“Why didn’t your mom stop him?” Abby’s hoarse voice brought his attention back to the present. A stream of tears flowed down her face.
“And have his hatefulness turned on her? No. She stayed out of it. She said that men knew how to talk to their sons. Only my dad thought ridiculing us along with a few closed-fist hits were the way to straighten us out. The first time he broke my nose I was four.” He’d never told a soul any of that.
“That’s not right. She should’ve been there for you.” Abby looked at him, pleading with her eyes for understanding. “You’re wrong. I care about you more than you know.”
“You cared enough to keep me away from my son?”
She covered her face and rocked back and forth.
“I swear, Abby, I’ll be a good dad. I’d never treat any son or daughter of mine like my dad treated me.” He hated the pleading in his voice, but the thought of a child of his growing up believing they weren’t wanted wasn’t going to happen.
When she looked out at him from red, swollen eyes, his gut tightened in fear. All those years of not being good enough, smart enough—
“Tommy’s not ours. Never has been. Suzie went through labor . . . they have medical records to prove it. Nothing forged by The Circle’s best, I swear.”
“Then where’s my kid?”
“You misunderstood.” She sighed, the sound forlorn and tired. “They believed the depression and stress of losing you had weakened me, and the beating I received compounded it.”
She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. “I was four months along, just starting to show. But I had lost so much weight while I recovered from . . . then I started to bleed . . . The Circle handled the burial as . . . as I couldn’t . . .” Her choked sobs filled the room.
“You miscarried.” He threw an arm over his eyes and slammed a fist into the mattress. “Why did you think I shouldn’t know this?” Using his arm, he rubbed off the tears and glared at her.
Most of her words were incoherent until the end as she said, “When I realized you weren’t dead, I wanted to explain about Jack . . . I didn’t know how without making you mad. I blamed myself. It happened the next day. We were told that you were dead in Peru, that they had thrown your body on a pile with others and burned your body and buried you. That night I didn’t want to be alone. All day I cried believing you were dead and my baby wouldn’t have a father, and then Jack showed up, angry, sad, crying too. We took comfort—”
He sliced his palm through the air. No way would he let her finish that sentence.
She nodded. Her gaze remained on the wall as she said, “Never would I do anything to harm our child. I had been so happy . . .” Her voice trailed off.
Seconds passed by and neither said a word as they mourned what they had lost.
Even if he wanted to examine his feelings about the whole mess, he wasn’t sure if he could. The wound ached like a son of a bitch and interfered with his thinking. One thing was for certain: her distrust hurt. Until he thought she was dead, he’d believed she respected him.
Ah, hell. What was he doing? If his old man had been alive, he’d say feelings were for sissies.
Dammit, he wasn’t an ignorant asshole like his dad. Men were human beings with desires and feelings; they only reacted differently from women and that was all.
A banging on the door made them jump.
Rex doubted Brody’s people would knock before shooting, but it was better to be safe than sorry.
“Where’s my gun?” He shifted on the bed, groaning as he jarred the wound.
“Under your pillow.” Her voice muffled as she used the corner of his sheet to wipe her wet face.
He grabbed the gun and slipped it beneath the sheets next to his thigh, ready to shoot if needed.
She hurried over to the door and peeked out.
“It’s Ryker.”
She flipped the security bar to the side and unlocked the door, opening it wide.
Ryker filled the doorway. With his black eye patch in place and ugly scars alongside of his face, he’d scare the devil himself.
“Doc sent one of the nurses to take care of you. From what Abby told us about the position of the bullet, and how the bleeding stopped, you’ll mend fine.” The commander of a billion-dollar organization who hands out death like flu shots stepped into the room.
“I’m surprised to see you here,” Rex said to Ryker as he nodded at the man who walked in behind him. The nurse spread out the contents of what looked like a fishing tackle box on the dresser. Most of the nurses working for The Circle were former medics and male.
Sitting in the chair near the small table, Ryker glanced at Abby with a worried look as he spoke to Rex. “I have a dozen people trapped in a cave. Ice is answering the local authorities’ questions. This is where I needed to be for the moment. You are my second-in-command.” Ice was the mystery man of The Circle. Some claimed he’d earned his name and his cold demeanor by killing his own father. Such a despicable act would take a coldhearted man.
“Yeah. Second-in-command. Right.” Rex slowly shook his head.
What was the real reason he was here? Ryker didn’t trust anyone, with the exception of his wife. He’d already proven he wouldn’t allow Rex to help in commanding The Circle. And no way would Rex continue to sit around with his thumb up his ass. That was part of the reason why he’d decided to help his brother track down the ammo.
When Ryker gave him an odd look, he figured he better say something.
“Ice is a good one to handle the situation. I never could— Damn, that hurt!” He frowned at the nurse. The needle the man was using to deaden the area looked to be two inches long. Returning his attention to Ryker, he said, “I never could read his face. The man could lie with the best of them.”
“Is his hair still that neon blue?” Abby butted in.
