Missing (The Brannock Siblings Book 3) (32 page)

"Let her go, Donny. It's
me
you have the fight
with. You want justice? You take it from
me
, right now, because you
aren't getting out of here a free man."

Gus moved carefully across the room in front of them. The
table with the surgical tools, stood between them. As Donny moved her closer to
the door, she started to panic. What was Gus doing? He was giving him an exit.

"Isn't this the sweetest justice, though,
Brannock," Donny spit out. "Taking the one you love most to show you
what a failure you actually are."

Gus flinched and pain crossed his features as he slowly
started to lower his gun.

"No," she screamed. "Don't listen to him,
Gus. He's crazy!"

"Put the gun down, Donny."

"Okay."

The gun dropped away from her temple and flew across the
room at Gus. He ducked out of the way, but quickly righted himself. The look in
his eyes hadn't changed, however. If anything, it had become more panicked.

The sting of a blade pressed into her pulse point and she
realized that Donny was even crazier than she originally thought. He was going
to toy with Gus until there was nothing left to take from him.

"Why are you doing this?"

"You think you are so dedicated to your job, that
you're good at it. I
gave
you those two children.
I
did that. Not
you. You're pathetic and it's time you people realized that you aren't doing
your jobs. You do the bare minimum and then go home to your pathetic families
and forget that you've destroyed lives!"

The knife pressed harder and cut into her skin. The small
trickle of blood running down her neck was the only thing she could actually
feel other than the pain. The hot tears stopped falling, her trembling body
stilled, the nausea faded. Her mind numbed itself, fear of the unknown just too
powerful.

"I'm sorry for what happened to you, Donny. It
shouldn't have ended that way. They shouldn't have given up, but it's not me or
Aiden you should be punishing and you know that."

As if he hadn't heard Gus speak, Donny continued casually.
"I must give you credit though, your family and friends are dedicated.
I
should have had that."

"Yes. You should have and I'm sorry you didn't."
The words were sincere. Gus focused on her, his eyes reflecting so much love,
she couldn't help but mouth
I love you
right back. "You should have
had what we have. A family that will never give up on you."

Donny shifted closer to the door until it was almost
directly behind him with Gus standing in the far corner now. She expected him
to say something hateful, but instead, his grip on the blade loosened.

When Gus stepped forward, that grip tightened once more and
pressed even harder. More blood trickled down her neck and Gus looked like he
was about to lose it. "I'm so sorry, Aiden. If it wasn't for me-"

"Don't," she pleaded. If it wasn't for him, she
would have never been whole, even if it had only lasted a short time.

The blade lifted from her throat, but the tip scratched
across her skin. She jerked in his hold when Donny started to hit his fist
against the side of his head, mumbling incoherencies. The blade returned to her
neck, a determined air to the movement, and she knew this was it. He was going
to finish it unless something happened
right now
. When he spoke once
more, his voice was strained and she felt hot tears drip onto her shoulder.
"Sometimes we all need to make sacrifices, Detective. Even you."

It all happened so quickly. The flash in Gus' eyes just
before Donny was ripped back, the burn of the blade across her collar bone, the
gush of blood that poured down her chest. She collapsed to the floor only to
feel the sharp crack of pain in her skull when it connected to the hard cement.

"Aiden!"

She tried to open her eyes. Tried to reach out to him, but
her arms were too heavy. Hot blood pooled in that dip at the base of her throat
and the last thing she remembered before the darkness took her, was how good it
felt when Gus kissed her there.

Gus

The sterile smell of antiseptic and the bright fluorescent
lights of the hospital room were making my pounding head feel like it was about
to explode.

Aiden was lying unconscious in the bed. Had been for hours.

I'll never forget the sound of her head hitting the ground.
The loud
crack
had ripped a hole in my chest. I'd been hit in the head
before, but never that hard. It took only seconds to get to her, but the blood
had already pooled around her. The deep cut just over her collar bone had bled
profusely, but it was the amount of blood coming from her head that scared the
shit out of me.

