Sawyer

by Delores Fossen

  She certainly didn’t go to her brother and hug him as she’d done the last time Bennie had arrived at the sheriff’s office. And that was a little surprising, considering that Bennie’s face still showed the bruises and cuts he’d gotten while being held captive.

  Well, a theoretical captive anyway.

  With everything they’d learned, Sawyer had to accept that Bennie might have orchestrated the whole thing. If so, Sawyer wasn’t sure he could stop himself from adding more cuts and bruises to Bennie’s face. After all, the kidnapping could have gotten Cassidy killed.

  “This way,” Sawyer told Bennie, and he hitched his thumb toward one of the interview rooms.

  “I don’t know why I had to come back to this place,” Bennie complained, but he followed Cassidy and Sawyer into the room.

  Sawyer was about to insist that Cassidy stay out of this, but Bennie’s whole lack of concern for her reared its ugly head. If Bennie was guilty, she needed to hear it from her brother’s own mouth. Then Sawyer could turn him over to one of his cousins so they could do the official interrogation.

  And maybe make an arrest.

  “There’s no need for you to worry about my debts,” Bennie went on, his attention fastened to Cassidy. “I’ve been in touch with the bar owner and worked out a payment plan.”

  “With Rex Ross,” Sawyer provided.

  Bennie flinched. Then his mouth tightened. “You’ve been spying on me?”

  “No, but we have been going through your phone records.” Sawyer dropped the pages on the table in front of them.

  One look at them and Bennie slowly sank into the chair. “You saw the calls I made to Diane.” He spoke to Cassidy not to Sawyer.

  “You said you weren’t having an affair with her,” Cassidy reminded him.

  “And I wasn’t.” Even though he’d only been seated for a few seconds, Bennie sprang to his feet. “What—do you believe him now over me?” In this case, the him was Sawyer, and Bennie stabbed his stiff index finger in his direction.

  Cassidy didn’t jump to assure him. She folded her arms over her chest. “I’m merely asking—are you having an affair with Diane?”

  “No,” Bennie howled. “Of course not. She was a married woman, and I wouldn’t have wanted to risk making enemies with her husband even if they are separated.”

  “Then why call her?” Cassidy demanded.

  “Diane wanted to discuss April, that’s all. She wanted some insight into April’s past because she thought that might help with her therapy.”

  While that explanation sounded a little unconventional, Sawyer couldn’t dispute it. Well, not until he’d spoken to Diane anyway. Hopefully, the doctor was still alive and he’d be able to do just that.

  “Why would Diane think you have insight into April?” Sawyer asked. “You hadn’t known her that long.”

  Bennie lifted his shoulder, and his mouth settled into a pout, making him look like a kid. “I guess April talked about me a lot during their sessions. Mostly lies, I’m sure. She had a hard time telling the truth about anything.”

  Still, April had convinced her shrink that Bennie had information that would help her recovery. Sawyer wasn’t sure he could buy that, but he moved on to the next subject.

  He tapped the next name of interest. Chester Finley. “Why would he call you just days before the kidnapping?”

  Bennie stared at it a moment. “I have no idea. I saw his name on my caller ID, didn’t recognize it, so I didn’t answer it. That number belonged to Chester Finley?”

  Sawyer nodded and looked for any sign that Bennie was lying. He didn’t seem to be, but Sawyer reminded himself that Bennie had a lot of nasty habits, and that included breaking the law. He probably wouldn’t have any trouble lying to an FBI agent.

  Bennie shook his head, huffed. “If I had any idea Finley was on the verge of kidnapping Cassidy and me, I would have taken the call and tried to talk him out of it.”

  If that was true, Bennie would have almost certainly failed. There was too much money at stake for Chester and Joe to back off. But the question was—did the men have help from Bennie?

  “You don’t believe me,” Bennie said, his nostrils flaring now. “Well, the person you should be looking at is Diane. I think April was right to be afraid of the doctor. Have you considered that Diane could be behind the kidnappings? A million dollars is a lot of motive, and Diane could have manipulated April into helping her.”

