Wren Delacroix Series Box Set Page 32

  “Your mother extorted money from my mother,” said Oliver. “She never let my mother get to know you, but she convinced my mother to write her check after check.”

  “Oh,” said Wren, laughing helplessly. “Well, that sounds like something she’d do. She was very opportunistic. I always thought she had people kill because she was testing the boundaries of her power, but now I see she used it to punish Adrian for what he…” She stopped talking suddenly, because a sob had risen up in her throat, out of nowhere, and it took everything within her to keep it from bubbling out of her. I’ll never get to know him.

  “You know when it finally stopped?” said Oliver. “When my mom found out that she’d been paying off my dad’s murderer.”

  Wren swallowed hard, finally swallowing the last vestiges of that sob. “I’m sorry.”

  “Well, it’s all bad,” he said. “But you can help, maybe. You’ll get tested for the bone marrow. You’ll do that for Emmaline.”

  “I…” Wren hugged herself. “Look, this is a lot to take in.”

  “You’re not going to turn me down,” said Oliver, and his voice cracked. “I won’t let you.”

  Wren turned to him, and something went through her, an awful thrill. She had heard something in his voice, something that frightened her. “What do you mean, you won’t let me?”

  “I don’t know,” said Oliver, gripping the steering wheel.

  “Where are we going?” said Wren, looking out the window of the car. “Where are you taking me?”

  “We’re just driving,” said Oliver. “Say that you’ll help me.”

  “Okay, I’ll help. Now take me home.”

  “Take you home?” He sucked in a shaky breath. “You’re just saying it, aren’t you? If I take you home, then you’ll take it back.”

  “Where the hell are you taking me?” she said. “What are you going to do to me?”

  “Nothing,” said Oliver, his voice very high in pitch.

  She took a deep, steadying breath. “I promise I will help, Oliver. I will get tested. I will donate the marrow to your sister.”

  “To our sister.”

  “To… our sister.” She felt that sob rising again.

  “I don’t believe you.” Oliver’s voice was even higher in pitch now.

  “Why not?”

  “Because you hate me. Why would you help me?”

  “I don’t hate you,” she said. “Now we’re family, so we shouldn’t hate each other. Trust me, Oliver. Take me home.”

  A tear rolled out of Oliver’s eye. “I can’t.” He was defeated. “Damn it, I can’t.”

  “What are you going to do? Keep me captive and forcibly extract my bone marrow? You can’t do that on your own. You’d have to have a doctor who would be complicit in that.” But hell, his father had been a doctor, so what were the odds that he did know another doctor who’d be willing to help out? “Oh, hell, Oliver, this really isn’t necessary.”

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

  Wren looked at him and then she looked out the window. She didn’t think, because if she thought about it, she would have stopped, and she had to get away from this guy.

  One hand unhooked her seatbelt. One hand opened the door.

  She hurtled herself out of the moving car.

  * * *

  Hawk knocked on the door of Wren’s cabin.

  He waited.

  Nothing from within.

  “Little bird?” he said. “I know you’re here. I can see your car in the driveway. Come on. Answer the door.”

  Silence.

  He knocked on the door again. “Wren? You in the shower or something?”

  Another long pause.

  He stepped back, surveying the door, and then he stepped closer, putting his palm flat against it. “Look, I was hard on you. I shouldn’t have been so hard. Coming home without you, being here without you, waiting…” He sighed. “Can we talk? Please?”

  Still no response.

  He sighed. He shoved his hands in his pockets, studied his shoes. Hesitated a little longer, and then turned and went down the steps of her porch. He started across the driveway, trudging with his head down, as if there was resistance in the air around him, as if he was fording a river against the current.

  Suddenly, he stopped.

  He turned back to the house.

  Lifting his chin, he went back to the door. He turned the doorknob. It was locked. He furrowed his brow. “Wren?” Now, there was a note of something else in his voice. Something was wrong.

