Page 67 of Don’t Say a Word (Angelhart Investigations #2)

“I don’t need to be there,” I said. “Just get him—and be careful.”

He smiled. “This is why I love my job.”

While Cal was having all the fun serving the warrant on Manny Ramos, I went back to the office to clean up the mess we’d left in the conference room on Friday night. I was surprised that it was already clean.

My mom was in her office, her reading glasses on the edge of her nose as she was reviewing a file. She looked up when I came in and smiled. “Adventurous weekend, wasn’t it?”

I sat down. “You didn’t have to clean up.”

“It wasn’t me—I would have made you and Jack do it, just like when you were kids. But Iris has a soft spot for you both.”

“I’ll get her those flowers she likes, the mums.”

Mom nodded her approval.

“So. The Madison O’Neill defense. Are Jack and Tess on board?”

“Reluctantly,” she said.

“Why?”

“Because Tess is a romantic at heart and Madison is accused of killing her husband, and Jack doesn’t want to work for anyone who might be guilty. But they also both agree that everyone, even the guilty, deserve a fair trial and proper defense. A good investigator is crucial to a proper defense.”

“Do you think she’s guilty?”

Mom didn’t say anything for a long minute. “To be honest, if I thought she was guilty, I wouldn’t have taken the case.”

“So you think she’s innocent?”

“No.”

“Mom,” I whined.

“I honestly don’t know. That’s what makes this case so interesting. Are my instincts failing me? Can I no longer discern fact from fiction? I’m fifty-nine, I’m not old, but maybe I’m getting there.”

I laughed. “Hardly.”

“I want the truth. I can’t help it. I told the lawyers that we would be their investigators of record.

There’s a lot to unpack, and the Scottsdale Police really messed up the crime scene.

So we have to recreate exactly what happened, and determine if Madison’s version of the story is accurate, and if we can help prove it, or if she’s lying.

And if she’s lying, what is her motivation?

It’s not money—she had plenty of money going into the marriage. ”

“Maybe she wanted more.”

Mom sighed. “Maybe she did.”

“I’m all in.”

Mom smiled. “Like me, you can’t stand an unsolved mystery.”

A ding sounded in the office, telling us the door had opened. Mom looked up and immediately frowned. She reached under her desk where I knew she had a panic button.

I turned and saw Manny Ramos. He had a gun on Tess.

I jumped up.

“Slowly, Margo,” he called across the office. “Hands where I can see them.”

Peter—Elijah’s friend—came in behind them.

I mentally hit myself. Peter was another fatherless kid, given a great work-study job at the Cactus Stop headquarters.

How could I have forgotten that fact while everything went down over the weekend?

Peter could keep tabs on Elijah and anyone else on campus because he was so normal, so very average.

I’d asked questions—they got back to Ramos. Angie talked to Peter, texted him, and it got back to Ramos.

Angie probably texted Andy and Peter about her conversation Thursday with Parsons, and it got back to Webb—through Ramos.

Damn, I’d missed it.

Because you weren’t looking at his friends, you were looking at his coworkers.

“Peter, get her gun, tie her up, tie up Ava. Ava, dear, please stay seated.”

Peter complied. He had no expression on his face, as if he had no emotions at all.

I didn’t attempt to convince him to turn on Ramos. Peter had my gun. Even if I could get him to listen to reason, I doubted I could do it quickly.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

Peter used zip ties on my hands, but I was confident that I could get out of them when necessary.

But not while Ramos had a gun on Tess.

“It seems my partner was arrested today, and I heard you had something to do with it.”

Did he have a mole in Phoenix PD? Or was it Peter? Or someone on campus who saw Webb being escorted out in handcuffs?

“Then why haven’t you left the country? Ticktock, Manny,” I said.

“You have something I want. Teresa, darling, please.”

He pushed Tess into her office. What did we have? I was tied up in the middle of the office, Mom was tied in her office, and now Tess was in her office with Ramos.

What information did we have that he wanted?

My phone vibrated in my pocket. Peter pulled it out and looked at it. “Mr. Manny? Someone named CR is calling her.”

