Bragg walked over to the body and studied the man’s half-open eyes and bloated face. He had grown accustomed to the foul smells of death. The gangs and cartels that moved in and out of the border traded in death as easily as dollars. Whereas the younger cops around him now had paled and taken a step back, he knelt and studied the victim. He’d built a reputation tackling dirty jobs.

Rope burns ringed the victim’s wrists. “Why bind his hands and then cut him loose?” he said, more to himself.

“Maybe the killer thought we’d be fooled by the suicide scenario,” Wheeler offered. “If the rains had come as the weather guys had said, those tire tracks would have been washed away. And a few more days out here and those wrist marks would have been gone.”

“Maybe.” Bragg glanced beyond the scene to the rugged brush and scrub trees around him. “What’s around this immediate area?”

“Immediate area? Not much. Brush and scrub. But like I said, on the adjacent land there is a vineyard. It’s small and family owned. Been around for twenty-plus years.”

Bragg studied the dead man’s brown and rotted teeth. He lifted the victim’s jean jacket and searched for any signs of trauma, bits of paper, stains—anything to offer clues about the man. He found a receipt in the front shirt pocket for Tate’s Bar. In his pants pocket he found two rumpled dollar bills, a room key, a couple of wrapped peppermints, and a half dozen sobriety chips. “Guy has nothing on him worth taking.”

“He sure pissed off someone.”

“That he did.”

Bragg rose and glanced back at the tree. Immediately he spotted the photo flapping in the slight breeze. He moved toward the picture featuring a young teenage couple. Both kids had the look of money. She wore pearl earrings and a gold chain around her neck. And he wore a white-collared shirt flipped up. His hair was thick and blond as if he spent a lot of time in the sun. Bragg leaned in and studied the boy’s smooth, hairless face. If he wasn’t mistaken, the boy was his victim. “Did you see this?”

Wheeler frowned and moved toward the tree. “Yeah, looks like the victim in the picture. But the image is old.”

“Who is the girl?”

“Don’t recognize her. A teen crush, maybe?” Bragg pulled out his cell phone, snapped a picture of the image, and then leaned in to study the young girl’s face. She smiled but it wasn’t joyful. Wherever she’d been when the picture was taken, she didn’t want to be there. Rory, on the other hand, appeared happy. His posture was relaxed and his smile full and genuine.

“The picture’s here for a reason.” He lingered on the girl’s image a beat longer, and then slid the phone back in its belt cradle. “We need to identify that girl.”

“It’s about a decade old judging by the victim’s appearance.”

“We need to find out what he was doing ten years ago. We know he didn’t kill himself, so whoever strung him up put this picture here for a reason.”

Wheeler nodded. “You think she killed him?”

He studied the girl’s strained smile. “She’d not be the first woman to track someone from her past and kill ’em.” Bragg glanced toward the ground at the wallet lying beside the evidence marker. He knelt, pulled a pen from his pocket, and opened the wallet to find a couple of dollars, no credit cards, and an expired Texas driver’s license.

“Ranger Bragg.” The summons came from the forensic technician. Melinda Ashburn, if he remembered correctly, was in her late twenties and wore her red hair back in a tight ponytail. Freckles sprinkled her nose.

He moved toward her. “Yes, ma’am?”

“The medical examiner can move the body anytime now. I’ve shot all the pictures I need, and I’ve made detailed sketches of the scene. Given the heat it’s better if we get the victim out of the sun.”

Behind her the medical examiner’s technicians stood ready with a stretcher and black body bag. “Go on ahead and take him. I’ve seen what I need. Though I’d like a set of those photos you took sent to me.”

“Sure. Will do.”

Often after the confusion of the day he’d sit in his home study and go over crime-scene prints. The camera lens frequently captured what the eye missed during the chaos.

Bragg arrived at the medical examiner’s office an hour after the body. He’d been delayed at the scene by the media who’d wanted a statement. While Wheeler spoke, he’d stood quietly off to the side.

Now, the building’s cool air greeted him and offered welcome relief from the heat radiating from the asphalt parking lot. The temperature gauge in his car had hit 105 degrees, and he bet it would rise higher by midafternoon.

Waiting for him at the end of the hallway was a tall, long-legged Ranger who now leaned casually against the wall as he checked his phone for texts. On the way in, Bragg had called in Ranger Brody Winchester. The two had worked together years ago in Houston. Bragg had transferred from El Paso two months ago and seeing as he’d dealt with enough changes in his life recently, he liked the idea of working with someone familiar.

Winchester had recently married Dr. Jo Granger, a psychologist who worked from time to time with the Rangers. Rumor had it the two had been married in college, but it wasn’t Bragg’s style to poke into another man’s personal business. Lord knows he had his share of personal crap he didn’t discuss.

Winchester pushed away from the wall and tucked his phone in its hip cradle. “Once I heard from you, I called ahead and let the medical examiner know we were coming.” He extended his hand. “Told them to clear the decks.”

Bragg’s iron grip matched Winchester’s. “Good. I want answers before I visit with the family.”

Bragg and Winchester showed their badges to the officer at the front desk and then headed to the bank of elevators.

“I pulled the victim’s rap sheet, like you requested. Sheriff Wheeler was right. Rory Edwards has been in trouble since he could drive. Family’s been cleaning up his messes for years.”

Bragg hit the down button, thinking his own old man had never eased his trouble, but had been the source of his burdens. The old bastard had been a worthless drunk who’d used Bragg and his older sister Sue as punching bags. Sue had left home at seventeen. He’d been fourteen and figured she’d send for him when she settled. But she’d found herself a man within months and married. Sorry, Tec, I just can’t take you with me. I got a chance to be happy and need to take it. You’ll find your chance one day.

Sue had sent him a Christmas card the next year and told him she’d had a son, Mitch, but that had been the last he’d received word from her until three years ago when an officer in Houston had notified him she’d died of an overdose. The husband, who’d never legally married Sue, had been long gone and the boy, Mitch, pissed as hell, had enlisted in the Marines.

Mitch had returned to Austin two months ago, recovering from wounds both visible and invisible from his tour in Iraq. Bragg would later learn the Humvee Mitch had been driving had been hit by a roadside bomb, which had all but obliterated the vehicle. There’d been four soldiers inside. Everyone but Mitch had died.

When the boy’s commanding officer had contacted Bragg, he’d informed him the boy was in a bad way. Seeing as Bragg was all the family Mitch had, he’d accepted the promotion and transfer back to Austin. His family might be a fractured mess, but it was his family.

Bragg didn’t hold illusions of a Hallmark family reunion, but he had figured he’d get the boy on his feet before he returned to fieldwork on the border. However, he’d quickly learned nurturing a troubled kid fit him as well as politicking.

Mitch’s wounds from shell fragments had been easy enough to fix but it was the post-traumatic stress disorder that had left invisible scars. The kid had nightmares constantly and most were loud and violent. Mitch wasn’t eating, and his drinking was becoming a real problem. Last night Mitch hadn’t come in the door until four A.M., and he’d been drunk. Bragg and Mitch had one hell of a fight, and Mitch would have left if Bragg hadn’t taken his keys. You’re not my father! The situation had to change soon for both their sakes.