Free (Save The Kids Book 4)

by E. M. Leya

  "We talked a little about it. We need to speak with you, find out what your brother knows and do a risk assessment on everything, but we don't want to cut you from the team. D did mention you sounded like you were using us to seek revenge, and that is something we need to discuss. While I can understand your desire, acting on something like that without letting the team know about it could get all of us arrested or killed." Jeremy needed to know that Jessica was going to be a team player. They couldn't have secrets between members.

  "Yeah, I know. I never planned on acting alone, but I was hoping to be a bit more established with the team before I brought up my past and that whole situation." She sighed. "I'm sorry all this happened. I never meant for there to be trouble."

  "There isn't trouble yet, other than the small heart-attack your brother gave D last night. He thought he was going back to jail for sure." Jeremy hated that D had gone through that, but he refused to be mad at Jessica for it.

  "I know. I should have never called D to pick me up. I didn't think my brother was going to show up. He wasn't answering his phone. Kevin won't do anything. He's a good cop, but he's an even better brother. He knows why I'm doing this and he won't take that away from me. We talked for hours last night about what happened, about D being in the Denver area, and he supports it, he really does. Most the cops in the area do. They've all seen far too much child abuse to not at least understand why the team does what it does. Kevin struggles with finding that line between being a cop and accepting that some illegal activities might not be all that bad. It's a judgement call he had to make, and he chose me over his job last night. I don't know if his thinking will stay that way, but I imagine it will. Still, I need to talk to you guys about it all so that you can make an informed decision if you are going to keep me around or not. I don't want to be the reason you are caught."

  "We appreciate that, Jess. For now, just get better. It's probably best you don't go to the team house for now. We can't risk your brother changing his mind and following you. D and I will talk when he wakes up and then let you know when and where we can meet and discuss all this. Do you need anything right away? You got food, money, whatever to get you by while you heal?"

  "Yeah, I'm good for now. Kevin is bringing me groceries later today, and I'll deal with my insurance company later about my car. Other than that, I'm just sore."

  "If you don't mind, I might have Rani stop by and check you out. That way you don't have to deal with the hospital or pay for other doctors right now. Rani needs something to keep him busy. Just play it off like he's just someone you met at work or hanging out with friends. He was worried about you last night. Let him feel needed." Jeremy hoped that having Rani stop by might help Jessica's confidence that they didn't want to kick her off the team.

  "Yeah, I can do that. You want me to call him?" she asked.

  "Sure, but we didn't tell him about last night. You can if you want to. It's something we'll discuss with the whole team. We just needed to get all the facts first. I'll leave that up to you. As for D, when he wakes, I'll let him know we've talked, and he can decide when and where he wants to meet with you. I know that you trust your brother, but we don't know him, and after everything D's been through, he's going to be nervous and guarded."

  "Tell him I'm sorry. I'll tell him myself when I talk to him, but let him know how bad I feel. I'll take the fall before I put any of you at risk again. I swear." It sounded like she was crying.

  Jeremy glanced up to see D standing in the kitchen doorway. He gave him a smile and held up his finger. "I'll tell him. We'll get hold of you later today once we talk. You call Rani and get him to take care of you. Don't try and be brave. D told me you were going to be hurting today. Make Rani give you something to take the edge off."

  "I will. Thanks, Jeremy." Jessica sighed. "Again, I'm sorry for all this."

  "I know. Bye, Jess." Jeremy disconnected the call before getting up and pouring another cup of coffee for D. "Sleep well?"

  "Yeah, I didn't even hear you get up." D took the coffee and sat beside him at the breakfast bar. "Thanks." He gave Jeremy a quick kiss. "So that was Jess?"

  "Yeah, she tried to call you, but I shut off your phone so you could sleep." Jeremy wrapped his hands around his warm coffee cup. "She's upset. Says to tell you she's sorry, and she swears her brother isn't coming after you or the team. I told her that while she might trust him, we don't know him to trust him. I promised her we'd talk."