Cal.

Ramos said, “Just watch her, we won’t be long. Now, Teresa, I am tech-savvy. So no tricks. Download the files—every file—you have on me.”

“We have backups,” Tess said, her voice cracking. “We have—”

“I don’t care, I want them, you don’t need to ask questions.”

We had something he didn’t have. Did he think someone other than Webb ratted him out? Or was he looking for someone else?

I thought back to everything we’d learned over the last week, about Elijah and the Bradfords and John Brighton and the Webb/Ramos network.

The Bradfords. Did Ramos think we knew who made the anonymous call? Did he think that’s how we were clued in to his operation? Or that we knew about a mole in his organization?

If he heard Kayla’s voice, he would know it was his niece. Would he hurt family?

Yes, he would . He would because she hurt him. John was the “good” son. But Kayla had taken down his operation with one phone call.

My phone vibrated again. Peter called out, “Now someone named Jack is calling.”

After Mom pressed the panic button, the security company would first try her phone, then Jack’s. If neither answered, the police would be called.

Our office was on a busy corner, set back from both streets by a narrow strip of grass and trees. But there were windows in every office, and the conference room looked out to the parking lot in the back. If the police showed up, Ramos would see them.

Jack would know that. Jack would keep it under control, stage outside of any line of sight.

But what if Ramos took my sister as a hostage?

He couldn’t get on a plane, but he could drive. The border was three hours south. They could monitor it, but he could slip through. Or drive anywhere in the country. He had resources. Even if the feds managed to shut down his network here, he likely had accounts they didn’t yet know about.

“You should have stayed put and took your chances with the legal system,” I called out to him. “It could be years before the police prove anything.”

Ramos ignored me. “Good, thank you, Teresa, this is what I need. No, no, don’t get up.”

He tapped on the keyboard.

Kayla’s voice came out of Tess’s computer.

Ramos’s face reddened.

The ding on the door alerted all of us that someone was coming in. I turned. It was Cal, dressed in tactical pants and a polo shirt. He didn’t quite look like a cop, but close enough. He probably hadn’t had time to change. At least he didn’t wear an obvious gun and his badge was nowhere to be seen.

“Hey, Margo, wanna get an early dinner—”

Ramos stepped out of the office with Tess in tow, gun still on her. “Hands up,” he told Cal.

Ramos didn’t appear to recognize Cal, but if Cal served the warrant when Ramos wasn’t there, he would have no reason to know that he was a federal agent.

Cal’s eyes widened and his hands went way up over his head. “Hey, hey! I didn’t mean to—”

“Shut up, sit down.”

Cal walked toward me. He looked at me and gave me the faintest of smiles, just one side of his lips curving up.

Outside, I saw some movement, then it was gone. Under the windows—a tactical team? Or just Jack?

“I said sit ,” Ramos ordered, moving the barrel of his gun from Tess’s side to Cal’s chest.

Cal moved fast and shouted, “Down!” to Tess.

I broke the zip ties as Cal ran like a bull toward Ramos. What the hell? He was going to get himself killed.

But Ramos turned the gun toward Tess, as if startled more by her dropping to the floor than by Cal’s charge.

Then he swung the gun toward Cal.

I disarmed Peter, elbowed him in the gut and kneed him in the balls.

He went down to his knees. At the same time, Cal leaped toward Ramos.

He kicked Ramos in the chest with both feet, before Cal smoothly dropped, rolled on the ground, and ended in a kneeling position while simultaneously pulling a gun from the small of his back.

I was very impressed.

Jack ran into the office with Hitch and two Phoenix PD officers behind them.

Ramos was reaching for the gun that had fallen from his grasp.

I stepped on his wrist. Hard. I heard the bone crack and he screamed in pain.

I pressed harder.

Cal got up, retrieved Ramos’s gun, and grinned at me. “That was fun,” he said. “So, that dinner you promised me is going to have to wait a bit longer.”

“I didn’t say yes.”

He laughed and read Ramos his rights.