by Casey Hagen
The little girl stood there, clutching a stuffed panda bear to her chest. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she watched her brothers disappear from view.
The card slipped from her fingers, hit the floor, and the vision disappeared.
“Luca,” Jasmine whispered.
He continued telling his brother about the card.
“Luca,” she said with more force around the lump in her throat.
“What?” he said, glancing her way. “Hold on a minute, Mason. What is it?” he asked.
She winced. “I hate to ask you this, but the last time you saw your sister—was she holding a stuffed panda bear?”
Luca’s gaze turned stormy. His hands flexed on the wheel in barely restrained fury. “Yes, why?”
Jasmine met his fierce look. “I saw her,” she said. Her stomach rolled. How the hell had Lily done this in the past? What did she do with the sorrow that overwhelmed her?
She’d been skating through life, free from the ebb and flow of emotions brought back to life by flashes of memory. She liked it that way. Life had been so much easier before she had started getting into other people’s business.
Despite that, now that she had started down this path, she had no idea if she could return to the one she was on—even if she wanted to.
And with the attraction that simmered between Jasmine and Luca, the desire growing exponentially with every touch and war of words, touching on the topic of his sister seemed far too intimate for her to maintain any kind of distance.
She needed to keep her heart out of it.
All of it.
Because the minute she made that connection, her life wouldn’t be hers anymore. No more living life for the moment and pulling up stakes when the need to keep moving struck her.
“What do you mean you saw her?” Mason asked on the other end of the line. His voice had taken on an edge she remembered from when Lily ended up in the hospital. He had been a man with one focus, and no one was getting in his way.
“I picked up the business card, and an image of her flashed in my mind. She was standing on a sidewalk, watching you guys walk away from her,” Jasmine said, surprised at how steady she managed to keep her voice.
“Fuck me,” Luca ground out.
No matter how hard she tried to block the image of their sister and back her way out of the connections fate tried to forge for them, her mind betrayed her and brought it back in vivid detail. And with it, it brought pain.
Alegra’s heartbreak flooded her heart. Her breathing grew shallow as she fought tears. She couldn’t tell them how bad they had hurt her that day. In the eyes of adults, or even older brothers, leaving a little sister behind wasn’t a big deal. She’d get over it.
And that would have been the case for them if Alegra had sat at the dinner table with them later that night.
Or any of the nights that followed.
Only, it was the last time she saw her brothers so, if she had been killed, she had died with that feeling inside her. If she lived and was out there somewhere, it was her last memory of her brothers.
Either way, it fucking sucked.
With that heavy burden of his sister’s disappearance sitting like lead on his chest, the knowledge might just crush what was left of it.
“Why are you having visions all of a sudden?” Mason asked.
She rolled her shoulders, desperate to alleviate the tightness that had her bound up. “I don’t know. It’s only one vision. I may not have another. Maybe it’s because Lily and I are in close proximity. Maybe it’s the two of you. I just don’t know.”
“But you’re still getting those gut feelings?” Mason asked.
“Stronger than ever,” she said.
“Okay, we’re going to meet at the office. I think we all need to talk before we go any further. We’ll see what the rest of the team found while you were out and decide where to go from here.”
“I can still lead this case,” Luca said.
“And I’m not taking it from you, not that I could, but I want to make sure none of us miss any angles. It also sounds like we’re going to have to pull shifts. You’ll have to sleep sometime, and it’s very possible that Tyler is just one piece of a massive puzzle. We don’t want to miss any details,” Mason said.
“This might not get us any closer to finding out what happened to Alegra,” Luca warned.
Jasmine flinched at his harsh tone as the anger rose within him. The guy could use a good punching bag.
“No, it might not. But if someone is trafficking kids, we have a chance to stop it. That’s always been the goal. I’m not so obsessed with the past that I haven’t lost focus on the present,” Mason said quietly.
“We’ll be there in fifteen,” Luca said, before ending the call.
“I don’t want to cause problems between you and your brothers,” Jasmine said.
“You’re not.”
“But bringing up memories of your sister, memories that don’t help, seems like a bit of a dick move. Even if it is my dick move. I feel like I kicked a puppy,” Jasmine said.
He laid a hand on her thigh and squeezed. “You said yourself you can’t help it. We knew something went awry when Lily had visions that sent us to that container. The only thing we found was Alegra’s necklace. Nothing to do with the case. We need to keep this sorted out. Make sure no gut feelings or visions keep us from finding Tyler.”
Jasmine traced a finger over the veins on the back of his hard hand. “There’s a chance they’ll help you find him, or your sister. Just because the visions are muddled up doesn’t mean they aren’t real.”
His fingers flexed. “We’re not going to find my sister.”
“Wait, what? I thought that was the reason you guys formed Alegra.”
He shook his head as he navigated his way through Baltimore, as if on autopilot. “We didn’t want any other kids getting lost to their families forever. Despite the line Mason gave us on the phone, my brothers hope to find her, or at least find out what happened to her.”
“And you?”
“I stopped believing in that miracle a long time ago.”
