“Roberta was there. The day I was taken. She was there.” Addy looked at Owen. “I remembered that last night. I guess the nightmare I had shook it loose.”
“What do you remember?” Owen asked.
“I saw her. The girl who took my place. The one who died that day.”
“What did you see?” Jax asked.
“She was in my room, wearing my favorite bra and panty set. She smiled at me and pointed to my dress, said she needed that too. Her hair was cut just like mine. Her nails were my favorite shade of pink. She was my doppelgänger.”
The terror in her eyes sliced into Owen. He took her hand.
“I never remembered that before. Roberta said, ‘It’s time, princess.’ She put something against my face and I blacked out.”
Owen put his arm around Addy as he began to envision all the different ways he could end her wicked stepmother. He wasn’t one who favored slow kills, like Greer had done with Whiddon. No, Owen just liked to get the deed over with. Slow sex and fast death were his preferences for the major things in life. The choice was just of weapons. A bullet, a knife, or his bare fucking hands. Whatever way he chose, she was a dead wicked stepmother.
“Okay. Good. I’m glad you remembered that,” Owen said.
“Dad had the girl cremated, but I’d already taken a sample of her tissue. I had that girl’s DNA tested,” Jax said. “I recently gave those results to my FBI contact. He’s looking for the family of the girl who was murdered.”
Addy looked at her brother. “She was happy that day, like she was part of some fun skit. I don’t think she knew what was coming.”
Owen kissed her forehead. “I doubt she did. And for the record—you are the only one of you that exists in the whole universe.”
Took a bit to digest that news, but Owen still had so many questions. “So after Ace’s rampage through the Omni bastards who’d hurt her, you switched her to finding Augie.”
“Yeah. I don’t know what Dad did or said to Edwards to get him to back off of Addy, but I guess Augie was Dad’s last straw. He confessed to me he’d married Addy off to Edwards and that she needed to get away from him. I’d been in and out of the tunnels for years. Addy wasn’t the only extra wife Edwards had. Guess he felt he alone had the right genes to seed an empire.”
“Except…he couldn’t,” Addy said quietly. “He couldn’t get an erection without medical intervention. And he couldn’t ejaculate without…a lot of effort. That’s why he used other men, ones he approved of, men like his War Bringer. It’s why he had rape parties…my panic excited him.”
The horror of that quiet statement, and the visual it brought, stole Owen’s breath. One more reason to ensure Edwards would meet a painful end.
“So there’s that,” Addy said, breaking up their shocked silence.
Jax looked at his sister. “You told me about some of what had happened over the years, ending with Edwards forcing her to choose between her boys. But not that.” He shook his head. “I didn’t know any of that was going on, but once I did, I set Ace on the trail of my nephew.”
“How did you get a settlement from Edwards?” Owen asked.
“I blackmailed him with the video evidence Ace had been collecting,” Jax said. “Made it clear that Addy was no longer his to abuse and that if he didn’t sign away the castle and its contents and also provide a monetary amount equal to her suffering, that I’d blow his world wide open. He caved.”
“When did you discover that my dad was still alive?”
“After Addy got sick. I’d known for a while that the Omnis were developing biological weapons. When none of her tests pointed to a known disease, I dug deeper into what they were doing. That’s when I discovered the schism in the Omni World Order. I learned your dad was part of the group who still represented the original mandate of the Omnis and that he was leading the resistance against the neo-faction that came up after World War II. He was gathering up all the scientists he could to keep them safe. But that tipped Neo-Omnis off that their game was up. They started cleaning house, killing them off. That’s when I figured out what everyone meant when they said Tremaine was King. It wasn’t you…it was your dad.”
“So you got involved in what my team was doing. Throwing us bones. Reeling us in.”
“I hoped I was helping,” Jax said. “I didn’t come to you directly because I thought at that point, you’d never believe me.”
