by Jayne Rylon
No. He couldn’t, could he? Why not? Someone had done exactly that to her mom.
And she’d never come home. She’d gone to heaven instead.
Julie didn’t want any more of her aunts and uncles to leave forever.
“Okay, I won’t. I promise. Leave them alone. But what’s your name?” she asked.
“Don’t worry about that. Scribble something. Anything. It doesn’t matter what.”
Another lie. It mattered an awful lot to Julie.
She yanked open the door, nearly crying again when she smelled the fresh air and thought about how quickly she could sprint home. Except she would never put her family in danger like that.
No way.
“Oh, hey.” The pizza man smiled. “Wow. You got some tattoos, huh? Those are pretty great.”
“Yes!” She could have hugged him for noticing. “I did them myself.”
“I guess that’s why your dad is so cranky, huh?” he teased in a nice way.
“What did I tell you? Hurry the hell up, kid,” the new bad man shouted. “That’s enough chitchat.”
Julie flinched.
“Didn’t mean to get you in more trouble,” the pizza man said with a frown. “Is everything okay here?”
“Yes,” she said, but she tried to shake her head no, a teeny tiny bit, as she did.
“Now! Sign it and let’s eat,” the bad man yelled again.
So she did as he ordered.
As much as she dared.
Then stared at the delivery guy as she handed him the receipt and his pen, and shut the door in his face. The whole time she thought really hard.
Help me, help me, HELP ME!
Would it be enough?
“Get over here and have some pizza,” new bad man snarled. “It’s almost bath time. We’re going to take your teddy bear with us and make it a long one, so we can get all that shit off you. Good thing I think your fans won’t mind too much.”
Huh?
She didn’t understand, but she did what he said.
Hopefully, if she kept him as unmean as possible, she could stand him better until Uncle Ben could find her. They had to.
Hurry, please.
22
When Ryan entered the living room, shoulder to shoulder with Shari and Ben, holding hands, he couldn’t have been more proud. Either of his roommate—no, boyfriend, because Jambrea’d had it right, he certainly had the right to call Ben that now—or of himself. To be claimed so openly by a dedicated, all-around awesome man like Ben and a wonderful, courageous woman like Shari gave him an ego boost bigger than the one he’d experienced when he’d received a rave review from one of the world’s top food critics last month.
Ben stood between them, clutching each of their hands, finally allowing himself to draw strength from their bond instead of believing it made him weak. Didn’t he see? When they were together, they were damn near unstoppable.
The sight of Ben, broken and weeping, had ripped Ryan apart. Not even in the dungeons had he lost it like that. At least, not on the outside. Maybe he was finally being honest about his feelings so that he could process them without so much guilt eating him alive.
That was a huge improvement.
Shari had changed him, somehow opened him to the possibility when Ryan had been unable to do it on his own. He would be forever grateful for that. He’d never seen anything as intoxicatingly beautiful as the two people he loved—and after today, he was sure that he did love them, was in love with them—sharing their feelings openly with each other.
“You’ve got this,” Lily said softly, patting his ass before leaving them to stand near her husband.
Otherwise, no one said anything. For a group of people who were so often boisterous and never shut the hell up, it was weird. Clint broke the tension with a slow clap and a huge grin. “So does this mean it’s official? Have we successfully corrupted three more people into joining the ménage lifestyle?”
Matt punched his partner’s upper arm lightly. “Leave them alone. You might have noticed today’s not a good day to fuck with them.”
Surprisingly, Ben laughed even if it was strained. “Yeah. I’m officially done being a dumbass. These two are mine and anyone who says otherwise will have to answer to me.”
Whoa.
Ryan felt himself in danger of popping a woody right there in front of a slew of their friends, and a couple strangers as well. Inappropriate! He chastised his dick.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Shari doing a fist pump and chuckled.
Their reprieve from the horror of their situation was shortlived, though.
