Vow To Protect. Ann Voss Peterson

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СКАЧАТЬ but she refused to let it loose. She’d been through bad things in her life, and she’d get through this, too. For Ethan she could get through anything.

      Leaving Reed McCaskey in the great room, she steered Ethan through the hall and into his bedroom. She pulled a duffel bag out of his closet and spread it open on his bed. “Pick out some clothes, games and books and stuff, too. Okay?”

      “How long are we going to be gone?”

      “I don’t know, sweetheart. A few days. It shouldn’t be any more than that.” At least she hoped not. “What do you say we go to a place with a pool? Just you and me? It will be fun. Like a vacation.”

      “What about school?”

      Ethan always pretended he didn’t care about school. But she’d always suspected he enjoyed seeing his friends and working on school projects more than he let on. “Tomorrow is Friday. You’ll only miss a day. You’ll be back in school next week.”

      “And your work?”

      She couldn’t imagine her supervisor at the lab would be thrilled with the short notice, but it couldn’t be helped. “I could use a day off with my favorite guy.” She slipped an arm around him and squeezed him close, bending down to kiss him on the forehead.

      “Mo-om.” He rolled his eyes.

      Her lips relaxed into a smile. That was the Ethan she knew. “Make sure you pack your swimming suit.”

      “Can we stay up in the Dells? At one of the water parks?”

      “Maybe.” At least Ethan was focusing on the bright side. She only wished she could do the same. But dread gathered inside her like clouds of an approaching thunderstorm.

      A storm she couldn’t escape.

      CORD LEANED BACK in the hard chair in the interrogation room and glanced up at the camera positioned in the corner. It stared down at him, its lens an accusing eye waiting to capture his confession. The only problem was he had nothing to confess.

      The only thing drumming through his mind right now was concern for Melanie and thoughts of the son he never knew he had.

      The son he would never know.

      The door to the interrogation room burst open, and a sour-looking cop with jowls that drooped like laundry hung to dry stepped into the room. He closed the door behind him and ran his gaze over the tats on Cord’s arms. His upper lip curled in disgust.

      Cord was used to the contempt of cops. Long before he’d gone to prison, he’d been the wrong kind of kid, not a hardcore gang banger but close enough. At least in most cops’ eyes. He returned the cop’s glare with a Murder One stare of his own.

      The cop was the first to break the silence. “Time to talk, dawg.”

      Cord hadn’t been called dawg since he was behind bars. A memory this cop obviously wanted him to relive. “And you are?”

      “Detective Stan Perreth.” He glanced down at his watch. “You have five minutes to come clean, or I’m calling your parole officer. I hear your friends are throwing a par-tay in your cell and everyone’s coming. You understand what I’m saying?”

      This guy was a riot. A regular prison jargon stand-up show, albeit a little cleaner than the language flying around the joint. “How about you call my lawyer first?”

      “Why? You got something to hide?” Perreth plunked into a chair and leaned close. Table shoved to the side of the room, there was nothing between him and the cop. The odor of cigarette smoke emanating from Perreth’s clothing and breath was enough to make Cord crave a rollie of his own, though he’d kicked the habit when he’d been paroled. “It’s in your best interest to talk,” Perreth said.

      Right. “I don’t see how it’s in my best interest to have anything to do with you.”

      “You should want to talk to me, punk. I can see to it that Melanie Frist and her boy are safe. Or should I say, your boy?”

      Cord’s gut clenched. He wasn’t surprised Perreth noticed the resemblance. One look and anyone could guess Ethan was his son. But Cord didn’t like the implication that Mel and Ethan’s safety hinged on him confessing to something he didn’t know about and didn’t do. “Is that some kind of threat?”

      “I’m just saying if you help me, I’ll be more inclined to help you. That’s how the world works.”

      That might be true. But it still didn’t tell Cord what he was supposed to be confessing to in order to earn Perreth’s favors.

      A sharp knock sounded, and the door opened.

      Cord never thought he’d be happy to see his brother-in-law. He sure as hell didn’t have a stash of good feelings for Reed McCaskey, but after chatting with Perreth, McCaskey seemed like a long-lost friend. At least he didn’t think McCaskey would resort to using Mel and Ethan to get what he wanted.

      A female detective with the face of a supermodel and the edgy stare of a barracuda stepped into the room behind McCaskey. Cord had met her before, on the same day McCaskey and Diana had dropped the news that Kane was his father.

      She stood behind McCaskey, letting him take the lead. But she was no shrinking violet. She had more in common with a sleek and beautiful Doberman pinscher with a keen eye for weakness and no qualms about attacking.

      McCaskey nodded to Perreth. “We’ll take this, Stan.”

      Perreth shoved his chair back and puffed out his chest. For a moment Cord wondered if he was going to get the chance to watch a cop pissing match, but Perreth turned and stomped from the room without lowering his fly.

      McCaskey and Valducci assumed the chairs facing Cord. Plunking a stack of files on the table at his elbow, McCaskey took the lead. “We need to ask you a few questions.”

      “And here I thought you dragged me in here for a social visit. You know, a little catching up among family.”

      McCaskey didn’t react. Next to him, Nikki Valducci leaned forward, as if she was anticipating the taste of blood and was just waiting for McCaskey’s go-ahead to take a piece out of him.

      In contrast, McCaskey leaned back in his chair, the picture of calm control. “Where were you last night, Turner?”

      “This again?” Cord really had to start documenting his every move. Maybe then his brother-in-law would get off his back. “Why don’t you just tell me what you think I did this time so I can get right to denying it?”

      “Have you been in contact with Dryden Kane?”

      He thought of the invitation and the scrawled note that had sent him racing to protect Melanie. “Are Melanie Frist and her son in a safe place?”

      “They’re in protective custody.”

      Cord blew a breath through tense lips.

      “Answer the question, Turner. Have you been in contact with Dryden Kane?”

      As long as Mel and Ethan were safe, the invitation didn’t matter. All admitting СКАЧАТЬ