Stop at Nothing (10 page)

Her stomach somersaulted at the idea of going back to Kyle's apartment. She averted her eyes, remembering all too well the few times he'd helped her work on cases so she could finish early and spend more time in his bed. Unfortunately, they'd rarely made it through her work before they'd ended up there anyway.

“That's sweet, Kyle, but there's nothing to restore. Nothing came through email, so I don't even have that to fall back on.”

There was a pause, then Kyle cleared his throat a couple of times. And his voice was a little deeper than normal, husky even, when he said, “You could come back to my place anyway.”

Abby's entire body went taut with tension, her heart suddenly hammering. “I need to go check on Emma,” she evaded, “and make sure Tyler's okay. Then—” Her phone rang, mercifully cutting off her excuses. She snatched it from her pocket. “Deputy Morrow.”

“Greetings, Deputy. I believe we have some unfinished business.”

Abby's blood boiled. “You got what you wanted, you son of a bitch!” she spat. “Why the hell are you calling me, Hamilton?”

Kyle's brows shot up and he motioned for Abby to let him listen in. She tilted the phone away from her ear so he could hear the conversation.

“You have yet to deliver the information I requested,” Hamilton replied. “As soon as you deliver your reports, that will conclude our business relationship. But until then—”

“You have a lot of nerve,” she seethed. “You kidnapped my sister to extort the data when I stalled, had your goons break into my house to steal the other copies, and now you have the audacity to call and pretend you have no idea what's happened? And what the hell did you do to my brother-in-law? Where is he? Was that him in the picture you sent?”

“Deputy Morrow,” Hamilton replied, his voice infuriatingly calm, “I believe there has been some mistake. I assure you, had I been behind any of the heinous activities you describe, the last thing I would do is call you to gloat and incriminate myself.”

“You wouldn't be the first criminal to try to use misdirection to cover your tracks,” she pointed out.

Hamilton sighed. “Deputy Morrow—Abigail—for your sake, I almost wish that were the case. I think perhaps you should tell me what exactly you found that has put you and those you care about in jeopardy. And as I imagine you are already attempting to call me in for questioning, I will come to you as a show of cooperation and good faith.” There was a slight pause, then, “Shall we say ten o'clock tomorrow morning at the Fairfield County Sheriff's Department?”

Abby glanced at Kyle. He gave a curt nod. “Fine,” she snapped. “Don't be late, Hamilton.”

When the line disconnected, Abby slumped against the doorjamb. “Do you think he's telling the truth?”

“Guess we'll find out tomorrow.” Kyle got to his feet and scrubbed at the stubble on his chin. “So, you're sure you don't want to come with me to my apartment? I don't like the idea of you staying here on your own right now.”

Abby surveyed the destruction in her study and suddenly felt defeated,
deflated
. And she realized the last place she wanted to be was there at her house. But she was going to have to be there when she called and reported the break-in and Tom sent someone over to file the report. And she hadn't been lying when she'd said she needed to check on Emma and Tyler.

“You'd better go ahead,” she said on a sigh. “I'll deal with things here.”

He eyed her warily. “Abby…”

“I'll be fine,” she assured him. When he still hesitated, she said, “The guy at Emma's got the drop on me because he caught me off guard, Kyle. I'll be okay here for the ten minutes it'll take for one of the guys to show up and take the report after I call it in.”

“Fine.” He nodded but the look in his eyes betrayed his disappointment. “But I'm still not happy about it. I'll give you a call when I'm headed back. You're not staying here tonight alone.”

She tried valiantly to ignore how her stomach twisted nervously at the thought of him staying another night with her. Trying to maintain some outward composure in spite of her insides Muppet-flailing on her, she led Kyle to the front door where they both hesitated, suddenly awkward.

Kyle shoved his hands into his pockets, his eyes on the ground. “I'm sorry about earlier, Abby. I should've talked to you before bringing my brothers in on the exchange. I had no right to make that call.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “You're right.” When his head remained lowered but his gaze snapped up to regard her through those long dark lashes of his, she couldn't help a grin—or the wave of heated desire that washed over her. Her voice was a little raspy when she said, “I'll see you soon.”

