Breathless (Steel Brothers Saga #10)(71)

I nodded. I knew exactly what he meant. Our conversations lately hadn’t exactly been Champagne and Bordeaux material. “I need the truth, Joe. About my dad. About what he was into and when.”

“You didn’t want to know at the time. Why now?”

“My mom all but destroyed her wedding photo today, and it got me wondering about him. He looked so happy in that photo. So innocent. So normal. So now I have to know. When did he become what he was? Or was he always that way?”

“I’m not sure of the timing,” Joe said. “All I know is that your father, Mathias, and Wade all went through extensive”—air quotes—“training to work for the trafficking ring. Training they were very well paid for.”

“Training? What do you mean?” Another sip left burning embers in its wake.

“You sure you want to know?”

Was I? Another sip, another flaming throat. “Yeah. That’s why I’m here.”

“During training, everything they ever did to another human being was done to them.”

“What?” I went numb. What? What? What?

“Surely you don’t want me to get into specifics.”

My mouth dropped open.

“Sorry, bro. You asked.”

“So my father…”

“Was tortured. Raped. Beaten. God knows what else. Probably starved too, but that would have been the least of his trials.”

“When?”

“Like I said, I’m not sure of the timing, but I could get that information if you really want it.”

Did I? Had he been going through this when he married my mother? When I was born? When he took Joe and me camping?

And why? Why in hell would he allow anyone to do such things to him?

“Why?” I asked quietly.

“For money,” Joe said succinctly. “It could only be for money. They were each paid millions.”

“Did they know what they were in for?”

He shook his head. “No idea. Probably not, or they wouldn’t have done it. Or maybe they would have. Money had become God to the three of them.”

“He was paid to become a monster,” I said, more to myself than to Joe.

“So it would seem.”

“Then maybe…”

“Maybe what?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he wasn’t always a psychopath. Maybe he could have been a normal human being.”

Joe met my gaze sternly. “I’m sure you’d like to believe that, man, and I wish it were true for you. But think about it. If someone offered you several million dollars to be tortured and raped so you could then inflict that horror on others, would you do it?”

“Of course not!”

“I think you have your answer, then. They were already messed up. Big-time.”

An image seared itself into my mind.

Justin’s limp body washed up on the edge of the river where we fished. We’d been looking for him all morning after we’d awoken to find him missing from the tent.

My father had held his fingers to Justin’s neck, said he was dead, and had taken him to the nearest police station. Joe and I stayed at camp.

Alone.

At nine years old.

Not a big deal. We knew where we were and what to do. We knew how to start a fire, how to find our own food, how to take care of ourselves. Besides, we were in an isolated area, and while mountain lions occasionally appeared, there were no grizzly bears in Colorado. We both knew how to shoot a rifle.

At nine years old.

My father had taught us.

My father had also warned us, when he returned that day, never to speak of what we’d seen. “It would be too painful for everyone,” he’d said. “If I hear either of you ever utter a word, I’ll tan your hides. This never happened.”

This never happened.

After a while, I’d believed it. I’d forgotten, and apparently so had Joe.

How? We were young, but still we had brains that worked. I remembered other things from when I was nine. How had my father made sure we forgot every detail?

“I’m sorry, Bryce,” Joe said.

I hurtled back into reality. “About what?”

“That your dad wasn’t a better man.”

I nodded. Joe had been there when my father had shot himself. In fact, my father had been ready to kill my best friend.

“I’m sorry too, for what he put you through.”

“Water under the bridge, man.”

I nodded again, though how Joe could be so readily forgiving, I had no idea. Probably had to do with Melanie and his son on the way. Love and a new life had a way of putting things into perspective.

“But we do have to talk about what happened thirty years ago.”

Once more, I nodded. “Justin,” I said softly.

“Somehow Ted Morse knows. Or he knows something else, but I don’t know what it could be. I’ve racked my mind for the last day and a half, trying to find something else we might have forgotten.”

“Me too,” I said. “All I can come up with is Justin. How have we forgotten for so long?”

“Your dad told us to. Told us not to mention him at school because it would be too sad for everyone. Told us we’d be in big trouble if we ever said his name.”