Long, Tall Texans_Hank

by Diana Palmer

  Will’s eyes flickered but he didn’t speak.

  “We have special software programs at the FBI that take photographs of missing children and show their age progression,” Julie said. “Periodically we post these on the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. These photographs stay in our databases because we never stop looking for the children.”

  “Julie?” Brody asked.

  She threw up a hand to silence him, then placed Jeremy’s childhood photo beside the sketch again. “You didn’t know this little boy because he was kidnapped before you. By the time you were abducted, he had been brainwashed.”

  Will blew air between his teeth. He was putting on an I-don’t-give-a-damn look, but she also read nervous signs. Beneath the table his leg had started to jiggle.

  “Maybe you consider Jeremy your brother,” Julie said. “But he was a victim just like you. And just like little Hank Forte.” She touched his picture again, and Will’s mouth went flat.

  “All this time we’ve assumed that the kidnapper was in his twenties when he started, so now he would be in his forties.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “But now I’m wondering if he has a partner.”

  Brody leaned over the pictures and studied the sketch of Jeremy. “What are you saying?”

  “I just met with a woman who saw a suspicious young man at the local fair where Hank went missing. She said that he was watching Hank while he played the dart-balloon game.”

  Will’s face looked tormented, the first sign of real emotion.

  “She described the young man to our sketch artist and this is what he looked like.” She waved it in front of Will. “Do you recognize him, Will?”

  “My name is Kyle,” Will choked out.

  “No, it’s not,” Julie said sternly. “It’s Will Bloodworth, and this man Brody is your brother. But you consider Jeremy your brother, don’t you?” She stood. “Is that why you’re protecting him?” Her voice rose, grew harsh. “Because it looks like Jeremy is helping the man you call your father, and he helped lure Hank Forte away from his parents. It looks like Jeremy helped abduct Hank.”

  Brody hissed, anguish in his expression, but Julie continued.

  “Did you help him kidnap this little boy, too, Will? Is that the reason you won’t talk? The man you call father taught you and Jeremy to do his dirty work for him.”

  Will shot up. “I didn’t help him take that boy!”

  Brody gripped the edge of the table. He started to speak, but Julie shook her head at him, warning him to let her handle the questioning.

  “Jeremy did, though,” Julie said, her heart pounding. “Jeremy was kidnapped when he was a little boy and brainwashed to the point that now he’s aiding in more abductions. And the fact that you’re covering for him—”

  “I’m not covering for him,” Will bellowed.

  Julie slammed her hands on the table. “Yes, you are, Will. By keeping quiet and protecting the man who took you, you are covering for him.” She swept her hand across the pictures. “You’re helping him hurt these other kids. Tell me, what does he do to them? Beat them? Lock them up in a dark room? Starve them until they beg for food and water?” She heaved a breath. “What is he doing to little Hank right now? Hank is probably terrified, crying for his mother and father. What does the man you call Father do when he cries, Will?”

  “Stop it!” Will hissed.

  “No, I won’t stop,” Julie said. “I won’t stop until I find this little boy and take him home to his mother and father. I won’t stop until I save him from becoming like Jeremy.”

  Pain wrenched Will’s face. Brody reached out to touch him, but Will backed away.

  “Please, Will, tell us where this man kept you,” Brody said. “Where is he holding Hank?”

  But Will refused to answer. Instead, he adopted his sullen, closed expression again. “I don’t know. Now if you’re finished, I’ll go back to my cell.”

  “Your room is not a cell,” Brody snapped. “This is your home, Will.

  “I want you to help us find that little boy and the other missing kids, so we can get these charges dropped against you and you can come here to live. So you can have the life you should have had.” Brody’s voice cracked. “The life that that monster stole from you.” He took Will’s arm and forced him to look at him. “I love you. You’re my brother and I want you back here where you belong.”

  Will’s gaze met his for a moment, emotions tingeing his eyes as if he wanted to believe what Brody was saying.

