His to Take (Wicked Lovers 9)
Joaquin continued with his story. “The woman being followed was twenty-one, obviously of some sort of Anglo-European descent, probably Eastern bloc, but born in the U.S., and adopted in December 1998, somewhere around the age of five. When I found Nate’s notes, he’d been working this furiously and found a string of mutilations over the last two weeks spread across the country. Four in total, but no one had connected the dots yet. All the women were the same age with the same ethnic background, adopted about the same time. The phone call I overheard between the two men indicated that they’d compiled a list of every female in the U.S. who met these criteria. They said they’d find Tatiana Aslanov if they had to kill a hundred women looking for her.”
Hunter and Logan shared another quick stare, but neither said anything right away.
“What do you know about her?” Hunter asked.
“Nothing. All the usual searches turned up empty, as if she never existed.”
“Some people would like to keep it that way,” Logan asserted.
“You know about this girl?”
“We do,” Hunter answered. “We’ll get into it as soon as you finish your story.”
Joaquin nodded, glad he’d followed his hunch to come here. “About fifteen hours ago, I overheard the two assholes talking about hunting the Aslanov girl. Then suddenly, they went silent, as if they knew someone listened in. Or maybe they just cycled out their phones. Whatever. But the conversation stopped abruptly. Another body fitting the description turned up in Atlanta this afternoon. Whoever’s looking for this woman is looking hard.”
“And obviously not finding who they’re looking for,” Hunter speculated. “If they were, they wouldn’t kill their victim and move on to the next.”
“Agreed.” Joaquin nodded. “From what I gather, they want information. It makes sense that if a woman isn’t who they’re seeking, they dispose of her. After all, they can’t let her blab.”
“Exactly,” Logan agreed.
“But why end her so brutally?” Hunter looked perplexed.
“My gut? Just because he can. This prick probably enjoys torture. I’ll bet he gets hard hearing a woman plead for her life.”
“Sick fuck.” Logan’s contempt couldn’t have been more obvious.
“This creep started around D.C. and swept down the Eastern Seaboard, struck as far south as Miami, then headed back west. Every single one of these bodies is . . .” Joaquin shuddered as the crime scene photos flashed through his head, each more shocking than the last. The terrible deaths these women had endured made him flat fucking sick.
Logan slapped him on the back. “’Nough said on that. How can we help?”
“These killers are two steps ahead of me. I need help compiling a list of women who fit the profile so I can warn each before they become victims.”
“We can help with that,” Hunter promised.
“And that’s everything I’ve got. Now tell me what you know about Tatiana Aslanov.”
“Not much about her specifically, other than her name. I’m more familiar with her father’s work.” Logan cocked his head. “Do you know Callindra Howe?”
“The heiress who was missing for, like, a decade? I know of her.”
“Yeah. I know her personally, so I know what she went through to escape the bastards pursuing her because of Viktor Aslanov’s research. There’s more to the story than they’re saying on the news.”
“You seriously know her?” Joaquin was about to call bullshit.
“Before he got married, he had the chance to know her up close and personal,” Hunter added.
“And you passed that up?” Now Joaquin just wanted to call the younger Edgington an idiot.
“Hey!” Logan objected. “We were both in love with other people.”
Was this guy for real? “So? That pic someone caught of her and her former ‘boss’ looking mighty cozy in Tahiti a few months back?” That had been one hell of a lip lock. “She looks insanely hot in a bikini. As long as her fiancé gets some, too, I kind of see why he just looks the other way.”
The Edgington brothers exchanged another glance. Okay, they knew something else he didn’t. He’d come back to it later. Right now, his goals were to avenge Nate and stop other women from dying, not worry about some pseudo-celebrity.
“So through Callindra Howe, you know something about the Aslanov case?”
Logan nodded. “Callie’s fiancé, Sean, still consults with the FBI. What we know is that the bureau is convinced that no scientist, especially one doing Aslanov’s sort of groundbreaking genetic work, would intentionally hand over every scrap of his research to her father, knowing that he would only destroy it.”
“What?” Joaquin hadn’t had much time to devote to the news lately, and he was a little embarrassed to admit that he knew more about how Callindra Howe looked on a beach wearing next to nothing than about her case.
“Her father, Daniel Howe, hired Aslanov to find a DNA-based cure for cancer when Callie was a little girl,” Hunter explained. “Howe threw millions at the Russian geneticist to try to save his wife from dying of ovarian cancer. When that didn’t work, he pressed on, hoping no one else would have to suffer as he and his family had.”
“Right.” He remembered that part.