“Sorry, we tend to overshare around here,” JRad apologized to the newcomers in their midst. Then he turned to the rest of the group. “I’d like you to meet Special Agent Gregory Salinas. We’ve been trying to lure him away from some no-name agency that our good friends Lucas, and Shari’s brother John, may or may not have once been associated with. If we’re really lucky and you all don’t scare him away, he might accept a position on the OSPD since the Chief is interested in beefing up our technology staff.”
“Hello, and no problem. You guys are great. Even during what has to be one of the worst times of your life. A definite perk when working on these types of cases. I’m sorry for what you’re going through right now. We’ll do everything we can to get your little girl back.” Special Agent Salinas, who appeared too young to be as successful as he must have been to attract JRad’s admiration, made up for his perceived lack of experience with boatloads of enthusiasm. He waved to them. “Pause a second, though. I recognize Lucas, of course, but…what’s your last name?”
When he pointed at Shari, she smiled softly before saying, “David. Shari David. Very nice to meet you. We appreciate your help.”
Poor Gregory’s eyes nearly popped out of his head and blew up to four times their usual size, like he starred in an old-fashioned cartoon. “John David was your brother?”
She nodded.
“I’m so sorry for your loss. He’s a hero.” Special Agent Salinas earned some major brownie points with Ryan for honoring Shari’s sacrifice. “An absolute legend.”
Lucas too, it seemed. “Seriously, the best.”
Maybe even with Jambrea, who sniffled. When most everyone glanced over to make sure she was all right, she shrugged. “Sorry. Super pregnant, remember? Hormone overload.”
They all knew it was more than that. She’d loved John once. Still did, he supposed. Matt and Clint surrounded her, cloaking her from view while she composed herself.
In typical Razor fashion, he brought them back to a less tense place with his immature antics. He didn’t quite sulk when he asked, “Wait. JRad, does this mean you’re gonna be the boss of the geek squad?”
“When and if there’s a division to be head of, they’re considering me for the position. Yes.” Jeremy nodded. After the work he’d done on the Sex Offender case, Ryan thought he deserved any job he damn well wanted on the state’s payroll. “First we have to convince Special Agent Salinas to stick around. So try not to be an idiot.”
“Might as well ask him to quit screwing Izzy.” Tyler laughed.
“Hey, kid zone.” Isabella shook her finger at them as Ezra buzzed around her ankles.
Mason stepped forward then. “I thought we could also use some expert advice from the Division of Crimes Against Children. So we’ve added Detective Raya Tran to our team. We’ve worked with her on other cases and I assure you, Ben, she’s an all-star in her field.”
“Thank you,” Detective Tran nodded.
The crispness of her uniform and the extreme ponytail she’d pulled her thick, glossy black hair into were a piss-poor disguise for how striking the fine-boned Asian detective was. Her porcelain skin and delicate features along with her ultra-petite stature probably meant she could easily infiltrate schools while undercover. Invaluable, yet probably also a pain in the ass when she wanted to be taken seriously.
Her ramrod straight posture and the brusqueness
of her communications made him certain that she was often underestimated. Ryan would never be that idiotic. He bet she could give Lily a run for her money when it came to issuing orders. Frankly, he’d pay good money to see that.
Hey, he was a guy. If visions of the two tough women battling it out while dressed only in chains and latex—don’t forget the thigh-high boots—before making out flashed through his brain, it was only natural, right?
When he peeked over at Shari, she was giving him the look. Could she read his mind? Or was he that obvious?
Uh oh.
Raya cleared her throat, drawing their attention back to her. “Mason asked me to meet you here so that Agent Salinas could analyze the surveillance footage we were able to recover from the schoolyard.”
Ben just about crushed Ryan’s fingers at that. “You have a lead? Solid information?”
“We have the suspect on film, sir. That’s all I can promise you at this time.” Detective Tran softened a smidge when she addressed Ben. “I’d like you to come take a look, if it’s not too difficult for you. To see if you might recognize this scumbag.”