Why did she want to know about the man’s hair? Rex remembered how Abby loved his long hair. That was why he cut it. He wanted nothing to remember how much she used to love to touch it.
When she shot him a funny look, he realized she was trying to get Ryker’s mind off his smart-ass comment about being second-in-command.
Ryker grinned. “Yep. He’s wearing a knit cap. He didn’t want to but it was for the best.”
“Warm weather for that,” Abby murmured.
“You all right over there?” Rex asked.
“Just tired.” She stood up. “I think I’ll go outside for some air.” She walked to the door. “Good seeing you, Ryker.” With a glance toward Rex, she closed the door behind her.
“You got anyone watching outside?”
“Yep. She’ll be fine,” Ryker said.
“You need to be still now,” the nurse said. “I’m going to take the bullet out and debride the wound before I stitch it up and give you an antibiotic. From what I can see, you should be right as rain in a few weeks.” The nurse bent over his hip and began to work.
For the next thirty minutes, Ryker kept up a conversation until the nurse finished. Later, Rex wasn’t sure when they left, although he remembered shouting for Abby until she returned and sat next to him.
The pain medicine he’d been given caused him to go in and out of consciousness. He remembered waking at one point and seeing Abby with a concerned look on her face. For a split second he’d been so happy to have her close enough to touch. She looked like an angel. Of course, the way his body floated above the pain helped. Then the memory of what she’d hidden for years brought him crashing back to earth.
His child. A son. Gone.
He wasn’t sure what he planned to do about it, but one thing was for sure—he’d had enough of being the nice guy.
Chapter Twenty-Six
* * *
ABBY HELD THE binoculars to her eyes and followed the drama unfolding below her. The sixth body found in the rubble came out on a stretcher covered with blue plastic. Ice stopped The Circle EMTs to check the body’s identity against a clipboard of missing operatives’ pictures
before waving them on.
Two hours earlier, she’d left Rex asleep with an operative standing guard outside the motel room door while she checked out the progress at the cave-in. The local news report had said stored explosives had detonated with no casualties. A simple mishap and a good cover-up.
The sheriff’s department was thankful to be left alone to continue their search for Edward and hold off the media circus that would ensue if word got out about their sheriff missing. One of the benefits of being a small county, rules could be bent without many knowing. But she wasn’t sure how much longer they would hold off before reporting him missing to the FBI. It had been two days since the explosion and three since her brother disappeared.
And one day since she’d unloaded the bomb of her miscarriage.
Rex had been in and out of consciousness while his body recovered from the barbershop-style surgery. During that time, she’d searched the Internet and contacted people, trying to find her brother while keeping her sister-in-law and mom up-to-date on . . . well, nothing. Brody and her brother had disappeared.
“Have they found Jack?”
She jerked around, dropping her binoculars as she aimed her gun at Rex. “You could’ve given me a heart attack or gotten shot again. How are you so quiet for such a big guy with a cane?”
He looked like hell, with his pale skin and deep grooves bracketing his mouth. A thin sheet of sweat covered his upper lip. His clothes even looked to be hanging off his body as if he’d lost weight in the last couple days. What was he doing? He should be in bed recovering.
He hobbled closer, keeping one leg straight to keep from pulling the stitches. The operative assigned to protect Rex stayed farther away. Smart man. She’d give him a piece of her mind later.
She lifted the binoculars from around her neck and handed them to Rex. “No sign of him yet. They’ve moved enough rock and dirt to fill in a stadium.”
“What are you doing up here instead of down there in the middle of all that?” He hooked the cane on his arm and balanced on his good leg as he looked through the binoculars.
“I’ve been down there, but Ryker told me I was in the way. So here I am.”
He stood so close that the heat of the day was nothing to the warmth radiating from him. Not from fever, but from his normal body temp. Those few nights they’d slept together, she’d enjoyed snuggling up to him, his internal heater thawing her body and heart. That had to be the reason men lost weight so easily. Their bodies generated so much heat that they burned calories by merely standing.
A flower petal caught in the breeze landed on his shoulder. She wanted to brush it off, but was afraid to touch him, afraid it wouldn’t be enough. She missed running her fingers down his broad chest, following the sparse trail of hair to his navel and beyond. Like a well-fed woman who was starving, the hunger pains were twice as strong.
“Jack will be found. I’ve got a gut feeling,” he said as he continued to watch the activity below.
“You really want him to be alive.” The amazement squeezed through and pushed her voice up an octave. With all the fighting they did, she’d expected him to be indifferent.
He lowered his hands and looked at her. “Why wouldn’t I?”
“From what I know, he hasn’t always been a good brother.”
“Don’t think I’m being so noble. I want him alive so I can kill him with my bare hands.” The worry in his voice told her he had mixed feelings about that.
He handed her the binoculars and headed back down the small path to where his transport was parked. His stiff walk with the cane didn’t mar the view from behind at all. The man had a fine-looking ass.
She shook her head in disgust. Time for her to move on and concentrate on finding her brother. She’d given the locals plenty of rope to hang themselves. Besides, Ryker didn’t want her help digging out the bodies and tracking down Brody.
