Deep Dark Mire (An FBI Romance Thriller ~ book four) (73 page)

The wounds were still fresh
, even in a dream.

“Elizabeth Renee Blackhawk, I’ve been waiting for you to come visit me,”
stated the familiar voice from behind her. When she turned around, there stood a piece of her heart. Timothy Blackhawk was in his regalia she buried him in not long ago.

“
Oh Granddad!” She crossed to him and went into his arms. The scent was there, the feel was there, and suddenly so was the peace. “I miss you so much,” she whispered, running her fingers reverently over one of his long gray braids.

“Oh sweetheart, I miss you too
.” Timothy kissed her on the forehead and held her against his body.

Elizabeth wept,
holding onto him, afraid to let go. “I’m so mad at you for not telling me you were sick. Mad isn't the word. Furious is a much better word about how we all feel.”

He laughed and then kissed her
again. “I did what I did in order to make it easier for you all. If you had to mourn for months, it would have hurt more. Sometimes it’s best for the Band-Aid to just be ripped off fast.”

Elizabeth nodded and stayed against his body.

“The funeral was beautiful, Lyzee. You did this old man proud, and I knew you were the one to take over for me.”

“It was so hard,
Granddad. It’s still so hard,” she said, whispering and holding his hand.

“Your assignment will keep you busy, and then when you arrive home your son will
occupy your heart and mind. I’m proud of you, sweetheart, and I’m proud of my boys.”

“I screwed up with Callen and Desdemona,
Granddad. I think he rushed into a relationship that was wrong for him, because of me.”

“I knew she was wrong, Elizabeth. Callen’s heart was always
meant for you. I know my boys, and every time you kissed him, it was clearly on his face.”

“They broke up.”

“Oh Elizabeth, don’t think I can’t see from where I’m at now. I see everything that’s going on and this old man blushes.”

Now she laughed. “Am I doing the wrong thing,
Granddad?”

Timothy Blackhawk squeezed her hand in his. “What does your heart say, sweetheart?”

Elizabeth walked with him, hand in hand, across the grass to where they’d buried him not many days ago. “It tells me I found love again.”

Timothy smiled. “Then you have your answer my protective raven. Doctor Adare wasn’t meant for him, but she was the bridge
. Everything that happened was needed to help him find the woman who was his true love. Without the mistake, there wouldn’t be happiness. You and he are together, because he rushed into a relationship that wasn’t going to work. The important thing is that you caught him when he fell, and healed his heart and soul.”

Elizabeth stared out over the burial grounds.

“All of this troubles you, but it’s not the reason I’m here, Elizabeth. Tell me what plagues you. I could hear your frustration from across time, and it called me here. I know it’s not about my boys.”

“This assignment is making me nuts, and I feel like I’m missing something,” she said, sitting in the grass beside him, and then lying
beside him to look up at the clouds.

“Tell me about it
, Granddaughter,” he said, holding her hand. “Maybe this old man can help you.”

Elizabeth broke it all down and told him everything that she knew
about the case, and everything she suspected and was leaning towards for the killer.

“You’re very astute sweetheart
. I think you need to stop over thinking everything and go with what you see. The eyes tell the truth, Lyzee. What information you have is already enough to tell you who killed those women, and why it was done.”

“I don’t know where to look
, Granddad. I feel like I’m all knotted up, and it’s crushing down on me. I’m tripped up with you dying, Callen and I coming together, Ethan, Wyler and CJ all needing me. I feel out of step.”

Timothy thought about it, and then pointed at the clouds in the sky. “What does that cloud look like, Elizabeth?” he asked
, pointing.

Elizabeth
watched it shift and transform into the face of her husband. “It looks like Ethan,” she answered, examining the facial structure that she’d fallen in love with the day she met him.

“And now look at the cloud right beside it. What does that cloud remind you of?” he inquired, softly.

Elizabeth watched that one shift too, just as the other had and take shape. This time it reminded her of Callen. “It looks like Cal,” she answered.

“Correct.”

It still wasn’t connecting in her mind. It was like there was a tiny hole sucking in the information that she desperately needed to complete the puzzle.

“I don’t get it,
Granddad. Help me get it.”

“Brothers and sisters often look the same on the outside, but sometimes it only takes one feature to connect them, and find the family relation. Ethan and Callen look nothing alike, different hair colors, different eye color, but they have a feature or two
to make them brothers.”

“Lips,” she answered. “They have the same lips.”

“Yes, I do believe you’re an expert at that feature,” he said, laughing.

Elizabeth grinned. “I can’t help it, they may be different on the outside, but they have the same father and grandfather.
I’m a sucker for Blackhawk DNA.”

He looked over at her with his very wise eyes. “Exactly
, Elizabeth, the DNA.”

She stared into his face, waiting for him to say more.

“Now, I must go. You need to finish this up and head back home to my great-grandson and son. They need their family.” Timothy Blackhawk stood and offered her a hand, helping her to her feet to stand beside him.

“Tell my boys that I miss them. Tell Ethan that inside
a book in the chest is, the first picture he ever drew of the woman he was going to marry. He was twelve at the time, and I think he should remember it, because she looks like you.”