“Of course. Anything I can do to help.” Ben practically yanked Ryan’s arm out of the socket when he zoomed over to the kitchen table, where Jeremy had set up an impromptu computer lab.
He never once let go of Ryan or Shari, even though it was a tight fit for them around the monitor. The rest of the Men in Blue and their ladies huddled up for a glimpse too.
“So here’s what we’ve got.” Detective Tran tossed a USB drive to JRad. “Don’t get your hopes up too high. It’s not exactly cinematic quality.”
Understatement of the century.
When Jeremy pulled up the file and pressed play, Ryan thought he might need glasses. It was blurry, kind of grainy, obviously blown up far larger than originally intended. The sound was mostly a garbled mess. As if a playground wasn’t already an assault on any human being’s ears, this was worse, distorted by the autumn wind, traffic on the street outside the chain-link fence, and distance.
Ryan’s shoulders slumped.
“Don’t get too discouraged yet,” Special Agent Salinas admonished. “I’ll be able to clean this up some. Isolate the different audio inputs and edit out the static. Sure, it’s not going to be studio quality, but it’ll be better than this.”
“I can do the same for the video. We might be able to add more chances for success if we can read their lips along with the edited audio.”
“With everyone putting their heads together, we’ll find her. We’ll get her back safe,” Ben uttered beneath his breath.
Detective Tran had obviously screened this footage about a million times. She knew it second by second. “Okay, get ready, here they come.”
A teacher Ryan recognized from his own pick-up or drop-off duties, parent conferences, and holiday concerts came onscreen, escorting the kidnapper. She had her trusty clipboard with the release information and checked something off on her list.
Ryan fumed. She’d half-assed her duties. Sure, Julie had a shit-ton of honorary aunts and uncles. Plus, their non-traditional work schedules meant that they relied on a variety of family friends to help out periodically. But, really, she hadn’t even asked for ID.
“Ms. Edwards has been placed on leave pending a school board review of this incident,” Detective Tran informed them.
What a sanitary way to describe the theft of a child, Ryan thought.
“They’re going to turn in a moment and you’ll have a better view.”
Ryan studied the back of the bastard’s head, not that he could tell much from the shot other than pettily noticing the man had a thinning spot on the crown of his head. Dark hair. Average build. Not much to go on.
Shit.
Then Ms. Edwards called, “Julie!”
That part was clear enough to make out plainly.
Ryan’s pulse tripped when she trotted into the frame, her brand-new purple pony backpack bobbing behind her. Ben inhaled sharp and deep.
Shari was there in an instant, ducking under his arm to wrap her free arm around his waist and help prop him up. Ryan squeezed his fingers, reassured when Ben returned the sign. He was hanging in there as well as could be expected.
Julie’s face lit up when she spotted her abductor.
“One reason Ms. Edwards didn’t question the pick-up was because Julie clearly knew this man.” Detective Tran broke the news. “So I hope you do, too. Wait for it. Detective Radisson, please freeze the frame…right…here.”
He did.
But Ryan drew a complete blank. The guy had pasty white skin, a pointy nose, and a chin too small to be proportional to the rest of his face. He squinted and tilted his head from side to side to be sure given the distortion of the video but…no.
If he’d seen that guy before, he would have remembered.
“Fuck,” Ben barked.
“You know him?” Detective Tran asked.
“No. Never seen him in my life.” He let his head fall back for a moment before meeting her stare. “So how the hell does my niece? You don’t understand. I never take my eyes off her. Not after what we’ve been through. Other than when she’s at school, me—or one of the other people in this room—are always with her.”
Ben looked around. Everyone was studying the image, most shaking their heads.
“No one recognizes him?” Tyler asked, for verification.
A shower of negatives confirmed it.
Shari spoke up then. “I don’t know him either, but…can you go forward a little? What’s that he’s holding?”
Detective Tran eased her grimace at that. “Very observant, Ms. David. That’s what I was going to ask next.”
