Sweetest Taboo (SIN 3)

"Part and parcel," Noah says. "Coffee's fresh and strong if you need it." He points toward a small kitchenette on the far side of the room, but I only shake my head. Coffee sounds a little too rough right now.

"Where's Quince?" Dallas asks.

"Just finished a session. Kept increasing the dosage throughout the night, still got nothing. Frankly, he's a little pissed with himself for pushing too hard. Now he's got Colin on a saline drip and some counteragents...working the drug out of his system." Liam glances at his watch. "Not too much longer, I'd think. We figured Jane would want to talk to him with as clear a head as possible."

"Good." Dallas turns to me. "He hasn't said a damn thing yet even with the drugs. You might be more effective than truth serum."

"Or I might not," I say. I don't add that maybe there is nothing for him to confess to. Dallas and the guys are already convinced. And, though I hate admitting it even to myself, their certainty has convinced me as well. Even so, I want to talk to Colin personally.

"Miss Jane." Across the room, Archie steps from the conference room, a smile wide on his face. I tug out of Liam's arms and run to him, then engulf him in a hug. He starts to pull away, but I hold on tight for another heartbeat, needing this connection to my childhood. A time when, as complicated as life was, things were simpler. A time when, though I now know that I'd been naive, I'd understood the people around me.

When I finally release him and step back, I find the Sykes family butler smiling down at me. "I cannot tell you how relieved I am that you're safe, Miss Jane. I won't say that all is well," he adds, his eyes softening, "because we both know that it isn't. But you are here and you are whole, and that is a very good beginning."

Despite everything, I smile. Yes, I'm standing in the middle of a criminal organization's safe house. Yes, criminal. Because even though an argument can be made that everything Deliverance did to rescue kidnap victims skirted against but never crossed any legal boundaries, there is no question that kidnapping Colin pushed them well into criminal territory, no matter how justified that action might be.

Dallas is at risk. So are Liam and Quince and all of the team, including Archie.

So, for that matter, am I. Accessory after the fact. I'd been married to an Assistant United States Attorney long enough to know that much at least.

And yet I'm here because even though I believe Dallas, I have to face Colin. With a sigh, I turn back to Dallas, my heart twisting a little when I see the expression on his face. Not just concern, but pity.

"I can handle it," I tell him for the umpteenth time. "More important, I can't move on until I hear it all from you guys, and then talk with him."

"I know."

I nod firmly, steeling myself. "All right," I say. "Tell me everything."

Liam and Dallas look at each other, and I can see the unspoken communication pass between them. Dallas nods, then takes my hand. "Conference room," he says. "We'll lay it all out for you."

And he does.

I sit numb in the leather chair as he and Liam flash documents up onto a screen, run through a timeline, and describe fact after fact after fact. They don't bother to speculate--they don't need to. The evidence is too damning. And each additional piece of information is like a stab through my heart.

Proof that Colin was in London at the time of the kidnapping--and that he'd used a false passport to enter the country.

A computer hard drive with damning emails between him and Silas Ortega, one of the six men who physically grabbed me and Dallas that horrible night seventeen years ago.

Proof that Colin wasn't in Boston as he'd told me when Ortega was murdered before he could cut a deal with the Feds. Instead, Colin flew to South America--which was where Ortega was being held.

Cryptic conversations picked up on a bug planted in Colin's Brooklyn house. Conversations that suggested that Colin was in the process of liquidating his assets in order to disappear.

And on and on and on it went with dozens and dozens of little facts that at first just swam into my brain, but then connected together to form a picture.

I didn't know why he would do such a horrible thing to Dallas, much less to me, but by the time Dallas said, "That's it. That's everything we have so far." I was convinced. I might not know the why of it, but I was certain that Colin--my birth father--had been our Jailer.

"Are you okay?"

"I--" But I can't get the words out. Instead, a wave of nausea rises up inside of me, and I stand in sudden panic--and then vomit all over Dallas's shoes.

"Jane." He is on his feet immediately, pulling me close and holding me tight. Then he pushes back. "You shouldn't do this."

"No. No, I was just--thank you," I say as Liam hands me a glass of water. "It was just all too much. But I'm okay. Really." I wrinkle my nose and glance down. "Sorry."

He doesn't look convinced, but he kisses my head and slips off his shoes. "Come on," he says, then leads me to a bathroom complete with spare toothbrushes and toothpaste. I brush my teeth, then take the time to splash water on my face. Dallas has left, giving me privacy, and I lean forward, my hands on the counter as I peer into my own eyes.

"You can do this," I say, and I look so resolute that I almost believe it.

Then I step back into the main area to find Quince standing beside Dallas. The wall to my left is no longer solid. Instead, a section of concrete appears to have been removed, revealing what I assume is a one-way window. I can see Colin inside, seated at a table, his wrists cuffed to the tabletop.