“You could’ve handed it off to one of the other agents on your team. The FBI has an entire division dedicated to this kind of thing.” Benning discarded the bloodied wipes, then opened a fresh package and cleaned the oversize tweezers he’d set out a few minutes ago. Standing, he unbuckled his belt, bringing her attention to those powerful thighs wrapped in denim. “But you took this assignment anyway.” He handed her his belt. “Here, bite down on this.”
Ana clenched the leather between her teeth as he pried at the edges of the wound with the head of the tweezers. She forced herself to keep her body relaxed, but the pain got the best of her after a few seconds. Ana screamed against the fire scorching through her side as he fished the bullet out of her. In seconds Benning discarded the slug onto the kitchen table. She shut down the primal urge to lean just a bit closer, to touch him for some warped sense of comfort, and spit out the belt.
“Does it matter?” Deep down she knew the answer. Why she’d taken the case when she could’ve pushed it off onto another agent. It had nothing to do with redemption. “Finding victims is what I’ve been trained for, and I’m going to do whatever it takes to get your son back.”
He nodded, threading the needle from the kit. After stitching the edges of her injury together in quick rows, he taped a fresh piece of gauze to her side and cleaned up the bloody mess she’d left behind. He stood over her. Bigger, more intimidating than he’d been a minute ago. “I know you will. Because if you can’t, the bastard who took Owen is going to wish he’d killed me last night.”
HE SMOOTHED THE backs of his knuckles across Olivia’s forehead. The swelling where she’d hit her head—presumably when she’d jumped or been pushed from the kidnapper’s SUV—had gone down, but she was still fighting against the sedatives the doctor had given her. Red flannel and pale bedding surrounded her small form on the queen-size bed. The saline bag attached to her IV had been emptied within the last hour, and he carefully unscrewed the connection, then wrapped her hand—needle and all—with gauze at the direction of her doctor’s message. With only two beds in the massive cabin, he and Olivia would be bunking together, but he couldn’t sleep. Not with Owen still out there. Alone. Afraid. His eyes burned as thoughts of how this investigation could end filled his head. If Benning handed over the skull he’d found in that building, what were the chances his son’s kidnapper would let Owen go free? What would stop them from ripping Olivia’s brother from her life?
“Can’t sleep?” Her voice slid through him, stretching into the deepest parts of his mind to chase back the uncertainty clawing at him from inside. Ana’s boots echoed off the hardwood floor as she closed the distance between her and the end of the bed. She’d gotten rid of the stained clothing, her shoulder holster and weapon stark against her white T-shirt, and in an instant, he had his answer. Ana. Ana would stop them from tearing his family apart. Just as she stopped so many others. She studied Olivia in the bed, then handed him a steaming mug of dark liquid.
“She’s hogging the bed.” The ceramic burned the oversensitized skin of his palms, but he only held the mug tighter. To keep him in the moment, to feel the pain. To remind himself that no matter how she still might affect his biological reactions, Ana was here to work this case and nothing more. He took a sip of his coffee. Decaf. “Unless you’re willing to share?”
The idea drilled down through his core, eliciting too many tempting visuals.
“I think you felt me up enough getting the bullet out of my side.” Her smile—the one he hadn’t been able to forget after all these years—flashed wide, and his nerve endings caught fire. This right here. This was one of the reasons he’d fallen for her in the first place. The quick banter, her jokes. No matter how dark the situation, she’d always had the ability to lighten the mood, and the hollowness that’d carved straight through him the moment he’d learned she’d left him ebbed for the first time in years. Maneuvering around to his side of the bed, she pulled up a chair. The lamp beside his daughter’s bed reflected the natural sheen of Ana’s long, dark hair as she rested her heels on the edge of the mattress beside his. Would it still be as soft as he remembered? “I briefed TCD on the latest developments of the case. The director is sending two agents to your property to oversee processing the crime scene. Good agents, who know what they’re doing. With any luck, they’ll have something we can use to identify the man who took your son and where he’s keeping Owen.”
He didn’t have to look at his wrist to see how many hours were left until the deadline the kidnappers had given him. It was as though the countdown clock had become part of his consciousness. Always there. Always ticking off the seconds one by one. Owen had been taken close to nine hours ago. The man who’d broken into his house had given him twenty-four to hand over the skull and any other evidence
