Page 62 of The Devil's Ice

Briley and her oldest, closest friend Cheryl Finnegan were sitting at the table, cups of untouched and cooling coffee sitting in front of them. The women looked up and over as the men entered, then Cheryl glanced over at Briley, who was staring back into her cup as if the answer to the universe was written in there.

“You want me to step out?” Cheryl asked quietly. “Give you guys a minute alone?”

Briley didn’t answer or even look up, but Cheryl got to her feet anyway. Briley had barely spoken for days now, and Cheryl wasn’t totally convinced it was because of the sedatives that the doctor had her on; as far as she knew, Briley had cut way back on them, and now she was just naturally numb. Blank and broken, her green eyes listless and lifeless.

Cheryl had seen her friend go through hell, and been scorched and scarred as she’d escaped it, but she’d never seen Briley look anything likethis. This woman looked, and moved, and spoke, like a total stranger. She was a wrecked shell of the woman she used to be, scooped out and hollow.

In some ways, it scared Cheryl worse than Hannah and Joe being missing in the first place. She knew that if those babies didn’t come back to her, Briley was going to be lost forever, just wandering in this half-living half-life, just waiting for death to take her. She wasn’t going to recover – Cheryl was absolutely sure of it.

“Nah, sweetheart,” Drake said now, and Cheryl knew that he was talking to her. She was ‘sweetheart’, while Briley was either ‘babe’ or ‘darlin’’, depending on which brother was speaking to her. “You can stay. Please.”

She nodded, returned to her chair, resumed clutching the cold coffee in her hand.

“Babe?” Dux said gently. “We’re going to the airport now.”

“We’ll call when we land in Wyoming,” Drake said. “Let you know that we’re safe.”

“And if you need us, you call anytime.” Dux moved closer, trying to get Briley to look at him. “If we don’t answer, then it’s because we have our phones off, because we’re –”

He broke off, suddenly unsure how to finish that sentence. ‘Because we’re in the middle of killing the fucker who took our kids’? ‘Because we’re taking gunfire and can’t quite get to the phone?’ ‘Because we’re dead’?

“Because we’re a bit busy,” Drake finished for him. “But we’ll call you back just as soon as we can, so don’t you worry.”

She said nothing, didn’t even act as if she heard them speaking to her. Cheryl and the men exchanged loaded, worried glances, then Drake stepped forward. He reached for Briley’s hand – in super-slow-motion, like he was approaching a skittish horse or a cowering puppy – and he picked it up. She made no resistance, but she didn’t respond either.

“Darlin’,” he said, and Cheryl could hear the pure love in those two syllables. “Do you understand where we’re going, and what we’re doing?”

There was no answer, and now Dux came and took her other hand. It was slack and lifeless, but he didn’t show how much that bothered him. Instead, he ran his thumb over her fingers, back and forth.

“We love you, babe,” Dux said. “We’ll call as soon as we land.”

“Love you,” his brother echoed. “We’ll be back soon.”

Both men gave Briley soft, sweet kisses on the top of her head, then as one, they turned back to the kitchen door. They’d taken three steps when they heard her voice behind them:

“You bring our babies home.”

Dux and Drake whirled around to look at her, and were stunned to see that she was staring directly at them, those amazing eyes awake and aware, as sharp as a laser beam. Her voice was raspy from lack of use, but the venom and rage came through as clear as a bell.

“I don’t care what you have to do to make that happen,” Briley said, her lips gray. “You torture and maim and killeveryonethat you have to,anyonewho stands between you and Hannah and Joe. You – youhaveto bring them home.Please. Promise me.”

Right away, both men were on their knees in front of her, catching the tears as they slid down her pale cheeks. They murmured to her that they would do whatever it took, to whoever it took, and they promised to bring their children home.

When they finally walked out the door ten minutes later, they hoped with everything that they had that they were able to keep that promise.

They were deathly afraid that if they didn’t, Briley wasn’tevergoing to be able to forgive them.

And they wouldn’t forgive themselves.

**

Clarice ‘Honey’ Potts heard a vehicle pull up and she pulled her gun before she even glanced out of the kitchen window. When she saw the black SUV, her muscles loosened marginally, but it wasn’t until she saw Tom‘Tank’Devereuxthat she fully relaxed and returned the gun to its holster.

“They’re here,” she said to Zoe and Keira, now eyeing the tiny blonde woman with the neck brace being helped out of the SUV by her hulking King’s Men partner. “I see them both.”

“Yay!” Keira squealed, almost upending her cereal bowl in her excitement to get to her feet. “Vixen!”

“Hey, now,” her mother admonished her. “No jumping on her, OK? You remember?”

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