  But he couldn’t. That was evident when he pulled away and backed toward the door.

  “Think about what your brother said,” Julie said quietly. “Help us find Hank and the other boys so they can go back to their families and have a normal life.”

  He hesitated, his expression tormented, but a second later, he darted out the door. His footsteps pounded on the steps, then the sound of his door closing echoed through the house.

  Julie knotted her hands in frustration, but Brody strode to the bar in the corner of his office, poured himself a shot of whiskey, then tossed it down. When he turned back to her, the anguish in his eyes made her heart ache.

  She couldn’t get involved with Brody again, couldn’t allow herself to get close.

  But she also couldn’t stand still when he was in such agony.

  So she went to him and did what she’d wanted to do since the first moment she’d seen him again.

  She pulled him in her arms.

  *

  BRODY’S BODY SHOOK as Julie wrapped her arms around him. He didn’t know how to feel or think. Julie had been rough on Will, but he understood her reason.

  God…were the things she’d said true? Had Jeremy, one of the victims of this monster, helped abduct Hank Forte?

  “I’m sorry, Brody,” Julie murmured. “I know you’re upset, that that was difficult.”

  He closed his eyes, inhaled a deep breath, savoring the comfort she offered. “You think Will really helped kidnap that little boy?”

  Julie’s labored sigh echoed in the tense silence. “I don’t know, Brody.” She rubbed his arms with her hands. “I want to say that he didn’t.”

  “But he did rob those stores,” Brody said gruffly.

  “Yes,” Julie admitted. “But even if he did help lure Hank away, he was probably forced to do so. So was Jeremy. We know Jeremy and Will were both abused, both physically and mentally. It’s going to take time to learn the details of what happened to them.”

  “I know. Earlier I caught Will trying to steal that Jeep.”

  “I figured that was what happened.”

  “He accused me of being like his kidnapper, of bringing the kids here to the BBL to force them to work.” His throat grew thick. “He said I was probably nice to them at first, then I turned on them.”

  Julie’s chest squeezed, and she reached up and stroked his jaw. “Obviously that’s all he’s ever known. Right now, he doesn’t trust anyone. Give him time, he’ll realize that you’re nothing like that monster who kidnapped him.”

  Brody prayed she was right.

  Then Julie’s finger brushed his jaw, and the tension in his body coiled tighter. Only this kind of tension came from the realization that she was in his arms, that her breasts were pressed against his chest, that her lips were only a hairbreadth away from his own.

  He’d thought about her so many times over the years. Had wanted her so much. Had dreamt about this moment.

  “Brody, I’m so sorry,” Julie whispered. “But I will make this right.”

  He gently brushed her hair from her forehead, the silky tendrils driving him crazy with lust.

  “You’ve already done a lot,” he murmured. Then he lowered his head and closed his lips over hers. She moaned and parted her lips, and Brody dragged her closer, deepening the kiss.

  God, he wanted her. He always had.

  He always would.

  *

  JULIE LOST HERSELF in the kiss. She’d craved Brody for so long th
at it was all she could do not to beg him to make love to her.

  His hands threaded through her hair, tangling in the long tresses, reminding her of how he’d loved to play with it when they were younger.

  The way it felt as he yanked her closer just before he lost control and thrust inside her.

  She reached for his shirt, hungry to touch his bare skin, to feel the rough coarse hair on his broad chest.

  To kiss his neck and torso and trail her tongue down to his sex.

  Her hands grew frenzied, pulling at his shirt, and he lowered his head and nipped at her neck, then lower to suckle her breasts through her shirt.

  But a noise suddenly made them both jerk apart. Will inside his room.

  He was pacing, murmuring something she couldn’t understand.

  Her breath rasped out in spurts as she tried to regain control. Brody ran his hands over her shoulders where he’d parted her blouse, his eyes smoky as he tilted her face toward him with his thumb.

  “We can’t do this, Julie.”

