‘He hired them to kidnap us. For the ransom.’
‘Your father wanted the ransom?’ She frowned, confused. ‘But it was his money.’
‘No. It was Mom’s money. One hundred percent Yarborough money. My biological father was a gold-digger who lived the high life and had a gambling problem. My mother had bailed him out too many times and they fought about his spending when it got out of hand. I was a quiet kid. A listener. I knew what was going on. I hated him.’
‘Did your mother cut him off?’
‘Not totally. She finally put him on an allowance and got angry. He hit her.’
‘Oh, Marcus, I’m sorry.’
‘I wanted to kill him, but he was the size I am now and I was scrawny.’
‘You were eight.’
‘And so angry. He begged her to forgive him and bought her an expensive bracelet – with her money – as an apology. I wanted her to make him leave, but she forgave him. Turned out it wasn’t the first time. He’d run up gambling debts in the past.’
‘So he figured he’d stage a kidnapping, get the ransom and pay off his debts.’
He nodded once. ‘She didn’t know. Doesn’t know. Please don’t tell her.’
She took his hand, kissed it again. She needed answers, but he needed reassurance even more. ‘I won’t. I wish I could say I can’t imagine a father risking his sons for money, but I can. I’ve seen it too many times.’
His strong shoulders sagged. ‘All those things you can’t unsee,’ he said. ‘And now I just added one more.’
She considered her words carefully. ‘If I told you that I’m not visualizing a frightened young boy betrayed by his father, afraid to sleep at night, I’d be lying. If I told you that the image doesn’t break my heart, I’d be lying even more. If that hurts your pride, then I’m sorry. But you’re mine now, and I will hurt for you if I want to.’
Slowly his head lifted, his eyes intense. Hungry again. ‘Say that again,’ he whispered.
She didn’t pretend to misunderstand. This was too important. ‘You’re mine, Marcus.’
His eyes slid closed, his swallow audible, his throat working as he fought to contain his emotion. ‘God.’
Hoarsely uttered, she couldn’t tell if it was plea or prayer. Maybe a little bit of both, she thought, her eyes stinging. Still on her knees, she crawled to his side and drew him into her arms. He turned his head, burying his face in the curve of her shoulder, wrapping his arms around her waist. She held him as the minutes ticked by, rocking him gently, letting him restore his composure.
Finally he drew a deep breath, lifted his head and ran one hand up her back, pulling her down for a hot kiss that left her reeling. ‘You’re mine, Detective. You have been since that first day I saw you.’
When he’d been shot protecting a woman he’d never even met. She smiled at him. ‘I know. But it’s nice to hear, isn’t it?’
His lips curved, just a little. ‘Hell, yeah.’ Effortlessly he scooped her into his arms, setting her on his lap, gently pressing her cheek into his chest when she tried to look at him. ‘I have something to tell you. It’ll be easier if you’re not looking at me while I do it.’
She braced herself. Not gonna be good, she thought. ‘Okay. I’m ready when you are.’
Twenty-eight
Cincinnati, Ohio
Wednesday 5 August, 6.25 A.M.
‘I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready to tell anyone, but I need you to know.’ He grew still, his only movement the rising and falling of his chest as he breathed. ‘You didn’t ask me how I knew my father had hired the kidnappers.’
‘I wanted to, but I figured you’d tell me when you were ready.’
His arms tightened around her. ‘Why am I so lucky?’ he murmured, then sighed. ‘Mom sent a car to drop us off and pick us up from school every day. Stone and I were taken when our driver was overpowered. He was found a few hours later, wandering the streets in Lexington, drugged and confused. By then, Matty had been taken too.’
‘From his bed.’
‘Yes. They took us to a warehouse by the river, but we didn’t know that. They locked us in an old beef freezer that was no longer used. It smelled bad, but it wasn’t cold. Stone and Matty were so scared. I tried to be brave, but I was terrified too. I knew we were rich. I knew my mother worried that something like this might happen one day.’ He was quiet for a moment, rubbing a lock of her tangled hair between his thumb and forefinger. ‘We weren’t tied up at first. I guess they figured three little boys couldn’t cause them any trouble.’
‘I guess they didn’t know the O’Bannion boys,’ she said, and he huffed a small laugh.
‘The day Jeremy O’Bannion adopted us and gave us his name was the best day of my life, up until that point. I couldn’t stand introducing myself as Marcus Gargano. Gargano was his name and I hated him.’ He’d grown stiff, but he drew a few breaths, his hold on her relaxing. ‘The freezer had a single bulb hanging from the ceiling, but the light switch was on the outside wall so we couldn’t turn it on.’
‘You were trapped, alone in the dark,’ she murmured. His littlest brother had died in the dark. Like Tala. ‘Oh, Marcus.’
Another audible swallow. ‘Yeah.’ His voice broke and he cleared his throat. ‘I’m sorry. I haven’t talked about this in twenty-seven years.’
‘Your mother didn’t get you counseling?’ she asked, appalled.
‘Sure, but . . . I didn’t tell the counselors anything. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I didn’t want my mother to know what I’d done and I didn’t trust the counselors not to tell her.’
Didn’t want his mother to know? Hell. ‘What did you do?’ she asked gently.
‘I climbed on a box and unscrewed the light bulb so that they wouldn’t have any light when they came in to check on us, then I used a paperclip in my pocket to loosen some of the screws on the metal shelving unit against the wall. I used one of the rods as a club and hit one of the kidnappers with it.’
She jerked in surprise, even as the knowledge registered that he was not answering her question. But this was his story and she’d let him tell it. ‘Wow. You were very resourceful.’
‘I watched way too much television. It was foolish, actually. I was only eight years old, and even though I hit him with all my might, it didn’t hurt him. It just made him mad. He wanted to kill me, but the other kidnapper calmed him down. The two of them brought in a chair and tied me to it, then turned me so that I couldn’t see my brothers. They tied Stone and Matty too. Didn’t blindfold or gag us.’ He shook his head. ‘It was winter and we all had colds. The calm one was afraid we’d suffocate if they covered our mouths with duct tape. I couldn’t get to my brothers, but I could hear them crying.’ He shuddered out a breath. ‘Stone kept asking me to make the men go away, saying he just wanted to go home. I kept promising him it would be all right.’
She remembered Stone’s near meltdown in Marcus’s office the day before. ‘He said that yesterday. Said to make me go away. You promised him it would be all right.’
Another shuddering exhale. ‘Certain things set him off. One of the kidnappers was the security guard for the warehouse. Told Stone he was a cop and would shoot him if he cried. For a long time he couldn’t look at anyone in uniform without unraveling, but he got past that eventually. Jeremy helped a lot. He’s a calm man and helped us calm down too.’
‘But Stone was in the Army. He wore a uniform.’
‘That was a personal challenge to himself. The ultimate “fuck you, world, I’m over that shit”. He wore a uniform, served with uniforms, took commands. He served his time and got out. His issue with cops, though . . . It’s still there. If he feels threatened by a cop . . .’
‘I don’t wear a uniform.’