Chapter 5
Luca wanted nothing more than to go for a good run and burn off the anger simmering inside him.
And helplessness. Always the helplessness.
It didn’t matter how many kids they found, or how high their success rate. The ones lost forever were the ones who weighed on his mind, no matter how much he denied it.
He led Jasmine into their offices and stopped in the middle of the room to make an announcement to the team. “My brothers will be here in the next few minutes. When they get here, we’re all meeting in my office to go over the case. Bring whatever you’ve collected thus far.”
“Everything okay, boss?” Dante asked.
“The case may be becoming a whole lot more complicated than we originally thought. I’m still lead, but my brothers will be on duty with this one. We’re going to need to take shifts,” Luca said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need a minute with Jasmine before we get started.”
He took her hand and headed for his office. Her whole demeanor had changed in that damn arcade, and he hated it. That flash of attitude and balls of steel she wore like a suit of armor had fled, leaving an unrecognizable shell of who she had been before they left.
He closed the door and backed her up to it. Cupping her cheeks, he grazed his thumbs over the silken skin along the edge of her jaw. God, she was so soft.
So fucking soft.
He wanted nothing more than to sink into her and forget everything.
“What happened to you out there?” he asked.
“I, uh…” She cleared her throat. “I don’t know what you mean.”
He raised a brow and ducked his head, forcing her to meet his eyes. “You want to try the truth this time?”
She wrapped her hand around his wrist, a hint of desperation in her grip. “I’m not used to this…all this feeling. It was cute up until a few weeks ago. Lily
always felt guilty that we went through it, but it really wasn’t so bad on my end, you know? I’d get a feeling, dumb stuff, and I would just know, but wouldn’t say anything. Sometimes I would watch situations play out for my own amusement, but they were superficial games. Not life and death, and not the broken heart of a little girl.” Her lips snapped shut, and she frowned.
Luca sucked in a breath and backed away from her. “What are you talking about?” A sense of dread lodged in his gut. He didn’t want to know what his sister had felt.
But a part of him needed to know.
Her eyes shot open wide. “I was talking about with Mara,” she said.
“Don’t lie to me,” he growled as his pulse slammed in a hard rhythm in his neck.
She eyed him warily, this woman who wasn’t afraid of anything—which told him that, whatever she knew, he’d be devastated by it. He leaned his palms on the door on either side of her head. “You’re protecting me,” he whispered into the hair at her temple.
Her breath hitched, and she nodded.
She’d been circling the perimeter of his heart for a few weeks now. Since he’d met her during Mara’s case. Sure, they had argued, bantered really, the heat more attraction than anger. She kept him on his toes.
Despite his smartass remarks, he’d loved every minute of it.
This, though, this marked a whole new aspect to their relationship. This was the kind of protection you didn’t walk away from.
Despite the list he could make of all the reasons why this was a colossally bad idea, he had every intention of holding on tight.
He nuzzled her ear and sighed. “As much as I appreciate it, I’d rather you tell me the truth so I’m not blindsided by it later, when the price of pain is so much higher. Right now, right here, it’s just us,” he whispered.
“You guys broke her heart that day, when you didn’t take her with you. It was the first time she had ever felt as though her brothers wouldn’t be there for her,” she murmured, her throat thick with tears.
And then someone stole her because they weren’t. They ripped her away from them and set a series of events in motion that destroyed his family. He dropped his forehead to her shoulder and slammed his hand against the door as his heart cracked and shame filled him.
“What’s worse than knowing that, is knowing that I’m the reason you’ll never be able to forget it,” Jasmine whispered.
Her words sent cracks splitting through him, and right after delivering the blow that shattered his heart, she wrapped her arms around him and held the pieces together so he didn’t fall apart.
He curled his arms around her and held on as guilt tore at him. The image of his sister that day, whimpering and in tears, when they told her that she wasn’t big enough, that she was too much of a pain in the butt, that she wasn’t a part of their unit.
They had been the ramblings of careless youths who had to lose their sister forever to finally understand that, from the day their mother had brought her home in her pink dress and frilly bows, she had become the center of their universe.
Without her the unit was never the same.
A knock vibrated the door, and he pulled away.
“Hey, everyone’s here and waiting. You guys ready?” Mason called.
“Yeah, come on in,” Luca said as he pulled Jasmine away from the door.
The whole crew piled in. Mason came in, hand in hand with Lily. Garrett and Talon stood just outside the office and waited while their assistants, Dante, Brenda, Callie, and Jasper, filed into the room.
Luca took his place behind his desk and did his best to push the past couple of minutes out of his mind. Jasmine backed into the corner of the room and stayed silent, that flirty smile replaced by tension and hurt.
He gave her a small smile, one meant to reassure her, but she didn’t return it. She glanced away. Lily whispered something to her, and she nodded.
The minute he had a chance, they were going to get to the bottom of all the crap that bubbled up between them.
For now, though, his job took priority. He spread out his notes and pictures, then cracked open his laptop. “This case might have intersected with our last, and if we find they’re linked, it’s going to have a lot of moving parts. Right now, we’re going to go forward with this meeting as if Tyler Mishler’s case is an extension of Mara Wilkins’ case, but I still want all angles explored, especially the runaway aspect. Understood?”
