Sins of the Father

by Winter Austin

  Jolie glanced over at the click of leather against polished floor. The sheriff sidled up next to her, his gaze trained on the two down the hall.

  “What do you think, Murdoch?”

  “I think this has become one convoluted mess, sir.”

  “Doc Drummond told me he had a CT scan and an MRI done. Hartmann’s in no danger, no signs of bleeding on the brain and such, but the doc’s concerned about the blackout. Hartmann doesn’t appear to be in a coma, but he’s unconscious, and that’s worrying all involved.”

  Jolie hugged her abdomen. If there was something wrong with Xavier, they might never learn what happened.

  “Sir, did he remember anything before passing out?”

  “He did.” Sheriff Hamilton turned away from the Hartmann siblings. “He remembered seeing Sarah, but nothing else. I sent Nash over to the courthouse to see if he could spot anything that might lead to the trail. So far, he’s come up empty.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Stay here for the night. I want eyes on him just in case his family decides to pull some stunt. They still don’t know why he was at the station. I also want you here in case he comes to and has any information. Maybe we’ll be cut a break, and his deep sleep will bring more of those memories forward.”

  Hamilton didn’t sound so convinced.

  Jolie leaned a shoulder on the wall next to her, holding out Xavier’s cell phone. “You might want to take this back to evidence.”

  “Have you found anything on there to connect him to the Krugers?”

  She frowned. “No. All he has on here are messages between himself and his brother and sister. There was one number he had labeled ‘Mum. That’s it.”

  “Call history?”

  “Nothing out of the ordinary. I could look further.”

  “Do that. I’ll let DCI know you have it. If you spot anything weird, tell me. Don’t give it to his siblings. We’re breaking chain of evidence here, but I don’t think his cell phone is going to be a deal-breaker.”

  Jolie watched Hamilton’s retreat. The older man’s shoulders drooped, like he carried more than the weight of a normal sheriff. It had to be difficult dealing with all of this, and it was an election year to boot. She looked away. Daddy’s dream was for her to run for sheriff and keep it in the family, something she wasn’t so sure she wanted to be. Just seeing how much crap Hamilton had to deal with made her want to run screaming in the opposite direction.

  Her attention drifted back to the Hartmanns, and she stiffened. They were looking at her.

  Oh, fudge.

  Not ready for a rematch with Ariel, Jolie pushed off the wall and made a U-turn to leave.

  “Deputy?”

  She froze, closing her eyes and squelching the need to groan. Slowly, she faced the approaching Zac. “Yes, Mr. Hartmann?”

  “Just call me Zac. Could I ask you something?” He stopped in front of her. His accent was thicker than his sister’s, and his eyes weren’t as green.

  “You can ask, but I can’t guarantee I can answer.”

  He gave her a coy smile, which made his resemblance to Xavier more evident. “My brother says that a lot. Must be a cop thing.”

  “Xavier’s a cop?”

  “Well, more like was. He was a Marine MP before he got hurt. I guess that’s the military’s version of a cop.”

  The veiled comments on the drive to the station made sense now. Classified. Had he been doing some top-secret, undercover police work with the marines?

  “Back to my question,” Zac said, yanking Jolie out of her straying thoughts.

  “Uh, yes, what is it?”

  “Why was Xavier at your station when he went unconscious?”

  He would have to ask the one thing she had no prepared answer for. She peeked over his shoulder at his sister. Ariel was eyeing them both intently. Big sister must have put him up to it, figuring Zac was the more likely of the two to get answers since he hadn’t spouted off to anyone.

  “Sorry, Zac, I can’t answer that.”

  Turning up the wattage on his smile till he could charm the devil, Zac leaned forward. “I know it can’t be that bad. My big brother is an angel … well, more like a saint. Was he helping you guys out on something?”

  Jolie opened her mouth to ream him for flirting but was waylaid by alarms going off at the nurses’ station. Something hit Xavier’s room door with a loud thunk, spurring Jolie and the Hartmanns into action. Ariel held the door wide open and stood rooted to her spot. Skidding to a halt to the left of Ariel, Jolie gaped.

