by Debbie Mason
Colin, who’d been comforting Kitty, looked over at his boys. He said something to Kitty and then walked over to Chief Benson and his detective. Resting his hand on Finn’s other shoulder, he spoke to his old friend. Chief Benson and his detective nodded before moving away.
“All right, son. We’re going to find Olivia. You’re not going to lose her.”
His face stricken, Finn raised his hand. “Don’t, don’t even go there. I can’t think—”
“Finn, calm down. You won’t be any good to Olivia if you lose it. Liam and Sophie filled me in about George and her mother, so what I need you to do is tell me everything Olivia said and did from the point they arrived and when she left,” Aidan said.
Knowing Olivia as well as she did, Colleen had a difficult time listening to Finn relay the information Aidan asked for. Heartache and fear was mixed with bitter frustration that they couldn’t hear her yelling in their ears, screaming the answers at the top of her lungs. She was nearly exhausted and not one of them had heard her. And the one man who could help her was so intent on ensuring Kitty was all right that he either didn’t feel her tugging on his sleeve and pushing at him or he was ignoring her.
While Colleen had been ruminating in her head, Finn had said something that made Aidan narrow his eyes at Julia Landon. If Colleen’s heart were still beating, it would have stopped. They couldn’t afford for Julia’s secret to come out now.
“You all thought I was overreacting yesterday, but I’ve been doing some investigating into Julia Landon. She has close ties to the mayor, who you may remember was working with Paige Townsend. But that’s not even the biggest red flag. The woman gave Mistletoe Cottage to Mia. She gave a kid she barely knew a property that’s valued at close to two hundred grand. Who does that? I’ll tell you who does, Ava and Griff’s fairy godmother. Surprised, right? So now maybe you’ll understand why, when you tell me the person Olivia was going to see was none other than our family’s stalker, that I’m going to walk right over there and haul the woman down to the station for questioning.”
“Come on, Aidan. You can’t do that. She’s…Aidan.” Liam went after his brother who strode across the ballroom to where Julia was talking to the girls.
Colleen had been counting on Aidan to somehow figure out foul play was involved. He’d always been a canny lad. But he’d made a right hash of it.
Colleen glanced at Simon, who was sitting at her feet. He was her last hope. “You’ve never let me down in the past, Simon. I need you now. Olivia needs you. Go to Patty’s, the mauve Victorian that looks like a gingerbread house. It’s a run-down old place just up from the cottage they’re renovating for the spa. See if Ivy’s holding Olivia there. If she is, you need to bring me something. A piece of mail, something with the address.
“It’s a lot to ask of you, I know. But you’re a canny cat. I believe in you, Simon. You can do this. Give Jasper one last scratch on your way out, will you? There’s a good lad,” she said when he gave her what looked like a clipped nod. He padded his way to Jasper, gave him a couple of head butts, and then got a piece of his pant leg between his teeth and tugged.
If that didn’t get his attention…“Shoo now, I’m busy. Can’t you see the family’s in a state, Madame? They need me,” he said, and bent to pat Simon. No doubt so people thought he was talking to the cat.
“They need you all right, you daft lad. They need you to read my book, not be mooning over my daughter-in-law. Look, the Widows Club is with her now. See, Rosa’s hugging her. They’ve put their feud aside.” They always did in time of trouble.
His hands clasped behind his back, Jasper rocked on his heels. “All right, Madame. It appears you are the only member of the family I can be of some use to.”
Colleen sent up a prayer of thanks and another one for Olivia’s safety as she followed Jasper to his room on the second floor. “Hang on, Olivia. Help is on the way.”
But Colleen’s belief that everything would be all right as soon as Jasper read the book and shared his findings with the family turned out to be wrong. Horribly so. Though she couldn’t completely lay the entire blame at Jasper’s feet. After all, she’d been the one who wrote down Olivia’s deepest, darkest secret. And Colleen had used too much of her energy today. So when Jasper turned to Olivia’s page, Colleen was unable to turn the pages to the day Patty had tea at the manor.
