“Yeah. For a while. I made a lot of money, even through my early teenage years. Went to school, could have taught most of the professors. Did a lot of research in pharmaceuticals, and we both know you can make a fortune there. I just kept making money.” He made small circles on the table with the edge of the beer bottle. His gaze once again held Wyatt’s. “You know that money didn’t mean a fucking thing to me, Wyatt. Not one damned thing. I can’t help the way my mind works. The money made it easy to get the lab I wanted and the equipment, but that was all. I live simply. I don’t use it.”

Wyatt frowned at him. “Trap, I’ve known you for years. We went to school together. We were both younger than everyone else and, yeah, smarter, so we naturally gravitated toward each other. We went into business together. You don’ have to convince me you aren’ into money.”

“She was kidnapped. They took her right out of the house when I was working in the laboratory. She would always come and get me for dinner. I could skip other meals, but not dinner. She didn’t come. When I went into the house, the place was a wreck. She fought them and I hadn’t heard a fucking thing.”

Wyatt listened to Trap’s voice, but he couldn’t hear any expression at all. Just the soft monotone Trap often used.

“I paid the ransom, of course. Millions, enough to set them up for life in another country where they could change identities and live life large. I paid it immediately. They returned her body to me on my front porch. She was dead. They’d used her.” Trap’s blue eyes went so cold it felt like the temperature in the room dropped. “Hard. They made certain there was plenty of evidence so I would see that. They hurt her in every way possible before they killed her. They left me a note. Quoted ‘an eye for an eye.’ They made it very plain that any woman I was with would suffer the same fate.”

Trap took another long swig of beer. “I knew it was my uncles. I pointed the cops to them. I hired detectives. They disappeared. Their tracks were so well-covered that I knew they had changed identities. Even bribing the best in the business, I didn’t find out who they’d become. All that money I’d made wasn’t worth shit, Wyatt. It didn’t buy her back for me and it didn’t find her killers.”