by Dale Mayer
“Yes,” Griffin said, “but we need to know who’s behind the kidnapping. I’m not prepared to turn you over until we’re sure this is resolved and the two of you are safe.”
Something about his wording sent unease sliding through her. Surely they’d not hold them hostage too, would they? “Presumably you’ll turn us over to our British government,” she said smoothly, “so we can go home.”
“Is that where you are from?” Griffin asked, testing her honesty.
She nodded. “I’m American, but I’ve been living in England for the last seven years, and I’ve been with Amelia Rose for five of those seven.”
“So her father sent you to Thailand for a holiday?”
“Her mother did,” she said quietly, glancing at Amelia Rose, who was still lying on the back seat and staring at the men. Lorelei nodded and added, “Just the three of us but her father was to join us there.”
“They killed Nurse Mary,” Amelia Rose said in a faint voice.
Griffin stared at her and nodded. “I’m sorry, little one. It’s hard to lose someone at any time, but, under these circumstances, it’s much worse. We did hear that one of your party was dead. I’m sorry about that.”
“They shot her,” Lorelei said. “And I think it was a lesson and a warning to us to behave, or we’d follow the same suit.”
“It makes sense,” Griffin said. “But apparently there wasn’t any ransom note. Instead they said that Amelia Rose had been married. I thought it was you, Lorelei, originally, because I didn’t understand child marriages here. Still don’t for that matter,” he muttered under his breath.
“They’re big in many parts of the world,” Lorelei said. “But the fact remains, she would not ever partake of or agree to any arranged marriage at any age, and, since she is not of age, they don’t have her father’s permission. None of that was mentioned to us, so I doubt any intended marriage had anything to do with this. And, although they had no hesitation killing Nurse, they didn’t hurt us.”
“Either way, you were both being held against your will.”
Lorelei gave a strong nod. “We three were originally kidnapped on the street and were taken to some hotel. When our guard was called away from the front door to our hotel room, we escaped out the patio door. We all three left but separated soon afterward. I was to stay with Amelia Rose, and Nurse was to return to our hotel room to gather our things and wait for us to meet up with her there as soon as we could.
“As we went back to our original hotel room, they were inside the room waiting for us. They already had Nurse—Mary, but she preferred to be called Nurse. She’d gone down for a nap, and they woke her up and had her tied in a chair when we returned. They’d hit her a couple of times. Poor Nurse. I should have known better than for any of us to return to our registered hotel rooms. We were told we were to cooperate or else. Then, as a warning, they shot her—in front of us.”
Griffin winced. “They probably planned on killing her anyway,” he said gently. “They couldn’t leave any witnesses behind.”
She hated to think of that, but it had crossed her mind. She nodded slowly and said, “I’m just so sorry that her last minutes on earth were full of terror. I’m also sorry poor Amelia Rose was subjected to seeing that. She loved Nurse very much. It’s traumatizing for her.”
“And I’m glad that you two are not facing your last few minutes on earth right now,” he reminded her. “And, with any luck, we can get you out of this mess. Her father can get a specialist to help her deal with the trauma when you are home.”
That reminder Lorelei needed to keep close to her heart. They’d been through a lot already. And she wanted to trust these two men. But something devastatingly attractive about both of them made her instinctively not want to trust them either. She’d had more than her fair share of smooth slick males. Not that these guys were like that, but she didn’t want to take the chance.
Amelia Rose needed to feel secure right now, and Lorelei couldn’t take the chance of these men betraying them too. “We figured her father was being blackmailed,” she said in a low tone. “That maybe something related to his businesses was involved in this.”
“Well, Gerard has two sons and then Amelia Rose, correct?” He kept his gaze on her.
She turned to look at Amelia Rose to find her eyes were closed. Lorelei gently shifted the little girl so that her head lay on Lorelei’s lap and brushed the hair off her head. “Yes,” she said. “Two adult sons who run part of the business and a dad who’s old enough that he’s thinking about easing back, so he can spend more time with his new family.”
“And sometimes that doesn’t always go over well in the family,” Griffin said. His tone was bleak.
She wondered what he was getting at. She understood some of his suspicions about the sons, and she had to wonder herself. “The brothers have no deep love for Amelia Rose,” she said quietly. “As sad as that is, there are an awful lot of years between them. Decades, in fact, and probably not a wish to share the very hefty inheritance pot either. However, I’m not sure risking all that would be worth it to get rid of her.”
“I think, at this point in time, there’s probably more than enough inheritance for three.”
“Probably,” she said, “but some people will never have enough.”
“True enough,” Jax said. “We’re five minutes out.”
She looked around the area with interest. “And where are we going?”
Griffin shrugged and said, “To our next destination.” He flashed her a wicked grin and turned to study their surroundings.
Even though he had been speaking with her, he never really lost that sense of alertness. And it was back in full force now too. She wondered if this was because of an already pretty intense scenario or if that was just the kind of guy he was. Did he work all the time? Did one take a break from this kind of a living? Was there even a break, or is that what they did until they died? Did these men die with their boots on? She had no clue, but it was an interesting thing to contemplate. He hardly looked like a 9-to-5 office-type guy.
