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“I was. I was recused yesterday because your other brother tried to kidnap my son. That means I was taken off the case,” he added when Jace looked confused.
Jace winced. “I’m sorry, sir. Rick wouldn’t’a hurt your boy. I swear it.”
Kaj didn’t believe that. “That’s a question for the police and the court.”
“Right. Okay. Rick thought that if we had your little boy, you’d give us Aaron.”
“I figured that out myself,” Kaj said dryly.
Jace winced again. “I’m sorry. You said to start at the beginning.”
“Yes, I did. Please continue.”
“My other brother—Corey—he was really mad at Rick for trying to take your son.”
That was consistent with Corey’s words at his press conference yesterday morning.
“Why was Corey mad?” Kaj asked. “Did he know about it?”
“No, sir. He didn’t know nothin’ about it. He was mad that Rick tried.”
“All right,” Kaj said calmly, because his gut said the kid knew more than he was saying. There was desperation in his eyes. Plus, he was here. Confessing.
Above them, Burke glanced at his phone, then mouthed, “Lucien’s here.”
That lessened Kaj’s tension a fraction more. “What happened next?”
“Corey took Rick and me to his camp, down the bayou. I’d never been there before. I never even knew it existed. You can only get there by boat. And then he...” Jace blinked, sending new tears down his dirty face. “He hurt Rick. Hurt him bad. He wanted to know who helped Rick plan—y’know. Trying to grab your son.”
“And did Rick tell him?”
“I don’t know,” Jace said miserably. “I heard him scream and scream and I knew they were hurting him.”
Kaj thought about Rick’s burns. Yes, they were. “Who was hurting him?”
“Corey and his friend Bobby. And maybe Ed. They work together. They do construction. But...” He frowned. “I think they do more than that. I saw...” He rounded his cheeks and blew out a breath, as if bracing himself. “They killed a man tonight.”
Kaj’s brows rose. Ah. This was what the kid had been holding back. At least part of it. “Who did they kill?”
“A mechanic. He worked on Corey’s construction equipment.”
“I need a name, Jace.”
“Dewey. Dewey Talley.”
Burke breathed out a curse and Val sucked in an audible breath, the only sound she’d made since coming closer.
“You saw this?” Kaj demanded. “With your own eyes?”
Jace nodded, his eyes now haunted. Again, if the kid was acting, he was truly good. “Yessir. They hurt Dewey, too. Then they shot him.” His voice broke. “In the head. And then they pushed him in the water. Corey laughed,” he said, anguished. “Dewey was nice to me. He didn’t treat me bad or call me dumb. He showed me how to work on engines. He said I was good at it. I wanted to go and live with him, but now he’s dead.”
Kaj let out a breath, his thoughts churning. The man Jace described did not sound like the drug dealer the cops had been searching for. He certainly didn’t sound like the kind of man who’d kidnap a child. But, based on the cops’ descriptions, Dewey Talley didn’t seem like the kind of man who’d have told Elijah to run, either.
“When did this happen, Jace?” he asked.
Jace frowned. “Corey took my phone and I ain’t got no watch.”
“Make a guess.”
