Shattered Valor (10 page)

“I will.” She couldn’t look at him. It hurt, this parting. It physically hurt. She didn’t want him to go.

“If anything doesn’t seem right, tell me you will call me,” he urged again.

Oh, man, she didn’t want him to go. She nodded, then blinked to hide the moisture in her eyes.

“Eden.” He cupped the back of her head and tilted her face up with his thumb beneath her chin. He bent toward her, fitted his mouth to hers. She couldn’t suppress a shiver at that first contact. She leaned into him, wrapping her arms around his neck, absorbing the feel of his body against hers, holding him tighter than she ought to have.

He opened his mouth and she followed his lead. When his tongue stroked against hers, she moaned, low in her throat. The hand he held at her waist pulled her closer against himself, lifting her slightly so that she bore little of her own weight. He worked her mouth, drawing his tongue out, sliding back in. She could feel her body heating up, melting, hungering.

A horn blew outside, jolting them back to reality. He sighed, then pressed his forehead to hers. “I’ve wanted to do that since I first saw you.” He kissed her cheek and set her back on her own feet. “Eden—just, please, call me.”

She shook her head. “I won’t.”

He lifted her chin and glared at her. “Then I’ll call you. Will you answer?”

Eden bit down on her lips. “Yes.”

“Lock the door.” He crossed the room. “Don’t trust anyone. Any of your neighbors can be bought or coerced.” He looked back at her. She blinked. She refused to cry. And then he was gone.

She walked over to the door and flipped the bolt. She told herself not to go to the window, not to watch their cars pull away, but she never was very good at listening to her own warnings. She crossed her arms around her waist and looked through the slats of her blinds as the big SUVs pulled out of the apartment complex.

CHAPTER SEVEN

After dropping Eden off, the convoy returned to Wolf Creek Bend. Angel parked in front of Ty’s house. The guys went inside, leaving him to move at his own pace. They knew he had issues with the house, but not what those issues were. He got out of the SUV and, for a long moment, just stood next to it.

His dad had died only two months before Ty had been shot in Afghanistan. He hadn’t been able to come home then, and after he was injured, it wasn’t possible. He sure as hell hadn’t expected to be stateside right now. And he’d never intended to come back to the house. There wasn’t anything here he needed to deal with that couldn’t be handled long distance or via a proxy. When the Army had given him a medical discharge and Kit pulled him into Owen’s company, he still hadn’t meant to come back.

It was just his luck that this was where their enemies were.

A long construction dumpster sat out front of his house. People he didn’t know were bringing stuff out in trashcans and bags. He watched them for a long while, surprised to realize he didn’t feel violated that his house had been ransacked or that its ruined contents were now being tossed.

His biggest regret was that whoever did this hadn’t leveled the damn thing. They should have blown it and spared Mandy’s riding center.

Kit came outside. Seeing him, Ty felt an unsettling mix of relief and anger. It irked him to have to be here, forced to deal with the open sores of his past.

Kit crossed the wide stone terrace and came down the steps. He leaned against the SUV’s bumper next to Ty and tucked his hands under his armpits as he studied the house.

“I hate this fucking place,” Ty said after a few minutes.

Kit nodded. “I know. But it’s just a house. And right now, we need it, feel me?”

“You sure they aren’t tossing the files Holbrook’s looking for?” Ty nodded to the workers who were carrying out more debris.

“They’re stacking any papers they find in some boxes in the den.” He looked at Ty. “How did it go with Eden?”

“She lives in a third-floor apartment of a garden complex near the base in Cheyenne. I don’t like leaving her there alone. If something happens to her, a lot of people might notice, but I doubt anyone would step in to help her.”

Kit made a face. “Owen offered her work and she turned it down.”

“She didn’t turn the work down, she turned us down. What we do is too dangerous. She knows she’s not ready for it.” He looked at Kit. “But it’s too late—she’s already in the middle of it. And being in Cheyenne, she’s still in easy reach of the WKB.”

