by HELEN HARDT
He mumbled unintelligibly against my hand.
“Why did you do it? Are you just that sick? Or did somebody pay you off? Why did you take my brother? Was it to get back at my father for something? You’re going to fucking tell me. When we go in the house, I’m going to duct tape your fucking arms and legs together, and you’re going to start talking.”
His lips moved beneath my palm, and I clamped my hand harder over his mouth. “No more biting, or I’ll make this worse for you.” I squeezed his neck harder. “Do we understand each other, Tom?”
He screamed against my hand, his voice vibrating against my palm.
“It’s a yes or no question. You nod or you shake your head. Do we understand each other?”
His eyes seemed to calm. What the fuck?
Slowly, without releasing my hold on his mouth, I unclenched my thighs from around his. Quick as a jackrabbit, I stood and jumped, bringing him with me and into a chokehold. I led him back into the house and threw him onto a chair.
Among the apples and other groceries on the floor was, lo and behold, a roll of duct tape.
I picked it up. “You use a lot of this, don’t you, Tom?”
He grunted, rubbing his neck.
Quickly, I opened the duct tape and bound his wrists and ankles. “Now we know you’re not going anywhere.”
“Who are you?” he asked.
I laughed out loud. “Do you really want to go there? Play the ‘you’ve got the wrong guy’ routine?”
“Help me! Help me!” His voice was forced and not very loud.
“Who the hell will hear you? That poor guy you have tied up downstairs? He’s so weak from the abuse he can hardly move. And why would he help you if he could? You’ve used and abused him, just like you did my brother, just like you did your own nephew. Just like you did all those other kids and God knows who else.”
He opened his mouth and then shut it.
“Got something else to say?”
“Joe…”
“So you do know who I am. Shocking.”
“Joe, you don’t understand.”
“I think I understand just fine. You and your psycho friends have been doing this for a long time. It’s over as of today. We caught Larry Wade, and now we’ve got you. But before I call the cops in here to drag your ass off to prison, I have a question for you. Who the hell is the third guy who abducted my brother?”
Tom pursed his lips into a line.
“Just like Larry. You’re not talking. What the hell does this guy have on the two of you?”
His lips remained closed.
“You know, I wasn’t in the Marines like Talon was. I don’t have any experience torturing people. But I do have a very imaginative mind. I bet I could get you to talk.”
He shook his head, his lips still pursed.
I was talking a big game. I had no idea if there was anything in the tiny house that I could torture him with, and I didn’t really relish the idea of doing anything other than pummeling him into tomorrow. But I had to do something. Something that would hurt him enough to talk.
“Ever been fucked in the ass, Tom?”
Tom stiffened. He was trying to remain unfazed, but this got to him. I could tell. The sweat was meandering down the sides of his face now, and he inhaled a swift breath.
“Don’t get too excited. I have no intention of doing the deed myself. Unlike you, I can only get a hard-on for women I feel something for. Not some poor soul down in the basement, and certainly not little boys and girls. And definitely not you. But I bet there’s something around here that I could shove up your tight virgin ass. Something big. Something to make you feel what it felt like to my brother all those times.”
“Joe, please…” Tom strained against his duct tape bindings.
“Begging? Really? You? The quintessential iceman?” I paced around the living room, eyeing everything, looking for something long and thick. “Do you really think I give a fuck? You’re delusional. How many times did Talon beg you? How many, Tom? How about Luke? How about that poor guy in the basement?”
He opened his mouth again, but I slugged him with a right hook.
“Not interested. Let’s just say that every time you open your mouth, I’m going to torture you longer.”
“You could never torture anyone, Joe.” He lifted one corner of his mouth in a half smile. His face went stoic. The iceman had returned. “You don’t have it in you.”
Rage swelled within me. “You have no idea how mean I am. Part of me died that day when you took my brother. Part of my humanity…and it never fucking grew back.”
That was a lie. Melanie had nurtured what was missing within me, and I had been on the road to becoming whole again.
But she was gone now.
And right now, I wasn’t feeling real human. In front of me sat one of the monsters who had tortured my brother.
Payback time.
I walked into the kitchen and zeroed in on an old broom standing in the corner. Not thick enough, but it would have to do. I broke it over my knee and regarded the splintered ends.
Yeah. One of those would do it.
Weapon in hand, I returned to the living room, where Tom had hopped to the door. I grabbed him by the arm and yanked him back down onto the couch.
I held up the splintered piece of broom handle. “What do you think I can do with this?”
His eyes widened. Only slightly, but I noticed. Then his irises flicked to the right and back. The iceman was melting again.
“I see you’re getting the picture. But first—” I channeled every bit of strength I had and whipped Tom across the cheek with the stick.
He grunted, but still, his countenance was unfazed.
“Enjoy that? We’re just getting started.” I whipped him again, this time on his shoulder.
He grunted again. “You won’t do it, Joe.”
“What did I say about talking? You just added more time to your torture, asshole. But you like fun. It’s fun, what you do to others. All those innocent kids. I mean, why would you do it otherwise?”