“Then when Howe figured out that Aslanov had stumbled across other genetic markers that had nothing to do with the grant he’d funded and the scientist had sold that information separately to make a buck, Callie’s father demanded that Aslanov turn over his findings since it had been created on his dime. Aslanov supposedly gave Howe every bit of research he’d ever conducted with the funding. But the end of their business relationship was contentious, and the scientist had to know that the billionaire was going to turn his life’s work into dust. Which is exactly what he did.”
“But everyone thinks Aslanov left a copy somewhere else?”
“In his shoes, wouldn’t you?” Logan challenged. “Would you endure years of advanced schooling, being ostracized in your own country for your controversial experiments, and work like a dog for a dozen years so that you could hand everything over and know it would all go up in smoke?”
His pride would never allow that. He didn’t think most men’s would, either. “No.”
“So the FBI is speculating that another copy of this genetic-altering research is somewhere. What we know is that Aslanov sold his initial findings to some well-funded, fuck-all-crazy separatist group with delusions of a super army. They experimented with some U.S. soldiers they abducted in South America. When these loons came back to Aslanov for the rest of the research, the Russian told them he didn’t have it anymore. They shot his family deader than dead—wife and two kids. They tortured him mercilessly for nearly two days before they killed him, too.”
Joaquin absorbed all that and let it rattle around in his brain. “That’s all terrible, but what does it have to do with my case?”
Logan clapped him on the back. “Well, the separatists never got their hands on all that research. Aslanov had three children, but authorities only recovered the bodies of two. This organization might seem insane, but they aren’t stupid. I’d bet they found the obscure news story of a little girl covered in blood and walking a dirt road the same November day as the murders, less than a mile from the crime scene, then decided that she was Aslanov’s missing daughter.”
“So you’re saying that’s Tatiana Aslanov and she’s still alive?” Joaquin’s blood started to spark and race. Finally, after a frustrating few weeks, he might be onto something.
“Exactly. But you won’t have an easy time tracking her down. According to Sean, the adoption records have been sealed tight. What we do know is the five-year-old girl wandering the side of the road was in shock and couldn’t remember her name. The couple who found her took her to the local sheriff. She was adopted out shortly thereafter.”
“She must be the one these people are after, just to learn what she knows about her father’s r
esearch or where he might have hidden it.” Joaquin blew out a breath. “I’ve got to find her.”
“Before they do,” Hunter added.
“Which means we don’t have much time. Days at most. Probably more like hours.”
Hunter plucked his cell phone out of the pocket of his sweat pants and made a call. Logan’s materialized from his jeans. Within a few minutes, the place was crawling with people. First to show up was a big blond mountain of a man Hunter introduced as his brother-in-law, Deke.
The big guy shook Joaquin’s hand. “I may have to leave suddenly. Kimber started having contractions this afternoon.”
“My sister,” Logan supplied to Joaquin, then frowned. “She’s not due yet.”
“We’re only at week twenty-eight, so it’s a concern. They’ll stop her labor . . . if they can.”
“No worries,” Hunter assured him. “If you’ve got to go, just go.”
“Jack’s on his way. Morgan isn’t due for months, so he shouldn’t have any problems being here for the duration.”
Joaquin frowned, staring at the men. What the fuck? A bunch of tough dudes all into their wives and kids. Were they trying to double the population of Lafayette, Louisiana, singled-handedly or go for some fucked-up record in that big Guinness book?
“Your wife is pregnant,” he said to Hunter. “And so is yours,” he addressed Deke. “This Jack guy’s wife is expecting, and . . .” He turned to Logan. “Your wife just had twins.”
“Yep.” Logan flashed him a cheesy grin. “Don’t forget my buddy, Xander. He and his brother are waiting for their wife to give birth, too. Six weeks to go.”
“Their wife?”
Logan nodded, giving him a stare that dared him to say more.
Honestly, he didn’t care much how these guys rolled, but . . . “What the fuck is in the water around here? If I get laid while I’m in town, remind me to tell her not to drink it.”
Deke barked out a laugh. “It’s not the water. We’re all just horny.”
Logan grimaced. “I don’t want to hear that about my sister, dude. Eww! I need ear bleach.”
“Get over yourself.” Deke punched Logan in the shoulder. “My wife is hot.”
Hunter rolled his eyes. “I’m ignoring your comments about my sister. Personally, I think everyone is trying to keep up with Tyler.”
“This will be baby number three for them,” Logan agreed with a nod.
“Delaney wants a girl this time.”
