Page 83 of Everything We Found

Thomas wasn’t harboring any illusions about his fate. He wasn’t walking into an exchange. The Hidalgos would kill him, just like Phil. But with any luck, they’d release Claire so that James’s boys wouldn’t lose their grandmother after all they’d already lost. With any luck, his sacrifice would satisfy Ruiz’s thirst for revenge on the Donato family. James would live in peace, never fearing for his life or those of his family again.

With one last look at Nadia, Thomas left the room, silently closing her door behind him. He slipped outside to Cammy’s old truck, using the key he’d found in the kitchen moments ago so Nadia could have the Ford and a way to get home when this was over. The engine turned over with a reluctant growl that had him glancing over at the house, waiting for a light to turn on, worried he’d woken them up. But the house remained dark and he pulled away from the ranch, leaving the headlights off. Moonlight guided him down the long drive.

Thomas turned onto the main road, the truck rumbling over the pavement, carrying him toward coordinates that would lead to his death. But for the first time in days, he felt a sense of peace. His path was clear. The waiting was finally over.

26

THOMAS

EIGHT YEARS AGO

Thomas stood at the base of the staircase to James’s studio, nursing the worst hangover in distant memory. He drank himself into a stupor after Aimee had left the bar, and he hadn’t slept in almost thirty-six hours. Confessing to Aimee some of what he’d done, at least the parts that had affected her where James was concerned, had come with a certain amount of relief. It was out in the open, at least among their circle of friends.

Now came the hard part.

Thomas climbed the stairs and reached for the door only to hesitate. James was in there, or so Imelda had told him when he’d asked where he could find him. Ironic how he’d threatened her to never call him anything but Carlos but he hadn’t been able to stop thinking of him as James.

A breeze inside the studio fluttered the papers taped to the window. They looked to be finger paintings, and he caught the name of one of them. Julian Dominguez. James’s adopted son. Bright yellow, five-pointed stars stood out against a dark blue sky. Oddly, the painting reminded him of the telescope he’d gifted James for his ninth birthday. He’d been as fascinatedwith the night sky then as he was with painting now. Edgar had destroyed that telescope. It hadn’t been intentional. Rather, it had been the closest thing available for Edgar to use to smash his and Claire’s own wedding china. That year hadn’t been a good one for their family. Phil’s true parentage had been exposed and the humiliation often sent Edgar into fits of rage. Thomas saved his money and bought James another telescope. But it hadn’t been James’s utter devastation upon discovering their dad had broken the telescope and refused to replace it that had compelled Thomas to fix what their dad had destroyed. It had been James’s quiet resignation and unsettling impassivity about the whole situation. He’d just accepted it as normal because that hadn’t been the first time Edgar had taken his anger out on either of them or their things. It hadn’t been the last either. And everything about any of those instances had been so wrong.

He guessed that was his downfall when it came to James. He’d think of that emotionless little boy and a fierce protectiveness rose inside him like a red tide.

“Arrrgghhhhh!!!”

A loud, anguished bellow came from inside the studio, followed by a crash. Then another crash. Thomas threw open the door and hurried to the back room just in time to witness James destroy one of the canvases Thomas had shipped here from California, and he couldn’t move. He’d only seen James once in the hospital when Kane had brought him to him, and a few times since from afar. But never close up, not since his face had been reconstructed. He hadn’t spoken to him either. He never met his wife, or his nephews. And he was speechless.

James was different, but the same. But different. James became Carlos became James, and back and forth and back again, his mind trying to make sense of the man he was seeing.

James lunged for another canvas, snapping him out of his stupor.

“James!” Thomas roared.

He whirled around, teeth bared. He glared at Thomas in the doorway. They were both breathless.

“Don’t destroy your paintings. You’ll regret it, James.”

“That’s not my name. I’m not him.”

He was right. The man before him wasn’t his brother. He didn’t look like him and wasn’t acting like him. Thomas had known he wouldn’t be the man he remembered. He’d accepted that. But remembering someone as one person and finding them as another tends to throw one off-balance. No wonder his head was spinning.

“Fine. Carlos. I don’t care what name you go by. You’re still my brother.”

James stabbed a finger in the air and crossed the small room to him. “You’re no brother of mine.”

The room exploded in white-hot pain, Thomas’s head snapping to the left. A bone-jarring ache reverberated through his skull, his teeth slamming together with an audible click. He staggered back a few steps, grabbing at the door casing before he fell on his ass.

James and his left hook. He hadn’t seen that coming.

Thomas pressed fingers to his chin and worked his jaw. A metallic tang filled his mouth. “Damn. Guess I deserved that.”

Color creeped up James’s neck and into his ears. His nose scrunched up, the bridge wrinkling, his nostrils slightly flaring. He pointed at the entrance behind him. “Get out.”

Turning back to the room, he picked a canvas off the floor, the wooden frame damaged, and tossed the ruined painting on the table.

Thomas wasn’t one to be easily dismissed. And neither were the Hidalgos. James needed to understand how serious his situation was. He needed to lie low. But the DEA was breathing down Thomas’s neck. They wanted to know what Jamesremembered about the Hidalgos. What exactly had they and Phil done to him and where?

He entered the room, edging the table, and stopped opposite him. “We need to talk.”

James sneered at him. “No, we don’t. I’ve heard all I can take from Imelda and Aimee.”