His group nodded, even Lily as an unofficial team member after her help with Mara’s case. But then his gaze landed on Jasmine, and for the first time in hours, fire flashed in her eyes at the suggestion of Tyler being a runaway.
Good.
“Today, Jasmine and I went to Leo’s Arcade. The owner was nice enough; he wasn’t there the afternoon Tyler went missing, and he not only showed me the security footage right there on the spot, but he sent it.” Luca turned his laptop so everyone could see it. “Here’s the interesting part. The last time Tyler was seen, that we know of, was caught on the footage.” He pressed ‘play’ and waited for Tyler to come into view on the screen. “Right there,” he said as he paused the footage. “Leo wasn’t there. He’d left the place in Will Carson’s hands, Kelan’s older brother. During that time Tyler was seen in front of the building, then the footage cuts out for about ten minutes and returns to Will, who looks to be watching someone drive away. Tyler is never seen after the point where he was arriving at the arcade.”
“Were you able to talk to Will?” Talon asked as he leaned his shoulder against the wall. His brother had this way of seeming harmless and casual, yet Luca knew for a fact, after years in the SEALs, he could slit the throat of someone across the room in under ten seconds with a room full of potential witnesses and have none of them see a damn thing.
“He wasn’t there, and I didn’t ask for his info from the owner. Jasper can have it in seconds if necessary, but I’d rather show up unannounced. I did speak to Kelan. And here’s the most interesting part…he said that Tyler hadn’t been there for well over a week. The boy was shaking in his boots. We know he was lying, but considering his age, I didn’t press the interview.”
“Good call,” Garrett said.
“Here’s where it all gets tricky. Jasmine found a business card matching the one found on Dan Simmons. Someone had tucked it behind the door casing. The code on the back is different than the code on the card Simmons carried.”
Talon let out a low whistle. “We need to find out what the codes go to, especially if cards are going to start popping up every time a kid goes missing.”
“Well, not quite every time. Garrett found Alex Steen in two days and no human trafficking involved. A dipshit father who thought he could steal his son, but that’s not quite as sinister as whatever this is.”
“Jasper, you want to give us a rundown on what you found?” Luca asked, turning over the floor to his team.
This was what he needed. A clear focus. To clean out the regrets from the past and put his energy toward the now. He took a deep breath, stood a little straighter, and avoided looking in Jasmine’s direction while he got a grip on his responsibilities.
“Well, their financials came back clean. They almost divorced four years ago. The wife filed the paperwork, but by the time they were supposed to show for the court-ordered mediation, they had reconciled,” Jasper said, tossing a manila envelope onto the table that Luca knew would contain printouts of his report for back-up.
“Any indication of what brought that on?”
“The wife was on antidepressants, so I presume it had to do with that, but I don’t know for sure,” Jasper said with a shrug.
“Well, I might have the answer to that,” Brenda said. “I spoke to former neighbors of theirs. Turns out Eric put a lot of pressure on Tyler to play sports, and the kid just wasn’t athletic. They fought about it a lot.”
“Do we have anything else on the parents?” Luca asked.
“Yes,” Callie said. “Stella had a miscarriage six years ago. Tha
t also could have contributed to the divorce filing.”
“That wasn’t in her medical records,” Jasper muttered.
“No, she told a friend, but that’s about it. Didn’t go to the doctor. She didn’t know what had happened until her friend said the same thing happened to her. After sharing the details, Stella decided she didn’t need to see a doctor unless there appeared to be more of a problem down the line,” Callie said.
“Anything else to add?” Mason asked.
“We just need to keep in mind that Tyler is considered a serial runaway. We don’t want to force pieces of the puzzle to fit into place.”
Jasmine snorted, and all eyes swung to her.
“Sorry, allergies,” she muttered.
Lily stood next to her, biting her cheek and studying the ceiling.
Luca directed his attention back to his team. “That’s why the cops aren’t stepping in.”
“So, what are you thinking?” Talon asked Luca.
Luca shoved a frustrated hand through his hair. “I’m still not convinced that they’re wrong.” His eyes found Jasmine’s, which homed in on him like lasers. “But in case they are, we need to be looking at everything, and the fact that Kelan is freaked out tells me there might be something significant there.”
“Was anything found from the I-83 underpass, Callie?” he asked, directing his attention to her.
“Nope, no one had ever seen him before,” she said. “They have a pretty high turnover there, so it’s hard to find anyone who’s been there longer than a year or so.”
“Okay. What about the shelter, Brenda?”
“He had been in there once, but that was two years ago,” she confirmed.
“Any chance he ran away to Kelan’s house and that’s what has him freaked out? He could have snuck Tyler in and his parents don’t know about it, so he’s worried he’ll get in trouble,” Talon mused.
“Definitely possible. Mason, can I get you to drop in on the Carsons? I’m thinking you look just official enough that they would tell you anything you want to know, but not so official that they worry about their sons being in any significant trouble,” Luca said.