“Who needs to go back? Go ahead, to something better. No one fights like that if they don’t care.”
She bit on her lip as she looked over his face, smirking some. “How’d you get so smart about relationships? You’ve never even had one. No offense.”
“Maybe that’s why. Once you’re in one, from what I’ve seen, it can make a person stupid.”
Stacy hugged him, gently, so she wouldn’t hurt his ribs. They went back into the kitchen together and she surprised them all as she said to Charlie, “I’m really sorry I kicked you. It was childish and out of line. If you want to press charges, I understand.”
After his mouth hung open for a full minute, Charlie grumbled, “You know I’m not going to do that.”
Her humbleness was disconcerting. Steve winked at Matt, who gave him a smile back, but that was gone quickly as Charlie was in a rush to change the subject. “Give me the rundown. How do we bust these people?”
“Calm down about busting them, Charlie. The last thing we need is for you guys to barrel in and create havoc on innocent people when the perpetrators are few,” Steve warned. “He’s got a little help inside, but we have got to be careful. There are good people in there, people that don’t know anything about what the leaders have been doing.”
Stacy and Steve gave him the details Matt had given them. He was thankful for that, knowing he couldn’t do it again. Every time he repeated the story, a part of him curled up, wanting to die. Not that he would allow himself that. He couldn’t give up, not with so many he loved at stake.
Charlie looked right at him once he’d heard it all, giving, “You’re a brave man, Mr. Whitehouse.”
“Matt, and not brave.”
Stacy argued, “Brave, good, and one of the few good men I’ve met in my life.” She realized how that sounded, but instead of retracting any of it, her lashes lay over her cheeks before her head lowered.
“We know what you meant, Stacy,” Steve soothed.
When Charlie squirmed in his chair, it was obvious he knew too. Trying to push through the awkwardness, he asked Matt, “Can you, as closely as you can, make a map for us of the compound? A detailed map, each home, where the leaders are who are guilty, that you’re sure of, other families, community buildings, all of it?”
“I’ve lived there all my life, I can draw it with my eyes closed. Why, though? I can take you where you need to go.”
“You’re not going anywhere near there,” Stacy told him, her voice like a mother’s, setting down the law. While he appreciated that she cared, he wouldn’t be told what to do by anyone again.
“Sorry, but I’m not sitting here while strangers try to go in and get whatever it is you’re after. I know where the men’s lounge is. I can take you there.”
He saw all of them looking at each other, like he was too stupid to read their thoughts all over their faces. Still, he waited.
Stacy was, of course, the one who pushed it. “You’re not healthy enough, honey. Your ribs are broken, you have head trauma. Even if they didn’t find you and beat you again, or worse, any fall or bump or anything could hurt you more, to the point you couldn’t help us at all.”
Charlie went next. “I know I probably made you nervous, but I swear, the wellbeing of all of them are our top priority.”
Then, the truth, from the one he was counting on more and more for exactly that. Steve huffed, “You both need to stop. He needs to know that if he goes in right now, he’ll be a liability. He’ll slow you down, maybe get you all caught.”
Matt could understand that. That, the truth, he could deal with. “For now, I just need to talk to Aaron. If I can find him, he can tell me when the next girl is going to get married out of the compound.”
Shaking his head, Charlie hissed, “Son of a bitch. That and marrying them, legally. I can’t believe they do that.”
“Makes sense. We told them how to do it, the federal agencies,” reasoned Steve, pointing to the two of them, then himself. “Raiding places like that, like Waco, Ruby Ridge, we gave them a step by step instructions on what not to do.”
Perking, like he thought of something, Matt watched as Charlie struggled to find his question. “Now, you said something about meeting up with your stepbrother, who was banished or whatever. Yet, you said no one was allowed off the compound much. How’d you do it?”
