by Lacey Baker
“Wait, a truck tried to run her down in my town and nobody thought to alert the authorities?” the sheriff asked, obviously annoyed by that fact.
“We didn’t think anything of it at first,” Quinn lied. “She wasn’t hurt so we just took it as someone speeding.”
“Nobody speeds in Sweetland,” Carl said. “Hoover tries to, but his cab always cuts off when he goes above fifty. If someone was speeding, you guys should have called the police.”
“I traced the tags, registered to a rental company in New York. The rental guy was dragging his feet on the records of his renters since I didn’t I have a warrant,” Parker told them.
The sheriff turned to Parker. “You doing cop work in my town behind my back again, Parker?”
“Just because you’re some big-shot detective in the city doesn’t mean you have to come down here to help the country folk out,” Carl said, moving closer to Parker.
They’d had run-ins before, Parker and Carl, stemming from their teenage years. And then again when Preston and Parker had helped clear Nikki’s name for murder. It was no secret the two guys didn’t like each other. The fact that both of them were now licensed to carry guns didn’t make matters any better.
“Why don’t we take this inside,” Michelle suggested. “Last thing we need is for the neighbors to come outside like we’re late-night special programming.”
She wrapped an arm around Savannah, and they both walked inside first. Quinn clapped Parker on the back and nodded for him to go inside. Nikki followed with Mr. Sylvester limping behind her.
“After you, Sheriff,” Preston said.
The sheriff and the deputies went inside.
“Thanks,” he whispered to Raine and kissed her forehead.
“Can’t have our star attorney getting arrested for punching a cop,” she said with a smile and went inside with him.
* * *
An hour later the Cantrell men rode in Quinn’s car behind the two police cruisers down to Yates Passage.
Only seven hours earlier, they’d all come to The Marina dressed in tuxedos ready to eat food, dance, and endure what was easily Sweetland’s biggest party of the year. They’d entered through the rear where tents and tables had been set up for the event and the band played music so boring Preston had immediately wanted to find someplace to lay down and take a nap.
This time, as he walked with his brothers beside him, the Sweetland police in front of him, past the fountain in the center courtyard and the intricately designed topiaries, through the freshly painted front doors, he was pushed by an even deeper need. It burned in the pit of his stomach like a freshly lit fire. Each time he swallowed it burned faster, brighter. His temples throbbed, the pressure so intense he could easily fall to his knees in pain. But he wouldn’t. Just like he hadn’t slugged that idiot deputy. Preston knew how to control his temper and his actions. He’d been doing it for years. If there was one thing a good defense attorney needed, it was control.
But even Preston had to admit, if only to himself, that if whoever had taken Heaven harmed her in any way—that control would be shattered. He would kill, without blinking an eye.
The Redling brothers were already waiting and led them into a conference room down the gorgeously decorated lobby. They were dressed in suits and ties despite the late hour, standing with backs ramrod-straight as they showed them to a table where the Montgomerys were already seated.
Opaline was up out of her seat the moment Preston walked in.
“What have you done to my daughter? What kind of mess have you gotten her involved in?” she asked, standing in Preston’s face like she wanted to slap him.
“Come, Opal. Have a seat and we can hear what’s going on,” Mortimer said, trying to get his wife back into her seat.
“Mr. and Mrs. Montgomery, your daughter was abducted from The Silver Spoon about an hour ago. I’ve already talked to the state police and we’ve shut down the roads in and out of Sweetland. Witnesses saw a black SUV pulling off. This vehicle has been traced to a rental company in New York, but as of right now we do not have any further information on it. Now, I understand your daughter’s been in town for just about three weeks. In that time she’s made some friends and seemed to enjoy herself. You come into town tonight and try to take her home until she states her plans to stay here permanently. And now she’s gone.”
“What on earth are you accusing us of?” Opaline asked, a hand going to her neck.
She sounded appalled, but that alone wouldn’t have convinced Preston. It was the way her hands shook that proved what he’d been thinking earlier. Opaline Montgomery loved her daughter, but she had no idea how to show it.
“When Heaven first came here, a truck tried to run her down. She was receiving prank calls that unnerved her. I asked her if anyone was after her, and she said no. She asked why they would be. I think you know,” Preston said to her, his intent gaze holding hers.
“My daughter is a world-renowned biochemist. She’s written publishable papers and is responsible for what may be the biggest medical discovery since penicillin. She’s intelligent and she’s worth millions. How dare you and these inept officers suggest I would know anything about her disappearance,” Opaline told him in that frigid voice of hers.
“Heaven is very important to us,” Mortimer put in. “She’s our only child.”
“Which means you want to get to the bottom of this as quickly as the rest of us,” Sheriff Farraway suggested.
Nobody seemed to look at Opaline anymore. They certainly didn’t ask her anything after her little tirade. But Preston sat right across the table from her, watching her carefully, waiting.
“How do you plan on finding her, Sheriff Farraway? Will you and your little friends go around knocking on everyone’s door asking if they have my daughter tied up in their basement? It’s apparent that you are not equipped to handle this situation. I will be calling our attorneys just as soon as I leave this room. What I suggest you do is look into this man’s financial background. There’s no doubt in my mind he’s after my daughter’s money. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he has her tied up someplace himself,” Opaline said, pointing her shaking finger at Preston.
“Now, wait one minute, Mrs. Montgomery,” Quinn began, but Preston held up a hand to stop him.
