by Rebecca King
Vanessa slumped against him. Justin put his finger to his lips once more to warn her that Curtis might still be listening at the door. It wasn’t until they heard the floor board creak again that they truly began to relax. Even so, Justin didn’t allow her to move.
“Stay still.”
“Where do you think he is?”
They waited. The faint sound of something like a chair being scraped against the floor downstairs gave her the answer. The dull thud of a drawer closing added confirmation that Curtis had gone back downstairs. Whatever it was Curtis was doing, he was taking his time about it, and had clearly not left without checking the rest of the house.
“Do you think he saw us?” Vanessa whispered.
“I think he knows he locked the door and wonders who has unlocked it. Stand still because we cannot move until we know he has gone,” Justin warned.
He shifted to ease the ache in his back, the remnants of a not-so-forgotten wound, and almost groaned when he rubbed intimately against her.
Vanessa did her best to quell the blush in her cheeks but could do little with Justin practically wrapped around her as he was.
“What on earth possessed you to come here?” he growled. “Did you not consider this kind of situation could happen?”
Vanessa sighed.
“You know we are going to look into your claims he might have had a hand in Geraldine’s disappearance. Do you not think us capable of searching this place ourselves?”
Vanessa looked at him. “Firstly, I don’t know who you are. I know you come from London, but Weeks is competent, but not excellent. He has a dubious reputation amongst the villagers because he has sometimes got his version of events wrong. He isn’t a bad magistrate but isn’t a good one either. How do we know you are not the same?”
“Nobody trusts him,” Justin murmured.
Vanessa shook her head. “Nobody will trust you either. Everyone is suspicious of the magistrate. They won’t tell on anybody in this village given the scurrilous gossip it would cause if Weeks was indiscrete. I am not saying he would be, but the villagers are wary. Weeks is still classed as new to the village.”
“How long has he been here?”
Vanessa looked at him a little ruefully. “Three years.”
Justin rolled his eyes. He suspected as much. It was often the case in villages like Bicester.
“We, the Star Elite, work for the War Office,” Justin breathed. “That’s all you need to know. Weeks wrote to our boss asking for help when he heard from the magistrate in Derbyshire that several people had vanished from that county as well. Both magistrates suspect a serial kidnapper is in the area, and so called for assistance because they can’t search both counties with their limited manpower.”
Vanessa listened, but knew immediately there was a lot he wasn’t telling her.
“You think there are more victims, don’t you?”
Justin sighed. “We deal with large-scale crime, including serial crime, gangs and the like. Magistrates usually deal with more petty crime. You know, sheep theft, pick-pocketing, drunks on a Saturday night, that kind of thing.”
“But you are used to dealing with gangs of criminals, not groups of missing people,” Vanessa protested.
“Keep your voice down,” Justin warned when she spoke a little too loudly. “He might still be downstairs you know.”
Personally, he was glad they were having a conversation because it helped keep his mind off what his lips truly wanted to do.
“You think they have been kidnapped and forced into slavery or something, don’t you?” she gasped in horror.
Justin pursed his lips. “We cannot be sure but can’t discount the possibility that a gang of criminals might be behind this. That being the case, your sister may not be dead but held captive somewhere. Now, don’t get all upset. I am not saying that for definite, you understand? It is just highly unusual for so many almost identical people to disappear? Why are they all around the same age, with the same hair colour?”
Vanessa was already shaking her head.
“You don’t think so?” Justin lifted his brows. He wanted to ask her what authority she had on the subject but didn’t want to offend her.
“Geraldine is strong, Justin,” she murmured, dutifully keeping her voice low. Vanessa used his first name without thinking about how natural it felt. Given the situation they were in, and how tightly pressed against her he was, formalities seemed ridiculous.
“Maybe so,” Justin replied doubtfully.
“She would have kicked up a ruckus like you wouldn’t believe if she had been kidnapped. While she wasn’t a huge woman, she was strong willed and would have fought.”
“Unless she had been rendered incapable of doing so,” Justin countered solemnly. While he didn’t want to alarm her, he couldn’t allow her to live in ignorance either.
“You mean like knocking her unconscious,” Vanessa whispered tearfully.
Justin hugged her close for a moment, silently offering her support. He didn’t whisper platitudes like most people would in a situation like this. While he empathised, he couldn’t allow her to live with false hopes that Geraldine might walk through the door unscathed. Given what he had learned already, he doubted she would still be alive by now, but he couldn’t tell Vanessa that.
“Yes, or some sort of chemical used to render her unconscious. These people vanished without a trace, remember. Nobody heard or saw a thing. It hints to them being rendered silent in some way, but it doesn’t mean they were killed instantly,” he hastily reassured her when he saw moisture gather on her lashes.
Vanessa nodded. She didn’t want to talk about it much less think about it. Usually when she began to contemplate what might have happened, she cried. It was difficult not to do the same now, especially when she saw the sympathy and understanding in Justin’s gaze. But she had to contemplate all possibilities, and cling to the hope he unwittingly offered her by suggesting Geraldine might have been knocked out and kidnapped by a slavery gang.
