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Big wet, blue eyes just looked up into his.
She melted him. Just like that.
She could do this. She would not fall apart right now. She saw darkness on the job every single day. She could do this.
She just wished it was anyone but him.
She’d imagined while with Handley that it would be Daniel or Jake or Gunnar or Heather she told what had happened. She’d hoped it would be Heather actually. She’d thought telling another woman would be so much easier.
She would never forget that man’s hands on her. Or the fear that she wouldn’t get away.
Why did it have to be Jarrod Foster? The man utterly despised her. She knew that. “There were five men in the van. They were arguing with each other a little. I don’t think they liked each other. One stuck something to my skin. A transdermal patch. He said…he’d only seen it used once before. During the Eastman thing. That’s what he called it. The Eastman thing. But it works. Fast. He said a friend of his had made it even faster. Just before I went under…something slammed into the front of the van. I think it was Handley Barratt’s car, or they cut the driver off. They said they couldn’t afford a firefight right then. One man counted Handley’s bodyguards’ visible weapons. They…ran. I couldn’t open my eyes. I couldn’t open my eyes, but I remember somehow knowing that I was okay. I didn’t even realize it was Powell’s uncle until later. When I woke.”
She straightened on the edge of the hospital bed. Haldyn was going to meet him eye to eye. She wasn’t going to look defeated and defenseless. Not with him.
Just…not with him.
Not with the way Jarrod was watching her from those dark gray eyes that never missed anything. “The driver was saying that another driver was going to cut him off. He swerved, and the van went off the road. There was at least one impact. And I went rolling. I hit my head on one man’s boot, I think. I wasn’t with them very long. Maybe fifteen or twenty minutes at the most.”
Long enough for that one to touch her in ways she wasn’t ever going to think about again. Long enough for them to hurt her and terrify her and drug her. Fifteen minutes was long enough to change a life. She would never forget that. Ever.
“That’s it?”
What, did he think she didn’t want to be able to help them find the men or something? She glared at him for a moment, then deflated. She just didn’t have the energy to battle with Jarrod Foster any longer. She just didn’t.
Haldyn hadn’t in a long, long time. Everything was just so dark now. She was getting so tired…And not just from being drugged.
“Did they get a blood sample?” Haldyn looked down. There was a bandage on her elbow. “I want to know what was in that patch. See if it matched what was used by Eastman. See what they’ve done to it—we might be able to track the patch that way. Handley gave me clean clothes from one of his smaller bodyguards. But I never actually saw any of the bodyguards. I think they threw my own things away. Any forensics from the attackers is lost. I still have my watch, though. Thankfully. It was a gift from Daniel last year for my thirtieth birthday.”
“Don’t worry about the forensics right now, Doc. What happened when you woke again?”
“I saw my new captor.” She shook her head, hoping it would help clear it. It didn’t work. She looked at the man in front of her. “He had on his Wonkus McBubbles jammies and carried his favorite Scraggle-Popps doll. The doll had blue hair.”
“What?”
“I was with Handley Barratt and his son then. When I woke, Beck was staring at me, waiting for me to wake. His little face was right next to mine. Like an inch away. Cutest face I have ever woken up to, honestly.”
“How did Barratt say he knew to rescue you?” Jarrod was just watching her. In that way that just always got right beneath her skin.
“He was in the area, apparently. He said he had business to conduct there. I didn’t exactly question him about what kind. He said he saw Powell and me. And when he saw she was safe with Gunnar—he knew Gunnar was a cop, a friend of Elliot Marshall’s—he followed to help me. I knew when I saw him, recognized him, that I was finally going to be okay.”
“So not a criminal.”
Of course, Foster was a snide asshole. He had a massive grudge against Handley.
She didn’t think Handley was the big, horrific monster everyone around the TSP painted him out to be. She never had.
Handley Barratt had been involved in what had happened to Brynna and Melody Beck. Haldyn had seen for herself how much Jarrod Foster had cared for Brynna several years ago. It was why Jarrod despised Haldyn—she’d replaced his precious Brynna after the lab bombing a year before the storm, before Haldyn was promoted to head of the forensics lab shortly after.
And that was nothing compared to the way she suspected he’d felt about Brynna’s older sister. If Jarrod Foster had ever loved a woman, it was Melody Beck, now Melody Barratt. Only a fool would have missed that.
“You’re just always irrational where he is concerned. You have blinders on.” She lifted her hand to her face, felt her bottom lip. It was swollen and sore. “I, for one, am glad he was watching his niece. Otherwise, I would probably be dead right now or wish I was. I don’t care what you think. I’m glad. I’m glad he was there, and if I can repay him by helping Beck, I am happy to do it, you ass.”
Her voice broke again. Haldyn pulled in a breath. She was not going to break down in front of Jarrod Foster. That was just not going to happen. She wasn’t going to ever cry in front of him. Never again.
“Who stitched your lip? Dr. Jacobson said it wasn’t anyone here at the hospital.”
“One of Handley’s guards, I think. I was drugged at the time. It was done before I woke up.” She forced herself to meet his eyes. She was a professional. She knew what came next in an abduction investigation. “I don’t know what happened from the time the drug hit me in that van until I woke up this morning in little Beck’s race car bed. I just…don’t. I know what Handley Barratt told me. He said he—and his guards, of which I don’t know how many there were either—saw the abduction happen, saw Powell was safe with Gunnar, and they followed that van, ran it off the road, and took me…somewhere. Then a bodyguard dropped Beck and me off two blocks from the TSP a few hours after I woke. That guard wore a hat and sunglasses. I never saw his face. All I know is he was a white man, around your height and very well-built. Probably around your age, too. He was very kind. Reassuring. You know the rest. I was told there was paperwork in Beck’s bag. Guardianship papers. All Handley wanted was for me to hug Powell for him and to make sure his younger son got to Melody. Because he couldn’t bring Beck to her himself safely. He thought it was time, that it was best for Beck to not live the fugitive life any longer. That he needed more than Handley could give him, especially educationally. That is what I am going to do. Whether you like it or not.”
