“I swear that man needs to get a life,” she muttered.
Suzy turned, looked at the bowls in the cabinet, shook her head and said, “And a wife.”
“I’m going to the store to get some stuff,” Gideon said. “I’ll be back.”
“Get paper plates and bowls, no one’s in the mood to wash,” she hollered at his back, glad to see that the Ranger excused himself and followed her brother out.
Sometimes, even in the midst of chaos, there were threads of normalcy. Morgan helped Suzy make the corn bread.
* * *
7:22 p.m.
Morgan sat in the living room watching TV. A football game was on. She had no idea who was playing, or what the score was. She wondered if anyone else knew. From the focused looks on the men’s faces, she would have to guess yes. Scanning the living room, she realized Gideon wasn’t there.
Taking a deep breath, she stood. Lincoln reached for her arm, his brows frowning in a question.
“I want to find Gideon.”
For a moment Lincoln stared at her, then he nodded.
Morgan walked down the hallway, its wall painted a neutral beige or tan or something; the baseboards, they had to be black.
He really needed more color. A bright red chair would still carry the warm colors. Or maybe a fall orange.
Shaking off the decorating she didn’t agree with, she knocked on then opened his study door at the back of the hallway. Her brother sat behind a U-shaped console, and all his computers—at least three—sat at various stations. His eyes leveled to her over his reading glasses.
Taking a deep breath, she walked in, shut the door and said, “What does a person need with three computers?”
For a moment he said nothing, only inhaled. “Who knows.”
Morgan, anxiety rioting in her stomach, plopped down in the sling-back chair opposite his desk. She moved, trying to get comfortable. “Do you hate real furniture?”
He only raised a single brow. “Just because I work with antiques doesn’t mean I have to live with them.”
“True, but geez, Gid, I haven’t seen a chair like this since college.”
They lapsed into a strained silence.
Finally, looking at her hands, she asked, “Do you hate me?”
“What?” he snapped, drawing her attention to his beetled brows. “No. God, no, Morgan. I just don’t . . . I can’t . . . Hell.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I’m not like Jackson. I can’t see all the different angles of things, okay?”
Again the quiet pressed in on them. Deciding to give him more time, she stood. “Sorry to bother you.” She raked a hand through her own mop of hair and crossed her arms. “I’ll let you get back to whatever you’re doing.”
He nodded, and she turned. At the door, his voice stopped her. “I’m sorry, Morgan. I don’t know what else to say.”
Without turning, she opened the door and walked out. At least he was speaking to her. Sort of.
In the hallway, Gideon’s secretary, Mrs. Wagner, stood, her curvaceous figure hidden beneath the broomstick skirt and vests she’d favored for as long as Morgan could remember.
Jackson was talking to her.
“It’s the biggest jump in sales we’ve had in years,” she said, thrusting a mail container at Jackson. “Ms. Owens sent your stuff along as well as Morgan’s.” She looked up and noticed Morgan at the end of the hall. “Oh, thank God you’re all right, Morgan, honey. We’re all just worried sick at the office, let me tell you.”
Morgan really wished she wouldn’t. Instead, she reopened the door, startled that Gid stood on just the other side. “Mrs. Wagner is here.”
A corner of his mouth tilted. He touched Morgan’s shoulder, strode around her and walked to his secretary.
“There you are, Gid. Well, I was just telling J.D. here that we haven’t seen sales like this in years. Everyone at the shop was hustling today. Several are staying later this evening to restock a few things. We sold figurines, artwork, entire bedroom suites today.” She wagged her gray eyebrows. “Even that atrocious Louis the XVI ensemble that sat in the corner for over a year.”
“Who?” Gideon asked.
“Oh, that new designer that’s working for the Johnsons.”
A collective “ah” filled the air. None of them liked working with the Johnsons. Mrs. Johnson—depending on mood—redecorated the entire house and didn’t see a problem with trading her previous purchases for new ones.