  Yes, Sawyer had considered it, along with a lot of other angles. Still, it was one he shouldn’t continue to dismiss just because Bennie had reminded him of it.

  Sawyer fired off a text to Kade and asked his cousin to check Diane’s financial records. He wasn’t sure just how deep Kade could dig, but maybe they could learn if Diane had any money problems.

  Like Bennie did.

  “Talk to me about this payment plan you have for your loan to Rex Ross,” Sawyer insisted.

  “Nothing to talk about. Rex has agreed to let me pay him monthly from my trust-fund allowance.”

  No way did that sound right to Sawyer. “Really? Bookies aren’t usually that accommodating.”

  “Well, in this case the arrangement works in his favor. Until the debt’s paid off, Rex gets paid most of my trust fund, and he’s added a hefty amount of interest. I guess the profit he’ll be making was enough to make him agree to the payments.”

  Cassidy huffed, put her hands on the table and leaned in until she was right in her brother’s face. “If that’s a lie or if there’s something you’re keeping from me, now is the time to tell me.”

  Bennie’s eyes instantly narrowed, and he stood, slowly, without taking his gaze from his sister. “It’s clear whose side youʼre on. What, are you sleeping with Sawyer again?”

  “That’s none of your business,” Cassidy snapped before Sawyer could say anything. “Now, what are you keeping from me?”

  “Nothing,” he said through clenched teeth.

  Bennie didn’t get a chance to add more because the jangling sound got everyone’s attention. The sound meant they had a visitor, and while that wasn’t at all unusual in the sheriff’s office, Sawyer didn’t want a kidnapper storming the place.

  But it wasn’t a kidnapper.

  Well, maybe it wasn’t.

  Willy walked in, and his gaze went straight to the hall where Sawyer was now standing. “I found out something about Dr. Blackwell.”

  Until Willy said that, Sawyer had been about to tell him to take a hike, but that stopped him. “What?” Sawyer snapped, walking closer.

  But Sawyer wasn’t walking alone. He heard footsteps behind him, glanced over his shoulder and there was Cassidy and Bennie. The stay-put glare he shot them didn’t even make them pause.

  Willy opened his mouth but then closed it when he spotted Bennie. “He’d better not be here to accuse me of anything.”

  “If the shoes fits...” Bennie grumbled. Obviously, there was no love lost between the two.

  “What’d you find out about Diane?” Sawyer pressed, ignoring the sharp looks Bennie and Willy were doling out to each other.

  “I heard a lot of talk about Diane being strapped for cash because her hubby cut her off without a dime,” Willy continued. “I’ve also heard that she’s within weeks of losing her home and business because she’s got an expensive drug habit that she wants to keep hidden. I figure that gives her motive to team up with Bennie here to put together his own kidnapping.”

  Bennie cursed. “I’m sick and tired of people accusing me of things I didn’t do.”

  “Join the club,” Willy grumbled. “The only reason I’m here is to show Agent Ryland that there are folks with a bigger motive than me for these kidnappings. And April’s murder.”

  “But you have a motive, too,” Sawyer reminded him. “You were jealous of April be
cause she’d broken things off with you. That’s a big motive, if you ask me. Besides, why would Bennie and Diane want April dead?”

  Willy casually lifted his shoulder as if he wasn’t affected by the accusation Sawyer had just tossed at him. “Maybe Bennie wanted April dead because she was a loose end. If she knew about the kidnapping, was maybe even a part of it, then the poor rich boy here wouldn’t have wanted her hanging around to rat on him. It’s the same for Diane.”

  “If she’s alive,” Sawyer replied, and he volleyed glances between both Willy and Bennie. Both men seemed surprised that she might be dead.

  Seemed.

  “Maybe Diane is a loose end, too,” Sawyer added. “Because she’s missing, and there are signs of foul play.”

  There were just a few seconds of silence before both men started to declare their innocence. And maybe they were. But Sawyer kept pressing. “Where were you both last night?”

  “At home,” Bennie immediately answered. “With a deputy guard at my front door. If I’d left, he would have known about it.”

