“He checked out? He was supposed to be here for the rest of the month.”
“He left.”
“Why?”
London sighed. Meryl wasn’t going to drop it. “I don’t know,” she said. “I guess he got called back for work, or something. He said it was a family crisis,” she added, still perplexed about his comment that his parents were missing. Had he been telling her the truth? And if so, how could it be that both of their parents had disappeared?
“Oh no. But he told you why he had to leave. Do you think he’s coming back?”
“I don’t know.” London backed up from the computer and threw her hands up in the air. “I really don’t know.”
She wasn’t ready for Meryl to walk up and wrap her arms around her. London wasn’t sure how to react when Meryl hugged her, holding her for a moment and stroking her back. It would be rude to stiffen and even worse to back out of the embrace. Meryl was the closest thing to a friend London had ever had, and she didn’t want to offend her. Fortunately, Meryl put her at arm’s length a moment later, smiling warmly.
“We need a chocolate and ice cream party,” she said, wrinkling her freckle-covered nose as she made a face. “It’s the perfect remedy for a broken heart.”
London almost insisted her heart was anything but broken. She’d been damn close, though. Not for the first time that afternoon, she told herself it was a good thing Marc was gone. If they’d spent much more time together, London would have seriously lost her heart to him. She’d been saved from heartache by Marc bailing on her when he did.
“I’m fine. Really, I am,” she said, smiling to prove it. “It’s just a Monday and I’m ready for the day to be over.”
“Uh-huh,” Meryl said, giving her a scrutinizing stare. “Go ahead and head on out if you want,” she offered, apparently coming to the conclusion that London wasn’t fine. “I can finish all of this.”
“You’re working tonight?” London could have kicked herself for just now realizing Meryl was here instead of Todd.
Meryl gave her a knowing look. “Yes. Todd asked me to cover for him tonight. Can you believe it? He actually has a date. I think he’s found a lady who is as big a geek as he is.”
“Okay.” London turned, walking around Meryl. It was bad enough feeling like a space cadet, but acting like one to the point where it gave her away made matters even worse.
“You are not okay.” Meryl crossed her arms over her chest. “If you don’t want to be alone you can hang out here with me tonight. Do you have the walking tour tonight?”
“No. I’m on tomorrow and Thursday this week.” She glanced at the schedule, not trusting her memory at the moment. “Yeah, that’s right.”
Meryl shook her head, making a tsking sound. “Hang out here with me tonight,” she encouraged. “I bet we can get chocolate and ice cream from the kitchen. What do you think?”
“Meryl, you’re a great friend, but you’re crazy if you think I want to hang out here any longer than I have to,” London stressed, doing her best to make herself sound convincing. “But I will take you up on heading out early. I’ve got a million things to do.”
She didn’t have anything to do, but she hurried out of the lodge to her Jeep anyway. London froze, her key in her hand, ready to unlock her car, and stared at the package stuffed underneath her windshield wiper.
“God, no,” she whispered. “Why won’t you leave me alone?”
There wasn’t a lot more she could take. Her hand shook as she reached for it, as if it might come to life and bite her if she wasn’t careful. As she freed it from underneath her wiper she glanced around, staring at each car in the parking lot to make sure no one was in any of them. There wasn’t anyone around. Even so, London shook like a leaf as she struggled to unlock her car.
Once she started it, London locked her doors, feeling a wave of nausea coming on. Even before she opened the package and the one picture inside slid into her lap, she knew it would be bad news. The picture lay faceup and she stared down at it, shaking so bad she couldn’t pick it up. And although it was a clear shot, London couldn’t make sense out of it.
“Oh God!” she cried, sucking in a ragged breath as she lifted it to eye level, holding the corner of it with her finger and thumb. “Oh God,” she repeated. “It’s blood.”
London studied the picture, confused although it was a perfect shot of Marc, hovering over another man in the snow, looking as if he was trying to drag him. The dark discoloration saturating the other man’s shoulder and also appearing to be on Marc’s arm really made it look as if they were bleeding.
“Why are you doing this to me?” she yelled, letting her head fall back against her seat. “Leave me alone. Goddamn it! Leave me alone.”
She barely remembered driving home. London hurried up her porch steps, scared to look around her for fear there would be another package waiting for her there. The porch floor was slick and she damn near fell on her face, and racked her entire body when she managed to stay on her feet.
London felt a bit of solace once she was inside her home with the door locked behind her. She took off her boots and left them at the door, then trudged into her kitchen. There wasn’t any way she could eat a thing, but a glass of wine sounded good. She pulled out the bottle that she and Marc hadn’t finished the night he’d been over for dinner. Although it didn’t taste as good as it had the night they’d drunk it together, after she had downed a glass and poured her second the warmth that spread throughout her insides helped calm her down.
“You aren’t going to win,” she told the picture as she carried it and her full glass of wine to her bedroom. “I’m not going to give you that power.”
