Primal Force (11 page)

She leaned forward, elbows on the table, and propped her chin on her fists. “It's okay to need someone in your life, Law. It's better than okay. I'm beginning to believe I deserve someone, too.”

Law regarded her with a wary gaze. “You ever wonder if there are more of us Battises out there?”

“You mean beside the two of us Dad acknowledged? Yeah. I'm sure of it.”

Law nodded. “When I was about twelve a woman and her daughter came to the reservation to visit. My mother wasn't very kind to the mother. The girl, nine years old if I remember right, liked to hang around me. Something about her seemed so familiar. The vibe coming off her said kin.”

Yardley nodded. “I loved Dad but he was a bastard. We aren't him.”

Law slid her a hard glance from beneath his brows. “I met a woman I wanted. I scratched my itch and left. Don't read anything more into that.”

“If that's all you think it was, you wouldn't have mentioned her to me.”

Law couldn't argue with most of that. But he wasn't about to own it. He scratched his chin whiskers. “Think I'll shave.”

Yardley grinned. He was changing the subject. That meant she'd gotten through to him. “Good beginning. If you're done, let's go home.”

 

CHAPTER NINE

Law hesitated. The manila envelope of paperwork Yardley had received was lying on the kitchen table of her cabin in front of him. Did he have the guts for the truth? Screw that! Scud was dead. He was a cripple. Nothing on paper could hurt more than those two realities. He tore open the envelope.

He devoured the pages with an intensity that didn't allow for blinking. Every word seared his retinas, but he couldn't stop or think or do anything except get to the end. When he did, his jaw was clenched so tightly his back teeth ached.

Suddenly he shot to his feet, flinging the paperwork across the table.

“The cowardly bastards!”

“I told you, you wouldn't like it.”

Law looked over at Yardley. “My own unit shot my dog.” His voice was harsh, as if a hot wind had blown over his vocal cords, leaving them husk-dry. “The bastards killed Scud.”

Yardley watched him closely. “I was told Scud was shot because he wouldn't let them near you. The men were worried that you'd bleed out before another handler could be summoned to help.”

“That can't be right. Scud knew every man in my unit.”

“He was wounded, Law. You read the report. He might have been too traumatized to recognize them. His Alpha was down. He was scared and in protection mode.” She shifted uncomfortably. “Law, you need to let this go. It's over.”

Law tried on her suggestion. Nothing he had read changed what he already knew. Only one new thing did register. Scud had died trying to protect him.

Sensing the heightened emotional outpouring from her handler, Sam came over and pushed her head in under his arm.

Law looked down, eyes narrowed. “Back off. Now.”

Sam's gaze rose to his face. After a brief stare-off in which her brows twitched constantly she lay down on his feet, no longer attempting to comfort him but refusing to back off.

Yardley, too, took a cautious approach. “You've got that half-crazy-Cajun, half-inscrutable-Injun thing going on. You're even scaring the dog.”

Law glared at her. She held up both hands. “I'm just saying.”

“I got nothing.” He waved at the paperwork for emphasis.

“Maybe that's all there is. Some things don't have an upside. We both know that.”

“There's nothing else? What about the details of my wounding? There's nothing here about that. I've always assumed we stepped on an IED. But it doesn't say that here.”

Yardley didn't quite meet his gaze. “I was told some papers went missing from the field report.”

Law knew that was code for cover-up. “So what? Was I hit by friendly fire?”

She shrugged. “Afghanistan was chaotic in those days. The surge was under way. Troops moving quickly from area to area. Shortly after your incident, your unit left the area. A paper trail didn't seem as important as tracking the enemy.”

A muscle ticced in Law's jaw. Yardley was trying to handle him. Soothe his irritation. Offer excuses. Which meant, she knew that whatever had really happened to him over there had been deliberately covered up. Nothing he could do now would change that. Except that Yardley was holding back. He could see it in the way she was sitting there a little too casual for the occasion.