Morgan, feeling odd, tried to slide past the trio who stood alone, the group of guards having disappeared to wherever they went to. But it wasn’t to be. Mrs. Wagner grabbed Morgan in a tight, big-bosomed hug. “It’ll be okay, honey. If you need anyone to talk to, you know you always have a place.”
Carefully, she pulled back and smiled. “To think of all the money I’ve wasted on a therapist, when I could have just come to you.”
Mrs. Wagner laughed. “Well, you know where to find me.”
With that, she quickly said her good-byes and left. She and her brothers all let out a collective sigh. Jackson said, “Come on, I’ll give y’all your mail.”
Morgan was in no hurry herself. A cop strode in from the kitchen, followed by Becca. The cop said, “Don’t worry, it’s all been scanned. Nothing in there to worry about.”
And from the looks of the few envelopes, there wasn’t much for any of them today.
Jackson tossed her a rubber-banded bundle of mostly junk mail and a cruise brochure. She flung them onto the coffee table.
Lincoln was sitting on the couch. He leaned up, grabbed the brochure and flipped it open.
She noted that her brothers both had Express envelopes with Photos written in black bold letters across the fronts.
Frowning, she turned back to Lincoln and sat beside him.
“Ever been to the Bahamas?” he asked her.
She nodded. “Yep. Rather nice, actually.”
He studied the cruise ship. “Ever been on a cruise?”
What was this? She smiled and shook her head. “No.”
For a minute, he looked at her, then smiled. “Maybe one day you should try it,” he said quietly.
“Morgan doesn’t travel, does she, Jack?” Gideon added.
Jackson didn’t answer. Morgan turned to him. His face was pale, a muscle ticking in his jaw, his brows pulled low.
He was pissed. About what?
His hand trembled as he flipped another photo to the back of the stack.
“Jack?” she asked.
His eyes rose to hers and he shook his head, then closed his eyes, blowing out a breath.
Gideon ripped his envelope open. “Jesus,” he muttered as the photos slid into his hands.
“What?” she asked, standing. “What now?”
Jackson didn’t say a word, his eyes narrowed, lit with anger, as he shoved the photos at her.
She took them, surprised when he strode to the window, cursing under his breath.
Her heart slammed in her chest and iced.
There, in black and white, she was collared and cuffed, the chain held by a nameless man.
A man who clearly wanted her. Who was fucking her.
And her own face . . .
Blank. Accepting. Accepting of whatever the man wanted to do . . .
Oh, God. No.
Chapter 31
Linc reached for the images, but she turned away, flipping to the next and the next. Each was worse than the one before, and all raked along her exposed nerves. The blood roared in her ears as she looked at the next one. One man held her chain while another fucked her from behind. Her eyes were wide, glassy, her expression blank.
Blank. Oh, no. Please no.
She faced another girl.
The last photo sent chills down her spine. She was chained to a bed, screaming as the man slammed into her.
“I remember him,” she whispered.
She heard Gideon curse again, knew he threw the photos; they fluttered at her feet.
All she could focu
s on was the image of that man with his cigarette. “Who is he?” she asked softly.
Lincoln stood beside her. “It doesn’t matter.”
Her gaze rose to him. “It does matter. He marked me. Gave me the scar on my hip. Kept strangling me and laughing about it. It was the only time I ever thanked Mikhail.”
“Give me those,” Linc hissed, reaching for them. Again she jerked them away, flipping back through them. Each was in harsh black and white relief.
And all made her sick.
Her and men. She and another girl working a customer.
She closed her eyes. Images and memories knifing and sharding through her brain.
The girl . . . She opened her eyes and stared at the photograph.
A girl with long black hair. And the look in her eyes was all rage.
Ebony.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered. Ebony. She had a picture of her. “Oh, my God.”
Quickly she flipped back through the rest of them, her heart slamming. Please, please let there be another one.
In a club shot, Ebony stood beside a chair of a patron while Morgan—no, Dusk—performed a lap dance.
Morgan stopped, staring at the photograph, shoving her own nerves away.