  Hurt suffused her and she pulled away, straightening her clothes. “Why? Because you still blame me? Because I was too rough on your brother?”

  Brody dragged her back to him, his eyes smokier than she’d ever seen them. Hunger and need flared in his expression, his breathing as ragged as her own.

  “No,” he said between clenched teeth. “I meant we can’t do it now.” His gaze dropped to her breasts, and her body tingled, her nipples stiffening to turgid aching peaks.

  “But we will make love,” he said. “I will have you again, because I’ve never stopped wanting you.”

  Julie’s heart stuttered, a myriad of emotions flooding her throat so she couldn’t speak.

  “Now go to bed before I change my mind and take you right here in the hall.” He gestured toward Will’s room. “And we both know that’s not a good idea.”

  Julie nodded in concession, although she wanted to tell him that she didn’t care. She was tired of work, tired of hunting down sadistic killers, tired of seeing women’s bloody bodies in her sleep, and tortured little boys crying out for help while she was awake.

  But she knew he was right.

  Still, his words taunted her as she rushed into the guest room and shut the door.

  She started to undress, and her hand slid over her gun. She’d vowed to find Brody’s brother and bring him back to him, but he didn’t really have him back yet.

  She wouldn’t give up until she did.

  Then and only then could she believe that she might have a chance with Brody.

  *

  KYLE STARED AT the photo of Brody and the kid on the wall, then at the photo album, his stomach churning. Images were starting to claw at his mind.

  Images of skipping rocks in a creek, of another guy there with him showing him how to angle them just right.

  Of Brody.

  Brody showing him how to saddle a horse. How to rope a calf. How to throw horseshoes.

  No…he had never lived on a ranch. Brody was playing with his head. He’d doctored that DNA report because he wanted him to believe that he was his brother.

  They were trying to trick him into ratting out Father. Father had said that the police were like that, that they were the enemy. That they would lie to him, beat him, try to make him believe things that weren’t true.

  His home was back with Father and Jeremy and the others.

  He closed his eyes, willing the images he’d seen today to leave his mind. They hadn’t been real.

  Except those boys had been laughing at the campout. Talking and having fun.

  Fun…not allowed at the compound.

  Then he saw Hank’s face. Hank crying as Jeremy had brought him to Father. Father’s harsh look as he’d dragged Hank to the pit.

  Hank’s scream as he was closed into the darkness.

  He began to shake, sweat beading on his skin. He was back there again, back in the hole, the cold dark swallowing him. He tried to count the minutes until Father would return, but minutes turned into hours. Hours into days.

  Days he couldn’t remember because the terror had played with his mind.

  That agent Julie thought he’d helped lure Hank to Father. That made his stomach roil. He hadn’t lured Hank.

  But still Hank was there now. Suffering. Terrified. Alone.

  Brody’s words echoed in his head. I love you, Will. I want to help you.

  Father had said he loved him, too. Just before he’d whipped him.

  Just before he’d closed him in the pit.

  He went to the door. Maybe he should tell that agent…no.

  The only way to save Hank was for him to go back.

  He paced and paced, then finally decided he’d better turn off the light and pretend to be asleep or that agent and Brody might be suspicious. So he settled on the bed, but that stupid photo album called to him, and he opened it up and studied the pictures again.

  The little boy with the sandy blond hair had looked happy. He was learning to tie a rope in one picture. In another, Brody was teaching him how to saddle a horse. In another, they were out on the boat in the lake fishing.

  He slammed the book shut. That little boy wasn’t him.

  He’d never smiled like that or tied a rope or saddled a horse or gone fishing.

  They were all lies Brody had told him.

  He had to escape.

  But not tonight. He’d already been caught once. He’d have to lay low. Play it like a good soldier. Wait for the right moment.

  An hour later, the house was dark and quiet, and he was actually nodding off when he suddenly saw something flickering through the sheer curtains. He stood and went to look out the window to see if it was a car’s headlights.

  But his pulse hammered when he saw it was a fire.