“I probably wouldn’t have, since I thought you’d gone rogue. You know no former Red Teamers are allowed to go off grid,” Owen said.
Jax nodded. “Which was the inciting event, getting you all to come out to Wyoming.”
“Why didn’t you join my company?” Owen asked. “I offered you a spot.”
“Because more than year ago when you were putting it all together, I still thought you were dirty. I knew my dad was. And knowing he was a silent partner and that he’d helped you get set up with some lucrative contracts, I was convinced you were in bed with him. And you had Val with you, whose dad thought he was running some maniac game. From my perspective, it didn’t look good.”
“How is your dad in contact with the Omnis?” Owen asked.
“I think Roberta is an Omni.” Jax looked at Owen, then Addy. “I can’t prove this yet, but I believe she was involved with our mothers’ deaths. I don’t know how or why, but think about it. She murders my mom, then sets herself up to take her place. Then she has dad—the senator—vouch for her in that community…and just like that, she owns Dad. He can’t expose her without ruining himself.”
“But why take out my mom?” Owen asked.
Jax shrugged. “Maybe Roberta tried to work your dad over first. Maybe Jason did it to get your dad into the game. I don’t know. Just think about it. Your cousin Val’s mom died the same way Lion and Hope’s mom was murdered. Roberta got a foothold in my family after my mom’s death. Why wouldn’t your mom be in that same mix?”
God. Owen hadn’t seen that pattern. “Did you talk to my dad about this?”
“No. Not yet.”
“So your dad sold his daughter to the devil instead of owning his own crimes?” Owen asked.
“Yeah. Something like that.”
“I hope this can be proven, Wendell,” Addy said. “I’d like to have some justice.”
Jax nodded. “That’s what I’m working on.”
“You know, Dad told me he paid you to go away.” She said to Owen. “He said you were happily settled down with a wife and kids of your own. I didn’t believe it until he showed me a newspaper clipping of your wedding announcement. It was dated only a few months after I was taken.”
Owen shook his head. “Never happened. Never could happen.” Her eyes filled with tears. She nodded. He pulled her close again and looked at Jax. “So are you ready to bring our teams together to end this once and for all?”
“I don’t think it can be ended. The Neo-Omni network is too pervasive. But yes, I am ready for our teams to work together. First, though, I need to track your father down so I can get Addy some help.”
“Do you know who King is? Is it Val’s dad?”
Jax shrugged. “He could have been. Maybe he is. But instead of being the lead dog, he diversified. He let others in, forced others in, distributing the infrastructure…and the blame. He went a little crazy. He calls this a game. Sometimes it feels like it is, like we’re all just pieces on a game board, some evil Omni game of Life. Not sure he can ever be caught—or ended. He’ll just morph into another persona, making someone else take the fall. Plenty of fools on hand to do that.
“But while he’s been busy working his corner of hell, Edwards and others were building an empire. They’re the ones with the true power. They have the international connections. They’re behind the biological weapons. I’ve wondered sometimes if Edwards is King.”
Owen thought about that, thinking about its impact on the whole team. He’d never pegged Jason for such a wily kinda guy. Didn’t think he had the smarts. Or focus. Edwards, on
the other hand, did. But if he was King, then that meant that Addy had been married to their worst enemy.
“How long has this been going on?” Owen asked.
“Decades. Jason was brought up in the inner sanctum of the Omni World Order. He liked the power his grandfather and father built after the end of the Second World War. By the time they bequeathed it to him, it was already a living, breathing fiend in need of a psychopath to run it. The Edwards have been in the Neo-Omni world for generations, too. From what I can tell, the Parkers and Edwards have been at odds for most of that time, fighting for power. Your dad is pushing back, forcing them to take some drastic measures to erase their footprints. And his search for the scientists behind the biological weapons is causing the Omnis to kill off their researchers…the only ones who could develop antidotes for the weapons they created.” He met Owen’s eyes. “I took you to draw your dad out.”
