Have Mercy

by N. E. Henderson

  “And she’s lucky that’s all he did,” she retorts.

  “You’re actually condoning this?” I ask baffled. “No matter how you feel about her or what happened in the past, you’re okay with his actions?” This is unbelievable.

  She drops her phone to her side, taking a step in my direction. “It’s nothing compared to what I’m going to do when I get my hands on her. If she so much as hurts a hair on either of their heads, I’m going to put a bullet in that bitch’s head, do you hear me?”

  “Jenna!” Josh and I say at the same time, only mine comes out shocked, whereas her name on his lips sounds more like a threat.

  “I have to find them.” She lifts her cell again as her head tips down. “I have to find both of them now. Something is wrong. I feel it. I felt it this morning. I should have never ignored the signs, but I thought . . .” Her voice chokes. That’s when my eyes drop, seeing her hands shake.

  “I’m going to call my buddy. He sent officers to Danny’s location. They are probably there by now.”

  “He’s stopped. Well, his truck is. It’s been in the same location for nearly five minutes. But the sensor in his necklace is moving away from his truck location. He’s in another vehicle.”

  “You track him?”

  “I track both of my kids!” she spits back, her eyes never moving from her phone. “I’m out of here.” She looks over her shoulder, her eyes glancing up to Josh’s face. “I’m going to follow him. Call me when PD gets to his truck to update me on what they find.”

  “Wait. I’m coming with.”

  “No.” She places her hand on his chest when he steps forward. “I need you to find Brandon. We have no idea where he is.”

  “Jules said he was on a boat at the Port of LA. That’s where Danny was headed.”

  “That’s where Hayes and McKinney were headed,” Josh says, almost to himself, his eyes cutting to the side in thought.

  “This isn’t good.” Her bottom lip trembles before she smashes her lips together to stop it. “Call Mal,” she tells him, then without a glance to me, she attempts to bypass me out of the door, but I step in front of her, halting her escape.

  “Would you please stop and tell me what’s going on?” I plead with her.

  “You don’t believe anything I tell you, Jamie, so no, I won’t stop to clue you in. I have to find my boys before your wife does something we all will suffer for.”

  “Tell me what that means,” I demand.

  “Julia was the reason I was taken!” Her voice booms, catching me off guard, not expecting the high pitch in her tone, making it feel more like a punch to the gut than a slap to the face. “She planned it. She paid him to take me, to torture me, to rid my body of my son.”

  “Wha—”

  “Don’t speak, Jamie. I don’t care what you have to say. It’s true. All of it, but if you don’t believe it, oh fucking well. I have other shit on my plate, like finding the boys before she does to them what she had done to me.”

  She shoves me out of the way. I’m too stunned by her words to stop her or catch myself before I fall into a desk, nearly knocking the large computer screen off.

  “What Jen said is true,” he says, his tone laced with heat as he types a message out on his phone. Pushing myself off the solid wooden desk, I can see he’s sending a text from where I’m standing.

  “I’m supposed to believe the woman I was married to for eighteen years, the mother of my son, orchestrated a kidnapping at sixteen? How do you expect me to even begin to wrap my mind around that?”

  He’s silent for a long beat, doing something else on his phone now. Once he’s found what he’s looking for, his head pops up as he flips the screen of his cell at me. An eerie feeling coats my spine, telling me whatever it is he’s showing me, I’m not going to like it once I figure out what it is.

  “It’s an audio recording. See, Julia was the first job where I met my employer in person. Usually things were done via computer, but she was adamant about not leaving any digital trail.”

  “She was sixte—”

  “Whose daddy is a rich fucker,” he says, cutting me off. “Whose daddy gave her access to unlimited funds no questions asked.”