She stared at the picture some more, studying the rugged terrain around Marc and the other man, then focusing on the two of them. Marc wore the coat he’d bought in Aspen, which didn’t make sense if he was in California. The snow on the ground bugged her, too. Last she heard, it didn’t snow in L.A. Downing more of her wine, she hurried back to her kitchen, where she’d left her purse.
“I’m done with so many questions.” It was time for answers. London pulled out the piece of paper where she’d written down the phone number for KFA, Marc’s family business, King Fugitive Apprehension. “Bounty hunters,” she mumbled, wondering if the picture was a shot of him working. “Did you have to hunt down and capture some bad guy?”
Returning to her bedroom, London got comfortable on her bed with her wine on her nightstand and the picture of Marc in front of her. Then grabbing her phone, she punched in the number for KFA before she could talk herself out of placing the call.
“KFA.” The woman who answered on the second ring sounded cheerful but serious.
London immediately wanted to know who she was. “Is Marc there?” she asked, wondering what she would say to him if he was.
“No, he’s not in the office right now. May I take a message?”
London hesitated. Did this woman get calls from ladies all the time for Marc?
“This is London,” she began. Her brain went blank and she couldn’t figure out what else to say now that she’d spoken. A business like that would probably have caller ID on their phone and he would know she’d called and hung up if she didn’t say something else. She needed to sound intelligent, sure of herself. When this woman told Marc she called, she wouldn’t be able to say London sounded like some kind of babbling idiot.
“London?” the woman asked.
“Yes. Do you know when he’ll be in?” London asked.
“Marc is out of town right now, on business,” the woman added, her tone changing. It softened, the all-business sound leaving, and she was friendlier when she continued. “I don’t know when he’ll be back, but he told me about you. You’re out in Colorado, right?”
Something inside London melted. Maybe it was part of the wall she’d always kept up around her to prevent anyone from hurting her. It could have been hearing a friendly voice and someone who was so far away she couldn’t do her a
ny harm. Or possibly it was simply that she was speaking to someone who could enlighten her, London hoped, about Marc.
“Yes, in Aspen,” London offered, leaning back on her pillows and sliding the picture to the side of her so she could stretch out her legs. “Where is Marc?”
The woman cleared her throat. “I can’t tell you that, but don’t take it the wrong way. We don’t discuss where the men are when they are out in the field.”
London thought she understood, considering his line of work. She glanced down at the eight-by-ten, the glare from her bedroom light making it hard to see from her angle.
“Okay,” London said slowly. “Could you tell me if he’s okay?”
“Last I heard. Why?”
There was no way she would tell the woman she’d just received a picture on her windshield that suggested otherwise. “Can you reach him?” she asked instead of answering the woman’s question. If she could be evasive, then so could London.
“Yes. Is there a problem? I might be able to help you if there is.”
London didn’t see how she could help when they were hundreds of miles away from each other. “I’d really appreciate knowing he is okay. It would mean a lot to me.” London reached for her wine and downed a good swallow. “I’ll leave my number unless you already have it.”
This time the woman hesitated, although only for a moment. “I have your number.” She rattled it off to prove it. “I’ll have him call you.”
London left her phone on her bed to refill her glass but then hurried back to her bedroom when her phone rang before she had more wine poured. She stared at the unknown area code for only a moment before answering.
“Hello.”
“I hear you were worried about me,” Marc’s deep baritone purred into her ear.
“Marc,” she said, sounding breathless.
“I miss you, too.”
She hated the damn lump that swelled in her throat. As she considered the possibility that getting a buzz and talking to Marc at the same time might not be her best move, she downed the last swallow in her glass and walked back to the kitchen to refill it.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “I know this sounds weird, but were you hurt today?”
“That does sound weird. I wasn’t, but my brother was.”
His brother. Crap. Jake. She poured wine quickly and licked her fingers when she spilled some over the glass.
“I got a picture today. It was on my windshield when I got off work. It was a picture of you and another man in the snow and there was blood.”
“What?”
He yelled loud enough to startle her and she spilled more wine. London held the glass away from her but then brought it to her lips, drinking and praying she wasn’t making a serious mistake as she returned to her bedroom. All of these pictures were making her nuts. She needed to talk to someone about it and suddenly it seemed imperative she tell Marc. After all, he was a bounty hunter and that was really close to being law enforcement. Or at least, she was pretty sure it was.
“I’m getting really tired of getting these pictures,” she confessed, and plopped down on the side of her bed, putting her wineglass down before she spilled more of it. “I don’t know what to do about them and it’s making me nuts. I know this sounds crazy,” she added, and tried to laugh to make light of her rambling.
“London,” he said, his serious deep voice soothing her with just the sound of her name. “When did you start getting pictures?”
“It hasn’t been that long ago, although it seems like it. The first few sets of pictures were of my parents. Do you remember the package you found on my front porch and put in my mailbox for me?”
“Those were pictures.”
“Yes. And I knew they would be. That’s why I didn’t want you bringing them in. I was scared after you opened the package in your room that you would expect me to open my package in front of you.”
“I should have.” He sounded remorseful. “My God, London. You’ve been getting pictures of your parents, too?”