When we had gotten into the hangar, I had no idea how we
were going to intercept Donny without Aiden being hurt. The shouting from the
small office at the back alerted us to their location and it made me sick to
think she had been alone with the guy for
any
amount of time.

I heard everything.

Donny Marks was extremely unstable, but it was to be
expected. Especially after Linc found out more about the kidnapping all those
years ago. At 7 years old, Donny had been through a hell I couldn't begin to
fathom and he lived it for three long years.

The man who had taken him was sick. Three months after
Donny's disappearance, other children had been recovered, but never Donny. Even
after hours of interrogation, Donny still had more to tell. At 10, he had
killed the man who had kept him prisoner for so long. The details of his escape
were brutal. A child finding the frame of mind to sneak into a room and slice a
man's throat… it was horrifying.

Didn't give him the right to do what he did.

Donny
was
a computer genius and had snaked his way
into three other departments here in Detroit, waiting for the right time to
strike. He had watched me for a long time, seeing hope where their originally
hadn't been. When I had left for Oakland to help Ash, it was the nail in the
coffin. An already fragile mind, broke completely.

He was locked up for now, until his trial where he would
most likely be put into a psych ward. From the sound of it, Aiden wasn't the
only person he had physically hurt. The darkness this man had been living in
was sick.

I thanked God Aiden's injuries weren't more serious.

Luke hadn't seen the blade in Donny's hand and the remorse
in his eyes every time he looked at me was painful. I kept telling him there
was nothing else we could have done. Better a cut to her chest than a slit to
her throat. I wasn't sure how Aiden would feel about it, but I knew she'd be
grateful to be alive.

If she would just wake up.

I held her tiny hand in both of mine and counted her steady
breaths as I stared down at her. The doctor said she had a concussion from the
blow to the head and the blood loss had only made her condition worse.

She would be okay, though. Once she woke up,
we
would
be okay.

"Gus, sweetie, you need to rest," Lily's anxious
voice came from the doorway.

She had cried tears of joy at the return of her daughter and
Aidy refused to leave her mother's side, not even for Rose and Jerry Murphy,
her grandparents. Chad had stayed close to them, but Aidy was hesitant with the
man she still hadn't met since Lily cancelled the dinner she'd invited us to.
Within a couple hours, Aidy had climbed into Chad's lap and embraced him.

"Do you like my mommy?" she asked.

Chad smiled and looked at Lily, his feelings very obvious.
"I do. Very much."

"I've already done it lots but I think it would help if
you laid her, too."

Lily had started to choke on her coffee and the rest of us,
well, most of us laughed and some were speechless. It killed me that Aiden
hadn't been there to hear it.

"I'll tell you about it later," Lily muttered to
Chad who kissed her tenderly with a big smile on his face.

After that, I had refused to stay in the waiting room a
moment longer. Aiden was moved to a private room and her family hadn't
protested my presence. In fact, Rose Murphy refused to let me leave the room
even once. Jerry had retrieved the coffee and Rose had interrogated the hell
out of me. When it was clear I was in this for the long haul, she gave us her
blessing with the guarantee that Jerry would be on board as well.

"You aren't upset? It's my fault she's even in this
bed," I mumbled.

"No, Fergus. It's because of you she is even alive.
It's because of you that for the last couple months she has lived more for
herself than she has for 27 years."

"I love her very much."

"I know you do, dear. I can see it all over your
handsome face. Everyone can. You two meeting was fate, even if you hated each
other in the beginning. Everything happens for a reason."

Rose reminded me of my own mom. The two of them would have
made instant friends.

Once everyone left to get some rest for the night, I set myself
up in her room. An uncomfortable looking recliner was tucked in the corner of
the room, but I hadn't even gone close to it. My place was right beside her, no
matter how long it took.

I still hadn't acknowledged Lily's presence in the room. She
knew I wasn't going to leave Aiden's side, but she felt obligated to try.