  "Fuck, this is a mess, Jer. What do we do?" D leaned his head against his hand.

  "What does your gut tell you? Carter and Bryon tell us all the time to follow our gut." Jeremy ran his hand down D's back, supporting whatever he decided.

  "My gut says this isn't a big deal. Which is crazy. It's a huge fucking deal. I had a cop recognize me, I had a team member admit to her cop brother that she was hunting with us, and I had that cop pull a gun and threaten to arrest me. It's a big fucking deal, but my gut says to let it blow over. My mind says to move the team to Canada and hide, but my gut isn't worried at all." D glanced over at Jeremy. "What does your gut say? Maybe I'm too close to this."

  Jeremy shrugged. "My gut says let's give Jess a chance. From what you told me, whatever happened in her past is pretty fucked up. If her brother witnessed it, it could be enough for him to keep his mouth shut and let us do our thing. We both know that having a past experience changes a person. I just don't know how I didn't find anything about it in her background check. Something like what she seemed to be talking about should have been mentioned. If not the attack or whatever happened to her, at least some police report, some medical history, something should be there. My biggest worry is that Jessica isn't who we think she is."

  "You think she's lying to us?" D asked.

  "Not just us, but everyone. Like she's changed her name or started over somehow. The only time I've seen stuff like this in the past is when I've dealt with someone in the witness protection program. There's a past, but it doesn't always match the facts that the person lets slip out. We need to talk to her, and she needs to tell us everything. If she wants our trust, she's going to have to trust us." Jeremy took a sip of his coffee.

  "Tell me I didn't make a mistake inviting her to join us." D sighed.

  "I don't think it was a mistake. I think we need to know more facts, but I don't see that she's really lied to us about much. I mean, it's obvious she's got intentions of revenge on whoever hurt her, and she didn't tell us about whatever it is. That's an issue. As a team, we don't deal with the Lone Ranger mentality. We talk and agree on everything. I'm not against going after people who have hurt our team members, like if you wanted to go after your parents, but we discuss it first. We don't just do it. My fear is she was going to use the team to help her either find whoever she's after or help her get access to them, then go in on her own."

  D rolled his shoulders. "We need to meet with her soon. I don't want to do this over the phone. I want to look into her eyes when she explains all of this to us."

  "I agree. Are you comfortable going to her place?" Jeremy asked.

  "Yeah, I think so. She's in no condition to come to us, though I know she's going to be a hard-ass and try and do too much too soon. She's got to be hurting. She'll take a week off if she's smart. I heard you say she should have Rani come over, so that's good. At least there will be a doctor watching her, because judging by her reaction to being in the hospital last night, she isn't going to go back, and I get the feeling she's not someone who bothers with a primary doctor either." D stood, going to pour more coffee. "We need to deal with Jessica, but we also have two new members who we need to train. We can't let them sit idle while we deal with her. Let's set up a time to meet with Jessica at her place, but in the meantime, we focus on what we were going to be doing before all this shit started. We train our new members, collect our evidence, and we go on with the stings we already have planned. I'm not putting them off. I'm not going to let more kids suffer because I'm scared of being arrested again. I know th
e risks and I'm willing to take them. Just promise me you'll put money on my books if I end up back in jail."

  Jeremy slapped D's arm. "Stop talking that way. It's not going to happen. I won't let it."

  "You can't stop it. We just have to be careful." D shook his head. "What a mess."

  "We'll get through it. I'll call Jess in a bit and set up a time to meet. Until then, we'll head back to the team house and focus on the new guys. There's nothing more we can do other than watch to ensure we aren't being followed." He leaned his head on D's shoulder. "And, for now, go back to being extra careful. Let the other guys run to the store and do things in public. I know it kills you to have to stay inside all the time, but I'd rather have you restless than arrested."

  "You'll just have to help me work off the extra energy." D grinned.

