where he is!”

  “I don’t know where he is,” Lisa replied honestly. “He did call me last night. But he didn’t tell me where he was. Is he not at his grandmother’s house?”

  “No. That’s the first place I looked. I went there last night, and Mrs. Fuentes said she would call me as soon as she heard from him. This morning, before I could even go over there again, she called me. She was worried because Benny never came home last night. We’ve checked out his friends’ houses. We have a twenty-four-hour watch on Mr. Rodriguez’s house, but it’s been extremely quiet. Hardly anyone in or out for the last couple of days. I think they’ve pulled out of there because we’re onto it. I don’t know if Benny’s hiding or on the run or…if something’s happened to him, too.”

  A chill ran through Lisa and she remembered her uneasy feeling the night before when she talked to Benny. “Well, he called me in the evening yesterday, about ten, I’d say. I think he was all right then. But he didn’t say anything about where he was or where he was going. It was very brief. I did tell him that I thought it was pretty serious and asked him to come meet with me, but he didn’t agree to.” She shrugged. “That’s all I know. If he calls me again, I’ll tell him what you said about the D.A. being willing to deal with him. I can’t guarantee anything.”

  “I know.” Quinn sighed and set his cup of coffee down on the counter, untouched. “I’m sorry if I jumped on you a while ago. I know you have Benny’s interests at heart. I’m just on edge—”

  “I understand.” Lisa went to him and put her arms around his waist, leaning her head against his chest. It bothered her that they had argued again about Benny. It seemed as if at the first sign of conflict in their jobs, the idyllic closeness between them the last two weeks had just flown out the window. Had she been fooling herself that she could have everything—her job and a life with Quinn?

  Quinn gave her a squeeze and planted a kiss on the top of her head. “I better go now. I have a meeting at eight with some guys from the DPS. The newspaper in San Antonio ran a story about Miguel Sanchez and the first body, and now everybody wants to help. It’ll be a madhouse here pretty soon if I can’t head some of them off.”

  “Okay.” Lisa smiled at him, and he kissed her briefly, then left.

  She stood at the door after she had closed it. She felt uneasy…about Quinn…about Benny. She wished that Benny had agreed to meet her last night. She thought back over their conversation. She wasn’t sure exactly why he had called. He had asked her about the identity of the murdered young man—but had that really been the only purpose for his call? His grandmother had already told him about it, and the news was all over town. He could have gotten confirmation from anyone. He had sounded nervous, and she suspected that he had called to tell her something or ask her something and then had backed off, afraid.

  Apparently he had run away or gone into hiding locally. Who was he hiding from? Was it the sheriff, who was obviously looking for him? Or had he been afraid of someone else? Lisa wondered if he was already in hiding when he called her or if he had left afterward. But she had an idea about where Benny might have gone.

  She felt guilty about not telling Quinn about her hunch, but she could scarcely turn her own client over to him—and, anyway, it was only a guess. Perhaps later she would check it out herself…if she was right, then she could tell Benny what Quinn had told her.

  Lisa finished dressing and went to work, where the office was once again abuzz with the subject of the murdered young man. Lisa went to her office and settled down with a stack of cases that she had been neglecting recently. It took a little effort, but after a while, she was able to shut both Quinn and Benny out of her mind—at least for several minutes at a time.

  An hour or two after lunch—a half-tasted sandwich eaten at her desk—there was a knock on her door.

  Surprised, Lisa lifted her head. “Come in.”

  Her secretary opened the door and stuck her head inside. “There’s a Mr. Garza out here to see you. He doesn’t have an appointment.”

  “Garza?” It was a common name, but it didn’t ring any bells.

  “Enrique Garza.”

  “Oh!” That was the name of the man who had hired her to represent Benny. Lisa’s stomach tightened nervously. If Quinn was right, he was involved in a crime ring and possibly murder. “Uh…all right, send him in.”

  After all, she reminded herself, what could the man do here in her office when her secretary and who knows how many other people had seen him come in? She rose to her feet as he walked in the door. He was dressed in designer slacks and a silk shirt, casual but expensive, as his clothes had been the other time she’d met him—and looking nothing at all like anyone from Hammond or Angel Eye. She put a smile on her face as she motioned toward the chair in front of her desk.

  “Mr. Garza. Can I help you?”

  Garza smiled thinly. “I hope so, Miss Mendoza. I am looking for Benny Hernandez.”

  “Oh?” Lisa kept her expression mildly curious, hoping that she did not betray the fact that her nerves had started jumping wildly at his question. “I’m sorry, but he is not here, as you can see.”

