Chapter Four

I Have Hours, Only Lonely

My Love Is Vengeance

That's Never Free

"That, detective is the million-dollar question now, isn't it?" The medical examiner answered.

Detective Bonanno looked up from the remains on the table to focus on the medical examiner. "And an even more expensive question is who is this laying here and how exactly is he related to Eliot Spencer?"

"Right. Well Pat, I just cut them open and such…" he said pointing to the remains on the table. "It's your job to find out who they were, but I have no doubts that you will find the answers." The man reached for the sheet to cover the remains. "Until I get the word from you, I'm placing these remains in limbo. CSI has recovered more remains found mixed with pieces of the truck and I'm expecting those anytime. I'll put those ahead of anything else today and I'll let you know what I find out from them."

"I know this may be the impossible question here, but do you think you can tell me what exactly the cause of death was or at least give me an idea of the cause."

The man looked at him and laughed. "You mean besides the obvious of being blown to bits?" When he saw the serious look, the detective gave him he asked, "You're kidding right?"

Bonanno chuckled lightly then as he answered. "If only I were."

The medical examiner slowly shook his head. "There just isn't enough remains here to give me a definitive cause of death. The most I can get from these is if I have some samples to run a test for drugs in the tissue. Or I might be able to have some samples tested for the decomp ratio. I might, and I mean I might be able to tell you if he was dead before he was blown to bits, but other than that it's doubtful I can get anything else. Now if your CSI guys could find me a piece larger than a bread box or maybe some sections of the internal organs, I just might be able to tell you more than that, but as it is, this is it."

"Whatever you can get me, Les, that'd be great. Run the decomp tests first. That's a good start. If this man was dead before the bomb, then that would mean this whole thing was planned to kidnap Eliot and that could drum up some different leads to follow. Meanwhile I'm heading out to talk to his team. Call me with the results as soon as you get them. And thanks, Les. I owe you one."

Lester McEvoy looked up at the detective. "You don't owe me anything, Pat. I owe you more than you'll ever know. You helped me out in the past and I'm here anytime. I'll get the lab started on those tests. Don't worry, I'll be in touch." He reached out and shook the detective's hand. "You'll find the truth."

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Somewhere in Eliot Spencer's Past

"Eliot!" Came the sweet-sounding voice of the young girl with her pigtails flying behind her as she ran up to the young boy who sat cross-legged on their front porch.

"Hey Emma." Eliot greeted his sister. " 'Bout time you got home. Mamma's looking for you." He continued to sit on the porch petting their lazy coonhound Jake.

"What for? I did all my chores before I went ridin'. Mamma said I could." Emma Spencer flopped down to sit on the other side of Jake as she took hold of one of his long floppy ears and played with it. The dog was totally worthless as an actual coonhound, but he was the most loving animal they'd ever owned, and she loved him.

"Not sure exactly, but I think it has to do with Aunt Marie and Uncle Marty. They called and said they were comin' out this weekend to visit and with Mamma being pregnant right now, she probably wants you to help clean up the house and get the spare room ready. And since it's women's work, she needs you." Eliot teased his sister.

At thirteen, his sister was a big supporter of the women's lib thing going on. Eliot loved to tease her whenever he could, but in all honesty, he really admired his sister's opinions and how strong she was. He was a firm believer that women were the stronger of the human species. Aside from physical strength men couldn't hold a candle to the things women had been enduring for centuries. Childbirth alone was all it took to understand just how strong his mother was, and then to see how she dealt with other things just made him believe his sister had a good teacher. The two women were exactly alike, and they were like rocks as far as he was concerned.

"Ha ha. Very funny Ellie." Emma teased back. She knew how much her brother hated the girlie nickname in public, but she also knew he liked it when it was between the two of them. "Okay, so Aunt Marie and Uncle Marty are coming out from Nevada to visit. We haven't seen them in a while. Did mamma say why they suddenly decided to make the trip?"

"Nope, but she's excited. She went to move dad's truck so they could park their motor home close to the house and she accidentally scratched the side on the fence post over there." He said pointing to their dad's truck parked next to said post. "Dad wanted to be mad, but mamma was so upset she'd done that, he couldn't help but laugh. You should have seen mamma's face when she realized what she'd done." Eliot said as he remembered the incident, laughing at the look on his dad's face.

Emma laughed too. "Well, Uncle Marty is her favorite brother and he hasn't been home in a while, so I can see why she'd get so excited." She brushed the loose hair from her face as she took in the sight of their dad's truck sitting there with the scrap that she could see from where she sat. "I bet dad's more worried about mamma havin' that baby than his truck, although it's probably a sure thing that the truck is in the back of his mind. He loves that old truck."