Jasper closed the book and bowed his head. “I pray that we’re not too late, Madame. For both Olivia’s and Master Finn’s sake.” He looked like he’d aged ten years when he returned the book to his safe.
Terrified for Olivia, Colleen was beside herself that she’d been unable to steer Jasper in the right direction. So she hadn’t given much thought to why he was walking across the ballroom. Until she saw that he was heading straight for Finn. “No, you daft lad! Not Olivia’s secret. Don’t tell her secret! You’ll throw everyone off. They’ll start looking at it as a suicide, not a case of foul play.”
And that’s exactly what happened.
Olivia came to on a battered oak floor. She smelled floor polish, mothballs, and mildew. She tried to lift her head and groaned when the dark, wood-paneled room spun around her. She was in a house; that much she recognized. How did she…
Her mind felt like it was covered in a thick, syrupy fog, but it slowly cleared. She remembered the sound of the waves, the warmth of the sun and rocks. She’d been at Kismet Cove, and then she remembered why. Her heart ached, and a tear trickled down her cheek. She went to wipe it away. She couldn’t. Her hands and ankles were bound tightly together. Panic rose up in her throat, a piece of silver tape across her mouth keeping it there. She’d been kidnapped.
There was a thumping sound and grunting coming from behind her. She rolled to her other side. Fighting against a wave of nausea and the searing pain in her head, she closed her eyes. Calm down, she told herself. Panicking won’t get you out of this. Breathe past the pain. Breathe past the fear. When the pain dulled and the nausea passed, she opened her eyes and found herself staring into the panicked gaze of Paige Townsend. She was bound and gagged too.
A woman’s angry voice came from a room off the one where they were being held. The words were muffled until she started to yell, “Your hands are as dirty as mine. I did what you wanted me to but were too afraid to ask.” It went quiet for a moment. “I find that hard to believe when the woman you hired to do your bidding burned down the Gallaghers’ carriage house last December.”
Olivia’s gaze shot to Paige. The other woman bowed her blond head and slowly shook it. The eyes she raised to Olivia were pleading. They could deal with the woman’s accusation later, but right now they had to get out of here.
Olivia nudged her head toward her own hands and then rolled slowly and carefully to her side, her back to Paige. While Paige worked on untying the rope around Olivia’s wrists, Olivia worked on getting the tape off her mouth. She got a small piece at the corner to lift. Closing her eyes, she blocked out the woman ranting in the next room and pressed her mouth and the tape to the floor. She jerked her head up and hard to the right. The movement caused a searing pain behind her eyes, and she was afraid she was going to throw up. She thought of Finn and George and tried once again and then again. On the fourth try, she ripped the tape off her mouth.
The woman was still ranting, but it sounded like it was to herself now. There was a loud crash. Glass shattered. All Olivia could think was that she didn’t want to face that woman bound and helpless. She tested her restraints but they hadn’t loosened. She turned to face Paige and found herself looking instead into a pair of bright blue eyes. “Simon,” she cried.
Seeing someone familiar, even if he was only a cat, caused Olivia’s eyes to fill with tears and her heart with hope. He dropped what looked like an envelope and then licked her face with his sandpapery tongue before he got to work chewing through the rope binding her hands together.
She grimaced, whispered sorry to Paige, and then leaned in to pull the tape from the woman’s face with
her teeth.
Paige’s eyes watered, but she didn’t make a sound when the tape was ripped from her mouth.
“Who is that woman and what does she want from us?” Olivia whispered.
“She was Patty O’Hurley’s paid companion, Ivy. She worked at the manor. I think she killed Patty for her house. She’s going to kill you.” There was another crash from the other room, and Paige shot a frantic glance over her shoulder. Returning her gaze to Olivia, she talked faster. “She’s got it all twisted up in her head. There’s a clause that prohibits the O’Hurley home from being sold unless a Gallagher no longer owns the manor and its lands. Ivy thinks that if she gets rid of you, the Gallaghers will have to sell out, and then she can sell the house she inherited from Patty.” Paige gave her another pleading look. “She’s going to kill me too. I tried to stop her. I offered her fifty thousand dollars to leave Harmony Harbor. I told her, if she didn’t go, I’d tell the police about the threats she’d made against you.”