  The barn across the way was in flames.

  And the horses were inside.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Brody jumped from his bed at the sound of the pounding on the door. He swung it open and saw Will in the hallway, his eyes panicked.

  “A fire…the barn…I saw it through my window,” Will cried.

  Brody raced to Will’s room, pushed back the sheers and saw the flames shooting up toward the sky. Pure rage shot through him. Dammit, the horses were trapped in there.

  “Call 9-1-1, get a fire truck out here now!” Brody yelled.

  He ran back to his room, yanked on a T-shirt, jeans, socks and boots. By the time he was dressed, Julie was at the door, her hair spiraling out of control, her hands twisting at her T-shirt and pajama pants.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “The barn’s on fire,” Brody said. “I have to get the horses out.”

  “I’m coming, too.” She darted into her room, and he raced down the stairs. Footsteps pounded behind him and he realized Will was on his tail.

  Brody had grabbed his phone and punched his foreman’s number, cursing as he waited on it to ring. Curtis was new and younger than his former foreman. He just hoped he was half as good.

  Finally he answered. “The barn’s on fire. Send some men out to help.”

  “We’ll be there ASAP,” Curtis said.

  “What do we do?” Will asked as he chased Brody outside.

  “We have to get the horses out!” Brody ran toward the barn, half panicked at the sight of the smoke billowing in a thick cloud.

  Julie caught up with them as he yanked open the barn door. “How many horses?”

  “Four,” Brody shouted over the roar of the flames. The fire looked as if it had started in the tack room and was probably spreading back toward the stalls. It would take only minutes to eat up the wood and hay and the barn would be gone.

  Heat radiated off the building and made it nearly impossible to breathe, but Brody yanked a handkerchief over his mouth and raced in.

  “Stay here, and wait for the ambulance,” he yelled at Julie and Will as he dashed into the barn.

  Flames spiked around him in patches, the tack room nearly fully engulfe
d. He coughed as the smoke filled his lungs, then raced to the first stall, dodging flames and falling wood as the section that had caught the roof sent boards crackling and flying down.

  Behind him, he realized Julie had followed and so had Will.

  “Get the two on the end out,” he said, knowing their stalls were the farthest from the raging fire.

  Julie ran past him and so did Will, both coughing and dodging the splintered boards falling from the roof.

  The horses were terrified, banging against the stalls, kicking and pounding to escape. Brody touched the latch on the first stall, the heat scalding his face and fingers as he turned the latch. “Come on, Sassy, get out of here.”

  The terrified animal rose and kicked at him, but he lowered his voice to a soothing voice. “Come on, get out of here, girl.”

  He slid into the stall, then slapped the horse’s hind section, and she shot forward, whinnying as she ran toward the back.

  Flames inched toward the second stall, the smoke so thick and gray that his vision blurred, and he bent over to draw a breath.

  One breath and he reached for the latch. It was hot, the flames starting to eat the floor of the horse’s stall. She was going crazy, whinnying, kicking and slamming her hoofs against the barn wall.

  “Come on, Honey,” he said softly. “I know it’s bad, but we have to leave the barn.”

  She rose on her back legs and kicked at him, but he held up a hand. “It’s me, girl. Come on, it’s hot in here.”

  She bawled and kicked though, and Brody knew she wasn’t going to come willingly. He looked back at the tack room but it was completely gone. Flames crawled toward him at a sickening pace, wood splintering and crackling all around him.

  “Brody?” Julie cried. “Are you in here?”

  “Yes, get Will and get out!” he shouted.

  “He’s safe,” she shouted. “And the other horses are outside.”

  “I’ll be right there!” he yelled. “Go on!”

  He spotted a rope in the next stall, then grabbed it and raced back to Honey. She was out of control, bucking and kicking but the flames were about to reach her hoofs.

  He made a looped knot and threw it around her neck. She bucked as he tightened it, and he had to brace his feet while she fought. “Come on, girl, I’m trying to save you, help me out.”