He was obviously the one in charge here, but Jax was an equal partner from appearances. She listened as the two discussed entryways. She didn’t quite understand the wording or what they meant, but her thoughts were now consumed with Amelia Rose’s brothers. She had met both of them a few times. They’d been arrogant but friendly. Both of them had been born into big money, and both of them had gone to business school, rising rapidly up through the ranks of their father’s company, like their father had for his father. Yet Gerard retained full control.
The sons felt they had earned their positions, whereas she was sure the sons had viewed Amelia Rose as just an observer, a pretty little tagalong who would spend money and not make it. As long as she kept to her little pile of money off to the side and just had fun on her own, the sons probably wouldn’t bother with her.
Yet her father had constantly mentioned bringing her into the business when she was old enough. Maybe that was enough to set this off. Lorelei didn’t know. She hoped not because how wrong would that be to be worried about your kid sister taking part of your inheritance pot when the pot was so damn big? Taking an active role in the mega-business that surely needed more bosses? But it was so hard to know what people were thinking, and sometimes they weren’t thinking at all. They were just reacting.
Griffin turned suddenly and asked, “Was her mother supposed to come on this trip?”
Lorelei shrugged. “Maybe … originally. I don’t know. I’m not privy to those kinds of plans.”
“What kind of relationship does Amelia Rose have with her mother?”
Not really liking where this conversation was going, Lorelei pinched her lips together and tried to be detached about it. Obviously somebody was behind this nightmare, so they needed to consider everyone and everything. “They were friendly,” she said, “but not necessarily very loving. Her mother is not very motherly, shall I say. Amelia Rose is closer to her father.”
> “So, if somebody wanted to hurt her mother, would doing something like kidnapping Amelia Rose be the worst way to do it?”
She shook her head. “No, it would be her horses.”
Griffin went still, then gave a clipped nod. “And the best way to hurt her father?”
“Either his sons or Amelia Rose,” she affirmed. “She and her father have a very caring relationship.” She smiled. “We should all be so lucky.”
“That confirms what I was thinking, that maybe she was the apple of his eye,” Griffin said, keeping his voice neutral and not letting Lorelei know exactly what he was thinking. Because, at the moment, he wasn’t even sure what he was thinking himself. His thoughts were firing off in random directions, still putting the pieces together. But, one thing was for sure, the mother was a suspect, and so were both sons. Yet he highly suspected that was just the tip of the iceberg in this case. Hell, there were too many suspects at this point. Best if they could knock some off the list. He hated to think that either parent was involved.
He looked over at Jax, who pointed ahead. Immediately Griffin leaned forward to study the neighborhood. The address was the fifth floor of a high-rise. Underneath in the parking garage, he helped Lorelei out, then leaned in and quickly scooped up the sleeping child.
With the duffel bags now carried by Jax, a procession headed up to apartment 504. The door was unlocked. They stepped inside, and Griffin walked right through to one of the bedrooms and laid the little girl down. He pulled a blanket off the second bed and quickly covered her up. Then he stood for a long moment in the doorway, wondering what kind of a bastard would hurt a young girl. He didn’t understand the child-marriage part of it at all.
However, in many countries, women were nothing but chattel, and marrying them off meant they had become somebody else’s possession. In many cases, it was legally binding too. He wasn’t sure about an eleven-year-old being of marriage age, but, having heard nightmare stories about child brides in many parts of the world, he wouldn’t be at all surprised in theory. But, in this case, there was no parental permission. She’d been kidnapped. And that was the key.
She was also a British citizen, but women disappeared into the sex trade all too often. From everywhere. Hell, many were young girls too. It’s possible marriage would be the end result for some but not for the majority. Boys had value but in a different sense; girls were valuable for blending marriages and powerful families. It was a scary world out there.
Griffin couldn’t see that as being anything other than a punishment for the father though. Particularly if they thought that they could get him to believe she had been raped. Griffin presumed any parent would do anything to rescue their child from that scenario.
He stared down at his clenched fists, hating that, even now, the thought of child rape could disturb him so much. He’d seen such atrocities in the war and had tried to avoid coming in contact with much of it because he tended to lose his temper and take it out on anybody and everybody involved.
Griffin had gotten in trouble in the navy as a young seaman after finding out one of his colleagues had taken advantage of a Thai girl. She’d only been nine. The man in question had taken a hard beating from Griffin and then had been thrown in the brig until his trial, which all had helped Griffin deal with this issue, but it hadn’t been enough. That little girl had to carry the childhood trauma of that rape for the rest of her life, and that wasn’t fair.
Hating the thoughts in his mind, he walked to where Lorelei had collapsed into a recliner and crouched beside her and said, “Please tell me for sure that she wasn’t raped.”
Immediately Lorelei shook her head. “No, she wasn’t. Neither of us were.”
“Did a marriage of any kind take place?”
She shook her head. “No. They did treat us better this last twenty-four hours though. Amelia Rose was given food and water and a bed to sleep in.”
“Probably realizing that a child being treated a little bit better would be easier to deal with.”
“Or make her prettier,” Lorelei said caustically. “It’s all about the value of the child.”