  Not necessarily. The O’Neal estate was huge, and Bennie could have slipped out.

  The phone rang, and even though there was no dispatcher or receptionist out front today, Grayson or one of the deputies must have answered it because it stopped after just two rings.

  “And what about you?” Sawyer asked Willy. “Where were you last night?”

  “I was at home, too. Alone. I didn’t figure I’d need to have an alibi for every minute of my life.”

  Sawyer gave him a flat look. “Well, you figured wrong. I’ll check your phone records to see if you’re telling the truth.”

  That pretty much drained the color from Willy’s face, but the man didn’t get a chance to change his story or balk again about his innocence. Grayson stepped out from his office, and he motioned for Sawyer to come closer, which he did, bringing Cassidy along with him. But Sawyer motioned for Willy and Bennie to stay put.

  “What’s wrong?” Sawyer asked after noticing Grayson’s concerned expression.

  “It’s someone from the lab.” Grayson handed Sawyer the phone. “They just got back the results of the baby’s DNA test.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Cassidy held her breath and watched Sawyer as he took the phone from Grayson. He didn’t put the call on Speaker, probably because Willy and Bennie were still there, and she couldn’t tell from Sawyer’s expression what the person from the lab was saying to him. She could only stand there and wait to see whose baby had been put in the middle of this dangerous mix.

  The cops didn’t have DNA from Monica Barnes, but they had Sawyer’s. If he was Emma’s father, then Monica was almost certainly the little girl’s mother.

  And maybe the kidnappers had known that all along.

  It would explain why they’d had her take the child to Sawyer and get that photo. The proof that would have made him pay any amount of ransom.

  But she had to stop and shake her head.

  The kidnappers had told her to leave the baby with Sawyer and bring back the photo. Why? If they’d just held on to the baby, then they could have collected more money.

  So, what was this about?

  Ruining Sawyer’s reputation by uncovering his involvement with a cocktail waitress? That would hardly ruin him unless the person behind this wanted to somehow tie him to the kidnappings.

  And that brought her back to her brother.

  Of their suspects, Bennie was the only one who would want revenge on Sawyer. It all went back to that investigation a year ago and Sawyer’s attempt to arrest Bennie.

  Mercy, had her brother decided to get even by embroiling Sawyer in a kidnapping? If so, she prayed she could deal with the consequence.

  “Yes, run it,” Sawyer said to the person on the other end of the line. He clicked End Call, turned and immediately snared her gaze. “April is Emma’s biological mother.”

  The relief washed through her. For a few seconds anyway. And then she realized what this meant. Emma wasn’t Sawyer’s child, and he had no claim to her. Yes, Sawyer and she had only had the baby for a short period of time, but Cassidy felt the loss.

  Apparently, Sawyer did, too, because that wasn’t happiness she saw in his eyes.

  “Who’s the kid’s father?” Willy snapped.

  The man’s eyes were easy to read, too. The anger had returned with a vengeance. No doubt because they already knew that Emma wasn’t Willy’s, and that meant April had indeed cheated on him.

  Sawyer shook his head. “We don’t know.”

  “Maybe I’m looking at him.” Willy glared at Sawyer.

  “I already told you that I never even met April.”

  Willy’s glare got worse. “Prove it. Or prove to me the test isn’t fake.”

  “It’s not fake,” Sawyer insisted.

  But judging from the sound Willy made, he obviously didn’t agree. “For all I know, you could be covering up your guilt in all of this. Where were you last night?” Willy added, repeating the question Sawyer had asked him earlier.

  But Sawyer didn’t respond to that. He turned to Grayson instead. “I was never with April, so there’s no chance Emma could be mine, but I told the lab tech to go ahead and compare her DNA to mine. To exclude me so we can focus on finding the real father. Maybe April’s killer, too.”

  Sawyer’s gaze landed on Bennie. “My DNA’s already in the system at Quantico, but since you’ve never been arrested for a felony, yours isn’t. I want you to give us a sample of your DNA so we can run it against Emma’s.”

