The Betrayed (21 page)

There was an amazing connection between mother and son, love and affection, obvious from even their brief encounter. Had he ever had that? Not with his birth mother, for sure. And as his foster mother had died so early, he remembered very little of her.

“How is it that you get both the girl and the action, while I'm stuck in the office?” Jamie's arrival ended the trip down memory lane.

“You're here now.”

He looked around. “Sounded more exciting over the phone. Didn't find anyone here?” He sounded disappointed at the missed opportunity for a scuffle.

His steps were sure as he brought the crime-scene kit over to the pickup, but he had a slightly uneven gait. Both of his legs were missing, courtesy of a rough overseas mission that had ended badly. He walked with the aid of two space-age technology prostheses, well hidden under his black cargo pants, originally developed for Olympic athletes.

He looked over the damage carefully. “Find anything else beyond the slashed tires?”

“Nothing.”

While Jamie lifted prints, Mo dabbed the tires around the slashes with oversize cotton swabs and sealed those into evidence bags.

Jamie put away the prints he'd collected. “Could be a warning for her to keep quiet about her brother's dealings.”

“That was my first thought.”

She had no idea how out of her depth she was in all this. He looked toward the house, not liking that he was beginning to feel protective toward Molly Rogers and her son. That could become a problem.

“She's a person of interest in the investigation,” he said out loud to remind himself of the exact nature of their relationship.

Maybe if he kept telling himself that was why he was so interested in her, eventually he'd believe it.

His phone rang at the same time as Jamie's. They clicked into a conference call with Ryder.

“Hey, Shep just called. He found some chopped-off fingers. No body to go with them,” their team leader said on the other end.

“Where?” Mo tensed, pretty much expecting that he wasn't going to like the answer. He was right about that.

“Rogers land,” Ryder said.

ISBN: 9781460318799

Copyright © 2013 by Jana DeLeon

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