"Yep, almost as much as mamma, but like you said, he's more worried about her right now. So, he's gone to the store to stock up on food since they plan on staying for a week or so. Mamma said it took Aunt Marie a lot of begging' but she got Uncle Marty to agree to a week so they could catch up with all the family."

"Cool. Okay, I'll go find mamma, but if I have to clean the house, then you get to start dinner!" Emma said as she jumped up and ran in the house before Eliot could object.

Eliot only laughed as he watched his sister run inside the house. He reached out and scratched Jake behind his ears and reveled in the sound of bliss that came from the dog's deep rumble. "Just between you and me Jake, I got the better end of the deal. And so, did everyone else cause we both know my sister can't cook to save her life!"

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Roughly 11:00 AM

"Not Eliot? Your positive detective?" Nate Ford said to the detective that sat across from him at the table in McRory's bar. The fact that the remains that had been found at the crime scene were not those of Eliot was all he'd really heard when the man had begun explaining what he had so far.

"Yes. The medical examiner is positive about that, but there's something we can't explain though."

Nate looked at the man. What else could there be to explain, he thought. Eliot was alive and now he and his remaining teammates had to find him. "What? What's to explain?"

"Les, the M.E. is positive that the remains are those of a male relative of Eliot's. They have the same genetic markers and the body has to be a close relative. Do you know anything of Eliot's family, Nate?"

Nate looked across the bar to the table where Hardison, Parker and Sophie were sitting waiting to hear what the two men were discussing about Eliot. He'd convinced them to let him talk to the detective alone in case…well in case the news wasn't good. But now, he was thinking it was because he didn't want to have them see him lose it in case the news wasn't good. They were facing away from him, but Nate knew they were very in tune with the two men and they'd know the instant the detective got up to leave. It didn't hurt that they were all listening via their earbuds either, he thought with a small smile.

Eliot was alive though and that was what he needed to focus on right now. He didn't know a lot about Eliot, but he did know some things that the others didn't. Eliot had told him some things since the events with Damien Moreau; to prove to Nate that he could trust him to be there for the team.

"I don't know much about Eliot's family, he's a very private man and he prefers it that way, but I know his father is alive and lives in Oklahoma. He's retired now, but he used to run a hardware store. I know Eliot had a younger brother, a younger sister and an older one, but the younger sister and brother were killed in a car accident with their mother when Eliot was younger. I don't know the details and I never asked. To get Eliot to give me that much was basically a gift of how much the man had come to trust me. And to ignore that gift by asking him questions was something I would not do. I don't know if his mother or father had any brothers and his one remaining sibling is a sister. He never said if he even kept in touch with any of them." Nate sighed as he remembered when Eliot had chosen to tell him about this much of his family. "I know he has a lot of skeletons in his past that he prefers to keep to himself and I've respected him for that."

The detective nodded slowly. "Do you know if his sister has any children, a son maybe?"

Nate thought about that. "I remember once he said something about his nephew, but he spoke of him like he was a small child. I don't think he has any other nephews since he only mentioned the one that one time. I have a number for his sister, but when Eliot gave it to me it was only to be used if we needed to give her…give her bad news. Accurate bad news, if you know what I mean, detective."

"Yeah, unfortunately, I'm gonna need that number, Nate. And before you say anything, I know what to say and how to say it. I'll keep everything quiet until I have something to tell her, but I need to know who this guy was and how he was related to Eliot. It could help us find Eliot. That's the next thing here Nate. We need to find out where Eliot is."

Nate looked at the man and nodded. He was right about one thing. They needed to find out what happed to Eliot and where he was. But Nate knew the police investigation was now on the back burner for him and the others. They would conduct their own investigation from here on out. If the detective could identify who the remains were, well that would be the best they could hope for, because whoever had Eliot had to know about him and his family. Whoever had Eliot could very possibly even be family.

Whoever had Eliot was not on the police's radar, but they could very well be on the government's radar and that meant it had to do with something from Eliot's past. Eliot had given Nate his sister's contact info, but that wasn't the only contact info Eliot had given him. Nate held the contact info for someone else; someone who could help him find Eliot and he was keeping that to himself.

Nate reached out for a napkin and pulled a pen from his jacket pocket and he wrote down the contact information for Emma Spencer-Whitmore from memory. That was the only place he kept his team's pertinent info. "I don't know how much help she'll be but promise me you won't say anything about Eliot missing until you have something concrete on his whereabouts. She'll panic and with what she's had to live with in the past about Eliot, she'll already be suspicious just from getting your call."