  "That is a deal." Jeremy laughed. "I'm going to go grab a shower. You want to join me?"

  D didn't hesitate, taking a long drink of his coffee before standing. "Lead the way."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  "Do you guys want anything to drink?" Jessica asked as they walked into the kitchen.

  "I'm good," D said as he sat down at the table.

  Jeremy waved his hand. "No, thanks."

  Jessica nodded, leaning up against the counter, her arm in a sling, and her face looking as if she'd gone ten rounds in a boxing ring. "First, let me tell you how sorry I am. I never meant to bring this problem to the team. If I'd thought Kevin would just show up at the hospital, I'd have never called you. I figured he was out with his friends and busy. It's not unusual for him to ignore my calls when he's out."

  "It's okay. I know you didn't plan it. It's happened. Now we just have to figure out what to do about it." D sighed. "What did your brother say?"

  "He wasn't happy. He said I put him in a really fucked up position, making him choose me over his job. And he's right, I did. Still, he knows why I'm associated with you. He understands it, maybe even silently supports it. He swore to me that he wouldn't pursue this at all. As far as he's concerned, he never saw you."

  "And if he changes his mind?" Jeremy asked.

  "He won't. He knows that would hurt me too much, and if there is one thing Kevin would never do, it's hurt me. I know I'm asking a lot for you to trust him, to trust me even, but I swear, Kevin isn't going to be a problem. He would rather die than do something to hurt me." Jessica stared down at the floor for a minute before looking back up at them. "I was attacked and raped when I was ten. The two men who did it nearly killed me. They left me for dead in a shed behind my house. It was Kevin who noticed one of my shoes on the grass outside and came to check on me. He found me, bloody, beaten, unconscious."

  D glanced at Jeremy, wondering how they'd missed this information.

  "I wasn't meant to live, but I did. I knew my attackers. It was my neighbor's son and his friend. I saw them all the time when I was playing outside. They were nineteen at the time. They used to sit outside and smoke pot and I'd watch them while I jumped on my trampoline. I don't know what made them attack me that day. I've always wondered if it was something I did, but I hadn't said or done anything out of the ordinary." She turned, reaching up into the cupboard and grabbing a glass. She kept her back to them as she filled it with water. "Charges were filed, and they were arrested, but then my parents decided they couldn't handle the attention. They seemed embarrassed more than upset. As soon as I was able, they packed Kevin and me up and moved us from Texas to Washington. They didn't let the police interview me anymore, they didn't tell me what was going on with the case. They refused to talk about it. I was just supposed to heal and move on. Trouble was, I had so much damage to my body, that healing took years. They'd destroyed my body, took away any chance I'd ever have of conceiving, and stole my innocence. Life was never the same after that. I struggled in school, couldn't trust enough to make friends. The only person I wanted to hang around with was Kevin. He was my protector."

  "How did you end up in Denver?" Jeremy asked.

  Jessica turned back to look at them. "Once I was old enough, I dug into what happened with the case. I found out that Marcus and Tony each served five years or so for assault and rape, then were released. They hooked up again, moving here. Kevin was furious that they'd only gotten five years each. He was pissed at the justice system. Said he became a cop so he could make sure that didn't happen to anyone again. He wanted to fight to make sure that people like them got longer sentences. He worked in Washington for a few years, then decided we should move to Denver with hopes that he could find some way to get Marcus and Tony back in prison. They had small arrests, DUI, drugs, public intox. Nothing major, but Kevin thought if we just waited, he'd find a way to bring them down. Our parents moved to Arizona about the same time, so Kevin and I decided that we'd come here. That was when I started pushing for new legislation for harsher penalties for child sex offenders."

  "You changed your name," D stated.

  "I did. I was nervous about coming back to the same area Marcus and Tony were in. They tried to kill me once, why wouldn't they again? I changed it in Washington before I came here."

  "That should have shown on the background check." Jeremy frowned.

