Merciless (16 page)

Jon called Joceline with the news the minute he was settled into his San Antonio apartment. He barely got the first words out when she asked where he was and hung up.

Markie was in school, with one of Rourke's men watching him. Joceline had to argue her way out of her apartment and, in the end, accept a ride from her own unfamiliar watchdog just to get to Jon's apartment. But she made it.

She walked in when he opened the door, closed it behind her, locked it and went right into his arms.

He held her close, rocked her, buried his face in her warm throat.

“I know, you're a big tough guy,” she said, her voice
muffled by his shoulder. “But losing a parent hurts. There's nothing wrong with grief.”

“No.” His mouth burrowed into her warm throat, opened, pressed hard. “Joceline…!”

His hands went under her blouse, up to the fastening of her bra. She didn't protest, not even when he removed every inch of clothing from her pretty body and started kissing his way down it.

He couldn't lift her; the wound was too fresh. But he tugged her into the bedroom, closed the door, smoothed her down on the bed and stripped off his pajamas without a second thought.

She opened her arms to him, welcoming, comforting, and let him pin her to the bed with his weight.

“I shouldn't,” he began.

She pulled his mouth down to hers and held it there, shifting to make way for his long legs and the sudden, sweet thrust of him inside her.

He gasped at the sensation he'd never felt. At least, he didn't think he'd felt it. But the rhythm of his body on hers was oddly familiar, like the sound of her soft gasps of pleasure as he shifted and twisted.

He lifted his head and looked down at her, saw the hard, dusky pink tips of her breasts, the shivering of her body, the wide-eyed fascination of her eyes as she looked down to where they were joined.

He lifted his hips to let her watch. He watched, too. It was the most intense sensation, like plunging into molten
heat, sheathing himself in the moist darkness of her with a slow, steady rhythm.

He groaned, shocked, as pleasure shuddered through him in slow waves every time he moved.

She watched his face, fascinated. She was feeling those sensations, too. It was nothing like the quick, almost frantic pace of the first time. It was glorious. She lifted, moaning as it increased the pleasure they were sharing.

He whispered to her, shocking things, loving things, smiling at her reactions, her responses. His hand slid under her hips and moved them to his rhythm. He was aware of pain from the wound, discomfort in other areas, but the delicious pleasure dwarfed them.

He closed his eyes, shuddering, as it became suddenly urgent. He pushed down hard, deep, pinning her wrists, looking straight into her wide, helpless eyes as he buffeted her with his weight.

“It's coming,” he whispered hoarsely. “It's coming…!”

“Jon,” she cried out, arching. “Oh, Jon…!”

He ground down into her, clenching his teeth, driving for satisfaction, frantic for release. “I'm sorry, it's too quick…!”

“No…it's…not!” she bit off. She matched his rhythm with quick, sharp movements of her hips, shifting so that he was there, right there, right there…!

He heard her hoarse cry, followed by a moan so descriptive of what he was feeling that he moaned with her, shuddering with each penetration as the joy rose to such heights that he felt himself explode inside her.

He arched over her, his face contorted, shuddering, shuddering. He thought it would never end. He said so.

But finally, inevitably, his damp body collapsed on hers and they lay together, still intimately locked, intimately close, with their heartbeats shaking the bed.

He stretched, wincing, and lifted his head to look at her. “Joceline,” he whispered. “Why does this seem familiar?”

She hesitated. Her heart was still pounding, and she was too emotionally spent to guard her expression.

“I have had sex, haven't I?” he asked gently. “I had it with you.”

She swallowed, hard. She wanted to deny it, but he looked at her as if he already knew the truth. And he did. He was making mental notations, doing sums, finding answers to questions he'd never asked.

His lips parted on a rush of breath. “Markie. He's mine. He's my son!”

She bit down on her lower lip. “I didn't think you'd believe me, that anyone would believe me,” she whispered tearfully. “You didn't know me. I could have been after you for your wealth, your position…” She closed her eyes. “I didn't know what to do.”