Owen grunted. “Finally, some honesty. Where is my dad?”
“I don’t know. I don’t communicate with him directly. Which is why I needed you.”
“How do you communicate with him?”
“Through Santo.”
Owen sat back in his seat. “Santo’s a piece of work.”
“We all are. We’re all fucking pawns in this game.”
“Santo was helping me,” Addy said.
“How?” Owen asked.
“My first nanny, Bonnie, was friends with him. Through him, she had a house and funds set aside for her retirement from the Omni world. She offered it to me, but I was too afraid to go. And because I was, they took Augie.”
Owen shook his head. “Santo’s in deep with the Omnis. Leaving with Bonnie would not have saved Augie. They would have still found him through Santo. I’m glad you didn’t go with her.” He looked at Jax. “I’m taking Addy and Troy out of here,” Owen said.
“I think that’s a good idea.”
“I can’t go,” Addy said.
“Why?” Owen asked.
“Because this is where Augie spent his first six years. This is where he’ll come back, when he can.”
“I will find him and bring him to you,” Owen said. “But to do that, to focus on our son, I need to know you and Troy are safe—which you aren’t here. This place is open to any type of attack. You can start packing this afternoon. I’ll call my team in the morning.”
Addy’s face was pale, accentuating the shadows that were deepening under her eyes. “Where are you taking us?”
“To my team’s headquarters here in Wyoming, a short ride by helicopter.”
13
Addy slept fitfully that night. Was it the right thing that they’d decided to do? How would Augie find her if Owen didn’t find him first? Wendell had finally explained his new position regarding Owen and why he’d believed for so long that Owen was King, but it was hard for Addy to shift her thinking, especially when it came to Owen, whom she’d blamed for everything for so very long. Her world was one of changing loyalties and shadow truths.
She wanted so badly to believe he was the honorable man he’d always been, but time would tell who was right and who was wrong.
The door to her bedroom opened. She looked over to see her son come in the room. She was about to lift her covers so he could come and snuggle with her, but he went straight to the air mattress where Owen was sleeping.
“Mr. Tremaine,” her son said in a hoarse whisper. She held still, curious as to how Owen would react. “I didn’t see you outside.”
“That’s because I’m here.”
“Should I wake Mommy?”
“Why? More bad dreams?”
“I got scared. Will you cover me up?”
“What scared you?” Troy shook his head fast, as if to say the words would bring the monster into the room. Owen sighed. There was a scuffing noise as her son got settled on the air mattress. “Do you know what I am?”
“No, what are you?”
“I’m a monster slayer.”
“You kill them?”
“I eviscerate them.”
“What’s ‘eviscerate’?”
“I turn monsters to dust. None of them can exist where I am.”
“I like that.” Silence took over that area of her room, quiet and thick like a shadow, then her son started talking again. “Mommy usually only lets me in her room. You’re here a lot.”
“I have to be here.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s never good to be far from your heart.”
“You can’t be away from your heart. No one can. You can’t live without it, Mr. Tremaine.”
“My point exactly. Now, if you’re going to keep talking, you’ll have to go back to your own bed.”
“I can’t go back. The monster’s tapping at my window. I think it’s a banshee.”
“Ah. A banshee. Now there’s a sad creature if ever there was one. Can you imagine screaming for all eternity?”
Troy said nothing.
Addy could imagine that; she’d lived that eternity in the years before her settlement.
“How about if I go check out your room?”
“Do you kill banshees?”
“I kill all monsters. You wait here.”
Owen took his pistol and climbed over Troy. A quick check of Addy’s bed showed she was still fast asleep. He was glad they hadn’t awakened her. He walked barefoot into the hallway. Troy’s room was after his classroom. The light coming in from the big conservatory was an eerie gray. If he hadn’t learned to appreciate low-light conditions in the long years of his military service, he could see how it alone would make someone—especially a child—feel like things were waiting in the shadows.