He held her gaze for a moment longer, letting the charge between them build until Abby's skin began to tingle, longing for his touch. Then he gave her an abrupt nod, threw open the door, and was down the steps, striding hastily toward his car, before Abby could do more than shiver at his sudden absence.

She stood in the doorway, watching him pull out of the driveway, already missing his presence in her house. As soon as his car was on the street, she pulled out her phone and dialed Tom's direct line. While she waited for Tom to pick up, she mentally calculated how long it would be before Kyle returned.

Kyle had been waging an internal debate with himself for most of the drive to his apartment—the need for information warring against the prospect of eating a healthy helping of crow with a chaser of humble pie. Humility had never really been his thing, and having to apologize to those he'd pissed off when the offense was still so recent, so raw, made his gut churn with disgust.

But by the time he'd showered, dressed, and thrown together a few days' worth of clothes, he knew he didn't have any other option. He had to find out if there was a possible connection between Abby's case and the one he'd been working down in New Orleans. And that meant going to the source.

As he was leaving his apartment, he grabbed the party-size bag of peanut M&M's from one of the boxes he still hadn't unpacked and mentally prepared for the humiliation he was about to put himself through. He tore open the bag and popped a handful of the sweet and salty goodness into his mouth, then fired up his Mustang.

A few minutes down the road, after he'd stalled as long as he could, he heaved a resigned sigh and dialed the number.

The phone only rang twice before Kyle heard, “Dave Peterman.”

Kyle cleared his throat, but his voice still sounded tight when he said, “Hey, Peterman, it's Kyle Dawson. I was—”

The phone beeped rapidly, the line disconnecting. Kyle pulled the phone away from his ear and stared at it with a frown, trying to determine if he'd lost signal. When he saw it was at full strength, he tried again.

“What the hell do you want?” Peterman demanded this time without preamble.

“Don't hang up!” Kyle said in a rush. “I need your help.”

Peterman grunted. “You have a helluva lot of nerve calling and asking
me
for help, Dawson. Right now, I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire.”

Kyle's brows shot up.
Well, damn. Maybe this
wasn't
such a good idea…

Now to make with the eating of the crow. “I was a dick,” Kyle announced. “I admit it. And you're right—you're the last person I should be asking for help. Trust me, if someone I cared about wasn't in danger, I guarantee I wouldn't be calling.”

There was a long, heavy pause while Peterman apparently mulled things over.

“Please,” Kyle said, forcing the word from his tongue, even though it pained him. “Just hear me out and then you can either help me or tell me to fuck off.”

Peterman sighed. “You have ten minutes to convince me to give a shit. Go.”

“Do you still have Harlan Rhodes in custody?” Kyle asked, cutting right to the chase.

He could tell Peterman was frowning when he said, “Yeah, he's not honoring the terms of the deal, so he's serving his time for the parole violation. Not sure if we can get anything else to stick before we have to release him again—which is any day now. Why?”

“I need to find out if he's ever heard of Patrick Hamilton, Preston Whitmore, or Curtis Maxwell,” Kyle explained.

“You're not on the Rhodes case anymore,” Peterman warned him. “You need to let it go.”

Kyle bristled. The fact that he'd been kicked off the case after putting so much blood and sweat into it still burned his ass. But he needed Peterman's help if he wanted answers. “I'm not working the Rhodes case. I'm on to something here in the Midwest and think it might have ties to the operation we were working. If I'm right, you'll want this information as well. It'll just make your own case stronger.”

There was another long pause and then, “I'm listening.”

Kyle quickly brought Peterman up to speed on Abby's investigation and what she'd uncovered so far.

“You have the data now?” Peterman asked, his tone far more focused and sharp now that he saw the same possibilities Kyle did. “Could you send it to me for our guys to take a look?”

“No,” Kyle said on a sigh. “All the copies she had were stolen.”

Peterman cursed under his breath. “This guy Hamilton—if he really isn't involved, maybe he could send her the data again.”

Kyle nodded. “Maybe. We'll see what that smug fucker has to say tomorrow morning. But even if he can get another copy of the data, it would take Abby some time to recompile everything and connect all the dots.”

