Club Scars (32 page)

“What do you suppose they’re talking about?”

Kat jumped as Ginny joined her. She shrugged, fighting back a manic giggle as their queen peered between the blind’s slats.

“I have no idea. My question is do they not want us to hear, or our other guests?”

“Maybe both.”

“Maybe,” Kat agreed and frowned. “He’d have told me if they found anything at Oakwood, right?”

“Oh, yeah, honey. Of course he would. I’m sure this isn’t about Cam. It looks like man stuff.”

“As much as I’m praying they find him there, the thought of Cam in that hellhole terrifies me.”

“The thought of you there scares the fuck out of me even with just the little you’ve told me,” Ginny said pulling Kat close in a hug. “They’re going to find him and bring him home safe to us.”

“I hope this is one of those times where you’re annoyingly right.”

“Me too, little sister.”

Kat shivered and Ginny tugged her away from the window.

“Come on. I think a day like this calls for a little Irish coffee.”

“Amen,” Kat breathed.

The look on Agent Hunter’s face made Crux’s stomach churn. He stared hard at him for a long moment searching for an answer before reluctantly stepping aside to let the man inside. Kat crowded close to his back, her hands fisting in his shirt: her eyes pleading for news she was afraid to ask for. Hunter sloughed a hand down his face and shrugged out of his dripping overcoat. He looked at the puddle forming on the floor for a moment.

“Sorry.”

“The floor is the least of our worries. You aren’t handing me a kid. What did you find?” Crux asked harshly. His heart pounded and he tried to steel himself for the worst.

“We haven’t found Cam yet, but we did find this at Oakwood.”

Kat cried out, lunging forward to snatch the evidence bag from Hunter’s hand. She clutched the tiny red bootie to her chest and hit her knees. Kneeling down beside her, Crux crushed her in a hug.

“It’s okay, baby. It’s something. They know he was there.”

“Cam’s like his mama, he’s always kicking his socks off,” she choked out, eyes clamped shut and trying to rock through the pain.

“Now will you take us seriously that Merrick is involved in this?”

“I never discredited your suspicions. We might have shown our teeth in a smile to the governor’s brother, but John Merrick’s connections haven’t changed the way we’ve conducted our investigation.”

“Did you check the cemetery?”

Kat’s whisper made both heads whip around. Crux closed his eyes for a minute and then turned back to Agent Hunter.

“We told you about the argument between Kat’s parents and her mother’s disappearance. There’s an old graveyard on the grounds at Oakwood and Kat thinks that John killed Kassandra and buried her there.”

“Did they search the grounds?”

Kat shook her head and gave a cynical bark of laughter. “I was a child. No one would take me seriously. When I wouldn’t shut up and fall in line, my father told them that I’d snapped. He said that the grief was too much for me. Guess where he sent me.” She laughed again at the horror on the Federal agent’s face. “But don’t worry. They gave me a room with a view. Even strapped to the bed I could see the cemetery out of my window.”

Crux swept Kat up off the floor and carried her to the couch without a word to Hunter. Her laugh had sent a chill down his spine. If there’d ever been a time he’d worried about his wife’s sanity, now was it. Settling on the chaise, he tucked her under his chin. He gently pried the evidence bag from her hands and replaced it with Cam’s blanket she’d been carrying around. She buried her face in the light blue fleece with the small black motorcycles and her shoulders shook with the force of her anguish.

Hunter sat down on the other end of the sectional. He scrubbed his hands over his face and Crux felt for the guy, they’d had a lifetime to get used to the dysfunction of their families. Wetting his lips, Hunter looked up at him.

“The FBI is still searching Oakwood. It’s a massive complex and Kat wasn’t exaggerating about the underground labyrinth. I won’t go into the horrors we found there, but I can promise you that Oakwood is being closed.” Hunter looked down at his hands and Crux could see they were shaking. “Closed sounds so civilized.  It’s the kind of evil where you should scorch the earth and never rebuild there,” he whispered, his eyes distant and haunted.

Hunter flinched, his hand going toward his weapon as Ginny appeared at his shoulder. She stared at him, some sort of understanding seeming to pass between them before he reached out and accepted the steaming coffee. Crux wondered if it was a cop thing. He’d never really stopped to think about some of the horrors they must see in their job and probably brought home. He shrugged. Either way, it didn’t excuse the ones that turned into abusive fucks.

“Can I get you anything?” Ginny asked him, but her worried gaze was on the woman huddled in his lap.

“More coffee,” Crux said with a tired smile of thanks.

Ginny nodded and stood wringing her hands for a moment before turning back to the kitchen. Kissing the top of Kat’s head, Crux rocked her. Her body shook with constant trembles.

“It’s a lead, babe. Now they’ll believe us and focus on the piece of shit,” he whispered.

“Please get my baby back,” she sobbed.

Crux turned his eyes heavenward trying to stem the wash of tears that filled his eyes at her heartrending plea. He took a deep breath and squeezed her tighter.

“I will, babe. Whatever it takes.”

Ginny sat down next to them on the couch and handed Crux his coffee before brushing Kat’s hair out of her face.

“Sit up, little sister. Take this for me,” she whispered.

Crux looked askance at the small pill in Ginny’s palm.

“It’s just a low dose Xanax,” their queen said with a small smile. “They gave them to me after the…attack. It won’t make her a zombie, just take the edge off.”

“Thank you,” Crux said, reaching over to touch her arm. He hadn’t missed the hesitation in her voice. She didn’t like to think about the rape. With everything she and the family had been through in the last year, Gin was still a rock.