  Xavier was propped up on his left elbow with a scowl on his face that would melt iron. His fury was directed at Ariel. “Who told you to come here?”

  “She did.” Ariel pointed at Jolie.

  That scowl shifted in her direction. For the briefest moment, she wanted to cower behind Zac. But then her good ol’ Scottish temper set in. How dare he. Had she not brought Ariel in, Dr. Drummond could have given him a drug that made matters worse—or killed him.

  “Deputy Murdoch—”

  “Whoa, everyone out,” a nurse ordered.

  “Not her.” Xavier jabbed a finger at Jolie. “That one stays.”

  “I beg to differ with you, Mr. Hartmann, but you don’t run this hospital, and I say everyone out.”

  “The hell you say.”

  “Xavier, knock it off before you black out again,” Ariel said, a hint of cajoling in her voice.

  Jolie would give better odds to her brother breaking out of prison than this woman getting her brother to budge even a smidgeon. Doing as the nurse ordered, Jolie started to pivot to make good on her escape.

  “Murdoch,” Xavier growled.

  That sound sent shivers skirting down her back. It didn’t scare her. Oh, no. The man’s damn voice did something to her that bordered on erotic.

  “What is going on here?” Dr. Drummond waded through the sea of bodies. “If you don’t have a medical license, get out, now.”

  Jolie split before Xavier could make more demands, Ariel and Zac hot on her heels. The door closed on a string of cursing that made Jolie’s ears burn.

  “Oh, God, he’s going to crack a fruity,” Ariel moaned. She looked at Jolie. “And it’s going to fall on your head.”

  “Excuse me! You’re the one who threw me under the bus in there.”

  Zac stepped between them. “Doesn’t matter now. X’s mad as a cut snake, and everyone is going to get it.” Raised voices from the other side of the door confirmed his statement. Gripping both women’s shoulders, he steered them down the hall. “We’ll let the doc sort it out.”

  “Won’t his fit cause another blackout or something?” Jolie asked.

  He blew out a breath. “Maybe. We don’t know. X’s brain injury is finicky; it comes and goes as it pleases.”

  Pulling up short, she eyed the two. “Would someone tell me why he’s so teed off about you being here? And why am I in so much trouble for something that is protocol?”

  Pink crept up Ariel’s neck and flooded her face. She bowed her head, turned away, and then continued walking down the hall. Zac shook his head, scrubbing his face with both hands.

  “Oh, this is bad. Really, really bad.”

  Jolie crossed her arms and tried to put on her best hard-nosed cop face. She was probably failing horribly, because she couldn’t pull it off quite like Nic or Cassy—or, heck, like Hamilton for that matter. “I’ll trade you information for information.” Oh, the sheriff was not going to like this, but if it got them a step closer to knowing what had happened today, so be it.

  His hands dropping to his sides, Zac frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I explain why Xavier was at the station in the first place, and you tell me why he’s upset over the two of you being here.”

  Staring at the now empty hall in the direction his sister went, he gave a curt nod. “Okay. So, why was he at the station?”

  Jolie checked to see that the hall was clear. No sense in blurting it out and hav
ing the whole world hear. “We found Xavier with a person of interest who was dead.”

  Zac’s eyes widened. “Let me guess, this was the thirty-minute window he can’t remember?”

  “Pretty much. Now, why is he torqued off?”

  “Because no one in this town is supposed to know about us. Ariel and I arrived a few weeks ago, which made him flaming mad, and the condition for us being allowed to stay was if we kept our heads down until we went back to Oz.”

  “Why?”

  “That, I can’t reveal. X made me swear on our mother’s life to keep my mouth shut. Ariel, too, so don’t bother asking.”

  Jolie shook her head. “It doesn’t make a lick of sense to hide you away from everyone in Eider. What’s wrong with us knowing about you?”

  Zac cocked his head to the side; a lock of his black hair fell to the side, giving him a rakish look. “When and if X ever tells you, you’ll understand.”