“It sounds so far-fetched,” she whispered.
“I am not saying anything like it happened, we are just discussing the possibilities, that’s all, Vanessa,” he murmured.
He paused for a moment and waited for her to object to his use of her first name. He didn’t mind her calling him by his first name. In fact, he quite liked it, and knew it was probably better that she did, especially if he wanted to garner her trust.
“I know,” she murmured sadly. “I just wish we knew for definite what did happen.”
“Well, we know one thing for definite,” Justin replied with a nod to the window.
Vanessa turned and looked at the cart track, and watched Curtis walk down the road.
“Don’t move,” Justin warned. “While I don’t think he can see us from that distance, and with the house as dark as it is, we can’t take the chance that he will see movement and come back to investigate once more. His suspicions are roused, don’t forget. Stand still. Once he has disappeared, we are going to leave and get the Hell away from here.”
“But we must search the place,” she protested. “I haven’t gone through all of this to go away defeated.”
Justin lifted his brows at her as warning bells rang alarmingly in the back of his mind. “You are adding burglary to your list of crimes.”
“I haven’t committed any crime,” she argued.
“You are standing in the man’s house, uninvited, having broken in,” Justin countered.
“I did no such thing. I broke nothing. I used a key. Well, you used a key, remember?”
Justin groaned, not least because she was as sharp as a tack and seemed to have an answer for everything. She was highly intelligent and, he had no doubt, a damned pain in the proverbial to argue with if she had a mind to be.
Making a mental note to keep her on side, Justin shook his head.
“Do you want to tell me what you intend to do then? What are you looking for?” he demanded.
“Any si
gn of my sister. She isn’t downstairs.”
“I know, she has vanished,” Justin replied pointedly, with the patronising patience of someone who was speaking to someone they considered less intelligent than themselves.
Vanessa glared at him. “I mean, none of her personal belongings are downstairs. All trace of her has been removed from the house, Justin. All the nic-nacs she had on display have gone. The pictures she painted have been removed from the walls. I want to see if her clothing is still in the dresser. If not, where are they? What has he done with them? If Geraldine has been kidnapped, why would he get rid of them all as though he doesn’t ever expect her to come back? What does he know that we don’t?”
Justin understood, but still didn’t agree with what she was doing.
“This is my job, Vanessa. It isn’t something you should be involved in,” Justin warned.
“Are you going to tell me that you intended to do this yourself?” Vanessa asked. “Would you know what to look for? Where to look? What things were hers?”
“Well, no, but we would have searched the house and barns properly,” Justin replied.
“But how could you if you don’t know what you are looking for?” she challenged.
Justin hesitated.
“We have only just started the investigation,” he warned. “There is a lot of work to do.”
“But if you suspect Curtis is the killer, why don’t you just search this house? Then you would realise he has gotten rid of all trace of his wife and could ask him what he has done with her.” Vanessa knew she was almost shouting at him, but was so frustrated she wanted to shake him. Did he not see any urgency in the situation?
“Why are you not doing anything to help?” she demanded. “What do you know that I don’t?”
“We are helping,” Justin argued.
“How? All I can see is you are trying to stop me looking for my sister,” she snapped.
“I just don’t want you getting hurt,” Justin replied, digging deep for his patience.
“Don’t you think you should concern yourself with those who might already have been hurt?” she replied crisply.
She was deluged with emotions she daren’t put a name to and couldn’t even bring herself to acknowledge right now, and it wasn’t all her growing fears for her sister.
“Well you can stand here all day, but I am going to do what I came here for,” she growled.
She threw one last look at the window. Although she couldn’t see Curtis, she had no reason to suspect he was coming back to the house a second time. Before she had second thoughts, she stepped around Justin and made her way to the door. Vanessa didn’t care if he intended to follow or not. Right now, she was angry with him for kissing her the way he had and awakening things within her she hadn’t even known were dormant. She was annoyed with herself, her sister for vanishing, and for Curtis for being so heartless over whatever he had done. Nobody was going to stop her from getting to the truth, no matter what it took, and that included the highly distracting Justin.
It was a relief to be able to put some distance between them, even if it was only a few feet down the hallway, to the small door that led to the attic.
Justin silently followed her. He closed the door behind them and kept a respectful distance as they climbed the narrow steps to the small roof space. To his consternation, it was completely empty.
“Now, where have all the packing boxes and the like gone,” she murmured aloud.
“There were things stored up here?” Justin asked, glancing around at the empty space. It was unusual for it to be completely devoid of the odd nic-nac here and there.
“Geraldine kept some of the things she didn’t want in the house up here. I know because I asked her to borrow an old loom she had and came up here with her to fetch it. It was full of clutter; moving boxes, even unpacked boxes full of things she didn’t need but didn’t want to get rid of. You know, memories of our childhood, that kind of thing.”
Justin nodded. “The usual things.”
“So, where has it all gone?”
“Would she have told you she was having a clear out?”