Matt relaxed, the question easy to answer. “Oh, well, I started out just sneaking off. There’s a place to get out, though it’s watched. Everyplace is watched pretty heavily, the goons and police monitor each road out and, of course, those roads come in too. The thing they don’t count on is someone wanting to get in or out enough to walk a few miles to another road they don’t monitor. I’d sneak off the compound and walk to that road, meet Dean.
“Then, like Dean told me to do, instead of avoiding my Daddy, I started sucking up to him. Pretending to want to work hard so I could be considered for marriage, to get my first wife. I wanted extra duty. Daddy only gives his most trusted people outside jobs, ones leaving the compound. I convinced him that I was the one to do it, show him how his family is always the family to look to. He was convinced easy, so I started being able to leave for day jobs, then overnights.”
“What are those jobs?” Stacy was fearful as she stared at him. Matt knew what she thought.
“No, not the girls. He and a very few others are involved with that. The men who have daughters, who are goons and in his close circle, those men keep their daughters in the compound. They marry men in the compound. The others? They’re fair game. I’d be fair game for a while, unless I worked up to be in one of those groups.”
Charlie was livid. His face red as he asked with awe, “The other men don’t wonder where the fuck their kids are being sent?”
“Yeah, a few have, but the goons pay them a visit, or they’re threatened with losing their wives and other kids and they shut up.”
Scooting his chair back with a screech of wood against tile, Charlie was up, pacing in a fume. Steve reached for Matt’s hand again, assuring, “It’s not you, it’s what they’re doing. Charlie takes injustice and crime personally.”
Matt figured that, but it was Stacy’s reaction that got to him. Stacy was watching Charlie, her admiration obvious. No matter what she’d said, Matt saw that they could very well mend the deep rift they had separating them.
Suddenly, Charlie stopped and rushed back to the table, slamming his hands down on it, making the three of them jump. “They’ll need someone else to do your job now!”
Seeing what he meant, Matt grew excited. “That’s true! If Aaron would take that job…”
“Is there any way to get word to him? Phone, mail, anything?”
They weren’t allowed outside mail unless it went through the office first. No one was allowed phones except for a select few. That wasn’t needed, though. “When we needed to meet, there was a spot that we’d leave word. Same place we went in and out of the compound. I can leave a note there that would take him to a phone we can leave for him. We’d have to watch out that no one else found the note or the phone, but that is the only way.”
“With you not dead, as he hoped, he’ll be more guarded than ever,” Steve reasoned.
Charlie pointed to him and said, “We have a drone. A stealth drone with arms. Very state-of-the-art. I can get it on loan for maybe a day. If we can leave a phone, then we’ve got an in.”
Matt was relieved for the first time, knowing how simple that could be. “When Dean and I started this, we had two spots. The rock I talked about, that’s not only where we’d meet. It’s where we’d leave notes for each other. There’s another spot, not more than a mile from there where we could leave the phone. If we can fly the drone to the rock, we can leave a note for him to get to the phone that we can leave in the other spot.”
Stacy smiled over at him, in awe. “You guys would be great in the CIA.”
“I know some people, I can get you in.”
Steve defended, “Leave him alone. T
hat’s all he needs, being a fed. He hasn’t been through enough?”
They laughed, but Matt didn’t. He was thinking how amazing it would be to have a job that helped so many people. Steve saw he wasn’t joining in the humor and leaned in to whisper to him, “Not that you wouldn’t be great at it.”
His breath on Matt’s cheek, his closeness, and he smelled so good. Matt was finding himself more attracted to Steve by the minute, but it wasn’t the time. He turned to him, and they were so close, but he simply said, “Thanks.”
Charlie was on the phone, arranging for the drone, and Stacy begged Steve, “I’m starving, but I hate to ask you to cook again. I can run for takeout, if you’d like.”
“It’s the mountain air. You’ll find your appetite off the charts. I don’t mind cooking at all. In fact, I love it. What would everyone like? I have a nice roast, but that would take time to defrost. I could also do omelets.”