“Doesn't matter to me if it takes a month of Sundays as long as we get it,” Peterman assured him. “And if it's about needing to devote more resources to the project, just send the raw data along with a few notes from her on what we should look for.” There was another pause, then, “You know what this means if you're right about the connection between the two cases, right?”

“Yeah,” Kyle said. “It means this thing is even bigger than any of us imagined. I want these assholes, Dave. I don't ever want to find another—” He bit back his words, his throat suddenly tight at the remembrance of the kind of atrocities against humanity that made him physically ill. He cleared his throat, forcing himself to pull it together. “We have to take them down.”

“I know.” If Kyle hadn't known any better, he would've thought Peterman was actually showing him some compassion. “We'll get 'em. Just send me that data when your girlfriend gets another copy, and we'll get our guys right on it.”

“Will do,” Kyle assured him, not bothering to correct him about Abby's relationship to him. Hell, he wasn't sure what to call her either. “Give me a call after you talk to Rhodes.”

“And, uh, Kyle?” Peterman added. “About everything that happened down here…”

“No worries, man.”

Kyle felt like a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders after talking with Peterman and getting confirmation from a colleague about what he'd already suspected—the fact that Abby's corporate investigation had uncovered a human-trafficking operation similar to the one he'd been investigating in New Orleans was just a little too coincidental. He'd worried that maybe he'd been so obsessed with the case in New Orleans that he was now suspecting connections that weren't there.

Now he just needed to see if Hamilton was willing to back his claim of innocence and produce another copy of the data for Abby.

He dialed her number to let her know he was on his way, but the phone merely beeped in his ear in protest. Frowning, he glanced down.

No signal.

He groaned. Seriously? He'd just been
on
the frigging phone!

Fucking hell.

Had to love the effect the wide, open fields and sparse population had on his cell phone signal—here one minute, gone the next. He'd have to wait until he was closer to give her a call.

He shifted restlessly in his seat, wishing he'd insisted that she come with him on his trek to his apartment. The thought of having to wait yet another hour before being able to hear her voice again was enough to make him twitch with impatience. But it was a lot more than that. He wanted her with an intensity that was staggering. And unless he was mistaken, she wanted him too.

Kyle pressed his foot down a little harder on the accelerator, urging his Mustang forward, eager to get back to Abby and give his new hypothesis a try.

* * *

The sky was growing purple as twilight settled over the horizon by the time Abby pulled into the hospital parking lot with a couple of bags from the local burger joint she knew her nephew loved. She'd dealt with the police report for the break-in at her home and had assured Tom numerous times that, yes, she'd be just fine, and yes, his brother would be back soon so she wouldn't be alone. Then she'd spent some time picking up what she could of the mess before finally saying, “Screw it!” and leaving it for later.

At least having things to deal with had kept her from dwelling too much on the events of the last two days and what awaited her, Emma, and Tyler. She'd been putting off another visit to the hospital as long as she could and had no more excuses.

Still, her stomach began to churn, sending her digging through her purse for a couple of Tums as she approached her sister's hospital room door. “Hey, Bradford,” she said, forcing a smile for Deputy Adam Bradford when his gaze snapped up from the John Gilstrap novel he'd been reading.

“Hey, Abby,” he said with a jerk of his chin, his hazel eyes crinkling in the corners when he returned her smile.

She'd always liked Bradford. He was a good guy and had an even, easygoing temperament that made him one of Tom's most trusted deputies. She was glad to see he was the one who'd been assigned to look out for Emma.

“Hungry?” She reached into the bag and withdrew a burger, offering it to him.

He shrugged. “Sure. I could eat. Thanks.”

“No problem. I appreciate you watching over my sister.” Her gaze darted toward the closed door. “Everything going okay?”

“Been quiet since I got here,” he said. “Tyler hung out with me here in the hall for a while when Mrs. Maxwell took a nap. He's a good kid.”

This time Abby's smile was genuine even though she felt suddenly tired. “Thanks.”

He gave her a terse nod and returned his attention to his novel.

Abby took a deep breath, then knocked quietly and pushed open the door. Tyler was sitting next to his mom on the hospital bed, happily chatting with her about something on his phone, and Emma was smiling, actually engaged in what he was saying.

