“Mom, I—”
“Shh.” She pressed her fingers against his mouth, refusing to hear his protest. Right. He was the leader of the family now. Man, were they screwed. “Just…remind them to keep their wits about them. And to watch their backs.”
His eyes settled on a strand of gray hair that had fallen over her cheek. The gray hadn’t been there the last time he’d seen her. The woman who’d been the Rock of Gibraltar for them throughout their lives was more vulnerable, more fragile than Edward had ever imagined. An inevitable sense of resignation—that call to duty that he’d tried to drink into a coma—awoke inside him. It was grouchy and unsure—and maybe even a bit afraid to take on the world again—but his mother’s need had reawakened it.
Reaching out, Edward brushed the gray hair off her cheek and tucked it beneath the rich dark hair at her temple. “I’ll talk to them. I’ll help them however I can.”
She blinked away another bout of tears and nodded her thanks. “And one more thing?” Why not? “I don’t have your father’s badge.”
Edward tried to follow her unexpected tangent. Had it been buried with him? Did she want it back? Or had it simply been misplaced? “Where is it?” She shrugged. Okay. Not misplaced. “I’m sure the commissioner would issue a memorial copy—”
“No. You don’t understand.” Susan tugged at the front of Edward’s coat, then quickly smoothed it back into place. “I want the badge he carried with him as a detective and deputy commissioner for all these years. It was never recovered from the crime scene. I don’t know if it was lost during the struggle in the park when they kidnapped him from his morning run, or if one of those murderers kept it as some kind of souvenir.”
Edward reached for his cane, certain that she was asking the wrong son for this favor. “Like I said, I haven’t been a cop for a while. Sawyer or Atticus could—”
“Edward. Please.” Her brown eyes darkened with her plea.
A muscle twitched beneath the scar on his jaw. He’d barely gotten himself to the cemetery. He’d already agreed to talking some cautionary sense into his brothers. He wasn’t equipped to ask questions or search for clues or go anywhere near a police investigation—not when the consequences for getting involved were so high.
“I can’t have the man I love anymore. But he was truly one of Kansas City’s finest for thirty-six years. He left the military and became a police officer the year I found out I was pregnant with you. That badge represents the best years of our lives together. All that he did for this city, the man he was, the sons we raised. It represents so much more than just his job to me. Does that make any sense?”
He’d packed away everything that represented his wife and child when he’d lost them. But one thing he’d taken to heart from those first few sessions with his trauma counselor—every person grieved in his or her own way. While he wanted to erase every painful reminder of loss from his life, his mother wanted to cling to the memories. Edward understood what she was asking of him. He understood that he was asking it of himself as well, though he couldn’t be sure how he was going to make it happen, or when, or what it might cost him.
“I want your father’s badge. If it takes two days or two years or forever to track it down, I want it back.”
“Okay.” That single word hurt—down deep in his soul. Even though this assignment was an unofficial one, he was going to be a cop again.
“Okay? You’ll do that for me?”
Edward wasn’t in any kind of shape to be making promises to anybody. But he made this one to his mother.
“I’ll do it.”
Chapter Two
December
With eight months of hard-fought sobriety inside him to filter his thoughts, Edward managed to keep a wiseacre response to himself as the teen with the bright smile behind the cash register chirped, “Merry Christmas!” and handed him his bags of groceries.
“Thank you for shopping with us, sir,” the girl went on, either genuinely caught up in the goodwill of the season or intent in her desire to impress her supervisor. Said supervisor, sporting a bit more weariness to his frozen smile, was pacing the bustling check-out lines, ensuring every customer had a positive shopping experience and would return to buy holiday turkeys and hams and whatever last-minute presents they might need in the upcoming two weeks.
At the girl’s tender age, Edward suspected it was the former. He tucked his billfold into the back pocket of his jeans and unhooked his cane from the edge of the counter before grabbing the two plastic bags. He sincerely hoped the young cashier would be way past his thirty-five years of age before learning to hate the cheer and dazzle and social expectations of the holidays as much as he did.
The economy might thrive on the holiday season. A few Pollyannas might. But Edward Kincaid did not.
For him, Christmas meant violence and loss and a lifetime of happiness and purpose he might never find again.
“Merry Christmas, sir.” The supervisor’s greeting echoed the cashier’s as Edward limped past.
His memory played a sweet lispy voice inside his head. “Merry Christmas, Daddy. Did you get my bike?”
“I did. A purple one. Merry Christmas, baby.”
He blinked, as if a physical jerk could shut off the nightmare of those last few moments of his daughter’s life. If he never said those words again, it would be too soon.
Clamping down on the bile of regret that rose in his throat, Edward acknowledged the man with a nod and walked out the sliding door, turning his face to the biting wind of a Missouri winter. He relished the icy crystals in the air, stinging his face and neck. Winter had come early to Kansas City this year. Snow had been on the ground for three weeks now, long enough to pack into drifts against buildings and trees and for grading salt and traffic to coat the pavement with a slick, slushy glop. The moisture beading on his charcoal sweater and the unzipped black coat he wore indicated another layer of this snowy mess was on the way. The dropping temperature that seemed to settle in his mended joints confirmed it.
Edward plunged the tip of his cane into the slush beside the curb, feeling even that tiny step down like the jab of a pin in his right ankle and knee. The twinges in his rebuilt body were tolerable most days. According to the doctors who’d stitched him back together, he was as healed as he was going to get. Now it was just a matter of building strength and continuing with his physical therapy exercises to maintain flexibility. His youngest brother, Holden, had insisted on giving him his weight-training set when he’d upgraded to newer equipment. Months of PT had made Edward fit. Dragging himself to the weight bench every time the need for a drink tried to take hold was getting him back into fighting shape. With the idea in mind that he’d wind up an arthritic old man before his time if he didn’t keep moving, Edward stretched his legs out to lengthen his stride and crossed the parking lot to his black SUV.
He’d just tossed the grocery sacks into the back seat of the Grand Cherokee when the cell phone on his belt hummed with an incoming call. He climbed in behind the wheel, tossed his cane over to the passenger side and started the vehicle’s powerful engine before unclipping the phone and checking the number. It was his youngest brother, Holden.
Edward cranked the defroster and opened the phone with a grin. “What do you want?”
“Bah, humbug to you, too.” Holden’s deep-pitched voice was laced with equal parts teasing and reprimand. “Where are you?”
Watching the first crystalline flakes dot his windshield and then melt away, Edward arched a dark brow with knowing sarcasm. Baby Bro wanted something. “I’m sitting in the grocery store parking lot, trying to get comfortable in my new car. You know, I had my old Jeep all broken in before