“Because what you need to understand is I’ve only ever ended up regretting saying this in the past. It’s always come back to bite me. And I don’t want that to happen now. But I do want you to understand the reason for all that therapy.”
“You don’t have to explain—”
“No, I do. I really do. Okay?”
“Of course. Go ahead.”
She could believe him. She could trust him. She knew she could.
“I still feel like Krista is alive. And I know, obviously, that’s what I would want to believe. She’s my twin. It’s not like that, though. It’s not the sort of thing where, you know, I just don’t want to let go. That’s not this at all. It’s more like I just know. I know she’s alive. She’s been alive all this time.”
What would he do? What would he say? Not until just then did she know how important it was for him to react the right way, for him to not laugh at her, just to know he took her seriously in the first place. Even if he didn’t believe her—and there was no reason for her to expect him to believe her—it would be all right if he didn’t make a fool out of her, if he at least tried to be understanding.
“I take it your parents didn’t believe you,” he replied, frowning. Not exactly what she hoped for, but it was better than not being taken seriously. She already knew too well how it felt to have her thoughts and concerns and fears brushed aside like they didn’t mean anything.
“That’s putting it nicely,” she replied with a nervous chuckle. “I’m pretty sure they both think I’m crazy still. The only reason I stopped talking about it is because I know it upsets them. Mom, most especially. So I kept it to myself for a long time, but the feelings haven’t gone away. I never stopped feeling her. I feel her all around me, all the time. Not just, you know, in my heart.” She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I know a lot of people feel that way when they lose a loved one, but this is different.”
“How is it different? Help me understand.”
“I don’t know. It’s like… Like when I was little, really little, maybe five, I woke up in the middle of the night, and she was there. She was leaning over me in my bed, looking down at me. I swear to God. I was wide awake. I could actually feel her breath on my face. It was like looking in a mirror.”
“Did it scare you?”
“No! Just the opposite. I felt good. I felt like I knew she was alive. I knew she hadn’t really died. We used to share a bed all the time when we were little. Mom and Dad gave up trying to get us to sleep in separate rooms because we always found a way to each other. For the first time since she left, things felt right again but only for a minute. Everything got dark again, and I fell back to sleep. When I woke up, she was gone.”
“You’re sure it wasn’t a dream?”
Of course, he would say that. “I’m telling you I was awake. Wide awake. I looked straight into her eyes, and she looked straight into mine. I can’t tell you how many times I tried to explain it to Mom and Dad. That was when they first sent me to therapy, and for such a long time, I was determined to make everybody understand that I wasn’t making this up. There were times when I would be on my way to school or playing with my friends and I would be so sure she was there, right behind me, like if I turned fast enough, I would see her. Only I never did see her, of course. It was never that easy.”
“I mean, you were twins. Of course, you were going to always feel a special bond with her.”
How predictable. Just the sort of thing she’d heard so many times, from so many doctors. “Jace, if I wasn’t completely sure of myself, I wouldn’t be telling you this. When you brought up the accident, I guess it brought all that stuff to the surface again. I’ve never felt like Krista was actually dead. I’ve always felt like she was out there somewhere. I’m sure of it. Sure as I am of my own name. Somebody is lying. I don’t know who. I know this isn’t your responsibility, and it’s not what you’re here to help me with. You’re not even here to help me.”
“Yes, I am,” he murmured. “At the end of the day, I’m here to help you.”
“Then please, help me find out what really happened to my sister. I was never able to get a hold of the records—”
“Wait, what? You tried to get hold of the hospital records?”
“And the police records, too. Yes. I did.” She leaned against the sink, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. “There are certain things you can’t even get for money in this world. I’m not ashamed to admit that I waved a lot of it around, hoping to get somebody on my side. Even that didn’t help. Nobody would show me anything. I don’t think my dad ever found out, or else I would’ve heard about it from him.”
“You’re that determined? You’re that certain?”
“I am. I’m sure, Jace. I know she’s alive. She didn’t die in that accident.”
“You realize you’re calling your father a liar.”
“But he doesn’t know! Listen to me.” She folded her hands under her chin like she was praying, and maybe she was in a way. Praying for somebody to be on her side. For somebody to listen to her and take her seriously. “What if somebody took her? What if it was some sort of political thing? What if he didn’t even know what happened because he was all messed up from the crash?”
When the light left his eyes, she knew it was a lost cause. He didn’t laugh at her outright, probably because he was trained in how to deal with disturbed people. “You think I’m crazy,” she whispered, defeated.
“I think you’re hurting. I think you lost the closest person in the world when you were just a little girl. Nobody would want to accept that.”
There went that stinging feeling behind her eyes and the pressure that accompanied it. She should’ve known. He was going out of his way to be nice and understanding, but he didn’t believe her. She was just as alone as she’d ever been.
“Forget about it.” She went back to the sink, turning the cold tap as far as she could before splashing her face. Stupid, stupid, stupid. When would she ever learn?
