by Lexy Timms
“Katie?”
“What the hell is going on here, Dani?” Katie clutched herself tightly, pulling at her white sweater as though using it to shield the outside world. Her face was pale, her eyes wide, glistening bright with unshed tears. The girl was terrified, and kept looking from one thug to the next as though expecting to be hurt at any minute.
What had they done to her?
Mentally, Dani took note of the thugs in question. Adding their deaths to Benny’s. So be it.
She took a deep breath, remembering the way Luke had shoved down the anger. How he hadn’t let a reaction create a situation there was no coming back from. “Are you crazy?” She snapped out the words, each one sharp and biting, and full of contempt. “Kidnapping people like this?”
Benny spread his hands and smiled. “In for a penny. I’ve already taken your boyfriend away from his ‘friends.’ Which, by the way, we need discuss. I would dearly love to know just what kind of stag party they’re planning. It wouldn’t do for things to... get out of hand.”
“Bastard.” She spat out the word without thinking. There was too much innuendo in this conversation and now she wasn’t sure of anything. The reference to ‘friends’ could mean anything. It might well be they’d figured out he was a cop after all. Dani felt the blood leave her face.
“I was at that.” Benny took a half-bow. “And while we’re on the topic, maybe you can explain your young man’s fascination with sticks.”
She wasn’t about to answer. She’d die before she’d give him so much as the time of day.
He stared at her for moment, his eyes hard. Assessing. “No? Well, take some time, think about it.” He put a hand on Katie’s shoulder and squeezed. The girl gasped under the pressure. “I’m sure the two of you have a lot to talk about.” He released Katie so abruptly that she dropped to her knees. Dani lunged forward to catch her as he turned and walked out, his boys trailing after him.
Katie flung herself into Dani’s arms. She began weeping uncontrollably. “I didn’t know what they wanted, I was so scared, they said that they were taking me here, but I didn’t know what they meant. They came into the house and my folks were gone and I need to get back to school, but they came in and took me and went into my room and ransacked all my things, grabbing clothes...” Katie was scared to death and near hysterics, but something felt off. Dani held her, feeling much older than the five years that separated them.
What am I missing?
Maybe it was because Dani had seen too much, been involved in too much for something like this to unnerve her. Would it piss her off? Definitely. But for her, fear was an indication that she needed to face something. Or attack something. She’d been afraid for Luke earlier, at breakfast, but that had made her sharper, more than ready to act if the situation called for it.
Perhaps Katie’s reaction only underscored how far removed she was from the real world. This was a normal reaction. This was what fear was supposed to look like. She took a moment to wonder at the differences between them, and couldn’t help but think about how she’d gotten to where she was. What would her life had looked like, what could it have been without the training, the violence, the fights and flights she’d been through?
She tried to comfort the girl as best she could, but Dani wasn’t very experienced with that sort of thing. She righted the wrongs, but let someone else deal with the clean-up afterwards. Now she had a friend, a girl who had looked up to her all through school, needing her to be strong and brave and compassionate. Dani could manage the first two, but compassion didn’t exactly come second nature.
What can I do? What does she need? Shock victims need to sit down... okay, start there...
Dani helped Katie to the couch and sat her down. Katie had gone from hysterics to small sobs that seemed to wrack her body. She hiccupped between half-coherent words. At least the endless diarrhea of words had trickled out and seemed to be stopping.
“I’m sorry.” Katie clung to Dani’s hand so hard she was losing circulation. “I don’t mean to babble all over you, I’ve just... I’ve never been so frightened in my life.”
“Where are your parents?” Dani asked, wondering how to shake her loose without seeming callous.
“Yesterday, they got a call from Markland.” She stopped and wiped a tear with the back of her hand. Dani got up and fetched a box of tissue. “Thank you.” Katie gave her a weak smile. “The company needed them to fly to Paris for two weeks on business. All expenses paid.”
“What kind of business?”
“I don’t know. I think they didn’t know, either, but a free trip to Paris? They couldn’t pack fast enough.”
Dani nodded. Benny was going over the top for all this. Okay, so her father had taken a lot of money, but to kidnap people, pull Katie into this, pay for her parents to play in Paris... that was over the top for simple revenge. There had to be more going on. Something she wasn’t seeing.
“Why am I here?” Katie wailed suddenly, causing her to jump.
Dani pulled the girl in close for an awkward hug and stroked her cheek, brushing at the tears with her thumb. “I believe it’s to keep an eye on me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Benny’s arranging a marriage between me and Luke.”
She stared at Dani with huge eyes. “The cop?”
Dani’s hand clamped over the girl’s mouth fast and tight. Katie’s eyes bugged in her head. “Never say that!” Dani hissed at the girl. “Never. Benny will kill us if he finds that out. Understand?” She held her hand there until Katie nodded. Slowly, she released the girl.
“What does that have to do with me?”
Dani considered filling her in, but something still felt off. Maybe she was getting paranoid. But maybe a little caution might serve her better right now.
The question was, had Katie told anyone else that Luke was a cop?
“I think you’re here to make sure that Luke and I are never alone. But that’s only good if he comes to my room. If I can maneuver the guards to get to his room, there’s no one there to be a chaperone.”