  When Bennie didn’t respond, Cassidy reeled in his direction. “Please tell me you’re not going to argue about this, too?” she said.

  Oh, her brother didn’t like that. “All right,” Bennie finally said, and he repeated it in a much louder, firmer voice when Cassidy continued to stare at him.

  Had Bennie hesitated for a reason?

  He’d already said the child wasn’t his, so there should have been no hesitation in giving them a sample of his DNA. Besides, Bennie had to have known this would happen. If neither Willy nor Sawyer was the baby’s father, then the next likely person was her brother. Well, the next likely person in the room anyway. It was entirely possible that April had had lovers none of them knew about.

  Grayson disappeared into another room, and a few seconds later, he came back with a plastic bag that contained a swab. “Use it on the inside of your mouth,” Grayson instructed.

  Bennie took the test kit, stared at it, before his gaze came back to hers. “The cops and FBI set people up all the time. You know Sawyer has it in for me.”

  It took her a moment to tamp down the anger so she could speak. “No, I don’t know that. Because Sawyer wouldn’t set you up.”

  “Yeah, you say that because you have a thing for him, but I don’t trust him.”

  Sawyer hitched his thumb at Grayson. “The sheriff will send your DNA sample to the lab. Unless you think Cassidy’s got a thing for him, too.”

  “No.” Her brother dragged that out a few syllables. “But you and the sheriff are cousins.”

  Sawyer huffed. “What possible reason would we have to falsify DNA evidence?” He didn’t wait for Bennie to respond. “Emma’s mother is dead, and we need to find her father. Not a fake one. But the real one so he can have a say in her future.”

  That hurt, too. It was stupid to have gotten this attached to Emma. After all, there had been no guarantees that Sawyer was her father. Now, Emma’s father would come and take her. Give her a real name. And Cassidy might never see her again.

  “Do the test,” Willy demanded.

  Her brother turned as if to blast Willy to smithereens, but Sawyer stepped between them.

  “Just do the test,” Sawyer repeated to Bennie.

  But Bennie still
stared at the bag. “Swear to me that you won’t use this to set me up for April’s murder.”

  The muscles in Sawyer’s jaw stirred. “I swear.” Though she wasn’t sure how he could speak with his teeth clenched like that.

  Bennie finally opened the bag and scrubbed the swab inside his mouth. As if he’d declared war on it, he crammed the swab back in the bag and tossed it to Grayson.

  “Satisfied?” Bennie snarled, and the snarl was aimed at her.

  “Yes. Thank you.” She hated this tension between Bennie and her, but it couldn’t be helped. She trusted Sawyer and his cousin to do the right thing. They wouldn’t tamper with the test, and soon Bennie would be excluded as Emma’s father.

  And that would take them back to square one as far as the baby was concerned.

  Cassidy almost hated to ask, but she had to know. “Did the lab try to match Emma’s DNA with people already in the system?”

  In other words—criminals.

  With April’s shady past, it wasn’t much of a stretch to believe that she’d had an affair with a criminal. And that might make things tricky when it came to Emma’s future.

  “The lab’s running that now.” Sawyer touched her arm, rubbed gently. “They’ll let us know if they get a match.” And he sounded as troubled by that as she was.

  Cassidy heard her brother mumble some profanity, and when she looked in his direction, she realized he hadn’t missed Sawyer’s arm rub. It no doubt caused Bennie to believe that Sawyer and she were sleeping together again.

  Willy laughed. He obviously hadn’t missed it, either. “Bennie, I almost feel sorry for you. Almost. I figure by this time tomorrow, one of these Rylands will be arresting you for murder. And you know what? I can’t wait. Somebody’s gonna pay for killing April, and I have a good feeling it’s gonna be you.”

  Willy’s phone rang, the music from his ringtone way too perky for the tension in the room, and he glanced down at the screen. His eyes widened, and he made a slight sound of surprise. “Gotta go,” he mumbled, and as he pressed the button to take the call, he walked out of the building.

  Sawyer stared at Willy on the other side of the reinforced glass.