Abby stopped dead in her tracks, a sudden surge of emotions making it hard for her to breathe. Emma and Tyler both glanced up with a smile for her when they realized she'd entered the room.

“Hi, Aunt Abby!” Tyler chirped. “I was just showing Mom how to play
Angry Birds
. Can you believe she's never played it before?”

Abby glanced at Emma, then back at Tyler. “No way! I thought everyone had played that game at least once.”

Emma smoothed her son's hair, her lips trembling a little as she pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “I think there are a lot of things I've missed out on, sweet boy. But not anymore.”

Abby swallowed the tears constricting her throat and held up the bag of burgers. “Hey! Anyone hungry? I brought your favorite, Ty.”

The boy's eyes lit up. “Sweet! Did you bring one for Mom? She doesn't eat anything but salads and stuff.”

Emma held out a hand to take the bag. “Are you kidding me?” she said. “I'm starving! We might have to send your Aunt Abby out for seconds. What do you say?”

He laughed. “Or maybe
thirds
!”

Emma laughed with her son and rooted through the bag, handing him a burger and taking out one for herself. “Abbs?” she asked, holding up the bag. “Are you going to have one?”

Abby waved it away, completely overwhelmed by the change in her sister. “Nah, you two go ahead. I just wanted to stop in and see how you were doing.”

Emma swallowed a bite of her double cheeseburger with everything and gave her sister a meaningful look. “I'm okay. At least, I will be.”

Abby sat on the edge of Emma's bed on the other side from Tyler and patted her sister's leg. “You need anything, I'm here,” Abby reminded her. “You know that, right?”

Emma nodded, her blue eyes going bright with unshed tears. She suddenly laughed and sniffed when Tyler stopped mid-chew to frown at her in concern. “Whew!” She chuckled. “These onions are getting to me! Strong, aren't they?”

His frown instantly morphed into a smile. “But that's why they're so good!”

“Well, hey,” Abby said on a sigh. “I will let you two enjoy your dinner. I'll come back a little later to pick up Tyler.”

“No!” Emma cried. Then she cleared her throat and took a deep breath, looking a little embarrassed by the note of desperation in her voice. “I mean, I've asked the nurses if he could stay here with me. They're going to set up a bed for him in here.”

Abby nodded. “Well, um, okay then. I guess I'll just bring a change of clothes for both of you and pick you up tomorrow. I figured I'd take you to the cabin to recuperate for a few days.”

“What about school?” Tyler asked.

Abby shrugged. “I'll give them a call for you. Okay, monkey? Explain your mom needs you for a couple of days. I'm sure it'll be fine.”

“Cool!”

Abby got to her feet and gave each of them a hug and a kiss, reluctant to leave them but wanting to give Emma time with Tyler.

“Deputy Bradford is still just outside your room,” she assured them, “so if you need anything, just let him know. Or give me a call and I'll be back here in a flash.”

“Have you heard from Curtis?” Emma asked before Abby could step away. “I tried to call him, but it went straight to voice mail.”

Abby stiffened. “Um, no. I haven't heard from him.” She knew she should tell her sister about the picture and what she feared had happened to her husband to prepare her for the worst. But not in front of Tyler. And not until she'd spoken to Hamilton to get some answers. “How about I keep trying to get in touch with him for you?”

Emma must have sensed something in Abby's voice because her smile faded. She nodded. “Okay. Maybe Tyler and I will just watch some movies tonight and give the phone a rest.”

Abby nodded slightly. “Probably a good idea.”

Emma blew out a shaky sigh but then steeled herself, squaring her shoulders in a display of strength Abby had never before seen from her older sister. “Well, I'm sure we'll hear something soon.”

Abby slipped from the room then, leaving her sister and nephew to enjoy their dinner together, and had a quick conversation with Deputy Bradford, making sure he understood the situation. When her phone rang, startling her, she flushed and lifted a hand in good-bye to her colleague as she answered.

“Hey, beautiful,” Kyle said when Abby answered. “Have you eaten yet?”

“No,” she said, sighing. “I just picked up something for Emma and Tyler. How about you?”