Lawfully Courageous

Chapter 2

Because of the many dangers swirling just outside the walls of his home, Sergio applied for their marriage license right away. The seventy-two hour waiting period felt more like seventy-two years. On the fourth day, he and Sal were married in a brief ceremony at the courthouse, accompanied by their closest friends, Coco Winslet and Luke Jordan, who'd recently gotten engaged, themselves. Plus, Davy was present in a crisp white dress shirt and a small navy suit that matched Sergio's deputy uniform. The kid had fulfilled the all-important task of serving as their ring bearer, and he was practically bouncing with pride at being included in the ceremony.

"Can we get some ice cream now?" Davy tugged one finger at his collar to alleviate the unfamiliar sensation of having a tie around his neck.

"Sure thing, tiger!" Sergio ruffled his son's reddish-brown hair and squatted down in front of him to loosen and remove his tie. They'd made it through the ceremony and gotten a few family pictures, so Sergio couldn't see any reason to make the kid suffer through another minute longer of wearing a necktie. Davy already had enough discomfort to deal with, considering all the stitches he had crisscrossing his belly.

Sergio's blood still ran cold every time he thought about how the blasted Surgeon had tried to carve his boy into a pack mule for the cartel. It was the biggest reason Sergio was so determined not to rest until the Surgeon was behind bars. Texas would be a much safer place once that particular bad hombre was put away.

"Show off!" Luke feigned disgust, elbowing Sergio as they strolled down the stairs of the courthouse with their ladies on their arms. Luke had thrown on his dress blues for the ceremony. It was one of the last times he'd be wearing his sergeant's uniform, since he'd dropped his paperwork to leave the Army in order to run the Desert Springs Police Department's new search and rescue unit. "That was a nice little trick, putting a rush on your marriage license so you could tie the knot before Christmas. Shoot! If I had thought of that—"

"My mother would have shot you," Coco finished for him, blowing a kiss to soften the threat. "You know she has her heart set on one of those way-too-big-and-expensive church weddings with no less than ten thousand of her closest friends."

The four of them chuckled.

Sergio glanced down at his bride in mesmerized admiration. She was so beautiful it clogged the air in his chest. He was still absorbing the fact that this amazing woman actually belong to him, now.

Somehow, she and Coco had gotten their heads together and pulled off the impossible via Amazon Prime. Sal was wearing a sleeveless white wedding gown that swept the floor with a ruched train, and Coco was wearing a lacy red bridesmaid dress. Both were carrying bouquets of roses entwined with a complicated swirl of greenery. Christmas colors, they'd claimed, since he and Sal were marrying on Christmas Eve.

At the bottom of the courthouse stairs, Sheriff Bennett Longfellow awaited them, along with five of the seven deputies on duty that afternoon. They clapped their hands as the two couples and Davy drew closer. "Congratulations!" The men crowded around Sal and Sergio, hugging and shaking hands.

"May I snap a picture for my column?" A reporter with an enormous zoom lens jogged around the edge of the courthouse. He had a shaved head and the camera was pressed against his face, making it impossible for Sergio to see his eyes. Sergio's suspicions were instantly aroused.

"We've got us a cue ball," he muttered to the sheriff, shoving Sal and Davy behind him. "Get ready in case we have to light 'em up."

Giving a hasty hand signal, Bennett Longfellow and his deputies spun around with their nine millimeters trained on the fellow.

The cameraman didn't falter or run. He seemed to be concerned only with aiming his lens.

"Everyone down!" Sergio shouted. Mon Dios! The freak was holding a grenade launcher!

A small explosion ensued. Instead of feeling the impact of bullet fragments like he'd anticipated, however, Sergio found himself choking on billows of smoke.

He acted on sheer instinct, pulling Sal and Davy beneath him and protecting them with his body.

The smoke was a diversion. A cover for something else. It effectively immobilized their weapons, because no one could be sure who they were shooting at — another deputy or an innocent bystander.

There were gasps, coughs, and one surprised yelp. As soon as the smoke cleared enough to see again, the deputies searched frantically for the cameraman. He was gone.

"Er, sheriff?" one of the deputies asked. "Where's Nick Frasier?"

Their small group gazed at each other in growing horror. The young deputy had been present before the grenade went off, and now he was missing.

"Nick!" his comrades called, darting around the concrete apron with their weapons drawn. "Nick?"

Sergio remained low, keeping Sal and Davy on the ground and crouching above them with his weapon ready.

"This is way better than the cops and robbers game we play at school," Davy confided in a low voice infused with excitement, as he gazed around in wide-eyed curiosity at the frenzied police activity.

Sergio caught Sal's gaze and rolled his eyes. It was clear Davy had no concept of how real and how very dangerous their current circumstances were.

A shot sounded in the distance and ricocheted off the surrounding buildings in a firecracker-like echo.

"There he is! There's Nick!" one of the deputies crowed.

Sergio's gaze narrowed in the direction the deputy pointed. Sure enough, Nick Frasier was limping their way.

Sheriff Longfellow ordered their squad cars to be brought around to the front of the building to escort them all back to the police station. There he conducted a grueling cross-examination of everyone who'd been present during the shooting, trying to unearth any clue — no matter how small — as to the identity of the perpetrator.

As it turned out, the shooter had gotten away following a wrestling match with Nick. "I winged him, though," Nick declared.

"Did you get a good look at him?" Sergio inquired.

"No, but he had a weird scar on his left wrist. It looked kind of like an upside-down pine tree."

Sergio's jaw tightened. "It used to be a caduceus," he supplied grimly. "It became distorted when he suffered some burns during a fire."

"How do you know that?" the sheriff barked.

Sergio cast a worried look at Sal and reached for her hand. "Because it belongs to the Surgeon."