Rebecca would never forget that strange-looking woman. Blond hair, brown eyes, she looked like a plain Jane, but Rebecca had seen the insanity in the woman’s eyes. “Yes, that’s crazy stalker chick.”
“Her name is Naomi Lake. Until three years ago, Ms. Lake was a guest of the state of Washington, in one of its restricted mental illness facilities.”
“What did she do to end up there?”
Rebecca knew she didn’t imagine the slight edge in Cody’s voice. Fortunately, Adam didn’t notice it—or if he did, decided to ignore it.
“She murdered her parents when she was fourteen years old.” Adam focused on her picture for a moment, then diddled with the phone again, obviously bringing up some notes. “The defense in the case stated that her father had sexually abused her for years, and that her mother had been complicity silent and physically abusive. There wasn’t a great deal of evidence, but the psychiatrist that the state called in to examine Naomi confirmed that she had many of the symptoms of longtime sexual and physical abuse.”
“I feel sorry for her.” Rebecca shook her head. “Something like that can ruin you forever. No wonder she’s crazy.”
“Naomi apparently refused treatment for the first year of her incarceration and then gave in, and three years ago she was released—three of the four psychiatrists on the institution’s panel were convinced she was cured. The fourth was not.”
“Let me guess,” Greg said. “The lone holdout was a woman.”
Adam raised one eyebrow. “How’d you know?”
“Just a hunch. Rebecca, you said that Brady told you he’d dated crazy stalker chick just once, and yet she seemed to have some sort of obsession with him?”
“Yes. He was very forthcoming about the entire situation—even after I told him there was no way I could go out with him. I’d already decided to track you down and get in your face.”
Greg grinned. “My very own private stalker chick.” He put his hand over his heart. “I’m touched. Not as touched as you are—in the head, that is—but still.”
“Jerk face. You’re going to be ‘touched’ if you keep it up. By my fist.”
Cody looked at Adam. “This could go on for a bit. They tend to slip into some kind of juvenile sniping mode every once in a while.”
Adam nodded. “Nothing ever changes. You should have seen them when they were kids. Talk about oil and water.”
“Hey, we’re older and wiser now,” Greg said. “So now it looks like the female shrink was right, because the cops in Seattle think Naomi Lake killed Brady?”
Adam leaned forward. “And two more men before him, they think, now that they’re tracing her background. One in Portland, Oregon, and the other in Tacoma—she’s averaging one obsession a year. And it’s worse. They also think she killed the girlfriend of the man in Oregon.”
“See, I knew she was crazy.” Rebecca slapped the table for emphasis. She had known it when she’d looked into the woman’s eyes. Rebecca shivered. Greg saw, of course, and reached over for her hand. Cody grasped the other one, and she felt better.
“Yeah. Anyway, that’s not the worse news. The worse news is they found her apartment—not too difficult—and her bolt hole.”
“Bolt hole?”
“According to witness reports, Naomi was last seen at her home just over a month ago. A neighbor said she looked frantic, didn’t respond to his hail. She had a small bag, like a knapsack, slung over her shoulder. Police gained entry to her place, and more importantly to her electronics. They pointed to another place, a home whose owners were on an extended vacation and had hired a security company to monitor it.”
“Pretty clever.”
“She’s clever and not quite sane. A dangerous combination.” Adam inhaled deeply and met Rebecca’s gaze. “So here’s the worst news. They missed her by, they think, a few days, but they found all the research she’d been doing, before and after Brady’s death. Research on you—and Lusty. And she’s gone. Vanished. They have no idea where she is, but they have a pretty good idea where she’s headed.”
“She’s headed here,” Cody said. “She’s obsessed, and she’s coming for Rebecca.”
“Odds are,” Adam agreed.
Rebecca sat back. “This cabin isn’t on any map, or even listed anywhere,” Rebecca said. “She won’t find me here.”
“No,” Adam said, “she’ll head to Lusty.”
“You’ll be ready for her.” Rebecca said.
“Hell, yes, we’ll be ready for her. From the information Dwyer has dug up on the woman, we can take a guess on what her strategy is going to be.”