  It’s true. Mitch Montgomery is one of the wealthiest businessmen in the world. He moves every few years. I used to wonder why Julia’s parents ever ended up in Mississippi to begin with. When you’re that rich, you can live anywhere. He could have easily paid for home-schooling and had for a number of years. I think that was why Jules was so shy when she first started ninth grade. She had never experienced public school or other kids her age. Her social skills had been severely stunted until she made friends with Jenna. And even after that, it took several years for her to begin coming out of her sheltered little shell she’d lived in her whole life.

  As those thoughts, those memories filter in, it makes his claims all the more unbelievable. I can’t fathom what he’s saying or what Jenna said before.

  It’s not possible.

  Those words ring out again as he presses play on his phone.

  37

  — Josh —

  Eighteen years ago

  “Can I help you?” I say to the little girl sliding into the booth across from me. Her massive amount of hair-sprayed hair is hiding her face from my view as she peers down, her chin tucked while placing an oversized designer purse on the bench of the booth.

  “Yes,” she finally answers, her head popping up. “You can get rid of someone in my life. Permanently,” she whispers, her voice so low I barely heard the last word from her mouth.

  “Excuse me?” Surely, this kid isn’t the person I agreed to meet to discuss a job.

  She slides a photo across the table. I see it, though my eyes never leave the eyes of the young girl eyeing me, whose light blue eyes strike me as matching my own. Evil lives inside her, the same as it’s seared into my soul. Though, I can’t imagine this hoity-toity bitch has seen the things I have. I bet she grew up pampered and sheltered from the ways of the world, getting spa treatments on a weekly basis.

  “Her name is Elise Thomas. Jenna Elise Thomas,” she clarifies, “and I want you to take her. Sell her to the meanest, the cruelest buyer you can find.”

  “What did she do to you?” I almost want to laugh. Is this little cunt for real?

  “That doesn’t matter. I have the money to pay you. That’s all you need to know.” Her perfectly manicured eyebrow that doesn’t match her bleached hair arches.

  “Uh huh, sweetheart. You want me to accept this job then I’m gonna need a little more info than that.” I don’t take women that come from stable homes. Women whose families give a damn if they don’t show up are too much trouble and not worth the extra profit. I certainly don’t take children, and the girl in this photograph is still a teenager, the same as the little blonde bitch sitting across from me.

  “Let’s just say, she has something I want, and unless she’s removed from the equation, I don’t stand a chance in hell of getting it.” She pauses, then adds, “And I always get what I want.”

  She’s a spoiled fucking brat if I’ve ever met one. The type that’ll go whine to daddy if she doesn’t get the newest, the coolest designer crap on the market and then throw a hissy fit when some other bitch shows up with one just like hers.

  “This about a boy?” I ask.

  Her brows furrow and her lips purse. “This is about you taking care of a problem. I was told you’re the best and nothing would ever come back on me. That right?”

  “I’m not in the market of stealing little girls,” I say, bored and about ready to ditch this place, this town, this state. I don’t have time to play games. I have to find my next project, get her trained for whatever master pays the highest and get paid. Same shit, different day. I was raised to take over my parents’ trade business and I’m damn good at it. There’s no one better at this than I am. I don’t have a conscience. I don’t feel remorse for stealing the life of pathetic women that had no life to begin w
ith. If anything, I do them a favor. I give them more purpose.

  “I’ll double your fee.”

  “No.”

  “I’ll triple it,” she seethes.

  With that kind of money, it would get my parents off my ass and give me a break from the mundane of my everyday hell . . . My fingers start to drum on the table as I stare at her, the silence between us palpable. Still, there’s a lot of risk.

  “She’s a troublemaker. It wouldn’t be such a farfetched thing that she just up and ran away. She hates following rules and . . .” A sinister smile stretches across her face. “With my help, I can have her parents, her boyfriend, her limited number of friends believing just that. I’ll have them eating out of the palm of my hand in no time. This will be easy for you. I’m the one that’ll do all the hard work.”

  There is nothing easy about kidnapping a person—any person. You have to plan everything to a T. The littlest mistake or mishap can fuck everything up and get you caught.

