Page 90 of Waiting For A Girl Like You (Haven House #4)

“ S he said she would think about it and let me know.”

Liam grunted under his breath, which told her nothing of his thoughts. “Sinclair’s remains will go to his parents. My dad has already been in contact with them. Apparently, Sinclair left a note expressing his wishes to be laid to rest with CeCe.”

“And they’re okay with that?”

“The Sinclairs have lost a son. Their daughter has disappeared with their grandsons. I don’t think they’re okay with anything. But my dad said they seemed like decent people.”

Jamison adjusted the phone and rolled onto her back. It was late, and she had waited up for his phone call, needing to hear his voice. It was almost time for him to come home now that things were winding down in Arkansas.

“When I was over at Evie and Samuel’s place today, I looked at some of the Georgia designs.”

“Did you find one that suits us?”

She loved that he was completely on board with moving to Georgia. Neither of them had enjoyed their time in Houston. It was their beginning, but it was time to leave it behind. “The small one would work. Three bedrooms, open layout.”

“We’ll need more than three bedrooms. ”

“Not really.” She moved to get off the bed, too full of energy to rest. “Our bedroom, and then we each get a home office. The shared spaces are huge.”

“Four bedrooms. Maybe five,” he countered. “Minimum.”

She laughed. “You’re acting like we have all the money in the world. I’ll have you know, Fairweather doesn’t build cheap crap.”

“I’ll ask for a raise.”

“How’s that going to work?” She wandered into her closet and turned on the light, her shoulders slumping at the mess still hanging around. “I’ve never even asked if this head of Fairweather security position will require you to travel.”

“For the first few months, yeah. After that… wait, what are you doing?”

“Cleaning up the shoes.” She bent to grab one of his sneakers. “I can’t sleep, and this place is a mess. Keep talking while I work. What did you learn today?”

“We got the journals.”

She froze. “You’re kidding! Tell me what they say.”

Every day, it was something new. A new piece of truth in this bizarre puzzle, which, when lined up with the others, made perfect sense.

They had Michael to thank for that.

Not only did Michael Sinclair make his disposal of Zanmi tidy and neat, but he’d also written detailed notes revealing his motives along with an extremely helpful timeline.

Left behind to carry out his wishes, Bruce sent Michael’s parents five journals from wherever he and Kristina had run off to, and the Sinclairs called the police the second they realized what they had in their possession.

“I’m a civilian now,” Liam said, and she rolled her eyes at the way he deadpanned the statement. “They don’t allow regular people access to that kind of information.”

“Cut the crap.”

“I’m serious. They restricted my access once we reached the part where Sinclair admitted to doing unsanctioned jobs for his superiors under the guise of serving his country.”

She should have been surprised. She wasn’t. “No way.”

“And he continued after his discharge. Every bombing that was labeled as a domestic terror strike was actually a hit put out by someone with a bunch of power in our government. The first one was an utter shitshow because he was feeling guilty about CeCe’s death and didn’t think she would have approved of him taking that route in life. ”

When he didn’t continue, Jamison chucked his tennis shoe to the back of the closet, unable to find the second one. “What else?”

“I told you. We weren’t allowed to read anything after that.

Homeland is already on the ground and in the Bureau’s face now that they know Michael Sinclair was involved in the bombing, so this news shot them into overdrive.

” Liam chuckled. “Then the DOD showed up, and Anderson got into a screaming match with what I think was a General. It was total pandemonium for a few hours.”

“But that sucks.” She decided to work on her clothes and went for her wedding dress first. It wouldn’t hurt to look it over. “We’ll never know what was in them. Or we won’t know for a long time.”

“Jamison, love of my life and my future wife, who do you think you’re talking to?” Liam huffed as if truly offended. “It hurts my feelings that you would think I’m just going to let something like this go.”

“William, what did you do?”

“While everyone was distracted and arguing over who was in charge of what, Holden and I nabbed the journals we hadn’t read yet and made copies.”

Halting mid-unzipping of the wedding gown’s garment bag, she gasped. “Liam, if your dad found out—”

“My dad worked as the lookout while we got the job done.”

Her eyes slowly closed. “Because, of course, he did.”

“You sound like you’re mad.”

“I’m not mad. I’m just trying to figure out where to hide you when Homeland Security or the Department of Defense kicks down our door.”