“What the fuck are these?” Gideon asked, his voice tight.
Morgan blinked, blinked again and looked up at her brothers. Her hands shook at Gideon’s words. At least they had some warning.
Morgan licked her lips, looking away from Gideon’s shocked, enraged expression, from Jack’s stiff back.
“They’re photos.” She looked at the man beside her, the man who had taken her from all she held in her hands.
His eyes were straight, direct, no pity, no condemnation, no sympathy.
“Don’t let these upset you. That’s what he wants, you know,” he said softly, the edges of his eyes crinkling as he narrowed his gaze at her.
Silence fell, heavy and thick. Just like the night before.
Gideon cleared his throat. Morgan took a deep breath, licked her lips. “I have a feeling it’s a bit hard to find out their sister is a whore and being shown what that means . . . exactly.” Had she really thought all this would stay buried? That her sins, many, varied and dark, would stay forgotten?
She saw the disgust in their eyes, the anger.
Inside she trembled, but she notched her chin up, looked first Gideon, then Jackson, in the eye. “I told you they took me as payment. Lincoln told you what they did to me. You’ve wanted to know where I was, what I was doing, why—why I couldn’t call you.”
Jackson stared at her, then shook his head, his hands fisting on his hips. “Well, it sure as hell wasn’t . . . wasn’t . . . ” He gestured to the stack Lincoln took from her. “Damn it, Morg. It’s one thing to be told. Another to . . . ” He reached over and jerked the copies from her hands. “It’s another to have it slapped in our fucking faces.”
Disgust roared up in her, at all men, and she yelled, “Do you think I don’t know that, Jackson? Think I can’t see what this does to you? How you see me? I was a whore! A goddamn whore!” She crossed her arms, cupping her elbows, trying to stop the shakes, quell the nausea. Quietly she asked, “How was I ever supposed to explain that?”
Gideon’s face reflected his shock at her words, the red climbing back up his features. “Why?”
“Why?” she scoffed. “Why what, Gideon? What the hell do you think? You think I wanted that? Wanted to fuck however many men I was told to?” She bent down, grabbed several photos lying at her feet and threw them at her brother. Nerves tightened, pinged, almost shattered. “You think I chose to be beaten, tortured, raped until I didn’t care and prayed for God to let one of them just kill me? Prayed for God to give me the courage to just end it? Do you know what it’s like to be so lost, so completely despairing that you can’t even slit your own wrists with a broken piece of glass?”
His silence answered her, his frown deepening.
All the dark and bitter secrets of her past refused to be silenced. Need for peace trembled through her, fought the fear and the shame. “You think I said, please put me in the hole, let me hear the girls screaming? Give me some drugs so I don’t know or care who does what?” She tightened her hold on her elbows until it hurt. “Please, Mikhail, take all my freedoms away and humiliate me, send me on a K trip just to terrorize me so someone else can laugh? Please beat me, fuck me, sell me to any depraved man that wants a night with Dusk?”
Her voice echoed into nothing. She felt Linc’s hand on her arm and realized she stepped toward her brother.
Rage, fury, and shame tangled in a fearful web.
She looked away from them, out the window, and hoped to bring her voice back under control. She heard the door open, heard Suzy and Shadow bantering, heard the words die away.
“What the hell is going on?” Suzy asked.
Morgan didn’t say a word, heard shuffling, assumed one of the boys was picking up the photos.
“Give me those,” Suzy said.
Morgan still didn’t turn. She didn’t realize she was crying until she reached up and flicked a tear away, then rubbed her cheeks with the backs of her hands.
Very quietly she asked, “How am I supposed to tell y’all about all this? All you know is Gaelord’s. Your lives revolve around the shop, the ranch, your own lives.” She glanced at them over her shoulder. “If people know whorehouses still exist I doubt any think women don’t want to work in them. Think of old west brothels and girls wanting to make money, or maybe the American idea of an escort service and women leading a high-rolling life? That’s not reality. Reality is that no one wants to be forced into prostitution, that a large number of us beg to be free, only to be punched, kicked, or drugged for simply asking. And that’s if the bosses are feeling merciful.”
