“Oh, she’s been trying all of the above,” Patrick said. “I’ve given her just enough rope to hopefully set us on a trail.”
“I thought the saying was enough rope to hang herself.”
Patrick shrugged. “That too.”
“Whom would she call? Or whom did she try to contact?”
“Well, it’s not the authorities. She’s called this number” —a string of numbers appeared on the screen— “six times and tried to send a few text messages. The calls didn’t connect, and the texts were intercepted.”
“Where does that area code go?”
“Would you believe Indiana?”
“What did she say?”
“Here it is,” Patrick said after a few more clicks of his keyboard.
* * *
“I NEED YOUR HELP. I THINK THEY KILLED DAD. THEY HAVE ME AND GORDY. YOU SAID TO ONLY CALL IF IMPORTANT. I DON’T WANT THEM TO KILL ME, AND I NEED TO GET GORDY TO A SAFE PLACE. CAN YOU TRACE THIS? I DON’T KNOW EXACTLY WHERE I AM.”
* * *
“She’s received an error message each time. Each message has been basically the same. Pretty soon the phone will die without a charge.” Patrick tilted his head toward my desk area. “I have you set up with a new phone. I was able to remotely switch all the storage on your phone and your cloud to this new one. Right now, your old phone is nothing more than our connection to Maples’s daughter.”
I took a drink of my coffee and considered Zella’s situation. As the warm liquid coated my tongue and throat, I mulled over the idea that we now had her kidnapped, as Lorna and Araneae had been. “If Lorna or Araneae would have had access to a phone, or thought they did, whom would they have called?”
“One of us.”
“Right. If the average person were taken and given access to a phone, whom would he or she contact?”
“If they believe they know someone who is capable of helping, they’d contact that person or persons. If not, I’d assume the police.”
Patrick’s train of thought was mirroring my own. “Now, Zella Keller is being held in an unknown place and she isn’t trying to contact the police or an emergency number. Instead, she’s trying to contact—”
“Someone she thinks will help,” Patrick interrupted.
“Who is that?”
“I can’t identify who, but I do have a where.”
We both looked up again at the overhead screen.
“Shit,” I said, “is that DC?”
“It is.”
“Who in the hell would Zella Keller know with a number linked to Indiana now located in DC?”
“That’s where I could use your help. I have the location of the device narrowed down to a city block, but that includes high-rise office and residential buildings.”
Putting my nearly empty cup on the desk, I sat forward and brought my computer to life.
As we both worked, I ran multiple searches. One was of the telephone number in question. Soon I was getting the last three months of data. The phone was a burner. Of course it was. However, it had been used with some regularity from around the country.
“Fuck,” I said. “That number was in Montana three weeks ago to a month.”
“No shit,” Patrick said. “I think we should cross-reference dates and locations. Ten bucks says this is Jettison.”
“How in the hell would Zella Keller know Jettison?”
“I’m not sure, but if she does, it’s a connection that I didn’t see coming.”
As I compiled the data for the program to accomplish what Patrick mentioned, he spoke. “Speaking of connections, last night, we had some success at Dino’s Liquor.”
“Some?”
“The Sparrows that accompanied Romero made the owner an interesting offer.”
I took a drink of my coffee. “Let me guess, help us or lose your business.”
“Something like that. And since the owner lost his nighttime cashier earlier in the day, the capos made a rather convincing argument. The problem is that the store’s security is ridiculously old. There’s a literal tape, and it’s been recorded over so many times, the quality is shit. That said, I’ve confirmed the presence of the black truck and a dark-haired man. He was the only one present.”
“Do we still believe that too is Jettison?”
“Other than the fact he’s officially dead, I do. And the good news is that as we speak, Dino’s Liquor Store is getting new security cameras.”
“And you’re sure the owner won’t inform the delivery person?”
“I’m not sure, but if the deliveries stop, we’ll know he did it, and then things won’t work out well for him or his business.” Patrick stood and stretched his arms over his head. “The circumstantial evidence connecting Andrew Jettison to the kidnappings, arms sales, and somehow Maples and Zella is stacking up.”
“It makes no fucking sense, but I agree.”
Patrick took a deep breath. “Is Lorna having any memories of the kidnapping?”
Numbers and codes were running in sequences upon my screens. I turned to Patrick. “It seems as though she fully remembers talking to Nancy Pierce.”
“Then there has to be more.”
“Laurel’s the expert on this,” I said, admitting my deficiency on the subject.
“I get your and Sparrow’s apprehension,” Patrick said, “but I think it’s past time we encourage memories from Araneae and Lorna. I realize this hasn’t been easy, but I think that between the two of them they may be able to piece more together.”
I let out a long sigh. “I don’t know what’s best for Lorna. She’s dealing with a lot.”
Patrick’s blue eyes turned my way. “She’s strong. Hell, she wouldn’t have put up with all of us for this long if she wasn’t.”
There was no denying my wife’s resilience, but how much was too much, even for someone like her?
What had she said...something about the dark not lasting and dawn coming?
If there were windows on this floor, we’d see that sun rising in the next few hours. I took a breath. “Lorna’s pretty certain that the recent resurrection of childhood memories came about because of whatever she suffered in that bunker. She’s also mentioned a dark-haired man.”