“Don’t shut me out,” he urged. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll see what I can find out about the accident.”
“Please, don’t go out of your way. You have enough to do. Honestly,” she added with a glance at him in the mirror. “I’m not being sarcastic. You have a lot of work to do, and this is the least of your troubles.”
Muscles twitched in his jaw when he nodded. Something told her he wouldn’t keep his word.
And she didn’t want him to.
A sudden burst of activity on the other side of the bathroom door jarred her out of her self-indulgent frame of mind. They exchanged a look before Jace opened the door. “What’s up?” he asked someone as they rushed past.
Whoever it was, they stopped dead in their tracks at the sight of him. “There you are!” The man then turned down the hall. “He’s here!”
Jace looked back at her for a second before positioning himself in the doorway like he was trying to block her view. Like there was something she needed to be protected from. Naturally, all this did was make her want to push him out of the way.
She recognized Logan standing in the hall, visible just over Jace’s shoulder. He muttered something that sounded like the word trouble, and then the word house.
Trouble at the house.
Trouble at the house! She reached out, grabbing Jace’s shoulder, digging her nails into it. “What’s wrong? Tell me, please!”
Jace turned to her, and the way his brows drew together over his flared nostrils told her this was going to be bad—maybe worse than she wanted to hear.
“Something happened. One of your father’s security team. We should stay here—”
“No way! I have to be with my parents!” She looked at Logan, pleading with her eyes. “Please. I’ve got to be with my parents. I have to know they’re okay.”
She expected him to fight and was surprised when he didn’t. “All right. I’m not going to argue with you.” The resignation in his voice and the pain in his eyes told a story he
didn’t need words to express. A sick sense of understanding washed over her and left her shaking.
There was only one person on her father’s team who he’d really care about, one person whose death or injury would affect him.
“It’s Sal, isn’t it?” she whispered. When his gaze lowered, she had her answer.
Chapter Eighteen
He had to give her this much: the girl was full of surprises.
He had expected her to wail, to weep the entire way from their North Jersey headquarters to the Hamptons. He expected her to shake, to hyperventilate, to call her mother or her father and demand answers.
He should’ve known she wouldn’t crack that easily.
Maybe it would’ve been easier for him if she had. He could deal with hysteria. He knew all the right words to calm a person deep in the grip of emotion, somebody grieving the loss of a loved one. That was routine, the sort of thing he could paint by numbers.
Silence, on the other hand, wasn’t so easy. It was downright eerie after a while.
Was she in shock? That would explain it. He could handle that too, but it would help if he wasn’t driving the car while he tried to do it—her car again since he didn’t trust her driving and didn’t want to leave it one state away. Sledge was driving his car and would ride back with Logan if need be, though he doubted anyone would be leaving the Collins house anytime soon.
“Do you think you can talk to me?” he asked as gently as he could. “It might be easier for me to ask questions now before we get to the house and your parents take up your time. I’m sure this won’t be easy for either of them.”
All she did was nod, then licked her lips and cleared a lump from her throat. “Yeah. What do you want to know?”
“I’m sorry to put this way, but you were close with him?”
Another nod. “Very. He was one of my dad’s security guys when he was first elected. So we’re looking at twenty years here. Most of my life.”
“As far as you know, were things always good between them?”
“If they weren’t, Sal wouldn’t have still been with us. My father doesn’t suffer fools.” Now he knew where she got it from.
“Tell me about Sal.”
“What do you wanna know? He was like a grandfather to me. All four of my grandparents were already dead by the time I was born, so he was the closest thing I can remember having. He always understands—understood me.” The catch in her throat when she corrected herself just about tore his heart out.
“I’m sorry.” It sounded empty. Meaningless.
“I was just talking to him this morning. I mean, we were just together. He was drinking coffee and reading the paper. Nothing was wrong. Nothing was out of the ordinary. We chatted like it was any other day because it was. We were just… talking. And he was giving me grief about things like he always did but in a nice way. Not the way Dad would or even you would.”
He managed not to snicker at the casual way she accused him of giving her a hard time. The girl was grieving and would only take it as an insult. “I’m sure he cared a lot about you,” he allowed. It was like walking on eggshells. What could he say? What shouldn’t he say?
She was his client, his responsibility, but it was more than that. Much more.
“I know he did. Kids always know without having to be told. That was why we got along so well, I guess. Because I knew there was always love at the heart of it. I loved him too.” That was what did it. She covered her face with trembling hands.
“I’m so sorry,” he murmured, reaching over to pat her knee. In the cramped little sports car, there wasn’t much space between them.
So when she leaned in, brushing against his arm, the only thing he could think to do was wrap it around her shoulders. It seemed like the right move. What else could he do when she was legitimately grieving?
“Sally, poor Sal,” she wept, her face against his chest. Tears soon soaked into his shirt. “Did Logan say…?”