“What about Luke’s best man?”
Dani sat back as if slapped. “Who?”
Katie blinked up at her, obviously confused. “David. I saw them escort him down the hall as I was coming in.”
“Oh, shit.”
ANOTHER DAY PASSED, and somehow they were all right back where they started. Or almost. Benny didn’t even bother to show up at breakfast. And Luke’s place was glaringly empty. Benny had left a single rose at his place, so dark it almost seemed black, which wasn’t funny in the least. Dani nearly picked it up, vase and all, to fling it across the room, but thought better of it at the last minute, and had to content herself with very pointedly picking up the vase and moving it to Benny’s empty place instead. David’s lips twitched at that, the first sign of humor that she’d seen in days, but he fell back to sullen silence when one of the guards at the door cleared his throat. Warning them, Dani realized. It was the grey-haired man who had brought her down yesterday. Stevens? She thought his name was Stevens.
She watched him surreptitiously as she poured syrup over her French toast, and wondered if perhaps some of the other men here were finding things a little too...heavy-handed.
Stevens used to read her stories when she was a child, keeping her busy while her daddy and Benny talked. He’d even done the voices. Stern as he appeared, was it possible they had an ally?
It was an interesting thought.
Even without Benny, breakfast was a subdued affair. Was Luke having his own breakfast delivered to his room? Dani wished she knew. Starving him was inhumane. She wanted to ask, but didn’t quite dare. Would David know?
She darted a glance over to David and Katie. David was unusually subdued, but then he had been since Benny had moved in. Katie, though, seemed to rally overnight, and had been quite cheerful as they’d dressed, chattering away about weddings as though she hadn’t a care in the world. Now, though, she was quiet and s
hied away even from David. Either the sight of the armed guards had left her rattled, or there was something more going on that Dani wasn’t quite seeing.
As the meal progressed, David seemed to shrink in on himself. He was sullen and closed off, and yawned throughout the entire meal.
“Didn’t you sleep well?” Dani asked him in concern.
“No,” he said petulantly, spearing a sausage as though it were an enemy. “Didn’t you hear the alarm going off this morning?”
Dani had. She and Katie remarked on it, wondering if there was a raid, some SWAT team heading into the mansion to rescue Luke, and maybe them, too.
“That was Luke’s fault.” He stared defiantly at Dani.
Dani blinked. “Luke tripped the alarm?”
“No, I did. But it was his fault.”
“How did you trip the alarm and why is it his fault?” Dani was confused now.
“I’m sleeping in the sitting room,” David explained. His voice took on a tone that accused her of being particularly stupid. “Once they dropped me off your idiot fiancé slammed the bedroom door on my face, so I had to stay in that sitting room all night. He didn’t even give me a blanket, and the damn air conditioning was on all night.” He looked at the two girls expectantly. When neither of them expressed sympathy, he sighed and explained as though it should be obvious. “The room without the bathroom!”
Dani was the first to understand and simply said, “Oh.” She and Katie exchanged glances. “So why did you set off the alarm?”
“What was I supposed to do? I pounded on the door, but he yelled at me to go to hell. So I pounded on the other door and the guard fucking said the same thing. There was nothing I could do, nowhere to go, and I didn’t even have jar or anything...”
Dani looked at Katie. She still wouldn’t make eye contact with David, but seemed to be moving closer and closer to her as David grew more agitated. Another minute and she’d be in her lap.
“Okay.” Dani nodded to her brother. “I get the problem, but what about the alarm?”
“It goes off when you try to open a window!” David snapped. “Every guard on the property came running when the window opened.” He looked down at his plate, his face began to color. More from rage than embarrassment, it seemed like. “I was standing there, pissing off the third floor, with every flashlight in Atlanta trained on my dick.”
Dani choked on her sausage.
“Did they find it?” Katie asked, and David threw down his napkin.
“You bitch!”
“Enough!” Dani glared at her brother. “Seriously? How old are you, David? Katie made a joke. The whole situation is...” She cleared her throat and tried not to laugh “...kind of amusing.” She cleared her throat again. “Sorry Luke wouldn’t let you in.” She couldn’t blame him, though. David was acting like a spoiled rich kid. She turned to the men standing at the door. “We’re going into the library,” she announced.
The two men looked at each other and shrugged; the older one, Stevens, nodded. “Good—see if you can educate the idiot.”
Dani turned to see David’s face burn bright red, his eyes trying to drill a hole in Katie’s head. For her part, she was the one refusing to look at him this time, letting her long hair swing forward, concealing her face from view.
Good grief. Could this get any more childish? “I think... I think I’m in the mood for a little game of chess,” Dani announced slowly and stared at Katie. “I think I recall you being very good at the squeeze play.”
Katie’s head shot up. A squeeze in chess meant losing ground because one was forced to make a move and there were no moves possible any other way.
Dani smiled sweetly, waiting to see if she got the message.
Katie looked over to David and then back to Dani. “Sometimes a double pawn has to make room,” she said carefully, “to protect the king.”
Dani nodded. “But if the queen’s still on the board, though, you don’t need to sacrifice anything. Just set up for the end game.”