Then she heard a shout. Looking through the binoculars, her gaze followed Jack as he walked out of the yawning blackness with someone’s limp body in his arms. With a thick coating of dirt over every inch of his body and clothing, he lowered the body stiffly onto a stretcher set up in front of him. EMTs surrounded Jack and the body. Several people slapped Jack on the back, sending clouds of dust into the air as they shouted their happiness. Behind them, several more operatives stumbled out of the darkness. She recognized Liam’s tall frame leaning on Charlie’s slightly shorter one. All of them covered with dirt. Emergency workers hurried over and helped by offering shoulders to those who stumbled out. Other personnel with stretchers waited a good distance from the caves in case the weak walls gave way.
Returning her attention to Jack and the stretcher, she caught an EMT leaning over it and examining the body. He placed a stethoscope to the person’s chest and then shook his head.
Jack’s shoulders hunched as he covered his eyes with an arm and his whole body shuddered. Another EMT said something to him and he straightened, lowering his arm to answer. No tears on his face, but in seconds the pain and sorrow aged him. He shook his head, causing dirt to fall in a cloud around his shoulders. The EMTs moved to help others, and finally Abby could see the face of the person on the stretcher.
She lowered the binoculars.
Nic. Nic was dead.
Closing her eyes, she said a little prayer. The woman was a psycho, but she’d never wished her dead. Rex and Jack thought a lot of her.
Brody needed to pay—not only for Nic’s death but also for the six other operatives who had died during the operation. Every time they entered the field, the expectation was that it could be their last.
Oh, no. What about Rex? How much more could he go through? And what about Jack? She was grateful for Jack’s survival, but she wondered at what price? She knew Jack praised his people when a mission was a success, but when things didn’t turn out right, he blamed himself—even when it was out of his control. He believed he should be prepared for anything.
A quick glance behind her confirmed Rex had left. He hadn’t heard the shouts. His brother was alive but his ex-lover, dead.
Between news of their baby and now Nic, what would he do? No one could continue to receive blows like these and not react.
She wasn’t sure if she wanted to be around when it happened.
REX LEANED ON his cane and glared at his brother.
The crowd of workers came to a standstill. Birds chirped in the trees as generators hummed beside the cave’s entrance. Everyone was quiet. Word had obviously spread about their fight a few days ago. They knew that even with his wound and Jack’s severely bruised body, they were still dangerous to each other and anyone around them.
All of The Circle operatives were accounted for, dead or alive, and the forensics arm of the organization had stepped in. Jack pressed each one hard for answers. Not so much who was responsible—they knew Brody was the culprit, as he’d given the Inferno the info—but how had he found out about their raid?
Mere hours before they showed up, the charges were hidden in the cavern. The type of explosive used had been too unstable to leave for an unforeseen future need. They had taken precautions along with taking out the guards before they could give an alarm.
Could it be someone within The Circle who betrayed them? Since the upper ranks were the only ones to know about the raid in advance, who among the most trusted could have alerted Brody? He, Abby, and Ryker were the only ones of rank not inside the cavern.
At another time, Rex would have been worried about the answer to that dilemma, but he had a more pressing need. His brother had lied to him again, had sworn to his face that he had no more secrets when it came to Abby.
Jack turned around to see what everyone was staring at, and that was when Rex struck. With his wound affecting his balance, he knew he would have only one chance. His fist hit with a resounding smack. His swing shifted his weight to his left side and the stitched wound, and he nearly fell. A couple operatives grabbed his arms. He didn’t fight their hold. He’d made his point.
“I’m sorry.” Jack pressed the back of a hand to his cut cheek. “I tried to protect her.”
“You lying asshole.” Rex shook his head. “Some protection. You believe fucking them is protecting them?”
“Fucking? I haven’t—” Then his eyes widened, and his mouth snapped closed.
“Oh, you’re remembering now.”
“Abby finally told you.” His relief evident in his voice.
“Yeah.” Rex leaned in, bunching his brother’s shirt in a fist. “I’ve forgiven you for sleeping with her, but I’ll never forget that you can’t be trusted. Taking her to bed while knowing she was pregnant with my kid . . . that I’ll never forgive.”
“But—”
Rex jerked him closer. “Shut the fuck up. Then when you heard I was alive, you didn’t even try to be a real man and contact me and tell me the truth. When I saw that you were alive, I was unbelievably fucking happy. Maybe I’m not as smart as you, but I know when I’ve been played.” He pushed him away. “You’re no longer my brother. You’re dead to me. When this mission is over, I’ll tell Ryker that I want to be reassigned to the West Coast division. The more distance between us, the better it is for The Circle and for your chances to live to an old age.”
Rex and Jack stared at each other. No one spoke a word for several seconds.
“I’m really sorry about that and about Nic.” Jack looked off to the side, avoiding Rex’s angry glare.
“You slept with Nic too?” He shook his head, gritting his teeth. Hatred for his brother boiled over until he was certain he could kill him with his bare hands.
Circle of Deception Page 21