Page 62 of Stolen Goods
“So, you going to make an honest woman out of her, Parker?”
The Fed cast a slow glance in his direction, but refrained from answering.
“Jo, I mean,” Thad continued, goaded by the silence. “Because without Robert around, I think it falls on me to make sure she’s treated properly, with respect.”
A glower appeared on the Fed’s face.
“Rumor has it you moved in together. I guess the tabloids are good for something. Personally, I think it’s a little quick. Jo tends to get a bit carried away sometimes. I mean, how much do you two really know about each other? After, what has it been—three weeks? Maybe four by now?”
He gave Parker an opening to speak. The Fed didn’t jump. So, he kept going.
“Did you know she’s an absolute mess? I mean, honestly, if Robert hadn’t hired that cleaning woman, the house would’ve become a biohazard with all the food she leaves on the counters. Eggshells. Raw batter. Milk.”
He paused, casting a sidelong glance.
Still no bite.
“Her voice could break glass—have you heard her sing? Do yourself a favor, don’t. And the manipulation tactics, don’t even get me started on those. The woman could talk a charging rhino into submission. But if you suggestonething—”
“Ryder?”
“Yeah.”
“Shut up.”
Thad grinned.Ah, yes, this is exactly what I needed. “Did I strike a nerve there, Parker?”
“You are the nerve.” The leather whined as the Fed’s grip on the wheel tightened. He stretched his neck side to side.
“That hurts,” Thad said with mock seriousness. “And here I thought we were starting to become friends.”
“Have you ever heard the phrasesilence is golden?”
“Oh, come on, Parker. We’re going to be spending a lot of time together with these trials. It’s time you got used to me.”
He grumbled something Thad didn’t quite catch and then reached out to turn the radio on. Every time Thad opened his mouth, Parker made the volume louder. By the time they pulled to a stop, his ears had practically started to bleed. But it was worth it, because he’d managed to not think about the enormity of what was about to happen for a whole half an hour. Until the car turned off, the sound blinked out, and Parker left him alone in the vehicle to talk to the agents standing at the end of the drive. Thad told himself not to look, not until the last minute. It would only make things harder. Still, he couldn’t stop his head from shifting, his gaze from searching, his heart from beating against his chest.
He recognized the house immediately.
He’d never been there, but he’d spent enough time studying the street view on Google Maps to have the image memorized. It was a Spanish-style house with stucco walls and a terra-cotta roof. Two floors. Five bedrooms. Four and a half bathrooms. Five thousand, three hundred, and forty-two square feet, if the public sales listing had been accurate. It looked like a nice place to live. One mansion among many, on a beautiful street, in a quiet neighborhood, the perfect spot for a happy family. Not that he had any experience with those.
“Ryder. They’re ready for you inside.”
Parker waited a moment, then pulled the door open and grabbed him roughly by the arm. Thad was in a daze until they got to the front door. He dug his heels in and forced the Fed to stop. At the sudden sound of half a dozen safeties clicking off, Thad blinked and looked around, surprised to find they were flanked on all sides by other agents. It was a testament to how off-kilter he was that he hadn’t noticed them fall in line behind him.
“I need a minute,” he said, forcing the words out. Parker waved the agents off, then murmured into his comm. Thad blocked it out and closed his eyes, taking a long, slow breath. He’d been preparing for this day for most of his life. He was ready. He could do this. “Okay.”
Parker opened the door. Thad followed him inside.
He recognized her immediately, standing in the front hall with her hand over her lips, eyes wide with shock. Her skin was wrinkled. Her blonde hair had lost its glow. She seemed small, smaller than he remembered, and fragile in a way he’d never imagined. But none of that mattered.You never forget the face of the mother who didn’t want you.He swallowed the thought down and let his gaze slide over her, as though she didn’t matter, as though she were nothing, the same way he’d practiced a thousand times before, careful to keep his face neutral. She didn’t deserve to know he hadn’t gone a day in seventeen years without thinking about her. Let her think he forgot, the same way he knew she’d forgotten him.
His gaze didn’t stop moving until it landed on a second figure, seated at the dining room table twenty feet away with her hands nervously clenched into fists. Her brown hair was in braided pigtails with white ribbons woven through. She wore a cheerleading outfit. The wordgowas painted in red lipstick on her left cheek.
I wonder what the other one says.
She glanced up as though she’d heard. He sucked in a sharp breath when those gray eyes found his, like a mirror reflecting an image he didn’t quite know how to read. She had their father’s eyes, just like him, but seeing it live instead of on a screen was a different thing entirely.
Though he’d dreamed of this moment a thousand times and thought of a hundred different greetings, only two words would come. The ones he’d been waiting seventeen years to say. “Hi, Emma.”