“So you had my child, thinking I wouldn't want him or you.” He bent and crushed his mouth down on hers. “You fool,” he whispered. “You sweet little fool…oh, God!” he groaned as his movements brought the heat and urgency back. “I can't stop. I don't want to stop…!”

“It's all right,” she whispered, lifting to the harsh, deep
thrust of his body. “I don't, either.” She arched up to the mouth closing on her breasts with aching delight. “I love you…so much!”

It was like pulling a trigger. There was no stopping then. He groaned as he drove into her, drowning in the joy of being loved and wanted. His mouth ground into hers as the rhythm grew faster and more urgent.

“Dear…God, it's…like dying…!” he groaned hoarsely as he shuddered again and again. “So sweet!”

“Sweet,” she whispered. She moaned. Her body shivered under the driving thrusts. She wrapped her long legs around his hips and lifted, lifted, arched, dying to end the tension, to make it like it was before, to know utter ecstasy.

She cried out, sobbing, as the tension suddenly broke for them both and they lay straining together, shuddering, as the climax shook the bed.

He moved lazily afterward, his body teasing hers in a caress that was beyond her dreams of closeness.

“This is how it should have been, how it would have been, if I hadn't been drugged,” he said at her ear, his voice drowsy with satisfaction. “I would have loved you like this, slow and sweet, until you dug those short nails into my hips and bit me.” He laughed softly. “I didn't know women really did things like that. I thought it was fiction. When I heard you cry, the first time, I thought I was hurting you, until I looked down into your face.”

Her arms slid around his neck and she sighed with exhaustion. “I wanted you so much that night. It was really
sweet, most of it. Just at the last, you were out of control and I was very naive. It hurt, and there was no time afterward to do it again. I had to get you to the hospital. Then when I knew Markie was going to grow in my body, I had to make a decision.”

He lifted his head and looked at her. “You made the right one. He's a wonderful boy.” His eyes darkened. “My son.”

“Yes. Your son.” She smoothed back his long hair. “You don't have to marry me….”

He chuckled. “It will look better if we're married. I won't be able to stay out of your bed.”

She sighed as she looked into his eyes. Her own were bright with tears of joy.

He smoothed his cheek against hers. “Now we have to face unpleasant things,” he said quietly. He drew away from her, fascinated by the process of intimacy, more fascinated with how they both looked afterward. He smiled.

She flushed, gazing at him. That made his smile broader. He slid into his pajamas and pulled the sheet over her. She was looking decidedly embarrassed.

He sat down beside her. “We decided to bury my mother, Cammy, in Jacobsville,” he said. “But first we have to find a way to flush out the killer. He's going to pay for what he's done.”

“Some of those men you're paying must have been watching Harold Monroe since he made bail,” she said. “That's our starting point.”

He nodded. He brushed her hair away from her cheeks. He looked very possessive. “But first we have lunch. Then we go and pick up our son from school. I have things to tell him,” he added with a secretive smile.

Joceline smiled back. Even through the tragedy, she had the first hope of a happy future.

 

Jon and Kilraven went alone to the funeral home in Jacobsville to make the arrangements. There were two men in suits there, very official-looking, who went into one of the viewing rooms when the brothers came in.

The funeral home director seemed unsettled when they asked about making arrangements. He hesitated, smiled with a little embarrassment, showed them into his office and then left for a minute.

The door was open. The brothers noted that he went into the same room where the men in suits had gone. He was back in a minute.

“Yes, now where were we?” he asked as he sat down at his desk and pulled up a file on the computer. “Yes, the funeral. You do realize that your mother requested a closed casket and that she wanted no one, especially her sons, to view her?” he asked solemnly.

That was news to both of them. They said so.

“How do you know that?” Kilraven asked suspiciously.

The funeral home director, Mr. Adams, flushed. He looked back at the screen. “She came to see me earlier in the week,” he said quickly. “She had a premonition, she
said.” He glanced at them. “She made the arrangements herself.”

Kilraven looked at Jon. The funeral home director was oddly stiff. “Well, she had these moods,” Kilraven said at last, and the director relaxed visibly. “I guess it makes sense.”