“No. Only that something happened involving him. The police are there and your father’s team. Braxton was there, but he told Logan he didn’t see or hear anything out of the ordinary until he looked out the window and noticed Sal hurrying to the beach. From his vantage point, he couldn’t see anything out there. Moments later, the cameras pointed at the beach went dead. When Braxton ran down to see what the trouble was…”
She let out a choked sob. “Because of me. It’s all because of me!”
“It isn’t,” he assured her, wishing he wasn’t driving the car. Wishing he could comfort her, wrap her in his arms and make it all go away.
The best thing he could do for her just then was to get her home, where she could grieve with her parents and never leave her side until this was all over.
Activity around the house was at critical levels when they arrived, the front gate choked with police vehicles. Only when Jace flashed his ID—and one of the guards recognized the car as Kara’s—were they allowed through.
What he would never dare tell her was explain the unlikelihood of him trusting any of them. It didn’t matter how long they’d been with the family or how qualified they were for the job, how clean their records were. None of it.
Now that one of them had been murdered, it was open season. He wasn’t about to trust anybody he hadn’t served alongside.
“Kara?” William ran for the car as soon as Jace rounded the bend in the drive and approached the roundabout. He appeared to have aged another ten years in twenty-four hours.
Kara was still crying as she climbed from the car and fell into her father’s outstretched arms. Laura was just behind them, and soon all three were locked in a tearful embrace. Jace stayed in the car for a minute to give them what privacy he could, considering the front yard was crawling with police, security, even dogs used for tracking the scent of intruders.
A lot of good they’d do with so many people already milling around. He could barely tell one of them from the other, all those men sweating in the humid afternoon air.
“I’m just so glad you weren’t here when it happened,” Laura was weeping as Jace eventually stepped out of the car. He couldn’t stay in there forever, especially with Braxton approaching from inside the house.
He looked absolutely flabbergasted. “I don’t know how I could’ve let this happen,” he muttered once he reached Jace. “I just don’t know, man. I thought everything was okay.”
“You didn’t do this,” Jace reminded him, though he knew the words would fall on deaf ears. It was a hollow sort of assurance, but it seemed something had to be said, something more positive than anything that would come from Logan, anyway.
That came soon enough. “What the hell is going on here? Do I have to set up camp? Can’t I trust you to take care of things?”
“I don’t know what happened!” Braxton managed to keep himself at a whisper, but barely. “I was inside, sitting behind the monitors with one of the guards. He pointed out Sal walking toward the beach, which we both thought was weird. I was just getting up to go out there and see what was up when all the cameras pointed in that direction went dark. I ran out there. It was too late.”
“How much time passed between losing sight of Sal and getting out there?”
“No more than thirty seconds. I ran at full speed. I felt something in the air, but it was too damn late. Don’t you think I would’ve done things differently if I’d known?”
“And there was nothing left behind?” Sledge asked.
“Not a trace. Not even footprints in the sand.”
Jace walked along with the rest of the team around the house, past the pool and tennis court and further down onto the private beach. The scent of salt air was heavy, naturally, but not heavy enough to mask other scents.
Blood, for one. Plenty of blood.
The dark-suited corpse was in the sand roughly thirty feet from the waterline on its back, arms spread out to the sides. Like a starfish. What a strange thing to think.
It wasn’t as if he’d never seen a
dead body before. He’d caused his share, both in and out of the SEALs.
This was different, somehow. This was someone Kara loved, someone who’d loved her.
Someone who shouldn’t have died that day.
The police finished taking their photos, careful to disturb as little as possible, but it wasn’t enough—none of their efforts were enough. Gulls circled, landing on the sand, picking up random bits of refuse washed up on the beach and squawking in protest when they were waved away. Wind shifted the sand. Water washed away any evidence that might’ve existed before then, though Jace doubted there’d ever been much of that.
Whoever did this was smart. Very smart, very patient. Prepared. They’d learned in advance what they were up against, what they were going to have to do to sneak onto the beach without being noticed.
Where the cameras were. How to disable them.
They were smart, and they sure as hell didn’t care who they killed so long as they got their message across.
The crowd parted, giving Jace a clear view of the body and the single slash across the throat, deep enough to hit bone. Whoever had done this didn’t want to take any chances.
“They lured him down here, whoever they are,” Logan grunted, looking around. “Why else would he come down alone?”
Jace shrugged, still staring at the body. Those wide-open eyes. The mouth, half-open. Just like the open throat. “It’s a beach. It’s private. He must’ve thought he’d be safe. Why would anyone think otherwise, especially if they were used to the area? Maybe he wanted to take a walk. Maybe he wanted to get eyes on the beach.”
“It still sounds strange,” Logan argued. “Why go for a sudden walk on the beach? Why? A man like this, he had a job to do. A duty. Something or someone lured him here. All we need to find out is who.”
“Terrific. That should be simple.” Jace turned away from the body since he couldn’t stop staring at it otherwise.
“You’re not losing your focus, are you?” Logan asked in a quieter voice, like he was hoping to keep their conversation private now.
Wolf Shield Investigations: Boxset Page 14