Curtis (22 page)

“Christ. Who? See if you can get him to
tell you.”

No shit
, Curtis wanted
to shout at the Fed.

“See if you can get him to at least
hint.”

Curtis said the first name that popped
into his head. “Pamela Long, the agent that first came to us.”

He saw the surprise first, then the
anger. It flared fast and hot. Curtis waited for the bullet to rip through him.
And was very happy when it did not.

“She told you. Not that it matters
really, but she has outlived her usefulness. Actually, she did that before I
went to visit little Vaughny here. She wanted…she wanted more from our relationship
than I wanted her to have. She currently lives in a shallow grave somewhere.” McKnight
looked around as if he just realized what he’d said. His next words confirmed
it. “I suppose there are ears here. Oh well, you’ll never testify and I’ll be living
in the lap of luxury long before they can sort through this mess.”

McKnight walked to the wall that had
been put back up. Curtis could see where the new bricks had been brought in and
replaced the broken ones, but obviously McKnight didn’t. He went about ten feet
from where the damage had been done and looked at Curtis. “Come now, you don’t
expect them to wait all day on you, do you? You have to have me trying to leave
with the money if the charges are going to be big enough to keep me locked away
for years and years. I have to be seen leaving with the money. Your death and
this shit here isn’t going to be enough and it’ll only serve to piss me off
more.” He pointed the gun at Curtis’ head and told him to pick up the sledge
hammer.

“No.” Curtis wasn’t going to help. He
was sure he’d be dead, but he wasn’t helping. “You want it, then you fucking
take it. No sweat off my balls.”

The first man to enter the room pointed
the gun to McKnight’s head. He only smiled. He didn’t fight the man, nor did he
say anything when he was shoved against the wall and held there. There was
something wrong. Very wrong. As the room filled with men in flack vests and
armor Curtis had a feeling he was missing something. And McKnight’s laughter
was getting on his last nerve.

“You might want to ask your family where
your future father-in-law is. He has been with me for some time now and he’s
not going to be found in time if you don’t let me go.”

Curtis moved toward him and pushed the
Special Forces officer out of his way.

“Tisk, tisk now, Hunter, you’re letting
your temper get the better of you.”

“Where is he? You tell me right now or
so help me I’ll kill you myself.”

The man laughed again. “You won’t
because your little wifey would never forgive you.” McKnight looked over his
shoulder and Curtis knew that someone else had entered the room. “Well, as I
live and breathe. If it isn’t my old pal Charlie Mann. How is the family?”

Curtis looked at Mann then back at
McKnight. The two men stared at each other for several seconds before McKnight
was taken away. Curtis turned to Mann and asked him where Jon was.

“We’re looking. He was supposed to be at
the doctor’s office an hour ago and I had a team there on the outside. As soon
as McKnight claimed he had him, I had them go in there. The entire office staff,
including the doctor, is dead. Washington is gone.”

“And Kylie? Does she know?” Mann shook
his head. “Christ, we have to find him now. He’s not well.”

“I’ve got my best men working on it. Like
I said, his appointment was an hour ago so he wouldn’t have gotten far. We’re
doing everything we can to find him.”

Curtis knew that he was. But it didn’t
lessen the fact that he was still missing. As soon as his family arrived he
took Kylie aside and told her. She didn’t believe him at first.

“I just spoke to him. He said he was in
the office and that he was waiting on the doctor to come in and see him.” She
looked at him with tears in her eyes. “How did they let this happen to him?”

