tried to head-butt him, so he was forced to hit back, knocking him unconscious. Then he finished tying the guy’s wrists behind his back and his ankles together so the guy couldn’t escape.
When he rose to his feet, he saw that Max, Zeke and Julianne were huddled near the front door. Unfortunately, it looked as if the gunfire had been exchanged both ways; there was a bit of blood on Zeke’s arm and two guards, he’d been right about one patrolling the perimeter, were dead, leaving only one to question once they’d cleared the house. Max and Zeke quickly took control of the fallen guard’s weapons.
“Ready to go inside?” Max asked in a low, urgent tone. “I’ll take the lead.”
Julianne nodded and pulled out the same evidence bag she’d used earlier that day, the one with Jake Morrow’s shirt inside. She opened the bag. Thunder buried his nose inside, taking his time to imprint the scent.
“Find Jake.”
Thunder put his nose to the ground, but Julianne kept her hand on his collar, giving him a hand signal of some sort. The dog stood at her side, his nose twitching with the need to follow the scent.
Max approached the door first, taking the right side. Zeke came up on the left. After a moment they both disappeared inside, each heading in opposite directions.
Julianne stepped up to the doorway, following Max. Brody didn’t like being separated from her, but took the left, following Zeke and Cheetah.
The house was plush, with at least a dozen different rooms, but there was no sign of a captured agent.
In fact, there wasn’t anyone at all. Other than the three guards they’d taken care of, the place was empty.
* * *
Julianne couldn’t believe that Angus Dupree and his henchmen had gotten away. Frustrated, she let go of Thunder’s collar. “Find, Thunder. Find Jake.”
Her partner went to work, nose to the floor, instantly alerting in the main living area. But then he kept going, down the hallway to one of the bedrooms, where he alerted again.
In the kitchen. The bathroom. Another bedroom.
Thunder found evidence of Jake in nearly every room in the entire house.
“He was here,” Julianne said, glancing at Zeke. “Probably recently. We must have just missed them.”
“Julianne, come look at this,” Max called from one of the back bedrooms.
“What did you find?”
His expression was grim. “Blood. Fresh blood along the side of the desk chair.”
She sucked in a harsh breath. “Thunder, heel.”
The dog bounded to her side.
“Find Jake,” she repeated. He’d already alerted in this room, but over by the side of the bed, not the desk.
Thunder put his nose to the floor, sniffing along the edge of the desk. When he got to the side where the blood was, he alerted again.
“We’ll need to test the blood to match Jake’s DNA, but according to Thunder it’s likely his.” She glanced around the room. “Maybe this is where they kept him locked up, either at the desk or on the bed.”
“That’s the picture I’m getting.” Max opened the desk drawers, but they were empty.
Julianne went down on her knees to look under the bed. A flash of silver caught her eye. “Thunder, find Jake.”
The dog crawled on his belly beneath the bed, emerging a moment later with something in his mouth. Julianne gently pried it out of his jaw.
“What is it?” Max asked.
Zeke and Brody came into the bedroom. Zeke took one look at the item she held in her hand and asked, “Where did you find that?”
“Under the bed.” She looked at the heavy silver watch. “Do you recognize it?”
Zeke paled, his expression full of anguish as he nodded. “It belongs to Jake.”
“How do you know?”
Zeke took the watch and turned it over. “See here? I had it engraved.”
J: Proud to be your brother—Z.
She swallowed hard, handing the watch back to Zeke. “The evidence proves Jake was here.”
“Yeah, but where is he now?” Zeke demanded, jamming his fingers through his hair. “And what’s with the blood? Are they torturing him in order to make him talk?”
Julianne shook her head, feeling helpless. She didn’t know where Dupree had taken Jake, or why there was blood on the edge of the desk.
The news didn’t bode well for Jake’s safety.
And worse, they were back to square one.
“Okay, now what?” Zeke demanded, staring at Max. “You must have some idea of what our next move should be. We have to find Jake before Dupree kills him.”
Brody remained silent, feeling the same frustration as the rest of the FBI team. The loss of their agent was clearly taking a toll, especially on Jake’s half brother. Zeke looked mad enough to take on the world.
He couldn’t blame the guy. He’d feel the same way in his shoes.
“We need an evidence team to come in and sweep this place, make sure we haven’t missed anything,” Max said. “And we’ll take the guard into custody, see if we can get him to talk.”
Zeke scowled. “You’re assuming he knows something worth telling us.”
“Zeke.” Julianne rested a hand on the newest agent’s arm in an attempt to calm him. “At this point, we’ll take every bit of information we can get. Have faith, we’ll find your brother.”
Brody knew that Julianne’s faith was strong, while his had wavered over the years. Once again, he hated the idea that she was clearly better off without him. Their disagreement over Lilly’s disappearance as well as her bluntly negative opinion of Nate, had created a rift between them wider than the Mississippi River. Besides, as much as he felt bad for the FBI’s missing agent, he had a bigger problem to contend with.
Finding Nate Otwell and the gunman who’d assisted his escape.
“We’d better get outside,” Brody interjected. “We’ll need to get the guard airlifted out of here, along with the rest of us.”
“Yeah.” Max jammed his fingers through his short blond hair before turning and heading back through the house, Opal at his side.
The two guards they’d been forced to shoot in self-defense were of course lying where they’d left them. But when Brody looked over