He said nothing.
I raised my hand to whip him once more when the door crashed open.
I jerked toward the noise. A man in all black, including a ski mask, stood there, pointing a Glock at me.
Icy blue eyes glared. “Don’t you fucking move, or I’ll blow your head off.”
Chapter Three
Melanie
I stiffened. Had I heard Detective Lee—Ruby—right? “Gina’s uncle is your father?”
She nodded. “I’m not proud of it. I didn’t even know him until I was in my teens.”
“Then you didn’t grow up with him.”
She shook her head. “No. My mom was a single mother. She died when I was fourteen. At least that’s what I was told. I never saw a body. She didn’t have any family that I knew of or that anyone could find, so the court sent me to the man whose name was on my birth certificate. My father.”
“And what was his name?”
“My father? Who knows which one he’s going by now? He went by a lot of different names. His real name is Theodore Mathias. He went by Theo—when he was using that name, that is.”
I flashed back to a session I’d had with Gina.
“What was his name? What did you call him?”
“I called him Tio.”
“Why did he want you to call him that?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s Spanish for uncle. Was your uncle Spanish?”
“No. He was my mother’s brother. They were both born here.”
Could Gina have meant Theo? She had been eight years old when the abuse started, younger when she got close to her uncle. Perhaps to her, Theo had sounded like Tio.
“When was the last time you saw your father?” I asked.
“I hadn’t seen him since I left. He never came looking for me. But a couple months ago, he called me. I’m not sure why I agreed to see him. A glutton for punishment, I guess.” She l
aughed nervously. “Maybe I thought I could get something on him. Anyway, he came to town with a girlfriend. Some ex-supermodel who hung on his every word. It was pretty sickening.”
My stomach dropped. “Oh my God.” Had Talon been right?
“What?”
“The model. Was her name Brooke Bailey?”
“Yeah. That was her. Gorgeous, but God, so full of herself.”
Yes, that was Brooke Bailey to a T.
“She went on and on and on about my high cheekbones and my delicate features and how she wanted to do a makeover on me. Get me into some decent clothes that would flatter my body, do something with my hair. Pretty much made me want to vomit.” Ruby rolled her eyes.
I was pretty close to vomiting myself, but not because Brooke had wanted to make Ruby over. This was crazy. Finally things were starting to add up. Talon had been right. Turned out that this was all too close for comfort for a reason.
Unbeknownst to her, Ruby had just given me the proof I needed. Proof that Gina’s uncle was most likely also one of the men who’d abducted Talon. The third man. The one who had so far been elusive. I wasn’t sure how much I could say to Ruby right now. It was still somewhat conjecture. All I knew for sure was that Brooke Bailey’s boyfriend, Nico Kostas, was Ruby’s father and the same man who had abused Gina. There was still no proof that he had abducted Talon, other than the circumstantial fact that someone named Milo Sanchez—another alias that Theodore Mathias had used, according to Rodney Cates—had the exact same tattoo as Nico Kostas and one of Talon’s abductors.
“Does your father happen to have a tattoo?”
“Yeah, he has several.”
“Any chance one is on his forearm?”
She nodded. “Yeah, he does have one there. On the left, I think.”
Bingo.
“Let me guess. It’s a phoenix.”
“How did you know that?”
I had just identified the third abductor. I swallowed back the nausea that threatened to overtake me.
“You okay?” Ruby asked.
I nodded. “I’m sorry. My mind was racing there for a minute.”
“You didn’t answer my question. How did you know my dad had a phoenix tattoo on his forearm?”
“I’m not at liberty to say yet.” I silently hoped she’d buy that. She was a cop. She understood keeping things under wraps. “So you haven’t seen your father for a few months, you say?”
She shook her head. “Nope. And let me tell you, I have no desire to ever see him again.”
“Why is that?”
“Why do you think? He’s a horrible excuse for a human being. He raped and abused my cousin, leading to her suicide.” She let out a huff. “Let me rephrase what I just said. I do want to see him again—behind bars.”
Was it too soon for me to voice my theory that Gina had not committed suicide but instead had been murdered? Probably. Not before I talked to Jonah and Talon. And I certainly couldn’t tell Ruby what else I suspected—no, what I knew—about her father. That he had been one of the three who abducted and molested Talon Steel.
“Ruby, he didn’t ever…”
She sighed. “No. He tried once, but I got away. That’s why I ran away when I was fifteen.”
My heart went out to her. The therapist in me wanted to find out everything and help her. “What did you do? Where did you go?”
She stood. “You have any booze around here? If we’re going to stroll down memory lane, I need a drink.”
A drink didn’t sound bad to me, either. “I might have a bottle of wine around. Maybe some gin. I’m not a huge drinker.”
“Neither am I,” Ruby said. “But if I’m going to talk about dear old Daddy, it’s a necessity.”
I rummaged through the kitchen and found a bottle of Pinot Noir. I foraged for my corkscrew and opened the bottle quickly, pouring two glasses. I handed one to Ruby.