  “Do we have a deal?” she asks, her light blue eyes sparkling as she digs through her purse that’s placed beside her on the bench seat. Before I answer, she pulls a box wrapped in what seems to be birthday wrapping paper encased in neon green ribbon.

  “What this?” I ask as she slides it across the table, releasing it when it’s placed in front of me.

  “Your birthday present, of course.” Her lips tip up on one side. Carefully watching her, I lean back on my side of the booth, throwing one arm over the back of the red, worn padding. “The money,” she whispers.

  Of course. This bitch couldn’t possibly know that today is, in fact, my twenty-first birthday. Not that I celebrate them. My folks never coddle me. Birthdays were just like every other day in my world growing up—not significant.

  “A little sure of yourself, aren’t you? What are you, fifteen?”

  Her nose scrunches up. “Sixteen. I’ll be seventeen next month.”

  “I need two weeks to plan,” I tell her, accepting a job I have no business taking, but the quicker I get out of here, the quicker I get away from eyes that are way too eerily like my own.

  “That’s not gonna work. I need her gone today. Right after school to be exact. Why do you think I said I needed this rushed and you here immediately? I didn’t ditch class for the hell of it. I need her gone.”

  “I’m the pro here, little girl. I’ll say when. I’ll say where. Got it? And before you open that little trap of yours, you better be careful. Wouldn’t want me to take the wrong little bitch, now would you?”

  She rolls her eyes like my threat doesn’t faze her, then she leans forward, a smirk on her lips. “There’s thirty thousand dollars in that box. You telling me you’re gonna walk away from it just because you don’t have time to plan. She’s one girl. How hard can it really be?”

  A lot harder than she realizes. When you don’t plan out things thoroughly, it leaves too much room for error. I wasn’t raised or trained to make errors. But thirty thousand dollars . . .

  “I’ll make it work, but you’re gonna have to get your hands dirty too, princess. I need you to bring her to me.”

  “Won’t be a problem. You tell me where and I’ll deliver.”

  Her lips spread and her eyes light up like it’s Christmas morning and she’s just run into the living room seeing piles of presents that are just for her and her alone. She’s a selfish little brat, but there is more behind her eyes than that. Her soul hasn’t just been touched with a bit of evil, she’s soaked in it.

  But the bitch is right—I can’t say no to that kind of money. No one in my shoes would.

  Present

  I pocket my phone, needing to get out of here and out there to find Danny. If that cunt is involved, there is no telling what she’ll do now that she knows I never handled Jenna’s pregnancy like she thought.

  “Jesus Christ. She really did that?”

  “She was the one that told me Jen was pregnant. You watched the video I gave to Cole. That’s who called.”

  I can see the wheels turning in his head, realizing not only is his ex-wife responsible for Jen’s disappearance but she did it so that she could have him. I’d be willing to bet she got knocked up on purpose to solidify her place with him. Even with Jenna out of the picture, he could have dropped her, and probably would have had she not granted herself a permanent place as the mother of his child.

  “Why didn’t Jen do something?” he asks. “If you had proof, why didn’t she use it to put her away?”

  That’s a question I’ve asked her over and over throughout the years. She knew about the recording. It’s how I got her to believe me that it was her best friend behind the whole charade. She would’ve used that evidence against her had Julia not up and become pregnant. Jenna’s emotions weren’t in the right place, she wasn’t in the right frame of mind, and I should never have divulged that information. Problem is, I couldn’t let her walk in that house, back into those lives without knowing all the facts I’d gathered after I decided not to go through with the deal. It’s not like I needed the cash. My parents didn’t know about all the cash I’d banked on the initial job. When I let her go, it was twenty-four hours before I was supposed to show up at the shipping docks to ship my captive off, like clockwork, just like the ones before her.