Jackson sat back on the arm of a chair, his shoulders slumped. His features tight and pale, his mouth in a hard line, his eyes narrowed.
Gideon still looked baffled, muttered to himself and turned to the window down from her before pacing back. He walked to her, his jaw moving out and in. In his hand he held one of the photos. She could see it was the one of her screaming, the man that had marked her, choked her.
Gideon’s gaze dropped to it. “Jesus, Morg.”
He was so damn angry.
Without a word, he grabbed her, looked into her eyes, his own blazing, then crushed her against his chest. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Morgan.” He rocked her back and forth. She could feel him shudder against her.
And she realized that he wasn’t just angry. He hurt. Wrapping her arms around him, she hugged him back. “It’s okay, Gideon.”
He jerked away from her. “It’s not fucking okay,” he muttered, raking a hand through his hair. “Why didn’t you call? We would have come and gotten you out! We could have . . . I could have . . . ”
She could only stare at him. Was he serious? Yes, she saw, he was. Her heart squeezed. “Oh, Gideon,” she sighed.
Morgan looked at Jackson, at the question in his eyes as well. Jackson and Suzy sat side by side on the couch.
“Fucking bastards,” Suzy said.
The word was so shocking coming from Suzy that Morgan just stared, then smiled. “Suzy, such language.”
The woman tried to smile through her tears, but failed, dropped the photos and cried.
Oh, God.
Jackson shook his head at Morgan and wrapped an arm around Suzy. “It’ll be okay, Suz.”
Morgan didn’t know what to do. She hadn’t wanted them to know, but now they did and she had no idea how to deal with it all.
Lincoln walked to her and took the hands she was twisting together.
Lincoln bit down, angry at the turmoil he had no way of stemming. He leaned over and kissed her forehead, pleased when she didn’t pull away.
He stepped in front of Morgan and very quietly said, “He wants you upset.”
He looked at Gideon and shook his head. “Mate, I thought I explained last night. There are
no telephones, and if Mikhail had caught her using one there is no telling what he would have done to her. Broken her hand, perhaps, ruptured an eardrum, who knows. Bastard is creative in his punishments from all we’ve learned.” He stepped closer until he was standing toe to toe with the man. “She’s lucky to be alive, to have survived and become the woman she is.” He looked into those eyes, so like the sister’s, and pressed the issue home. “I’m tired of you making condemning remarks when you don’t have a clue.”
Truth be told he was tired of everything. Tired of the fact he couldn’t make this all go away. Morgan was still terrified and she had every damn right to be. They were no closer to discovering who the hell the informant was than they had been before. Checks were run, people investigated—bloody hell, himself included. And still nothing.
They were playing on the defensive and Lincoln hated it.
Morgan cleared her throat, and flipped a photo to him. “Who is she?”
She was pointing to a picture, the photo of a young girl, Mediterranean if he had to guess. Linc shook off his anger at her brother and focused on the photo she was holding, ignored what was happening in the photo.
He studied the girl, then looked back to Morgan. Raw pain showed on her face, in her pallor, the tightened features. “I don’t know, luv, why?”
Her lip trembled and she sat in a chair, her fingers running over the girl’s face.
Lincoln figured she really didn’t need to know.
Her eyes rose to his. “Here’s another one.” She flipped another picture toward him. “This is the girl he killed and tossed into that shallow grave. This, Lincoln, is Ebony.”
He jerked the photos from her hand.
“Can you find out who she is?” she asked.
He studied the photo, wondered if this face would match any . . . Something about the nose. Was there already a yellow notice on this one?
He looked to Shadow. “Have you seen her?”
Shadow took the other stack from Suzy’s lap and started flipping through them. He glanced up, took two out of the stack in his hand, studying them.
And Lincoln knew that Shadow saw something.
“I’ll need to check first,” Shadow said.
Hunted Page 33