“We could show them pictures, like a lineup. I’ll put together pictures including Jettison from six years ago and ones more recent. I’ll also add some fillers. We’ll question the women separately.”
The thought of causing Lorna more distress ate away at me while at the same time I wanted to discover more concrete evidence. “Why would Jettison have Nancy Pierce and take Araneae and Lorna? Why would he want Laurel?”
“We’re assuming it has to do with her research.”
“What if it doesn’t?” I sat taller. “Think about it. Whoever took them has a formula. We know the Order has a formula. What other reason was there to take Laurel, Lorna, and Araneae?”
“Sparrow?” Patrick answered.
“Laurel offered to be a target.”
Patrick shook his head. “Mason told us. No one supports that.”
“Even if it is connected to Sparrow, how in the hell does Nancy Pierce fit this equation?” I asked.
“I agree that seems like an outlier.”
“The only connection is Zella and Maples. He said that he’d seen Nancy and that she’d been in Englewood.”
We turned as the steel door opened, and in walked Mason with a tangle of freshly wakened hair. When his early-morning green stare met mine, he shook his head and lifted his phone. After typing a text message, he said, “I figured this was where you were.”
“Shit, did Lorna wake you?”
“Since your phone is AWOL, yeah.”
“I should have left a note. I figured she’d stay asleep.”
“It wasn’t only her who woke me,” Mason said, making his own trip to the coffee machine. “I got a message from Top.”
Lorna
Mason’s text message telling me that Reid was on 2 was exactly what I needed
to lull me back to sleep. One would think after all of these years I would know my husband was safe. While that had always been a constant worry, today I realized it was more than a concern—it was a reality. Waking to his empty side of the bed filled me with more apprehension than I was willing to deal with alone.
I’d told Reid that even when we were young, Mason and I were protective of one another. I think it was and still is more than simply protecting; it was that sense that no matter what, we could depend on one another. Knowing that Reid’s phone wasn’t available and accessing 2 was beyond my ability, texting my brother, even before five in the morning, was my next thought.
A smile came to my lips as I read my brother’s text message one more time.
* * *
“VISUAL CONFIRMATION, SIS. HE’S ON 2. GO BACK TO SLEEP KNOWING ARANEAE WILL CHEW HIM A NEW ONE LATER TODAY.”
* * *
I replied.
* * *
“HE DESERVES IT. THANK YOU. SORRY I WOKE YOU.”
* * *
Mason:
“I WAS GOING TO GET UP EVENTUALLY. GET SOME MORE SLEEP.”
* * *
My alarm was set for less than an hour from now, yet a little more sleep sounded too good to do without. Cuddling under the covers, I scooted to Reid’s cool side of the bed, laid my head on his pillow, and inhaled his scent. There were too many specifics to name, yet with my eyes closed, I knew the aroma was him. It was a combination of clean and fresh bodywash, the kind they advertised with clothes on an outdoor clothesline, and the spicy scent of his cologne. His aroma was never overpowering, but there.
The morning melody from my phone woke me as if I’d only seconds before fallen asleep. Yet the clock told me it had been almost an hour, an hour of bliss with no thoughts or dreams. As I made the journey into consciousness, I noticed the light streaming from beneath our bathroom door.
Throwing back the covers, I wrapped my robe from a nearby chair around me and with bare feet, padded across our bedroom. With a slight push of the door, I had the perfect view of the man inside. I could concentrate on the bandages around his torso, the ones Dr. Dixon told him not to get wet, or the wound on his arm, the one he was now dressing with fresh gauze. Instead, I did as I’d asked him to do for me weeks ago and looked past his injuries and saw him.
The him I saw was every inch of the man I loved, my Prince Charming, my knight, and my husband.
Apparently, Reid hadn’t heard me with his concentration on the gauze and other dressings.
If I mentally took away those bandages, my husband was standing in front of the vanity as I was beneath my robe, nude. For a moment, I marveled at his muscles, the way they flexed in his arms, legs, and his tight ass. I even marveled at his resting penis. My gaze lingered a bit too long, my mind and body recalling his capabilities in that particular area of his expertise.
I wasn’t certain what my specialty was, but I knew that I lacked artistic ability in the sense of drawings, paintings, or sculpture. And still as I slid my bottom lip beneath my teeth and stared, I imagined how a talented artist would draw this man, the one who I’d been given back from the jaws of death. No doubt, that talented individual would concentrate on each feature much as Michelangelo did when he created David.
“Fuck,” Reid mumbled as the clip he’d been about to place on the exterior bandage fell with a clank to the bathroom floor.
As I opened the door farther, my husband’s dark eyes met mine as he was about to crouch down to rescue the lone clip. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“You didn’t. Let me,” I said as I brushed my lips over his, immediately noticing the fresh mint taste masking his one or two cups of coffee I was certain he’d already consumed. I knelt to retrieve the clip. It was as I looked upward that my breath hitched and my core woke with a twist.
“Lorna.”
