Chapter 23 #2
He passed her a cloth and some alcohol. She did what she could to clean her hands. It was oddly symbolic washing her sister’s blood from her hands.
They were wheeling Iris toward the ambulance when a familiar voice called her name.
“Elena!”
She looked up to see Sully running toward her, his face a mixture of relief and concern. He reached her, and without a word, he pulled her into his arms, holding her against his chest.
“Thank God,” he murmured into her hair. “Thank God you’re safe.”
The warmth of his embrace broke something inside her. Tears spilled and her body shook with the sobs she couldn’t contain.
“I thought I’d lost you,” Sully said, his voice rough.
When he pulled back slightly, his eyes searched her face. Then he lowered his mouth to hers. The kiss was gentle at first, then deepened with relief and longing. Elena clung to him, anchoring herself in his strength.
When they finally separated, Sully pressed his forehead against hers. “Don’t ever do that to me again.”
“I’ll try not to make a habit of it.”
Sheriff Donovan approached. “Elena, we need to get you checked out by the medics. And we’ll need your statement.”
Elena nodded, reluctantly stepping back from Sully’s embrace. “My father—where is he?”
“We have him in custody,” Donovan replied. “He surrendered without resistance.”
“He saved my life,” Elena said. “Iris was going to kill me, I think, and he shot her to stop her.”
Sully’s arm tightened around her waist. “We’ll sort it all out. Right now, you need medical attention.”
She really didn’t but caved to his wishes.
As they walked toward a waiting ambulance, Elena spotted her father sitting in the back of a police cruiser.
Their eyes met through the window. He gave her a small, sad nod—an acknowledgment of all they’d lost and all that might have been. And no regret that he’d saved her life.
“Iris said my mother came back for her two years after we escaped. Why didn’t I know that?
Why didn’t she tell me that?” She said the words aloud, and the truth was, she might never learn the answers.
In the two months they’d had together before her death, her mother hadn’t said a word about going back to find Iris, so maybe that was just the way it was supposed to be.
Or her mother knew what Iris had become and wanted to spare Elena from that knowledge. That seemed most likely.
“One thing at a time,” Sully said gently. “Let’s get you patched up first. Then we’ll find the truth. All of it.”
“Maria. I need to go back and find the girl who was in the cells with me.”
“She’s okay. We got her.”
“Thank God.” Elena leaned against him, exhaustion finally overtaking her.
He pressed a kiss to her temple. “It’s over.”
After a few hours of sleep, a shower, a hot meal, and reassurances from his buddy Chris that he really was okay and would heal up just fine, Sully now paced outside the FBI’s interrogation room that held Piper.
Now that Elena and Ollie were safe and Bellini’s men rounded up, it was time to deal with his ex-partner.
His emotions were a tangled mess of relief, anger, and profound disappointment.
Hurt. Betrayal. He couldn’t figure out which took priority.
The door opened, and ASAC Winters stepped out, his expression grim.
“She’s been through a lot,” Winters said.
“We all have.”
“Yeah. She’ll answer any question you have, but she’s going to have a long road ahead of her to overcome this.”
“She’s seen Hannah?”
“Yeah. The grandparents came and got her a couple of hours ago. She’s okay, but she’ll need therapy. She’s definitely traumatized.”
Sully nodded and entered the room. Piper sat at the table. Dark circles shadowed her eyes, and guilt had etched new lines into her face. “I’m in a lot of trouble, Sully,” she said, her voice low.
Sully remained standing, maintaining his professional facade. “Why didn’t you come to me, Piper? I would have moved heaven and earth to help find Hannah.”
Tears welled in her eyes. “Because I was explicitly warned not to. The first message came with a photo of Hannah bound to a chair. It said if I involved you—and yes, it named you specifically—or anyone at the Bureau, they’d kill her immediately.”
“Who sent it?”
She hesitated. “I don’t know. It came from an unknown number.” She looked at Sully, then glanced at the camera. “I don’t know anything more than that.”
Sully scoffed. “You can do better than that.”
“No.” She shrugged. Looked hard into his eyes, then glanced at the camera through lowered lashes.
He finally got it.
“I see. Look, Piper, if you’re not going to talk, then there’s nothing I can do to help.”
“But I don’t know anything!” Another glance at the camera. Subtle. Anyone watching wouldn’t see it, just him.
“Then I guess we’re done.”
He left the room and closed the door behind him. Winters waited, arms crossed, expression unreadable. “She doesn’t know anything,” Sully said.
Winters’s brow lifted. “I’m not sure I believe that.”
Sully shook his head. “I’ve been partners with her for a while now. She doesn’t know squat.”
Winters sighed, rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, we’ll just let her sit there awhile and think about things. Maybe something will come back to her.”
Sully pinched the bridge of his nose. “Give her a break. Let her rest a minute. I’ll bring her some decent food and talk to her.”
“That’s not how this works.”