He straightened up and lasered his focus on her. “Tell me.”

She hesitated, bringing her considerable determination to the sibling contest of wills. “Okay. I asked a few more questions. No one will officially verify anything I tell you. But there were originally eyewitness accounts. A couple of civvies found you first. American contractors.”

She pulled a sheet of paper from beneath a book on the table and unfolded it. “I couldn't get verification on the particulars, but through another connection I got the names of the contractors working the area where you were wounded.” She ran through the list.

Law leaned forward to read over her shoulder. One name jumped out at him. “Tice Industries was in the neighborhood?”

“You know the name?”

Instead of answering, Law picked up and glanced again through the redacted paperwork he had scattered. There was nothing there about Tice Industries. Or why he was in that village on that particular day. But he had other, older memories to help him fill in some blanks.

Frowning, he looked up. “Tice is an Arkansas company. There's a history. Been on law enforcement's radar since before my time with the state police. But they have money and connections in all the right places. Nothing ever stuck.”

“What kind of nothing?”

“Why do you ask?”

Yardley shook her head.

Law was instantly alert. “What?”

This time she just stared at the carpet.

Law leaned toward her. “This paperwork doesn't say why I was at that location. Command sent me and Scud out alone for a reason. I have to know what you know.”

She nodded tightly. “I made another call, to a reporter who was in Afghanistan at the same time you were. I asked about civilian crime there. He sent me a link to a copy of an old
USA Today
report with a few lines highlighted.” She pulled it up on her tablet computer and pointed.

The U.S. Army has investigated 56 soldiers in Afghanistan on suspicion of using or distributing heroin, morphine or other opiates during 2010 and 2011 … Eight soldiers died of drug overdoses during that time.

“There are more stories on the Internet. Around the time of your wounding, a soldier in the Kentucky Guard died after using heroin allegedly bought from a civilian contractor. Ring any bells?”

Law monitored his thoughts as he ticked off the points in his mind. Even in a theater of war, criminal investigations were done by Army Criminal Investigation Command. CID. Him.
A drug investigation. Soldiers dying of drug overdoses. Civilian contractors involved in drug distribution.
The words should have triggered more than a hunch. Tumblers should have fallen into place and unlocked his memory.

Nothing.

Law scraped a hand through his hair. “You done good, Yard. I appreciate it.”

“What are you planning to do about this?”

Ignoring her question, he pointed to the file. “This must have cost you.”

“Let's just say no one in Washington will be accepting my calls for a long while.”

The mention of her secret sources reminded him that she'd possibly made herself vulnerable by helping him.

“Do you trust those you've had contact with? This can't blow back on you?”

“I already thought of that, little brother. But what happened in Afghanistan is history. You'll never pick up that trail.”

“I don't need to.” Tice was still in business in his backyard. If they were dirty before, they were dirtier now. “I just need to connect these new dots to the old, and wait.”

“I don't like that idea. You're not the vigilante type. It's not your problem.”

“I am—was a cop. It's my problem.”

Law felt energized for the first time in four years. Something was now ahead of him, instead of it all behind him. He was a law enforcement officer, first, last, always.

He stood up. “Guess I'll need that desk jockey job at state police headquarters, after all.”

Yardley picked up the pages and shoved them back in the envelope. “You said yourself Tice Industries is intertwined with political and law enforcement allies. You won't know who to trust. You've been out of the loop too long.”

Law didn't answer. He knew one thing. He had to get Yardley off the case. For her own good.

“Go back to your life, Yard. I got it from here.”

“I did what you asked in the hope that answers would give you peace of mind. You sound more like I've given you fuel for a vendetta.”

Law stared off in the middle distance. “Not your problem.”

She stood up and put a hand on his arm. “About Scud. I'm sorry.”

Law nodded once. He wouldn't talk about that. Not even with Yard. “Anyone I can pay to drive me back to the airport tonight?”

“You won't get a flight to anywhere this time of night.”