“Denver omelets?” Charlie asked, then licked his lips in anticipation.
“Sure, Charlie.”
As Steve got up to cook, Stacy offering to chop the vegetables, Matt told Charlie, “Thanks for coming. If we find proof, you can stop them, right?”
“If we find proof, not only can I stop them, but it will be a pleasure to. I hate people that think women are toys or property they can sell or rent out. I had a friend that was a vice cop, and he told me stories that made me, an FBI agent, want to puke. Man is his own worst enemy, Matt, but then…” he started, casting a glance over his shoulder. “There are good people.”
Matt kept his voice low, needing to understand, though, kept him from holding back the question entirely. “Why did you let her go? I know it’s none of my business, and I don’t know her well. She just…she’s special.”
The way he couldn’t meet Matt’s eyes, the way he started picking on his cuticles, Matt knew the question had been hard, but it was something he’d asked himself probably many times. “My career means a lot to me, Matt, and being younger, idealistic, I thought I was doing the right thing, and I did, in one way. The more time that passes, though, and not meeting anyone else that comes close to her…”
He couldn’t help thinking of Steve as he said, “Dreams are important, but having someone that you can love, that’s a lot of people’s dream. One that doesn’t come true most of the time.”
“Never thought of that at the time. I kept thinking she’d come around, but she wanted me to. She’s more beautiful than I remembered.”
Stacy was glancing at them as she chopped, and Matt was afraid she’d cut off a finger. He ended the whispered discussion with, “I don’t think she’d kill you if you wanted another chance, but then again, she might.”
His grin was wide and filled with memories. “Might be worth a try either way.”
After dinner, Charlie told them he’d made all the arrangements. Matt was still worried about Dean, so Steve offered to take him around to the places Matt knew Dean frequented. Stacy wanted to come along, but Matt begged off, pretending to want time alone with Steve, which had her brows wagging. “I thought I saw a spark.”
“He’s just nice to talk to.”
“Sure, sure. Have fun but stay out of sight. Those assholes might be looking for you.”
Steve had that handled, bringing out a baseball cap for him, black and unadorned with any team symbol. He also had a pair of sunglasses, though they’d be out at night. “They’re light, so you’ll be able to see. If I ride around with someone with bruises, people will think I beat you up, and I’d never want anyone to think that.”
There was more to his words, Matt could tell, but he wasn’t one that was savvy about reading between the lines. Matt couldn’t figure out a lot about Steve, except he was terribly sweet, and a little shy, it seemed. Though being shy didn’t match up with his former career. Still, meek in a way that wasn’t like a beaten down man, just giving. Maybe that was why he didn’t understand. He’d known so few truly giving men in his life.
“I don’t think, if they knew you at all, they’d think that, Steve.”
There were little lines feathering from his eyes when his smile bloomed, and his eyes themselves weren’t wide and childlike, which told Matt he wasn’t young, but he wasn’t older than thirty-five, not unless he was aging extremely well. Still, he didn’t seem that young. He was older than anyone he knew, at least that was what his eyes told Matt.
“I know how much he means to you, but if we don’t find him, don’t be too discouraged. He might be hiding, like you should be doing.”
With his back stiffening so suddenly like it did, his ribs gave a harsh twinge of pain, but he covered it, his obstinance more powerful than the pain. “I should be doing something more to help my family, not hiding out at all.”
With that, he turned, heading out to the driveway. Steve’s Four Runner was there, shining, new tires, no bumper stickers or personalized plates. Like the house, simple, clean, no frills, but there were none needed.
When Steve came up beside him, he asked, “Are you okay?”
Matt didn’t know how to answer that. There was no answer to that. “How okay am I supposed to be? I’m scared, Steve, but not of what you’d think.”
Moving around him, Steve went to his truck and leaned back on it, moving a rock around with the toes of his shoe. “I guess you’re scared of the change. You’ve lived your life in one place, one way, and even after you found all this out, you lived there, worked there. Now, you can’t go back, and it’s not your choice as much as you’ll be killed if you try. You’re not one to be told you can’t do something.”