“But there could be all kinds of value involved in something like this,” Griffin said. “Even if it’s to make her father’s business holdings look shaky because he can’t look after his family. Stock prices on his US newspaper holdings have already started to drop.”
“Why would people do things like that?”
“To make money,” he said. “To make lots and lots of money.”
“If someone did that,” Jax said from behind her, “they would have sold their stock immediately. And now that the shares are dropping, it’s pretty easy to buy up shares cheap when it hits its low point. Then you wait until they bounce back up again and sell them off for a tidy profit.”
She shook her head, stood from the chair, and walked to check on Amelia Rose. Lorelei wrung her hands as she paced back and forth, obviously distressed. “The only ones I can think of who would have anything to do with this,” she said, “would be either Gerard’s sons—because they’re part of the bigger business picture—or one of Gerard’s enemies. And I’m sure he has more than a few of those.”
“What’s he like to work for?”
“As long as you’re on his good side,” she said with a wry smile, “it’s fine. But the minute you cross him, like anybody, it’s not much fun.”
“Is he fair?”
She tilted her head to the side, thought about it, then nodded slowly. “Anytime I’ve had any dealings with him, it seems like he was fair. But then my job is looking after Amelia Rose, to teach her, to guide her, and to help her grow up. As long as I do that, and she appears to be in good health emotionally and physically, then he’s happy with me. But, when he does test her on her knowledge, if she slips up, I’m the one who gets blamed.”
“That’s because the father never wants to believe the child is not doing what she’s supposed to,” Jax said with a smirk. “Did he ever show any signs of violence toward her or his wife?”
Immediately Lorelei shook her head. “Not that I ever saw. I’m with Amelia Rose most of the time.”
“What about Nurse?”
“No,” she said, her face softening. “Gerard had a soft spot for Nurse.”
“And his wife?”
She winced and exclaimed, “I hate saying bad things about anybody.”
“You don’t have to,” Jax said, his tone quiet but giving no quarter. “But, if you want to get out of this nightmare scenario and get back to England and be completely free of this threat, we need the truth.”
“I would say it’s a loveless marriage then,” she said promptly. “I don’t think they even have meals together.”
“Any sign of a divorce in the offing?”
“I think Gerard’s tired of divorces,” she said. “He lost out pretty badly on the last one. Likely the one before that too.”
“There would have been a prenup on this one though,” Griffin said. “I can’t believe he wouldn’t have that in place.”
“True,” she said, “but it’s also important to understand that he doesn’t want to disrupt Amelia Rose’s life.”
“Sure. But one has to find happiness somehow,” Griffin said. “I don’t believe in staying together for the children. Those kids feel the tension, see the fights, the lack of real communication. It leaves a mark on them, in my opinion. And a child witnessing a bad marriage is not setting a good example for her either. Every child should be so lucky as to have two loving parents, who love and respect each other, and who love their children unconditionally.”
Lorelei sighed. “There are more divorced families now than not in some places,” she said with a nod. “All I can tell you is that there doesn’t seem to be any affection or love between Amelia’s parents.”
“Do you ever see the three of them together?”
“Yes, but not often,” she said, slowly crossing her arms over her chest as she stood, her legs slightly wide. She stared at the two
men. “Is this really necessary?”
“Yes,” Griffin said. “We have to figure out exactly what’s going on, and, to know that, we have to figure out who the major players are and what their role in this is.”
“I don’t believe that either Gerard or Amelia Rose’s mother has anything to do with this,” she said. “Gerard adores Amelia Rose. As for Wendy, I don’t think she wants anything to change the status quo.” Lorelei held up her hand. “Let me qualify that. Wendy doesn’t want to be poor. Wendy loves money and what it can buy. That’s her status quo. Her status quo has nothing to do with being married to Gerard but that she married a rich man. Any rich man would do, in my opinion. She obviously has no respect for marriage as an institution—or even motherhood for that matter.”
“Meaning, if she were to instigate matters, she’d have, more than likely, targeted Gerard instead of her daughter?”
“Exactly,” Lorelei said. “When you think about it, she doesn’t want a divorce, but that doesn’t mean being a wealthy widow would be a bad thing.”
Griffin nodded, walked to the window, and stared outward from one of the corners. He knew enough to not stand fully in front of the window and to let anybody even see him. He didn’t know what the deal was on this apartment—who it belonged to; where the owners were; how their Mavericks boss came to know about—and it didn’t matter. It was a place to stay. He glanced at her and asked, “When did you eat last?”
“I picked up coffee and a few treats at that coffee shop where I met you,” she said. “I shared them with the driver to make the relationship a little less strained, but that was our last meal.”
“So you need food then?”
She nodded. “As does Amelia Rose. But we need good food, like real food.”
Jax was in the kitchen, opening cupboards. When he opened the fridge, he said, “Aha.”
Griffin looked at him and asked, “What did you find?”
“All the food’s here, just like I asked,” Jax said with a big smirk. “We got a roasted chicken, a cooked beef roast, lots of sliced deli meats, cheeses, and salad makings.” He opened another cupboard and brought out bread and buns, then quickly took the food from the fridge, and they stared at the assortment.