  He backed away and climbed down off the porch again. He went around to the back of the house and peered into one of the windows. It looked into Wren’s bedroom, and it was open, a breeze from outside fluttering her blue curtains inside. “Wren!”

  Nothing.

  “Hey, I’m coming in,” he said. “If you’re all right, if you’re pissed at me, now’s the time to say something, okay? I’ll back off if you just locked me out.” He waited.

  Nothing.

  He reached in and knocked the screen out of the window. He climbed into the bedroom. “Wren!”

  He strode through the house, room after empty room. In the living room, he found her suitcase sitting next to the locked front door. He knelt next to it. “So, you came home, and you put your suitcase down, and then you left in a hurry.”

  He ran his fingers over the luggage.

  “Probably something with work,” he said, nodding. He stood up. “Yeah, maybe there’s another body or something.” He took his phone out of his pocket and dialed, holding it to his ear.

  A phone began to ring. In Wren’s suitcase. Well, not her suitcase, her carry-on bag, which he remembered she’d shoved everything into, including her purse, because they only let you have the two bags on the plane, and they’d carried on their suitcases.

  He hung up, jamming his phone into his pocket. “Why’d she leave her phone?” He knelt back down and got it out of her bag. “She must have been in a hurry. Upset. Maybe if there was another body…” He shook his head. “But how did she know about the other body without her phone? Unless Detective Reilly was here…?” He set her phone down on the end table next to the couch in the living room.

  He wandered into the kitchen and found a pad of paper she used to write herself reminder notes.

  He scribbled out a note to her. Wren, Sorry about the screen in your window. If you get back here and you’re okay, call me. I’m a little worried. -Hawk

  He climbed back out the window in her bedroom.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Wren couldn’t move.

  Everything was pain.

  She’d scraped herself up bad. The whole side of her body where she’d landed was one big scrape. And probably a bruise too. A bad bruise. She lay on the side of the road in a heap, and everything hurt.

  She willed herself to move.

  Get up, she told herself.

  After all, Oliver had pulled the car to a stop, just up the road.

  She groaned.

  Oliver was getting out of the car.

  She managed to push herself to her hands and knees, her body screaming at her at the effort. She blinked at tears in her eyes. She let out harsh, wheezing breaths. You had to throw yourself out of a car without thinking about it, didn’t you? What the fuck, Delacroix?

  But she got to her feet, and she started to move. The more she moved, the easier it was.

  Right, right. Walk it off, she told herself.

  She started for the woods. They were out at the edge of the compound, and the woods behind here was all owned by the FCL. It was acres and acres of undeveloped land. She could hide there.

  “Wren!” yelled Oliver.

  She picked up speed, half-limping, half-jogging towards the woods.

  Oliver was coming after her.

  Yeah, this isn’t going to work, she thought. She reached into her pocket for her phone, worried it had been crushed when she threw herself from the car.

  It wasn’t there.


  What the hell?

  She pushed herself to go faster, the tree line looming ahead of her. If she could get there, maybe it would help, but she’d feel better if she could call for help. Had Oliver taken her phone?

  She looked over her shoulder at him.

  He was gaining on her. He was going so much faster than she was.

  She pushed herself to go even faster, but her body was badly hurt, and she cried out in pain as her bruised muscles were forced to work harder.

  No, I left my phone in my carry-on, she remembered. In the wake of the news of her father, she hadn’t been thinking about her damned phone, which she normally would have transferred to her pocket or purse before going anywhere. But she hadn’t been thinking. She’d been so thrown.

  “Wren!” bellowed Oliver. He was really running now.

  She tried to push herself for more speed.

  But a rock on the ground jutted up suddenly, and she didn’t see it until too late, and then she was falling—face-first on the ground.

  * * *

  “…don’t really let people just come in here,” came the voice of Maliah, drifting down the hallway.

  Reilly was in his office at headquarters. He got up out of his desk and went out to see what was going on.