Vanessa looked at him. “I came up here with her for the loom two days before she vanished, Justin.”
Justin kept his face devoid of emotion. He knew Vanessa was staring at him and daren’t give her any hint of the thoughts running through his mind right now. Whatever had transpired between them in that bedroom had gone far beyond a kiss. He suspected they had developed a connection somehow that had given her the ability to read his bloody mind, and it was enough to drive him out of his mind.
“Damn it,” he growled in frustration, unsure what he was going to do about it.
It was too late to turn the clock back, even if he wanted to, which he wasn’t at all sure he did. Unfortunately, it made the investigation into Geraldine’s whereabouts considerably more personal.
“Damn it all to Hell.”
Vanessa lifted her brows at him. “Do you believe me now?”
Justin growled at her as though displeased, which of course he was, but not entirely with her.
“No, I do not,” he snapped.
Vanessa planted her fists on her hips because the urge to swing at him was strong. To her amazement, he nonchalantly turned around and descended the stairs without bothering to look at her. It was as though he had descended into a world of his own; one where she didn’t exist. She had never felt so dismissed in her entire life. Stymied, she slowly followed him, inwardly battling the hurt that began to flood the centre of her chest.
It was a surprise to find him rummaging around in the main bed chamber.
“For God’s sake,” he growled.
“What is it?” Vanessa asked as she entered the bed chamber and watched him slide one of the dresser drawers closed.
“Show me downstairs,” he ordered, then marched out of the door.
Vanessa stood mutely by the sitting room door while he searched the contents of the bureau. Solemnity stole her warmth when she looked at the empty spaces on the walls where her sister’s artwork had once sat. There was very little else in the room for her to search.
“The furniture?” Justin asked.
“Geraldine’s,” Vanessa replied quietly.
“Is there a cellar or something?” Justin asked. Even the cupboards on either side of the fireplace were empty. What was tucked away neatly inside was masculine in nature with very little evidence of any feminine involvement.
Vanessa shook her head.
Justin sighed and stared thoughtfully out of the window for a moment. His gaze turned to the out-buildings.
“We need to search those,” he growled.
“Do you believe me now? Don’t you find this a little odd seeing as Geraldine is supposed to have been kidnapped, and could be found?”
Justin hated to say anything without proof to support his theories but was starting to believe Geraldine had left the house of her own accord. Not least because everything that was left was neat and tidy, and not dishevelled, or upended as one would expect if things had been moved about hastily. The house was bare, but tidy. It didn’t point to a fraught husband having removed his wife’s belongings quickly. Something wasn’t right, he just had no idea what. It was damned unusual, though, for there to be none of Geraldine’s possessions in the house, except heavy items of furniture she would be unable to move alone.
It wasn’t unusual for a woman to disappear with a lover and not say anything to her family, not least because of the scandal it might cause. Vanessa had already said that Geraldine was unhappy; was her displeasure with her marriage down to a lover making her happier than her husband?
“Don’t make assumptions,” he warned as he swept past her and began to look around the rest of the house again.
“Well, what do you think happened then?” she demanded, her fists clenched with frustration.
She followed him through the kitchen to the back door. The distance between them seemed to grow and it w
asn’t just physical. She mentally began to back away from him, nudged into greater distance by disappointment. She realised she didn’t know him at all. It had been foolish to allow him the liberty of kissing her. So much so, she began to wish it hadn’t happened at all, but this time for a completely different reason.
CHAPTER NINE
“We need to get out of here,” Justin growled once they were outside.
Vanessa’s stomach sank to her toes when she heard the low rumble of Curtis’s cart over the cobbles of the courtyard.
“He went to fetch his transport,” Justin hissed. “Damn it.”
He glared at the fields around them, wishing they contained something they could use for cover. But there was nothing. The field had been mowed recently, leaving not even tall grass they could hide in.
“We could go back inside,” Vanessa whispered.
Justin was already shaking his head. Not only did he not want any more temptation presented to him in the form of several hours alone with Vanessa in a bed chamber, but Curtis may not leave the house until dawn. They couldn’t take the risk that they might get stuck inside the house, unable to creep out, or worse, get caught inside if the man did a more thorough search of his property. He would have some explaining to do if Curtis called the magistrate.
“Let’s get over this wall. There isn’t anything else we can do. We can then skirt around here, over to the back of the barn.”
To their disbelief, the cart began to move again and promptly left the yard. Minutes later, they watched Curtis drive back down the cart track toward the village.
“I have no idea,” she murmured when Justin looked at her askance.
“Wait!” Justin grabbed her arm when Vanessa tried to walk around the end of the house toward the yard.
Vanessa gasped when, within a heartbeat, she found herself pressed intimately against him once more. A shiver of awareness swept through her when she felt his arms slide around her. It wasn’t just the speed in which he moved that threw her off balance, it was the way he swirled her around until their positions were reversed so he provided a physical barrier to whatever had worried him in the yard. Tentatively, Vanessa stood on tiptoe and peered around the broad width of his shoulder.