  “Yeah. I didn’t figure he was. I was thinking, though, you might have heard from him…since you’re his attorney.”

  “No. I haven’t heard from him in some time,” Lisa lied coolly. “Is there some reason why I should?”

  He shrugged. “No. I thought maybe he was in trouble. Nobody can find him. So I thought maybe he would have called you.”

  “I see.” Lisa looked at him for a moment.
“I’m sorry that I can’t be of more help. Have you tried his house?”

  “Yeah. And his friends. Nobody’s seen him.” He paused for a moment, then said, “What’s going on with his case? I know that sheriff hauled him in again.”

  “Yes, but as you no doubt know, he released him again.”

  “Does he have anything on the kid?”

  “Mr. Garza, I really can’t discuss my client or his case with you. I realize that you hired me to represent Mr. Hernandez, but Mr. Hernandez is the one who is my client, no matter who is paying the bills. I am sure that you will understand that I cannot divulge anything to you. That’s privileged information.”

  Garza sat for a moment, regarding her with his flat, dark eyes. His gaze unnerved her, but she was careful not to shift or twitch or in any other way reveal that fact.

  “So are you saying you wouldn’t tell me where he is if you knew?” he asked finally.

  “Not without obtaining my client’s permission first,” Lisa responded. “However, since I don’t know where he is, it’s a moot point.”

  “Yeah. Right.” He rose smoothly to his feet and started toward the door, then turned back. “You know, Miss Mendoza, you should watch who you hang out with. You’re spending a lot of time with that sheriff. Doesn’t seem like a good idea.”

  There was something chilling about the look in his eyes as they focused on her face, but Lisa was too angered by his words to let that stop her. “I beg your pardon?” she told him icily. “I don’t think my relationship with Sheriff Sutton is any of your business—or anyone else’s.”

  “It is if it means you favor him over your clients.”

  “Are you accusing me of unethical conduct?” Lisa snapped. “I can assure you that I have not done anything that would be detrimental to any of my clients, nor would I ever do so. My personal life and my law practice are completely separate, and I don’t allow either of them to interfere with the other.”

  “Well, that’s good,” he replied, unaffected by her outrage. “I hope you make sure it stays that way.”

  He turned and walked out of the office. As soon as the door was shut, Lisa flopped down in her chair. Her stomach was churning and her knees were weak. She wasn’t sure whether she was more mad or scared. She wished she knew exactly how deeply Benny was involved in this. Benny was not a bad kid. Lisa was sure of that. But he could easily have gotten into something over his head.

  She stood up and walked over to the window, leaning against the wall and looking out at the tangle of branches outside her window. In summer the leaves of the tree shaded her window and cooled the office, blocking the view. But now, in October, the leaves had been drifting to the ground, so that the branches were bare in patches, and she could see through them. As she looked out idly, thinking, she saw the form of Enrique Garza walk down the sidewalk away from her building. She watched as he crossed the street and continued on the other side, stopping beside a dark blue Mercedes, as sleek and expensive as his clothes.

  She watched as he opened the driver’s door and got into his car. But the car did not pull out from the curb. Instead, she saw the side windows slide down, and still the car sat in its place. Without thinking, Lisa slid farther to the side of the window, so that her body was not visible through the window. She waited, and so did Enrique Garza.

  Lisa realized that he was not going to leave. A little frisson of fear ran through her. Garza was keeping a watch on her.

  Chapter 11

  Lisa moved away from the window, going instinctively to the phone to dial Quinn’s number. But she stopped, her hand on the receiver. No. She couldn’t call Quinn about this. He would come over and roust Garza out, and that would accomplish nothing except to convince Garza that she was in league with the sheriff. Besides, she couldn’t go running to Quinn with all her problems, like a helpless female. She had a client who was in all likelihood in trouble, and her first priority was to help him.

  She sat down at her desk and picked up one of her pads, starting to doodle as she always did when she was thinking. Garza’s interest was in finding Benny. Therefore, she knew, he was watching her building in the hopes that Benny would come there to seek her help—or that, if she knew where Benny was, she would leave the building and go to him, enabling Garza to follow her and find Benny.

  Clearly, then, she could not follow her first instinct, which had been to act on her hunch about Benny’s whereabouts. Instead, she would remain here the rest of the afternoon, giving no hint that she had a clue about where Benny was, and hope that Garza would grow bored and leave. If not, she would have to come up with a plan to throw him off before she set out to find Benny. She didn’t know why Garza wanted to find Benny, but she felt sure that it was not because he wanted to help him.