  “I’m only wondering about Wren,” said Hawk Marner to Maliah. He was standing at the end of the hallway, looking as flanneled and scruffy as ever. How did the guy manage to have that perpetual amount of stubble of his face? Did he set a beard trimmer to trim it close instead of shaving or something?

  Reilly strode down to confront Hawk. “Hey, you heard the lady.”

  Hawk noticed Reilly and looked relieved. “Detective Reilly. Have you seen Wren? Is she here?”

  “No,” said Reilly. “She was getting back from her dad’s wedding today. I thought you went with her.”

  “I came back a little early. She was supposed to come find me, but she didn’t, and she’s not at home.”

  “Well, she’s not here.” Reilly spread his hands.

  Hawk scratched the side of his jaw. “Okay.” He turned to leave. Then he stopped. He looked back at Reilly. “She locked her door.”

  “Okay,” said Reilly slowly. “And?”

  “Well, she never does that. She doesn’t lock her door. I don’t know why she did that.”

  “Maybe she’s getting a little concerned about her safety,” said Reilly. “We do track down murderers on a daily basis. That tends to mess with your head a little.”

  “She didn’t take her phone,” said Hawk.

  “How do you know that?”

  “I tried to call her. I heard it ringing.”

  “Huh,” said Reilly.

  “I’m sorry, I just…” Hawk shook his head. “I’m probably paranoid. It’s the fucking Fellowship. Screws with your head sometimes.” He put a finger to his temple and twisted it like a drill. “I’ll go. I’m sure she’ll turn up.”

  Reilly furrowed his brow. “Okay, sure.”

  Hawk nodded. He turned to go.

  “Hey, Hawk, if you hear from her, can you let me know?” said Reilly. “Let me give you my phone number.”

  * * *

  Kimora Allen was in the middle of a debate with her daughter about watching more TV. She was maintaining it was time for bed, but her daughter wasn’t having any of it.

  Kimora was pretty sure that this kind of intense arguing wasn’t supposed to start until the teenage years. It was her bad luck to have gotten the kid who was developmentally advanced and could twist the argumentative knife with her brilliant points.

  “You go to sleep watching TV, Mommy,” said her daughter. “Why can’t I go to sleep that way too?”

  “It’s not good for you, sweetie.”

  “But if I try to go to sleep on my own, I just think and think. If the TV’s on, I can relax.”

  Someone was knocking on the door.

  Kimora sighed. She held up her finger. “One minute. This conversation is not over. And do not turn the TV on.” She went to the door and opened it. It was Hawk Marner.

  “Sorry to bother you, Kimora,” he said.

  “You all right?” she said. She had to admit that sometimes Hawk Marner gave her a touch of the creeps. It was probably because of his association with Major Hill, who also made her feel weird chills up and down her spine every time she saw him. When she’d found out that Major was the killer of those little girls, it all made sense. Hawk was creepy too, but only by association, she supposed. Still, she wasn’t about to invite him into her house. She had one of those awful moments that she had sometimes, where she felt her own vulnerability. She was a woman alone with three small children. If something threatened her, she had no recourse.

  Maybe she should get a gun.

  But no, because she’d read about how it was a zillion times more likely that the gun would be used accidentally against a friend or family member than against a burglar or criminal. She didn’t want to risk that, even in the face of possible stranger danger.

  Of course, hell, Hawk was not a stranger.

  “I’m just looking for Wren,” he said. “I know you and her are friends.”

  “Oh, um, we haven’t really been talking much,” said Kimora. “She’s busy with the task force.”

  “She’s not here?”

  “No,” said Kimora.

  Hawk looked at her, deep into her eyes. “Listen, if she’s here, avoiding me, just tell me she’s okay. I promise I’ll leave, and I won’t bother her or you. I just… I’m worried.”

  Kimora knitted her brows together. “She’s not here. What’s going on? Is she okay?”