He stared at nothing a bit longer. “See you in the morning then.”

He looked down at Sam, who had risen from her place to heel at his side without being asked. “Keep the doodle here for the night. Sam,
bleib
—ah, stay!”

He picked up his gear and walked out the door without looking back.

Yardley watched him head down her steps and then across the empty yard toward the bunkhouse where guests at Harmonie Kennels stayed. His limp was more pronounced than when she'd picked him up in Richmond. The revelations in the folder weighed upon him though he would never admit it.

She folded her arms tightly under her bosom. She knew it would have been useless to ask him again to stay with her at the main house their father had built. He'd said earlier that he preferred the empty guest quarters. The family intimacy that had once discomforted both of them was now one-sided. She would have welcomed his presence in the house.

She felt a bone-deep ache watching her brother's retreating back. She was worried about him. He had suffered so much, alone. She would have been there, if he'd allowed it. Yet someone else had had to call her when it seemed like Law was about to do something irrevocable. He really needed to learn how to ask for help. At the moment he was determined to turn his back on the woman who had gotten to him in a way that scared him. She'd love to meet this mystery woman who had disturbed her brother's spirit. She could easily call Warriors Wolf Pack and ask who had trained Samantha. But her instincts kept her from doing that. Warriors were meant to hunt. Law was on the scent, whether he knew it or not. He would not accept what came easily to him.

She didn't have much connection with her own part-Choctaw heritage. But Law had been reared on the reservation. Tribal life ran in his veins. A disturbed spirit needed to be made whole and joined to the world. Peace came from acceptance and love.

Yardley sighed and closed the door against the chill. Some men were more afraid of gentleness than hardship. It was her fate to love three of them. The first was Bronson Battise.

Their father had laid a heavy burden on his children, telling them to trust and rely on no one, not even him. All they had was themselves. To need another person was to be weak. It explained why for most of her life she, and she suspected Law, had had an easier time dealing with emotions when animals were involved rather than humans.

The second man was Law, whom she knew more by that indefinable bond of blood than actual connection. Something deep and long-standing was troubling Law. It wasn't just his wounding at war. She was certain he didn't have a clue what it was. She'd felt the same unnamed emptiness most of her life. Finally, a few months ago, she had found the answer. It had been as simple as dropping her guard.

She'd fallen in love.

Yardley turned away from her door after Law entered the bunkhouse, rubbing her hands up and down her arms. The chill she felt had nothing to do with the temperature.

The third man she loved was missing. In his world, there were no strings to pull or favors to call in. That scared her spitless.

She looked down at the sound of whimpering. Sam stood still staring out the window toward the bunkhouse.

“I know. He's a hardheaded cuss. Serves us right for caring about him. I hope that woman he mentioned has the wisdom to see through his bunker mentality.”

She pulled a treat from her pocket. “Come, Sam. You can sleep with me.”

*   *   *

Sam waited until the house was quiet. There were dog doors in both front and back in the woman's house. She went out the one closest to the bunkhouse where she knew her Alpha was. It was a dark moonless night but she let her nose direct her. Alpha's footprints were so vivid in her nostrils, they practically glowed under the inspection of her nose. All the other smells of the night, and there were thousands, faded in comparison.

She found the doggy door into the bunkhouse with ease, slipping easily through portals sized for Belgian Malinois and German shepherds, whose scents drenched every inch of the area. She glanced nervously about, unaccustomed to so many strong Alpha scents in one place. Finally, convinced that no animal lay behind those scents, she moved on through the dark, following the wisp of familiar pheromones.

She found her Alpha in a small room in the back. He was slung across a narrow mattress, fully clothed. She climbed up carefully and then snuggled in slowly against him, so as not to awaken him. Only then did she sniff him, taking careful notice of his unique blend of smells and physical signs. Heart calm. Breathing easy. He was asleep. A quiet sleep where no ugliness penetrated. It was the first time since she'd chosen him that she felt he was at ease.