“See if Rocco will let you take his truck over there some evenings to keep an eye on her. She’d notice a black SUV, but not his old Ford.”

Yeah. He could do that, Ty thought. He could sleep in her parking lot. Near her. And far, far away from his father’s house of horrors. “You know, Kit, I can’t make the pieces fit together. What did I do to make my father hate me?”

Kit drew a long breath as contemplated Ty’s question. “Some things don’t have explanations. You didn’t cause what happened. How could you? You were just a kid.” Kit shook his head. “Your dad did it because he could.”

“The only good thing that ever happened to me here was meeting you that day you broke in.”

Kit grinned. “Jesus, those were bad days.” He looked at Ty. “But they didn’t stay bad. We survived them. You’ll survive this.”

“Right,” he said without conviction. “And when this mission is over, I’ll torch the place.”

“Or you could sell it.”

Ty shook his head. “No one should ever live here. It’s bad.”

Kit set a hand on Ty’s shoulder. “Those times are gone. You aren’t the child you were, Ty.”

Ty huffed a dry laugh. The fuck of it was that he still was that child. He still missed his mother. He still feared his father. He still couldn’t understand why what happened had happened.

“Take your time,” Kit told him as he straightened. “I’ll be in the bunker. We’ve moved the bunk racks into the empty room down there and set up tables in the main area. Rocco’s already going through the journals and documents Amir’s crew left behind. I’ll be helping him. I’m not as fast with Arabic as he is, but I can hold my own. Come get me if you need me.”

He took a few steps toward the house, then turned back to Ty as if to say something else, but neither of them spoke. Ty watched Kit cross the front patio. He knew some of the things that had happened here. He knew a lot. Just not everything.

Ty stood outside for hours, facing off with the house. He waited until the workers ended their shifts and left the house. The Jacksons followed them out. Seeing him, they came over to chat.

He looked at Kathy’s bandaged head. “You shouldn’t overdo it. You’re still recovering.”

“Oh, nonsense.” She waved off his concern. “I’ve waited many long years for you to return. I’m happy to see the house being put to such a good use. I didn’t like the men your father entertained.” She looked at him. “I didn’t like your father.”

Ty smiled and pulled her into a sideways hug. He looked at Dennis, his arm still around Kathy’s shoulders. “I don’t understand why my dad built the bedroom wings,” he said. “Or the gym. What was he doing here? Did he have that many visitors?”

Dennis made a face. Clearly, he didn’t like talking about Ty’s dad any more than Ty did. “He quit cattle ranching several years ago and focused on his investments. He’d started to do a lot of entertaining. He would invite his associates out for hunting and built the new wings so that he could offer them a place for meetings and retreats. He did business with the country’s top bankers and politicians. We had to have quite the staff there for a while.”

“Speaking of which,” Ty changed the subject, “the team’s going to be moving in over here. You’ll need help again. You probably met Max today. Have him check the names of the staff you want to bring in. If he approves them, it’s fine by me. Let Owen know what resources you need. If he won’t pay for them, I will. I don’t want you running ragged.”

“Thank you, Ty.” Kathy smiled at him, though there were shadows in her eyes. He could tell she was thinking of all the things they’d been through together. But even she didn’t know the half of it. His father had sent them away the weekends he’d gone on benders with some of his more interesting visitors when Ty was a kid.

“When Amir was here, Dennis, you said he kept you two separated. How did he do that?” Ty was curious about whether they knew of the bunker.

“He kept Kathy in the den,” Dennis answered.

“Is that the only place you were held?” Ty asked her.

“There and the kitchen. They made me cook for them.”

Ty looked between Kathy and Dennis, seeing no subterfuge. He nodded. “One other thing. If my father were to hide some business documents or other valuables, where would he do it?”

Dennis thought for a minute, then shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think he had a safe, at least I never saw one.”