"All right. But that's a two-way promise." The man said taking the napkin and folding it then putting it in his inside jacket pocket. "You come up with anything on your end, you let me know. But only let me know when you have something concrete. The less I know right now about Eliot's past means the more I can apply plausible deniability." He smiled as he reached out and shook hands with Nate over the table.

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Roughly sometime around noon

Eliot Spencer knew for a fact he was not lying on his kitchen floor anymore. He had slowly been coming more alert as he continued to fake unconsciousness. He could hear the steady beep beep of the monitors that were recording his heartbeat and his breathing, while he could feel the pain in his chest and his left side. His first thought was he was in a hospital, but that thought quickly vanished when he couldn't smell any of the smells he would have associated with a hospital.

Hospitals, no matter where they were, all had the same distinctive antiseptic smells, and this one had none of those smells. He knew he was in a bed, but it was not a traditional hospital bed. While he knew it was raised slightly, it didn't feel like a normal hospital bed and he knew that he was restrained at both wrists by leather cuffs that were not attached to bed rails, but rather where attached somewhere under the bed itself. Probably to the framework. He also knew his ankles were restrained as well.

He'd slowly been assessing everything he could while he still gave whoever held him captive the impression that he was still out. He needed to have all his faculties about him if he intended to get out of this mess and right now, he knew he wasn't moving very soon. He knew he'd been shot at least twice in his house. One bullet had entered his left side and the other hit him in the chest just as he was going down. And neither injury would have been a simple wound. He knew he should have died from those injuries, but someone had saved him, and he could only speculate that the reasons for him being alive meant they needed something from him.

He had a long list of enemies and any number of them could be behind this, but for some reason he couldn't come up with a name now. He could only think it had to be someone who hated him, and it had to be from his past. It wouldn't involve his team, or he'd have just been dead. If he and the team had been targets, then any of those enemies they'd made on their jobs would have just killed him. No, whoever was behind this wanted him to live just so he could suffer later.

"I know you're faking it Eliot." The voice was male and was familiar. Eliot thought it was the same voice from his kitchen, but he wasn't sure. Something was nagging at the back of his mind about that voice.

"Hello Mr. White Hat…"

Eliot slowly opened his eyes to find his vision slightly fuzzy as he tried to focus in on the man standing over him. As his vision slowly cleared and the man came into focus, Eliot was sure he was hallucinating. This man was…dead. As in, Eliot knew he was dead because he'd been the one to take his knife and slit his throat. He had killed this man over five years ago. Five years ago, when he'd worked for Damien Moreau.

The killing of this man had been the only thing Eliot had ever regretted doing. The one truly worst thing he'd ever done. The one worst thing he'd done for Damien Moreau. He remembered telling his team. He remembered…

Nate slowly stood up and walked over to Eliot. "We've been chasing Moreau for six months, and you didn't tell us?"

"Because I was trying…" Eliot began. He didn't know how to tell them. He'd been trying to protect them, and he'd been hoping he'd never have to tell them. But he knew Moreau and he knew what he was capable of.

But Nate interrupted him. "Because what?"

"…to figure out a way around this, all right; maybe take my shot before-"

"Because you're protecting him?" Nate interrupted again. "Is that what you're-"

This time Eliot snapped back at him. "I'm protecting you! All right…last time I checked, that's my job."

"Look we can handle Moreau."

Eliot sighed as he looked up at Nate. He didn't understand. None of them understood. They couldn't even begin to understand. "We're out of our league, Nate. Every one of Moreau's men has innocent blood on their hands, every one of 'em. Every one of 'em…are worse than me. You think you know what I've done? The worst thing I ever did in my entire life, I did for Damien Moreau. And I – I'll never be clean of that." Never he thought to himself.

"What did you do?" Came Parker's soft voice from behind Nate and that voice just about killed Eliot. Her voice just about made him lose any control he had left.

Eliot slowly turned his gaze from Nate to Parker. "Don't ask me that, Parker." He knew she could see the unshed tears in his eyes as he spoke to her. They could all see. "Because if you ask me, I'm gonna tell you. So please don't ask me."

"So, you remember me, don't you Eliot?" The man stood over Eliot looking down at him. He bent down until his face was mere inches from Eliot's. "Ghosts have a way of making themselves known, don't they? Ghosts always have a way of making themselves known." He chuckled softly at the look in Eliot's eyes. "But then again, you have a lot of ghosts making themselves known to you. You've killed more men than you can count and I'm sure that most of them even deserved it. But I didn't. Did I? Brother?"

Eliot closed his eyes slowly and when he opened them the man was gone and there was no one near him. He was still in the bed and he could still hear the monitor beeping, but the man he'd killed for Damien Moreau was gone. The man that he should never have killed he thought. The man who was family…the man who was his brother.