A grin came to my lips as I stared upward. The cock that moments ago had been at rest grew before me with little provocation on my part. I retrieved the clip and placed it on the counter. Still on my knees, I ran my hands over his muscular thighs, reveling in the strength they were capable of yielding while relishing that he was still here with me. “I almost lost you.”
“You didn’t,” he replied, his voice now thick with the possible concoction of desire and anticipation. That mixture swirled in an intoxicating fog around us.
Peering up, I noticed the way his wide chest moved with each breath. With one hand, he grasped the edge of the vanity while the other remained at his side. The air around us snapped and crackled with electricity.
In that moment, I had an idea how Reid had felt when he brought me home from Montana. There was nothing I wanted more than to run my tongue over his velvety skin, to lick the gleam from the tip of his thickening rod, and take him as far as I possibly could between my lips until he came undone at my doing. However, the bandages I’d looked beyond were nonetheless present. He had been injured.
According to Dr. Dixon, his heart had stopped.
I looked up until Reid’s dark gaze met mine. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Fuck, Lorna.”
Licking my lips, I waited for an indication from him, encouraging my intended path or dissuading me. I was ready for either, and as we stayed as we were with me kneeling before him and his intense gaze on me, I realized I wasn’t to receive either.
The decision to proceed or stop was mine and mine alone.
Sticking out my tongue, I ran it all the way from the dewy tip to his curly dark hair. My hands moved around him, and my fingers grasped his ass. Again, I licked, his cock twitching. Over and over, I simply licked, slow and steady, as beneath the wet warmth of my tongue, his cock grew until it jutted toward me, the skin stretched and lined with veins.
“Tell me to stop if this is bad,” I said, again looking up with my veiled gaze.
“Shit, Lorna, bad isn’t even close.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You’re fucking killing me.”
I sucked in a breath. “What?”
Reid reached down and with his thumb and forefinger pinched my chin before lifting it upward. “Sweetheart, I love you, but if you move any slower, I’m going to come all over this floor.”
It was the encouragement I wanted, the knowledge that this Greek god of a man was mine for the taking.
With a deep breath, I opened my mouth, sheathing my teeth with my lips and took him deep. At the same time, I wrapped my fingers around his base and worked my mouth and hands in unison.
Deep, guttural curses and moans resonated through the bathroom, bouncing off the colorful tile while I too added sounds and wanton whimpers to the chorus. Though Reid still hadn’t touched me, my nipples were as hard as diamonds, and my core was painfully twisted and thoroughly drenched.
My knees scooted and I fidgeted with unspoken need as I pulled him closer, his cock teasing the back of my throat. With my other hand, I rolled his tightened balls as I bobbed my head faster, my lips running up and down his length.
The muscles in his thighs and ass tightened as finally his hand came to the back of my head.
“Shit, sweetheart...”
I didn’t stop or slow as I added my tongue to the mix until his hips began to piston against me. If our sounds and noises were a performance of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, we’d reached the crescendo. Reid’s muffled roar came in time as his body shuddered and warm liquid filled my mouth.
The familiar salty taste was welcome as I swallowed what he had to give me.
It was as I looked up that my husband’s expression took me by surprise. Instead of satisfaction, there were lines of concern near his eyes, his nostrils flared, and there was an uneven tenseness to his lips.
“Are you okay?” I asked as I stood, licking my lips.
Reid’s large hands came to my cheeks. “Are you?”
I searched his gaze for understanding, but I was lost. “I don’t know what you mean. You’re the one who was hurt. You came. Was
something wrong?”
The brown surrounding his dilated pupils swirled with specks of golden emotions I couldn’t identify as his unwavering stare searched my own. “Never wrong, Lorna. You’re fucking perfect.”
I laid my hand gently over his chest. “Is it your heart?”
His grasp of my cheeks tightened as he held my gaze to his. “It’s my heart. You own every fucking piece of it, and right now I am terrified to hurt or upset you.”
I tried to shake my head, yet his solid grasp gave little room. “Reid, you’re not hurting me. I’ve healed.” It was true. My injuries from a few weeks ago were either on the mend or mended. Yet I could see there was something he wasn’t saying. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“I fucking did, Lorna. I think you’re the most amazing woman in this godforsaken world, and I love you more than life itself.”
I reached for his shoulders. “I love you too, so why does this feel weird?”
He gestured toward the floor. “That was what he made you do, wasn’t it?”
He.
Mr. Maples.
My breath caught in my chest as my eyes opened wider. “Yes, if you must know. Yes, it was.”
Reid head shook. “I don’t want to remind you—”
“You hadn’t until a second ago.” I lifted myself to my tiptoes until our lips met. I didn’t stop until mine were parted and our tongues danced to a new slower melody. A soft moan escaped my lips as Reid’s fingers twisted in my hair and my body melded to his. When we pulled away, I smiled. “You aren’t him. You never have been. That” —I gestured toward the floor— “wasn’t because you told me to do it or demanded that I do. Fuck, Reid, I like being close with you. I like your cock throbbing in my mouth. Maybe I’m no better than Nancy. Maybe that makes me some kind of whor—”
Reid’s lips met mine, silencing the conclusion of my next word.
Dawn Page 7