  “I don’t know,” said Hawk, running a hand through his hair. “I’ve been all over. I can’t find her. Wherever she went, she left her car and her phone behind.”

  “Sometimes, she walks down to the coffee shop,” said Kimora. “Or Billy’s. That’s right across from the coffee shop. Have you checked Billy’s?”

  Hawk looked visibly relieved. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that. That’s got to be where she is. Thanks, Kimora.” He gave her a little wave and left.

  * * *

  Wren scrambled to her feet, but Oliver was on top of her now.

  She lurched towards the woods, trying to get away from him.

  He was crying freely, tears streaming down his cheeks. “I’m really sorry,” he was saying. “I can’t… I have to…”

  “You don’t,” said Wren. “You really don’t.”

  He grabbed her arm and tugged her against his body.

  She balled up a fist and punched him in the face.

  It hurt.

  She backed away, cradling her hand, moaning.

  He stumbled backwards too, hand to his nose. It was gushing blood. “Fuck!” he screamed. He looked up at her, eyes murderous, blood streaming down over his lips and chin. “You fucking bitch.”

  She ran.

  He ran after her.

  She made it maybe five feet. Maybe ten.

  He tackled her.

  She went down, and he landed on top of her.

  She twisted, turning beneath him, trying to get her legs free to kick him. She tried to remember training. She had been in the FBI Academy, and she had some classes on hand-to-hand fighting, but it had all been on mats in a room with a professor explaining things and all the moves had been drilled and practiced, and now she wasn’t sure what to do.

  He straddled her, sitting on her thighs.

  She raked her nails over his face.

  He punched her. Drove his fist into her jaw.

  She shrieked. She’d never been punched in the face before.

  He shook out his hand. It had hurt him to punch her too.

  Her face was alight in pain. Everything hurt. Maybe if she hadn’t tossed herself from a moving car, maybe then she would be a better match for him. She grabbed at his face again, digging her fingers into his eye sockets.

  He tore her hand away and pinned it above her head. He seethed over her. His blo
od dripped onto her face.

  She drove her free hand into his chest.

  He huffed, grunting. But he seized that hand too and brought it up with her other hand. His hands were bigger than hers. He pinned both of her wrists there with one hand. And then he started shrugging out of his jacket.

  Panic in her throat. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “Shut up,” he said, gasping for breath.

  “I’m your sister. Your sister. Don’t… please don’t—”

  “Shh.”

  She shuddered, her whole body alight in revulsion. “Oh, God, Oliver, keep your fucking clothes on.”

  “I’m not going to…” He glared at her, horrified. “I’m just… you need to pass out.” And then he was balling up his jacket and shoving into her mouth, covering her nose with it.

  He had to use both his hands, so he let go of her arms and she fought and struggled and tore at him as best she could.

  But he didn’t stop, he only swore at her.

  And she couldn’t breathe, and the world was going dark at the edges.

  “Shh,” said Oliver again, his voice tearful. “Just go to sleep, Wren. Just go to sleep.”

  She tried to rage against it. She tried. But the dark climbed into her brain and wrapped its tendrils around her and tugged her down, down, down. And then the darkness was everything.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Reilly stepped into the coffee shop to see that Hawk Marner was in there, leaning over the counter, talking to Angela, the barista. He strode over to them. “You still looking for Wren?”

  Hawk turned to him. “Yeah. I thought she’d be at Billy’s, but she’s not there. She’s not here either.”

  “Hey, Caius,” said Angela, “I’m really trying to close up. If you want something simple, I could do something with the cold brew, but I already cleaned up the espresso machine. I just forgot to lock the doors and he came in.”

  “It’s fine,” said Reilly. “Uh, I don’t need anything.”

  “I’m leaving,” said Hawk to Angela. “Sorry to barge in on you.”

  “No problem,” said Angela. “My fault for not locking the door.”

  Reilly eyed Hawk.

  Hawk eyed Reilly.

  Silently, they both seemed to decide to walk out at the same time, so they walked out together.