“No hidden rooms, secret passageways?” Ty asked, laughing to camouflage his curiosity.

“No,” Dennis scoffed. “The house is just a house. Maybe he hid them in his room. Is that why everything was trashed? They were looking for something?”

Ty nodded. “I believe so.”

“Doesn’t look as if they found it, then, seeing as they tore every room apart.”

“I don’t think they did.”

“The insurance adjuster came by early this morning. I left his report on the desk in the den.”

“Good.” Ty looked at Kathy and Dennis. “You know you two are still in danger. Staying here is risky. If you would rather leave, my offer to send you someplace safe still stands.”

“No,” Kathy answered for the both of them. She straightened her shoulders and looked Ty in the eye. “I won’t have thugs chase us out of our home. And we won’t leave you to face them alone. We left you to face your father alone too many times. And Amir as well. We’re done running.”

Anger flashed inside Ty. His father had victimized these kindly people; caught them in his web of lies and machinations. Dennis had been Ty’s only advocate in those early years. He’d been the one who’d forced his father to bring in a tutor to home school Ty when his dad had refused let him attend the local schools or send him to boarding school. Dennis had been the one who’d taught Ty to read and helped him with his homework. He’d even hidden Ty when his father’s rages had begun to be so lethal, until his father had caught on to what was happening. From there on, it had been Ty against his father, alone.

“You had no choice,” Ty told her. “He gave you no choice. You had children of your own to protect. I don’t hold you accountable for his actions.”

Kathy’s eyes filled with tears. “Well, we’re not doing that any more.”

Ty smiled. He gently kissed the crown of her hair. “Don’t take chances, then. Be alert. Tell one of us if you see anything that isn’t normal. For the time being, I’m going to move you up to the house. I think the caretaker’s house is too isolated. Pick one of the rooms in the house. I can help you move your things over.”

Dennis nodded. “Whatever you need from us, just ask. I’ll work on bringing in more help. Maybe a maid and a gardener.”

“Sounds good. I’m glad you decided to stay,” he told the Jacksons. Shortly after they left, Kelan, Val, and Angel came out of the house. Kelan stopped next to him as the others went on to one of the SUVs.

“Max, Kit, Rocco, and Owen are in the bunker. Otherwise, the house is empty,” Kelan said, watching him. “I can stay, if you want.”

“Thanks, K. I need to do this alone. Don’t hold dinner for me.”

“See you at Mandy’s, then.” Kelan started toward the waiting SUV, but stopped. “Blade, if you want to talk about what happened here when you were a kid—”

“I don’t.”

Kelan nodded and left with the other guys. Ty went up the steps to the wide flagstone patio and stepped into his father’s house.

His
house.

Despite the surface destruction, little had changed in the bones of the place since he lived there. Ty forced himself to go upstairs, feeling curiously numb. He had many memories, but the emotion they all shared was pain and fear. It was pointless revisiting each one. He’d known no joy in this house.

The décor in the bedrooms that survived the rampage had been changed since he left. It was now decorated in heavy and masculine plaids, geometric patterns, and ranch-inspired prints in the rich earth tones of the southwest. His father’s associates must have been predominantly male, for there wasn’t a single room that was in any way feminine. The furniture that had been slashed or broken had all been removed, leaving naked bed frames and odd collections of furniture behind in the bedrooms. There was a lot that needed to be replaced.

Ty wandered through all fourteen of the bedrooms upstairs. What the hell had his dad been up to? The place was as big as a hotel now. He went downstairs to the bedrooms in the new southern wing. It felt strange meandering through a house he and Kit had sneaked through as kids. Everything he saw was his now. Every cursed thing.

He forced himself to face his father’s room. It wasn’t the room he’d used when Ty had lived there, but many of his things were familiar enough to invoke the old dread. Ty was about to leave the room when Max came out of the elevator in the closet. His face was pale, his eyes intense.

“What’s up, Max?” Ty asked.

“I sent you the data I gathered on your dad.”