Chapter 25
THOMAS
The day had dragged on after his meltdown in the stables.
He’d returned to the house, heated up the omelet Cammy had saved for him, and mechanically consumed it without tasting a bite.
They’d watched the news together, the three of them, waiting for updates that never came.
Cammy often checked her phone, but her source remained silent.
Unless there were major developments, she’d explained, they weren’t going to risk their careers by passing along information to her, especially now that mainstream media had exposed federal agents were leaking information.
At her prompting, he and Nadia exercised a couple of her horses, taking them for a long ride under the setting sun.
It had been good to get out into wide open space.
It would probably be the last time he’d ever ride. At least it had been with her.
In the den, he packed the duffel that held the rest of his cash, a change of clothes, a few energy bars, and the burner phone bearing the message Kane had sent him before his arrest last night when Thomas had lain awake as Nadia slept deeply at his side. The message Thomas had shared with no one.
They have Claire. They’re demanding an exchange. You for her. Come alone. Coordinates to follow.
Those coordinates had followed. Hours later from a different, unregistered number.
As did a grainy photo of his mother. Head bent, hair falling forward.
Eyes closed, face unsmiling. The photo could have been of any woman who’d been beaten.
But it was her. And the bruising around an eye and blood on her cheek and lip stirred something primal in him to react.
To keep their demands close to his chest and follow their orders.
He wondered if the feds knew about the message or if Kane had managed to delete it before they seized his phone, which they surely would have done when he’d been apprehended. Standard procedure.
Not that it mattered. Thomas would have left here alone regardless.
He slung the duffel strap over his head so that it hung cross body and grabbed up the few personal items he’d left on Cammy’s desk—his wallet, watch, and a photo of James and the boys his mother had given him.
The image of Marcus and Julian’s smiling faces twisted something in his chest. He wasn’t religious.
He wouldn’t even describe himself as spiritual.
But he sent up a silent prayer to whatever god might be listening that his nephews never learned their uncle had traded his life for their grandmother’s.
If James had any forgiveness left in his heart, he certainly wouldn’t give it to Thomas, not with this final sacrifice.
If he was in James’s place, he’d probably be fed up with his brother sacrificing himself on his behalf. He could still hear it, the wet crack of leather on skin. Not on his own back that time, but James’s.
His brother’s muffled sobbing came through their father’s office door. Thomas had been sitting at his desk doing homework when he heard the first strike. He sat frozen through the second. By the third, he was on his feet.
He found James shirtless on the floor, his back latticed with glistening, raw welts. Edgar stood over him, panting, belt doubled in his fist. The room and his sweat smelled of bourbon.
“Get up, James. We’re not done.”
Thomas didn’t think. He simply moved, inserting himself between them. “Hit me instead.”
His father’s jaw worked. He looked at Thomas with eyes glazed over. Then the belt swung.
Thomas took the first lash across his shoulder blade, a searing pain that stole his breath.
Two more came in quick succession, each burning hotter than the last. Behind him, he heard James trying to stand.
Thomas didn’t turn around. If he did, Edgar would see that he was crying and he’d only strike him harder, longer.
When it was over and Edgar had thrown the belt onto his desk and ordered both boys to get out, Thomas followed James to the bathroom, helping him press a wet towel to his back with shaking hands.
“I won’t let this happen to you again,” Thomas had said, his voice low and hoarse from holding everything in. “I promise.”
James had just looked at him, eyes red and chin trembling. Then he’d nodded.
Thomas pressed his thumb against the photo’s creased edge.
James didn’t know he had a photo of his family or that Thomas kept it folded in his wallet.
But Thomas would at least leave this world knowing, for once, he’d given his brother something more than his dignity.
He slid the photo behind his cash and dropped the wallet into his back pocket.
He quietly made his way through the Jack and Jill bathroom connecting the den to the bedroom Nadia was using.
He pushed images of Phil and the brutality of his murder from his mind, closed his eyes against the suffering his mother must be enduring, and cleared his head until there was just Nadia.
Moonlight streamed through the window above the bed, painting silver streaks across her sleeping form.
Her breathing was deep and even, her face relaxed in a way it never was when awake.
The weight of their secrets, the burden of their past fell away in the quiet vulnerability of her slumber.
She looked so peaceful, so beautiful, and the cruelty of the timing nearly buckled him.
It seemed like he’d longed for her forever.
So he made love to her hard tonight, pretending tomorrow didn’t exist. But tomorrow was already here, and only he knew it had been their last time together.
He hoped she could find it in her heart to forgive him one day.
Thomas bent down, his face hovering above hers.
He dared not touch her as he desired and placed the faintest of kisses on her.
A brush of lips no harder than the flutter of a butterfly’s wing, fearful he’d wake her.
He couldn’t risk her asking what he was doing or where he was going, or his resolve would cave.
He couldn’t risk her life by taking her along when she’d insist on coming with. Couldn’t risk her stopping him either.
“I love you.” He breathed the words into her hair, so low he couldn’t even hear himself.
He straightened, committing her moonlit face to memory—the curve of her cheek, the arch of her brow, her lips, the lower much fuller than the top. The little divot in her chin he loved so much. She would be the last image he’d take with him.
Thomas wasn’t harboring any illusions about his fate.
He wasn’t walking into an exchange. The Hidalgos would kill him, just like Phil.
But with any luck, they’d release Claire so that James’s boys wouldn’t lose their grandmother after all they’d already lost. With any luck, his sacrifice would satisfy Ruiz’s thirst for revenge on the Donato family.
James would live in peace, never fearing for his life or those of his family again.
With one last look at Nadia, Thomas left the room, silently closing her door behind him.
He slipped outside to Cammy’s old truck, using the key he’d found in the kitchen moments ago so Nadia could have the Ford and a way to get home when this was over.
The engine turned over with a reluctant growl that had him glancing over at the house, waiting for a light to turn on, worried he’d woken them up.
But the house remained dark and he pulled away from the ranch, leaving the headlights off.
Moonlight guided him down the long drive.
Thomas turned onto the main road, the truck rumbling over the pavement, carrying him toward coordinates that would lead to his death. But for the first time in days, he felt a sense of peace. His path was clear. The waiting was finally over.