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“Is that a Texas Ranger?” I hear someone ask their friend.
I ignore the attention and wend my way toward the crime scene. The front of the jewelry store is roped off with police tape. I think,Now it’s obvious a robbery happened here. I approach the uniformed officer posted outside the door, tell him who I am and why I’m here, and he lifts the tape and lets me duck under.
Inside, I’m greeted by a woman in her late thirties or early forties, with a sharp blue suit and a shock of ink-black hair pulled back in a ponytail.
“Rory Yates?” she says, extending her hand. “Sandra Post, chief of detectives.”
“Thanks for seeing me,” I say.
She nods curtly.
“We’ve already been working with the local Rangers,” she says, not unprofessional but also clearly not excited to have to tell me the exact same thing my colleagues probably already know.
I don’t want to tell her that I’m not exactly in good graces with the rest of the Texas Ranger Division at the moment.
“If you don’t mind,” I say, “I’d like to hear it from the source.”
We walk outside and stroll down the paved walkway. She points out where the boats exploded and where the other robbery occurred in the pawn shop, which is also roped off with yellow police tape.
“Very coordinated,” I say of the robbers. “Professional.”
“I haven’t told you the most interesting part yet,” she says.
She stops walking atop a bridge arching over the opaque waterway. Her previously pursed lips curve into a smile she can’t quite hide.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“The River Walk area is full of potential targets. It didn’t make much sense to us that they would hit these two particular stores and no others. So we’ve done some digging into the businesses that were robbed.”
“And?”
“Turns out both of these businesses were crooked,” she says. “The pawn shop bought and sold stolen goods. The jewelry store laundered money for drug dealers. I don’t know how the robbers knew, but they chose these places for a reason.”
She explains that plenty of valuables were left behind. In the jewelry store, for example, no diamonds were taken. No gold. No silver. Same story in the pawn shop. Lots of expensive heirlooms were left untouched.
The robbers were after only one thing.
Cash.
Dirty cash.
CHAPTER 39
ON THE ROAD back to Redbud, as I’m debating whether to call Carlos, my phone buzzes with an incoming call from him.
“Lubbock morgue,” I say. “You slice ’em, we dice ’em.”
He laughs, a sound that warms my soul. Without discussing it, we’re back where we were. All may not be forgotten—but it’s forgiven.
“I’ve got news,” I say.
“So do I.”
“You first.”
He tells me that the serial numbers on the cash donated to the trust match money taken from at least two of the robberies.
“And,” he adds, “I’ve been looking into some other anonymous donations over the past year at other charities. I’m waiting on verification of numbers, but I think we’re going to find this has been a trend.”