In Troy’s room, it was even darker. The heavy floor to ceiling drapes were pulled over the window. He switched on the flashlight utility on his phone, then did a quick pass around the room. He knelt down and checked under the boy’s bed. It was at this point that he heard something at the door to the hallway. Heavy breathing. A small, white shape stood there.
Troy.
“I told you to stay in your mom’s room,” Owen said.
“But I wanted to see the banshee die.”
Owen gave the kid a half-smile. “There’s no banshee here.”
“You didn’t look in the closet.”
“Banshees are famous for floating outside windows. They don’t usually come inside. As long as you don’t open your window…”
“Mr. Tremaine,” Troy interrupted. “My closet.”
“Right.” Owen crossed the room and opened the closet, which was nearly half again as large as the boy’s room. Shelves of dormant toys, well worn and much loved, sat in creepy silence. Owen shined his light over them, wondering if any of those were toys that his own son had played with.
“See anything?” Troy called from outside the closet.
“No.” Owen poked around any likely hiding spot, opening cabinets, shoving aside lower racks of clothes. Stepping back into the main room, he shook his head. “No monsters there.”
And then a sound that made the hairs lift across Owen’s neck slipped into the room—a quiet tick-tick-tick sound tapping on the window—the second story window.
Troy gasped. “See?”
“Probably just something hanging loose outside.” He walked over to the window. Pulling the drapes open in a fast motion, he came face to face with a floating black shape.
A drone…with a machine gun suspended in the center of it.
“Shit.” He ran toward the middle of the room where Troy stood exposed. He dove on top of him just as bullets began to pepper the room, shattering glass, sending debris everywhere. He commando-crawled out into the hallway, dragging Troy with him. He wanted to get to Addy’s room, terrified she was going to run into the gunfire. She almost did just that as she hurried into the hall.
“Get down, Addy,” Owen shouted and waved her down. “Get down now!” He dragged Troy with him, like a tiny soldier he was pulling from a battlefield. She slumped down against the wal
l, reaching her hands out for her son. Owen shoved the boy at her, then gripped the side of her face and pressed her all the way down.
“Do you have a panic room?” he asked, shouting to be heard.
She nodded.
“We need to get to get into it.”
The blaze of gunfire had stopped. He’d noticed it had followed them a short way down the hall. Either the drone operators knew who was in which room, or they were tracking their heat signatures, which meant it was only seconds until they came over the roof and started blasting through the glass conservatory ceiling into the corridor where they were.
“Let’s go.” He took Troy and pulled Addy to her feet, rushing them into her room. They slipped into her dressing room. Addy used a biometric panel to open the door just as gunfire resumed in the hallway, causing an explosion of shattered glass. Owen shoved them inside and closed the door behind them.
Her panic room was right where Owen thought it would be, accessed from inside her dressing room. It had a biometric lock, one only Addy could release, which she did by looking into what appeared to be a standard mirror. A blue light came on inside a glass armory—a smaller version of the one in Jax’s room. Owen shook his head. Typical Jax to be over-prepared. Just who was he prepping to fight?
The small room was fully stocked with water, MREs, and medical supplies. There were two sofas and a bathroom in there as well.
“Wendell changes out supplies from time to time. Oh, my God! Wendell.” She turned panicked eyes on Owen.
“He’s probably fine, sheltering in his own panic room. I’ll find him.”
He opened the case and took out a Mossberg tactical pump-action shotgun. He loaded the magazine, then filled his pockets with several more rounds. He pumped it once to chamber a round.
“I hate banshees,” Troy said, watching him solemnly.
Owen put a hand on his shoulder. “That wasn’t a banshee, son. It’s a drone—a machine run by bad guys somewhere. Nothing mystical about it.”
He took his phone out of his pocket, turned off its security, and left it on a shelf. “If I don’t come back, call Kit Bolanger.” He wrote Kit’s number down.
Forsaken Duty, The Red Team Series, Book 9 Page 12