Katie nodded slowly and they both looked at David.
“I hate chess,” he mumbled, but got up and followed them to the library. He stomped over to a chair in the corner of the library. “Why isn’t there a TV in this room?”
“We’re in a library, David. Try reading something.” Dani shook her head. “Fine, then, we’ll play, you just watch... the wall.” She turned back to Katie. “It’s easier to use a knight than a pawn anyway.”
Katie stole a glance at David, her eyes filled with something Dani didn’t understand. David was being obtuse and sulking. To tell the truth, even she was getting fed up with his childish attitude. She couldn’t blame Katie for being frustrated, too.
Dani made her way to the chess board in the corner. She glanced up, thinking how far away Luke seemed. Three flights of stairs, and on the other end of the house. He might as well have been on Mars. She ached with missing him.
Still, she took a deep breath and started setting out the pieces. The guards sat down next to the door, the younger not even paying attention. He had his cell phone out and was tapping at the screen as though his life depended on it. Stevens stared at him a minute before finally reaching over and removing the phone from the kid’s hands with a muttered word Dani couldn’t quite hear.
She stared at the phone as he pocketed it. Damn, but she wished she could get a hold of one of those.
“Katie, what happened to your phone?” she asked suddenly.
“I don’t know...” The girl hesitated in setting out her pawns. The pieces were beautifully wrought in metal and glass, each piece a work of art.
Dani nodded. Of course they’d take it. With a sigh, she took the queen from the velvet-lined case that held the pieces when not in use, and cradled it in her hand. She could almost feel her mother’s presence, and savored the warm feeling before reluctantly setting the piece on the board with the rest.
“All right,” she said, surveying the chess board. “Let’s play. David, be good and watch, quietly, please.”
David took a long, exasperated sigh and grabbed at a magazine which he threw aside a moment later, instead staring petulantly at them as they played.
Dani took white. She moved a pawn and looked at David. “So, everyone came running to see you last night?” she asked as though the question were an idle one. Nothing to see here, folks...
“Yes,” David snarled back. His anger was directed at Katie, though, who was pretending that David wasn’t in the room.
“You might be exaggerating. It was probably only a few of them.”
“No!” David snapped back at her. “It wasn’t! I counted. I was standing there with my dick in hand and there were ten—wait, eleven assholes staring at me!”
Eleven. That’s more than I initially thought. Obviously I missed a few faces. So, that means a couple here probably were my father’s men... if they haven’t all left. The rest Benny’s. I figured that even with the half dozen who worked for my father, Benny would have a dozen at most if they’re working in shifts like I thought. Where is he getting them and how is he paying for all that? “I’m sorry that happened to you, David,” she said, sliding a pawn to a new position with the intensity of someone who’d spent hours at a chessboard.
“You’re excused,” he said with mock graciousness, still staring at Katie. Dani looked over to the girl, who had been silent the entire time. Katie had moved a pawn on her side and was waiting for Dani. Her counter-move wasn’t bad. Dani grabbed the pawn on the queen’s rook and slid it forward.
Katie took hers and dropped it in front of Dani’s queen’s pawn. “Your queen is stuck behind the pawn that’s supposed to protect it.”
Dani smiled. She’d always liked Katie. Smart girl. “It doesn’t matter. All that matters is keeping the king alive. That’s the game.”
Katie looked up at her sharply. “Maybe. I always thought that the other pieces might object to being expendable, though, don’t you?”
“They don’t have to be killed
off to keep the king safe. Sometimes all they have to do is keep the attention on the wrong side of the board.” She moved her bishop and took Katie’s rook.
“While the queen wreaks havoc on the opposition?”
“If the queen’s in position, yes.”
Katie glanced over to the guards. They were almost as bored as David. The younger one had crossed his arms and looked like he was going to sleep. Stevens watched them through half-lidded eyes. Doing his job, but not pleased at baby-sitting duty. She wondered what he would be doing if Benny wasn’t running a lock-up in someone else’s house. “But you have to get her in position. And you have to time it right.”
“True. But if there’s a window, you can get the timing close enough.”
Katie nodded and moved her queen. It sat in the middle of the board, facing Dani’s. Both kings were forgotten as the current battle waged between the queens.
“And if that window shatters,” Dani said, moving her bishop to take Katie’s queen, “then all eyes are on the wrong side of the board.”
Katie sat back. She apparently hadn’t seen the position of the bishop, and had been caught by surprise. “Nice move! You’re right. But the king has a limited amount of room on the board.”
“That doesn’t matter,” Dani corrected her. “All that matters is getting the window shattered so as to redirect attention from the real battle.” She moved the queen again. “Check,” she said, and stretched. “I’ve been locked away for a long time,” she said, yawning. “I need to stretch a little. Hey, do you still play tennis?”
Katie’s head shot up to look at Dani. “Yes.”
“I never learned. I tried once, but David was the tennis player in the family. I was so bad at it, I almost put a serve through the kitchen window.”
“Yeah,” David piped up with a snort, “Father saw and banned you from the courts. He said he’d never seen anyone who lacked coordination as badly as you.” He snickered.