Paige shook her head, tears spilling onto her cheeks. “I didn’t know she was crazy. I should have just gone to the police, but then I’d have to tell them everything, about the carriage house…The fire was an accident, Olivia. I didn’t know all of you were staying there that night. I just wanted to give the Gallaghers a scare. Make them think about what could happen if a fire started in the manor.”
Olivia barely processed everything Paige was saying. She was stuck on the revelation that Ivy wanted her dead. Just as panic once again threatened to overtake her, Simon nudged her. Her hands were free. Her small cry of relief and gratitude was cut short when the door flew open and bounced against the wall.
Ivy sent a hate-filled glare their way. She spotted Simon, startled, and then snarled. She turned and ran back into the room that Olivia now saw was a kitchen. Simon looked from the kitchen and back to Olivia. He padded to her. Rubbing his cheek against Olivia’s, he purred. His eyes held hers for one brief moment, and then he picked up the envelope and ran from the room. His tail disappeared around the door just as Ivy reappeared with a knife in her hand. “Devil cat,” she cried, chasing after Simon.
Paige stared at Olivia and whimpered, “She’s going to kill us.”
“Don’t panic. We’re going to get out of this.” She leaned over to quickly untie Paige’s hands while searching the living room for a weapon. She made a list of them in her mind; poker by the fireplace, seven feet away; lamp on a small table to her right, two feet away. The rope fell from Paige’s hands. “Untie your feet, Paige.”
She glanced at the other woman, she was pale, her hands shaking. Afraid Paige was going into shock, Olivia whispered in a firm, confident voice that she planned to get them out of there. She kept talking while untying the ropes binding her own feet together.
“She’s coming back. She’s coming back,” Paige said, her voice warbling as it rose.
Ivy stormed into the room, waving the knife. “Where is he? Where have you hidden him?”
“He’s gone, Ivy. He’s just a cat,” Olivia said while surreptitiously testing the rope at her ankles. She hadn’t had time to completely untie the rope, but she’d managed to loosen it. She glanced at Paige’s feet. They were still tightly bound. Olivia’s first thought had been to run. It looked like she would have to stay and fight.
“What do you know, Miss Richy Rich?” Ivy snarled, ranting about a ghost at the manor.
While she ranted about the ghost and the Gallaghers and Patty O’Hurley’s children, Ivy paced from the kitchen to the window in the living room. Olivia took advantage of Ivy’s distraction to inch her way back and to the right, at the same time pushing against the rope with her feet.
When she was within reaching distance of the lamp and reasonably sure she could kick off the rope around her ankles, Olivia drew Ivy’s attention back to her. “I don’t know why you’re doing this, Ivy, but I have money. I’ll give you whatever you want. All you have to do is let me and Paige go.”
She snarled, stabbing the knife in Paige’s direction. “If it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t be in this mess. She’s not going anywhere.” Ivy crossed her arms, sucked on her teeth, and nodded. “But you and me, we could work out a deal. Two million. I want two million, a new identity, and a house. I want a house in…somewhere warm, somewhere no one will…” Something came over her face, and her eyes narrowed. “You’ll tell them. You’ll tell the Gallaghers. I have to get rid of you and just bide my time. Yeah, that’s what I have to do. Get rid of—”
Olivia grabbed the lamp, staggered to her feet, and worked on kicking off the rope as Ivy ran toward her. Olivia swung the lamp, knocking the knife out of Ivy’s hand. It clattered onto the floor inches from Paige. “Paige,” she cried, but the woman was curled in a ball, rocking. Olivia dove for the knife, her fingers closing around the handle just as Ivy jumped onto her back. The force of the blow flattened Olivia on the floor, knocking the breath from her lungs. Ivy slammed her head into the back of Olivia’s. Olivia cried out. It felt like her head was splitting in two. The room spun, pinpricks of light exploding in front of her eyes.
Ivy grunted, breathing hard. Her hand closed over Olivia’s. Olivia tightened her fingers around the handle and gritted her teeth, determined not to let Ivy get the knife. She thought of Finn and George, and it gave her a sudden burst of strength. She pushed up off the floor, flipping Ivy onto her back.