  That odd gleam in his eyes didn’t assure her. What was so important to Xavier that he kept his siblings a secret from everyone and bound them by an oath to keep their mouths shut about why? Could it be her earlier thought that the three were actually half-siblings? But why would that be such a bad thing? It’s not like it was uncommon in this day and age.

  “Deputy, I can see on your face you’re trying to pick this apart and figure it out. My advice: don’t. Xavier has his reasons, and you don’t tread on them. When he’s ready, he’ll be ready, and world, look out when he is.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Zac grinned. “My brother never does anything halfway. It’s all out, balls to the wall.”

  Jolie swallowed. The enigma of Xavier Hartmann was beginning to get more intriguing. And she wasn’t about to sit on the sidelines and watch somebody else uncover it.

  • • •

  The throbbing head and aching chest were enough to make Xavier want to crawl in a hole and die. Losing his temper hadn’t been the wisest move he’d made. Nothing like giving away that he had a problem. He shouldn’t have yelled at Ariel or Jolie. But when he’d realized what had happened and why they were all here, his lack of sense got the better of him.

  He was on the path to an apology tour.

  After getting his wild mood under control, he convinced Dr. Drummond he was fine, although the man was none too happy to learn that he had a walking medical chart living in his town for a year and had never been given a warning. Xavier’s first apology went to the good doctor.

  Xavier allowed another round of tests to make sure there were no leftover, sneaky symptoms. But Dr. Drummond wasn’t going to learn anything new or more than the previous doctors had. When one doctor too many had put up their hands in defeat or told Xavier his problems were all in his head, he’d thrown in the towel on them, too.

  Some TBIs—like the type Xavier had—were hard to detect. So much of it could not be seen or studied on a living subject. CT scans and MRIs couldn’t detect the problems. The manifested symptoms were the only clues to prove something was wrong. While educating himself on the matter, Xavier learned that the best way for doctors and scientists to study a TBI’s effects was on deceased donors. And, typically, some of those donors couldn’t stand living in the constant pain and committed suicide.

  By God, he’d never become another statistic.

  At the light tap on the door to his room, he rolled from his side onto his back. The door creaked on stiff hinges, and a strip of light slashed through the semi-darkness—the nurse having left the lights dim so his eyes and head could recover without dealing with the brightness.

  “Is it safe for me to come in?”

  Jolie Murdoch’s sweet voice stirred his wounded soul and pricked his conscience. Here came apology number two.

  “Yeah.” His voice cracked. He cleared it. “Come in.”

  She slipped in, the light from the hallway backlighting her body, accentuating her figure. She was a skinny thing, but her small frame masked the fireball hidden within. The dimness returned, and he was able to see her better. She remained near the doorway, a move that would ensure she could make a quick getaway if he lost it again.

  “I won’t bite this time. I promise.”

  “Not how you sounded when you woke up.”

  “Sorry about that. I don’t wake too well after a medical emergency.”

  She rammed her hands into the pockets of her uniform slacks. “That a result from when you lost your leg?”

  Well, the uncertain deputy was sharp, maybe too sharp for her own good. “For the most part. I’ve always been this way, it’s just gotten worse since I came to in Germany and found my leg was gone.” He eased up into a sitting position. “Are you my bodyguard?”

  “Something like that.” She finally took a few steps closer. “Your brother seems nice. Not so sure about your sister.”

  “Don’t mind Ariel. She’s like a mama ’roo. She’ll kick you good and hard if she thinks her family is in trouble. Tends to forget I’m the older brother.”

  There was a shift in the atmosphere; a sense of disappointment seemed to draw out all the air in the room. Because of the low light setting, he couldn’t see Jolie’s face that well, but it had to be coming from her. It took a split second for the gist of his answer to catch up with his addled brain. Her only sibling in the world was a cold-blooded killer. She had no one to look out for her.

  “I’m sorry. I’m mucking this all up. I didn’t—”

  “You don’t need to apologize.” She sighed. “Listen, I just came in to check on you. See if you needed anything. I’m going to be here for another hour or so, and then an Eider officer is going to come and pull guard duty.”

