The Missing

highway wasn’t as busy in the middle of a Monday morning, but the cars were still moving too damn slow to satisfy him.

    The silence got to him, and he glanced at Taige again. “Where are we going?”

    Finally a response. “Just keep driving.”

    “Driving where , exactly?”

    She didn’t answer. The thick fringe of her lashes lowered, shielding her eyes. She looked—damn, Cullen didn’t even have the words to describe how she looked. Shattered. Devastated. Shocked.

    He wanted to hold her, wished he could pull the car off the road and say screw it . The need to do just that was strong.

    Yet there was an equally strong need that kept him driving. A part of him that was hot with anticipation and the need to get where they were going, find who they were looking for, so Cullen could kill him. Slow. Nice and slow. Cullen hadn’t ever pegged himself as a bloodthirsty type. He’d never admit it, but when he was in the delivery room the day Jillian was born, he’d gotten damn queasy when he saw the blood. His legs had gone all watery, and for a minute, he had been scared he was going to humiliate himself and pass out on the delivery room floor.

    His dad loved to go hunting, but Cullen had gone with him exactly one time—one time, and he’d known that hunting was not his thing. The smell of blood, the sight of it, the feel of it. Hell, no.

    But right now? He craved it. He didn’t just want to find this man and kill him. He wanted to hurt him.

    The bastard didn’t know it, but he was already dead.

    As they drew closer to Gulf Shores, the traffic from the tourists thickened until they were moving along at a snail’s pace. At least it felt that way to Cullen. Blood roared in his ears so loud, he barely heard Taige’s voice when she said, “Turn here.” The narrow highway was just north of town, and it wasn’t at all familiar to Cullen.

    “Where are we going?” he asked as they started to head east.

    “The church.”

    Cullen didn’t want to ask which church. He had a feeling that he already knew the answer to that, just by that expression in her eyes: dazed disbelief and desolation. “What church? Why?” he asked shortly. She didn’t answer. Just barely, he kept from growling at her. He took the turn onto that gravel road so sharply, the truck skidded, and the tires threw dust into the air. There was a sign set in a flower bed, surrounded by chaotic bursts of flowers.

    Disciples of the Lamb, it read.

    Under that, worship times. And under that . . . a name.

    Leon Carson, Minister.

    For just the briefest second, time seemed to stop. Cullen slammed on the brakes and read the name again, certain he’d misread it.

    “Son of a bitch !” he roared. Shoving his foot down on the gas, he sped down the winding little drive, pulling in front of the church and stomping on the brake. Tires squealed.

    “He’s not here,” Taige murmured. Cullen released his seat belt and paused, looking back at her. She moved slowly, as though each movement hurt.

    “Did he take my daughter?” he demanded.

    She swallowed. He could hear it, and it sounded as loud as a gunshot. “I think he did.”

    Taige wasn’t sure if she’d be able to stand up just yet. In the entire time she’d known Cullen, he’d always been so self-contained. Even when she’d seen him after his mother died, he’d been contained. Holding his grief, his rage, everything he felt so tightly inside, only the echo of it could leak through to spill onto her.

    But that restraint was shattered now.

    She could feel his rage so strongly, her hands trembled in sympathy. Her gut was tangled into a million knots, and adrenaline pulsed through her. When she took a deep breath, the connection deepened, so strong and sudden that for a moment, she couldn’t tell where she left off and he began. When she looked around, it was with his eyes.

    When she moved, it felt wrong, felt off, and it was because her brain was still mired in his. It took three tries to get the door to open, and when she slid out, she had to brace a hand against the side of the truck just to stay upright. Closing her eyes, she forced herself to erect some sort of shield between them. It was shaky and thin, not strong enough to block him out, but it was better than nothing.

    Just barely. Enough that she could open her eyes and look at the church and the rectory and know that she was seeing it with her eyes and not his. To her eyes, the church looked simple, plain, just a