Wolves of the Brazos: A Novel (The Ghosts of Minera Springs Book 3) by Charles Franklin

Author:Charles Franklin [Franklin, Charles]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-06-08T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

Tobi

After Paw left for wherever he was going, I called Bree and she hurried over to the house. We sat in my spot on the front porch, huddled together in silence, while Maw smoked cigarette after cigarette.

Rachel couldn’t put off going into the diner anymore, so she and Mama went in for a few hours. Neither of them had gotten any sleep, but the diner was already shorthanded, and it wasn’t going to run itself.

Maw finally broke the silence. “I know y’all are worried sick, but you have to know how capable your Paw is. And I don’t mean he’s a run of the mill lawman. No, Pete Sloan is something different. But you can never tell him that I told you this story.”

She looked at us all, wide-eyed, until we nodded back to her. Then she told us the tale.

I didn’t doubt my Paw was special, but I also didn’t realize just how tough of an hombre Pete Sloan was. Sometime around 1958, Paw was on the tail of some really nasty men outside of San Antonio. They were part of an organized crime syndicate in South Texas, called the Mendez Family. The whole region was afraid of them, because they had their hands in everything, from shipping routes to local businesses and money laundering.

Law enforcement could never pin anything major on them, and it was one of the toughest cases Paw ever worked on. Maw said he was all but obsessed with it. And, when a family owed the Mendez Family, they would often take one of their daughters as payment.

That’s where they messed up.

Paw traveled all over South Texas while he investigated the family, and he often stopped at a little store in Fowlerton–a small town, no more than a dot on the map. The store owner’s daughter always greeted him with a big hug. Her name was Aleyda, and she was fifteen years old. Paw would buy her a Dr. Pepper and sit on the steps and visit with her for a while.

Maw said when he came home, he would tell her about the girl, and it was one of the few things that put a smile on his face in those days.

One day, when he was passing through Fowlerton again, he made sure to stop in to see Aleyda so they could share a cold drink together. But, when he got out of his truck, she didn’t come out to greet him.

When he went inside, he could tell by the store owner’s grave face that something had happened. At first, he wouldn’t say, but Paw grew angry and demanded to know where the girl was.

A proud man, the store owner finally broke down and told Paw that he’d fallen into debt with the Mendez Family, and there was no way he could pay them back. When they came to collect payment, they beat him up and took Aleyda with them. Paw asked where they might have her, but her father didn’t know.

He stormed out

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