"I never said thank you, Gus."

I frowned. "Yes, you did."

"For helping to find Aidy, yes. But not for saving my
sister."

"You don't need to thank me for that," I grumbled,
smoothing my thumbs over the soft skin at Aiden's wrist. "I love her.
There was no other choice."

"Still. Thank you."

I nodded and turned my eyes back to my beautiful girl, lying
helpless on the bed. Her eyelids flickered and my body tensed, but there was no
other movement. The doctor said she would wake up in her own time, but I was
getting impatient.

"I need to get back to Aidy. Please rest, Gus. She
needs you whole."

She left quietly and I dropped my forehead to the bed,
holding in the curses I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs. I wouldn't be
whole until she came back to me. No matter how many people told me she would be
fine - including me repeating it to myself over and over again - I wouldn't be
able to relax until she opened those big brown eyes of hers and smiled at me
the way she always did.

I pressed my lips to her wrist and inhaled. She still
smelled sweet, like sugar and apples, like my Aiden, but it was dulled by the
smell of the disinfectant.

"Come on baby, open your beautiful eyes for me. Yell at
me for being an asshole and getting you into this mess, yell at me for making
fun of your god awful cooking. Anything. Just wake up for me, okay?"

"I'll never get better if I never practice."

The sound of her beautiful voice pulled a sob out of throat.
I raised my head to a sleepy grin crossing her face and the tension in my chest
finally disappeared.

"Sometimes practice doesn't always make perfect, baby.
It just makes people sick."

She smiled and tightened her fingers around mine.

"I'll be sick every day for the rest of my life if it
means I get to love you," I added gently, leaning over her to kiss the
single tear that had fallen down her cheek.

Her eyelids were heavy, but it didn't look like she was
going to be going back to sleep. She started to raise her head to mine, her
eyes begging for a proper kiss, but she winced from the pain in her head. I
moved to push the button for the nurse and her hand reached out and stopped me.

"Wait. Aidy?"

"She's just fine. Not a scratch on her. Already making
jokes and ready for another fort. She said she wants to have another sleepover
since we let her eat a shit ton of junk food."

Her short giggle was the most beautiful thing in the world.
I pressed my lips to her wrist once more.

"You, on the other hand, have a concussion. You lost a
lot of blood and had to have a transfusion. I need to get the nurse in here and
make sure you get enough pain medicine."

She reached up to her collar bone, but I caught her hand.
"Don't."

"Is it bad?"

I sighed, my gaze finding the bandage that covered the
jagged line I knew was there, marring her perfect skin. "Not as bad as you
think. It was deep and needed a lot of stitches. We were all more worried about
infection. The blade he cut you with was… it was used on a few other people,
too. They ran a bunch of tests just to make sure you were safe. So far,
everything has come back just fine."

"I'm going to have a scar," she grumbled and
shifted her body on the bed.

"You'll still have the most gorgeous body I've ever
seen or
will
ever see."

She smiled wickedly, "You plan on seeing a lot in the
near future?"

I laughed. "No, baby. Plus, I don't really see them.
All I see is you."

She shifted again and I reached for the call button once
more. Her hand tightened around my wrist.

"Tell me, Gus. I need to know."

My back teeth started to grind together. I didn't want her
to know all the sordid details of Donny Marks' reasoning behind what he did,
but I knew she wouldn't give up and if anyone was going to tell her, it was
going to be me.

"Let's wait until you are out of here. There's too much
to tell and you need to rest."

"Promise?"

"I promise, Red. I'll tell you everything, then we can
forget it."

"Is he…"

I shook my head, "No. He's locked up and will be
getting some help as soon as possible. I heard everything he said to you."
I swallowed and looked down at her tiny hands. There would never be a day that
goes by that I wouldn't think about what happened, how I almost lost her.
"I'm so sorry, Aiden."

"Gus, don't. It's not your fault."