“I hope the men in town can resist what appear to be her ‘fatal’ charms,” Cody said.
He looked really worried about it, so Rebecca rubbed the back of his hand with her thumb.
Then, something she’d said a few moments before seemed to come back to him. “What do you mean, this place isn’t listed?” Cody asked.
“It’s kind of a family safety thing,” Greg said. “Benedicts, Kendalls, and Jessops have always been targets because of our wealth, so when we decided to have a place to get away from it all we ensured this cabin wasn’t listed anywhere and doesn’t even show up on Everywhere Earth satellite photos.”
Cody gave a low whistle. “You have this location scrubbed? Now that’s what I call influence.”
“What was the other thing?” Rebecca had been watching Adam, and he’d been sort of keeping an eye on Cody. When she asked that he met her gaze. “You said you had a couple of things to talk to us about.”
“The other thing is about Cody.”
“You come to arrest me for something?”
“Hell, no.” Adam sighed. He looked off to the distance for a moment and Rebecca knew he was choosing his words carefully. She felt Cody tense, and stroked the back of his hand with her thumb again. “One of the things that the head of security for Benedict Oil and Minerals does is to keep his ear to the web, as it were. He has alerts out for the mention of anyone in the families, with regard to anything, anywhere, online.”
“Sort of like an Everywhere alert,” Cody said, naming the world’s largest Internet search engine.
“Exactly,” Adam nodded. “Any news item, any…well, any anything, he finds out about it and if he deems it significant, he reports it to the Town Trust.”
“Okay,” Cody said. “But what does that have to do with me?”
Adam raised one eyebrow and looked at Greg. Greg leaned forward so he could meet Cody’s gaze, and said, “That sign that hung at the party last week that said ‘Welcome home Greg and Cody’ wasn’t just a decoration, boyfriend. Even if we don’t stay here, even if we carry on with our nomadic ways, Lusty has claimed you, so Lusty is your home, now. Your name would have been added to the names being monitored. You’re family.”
“What’s happened?” Rebecca asked. Personally, she really didn’t like all the pussyfooting around both Greg and Adam were doing.
“Does the name Drummond Pierce mean anything to you?” Adam asked.
“Asshole.” Greg practically spat that.
Adam quirked one eyebrow.
Cody shook his head and said, “Yes, he was the former ANN news anchor I went to Syria with. He’s got a book deal with my publisher, who asked me to go along and get some photographs for the book he’s writing. Why?”
Adam looked at Greg. “Why’d you call him an asshole?”
“He and Cody were kidnapped together, but somehow that asshole managed to free himself and then fled. He didn’t even try to get Cody out of that mess. Then, when he made it back to Turkey, he didn’t even wait around to see if Cody got out, too. He acted as if Cody was already dead, which terrified me and pissed me off. Fucking asshole was on a fucking plane to New York before anyone could say the words, ‘news cycle.’”
“Well, fuck, the guy is an asshole.” Adam sat for a moment, and Rebecca could almost see the wheels turning. “I don’t like that. And y’all won’t like this, either. Pierce gave an in
terview on Morning People on ANN—and he claimed that you, Cody, are mentally unstable. He said that you had been under psychiatric care as a child, and that you’re, in his words, ‘sadly delusional, likely even schizophrenic.’ He was playing it up as if anything you said couldn’t be trusted.”
Greg’s eyes widened in anger. He surged to his feet. “What the fuck! That fucking little cockroach. I’m going to fucking kill that bastard!”
“I win ten bucks from Jake,” Adam said. “I told him you’d threaten to kill the little pissant. Jake thought you’d just want to fuck the guy over in the press.”
Cody looked from Adam to Greg. Then he met Rebecca’s gaze. “It doesn’t sound as if anyone here believes Pierce’s claims.”
“Why the hell would they?” Greg demanded.
“Of course they don’t, darling. You’re ours, and that’s that. And by ‘ours,’ I mean ours, and Lusty’s.”
Cody shook his head. Rebecca thought the look of wonder on his face was something. “Well, I did see a psychiatrist when I was twelve.”