  Since Garza was looking for Benny, that meant that Benny was hiding from Garza as well as from the police, which must mean that Benny was afraid of him. It also meant, she thought thankfully, that the other people in the smuggling ring had not killed Benny, as the other young man had been killed, a worry that had been growing in Lisa all day. No doubt Benny had contacted her last night because he was confused and scared, but then he had not been able to bring himself to tell her about the situation.

  Lisa knew that he might very well contact her again. She did not think that Benny would come to her office without calling first, but if he did, he would walk right into Garza’s hands. Therefore, she had to try to prevent his coming here. She reached for her phone, then hesitated, her thoughts going back to Enrique Garza. She was being paranoid, she told herself; Garza would not have been able to put a bug on her phone—and surely Quinn wouldn’t have, either. Still…she reached into her purse and pulled out her mobile digital phone. She flipped through her Rolodex until she found the number for Benny’s grandmother and dialed it. From what Quinn had said, she didn’t think that Senora Fuentes knew where Benny was, but the old woman could have been lying to Quinn. However much his grandmother might dislike what Benny was doing, that did not mean she would turn him over to the sheriff if he was in serious trouble.

  “Señora Fuentes, this is Lisa Mendoza, your grandson Benny’s attorney.”

  “Si? Do you know where Benny is? Is he there?”

  “No. I don’t know where he is. But if you should happen to see Benny, would you please tell him I want to help him. Tell him to call me at this number—do you have a pen and paper?”

  “Si. Un momento.”

  The old woman put down the phone and returned a minute later. “Okay.”

  Lisa gave her the number to her mobile phone. “Tell him to call that number, not my office number. And tell him not to come to my office. Comprende?”

  “Si, comprendo. This is very bad, isn’t it, miss?”

  “I’m afraid it could be. But I want to help Benny. He needs legal advice.”

  After she hung up, she looked up another telephone number in the yellow pages and dialed it.

  “Moonstone Café.”

  “Is Teresa working there today?”

  “Sure. You want to talk to her?”

  “Please.”

  She waited, and after a while a young voice came on the line. “This is Teresa.”

  “Teresa, this is Lisa Mendoza, Benny’s attorney.”

  “Yes?” The girl’s voice turned wary.

  “I don’t know whether you have seen Benny or are likely to see him, but if you do, I wanted to let him know that I would like to talk to him. But he must not come to my office. Do you understand? Could you give him that message?”

  “Yes…if I see him,” Teresa answered carefully.

  Lisa gave the girl her mobile number and repeated her warning about coming to the office. Teresa responded that she understood, and something in her carefully noncommittal voice told Lisa that she had guessed right about where Benny had gone.

  She hung up and tried to settle down to the work before her on the desk, but it was hard going. Every few minutes, she got up and edged over to the window to peek out
at Garza’s car. It was still there, and she assumed Garza was still in it, though from this distance it was hard to see a person inside it.

  Almost an hour passed before her mobile phone rang. Lisa grabbed it. “Yes?”

  “Ms. Mendoza?”

  “Benny! I’m glad you called.”

  “Yeah. I—I don’t know what to do.” Benny’s voice sounded young and scared. “I think I’m in trouble.”

  “Yes, I think you may be. We have to talk, Benny. You need legal advice. The sheriff has been by looking for you, and so has Mr. Garza.”

  She heard a whispered curse, followed by a brief silence. Then Benny said softly, “Enrique Garza? He was looking for me?”

  “Yes, he came to ask me if I knew where you were. Of course, I told him I did not. But he’s sitting in his car in front of my office building—that’s why I said for you not to come here. Is there someplace else I could meet you?”

  “I—I don’t know. What if he follows you?”

  “I was thinking, perhaps I could go to the café for supper. I don’t think he would follow me inside—it would be too conspicuous. And he wouldn’t think I was meeting you—especially if I joined a friend there.”

  “Not the sheriff!” Benny blurted out.

  “No. Not the sheriff. A woman friend.”

  “Okay,” he said after a moment. “Yeah, that would probably work.”

  “All right. I will go to the Moonstone sometime after work, say six or six-thirty. I don’t want it to look unusual.”

  “Sure. See you.”

  Lisa hung up, sat for another moment, lips pursed, thinking, then looked once again in the yellow pages and dialed the number for Gallagher Realty. A receptionist answered the phone and told her cheerily that Eve Gallagher was out in the field with a client and would not be returning until well after seven. Lisa thanked her, declined to leave a message, and hung up. She sat for a long moment, looking thoughtfully at her phone. The only other person she could think of to meet her at the restaurant was Meredith.