“I didn’t understand them. I don’t understand them. I haven’t talked to my parents in years, and to all of a sudden have shots of them sent to me in the mail, and with no return address. It was the notes with them that really made the whole ordeal confusing.” Once she started talking about them she didn’t seem able to stop. But when she took a deep breath and reached for her wine, she stopped, wrapping her fingers around the damp glass and staring at it. “Marc, what do you mean: ‘too’?”
“The entire time I was in Colorado pictures were being sent to my house of my parents. They weren’t pictures they took of themselves, though, and neither of them knew anyone had taken pictures of them. There were notes typed on typing paper. Just two sentences.”
“That’s the same thing that has happened to me.” She forgot about her wine as she jumped to her feet, her heart suddenly pounding so hard in her chest she couldn’t breathe. “The first note said: ‘Say good-bye to your mother and father. You’re never going to see them again.’”
“And the second note said: ‘As promised, your parents are gone. Let the game begin!’” Marc said, finishing for her.
“How did you know?” she whispered, turning slowly and staring at her dresser where all the pictures were. “You saw my pictures?”
“No. The notes that came with the pictures sent to my house said the exact same thing as your notes did.”
“What are you talking about? That doesn’t make any sense.”
“You’re right. It doesn’t.” Marc was quiet for a moment.
London barely noticed. Her head was spinning. She made the decision to talk to Marc about these pictures and he already knew about them. But he didn’t know about her pictures. He knew about his pictures.
“Someone is sending pictures to me and also sending them to your house? I don’t understand. You and I didn’t even know each other before two weeks ago.”
“London, what do your parents do for a living?”
The question took her aback. “Why do you ask?”
“I’m curious. I don’t think these pictures are about you and me or whether we knew each other. I think they’re about our parents. Are your parents in law enforcement?”
She couldn’t help laughing. “No. Hardly,” she said, afraid a wave of hysteria would kick in if she didn’t put some sense to all of this really soon. “They’re as far from law enforcement as you can get.”
“Okay. Well, I don’t know the connection yet. Do you have any vacation time coming to you?”
If he didn’t quit throwing really odd questions out at her, continually changing the subject, she would go nuts. “I’m sure I do. I’ve never used any of it. Are you suggesting I take a vacation?”
“I don’t know how much of a vacation it will be. I want you to call in to work tomorrow. Tell them you’re going to be gone for a while. And don’t leave your house. I’ll be there tomorrow to get you.”
Chapter Nine
Staying home just wasn’t an option. Marc was serious about coming to get her. There was something incredibly exciting about knowing he was driving to her right now. A rush of butterflies attacked her stomach as she leaned against the counter at the front desk, zoning in on the roaring fire she’d started after getting to work that morning.
Marc called her an hour after hanging up with her last night to let her know he’d be driving up to get her during the night. He was in Arizona, not California, but that was all the detail he’d give her over the phone. When he explained she wasn’t secure, London had an image of 007 with all his gadgets and tools of the spy trade. London was probably as far from secure as they came. Up until a couple weeks ago, she liked not having to worry for her safety or look over her shoulder.
London had taken a leap of faith when she decided to talk to Marc about the pictures. She’d honestly believed telling him about them would help clear matters up a bit in her head. Instead she was dragged deeper into a mystery, one that seemed to be wrapped around
Marc as tight as it was around her.
“I just got your voice mail.” Cliff appeared at the end of the hallway, scowling at her.
London snapped her attention to her manager, dragging her hair over her shoulder and letting it fall behind her back. It took a moment to clear her head from her brooding thoughts.
“Good. I’m sure it sounded rushed,” she said, smiling in spite of his continual frown. She hadn’t expected Cliff to be thrilled about her requesting immediate time off. “I just got word late last night. I need to leave town for a while.”
“You can’t just up and leave like this. I’m denying your request,” he informed her, sticking his jaw out and glaring at her.
“I haven’t missed a day of work in three years,” she complained.
“That doesn’t give you the right to leave without notice. You’ll just have to plan your vacation another time.”
“This is hardly a vacation.” London had never enjoyed dealing with Cliff. He was egocentric and spoiled. If she avoided any confrontation with him, he was tolerable at best. There wasn’t any way she could leave town without discussing it with him. And she’d be damned if she lost her job over this. “I didn’t plan this and I’ve already covered all of my shifts. You won’t have to work any more than you do now,” she added, knowing she stabbed at him when she implied he didn’t do anything around the lodge anyway, other than make his employees’ lives miserable. It was a great job if they didn’t have to deal with Cliff, and since he seldom came around unless someone famous made reservations or important people held parties, it wasn’t hard avoiding him.
“I hardly have time to work the front desk. I have my own workload, you know.” The way he tilted his head, looking defiant and superior, showed he completely missed her jab that he didn’t work at all.
The phone rang and London spun around to answer it, keeping her back to Cliff when she grabbed it. Losing her cool with him wouldn’t help matters. All that mattered was that he approve her time off and leave her alone.
“Elk Lodge,” she answered.
Get Lucky Page 16