  I disappeared before they got wind. Though I never had feelings for my parents, not like I do for my wife or daughter. The way Maggie sees Jessica and me is completely different from how I saw my parents. I always thought it was because they raised me to not have a conscience, to not love or hate, to just exist. In the last hour, it dawned on me why—they weren’t my real parents.

  “She couldn’t do that to Brandon,” I finally answer. “She couldn’t take his mom from him. And well, there has always been a part of Jenna that still doesn’t want to come face to face with what your wife did to her.”

  A part of Jenna has always been in denial. She knew the facts, heard them even, but in the back of her mind she never actually dealt with that realization. When you’re scared and as young as she was, faced with protecting a life that wasn’t even born yet, you’d do anything, make yourself forget or believe another version if you think that’s what is best at the time.

  “She isn’t my wife,” he spits out.

  “Funny,” I tell him, “because you still take her side like she is.”

  He doesn’t have a shot of hope if he keeps questioning Jenna versus taking what she says at face value. Every time he questions her or doesn’t immediately believe her, I can see the pain on her face, in her eyes.

  “Do you not see how crazy all of this shit sounds to the blind eye?”

  “No, actually I don’t. I’ve seen a lot more fucked up than this. I didn’t start dealing with evil when I joined the FBI, I created the evil that’s out there. Took pleasure in it in fact.”

  “Saying shit like that isn’t helping. I want nothing more than to stick a hot iron-rod through your gut.”

  “Good. You should.” My cell dings with an incoming message.

  Lark: Truck’s empty in the middle of the road. Beat up too. Keys still in the ignition. I have a team en route to take the vehicle apart for clues. Do I need to keep this shit under wraps or not?”

  Me: Keep a lid on the media as tight as possible. Let me know when you have something.

  Lark: 10-4.

  “Come on,” I say, pocketing my cell again. “If you can stomach being in a vehicle with me, then you can come while I go find my little sister.”

  “Your sister?”

  “I’ll explain what I can when we’re on the road, but it isn’t much, except come to find out, your wife and I are blood.”

  “Stop calling her my fucking wife.”

  “Brother-in-law, ex-brother-in-law.” I shrug, walking past him. “You coming or not?” Frankly, I don’t give a shit. He can stay or come. If it were me, I wouldn’t be able to sit still or calm while my kid was missing.

  Danny fucked up going to that house. Why the hell didn�
�t he call me?

  38

  — Malachi —

  Thank fuck Kelly wanted to take two vehicles. With everything I have turning over in my head, I don’t want to be cooped up in a car with her. She’s a nosey little thing, and at twenty-three, damn near fresh out of the academy, she’s trying overly hard to bond with her fellow teammates. I get it though; once upon a time, I was in her shoes. I wasn’t always under Josh Breckett. I joined his team only five years ago after Jen spent nearly that long talking me into it.

  I didn’t understand how she could work alongside him after what he’d done to her. Then again, I was still struggling with why she’d want to work with me after the part I unknowingly played that got her taken in the first place. Still to this day, it bothers me. I haven’t gotten over it and I doubt I ever will.

  The sound of my cell phone ringing from the cup holder between the driver’s seat and the passenger’s steals me away from the ugly thoughts flicking through my head. Without taking my eyes off the road, I snatch it up, answering the call without looking to see who it’s from. “Hayes,” I say.

  “You really just gonna leave without so much as a bye this morning?” Cole’s angry voice both excites me and pisses me off. My dick can’t tell between the two as it jolts to life beneath my tactical pants.

  “You were asleep. I have a job.” And I don’t really want to talk to him right now. I could kick myself for not checking the name on the screen. Had I known it was my on again, off again, fuck buddy, I would have sent his ass straight to voicemail.

  “Could have woken me up,” he says, sounding butt-hurt over me slipping out of his bed and out of his house, leaving his sleeping form undisturbed. And here I was thinking I was being nice, considerate even when I left at four this morning to sneak in an hour-long workout before heading to the beach house to check on the girls and start my morning before everyone else filtered in around eight.