  “You don’t have to worry. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Maybe so, but we want someone on standby in case you remember anything, too. Sarah is still missing, her father is dead, and we have no idea what happened. The sheriff said right before you passed out you remembered that you saw her.”

  Her words clanged around in his head. A girl, teenager, fourteen, maybe fifteen years old. Her hallowed eyes glinting in … a window. Sarah. He had seen Sarah Kruger.

  “Xavier?”

  His gaze snapped back to Jolie. “She was in a car.”

  This perked up the deputy. “What did it look like?”

  “Don’t push. I don’t have all the details. But I do recall she looked odd, kind of like she was stoned.”

  “Was she driving?”

  “No, and before you ask, I didn’t see the driver.” Damn it, why did this have to be so hard? When he was an MP his brain could process all of this and come up with a solution. Now it was just a jumbled mess of nothingness.

  “Hey, don’t worry about it. We don’t need you overdoing it and passing out again.”

  Xavier peered at the woman. In his moment of mental berating, she’d inched closer to the bed and stood within arm’s reach. Over the typical disinfectant hospital smell, he caught a whiff of her scent, an exotic mix of orange and jasmine. A powerful urge to drag her closer and inhale enveloped him like a fire on the beach, the roar of the waves in the background and a cold longneck in his hand. How had he not noticed it in the car earlier?

  Jolie touched his left leg. “Are you okay?”

  Her concern ripped away a veil of desire, and he jerked his leg out from under her hand.

  “I’m fine,” he snapped.

  Frowning, she withdrew her hand, tucking it under her arm as she crossed them.

  This sudden attraction to her was ridiculous. First off, he wasn’t here in Eider to make friends. He’d come with a goal in mind—it was too bad he’d turned into a coward and hadn’t accomplished it. Secondly, he was the prime suspect in a murder; no bloody way was he getting attached to the very woman who’d caught him red-handed. Talk about conflict of interest. Yet he hadn’t been taken in by a woman like this before. As a teenager, Xavier had a fling or two back in Adelaide, but once he moved to America, there hadn’t been time for dating. And now that h
e was a cripple in body and mind, there never would be a significant other in his life.

  “You know, I don’t much like you growling at me like that.” Jolie jabbed a finger at him, directing it right at his nose. “Let’s not forget you’re in police custody at the moment. And this bad behavior is only making you look more likely to have killed Clint Kruger.”

  His hand moved of its own accord, snatching her hand in midair and tugging her closer to the bed. Startled, she wobbled forward, nearly falling into his lap. Catching herself with her free hand, she braced against the stiff mattress and leaned over him.

  “Don’t throw my past regrets in my face, Deputy. I don’t take kindly to it.”

  In the dim lighting, he saw the shock and awe play out on her features until it settled into a steely-eyed glare. “Release me, Mr. Hartmann.”

  He grabbed a deep breath of her orange-and-jasmine scent before complying. She slid back from the bed, the hand he’d held coiling into a fist.

  “You sure don’t act like a former MP.”

  Those words socked him hard in the chest. “How do you know I was an MP?” The moment his question left his mouth, it hit him. “Zac. That ankle biter never could keep his mouth shut.”

  “Your brother isn’t a child, and he’s concerned about you, as is your sister. You should be glad of that.”

  Frack, she knew how to put him in his place, a feat he didn’t know was possible from the female population. Mum hadn’t managed to accomplish that much, and try as she might, Ariel couldn’t do it, either.

  It appeared that the rumor mill churning out slander against the former sheriff’s daughter and her muck-up with her brother months ago was wrong. Jolie Murdoch had grown up in the public eye, but the people of McIntire County did not know their former darling as well as they gossiped.

  Reclining on the bed, he turned his back to her. “I’m feeling fatigued. Please leave, Deputy Murdoch.”

  There was a moment of silence and then the squeak of rubber soles on highly polished cement. Light filled the room as she exited. Once the door clicked shut on her departure, Xavier relaxed.