“I will
Granddad.”

“Tell Callen that I kept the first book he wrote as a child. It was about a dog named Red. Both are
there waiting for them to just remember.”

“Okay
Granddad.”

He started walking towards the trees, and a woman with braids stepped from behind the biggest one. He paused and looked back. “Elizabeth, tomorr
ow wear your vest, or you’ll be seeing me again, and not in a dream.”

“
Will I see you again?” she asked, watching the woman walk towards Granddad. They held hands, linking fingers much like she and Callen did. It caught her breath in her chest.

“
You’ll see me again, sweetheart, but you have a long life ahead of you yet.”

The woman smiled and blew her a kiss. On her left hand sat the wedding ring that
Elizabeth had been wearing, while awake. It was the one that Callen had given her. On the top of her hand was a birthmark, in the shape of a blotch. Elizabeth stared down at the rings on her finger, and the family one was suspiciously missing.

“I love you,
Granddad! I always will, and thank you for the year you gave me. I’ll never forget you,” she sobbed, as he walked away.

“Go back to the men
, Elizabeth, and remember the eyes don’t lie.”

With that
, they walked into the trees and disappeared.

~ Chapter Eighteen ~

Elizabeth sat up
, gasping for air and fighting to be free of the arms that were wrapped around her.

“Baby! Are you okay?”
Ethan asked in alarm. His wife just pulled all three of them from sleep, scaring the hell out of him.

Callen was also awake, and running his hands up and down her arm. “Shhhhh. We’re right here,
angel. It was just a dream.”

“It was more than a dream,” she stated, laughing. Elizabeth
climbed out of bed and glanced down at her hand. The family ring was back on her hand and she grinned.

Both men were staring at her like she was out of her mind.
“Ethan, I need that paper that Desdemona gave you months ago with the list of all the men she had relationships with. I also need those journal entries.”

“Okay,” he said, climbing out of bed. “Are you
sure you feel okay?” he asked again, watching her carefully.

“I think I know who killed Trinity Adare. I just need to see if I’m right.
”

Elizabeth
grabbed the tablet on the table. On it she pulled up Desdemona Adare’s driver’s license. She took the papers from her husband and knelt on the floor, spreading them around her and looking for the specific paper.

“Okay, you’re acting really bizarre. What happened that lit up the light bulb?” asked
Blackhawk, sitting on the side of the bed.

“I was dreaming about granddad, and he told me how to figure it out.”

Ethan smiled gently. “Baby, you just worked it out in your subconscious.”

She looked up at him. “He told me to tell you that he kept the first picture you drew of the woman you were going to marry. What were you,
twelve?” she asked, watching his brother stare over at him with a look on his face.

“I remember that picture,” said
Whitefox. “It was taped to our bedroom wall.” Now that he remembered, it dawned on him. “It looked just like…”

“I’m aware, Cal,” he cut him off
, uncomfortable with the meaning.

Elizabeth continued.
“I didn’t know you wrote, Callen. He told me he kept your first story about a dog named ‘
Red’
.”

Now
, both men looked at her like she was possessed.

“How did you know that?” he asked, knowing he’d never told her
about it. Callen never told anyone that his secret dream was to be a writer.

“I told you.
Granddad told me.” Elizabeth scanned the papers and highlighted the information that she needed.

“Elizabeth, you're telling me you
had a dream with granddad, and he told you all of this?” Whitefox was freaked out, because he remembered that book he wrote. He even colored a picture of the dog and named him Red, because he couldn’t think of a better name.

“He said that the picture and story are in the chest he left you, Ethan. You’ll find them in there.”

Neither man spoke.

“
Your grandmother was there. Birthmark on her left hand about this big?” she pointed to the spot on her hand. “Weird shaped?”

Now both men knew she wouldn’t know that. There weren’t any pictures of the woman’s hand in granddad’s house.

“She met him, at the end of the dream, and they held hands like we do, Cal,” she said, smiling up at him.

Callen
felt his heart skip in his chest. He was very aware. He used to watch his grandfather and grandmother hold hands when he was very young; it was his one memory of her. “I’m pretty freaked out about this.”

Elizabeth started laughing. “Well, then you’re really going to be freaked out when I tell you he’s seen us in bed.”

Both men looked downright ill.

“If it makes you feel better, he approves.”
Elizabeth refocused her attention. “Desdemona Adare dated Vincent Delray,” she said, grabbing the other tablet from the floor. She accessed the driver’s license database and pulled up his picture too.

“At first
, granddad told me
‘the eyes don’t lie’
.” It helped Elizabeth see what she’d been missing. “He didn’t mean my eyes.”

Blackhawk looked confused.

“Granddad told me that brothers and sisters don’t always look exactly alike, you two were the case and point.” Elizabeth turned both tablets towards the men, and showed them what she saw. “You both have the same lips, but that’s really it. Same father, different mothers and all you got were the exact same lips.”

Blackhawk stared at the pictures.

“Oh shit,” mumbled Whitefox. “They have the same eyes.”

“The eyes don’t lie, boys,” Elizabeth grinned. T
hen she pulled up the picture of Jonathan Delray and showed them.

“
They have the same ears.”