* * *
Wes walked into his home. Mike, Kip, Kieran and Lance Starr were sitting in his dining room. The house smelled of coffee, and a platter of cookies and brownies sat on the table. Wes poured himself a mug and joined the group.
“How is she?” Lance asked.
“Strong, stubborn, afraid. I don’t know. She’s covering the clients assigned to Brandon. You’ll have to catch up with her on a break.”
“Crockett, I’m not the enemy. I want her to be safe too.” Starr frowned. “I appreciate your hospitality. I’m going to head to bed.”
“How’s Greece?” Kieran asked.
“Strong, stubborn, afraid. Kyle texted that Ellie made a small breakthrough.” Wes swallowed hard.
The group sat silently for a long moment until Kieran broke the silence. “Alamo, I’m sorry.”
Wes’s head bounced, not quite sure he heard his boss say those words. “About?”
“Two therapists, an FBI agent, the shit show with the medical staff taking care of Operator Hopper, a PA, two security providers…we did a shitty job hiring in your absence,” Kieran said.
“We’re trying to figure out how to prevent what happened,” Mike said. “We’ve had issues in other divisions too.”
“The therapists…one was plain obnoxious and cruel to Ellie. The PA was the same. Add Theo, or rather, Gideon Murrow. I can’t help being paranoid. What were the bullies trying to accomplish? Was it mean girls doing their thing?” Wes asked.
“I don’t think you’re paranoid. Boss, did you find out how Murrow infiltrated us?” Kip asked.
“Yeah, he misused FBI resources. His identity was developed by one of their behavior analysts. They took it down three generations. He was irresistible. Murrow majored in psychology in college and worked in a counseling center. It helped him pull the persona off,” Kieran said.
“That’s part of it. But how did he know Ellie applied and got a job here?” Mike wondered.
“They had someone inside the Coventry School where she was working. Once she wasn’t able to tell them what they wanted to know, Murrow and his friend Nash started surveilling her,” Kieran said.
“What do they want from her?” Wes asked.
“My guess is finding out whether or not she had a baby.” Kieran’s blue eyes lasered into Wes.
“I don’t know. And she’s shut me out,” Wes said defensively.
Kieran held up his hands. “I wasn’t asking.” He shoved a file sitting on the table in front of him. “Our resources moved some things along. Three of the dead women who weren’t completely incinerated were identified and had high concentrations of Clomiphene citrate and choriogonadotropin alfa in their systems. Fertility drugs. Each of the women disappeared under similar circumstances.”
“You mean their kidnappers were making them have children,” Kip said.
Wes read through the reports in front of him. Kieran had arranged for every set of incinerated and partially incinerated skeletal remains as well as familial DNA of the missing to be tested. “Starr said it… She was hiding something too painful to admit. It didn’t make sense to me. She’s strong-minded and self-aware. Hell, she has stitches in her side, and she went to work. Mike, Kieran, who would you die to protect?”
The two fathers replied together, “Family.”
“Belinda and that baby,” Wes said. “They took that baby from her fifteen months ago. She heard voices at that car accident, and we confirmed Belinda was there. And yesterday, they killed Hazel; they put a near lethal shot into Finch, and she was shot in the side. It’s painful but relatively minor. I’m sure that was a warning. And Keith Hartung was rammed chasing a pickup on the Knolls’ property. He’s got a small brain bleed. Transfer to his vehicle was bumper to bumper. There is no such thing as a coincidence.”
“How do we get her to tell us?” Mike asked.
“We find Belinda,” Wes said.