  Jessica shrugged. "I have no idea how that all works. I just wanted a little more security if we were going to be here. Kevin wants Marcus and Tony to know he's the one who is after them. He wants them to remember what they did and know that my brother was the one to take them down, but I wasn't that strong. I didn't do anything to hide the name-change, so I don't know why it didn't pop up. I thought you knew about that."

  "No. There is nothing before Washington for you, but I didn't find that strange as a lot of people don't have much of a public record until they are older. Honestly, I didn't pay attention to searching for much when you were younger. It didn't dawn on me that I should focus on birth records or things like that. I had everything from your eighteenth birthday on and thought that was enough." Jeremy glanced at D. "That's a lesson learned for me. It won't happen again."

  D wasn't worried about that. They were all figuring out how this all worked as they went. "I wouldn't have worried about it either." He glanced over at Jessica. "So you've been here several years now and Kevin hasn't been able to take them down for anything?"

  She shook her head. "He's watched them closely, but even though they do a lot that's questionable, they haven't given him any reason so far. Marcus is married now. He's got two step-daughters. I often wonder if the woman knows what Marcus did to me, and if she did, would she let him around her daughters. Tony lives in Marcus's basement. They work construction, drink too much. Basically the losers you'd expect them to be."

  "From what you said at the hospital, I assume you were hoping that by joining the team we'd help you go after them?" D asked.

  "It was a thought. Still is, honestly. I want them to pay for what they did to me. It was something I was going to bring up once I got to know you guys better. I wasn't going to run off and act on my own or try and force you guys into something quickly. I just need some kind of…" She shook her head. "It's hard to explain."

  "I understand what you're saying. You want them punished, you want them to suffer the way you did. You don't care how vindictive it is. You just want the pain to stop and hope that by seeing them suffer it might help ease your suffering." D glanced at Jeremy, sure he knew he was speaking about his own parents.

  "Yeah, but that sounds so horrible." Jessica moved over to the table and took a seat.

  "It's not horrible to want revenge. I think it's very human. Wanting it and acting on it, though, are two different things," D told her. "You don't want to fall to their level. You can't put that on your shoulders."

  Jeremy nodded. "I'll look into them, do some digging. I promise if I find anything we can use, we'll use it, but as a team, we don't go in unless there is an active threat to children. This happened a long time ago, and even though it feels like yesterday in your mind, it wasn't. If there is no current threat, the team
can't back you on this. I promise I'll search as soon as I get to my computer, but the team has to run by rules or we ruin the effectiveness of what we do. We aren't revenge-seekers."

  D reached over and touched Jessica's arm. "But we are here for you. We'll do what we can, if we can, but we can always listen and be the support you need. I know from personal experience that the abuse still sticks with you. It doesn't matter how many years have gone by. The struggle is a daily thing. Let us be your support."

  Tears filled Jessica's eyes. "Thanks. It's been a long time since I've talked to anyone about this other than Kevin, and he tends to get so angry when I do. He tries to be supportive, but he blames himself for not being there to stop it. He saved my life, but for him, that wasn't enough."

  "One of the things I'm working on for the team is finding a good therapist we can trust with what we do. On my old team, it was mandatory that we go in every so often just to talk. I hated it, but honestly, it was good, because sometimes we ended up talking about things I didn't even know were bothering me. When I finally find someone, I think it might do you good to do some sessions alone, but maybe to also have Kevin sit in on some with you. Nothing will ever heal you completely, but it will help take some of the edge off that feeling of helplessness." D gave her shoulder a squeeze before sitting back.

  "Thanks." Jessica wiped her eyes.

  "So, back to Kevin." Jeremy leaned forward, resting his arms on the table. "Having a cop know about us isn't really how we like to do business. It makes me nervous, especially when we don't know him. We have no choice but to trust you when you say he won't do anything, but you have to understand, we're going to be cautious. How did he react to you being part of the team?"