Big Daddy Sheriff (Big Cedar Daddies #1)

Chapter 13

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Hector and Bruce arrived in Big Cedar with the morning sun.

They’d left Little Rock early. It took them a little under three hours to reach their destination. Neither of them wanted to be there longer than they had to be. There was no reason to drag this out. So, they figured an early start would help move the proceedings along.

With any luck, they’d have this wrapped up by lunchtime.

How hard could it be, after all?

They were after one girl in a sleepy little hick mountain town. Should be an easy job.

“Does Lana want us to kill her here?” Bruce asked.

“Nope,” Hector said. “Wants us to bring her back.”

“Is she sentimental all the sudden?”

Hector snorted a little laugh. “Who knows? Maybe she wants to say goodbye to her first. Or maybe she’s just going to keep her stashed somewhere until she figures out what to do.”

“There’s only one thing to do,” Bruce said.

Bruce knew it sounded cold and heartless, but it was the truth. If you wanted to succeed in their business, ruthlessness was the order of the day. Sometimes people had to be eliminated. He wouldn’t go against Lana’s wishes, though. It wasn’t out of respect for her or anything. He didn’t give a damn about shit like that. It was a matter of practicality. Lana paid his salary. That salary paid the bills.

He would defer to Lana as long as the money kept flowing.

“Pull over here,” Hector said.

Bruce angled the car into the driveway of a repair shop. It was a cinderblock building. Nicely kept, but it had obviously been there a while. Probably since the Sixties or maybe even before that. Even still, from what he could see, it was one of the newest buildings in that tiny town.

“They’re closed,” Hector noted.

He’s a real genius, Bruce thought.

“It’s a little past six in the morning,” Bruce said. “Why are we even here?”

“That’s where the tracking app shows the girl is.”

“In the garage?”

“Yeah.” Hector held up his phone, showing the blue dot on a gridded map.

“That’s how Lana knows where she is? She’s tracking her?” Bruce said.

“Uh-huh. You know that car she sold her? She put a device in it.”

Bruce chuckled. “Smart. But the only problem is that tells us where the car is. Not where she is. She’s obviously not in the garage.”

Hector nodded, staring at the closed shop, as he thought it over. “Well, she can’t be too hard to find. Right? This is a tiny town.” He shifted in the seat, craning his neck to look around. “That little café across the street looks open. We go get breakfast, ask the locals, and we’ll find her.”

“Yeah,” Bruce said, backing out of the garage’s driveway and back into the street. “That car was a piece of shit. It probably broke down and she’s just hanging out here until it’s fixed. If they have a motel, I bet she’s there.”

They decided to check after breakfast.

One way or another, they’d find their target.

They’d have Alyssa back in Little Rock before dark.