Page 76 of Ransom for His Secret Son

“Boss, you want to ask him anything before I take him to the station?” Harlan called out.

Brody looked at his deputy motioning toward Zeke who was now secured in the back seat of the cruiser. Despite the bone-weary fatigue from the spent adrenaline, Brody did indeed have some questions, and he and Remi made their way over.

“I’ve Mirandized him,” Harlan volunteered, stepping to the side.

“Good, thanks,” Brody said, and he aimed a cold, hard stare at Zeke. He didn’t bother to tone down any of the hatred and disgust he felt for this man.

“I want names of anyone who helped you and Eloise,” Brody demanded.

He expected Zeke to try to stonewall him. He didn’t. The man kept his blank stare in the direction of Eloise’s body. “Lila Montgomery,” he muttered. “And Dr. Theodore Watkins.”

Brody knew the first name, of course. She was the dead nurse. But this was the first time he was hearing the doctor’s name. He gave a nod to Harlan, who was already taking out his phone, no doubt to try to track him down.

“Is Watkins the one who stole the embryos and used a surrogate to have my sons?” Brody asked.

Zeke nodded. “Eloise met him in her survivors’ support group. The doctor owed money to the wrong people, so Eloise got him to work for her.”

Work. That word riled Brody to the core. Because that work had ultimately put a whole bunch of people, including his sons, in danger.

“Who else helped?” Brody snapped.

Zeke shook his head. “The woman who hired the surrogate. Not sure who she was. Just someone Eloise found. She found the doctor, too, and I took care of him. As for the rest of it, Eloise and I did all of it.”

Hell, that word all enraged him too, and that’s when Brody knew he had to take a step back. Remi must have sensed his bubbling anger as well because she caught his hand in hers for a moment.

“Joe and Daniel are safe,” she whispered to him.

He needed that reminder. Needed it bad. And Brody got a flash of a different kind of memory. Not of the nightmare but of his sons sleeping in their crib.

Remi was part of that memory. Right there at the crib beside him. And he suddenly wanted them to re-create that.

“I need to go home for a while,” he told Harlan.

“Yeah, you should,” Harlan agreed. “I’ll handle anything that needs wrapping up here.”

Brody thanked him, and he and Remi stepped away, heading toward his cruiser. They didn’t make it far, though, because Christina approached them. She looked just as shocked as them, her eyes scanning the carnage around them. For all her ruthlessness, she was still human, still capable of being rattled by the kind of violence she’d just witnessed.

She stopped in front of them, taking a long breath before speaking. “I don’t even know what to say,” she admitted. “You got justice for my sister.”

Brody studied her, trying to gauge if there was anything more behind her words. She’d wanted Tarrant dead, but she hadn’t been willing to go as far as Eloise.

“I had no idea what Eloise was up to,” Christina added, shaking her head. “I knew she was desperate, but I didn’t think she’d go that far.”

Brody and Remi exchanged a glance. They believed her. Christina was ruthless in her own right, but she played by a different set of rules. Added to that, the stakes were higher for her than Eloise, since Christina had a child to raise.

Christina blew out a hard breath, looking toward Tarrant’s body, now covered by a tarp as the crime-scene techs worked. “I’m glad he’s dead. And Langley…I hope they throw him in a hole and never let him out.”

“He’ll be in jail for a long time,” Brody assured her. “The charges against him are stacking up fast. He’s the one who helped Tarrant steal Grace’s embryo. That alone will put him away for a long time, not to mention his part in covering for Tarrant after he killed your sister. That makes him accessory after the fact to murder.”

Christina nodded, her lips pressing together. “Good.” She looked at Brody and Remi again. “I owe you both a thank-you.” She didn’t wait for a response. She gave them a small nod and turned, walking back toward Jolene.

Brody scanned the scene one last time before turning to Remi. “We need to get out of here before anyone else stalls us.”

She nodded without a shred of hesitation. “Agreed.”

They didn’t waste any more time. They walked to the cruiser, and Brody climbed into the driver’s seat while Remi got in beside him.

Navigating out of the chaos was a challenge. The scene was packed with vehicles: Eloise’s, Christina’s, Langley’s and those of the responders. The CSIs had sent out not one but two vans, and they were squeezed in next to the ME’s. Brody had to thread his way through the mess, but he finally got out on the road.