“I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

She rolled her eyes and unzipped the garment bag fully. “Are you going to tell me what the journals say or not?”

“The first couple focus on his time in the service and how he met CeCe. He didn’t lie.

They met in a coffee shop in Miami, and he fell hard for her.

He also states how when he met Toby and Taylor, he knew right away what he was dealing with and began to extract CeCe from the situation immediately.

Missouri was a long shot, but he convinced her, and they moved. ”

“But did she help Toby kill?”

“Yes and no. Toby mainly killed when Taylor pushed him. She liked to watch, acting as the puppet master controlling the monster in a way. The ritualism behind the later murders stemmed from her obsession with the massacre that took place at Haven. Toby told her about it when they were young, and she became absolutely fascinated. Michael wrote that Toby exhibited dissociative behaviors seen in all impulse killers, but that he felt Taylor was the push Toby needed to act on those impulses. Sinclair thought that if she hadn’t remained in his life, he would have never moved past the sexual sadism Taylor started him off on. ”

“Michael told me she was obsessed with my mother’s death…

but wait.” She dropped to sit cross-legged on the floor, trying to remember everything Michael had told her.

The drugs made her memories hazy, and the frustration was nearly unbearable.

“He said Toby developed those sadistic kinks before college.”

“He did. According to the journals, Toby and Taylor were tag-teaming young men and women in St. Thomas as far back as their teen years. But they didn’t kill anyone except Charlie Fairweather.

Their other killing didn’t happen until Toby went to college and made friends.

Marcus, Richard, and Eugene were just as we thought.

Disgusting humans. But they weren’t into murder.

Maiming, sure, but not murder. Taylor got jealous of Toby connecting with others, and when the three of them pointed out how fucked up she was, Taylor set out to prove a point and convinced Toby to kill an island girl while his friends were with him. ”

“They were into it, weren’t they? They might not have participated before that, but after it happened, they wanted more?”

“Eugene Gilbert was the only one with real reservations, but once Taylor figured out his pressure point—female children—she helped, again in Michael’s words, feed his needs so he would stay loyal.”

Jamison laid a hand on her stomach, suddenly nauseous. “What will they do with Eugene now that he’s in custody?”

“Nothing. He’s dead.”

“How?”

“Heart attack. ”

Wherever Bruce and Michael’s sister ran off to with her two boys, Jamison sincerely hoped they lived a long and peaceful life. Bryan Carroll’s body had been found on the bathroom floor of his hotel room. The official cause of death was heart failure.

“Fancy that,” she whispered, needing to lie down, and decided the bed was too far away, so she spread out on the carpeted floor of her closet. “Keep talking.”

“There’s so much to tell. What do you want to know?”

“Tell me about CeCe’s life with him.”

“They were happy, Jamison,” Liam said simply.

“They lived a quiet life, both craving normalcy. Michael was still bouncing in and out of war zones, and CeCe came from a life with her brother and the world of Bryan Carroll. Oh, and we were kind of right on one thing. Michael and his sister worked for Carroll at one point. As a bargaining chip for CeCe, Michael did a few off-the-books jobs for him while Kristina functioned as the brains, covering Carroll’s digital footprints, which included erasing pictures of his daughter. ”

“So that’s why Rowan couldn’t find any photos of Taylor.”

“Exactly. Kristina Scherer is one of the best, and Rowan is still pissed.”

“But why would they work for Carroll at all if Michael wanted to pull CeCe away from that world?”

“Because CeCe refused to cut contact with them. Toby was her brother. Taylor was her friend. When Charlie started using and staying out drunk all the time, Taylor and Bryan stepped in to take care of a young CeCe and Toby. You have to understand that CeCe didn’t have the usual upbringing, so hanging around a drug lord and his psycho daughter felt normal. ”

Jamison exhaled slowly. “Then she goes off to fall in love with a man who later becomes a domestic terrorist.”

“Michael was already in the picture when Toby started sniffing around your family. Once CeCe found out Taylor was working at Fairweather Holdings, she was done. That sealed her decision to leave with Sinclair.”

“But, when her big brother comes to town and starts killing women connected to CeCe, Michael gets pissed.”

“They fight. He leaves,” Liam continued. “And the rest is how we know it.”

“He built CeCe that house. ”

“ After she died. He built it when he refused to do any more black ops jobs, and not long after the house was complete, the headaches started. The doctors found the tumor almost immediately.”