To Jeremy, she said, “Roll forward about fifteen frames, please.”
He tapped a couple keys and the image skipped.
Ryan felt sick. “Oh shit.”
“I touched that thing!” Shari shrieked.
Ben released Ryan’s hand then so he could catch her before she hit the floor, passed out cold.
“Here, give her to me. Show them,” Ryan said to Ben.
By the time he’d scooped Shari up and crossed to the couch, she was stirring. She’d hardly settled onto the cushions before Lacey and Jambrea were there, shooing him away. “Give her space to breathe.”
Lacey snagged a stack of pillows and jammed them under Shari’s feet while Jambrea unbuttoned the top several buttons of Shari’s flannel shirt. “Hey, honey. You’re fine. Just relax a minute or two before you try to stand up, okay?”
When Shari began to realize what had happened, she covered her face with her hands. “Oh my God. That bear. I was just holding it.”
“Hang on, you have it? Here?” Mason risked getting his balls ripped off by one of the nurses when he approached Shari despite their glares.
“Yes.” Satisfied she would recover, Ben motioned to the officer. “It’s in Julie’s room. I thought it was a birthday present…”
“No,” Shari moaned from the couch. “She had it two days ago. When you two were fighting.”
“She did?” Ryan asked, certain he’d never seen it before today.
JRad stood and crossed to Ben and Mason. “I think we should go slow. I only poked around on that footage for a few seconds, but I’m picking up some kind of interference. I think that’s why the quality is so bad.”
“Does that mean what I think?” Special Agent Salinas asked.
“It could.” Jeremy nodded solemnly.
Ryan thought his head might start spinning around from looking back and forth between Shari, Ben, and the cops so often, so quickly.
Izzy said what they were all thinking from where she bounced Ezra on her hip compulsively. “Spell it out for the civilians among you, please.”
“Sometimes a bear isn’t just a bear.” JRad punched his palm. “Give me a minute to grab some equipment out of my car. Don’t go near it until I say so.”
Ryan knew it had to be awful if they wouldn’t explain without proof.
Fuck.
He returned his attention to Shari, who was slapping Lacey’s hands away and struggling to sit up on her own. Ryan squatted beside her, keeping her company while holding her in place. They didn’t need her cracking her skull open because she was too stubborn for her own good.
It wasn’t long before Jeremy jogged back into the room, a briefcase in tow. “Okay, show me where it is. Don’t say anything. Not a word, got it?”
“Yes,” Mason said. Then he and JRad disappeared down the hallway.
For the ninety seconds it took for their resident techno-whiz to work his magic, no one made a peep. Hell, Ryan hardly breathed. He rocked Shari, and she hugged him back.
Then from Julie’s room, Jeremy shouted, “Got it! It’s disarmed.”
He reappeared with Ben, who looked as white as a ghost. Lacey forced him to sit beside Shari and shoved his head between his knees so they didn’t have a repeat performance.
“What? What is it?” Lily wondered.
“Give me something sharp,” JRad demanded.
Detective Tran reached for Ryan’s prized ceramic chef’s knife and handed it over. Any other time, he would have objected to such an unsuitable usage.
Jeremy took it and, with one motion, beheaded the bear. He stuffed his fist inside and yanked out its brains. Actually, one of its eyes. Because the eye turned out to be the lens of a compact action cam.
“Fuck, no!” Ryan looked over at Shari, then Ben.
“Someone’s been watching her? Us?” Ben’s face turned purple then.
Ryan wasn’t sure he’d every truly seen the man full of rage before.
He never wanted to witness it again.
“Oh fuck, that’s disgusting.” Razor even seemed kind of ill and the Men in Blue had seen it all.
Detective Tran was suspiciously silent.
“Did you suspect this?” Ryan asked her pointblank.
She nodded. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to frighten you needlessly. One of the priorities for Special Agent Salinas is to compare the voice samples from the surveillance footage to known child pornographers. It’s a leading motive for abductions.”