The Missing
convince her to give him another chance. Both he and Jillian were still trying to deal with the trauma of what had happened. Jilly would scream in her sleep, haunted by nightmares. Those screams would wake him from a dead sleep, and he’d go to her room to find her thrashing on the bed, held captive by the dreams.
She was going to a counselor, but it didn’t seem to help much. Cullen wasn’t going to quit it this time. It might take years for Jillian to move past that trauma, if she ever did.
No. Not if. She would. Jilly was strong. It was just going to take time. Cullen had his own demons to deal with. His guilt over not protecting her. The helplessness that plagued him. It wasn’t him that had saved Jilly, it had been Taige. Cullen had been all but useless, and it ate at him. It was a father’s job to protect his child, but he had failed at it.
As much as Cullen wanted to hear Taige’s voice, he looked away from the phone and shoved to his feet. He passed a long, sleepless night. Knowing that sleep would elude him for the most part, he didn’t bother going to bed. For a few hours, he worked in his office, knocking out another chapter on the book that was due at the end of the summer. Then he made a sandwich and ate it before watching TV and dozing through another L & O rerun.
By morning, he was bleary-eyed and damn thankful that it was Saturday. His dad was coming to get Jilly. It was going to be the first time she had left the house without Cullen since the kidnapping. It would be good for her—and him. By the time Robert Morgan showed up at the house at ten, Cullen was dragging. Still, he crouched by Jilly’s side and studied her face. “You sure you’re going to be okay? I can come with you.”
She gave him a smile. “No, Daddy. It’s just me and Grandpa this time.”
He nodded and then leaned, kissed her cheek. “You call me if you need me, okay?”
“She’s going to be fine, son,” Robert said as Cullen straightened up. “We’re going to get some pizza. See a movie. Maybe I’ll let her con me out of a toy or a book.”
“Or both,” Cullen said with a faint grin. He knew his dad, and he knew his daughter. Jillian had Robert so completely wrapped, if she asked for the Eiffel Tower, Robert would find a way to steal it for the girl.
On his way on the door, Robert paused. “You should get some rest, Cull. You look awful.”
Cullen just smiled, but after they left, he paused in the hallway and stared at the mirror hanging over the console table by the front door. Awful. Yeah. That about summed it up. He’d lost probably ten pounds in the past month, and the bags under his eyes were bordering on ridiculous. Last night’s sleeplessness hadn’t helped, but Cullen had been looking a little worse for wear for a month now.
It wasn’t going to get better for a while, he suspected.
He moved through the house, picking up toys, clothes, and shoes. The cleaning lady was due in Monday, but Cullen didn’t pay her to pick up after his daughter. Normally, he got after Jillian to do it herself, but he’d been coddling her. Logically, he knew he needed to quit doing it so much, but he couldn’t seem to control it.
He dumped clothes down the laundry chute, toys into a basket by the steps for the trip back to her room, and cleaned up toast crumbs, cereal, and spilled milk from the breakfast bar. That done, he headed for the stairs at the front of the house. He was going to get some sleep. Real sleep. Sleep that didn’t involve Taige, sleep that wouldn’t be interrupted when his daughter’s screams woke him.
But he hadn’t even cleared the landing when the doorbell rang. Cullen heaved out a sigh and headed downstairs. Whoever it was would just have to come back. But a peek through the Judas hole and the sigh turned into a flat-out, ugly swear.
“What in the hell do you want now?” Cullen demanded as he opened the door to Special Agent Taylor Jones. Using his body to bar the way, he kept the agent out on the porch. Part of him really wished he didn’t dislike this guy so much; Jones was busting his ass trying to find the man who had kidnapped Jillian, but he was so damned overbearing, and he didn’t seem to care that his questions would put Jilly through that trauma again. He came back to the house once a week, and the first week, he’d been there almost every day.
“Thought you might like to hear the progress we’ve made,” Jones said, showing off what Cullen
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