Olivia scrambled away, but Ivy recovered quickly and lunged, grabbing her by the hair. She dragged her backward. The second blow to her head had weakened Olivia, but she still had the knife. She slashed the blade in the air.
“Bitch!” Ivy bared her teeth when the knife caught her arm. She threw herself at Olivia, and they struggled for the knife. Olivia tried to push Ivy off her, and in doing so, her grip on the knife slipped. Ivy grabbed the knife and plunged the blade into Olivia’s side.
As Olivia fell back onto the floor, she heard Paige screaming. Olivia thought how unfair life was. Two years before, she would have given anything to die. And now that she had everything to live for, it didn’t look like she would survive. But she couldn’t go without letting Finn know how much she loved him.
She had to say goodbye, to him and George, the little girl who she’d come to think of as her own. She didn’t want them to suffer. She wanted them to be able to let go and go on. The thought that they’d let their life and future be overshadowed by grief was as painful as the thought of leaving them behind. She knew now that Cooper would have felt the same. He would have wanted her to be happy.
Olivia brought her finger to the wound in her side and then, on the battered floor, began to write a love letter to Finn and to George.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I’m sorry, Master Finn, but I thought you should know. In case—”
“In case what, Jeeves? In case Liv tried to kill herself? Look, look at their faces.” He gestured to Griff, Liam, and his dad. “They’re wondering too. And you know what will happen now? Instead of searching for my wife, searching for the person who took her, they’re going to be looking for a body.”
“Son, Jasper was only trying to help.”
“But it doesn’t help. None of you know what Liv suffered when she lost her son.”
Finn took a deep breath, bowed his head, and nodded. “I’m sorry, I know you do, Dad. Our family has suffered, too, but there’s a difference. We had each other. Liv didn’t have anyone. She’d lost her parents a few years before, and because she’d spent every minute of every waking hour caring for her son and searching for a cure, she’d lost her friends too. Her husband wasn’t there when Cooper died. And Liv, who fought so hard to keep her son alive, was shamed and blamed for prolonging his suffering by her husband and his parents. She lost the most important person in her life, and she had no one to turn to, Dad. She was in pain, she was burned out, and she—”
He swore and wiped his arm across his eyes. “Dammit, you know her now. You know the person she is. She wouldn’t take her own life. She wouldn’t leave me. She
loves me. And as much as she loves George, she would be happy that George didn’t lose her mother.”
“Finn.” Griff lifted his chin.
He turned to see Stanley, George, and Isabella staring at him. Both mother and daughter were crying. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I didn’t know,” Isabella sobbed.
George angrily scrubbed at her face and lifted her chin. “You’re stupid. You’re all stupid. Livy wouldn’t do that. Livy wouldn’t hurt herself ’cause she was sad. She—” George broke off, staring into space, and then she nodded. Her brow furrowed as though she was concentrating.
“What’s wrong? What’s happening to my daughter?” Isabella cried.
“I’m sure she’s just upset. Master Finn, I can see to the little one,” Jasper said, nodding at George’s half-hysterical mother while he guided the little girl off to the side.
Finn frowned. George seemed oblivious to where she was. “Stan.” It took a minute for Finn to get the lawyer’s attention. When he did, Finn gestured at Isabella and then he walked to where Jasper was crouched beside George. Finn was relieved to see George appeared to be fully alert now. She nodded at something Jasper said to her and then took the old man’s hand.
“Master Finn, the little miss believes she knows who would wish Olivia harm.”
George glanced up at Jasper and then looked at Finn. “Ivy did it. She hit Livy and took her. She’s bad juju. Ivy’s bad juju. We have to save Livy.”
“Ivy’s your ghost?” Finn asked George, confused.
“She’s not a ghost, Master Finn,” Jasper said, answering for George. “Ivy’s been working in housekeeping for the past couple of months, but she hasn’t shown up for work since Olivia’s shower. There’s something familiar about her, but I can’t place her.”
“I’ll check the employment records,” Sophie said, and hurried from the ballroom.
