Blood Line (A Tom Rollins Thriller Book 1) by Paul Heatley (korean ebook reader txt) 📕

“Alejandra is his girlfriend,” Tom says, speaking slowly. “And she’s pregnant. We need to know that she’s safe.”

Jeffrey is silenced by this. He thinks on it for a while, until the only thing he’s able to say is, “Well, shit.”

“Yeah,” Tom says. “Shit.”

“He never brought her around here,” Jeffrey says. “I never met her.”

Tom chews on his lip, worried. More worried now than he was when in the car driving here. “We need to ask him,” he says. “We need to wake Anthony up and ask him.”

Sylvia enters the room at this point, closing the door behind her. “You’ll have a hell of a lot of trouble doing that,” she says. “He’s pumped full of painkillers, gonna be out a few hours yet.”

Tom clenches his fists down by his sides, impatient, but there’s nothing he can do about this. He exchanges a look with his father. Jeffrey doesn’t say anything about Alejandra to her, doesn’t tell her it looks like they’re going to be grandparents and this is the first they’re hearing of it.

“You want something to eat while you wait?” Sylvia says.

“No, thank you,” Tom says. He goes to one of the wooden chairs, takes a seat finally. “I’m just gonna wait for Anthony to wake.”

“You sure?” she says. “Must’ve been a while since you ate last. How long were you driving for?”

Tom wants some more time alone with his father. Sylvia will be in the kitchen, away from them. “Sure,” he says. “If it’s no bother.”

“No bother at all,” she says, smiling, leaving the room once again.

Tom turns to Jeffrey. “The phone you were contacted on – you still got it?”

“I do.”

“Go get it for me, will you?”

“It’s just a burner,” Jeffrey says. “You ain’t gonna be able to get anything from it. I already looked. Doesn’t have any numbers in it, not even the one that called me – it was screened.”

“Bring it anyway,” Tom says.

“All right, then,” Jeffrey says, getting to his feet. “But brace yourself for disappointment. There’s nothin’ to be found on it.”

He leaves the room, and for the first time since he arrived at the commune, Tom is alone again. His thoughts return, his worries, his concerns. Now, with Alejandra nowhere in sight, and Anthony asking for her, they are amplified. They are worse than they ever were.

He needs Anthony to wake up.

13

Ben can’t sleep.

It’s late, but instead of lying in bed staring at the ceiling, he’s downstairs, in the dark, staring at the walls.

He’s also on the phone.

Gerry called him, interrupting his thoughtful reverie, to tell him he’s been working late on the laptop.

“You’re still at the office?” Ben says.

“No,” Gerry says. “I’m at home. I took it with me, to get at it with some of my more … shall we say, specialist hard- and software?”

“And?” Ben says, clutching the phone tight.

“Nothing.”

Ben isn’t sure he’s heard him right. “What was that?”

“Nothing,” Gerry says. “I’ve been at this thing for hours, man, and there’s no sign who – if anyone – has hacked it. Looks like the only person who’s ever accessed it is you.”

Ben isn’t happy with this. “You sure about that?”

“There’s nothing on here that shouldn’t be. No spyware, no malware, nothing like that. It’s clean, to be perfectly honest with you.”

“I highly doubt a bunch of backwoods hillbilly Nazis have the technology or the smarts sophisticated enough to leave zero trace,” Ben says. “There has to be a trail. There has to be something.”

“I’ve been thorough, man.”

Ben is silent for a moment, thinking. “That’s not good enough,” he says. “There can’t be nothing.”

“Maybe it had nothing to do with you, Ben,” Gerry says. “Maybe they found out their information another way.”

“That’s impossible. I already told you how.”

“But how can you be so sure maybe Anthony wasn’t talking to somebody else? Another agent?”

“I don’t know that, but I don’t think he’s the kind of guy with loose lips. He wasn’t gonna take that kind of risk, not with his own safety, or –” He stops himself, thinking of Alejandra. “What I do know is that his details were on my laptop. Everything was on there, and my best guess, my only guess, is they got hold of it. I want to know how, and I want to know who.”

“I’ve done all I can, Ben.”

“Then do more.”

“I don’t see how that’s possible. I’ve come at it with everything I’ve got.”

“Then find a way. Find more ways. Get at it again tomorrow. There has to be something you missed.”

Gerry doesn’t say anything.

“Are you there?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” he says, his voice quiet.

“Did you hear what I said?”

“I heard you.”

“Good.” Ben tries to soften his tone. “This is important, Gerry.”

“I understand that.”

Ben sighs. “I’ll see you in the morning.” He hangs up the phone.

He doesn’t move from the couch. Remains where he’s sitting, presses the phone into his forehead, his hands clasped in front of his face.

He thinks of Anthony. Of Alejandra. He blames himself. It’s his fault. There’s no one else to blame. He has to atone for this. To make right what he has caused. He just doesn’t know how to start. Can’t find the beginning. It was all hinging on his laptop, on the truths held therein.

And now Gerry is telling him it holds no truths.

This isn’t acceptable. Ben needs answers.

There are footsteps on the stairs. He looks up. Carly comes down. She wears one of his shirts. Her usually perfect hair is spread out and matted where she has been sleeping on it. “Ben?” she says. Her voice croaks, thick with sleep.

“Hey.”

“What’re you doing still up?” she says. “Why are you sitting in the dark?”

“It’s nothing,” he says. “I just couldn’t sleep is all. Go on back to bed, Carly. I’ll be up in a minute.”

She comes to the bottom of the stairs, looks at him. “You want me to sit with you? I don’t mind.”

He smiles at her, shakes his head, though he’s not sure she can see this gesture. “That’s all right. But thanks.”

Carly goes