Personally, Joaquin didn’t give a shit, but just about the time he opened his mouth to remind them they had a case to work and that lives hung in the balance, Jack Cole showed up. He brought along a guy he introduced as Stone, who had a heavy brow line, a square face, and almost dead eyes.
Joaquin brought the newcomers up to speed. Within five minutes, they had multiple workstations up, humming on a super-secure Internet connection. Several of the guys were on the phone with their contacts as they quickly took Joaquin’s list of all girls adopted in December 1998 at age five. Stone’s fingers flew over his keyboard. He might look like a caveman, but the guy was definitely high-tech. In moments, he began whittling the list of names down to a handful that fit Tatiana Aslanov’s profile.
Finally, as dawn crested over the Louisiana skyline, Logan made one last call, to a guy named Mitchell Thorpe. The name sounded familiar, but Joaquin couldn’t place it.
“Callie with you?” Logan asked the man.
“Right beside me,” said the voice on the speakerphone. “Aren’t you, pet?”
A little feminine sigh, followed by a giggle. “Yes. Stop it!”
“Would you like to change your tone and rephrase that? It sounded a whole lot like a demand,” said the man with the commanding voice.
“Sorry.” She sounded almost contrite . . . but not quite.
“Because she’s a little minx,” said another man on the other end of the phone.
Joaquin frowned. The Callie on the line was Callindra Howe? Apparently. So Thorpe was with Callie and . . . who else? Her fiancé?
“Did you need to talk to her, Logan?” Thorpe asked.
“With your permission.”
Permission? Did all these guys swing just left of normal? Whatever. If they could help him solve these murders and give him justice for Nate, nothing else mattered.
“Of course.”
The speaker rumbled a bit, then a woman’s voice took over. “Logan?”
“Hi, Callie. Sorry if we woke you.”
“We’re just being lazy. Sean’s half-asleep, but you’ve got me. Tara good?”
“Absolutely. I called for your help.”
“Anything. Name it.”
“I might bring Kata’s brother to Dallas to talk to you. How soon is the wedding?”
“Next Saturday.”
“Can you squeeze a meeting in before then? I’m sure it’s a crazy time, but it’s about Aslanov. I don’t think this shit is over. We’re onto a new angle here.”
“What do you mean?” The second male voice resounded over the phone again, sounding sharp.
“Half-asleep, Mackenzie?”
“Wide awake now,” Sean grumbled. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“Time is of the essence, and I don’t want to get into too much over the phone.” Logan winced.
Joaquin nodded. Never know who might be listening . . .
“We’ll make time for a meeting,” Callie assured Logan.
“Thanks, hon. We’ll be in touch when we’re headed in that direction.”
“Excellent,” Thorpe assured him. “We’ll be waiting.”
Logan hung up and looked Joaquin’s way. “They’ll have information no one else will. You can interview them, see if anything helps your case along.”
“Thanks, man.”
Logan nodded. “No sweat. I hope we’re able to stop anyone else from losing their life.”
“I got it,” Stone said into their discussion.
Since the guy barely talked, Joaquin had kind of forgotten he was there. Well, except for the constant tap, tap, tapping of his keyboard.
“You’ve got a list?” Jack asked, clarifying.
“Yeah.” Stone nodded sharply. “I narrowed it down to women who fit the profile and are still alive. I went further and searched for women with blue eyes, since the only picture of Tatiana Aslanov I found shows she had them. She was only two at the time, but I’m rolling with it. That leaves us with four possibilities: Caitlyn Wells of Mobile, Alabama. Emily Boyle of Norman, Oklahoma. Bailey Benson of Houston, Texas. Alicia Allen of Casa Grande, Arizona. I pulled together brief bios of them all.”
As Stone printed everything out and handed it to him, Joaquin stared in awe. “Where did you come from?”
The man never broke expression. “Prison. Jack just pays me to put my skills to good use now, instead of hacking into Uncle Sam’s panties or department stores’ customer payment records.”
Joaquin didn’t think Stone was kidding. On top of being good with a computer, between the ink covering his arms and the slabs of muscles lurking under his T-shirt, he just looked like a bad motherfucker. Nice to have the ex-con on his side.
“Thanks.”
Stone inclined his head, his severely short hair like a dark paint over his scalp, matching his expressionless dark eyes. “By the way, Logan said you were wondering if you still had a job. You haven’t been fired yet. I looked into it. There’s a meeting on the subject this coming Tuesday.”
Fabulous. “I appreciate it.”
Jack slapped Stone on the back. “Good job.”
Joaquin stared down at the list. The obvious would be to head to Mobile first, but what if these violent bastards changed their M.O. or skipped around the country for some reason? “Any chance I