Adam waved his hand. “Irrelevant. Pierce’s claims, though, do beg the question.”
Cody sat forward. “Yeah. What the hell is he up to? There has to be a reason for him to try and discredit me. What’s in it for him, doing that? I know he didn’t like that the publisher wanted me in on his little project.”
Adam nodded. “That’s the question, isn’t it?” He looked at Greg, then back at Cody. “It’s up to you, of course, to say yes or no, but the Town Trust is ready to look into that little thing, on your behalf. Pierce won’t know it’s you asking questions, but he’ll sure as hell know that someone is. Someone with a hell of a lot of clout.” Adam rubbed his hands together. “If he’s up to no good—which I believe he is—that ought to scare the shit out of him.”
Greg met Rebecca’s gaze. She nodded. “I say let’s do it. I don’t like anyone trying to screw with my man.”
“Neither do I,” Greg said.
The look on Cody’s face was priceless. Rebecca thought they were really making headway with him, because doubt was being supplanted by joy. “Okay. Who do I have to talk to in order to authorize this?”
“That part’s easy,” Adam said. “You talk to me.”
Chapter 17
Greg had absolute trust and faith in his cousin, Jake Kendall, and that man’s determination as the manager of the Town Trust to protect the good people of Lusty. He knew that it wouldn’t take long for him and whatever investigators he had on retainer to get to the bottom of whatever the hell it was Pierce was up to.
But he had his own resources, and flat-out hated waiting for other people to do something when he could be doing something himself.
He looked up from his computer and watched the two people he loved. They were all three of them in the great room of the cabin, each of them occupied, Greg thought, by aspects of their particular passions.
To his right, Rebecca had already slipped into that special place she found whenever she picked up a paintbrush—or a piece of charcoal. The portrait she was painting of Grandma Kate was nearly finished, and damned if he didn’t think it was the best portrait she’d ever created.
To his right, Cody was working on his cameras, cleaning them, inspecting them the way he would do before going out and submerging himself in his work. He also did that if he was troubled, or thinking over a problem.
Maybe he’ll take them and go outside, take a few shots. God, I hope so. He mentally shook his head. He wasn’t going to worry about the fact that Cody hadn’t taken a single photograph since coming back from Syria.
He’d pick up his cameras again, shoot again. When he was ready.
And Greg was pulling strings and online, looking for information, determined to take care of his lover.
He had a suspicion about Drummond Pierce, but he hadn’t wanted to say anything until he was absolutely sure. Sometimes, he had a sixth sense about certain people. When he’d taken an instant dislike to Pierce, he chalked it up to the fact that he could tell the man hadn’t wanted Cody in on his book deal. One would almost think that Pierce was being made to pay Cody out of his own advance, which according to one publishing news website had been substantial. The fact was that Cody’s being signed for the book by the publisher didn’t diminish Pierce’s potential income one whit. In fact, Greg was positive that the inclusion of photographs by Cody Harper would have just the opposite effect—likely the book sales would soar from the photos, alone. But then, Pierce wouldn’t be alone in the spotlight.
“Maybe that’s it.”
“Maybe what’s it?” Cody asked.
Greg tossed a glance at Rebecca, but she seemed to be completely oblivious to them. He turned his attention back to Cody but kept his voice down. “Maybe he’s trying to ruin your reputation because he wants the publisher to cancel the contract you signed. He doesn’t seem the kind who wants to share the spotlight.”
“I can tell you he’s not. He’s also got a rep for being a real PITA.” Cody shook his head and put his focus back on the camera he was working on. “Remember Smitty, that kid who came with us? The one on the plane sitting with Pierce?”
“Fuck, I forgot about him.” Greg had forgotten everything, practically, in the hours and then days following Cody’s kidnapping. “He was a nervous-looking fellow who jumped anytime anyone said anything to him.”
“Pierce’s personal assistant. I chatted with him for a while the day before we headed into Syria. He was looking for another job. Couldn’t stand his boss.”
