Hour of Need (Scarlet Falls #1)(76)

Grant turned toward Scarlet Falls. “Relax. It was all an act.” Mac had never seen him in full combat mode. But Grant knew it wasn’t an act. He could still feel the rage simmering just below the surface of his skin, ready, willing, and able to take an unarmed man’s life in pure anger. Earl wasn’t the man who’d killed Lee and Kate.

Grant had nearly lost control. That couldn’t happen again, but it seemed like the more time he spent with his family, especially Carson and Faith, the angrier he became over Lee and Kate’s deaths. And the closer he came to snapping. Grant had seen it happen. Once a man crossed that line, retreat was not an option. The damage could never be undone.

“Now what?” Mac asked.

“Now we check out the trailer park.” But a stop at the trailer park would put him behind schedule. They’d be late getting back to the house. Grant consulted the map in his smartphone for directions. “It’s only a couple of miles from here.”

“Maybe we should just tell the cops where Donnie is?” Mac said.

“Two problems with that scenario. We’d have to tell them how we got the information, and we don’t even know if Earl was right. I don’t think he was lying, but we can’t be sure until we check out the trailer.”

“I don’t think Earl was lying.” Frowning, his brother studied him.

Grant glanced sideways. “What?”

“I’m worried about you.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine.” Mac’s voice grew bitter. “Just like I’m not fine. Hannah and the kids aren’t fine either. You know why?”

Grant assumed the question was rhetorical and kept his mouth shut.

“Because Lee and Kate were murdered, that’s why.” Mac crossed his arms over his chest. “We lost our brother. Two kids have been orphaned. No one could possibly be fine under these circumstances.”

Grant sighed. “Then what I meant was that I was as good as can be expected, considering.”

“Bullshit. We might not have spent a lot of time together lately, but I know something is going on with you.”

Grant drove in silence for a few minutes. Mac radiated anger from the passenger seat.

“Right before I got word about Lee, something happened over there.” Grant kept his eyes front, but he could feel the weight of Mac’s gaze. He gave him a quick rundown of the ambush. “I did the math. With the time difference, I could have shot that guy in the face at the exact same time Lee and Kate were being murdered.” He stopped short of telling Mac that every time he closed his eyes, he saw Lee’s face explode. The parallel universe bullshit was freaky enough.

“I can see how that might f*ck with your head.” Mac’s hand scratched three days of beard scruff. “Talk to me, Grant. But if you can’t talk to me, find someone who can help. The military has psychiatrists, right?”

“I’ll be all right. I just didn’t get any time to decompress after the ambush. It’s easier to deal with this stuff then and there.”

“You’ve had issues before?” Mac sounded surprised.

Grant struggled for the words to describe how senseless killing, cruelty, and horror left their imprint on man. He settled on, “nobody goes into combat and comes out the same.”

Mac leaned back into his seat, his face thoughtful. “I’m sorry. I always thought you loved what you did.”

“No one could love combat.” Grant thought of all the good men he’d seen maimed and killed, all the flag-draped coffins he’d saluted, the crying widows and shock-faced children.

“Then why do you do it?”

“Duty. The country needs soldiers. I’d been groomed my whole life to serve. To protect American citizens and their way of life.”

“People like Lee and Kate,” Mac added.

“Ironic, isn’t it? I was protecting them thousands of miles away from where they were being murdered.”

“Whoa.” Mac raised his hands. “Even those Mr. Clean shoulders of yours can’t bear guilt over this. Or at least not any more than me and Hannah. None of us were paying attention. None of us knew anything about what was really going on in Lee’s life. If any of us failed him, we all did. Don’t think for a second that me and Hannah aren’t feeling plenty guilty, too.”

“I have no intention of failing him again.” Grant drove the rest of the way without speaking. Mac’s revelation about their shared guilt shouldn’t have come as a shock. Of course they felt remorse and regret. None of them knew Lee’s life was in shambles. Were the three of them so wrapped up in their own lives, so disinterested in Lee, that he felt like he couldn’t share his troubles? The answer was an obvious and resounding yes.

Ambition would be the Barretts’ downfall.

The trailer park occupied a field in the middle of f*cking nowhere. Forest surrounded an open space the size of two side-by-side football fields. Dirt roads bisected a grid of small, square lots. Grant turned at the ingress, where white script on a faded green sign proclaimed they were entering Happy Valley Trailer Park.

He drove up and down multiple rows, the muddy road grating and squishing under the tires.

The sedan lurched over a deep rut. Mac grabbed the chicken strap hanging above the door. “We should have brought my truck.”