“She wouldn't want people staring at her,” Jon said quietly. “I'd feel like that, too. It's okay. I understand,” he told the director.

“So do I,” Kilraven added. “We'll need to contact her minister and we'll need pallbearers…”

“We'll have no end of offers from both our agencies,” Jon reminded his brother. “Not a problem.”

“We'll contact her minister,” the director offered, “and take care of all the other arrangements. You'd like an arrangement for the casket?”

“Yes.”

“I'll call the florist,” the director added.

“Have you had any calls about Cammy?” Jon asked suddenly.

“In fact, we have,” he replied. “Several newspapers, a television journalist and some man who never identified himself,” he said, reading notes he'd made on the computer. “I thought it was very odd.”

“No chance you recorded it.” Jon sighed.

The man cleared his throat. “Well, we've never had any need to,” he began.

“Of course not,” Kilraven agreed.

The director outlined the service and they set a date for the funeral and arranged with a company to open the gravesite Cammy had already paid for in a memorial garden in, of all places, Jacobsville. The brothers had wanted to bury her there, but she'd already anticipated it and bought a plot. They smiled at her efficiency, through the sorrow.

 

Jon had supper with Joceline and Markie. He was sad about Cammy, and it showed. He was going back into work the next day, despite the protests from everybody.

“I'm perfectly able to work,” he argued.

Joceline glowered at him. “You're just out of the hospital and your mother has been…”

“Yes, I know,” he said, intercepting the word before it could upset him. “But life goes on. You have to come in, too.” He smiled at Markie. “Not you, I'm afraid,” he said with a smile. “You'll have school.”

Markie sighed. “Okay, Dad,” he said.

Jon actually flushed when he heard the word. “That sounds very nice,” he said gently.

Markie grinned. “My daddy works for the FBI. The other kids are going to be soooo jealous!”

Jon and Joceline both laughed.

“Another thing we have to plan is a wedding, and quickly,” Jon added.

“Can I be the flower boy?” Markie asked.

They burst out laughing again.

“No, but you can carry the rings. How about that?” Jon asked.

“That would be okay, I guess,” he said, and dug into his spaghetti.

 

Jon was uneasy. He'd been so full of grief, and too fascinated with Joceline and his new status as Markie's father, to start to make sense of all that had happened. But now he was trying to put all the pieces of the puzzle together.

Jay Copper had said that he sent his nephew Peppy to help Dan Jones murder McKuen's first wife, Monica, and their daughter, Melly. But Peppy, alias Bart Hancock, had escaped the charges, thanks to a missing tape and only hearsay evidence to carry to court. Hearsay, especially from the family of the deceased, would not convince a jury of guilt.

Subsequently, Jon had arrested Harold Monroe for human trafficking and the less-than-brilliant career criminal had managed to have the charge dismissed thanks to the retraction of the charge by the main witness. Joceline's apartment had been broken into. A file involving Bart Hancock had gone missing. Jon had been shot.

Then a witness had come forward who'd been planted in Monroe's cell during his confinement awaiting trial on the trafficking charges. The inmate was wired. He gave evidence that Monroe had bragged about helping to kill three-year-old Melly Kilraven and had even told the inmate the location of the hidden shotgun that he'd used on her. That had led to his rearrest on a murder charge.
Incredibly, he was allowed bail at the hearing and soon after, Cammy Blackhawk had been murdered.

But there was something wrong here. Joceline had mentioned it. How had anyone known that she'd taken the file home? How did someone know where Cammy Blackhawk would be so that he could kill her? How had Harold Monroe, of all people, managed to pull off Jon's shooting, Cammy's shooting and, further back in time, the murder of Kilraven's wife and child? The man could barely talk on the phone and think at the same time.

Jay Copper's sister, Bart Hancock's mother, had committed suicide when she was told that her brother and her son had been implicated in the murder of a child. Bart Hancock had been charged with the murder of children in Iraq years before, but was never brought to trial. Harold Monroe was notorious for fumbling whatever crime he attempted. He was always being rescued by his vicious uncle.