Twenty-Three

“I’ve been cleaning up your messes for sixty years, little brother, and I’m beginning to find it tiresome,” Connor said with a sigh.

The hair on John’s nape stood up at the soft, conversational tone of his brother’s voice. His eyes narrowed as he watched the politician pace the spacious den. Sliding his hand under the desk he found the grip on the revolver hidden there. He stroked it with his fingertips, its presence soothing his tattered nerves.

“I didn’t ask for your help, Connor.”

“You didn’t have to. Unlike you, I’m quite capable of looking at the big picture and realizing that you’re in over your head.”

“I have everything under control. The FBI searched the house and grounds and found nothing. I’ve been completely cooperative. I’ve even offered to fund a reward for my grandson’s safe return,” John said, waving a dismissive hand at his brother’s high-handed assertions.

Connor nodded, his hands clasped behind his back as he stared out the window. The second hand on the mantle clock ticked loud in the silence. John fought to keep his composure, waiting for his brother’s next move. Connor turned, his pale eyes zeroing in on him like a great white.

“If you have it all under control then I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how many FBI agents are swarming Oakwood as we speak. Undoubtedly you’re also aware that they have video footage of you entering and exiting the old ambulance bay and that they’ve found one of your grandson’s socks at the scene.”

His heart skipped a beat. He searched Connor’s face for any sign of deception, but the condescending sneer there just drove the words home.

“How?” He barely managed to choke out the single word.

“It seems you underestimated Katrina, or perhaps the resourcefulness of her new friends. Did you think she’d forgotten about Oakwood? I first got wind that Cleveland detectives were sniffing around. So either something they found, or perhaps that Katrina said, focused the FBI’s attention on Oakwood,” Connor said, pouring a drink. He tilted the decanter toward John in question and he nodded numbly. Connor set a glass on the desk and took a long drink of his before continuing.

“Besides the video of you, they have tape from the main lobby of a man carrying in a duffle bag. That man later leaves empty handed. The FBI hasn’t found the bag, but they’re speculating it could’ve carried an infant. Either way, your presence there so soon after the abduction is extremely damning. That’s very sloppy on your part.” Connor took another drink. “So far they haven’t been able to find any sign of young Camden leaving the hospital. Please tell me that you did a better job disposing of the body than you’ve done covering your own ass.”

“There aren’t any cameras on the old ambulance entrance. Only Beck parks back there,” John said shaking his head in disbelief.

How in the hell had this happened? He’d planned so carefully and yet nothing had gone to plan. He pinched the bridge of his nose. Katrina had gone to the police. His trusted maid, Etta, who he’d planned to have care for the boy until things blew over had just not shown up. Obviously, past mental health records and assault charges meant nothing to the FBI. They’d taken Katrina and her lowlife husband’s accusations seriously. Now there was a camera where there hadn’t been one. What were the odds that many things could go wrong? He froze, the question deserving serious reflection. Wasn’t it interesting that Connor had all the answers?

A cold knot of rage roiled in his stomach and he looked up, but Connor wasn’t looking at him. His unflappable brother was pale and his eyes were wide in disbelief as he stared at the doorway.

“Aren’t you going to say hello, John?”

The husky voice wrapped around him igniting a surge of lust and rage. He turned slowly. His eyes ran over Kassandra, drinking in her effortless beauty. Other than faint lines at the corners of her eyes, she’d changed very little. The gun in her hand was a new twist.

“How did you get in here?” Connor asked.

John grimaced. Leave it to his brother to ask the mundane after twenty-two years.

“Hello to you too, Connor,” Kassandra said with a sarcastic smile. “Etta was happy to loan me her vehicle and uniform as well as provide me with the pass codes I needed. It seems she missed me.”

“Why, Kassandra?”

Her head tilted ever so slightly at the question and then she shook it gently. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to be a little clearer, John. There are a lot of
whys
left between us.”

John laughed, it sounding harsh and humorless even to his ears. He relaxed in his chair, fingers caressing the hidden revolver’s grip.

“How about we start with why did you leave us?”

“I think we all know the answer to that, John. Do you think that is the best use of our time after twenty-two years?” she asked, her tone chiding.

“Maybe you and I had our differences, but your disappearance destroyed Katrina.”

“I regretted leaving her, but I didn’t even know how I was going to care for myself.”

“Do you know that she still thinks I killed you and hid the body?”

“Didn’t you? You drove me to run and forced me to hide from you, John. I knew you would never let me go,” she hissed, eyes flashing in ire.

“Do you have any idea how messed up a little girl has to be to think that her father is capable of murdering her mother? She spent time at Oakwood trying to deal with what you did to her.”

“What I did to her or the fact that her sick father decided she should step up and fill her mother’s shoes and her father’s bed?”

John gritted his teeth. He could feel the vein throbbing in his forehead. His fingers closed around the revolver.

“You actually seem surprised,” Connor sneered. “What exactly did you think was going to happen when you left, Kassandra?”

“I – I – I didn’t—” Her faced crumpled and she brought one hand up to cover her mouth, nodding. It was obvious a small part of her had known.

Connor leapt forward and the gun in Kassandra’s hand exploded in the quiet room. Pulling the revolver, John came around the desk. His hand shook as he held the gun on Kassandra. Connor knocked over one of the chairs in front of John’s desk as he staggered before slowly slumping into the other. His mouth opened and closed without words. John blinked at the stain that was already bleeding through his brother’s suit jacket.