“I don’t know, honey. I have no idea.” He
held her in his arms and tried to think. He wondered if Jon might already be
dead, but didn’t say that to Kylie.

~~~

Jon looked around his cell. He knew that
he was here because of that LaMancusa person. He tried to think how he’d ended
up here and decided that the pain in his head was too much for him to think on
that overly hard right now. Jon knew that his arm was broken, as was his hip. The
way that man had tossed him into the trunk and slammed the lid shut, it was
small wonder that he didn’t have more broken bones. He wiped at the tears that
seemed to flow down his cheeks. He was going to die.

Jon wasn’t an overly brave man. But he
wasn’t stupid either. He was insurance, plain and simple. LaMancusa wanted to
make sure that things went his way and Jon had been his insurance policy in
keeping them all in line. He hoped that they wouldn’t worry about one little
old man and take the man out, but he knew the heart of the Hunters and knew
that they’d never leave him behind. He smiled when he thought of how happy his
little girl was going to be as soon as she married young Curtis.

Sitting up off the cold floor, Jon
moaned. His hip hurt him so badly that he wasn’t sure how long he’d be able to
hold in that position. Not long, he figured, and tried to see if he could see
if anyone was at the doorway again.

“Hello. I was wondering if I might have
a pain reliever? I’ve been hurt badly and I would very much like something to
help me.”

“You’re not gonna be around long enough
to care about a little pain in your old stinking body. Shut the fuck up and sit
still. I have a game on and you’re fucking with my entertainment.”

Well
, Jon thought,
that settles
that
. He tried to think of anything but the pain and had to lie back down. His
bladder was full, but just thinking about trying to stand to urinate was too
much. Closing his eyes, he thought of his only child.

Kylie hadn’t been a problem child. Not
even for him. She’d been born so late in his life that he’d been terrified of
messing her up. He knew nothing of children, being an only child himself, and
knew less of little girls. His wife had been so good and kind to him that when
she’d passed when Kylie had been a baby, he’d actually thought of putting her
up for adoption. But the night he’d come to that very decision and walked into
her room to see her one last time had knocked that idea right out of his head.

She’d been awake and not making a sound.
When he looked into her bed, she turned her head slightly and stared up at him.
She looked at him with her mother’s eyes and she seemed to be telling him that
she’d be no trouble for him, that he should give her a chance. He reached down
and touched her downy face and she grabbed his finger.

Love. He’d loved her before that. Loved
her with all of his heart and then some, but when she’d touched him, held his
finger, his heart had nearly exploded with newfound love. Jon knew in that
moment that he would give his all to seeing her grow up, give his life to make
her happy, and he’d do anything in the world to keep her safe.

The rattling at the door had him look
up. The man standing there held a tray in his hand. Jon knew it was his meal. The
same man had been bringing him food since yesterday on the same tray. This time
was different only in that Jon didn’t have the strength to sit up and eat
today.

“Get up.”

Jon didn’t move. Couldn’t move.

“I said to get up and eat. I ain’t gonna
feed you this shit.”

“I have to use the facilities and I hurt
too badly to get myself there. You’ll have to help me.” The man snorted. “Please.
I have hurt my hip and I need to get up.”

The man tossed the tray on the floor. Then
he ground his boot into the mess he’d made. As he moved back to the doorway Jon
thought he was going to leave him there. But before he went through it and shut
it, he turned back to him. “You eat what’s there or nothing. And I’m not your
maid, fancy man. You have to piss then you either get up and do it or you wet
yourself. And I’m not gonna change your pants either. You’re on your own.”

The door slammed shut and Jon continued
to lay there. He knew now that he was going to die for sure and wished that he
could see his lovely daughter once more before he did. Closing his eyes again,
he sent up a little prayer. He rarely did that anymore, not since his wife had
died, but he did now.

“Please watch over my baby. Please keep
her safe and happy, Lord.” He looked at the food in front of him and felt his
bladder let go; there was no hope for it. “Lord, I ask you for this in the name
of your son. Please make sure that the man who did this to us is held
accountable for all that he has done.”

Jon moved again; this time he screamed
out in pain. As blackness took him he remembered Curtis’ promise. He’d said he’d
keep her safe. Smiling even as he blacked out, his last thought was that the
man was going to pay when Curtis found him.

The next time he woke he was freezing. Jon
could see very little. He wasn’t sure if the room was dark from the lack of
light or that he couldn’t see. He found that he didn’t care. Pain racked his
body relentlessly now and he cried from it. The man had come in to get the tray,
he could see, but the food still lay there. Closing his eyes again Jon knew in
his heart that he’d never open them again. Looking up, he saw his wife and
smiled at her.

“Hello, my love.”

She nodded at him and held out her hand.

“I can’t leave her just yet. She’s not
safe.”

She nodded again and stepped toward him.
Jon knew that as soon as he touched her that he’d be pain free and he could
move again. He was tempted. Wanted to join her so badly, but there was their
little girl to care for.

“She is going to be fine, love. Her man
will keep her safe and the grandchildren she has for us will give us something
to watch from where we’re going. She is going to be fine, trust me.”

Jon nodded now, touched the tip of her
fingers, and felt himself being lifted. His body, for the first time in so
long, even before he’d been hurt, felt new, revitalized, and almost young
again. When he wrapped his hand around his wife’s waist and held her, she told
him not to look back, that Curtis would take care that he was found. As he
moved out of the building he didn’t look at anything but her eyes, the eyes of
his child, and knew that she was right; Kylie would be all right from now on.

“I love you so much, Olivia. I’ve missed
you more and more every day.” She kissed him and he held her. “I tried too hard
to be a good father. I’m afraid that—”

“You gave her everything she needed. She
loved us both because you told her about me.”

Jon felt tears spill from his eyes.

“Don’t cry, Jon. We can spend our days looking
down on her and the children and be happy together once again.”

Jon nodded and, suddenly, he was high
above the earth. Settling down on a chair, he watched as Olivia pointed to
something beyond them. Looking out, he could see them, all the small children. And
he knew these children were going to be babies soon. And a few of them were
going to be his. Jon leaned back in his chair and his lovely wife sat with him.
Jon knew that his daughter would be sad for a time, but she would be happy,
happier than she’d ever been. Smiling, he held on and closed his eyes. Life had
never been sweeter.

Chapter 18

Kylie watched the men move into the
house. They had been watching it for a few days and she simply wanted to go in
and find her daddy. He’d been missing for three days now and she didn’t want to
think about what might be inside. She reached for and found Curtis’ hand and
held on tight. Kasey was on her other side and she, too, held her hand.

“It’s going to be all right. We’ll go
inside and he’ll be sitting in a chair wondering what all the fuss is about.” Even
to her own ears she sounded insincere. “We’ll be hearing about this for years
to come.”

Curtis squeezed her hand and said
nothing. He knew too, she realized. Knew that her daddy wouldn’t be found
alive.

The cop had said that the blood they’d
found in the trunk of the limo had been more than one person could lose. Her
daddy had been hurt along with all those people in that office that day. He’d
been taken away for insurance, they’d told her. They’d also told her that the
likelihood of them finding him after all this time was nearly impossible.

McKnight wasn’t talking. He’d said not a
single word other than “no comment” since they’d brought him to the jail. Now
he was sitting in a prison cell waiting on his trial. A trial that Jesse had
told her would only be small time for all they thought he’d done. All they had
him on now was the murder of another bad guy, Vaughn LaMancusa.

“It’s clear,” the man in front of her
said.

“Kylie?”

She looked up in the face of someone she
knew she should know, but couldn’t place. It took her several seconds to
realize that it was Annamarie.

“He’s dead, isn’t he?”

Annemarie nodded.

“Can I see him now? I’d like to see my
daddy now, please.”