“Hmm.” Greg made a note to try and see if Smitty the personal assistant would be willing to tell tales out of school. In his estimation, close staff always knew where the skeletons were buried.
“I figured you wouldn’t be able to leave any of it alone,” Cody said. He grinned when he looked up from his camera. “You’re digging into Pierce, doing what you can to ‘take care’ of me. And I did see you put another handgun in the other bedside table in the bedroom, and I do note that the rifle is still beside the back door.”
Greg shrugged. “Hey, I think our woman was right. Lake is a crazy stalker chick. We should be ready for her, even though there is no way I can imagine that she can find this cabin.”
“And you’re one-hundred percent positive that no one in town would fall for her, um, ‘fatal charms’?”
“It’s Lusty,” Greg said. “Trust me when I tell you that by now, everyone will be on the lookout for her.” Greg ran a hand through his hair. His thoughts kept circling on Pierce. “I just can’t imagine why this dipshit is doing what he’s doing.” Greg sat back from his computer. “It’s almost the kind of thing you’d do to get even with someone, only you didn’t do anything in the first place to provoke his actions.”
“Huh.”
Greg looked over at Rebecca. “Huh?”
“Sometimes when I’m just tidying up a painting, like I am this one right now, my mind wanders. I listen to what’s going on around me, and I don’t necessarily think about what’s being said, and I may look as if I’m not tuned in, but my brain is working nonetheless.”
“Becca, darling, neither of us would ever accuse you of not having a good, working brain.”
She flashed him that fast smile that he’d fallen in love with years before. “Anyway, y’all were chatting and my mind sort of gathered in what you were saying and what y’all said before. And I was wondering…what was this Pierce person like when he spoke to you?” Since she put her brush down and turned to face him, Greg knew she was talking to him.
“When, baby?”
She looked over at Cody, then back at him. “When he arrived safe and sound in Turkey. I take it he hadn’t been wounded?”
“No. Hell, he hardly looked worse for wear.”
“Didn’t he talk to you when you got in his face?”
“What makes you think Greg got in his face?”
Rebecca shrugged. “He loves you. The two of you went into Syria and he came back without you. I know d
amn well Greg would have been in his face.”
Greg exhaled. He hadn’t really wanted to share with Cody the hell he’d gone through during those days. Cody had had enough to deal with. But now he met Cody’s gaze, and although Rebecca had asked, he directed his answer to Cody. “That’s when I started to fear the worst. Because Pierce said he hadn’t seen you after the two of you had been taken, but he acted…he acted like he believed you were dead.”
“Which he more or less backed up with action when he got out of the country,” Rebecca said. “Remember how your publisher released a statement just coming short of declaring you a casualty of the chaos over there?”
“Drummond Pierce would have told them that when he got back to New York,” Greg said. “But I have no idea why he would do that.”
Rebecca looked at the painting she’d just finished. “I do all right. I’ve had some showings, and I’ve even got a couple of wealthy patrons—people who believe I’m going to be famous in time. But you know what?”
“What?” Greg wasn’t sure where she was going, but he could see Cody begin to slowly sit up straighter and focus on her.
“If crazy stalker chick kills my ass dead, my work is going to be worth a fucking fortune, instantly.”
Greg felt as if he’d just been shot. He looked from Rebecca, to Cody—whose eyes had widened in shock, too.
“But I’m not dead,” Cody said slowly.
“No, you’re not, darling. I bet Mr. Pierce isn’t very happy about that fact either. But I wonder, is he also scared? Because the only thing he thinks he gains by smearing you…” Rebecca let the sentence hang.
“He thinks he’s discrediting me. As if he’s afraid of what I might say? What the hell could I say?” And then, Cody said, “Well, fuck! I might say the fucking coward ran away, saving his own ass, and purposefully left me behind—believing I would be killed.”
“That asshole!” Greg said. It was the only thing any of them had come up with so far that made any sense. But as the idea settled in, Greg wondered if maybe there could be one other reason for Pierce’s ploy. And he wondered if there was a way he could find out.
Love Under Two Adventurers [The Lusty, Texas Collection] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 17
