Page 53 of Jericho

"I would too," I quickly agree, cutting off her words because I don't want to think about the future pain the man might cause her. What he's done to her already is enough to last a lifetime. "Know that I would lay down my own life to save that of our son, Peach. No questions asked. If that's what Damien wanted, I'd gladly expose my neck for his sword."

I mean every fucking word.

"Maybe if I—"

"No," I say, stopping her again.

I know she wants to bargain. She wants to be able to barter with the man, but there's no way this ends other than with Damien's death.

"I can handle whatever he has planned for me, and it was working. Eli was safe, and it didn't matter how many slaps to the face it took."

I pull her tighter to my chest, resting my chin on the top of her head as she sobs.

I can't guarantee Eli is safe, especially not after finding two shallow graves with dead children in them. The man is capable of anything, and it's possible that our son was gone the day after his last visit with her, as much as it pains me to consider it.

She wasn't keeping him safe because Damien doesn't work that way. It's his way a hundred percent of the time. If Ivan Reese ordered me to be maimed but left alive, he would've slit my throat that night. I'm only alive because Ivan wanted me dead, and I can't help but think that the pain Aspen would feel for losing her son is the reason Damien would do it. He's poison, a cancer that digs in deep and eats away at the very soul of a person, and the way he does that is by hurting the people they love and sparing the ones they hate. Whatever causes the most pain and heartache is what he picks, and that is incredibly bad news for Eli.

"The teams are going back and looking at the places they've searched. They want to see if they missed anything," I explain.

"Graves you mean. They're looking for more graves."

I wish I could tell her that isn't accurate, but lying to her won’t help the situation.

Before I can think of a way to explain it better, my phone vibrates in my pocket. She moves off my lap quickly, her hand automatically going to her mouth as I pull my phone out.

"Yeah," I snap into the phone, my eyes locked on her.

She looks like a caged animal, ready to either hightail it out of here or claw the eyes out of anyone who gets in her way.

"We found something," Hemlock says. "Come back downstairs."

The phone call ends without another word, but I can tell by the tone of his voice that whatever it is isn't good news. The only thing I can breathe a breath of relief over is the fact that he didn't come up here and speak to us in person. That tells me that it may be bad news he has to deliver, but it isn't the worst news it could be.

"They need us back downstairs," I say, standing and reaching out for her hand.

She looks down at the thing as if it will only cause her pain. I can't blame her for the reaction, but living with her head in the sand and refusing to know the truth won't ease anything inside of her either.

After a long moment, she places her hand in mine, and I take one more second to pull her to my body and wrap her in a hug.

We head downstairs and right back into the conference room.

No one speaks until we're inside with the doors closed at our backs, and I know part of that is because of Zara and Cora. Hemlock and Ace want to protect them from this dark part of life as much as they can, while also telling them enough to keep them aware of their surroundings. There's no sense in anyone losing sleep over the shit they can't get out of their heads if it can be helped.

"We found this on the dark web," Casper says. "He must've known we would be looking for it."

The massive television at the front of the room comes to life, and a whimper escapes Aspen's lips at the sight of Eli sitting there tied to a chair as if he's a prisoner of war. I guess, in a way, he sort of is.

This is the first time I'm seeing my son other than a few pictures the guys were able to scrape up online. It's not uncommon for people in certain illegal enterprises to keep all their kids off social media. It's one of the things that keeps them safe. I honestly wish so many others would do the same. It's insane how many regular pictures of children are scraped from the internet and put on the dark web for some of the vilest of reasons.

"He looks terrified," Aspen says with a sob, and I pull my hand from hers and wrap my arm fully around her shoulder.

"But he's alive," I assure her as relief washes over me.

The sight of him scared answers that question I had in the back of my mind, but I don't know how old the video is.

"We've determined that this video was taken just over two hours ago," Casper says as if he can read my mind.

"Is this what you want?"Damien asks as he stumbles toward our son with a gun in his hand.

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