“I wish I had a decent place to sit.”
“Don’t mind me. The floor is fine.” She sat back down cross-legged.
“I’m really sorry,” I said. “About what you went through with your father, I mean.”
Ruby took a long sip of her wine. “That’s not bad. Wine is my drink of choice, though I’m not usually a big Pinot Noir fan. I’d like to learn more about wine sometime.”
Ryan Steel popped into my mind. Now there was a man who knew wine. I looked at Ruby. She did have a lovely face, and her hair, although pulled back, was clearly thick and a lush dark brown, nearly black. Her eyes were a startling clear blue. I smiled in spite of myself. This woman must have been a wet dream for Brooke Bailey. A blank canvas upon which she could work her makeover magic.
Certainly not Ryan Steel’s type. But then, what did I know about his type? I hardly knew the man. He’d been absent from family stuff lately because it was his busy season. He was gorgeous, though. Model handsome, and Ruby Lee was far from a model. With a makeover though—
I stopped that thought. Now I sounded like Brooke Bailey. God forbid.
“I like wine myself too. Pretty much all red wine.”
“Yeah, I prefer red as well. It has so much more complexity than white.”
I wasn’t really interested in talking about wine, but it was a way to open Ruby up. “What’s your favorite? Red wine, I mean.”
“That’s a tough one. I love a good vintage Bordeaux, but sometimes a nice Barbera table wine from Italy is perfect. Depends on my mood, you know?”
Clearly, she already knew way more about wine than I did. I had never heard of Barbera. I’d have to ask Ryan about it. “Yeah, I get it.”
“So you were asking about my father.”
“Yeah. I don’t want to pry, but you already know that Gina was a patient of mine. Anything you can tell me that might shed light on the situation, even though she’s gone now, would help me.”
“I don’t know that much about him, really. Or rather, I don’t know that much about what he does. He’s gone by many names in the past. Obviously, he’s a child molester, and I can’t even begin to imagine what other things he might be culpable of. Hence the need for all the aliases, I guess.” She took another sip of wine.
I regarded her. Ruby was being nonchalant about this. Too nonchalant. It was a facade. Her facial muscles were tensed up. I wanted to tell her she could be herself with me. To be angry if she needed to be. That I understood. But it was too soon. We hardly knew each other, so I couldn’t go into therapist mode yet. “Do you know which alias he was using when you saw him recently? When you met Brooke?”
“She called him Nico. That’s a new one. I’d never heard him use it before.”
“How do you know about all the others?”
“I’ve kept tabs on him over the years.” She shook her head. “It’s crazy, to be honest. I don’t know how he gets away with the shit he does. He’s never even been arrested.”
“What was his relationship with your mother like?”
“It was nonexistent. I didn’t even know who he was until my mom left.” She cleared her throat. “She never told me anything about my father. Always refused to talk about it when I asked. Then, when she disappeared, my birth certificate was pulled, and there was his name and birth date.”
“So you never knew the story between them?”
“Nope. According to my father, it was a one-night stand that went wrong.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be. The man is a psychopath. I’d just as soon not have his genes, but I wasn’t given a choice in the matter.”
“So what happened then? When you ran away? Did your father come looking for you?”
“Are you kidding me? He never wanted me in the first place. Sure, I was good enough for a fuck buddy, but he could find that easily anywhere else, as we both know.”
“Where did you go?”
“It was summer when I left, and I lived on the streets for a few weeks. It wasn’t that difficult. My mom and I had been pretty poor, and I’d been reduced to stealing to ea
t more than once. So this was nothing new, though I tried to avoid stealing as much as possible. I didn’t want to be arrested and sent home. Once fall came, I knew I had to find other arrangements. I was afraid to go to social services, for fear they would send me back to him. So I got a job waiting tables, with the help of a fake ID, and within a few weeks, I had scraped together enough to move into this really shitty place on the wrong side of town. But I kept quiet, slid under the radar, and stayed safe for the next three years, until my eighteenth birthday. I also went to the police department and filed a complaint against my father. Then I applied to the police academy.”
“Wow.”
“My happy ending didn’t start there, though. I found out I had to be twenty-one and a high school graduate to be accepted into the police academy. So I needed a new plan. I had worked my way up to night manager at the little diner where I waitressed, so I kept that job, moved into a slightly better place, got my GED, and waited another three years. During that time, the PD never did anything about my father. I contacted them every week for a while. Then I gave up.”
“Wow,” I said again.
“At that point, I didn’t want to leave anything to chance, so I started working out voraciously. I was determined that in three years, I would be accepted at the academy and become the best police officer out there. I would put people like my father away.”
“So why haven’t you? Put your father away, I mean?”
“Because the dirty bastard never leaves a trail. I’ve never had probable cause to even have him arrested, let alone evidence that would stick through a trial and conviction.”
“Really? What about Gina?”
“She refused to press charges. I stopped pestering her after a while. She was having a hard enough time as it was.”
“And there was nothing else?”