Wanting (26 page)

***

Carrie could still feel him
pressed against her. Could smell the warm mint that characterized
his aftershave, even though she’d taken her spot on stage fifteen
minutes earlier.

Something had change
between them. She couldn’t figure out exactly what it was between
them. But she knew it was there.

And that terrified her. For
the first time in her life, she was terrified of a relationship
with a man. With her three prior relationships—if she could even
call them that—she had been fine with whatever had happened. Once
it turned physical she hadn’t objected. She’d actually enjoyed that
aspect of the relationships. It had been their desire for her to
adapt to them that had led to the relationships’ inevitable
endings.

She had tried to change,
but once she made little changes they started expecting her to make
big changes. Quickly. Big changes were not easy for her, and
probably never would.

So why was this—an
exceptionally big change for her—seeming so right? She wasn’t the
least bit certain of anything now.

She slipped from behind the
piano, changing places with Paige, and began the slow, hot love
song that she’d helped Paige compose almost ten years
ago.

What had they really known
back then? Of love and lust and men that could burn their insides
with just a glance from green eyes?

She infused the song with
as much romantic emotion as she had ever felt, and never been able
to truly express. Until that very moment.

She closed her eyes as she
sang each word, hit each note.

When the song was finished
she opened her eyes and looked out into the audience.

Her eyes met his. And she
knew.

Sebastian Lorcan felt it,
too.

Chapter 58

*****

Kevin had spent every night
for a week at Smokey’s bar and club, and still his daughter didn’t
return. He’d even taken to sitting in the same section of the bar
every night, where he could see the table she’d occupied with her
friends that first time.

He saw several faces that
were repeats, but never his girl.

It hurt him each night when
he returned to his hotel room, but Kevin would never give up. He
couldn’t. He was her father, and that meant everything in the world
to him.

Melody, Brynna, Sydney, and
Jillian—they had been his world for so long and always would. But
Caroline had been his heartbreak. He’d thought of her and worried
for her every night since he’d first learned of her
existence.

He’d never been this close
to finding her before. And he knew the woman he’d tracked down here
in St. Louis was his Caroline. He had found a few women in the past
who he had briefly thought was Caroline but none of those three
girls had looked as much like his daughters or like Caroline’s
mother Madeline as this girl.

And Kevin knew it in his
gut that this was his child, just as he’d felt the visceral
reaction each time the doctors handed him a little redheaded
newborn over the past twenty-five years.

Where was she?

She hadn’t been at her
apartment at all in the past week, and that worried him. Was she in
trouble? Had something happened? How would he ever find
out?

He’d finally managed to
track down the super of her building, and Kevin had to say he
approved of the man. They were of an age, he and the super and had
found much to talk about in the brief tour of the apartment
building the super had given him.

But the super had been
obsessively protective of the girl who lived on the fourth floor,
and that had earned him Kevin’s appreciation and friendship, even
though the super would never know that.

And it reassured him just a
bit that there was someone extra to watch over his daughter when
Kevin couldn’t.

He sat nursing his one beer
of the night, trying not to allow his attention to wonder to her
table. The one she’d been at that first night.

Some of the same people
were there, but still there was no sign of his Caroline.

There was a redhead there,
and Kevin had taken to watching her as surreptitiously as he could.
She was beautiful and pregnant, and in his mind had no business
being in a bar night after night.

But she was never alone and
she never touched the alcohol. There was always someone with her,
and it took him a day or two to put together that the man with the
prosthetic arm was her husband.

Watching them made him miss
his wife so much he thought the ache would consume him. She’d been
gone two years, from a fast acting cancer. Leaving him with four
grieving daughters. Kevin hadn’t known what to do with the girls,
but thankfully the two older ones—Melody and Brynna—had stepped up
and helped him with Sydney and Jillian, who’d both still been in
school at the time of their mother’s passing. Now it was just
Jillian in school. Melody and Brynna were watching her for him,
until he brought Caroline home.

Was Caroline all alone in
the world? Did she have people to love her besides that boyfriend?
Did the redhead at that back table and her ever-revolving table of
friends care for Caroline as much as her real family
could?

He could only hope
so.

He’d contemplated
approaching the little redhead when she was alone, thinking maybe
she’d be willing to help him bridge the gap with Caroline, but had
ultimately decided against it.

For one thing the redhead
was rarely alone. Either her husband or someone else was constantly
at her side. That would make it doubly awkward for him.

Plus, it wasn’t anyone’s
business but his and Caroline’s what he needed to tell her. And who
was to say she’d want her friends involved in her personal
life?

He wasn’t the type to want
others knowing what he was doing. Would his daughter be any
different?

Was she like him at
all?

Chapter
59

*****

The old calluses on Dan’s
fingers were hurting again. Was that even possible? He hadn’t
played the guitar much in the last fifteen years. How could he,
when the act reminded him of each and every time he and his oldest
had practiced together?

Kelly had been a phenomenal
musician at the age of eight. Probably a prodigy, but he and Beth
hadn’t chosen to pursue training for her. Now he wondered if he
should have.

Would that have made Kelly
happy in the short ten years he’d had with her?