“How do you know that about me?”
The shy smile he got matched the way his eyes lowered, a dark blush came across his cheeks while he answered, “I’m attracted to that kind of man, and ever since I first saw you, I’ve been drawn to you.”
Chapter Seven
After he hurried to the driver’s side, they both got into the car, and the first part of the drive was quiet. Matt busied himself with watching the amazing scenery go by as they drove, the tall trees blocking out most of the sky until they rounded a curve. There, laid out, was a valley with a lake that was so flat, it was a mirror to that beautiful blue. There was no wind to make a ripple to blur it, reflecting the mountains west and north of it, the sky, the wisps of clouds.
The two towns they passed were close together, but so small, they were mostly for tourists. They were headed to the small city to the west, and the quiet built until Matt couldn’t stand the thought of it for another twenty miles.
“I don’t know if men hate the question like women do, but is it okay to ask your age?”
“Thirty-seven,” he said without hesitation.
Matt looked over at him, commenting, “I’d have never guessed.”
“If you say I look older than that, I’ll pull over right now and ugly cry for an hour.”
That got him laughing, making it hard to deny that was his first thought. “N-no! No, you look younger than that!”
“Whew! I was goin to make an appointment to get Botox.”
“You know you are good looking, and I doubt age will hurt that at all. Older men can be much more handsome than what they looked like when they were younger.”
“Oh?”
He’d seen it happen, even some of the older men on the compound were handsome, and they’d been gangly messes when they were younger. The community pictures they took twice a year was testament to that. “Yeah.”
“Well, thank you, Matt, for saying that. I don’t always have the greatest confidence of that. Being my age and unattached, I sometimes wonder if I’m over the hill with my looks and ways.”
Unable to imagine anyone not wanting to get to know Steve better, he asked, “Why are you unattached? I mean, was there ever anybody you were…I don’t know, attached to?”
“Sure, sure, but with my career, never being in one city for very long, and even when I was, I had to stay with the people I was protecting, I couldn’t devote mysel
f like I wanted. Like they wanted.”
The cryptic way he said it got Matt more curious, rather than answering anything for him. “What do you want in a guy?”
Turning wistful, Steve mused, “Strong, not afraid to take what he wants, consensually of course, unlike your father and those types.”
“Take what they want?”
The bridge of Steve’s nose darkened, and he looked away, out his side window. “That sounds terrible, I guess. I like dominant men. I have for the longest time. Making a man feel good, giving into his needs and happiness, that is what makes me happy.”
Never in his life had he heard another man speak that way, about wanting another’s needs ahead of their own. He doubted even good men like Charlie or his stepbrother, Dean, that they’d feel that way. The only women he knew that felt that way were the women on the compound, and they were taught that. “Where did you get that? I mean…did someone teach it to you?”
“No, no, it’s just how I’ve always been. I’m submissive to a fault, I’ve been told. Some, those that don’t understand the dynamic, think I’m a doormat, but it’s not like that with the right person. Their appreciation is a drug for us, that are like me. Eh, it’s complicated.”
“How’d you ever do the job you did, you know, feeling like that?”
Steve chuckled deeply and teased, “Oh, I can be quite butch when I need to be, don’t worry.”
His laugh, the way he smiled, kinda shy but real, he made Matt long for him. His easy, mellow way, it was contagious. Though, he couldn’t exactly claim that being around Steve relaxed him completely. A part of him was trembling on the inside whenever he was around the man.
The curves in the road were a perfect metaphor for it, how Steve made him feel. Some were wide, easy, letting the world open as they rounded it, seeing beautiful things, and then the next was tight, a little frightening, the land dropping sharply on the side of them. It would be so easy to fall off that ledge, tumbling into something so unfamiliar.
The Principle (Legacy Book 2) Page 6