No, he’d put his guitar on
the shelf in his den, next to the pink child-sized one he’d special
ordered for Kelly’s sixth birthday, and hadn’t touched his again
until about a year ago, when Paige had moved into the apartment in
his basement. She’d questioned him about it, her eyes reverent.
She’d been impressed with the brand and quality of the instruments
he had, and he’d half thought about giving her the guitar. But he
hadn’t. He couldn’t. Every time he’d looked at the two guitars on
the shelf, he remembered the expression on his little girl’s face
when he first gave her the tiny guitar. When he’d first covered her
little hands with his and showed her what to do.

Would he ever forget? Would
it ever hurt any less than it did now?

He faltered. Paige looked
over her shoulder at him. He shook his head, indicating she should
pay attention to the crowd in front of them. That’s what they were
there for, anyway. That’s what was important, the case. Finding the
bastards responsible for someone’s child never going home
again.

The boy’s picture was like
a raw wound in Dan’s heart. What if that was what had happened to
Kelly or one of his younger girls?

He pushed the thoughts
away. He was stronger than that. He would do his part to catch the
bastards responsible for Marco Galeano’s death. Then he’d go back
to hunting for his girls.

He wasn’t stopping until he
found them.

He glanced at Carrie, as
more worry filled him. The girl and Lorcan were worrying him. It
didn’t take a profiler—which Dan was not—to see that whatever it
was burning between them was heating up. Was it for real, or was it
just an act? Was she going to get hurt when this damned case
ended?

Dan certainly hoped
not.

Carrie was situated closest
to the backstage exit, where the lighting was a bit dimmer than the
rest of the stage, and Dan could just make out the hall behind the
stage. Lorcan usually waited there for Carrie.

Dan had to give him credit;
the younger man had ensured that Carrie pretty much went nowhere
alone. Even the restroom; the girls went as a group almost every
time.

Dan encouraged it. Benito’s
patrons were disgusting, the lowest lowlifes Dan had ever
encountered in nearly thirty years of law enforcement work. He
didn’t want the younger female agents there, despite their FBI
training. What kind of decent man would?

Lorcan wasn’t where Dan
expected him to be. That had his interest sharpening. Had the man
found something? Or had something happened to him?

Every instinct Dan
possessed told him something was going down. Now. He pulled out his
phone and texted Brockman and Hellbrook. Then he went in search of
Carrie and Lorcan. He’d grab Josh along the way.

Chapter
6
0

****

Footsteps sounded outside
the office Sebastian was searching, and he bit back a curse. If he
was found in here, the entire operation was done. Blown. He looked
around, hoping for a place to hide or a way out Benito Jr.’s
office. The only viable option was to go in the closet. If he did
that, though, he was basically trapped until something pulled
whoever it was outside the door away. And nothing he found inside
the closet could be used against Benito Jr.. He’d have to make
damned sure to cover his own ass. But they had less than one more
night to find something. Or the team was being pulled and they’d
approach the trafficking ring in a different way.

He had no other
alternative. He’d already searched the office; the only place
remaining to search was the closet. He slipped inside it as voices
grew louder outside the room. He did not want to be interrupted—or
questioned. He and Hellbrook had decided a single agent searching
the club would be more effective than an entire team.

The warrant that Hellbrook
had secured allowed for the team to search any offices throughout
the building for visible signs of a connection to the trafficking
ring. It was sketchy, but the legal department had persisted until
the warrant went through less than four hours earlier.

Sebastian’s search was
covered, barely, through some fancy maneuvering by the legal
department. They’d come through for the CCU again.

The smell of cigars—Benito
Jr. was a heavy smoker—and dust filled his lungs and he forced
himself not to sneeze or cough. He felt around with his hands,
trying to identify what it was surrounding him. Mostly old coats.
Suits. An umbrella; nothing he wouldn’t have expected to find in an
office closet.

His fingers landed on a
latch just as he heard someone enter the office. He pressed his ear
against the door and listened. The voices were muffled but he had
no difficulty identifying them. Benito, Jr. and his main henchman,
the bartender Lonnie Victorino.

Victorino was obviously
upset about something. Sebastian heard it in his voice. “I’m
telling you, Benny, something is wrong. Courtney’s not been seen in
over a week.”

Sebastian hit the camera
button on his phone. The screen would be dark, but the audio was
supposed to be state of the art. If they said something while
Sebastian was in the process of executing a search warrant, it
could be used against them. Not as hearsay.

“
No use borrowing
trouble,” Benito Jr. said. “And I have men looking for Courtney.
He’ll turn up. He’s probably just hiding since he failed to deliver
the last package like agreed upon. I’d given him one warning after
the Brazilian merchandise ended up undeliverable.”

Brazilian. Marco Galeano,
the thirteen-year-old boy kidnapped from his school.

Bingo.

The two men continued
talking, saying nothing else incriminating, but that didn’t matter.
Benito Jr. had mentioned Elliot Courtney by name, and hinted at
Marco’s death.

It wasn’t much, but
hopefully the black bag in his shirt pocket would lead them where
they wanted to go. And they almost had enough for a better warrant.
To tear the club apartment searching for anything and everything
tied to Brazil and the trafficking ring.

He waited a good five
minutes after the two men left the office before turning his phone
on to use the flashlight. He shone the small beam—an upgrade that
every PAVAD agent’s phone had—toward the cardboard box he’d bumped
into earlier.

Sebastian looked through it
quickly. File folders. Simple, innocuous. He opened the first one,
then the second. Scanned them quickly. Purchase orders.