“I don’t need your daughter’s money, Mrs. Montgomery. I have my own. But I am beginning to wonder about your financial status.”
Chapter 24
The room wasn’t dark and dirty. It didn’t stink and she wasn’t bound and gagged the way she would have pictured in a kidnapping. But as Heaven lay on the twin-sized bed, Coco curled in her arms, she thought, a tear rolling down her cheek, that’s exactly what had happened.
Why? Who? And how would it end?
All questions that had filtered through her mind in the last minutes, hours, that she’d lain here. It was a waiting game now, she supposed. For her kidnappers to get whatever they wanted, or do whatever they needed. There was nothing she and Coco could do but wait.
Or try to get away.
That was a fleeting thought, one she wasn’t so sure she would carry through. One of the men had a gun, the other a knife. So far she’d only seen the two of them with their black ski masks, turtlenecks, pants, and shoes. They looked like the proverbial kidnappers, or bank robbers, or murderers, or whichever unsavory character one could imagine.
Fear still engulfed her, anger resting subtly inside as she racked her brain trying to figure out who would want to kidnap her and what they might get out of it. Money was the easy answer, the likeliest. She was rich. They could request a hefty ransom for her safe return. But would her parents pay it?
Opaline was more than a little upset at Heaven’s actions. She’d expected the same unquestioning agreement Heaven had always given her. What she hadn’t expected was that her daughter had finally grown a backbone. Funny, surviving an explosion could do that to a person.
Now she needed to survive a kidnapping. The differenc
e this time was that Heaven felt she had so much to live for. She’d found a place where she belonged and that made her feel like her whole life was ahead of her.
Then there was Preston. She thought of him intermittently—well, every few minutes was more like it. What was he doing? Was he worried about her? Did he care enough to try to find her? Did he love her?
The last question was by far the most important because Heaven was certain that she was in love with him. He was the man she’d always wanted, even though she’d just realized it. It sounded a lot more complicated than it actually was. She’d come to this small town in search of a companion and she’d found a puppy, a man, and his family. She didn’t want to lose any of it, certainly not at the hands of a kidnapper.
“Preston.” She sighed quietly. Coco moved upward so that her head was now tucked right beneath Heaven’s chin. “You love him, too, don’t you?”
Coco’s answer was to lick her chin, then resume her snuggling position.
“We’ll get back to him, don’t worry,” she whispered and let her eyes close once more.
* * *
He could smell her as he buried his face in the pillow on her bed. Her nightgown, that pink one she’d never had a chance to wear for him, was clutched in Preston’s hand.
He lay on her bed, staring up at the ceiling. Michelle had forced everyone to bed. She and Raine had both agreed to stay in the room with Savannah, who was still acting strange. Quinn and Nikki had taken one of the guest rooms, and Michelle had given a room to Deputy Jonah. Deputy Carl wouldn’t have stayed because he and Parker were only seconds away from a physical altercation. The sheriff said he would be back in the morning.
They’d left the Montgomerys at The Marina, the arrogant and woefully ignorant couple whom Preston still could not understand. They had a wonderful daughter, but they thought of her as an object, one they could control at their whim. It was a shame, not for them, but for Heaven, because she deserved so much better.
She deserved the best, he thought with a sigh. A man who loved her above all else, who cherished and respected her and who would take care of her for all time. That’s what Preston wanted for her. For himself, he wanted her to live, needed her to come out of this situation safe and sound. There was no way he could live through any other outcome.
This was the exact moment he hated. The one where the love you had for a person just wasn’t enough. He could go to the roof of the house right now and shout that he was in love with Heaven Montgomery, but it wouldn’t persuade the kidnappers to let her go, it wouldn’t make her magically appear in this bed beside him. So he was helpless, once again, to change the circumstances surrounding him. Or was he?
* * *
“Thomas Riordan holds the controlling shares in Larengetics Pharmaceuticals. He’s sixty-one years old, divorced with two grown children. His sister went to school with Opaline Montgomery.” Ryan DelRio sat at the dining room table, a half-eaten slice of apple pie beside the folder he’d opened and was now looking through.
It was almost noon on Sunday when he’d arrived at The Silver Spoon.
“So she got Heaven the job at Larengetics,” Preston said.
Heaven had said that the offer was too good to turn down and that her parents had expected her to take it. Of course they did if they orchestrated it.
Ryan drummed his fingers on the table. “Not only did she get Heaven the job, but she was collecting a very handsome chunk of change from the company herself.”
“How was she being paid?” Parker asked. “She doesn’t work for them. She’s from a long line of her own money, so why would she need more?”
Ryan shook his head and looked up at them. “She was from a long line of money. Seems the rest of the Montgomery fortune—the part Opaline hasn’t spent on her extravagant lifestyle—is locked tight in a trust fund. Give you one guess who holds the trust?”
“So Heaven’s rich?” Quinn asked. “Even without working at this company, she’s rich.”
Ryan nodded. “She’s what some might call filthy rich. The account came fully into her name the day she turned thirty. She’s never touched it. Ever.”
“Larengetics is still paying her,” Preston said, his head only mildly pounding with the information Ryan had just given him.
He wasn’t going to think about Heaven’s money, because just as he’d told her mother, he didn’t give a damn about it. Besides, he’d known she had money, thanks to Joe’s mother. His bigger concern was how Heaven’s trust fund played into her kidnapping.
“Even though she hasn’t worked there in six months?” Quinn asked.
Preston nodded. “She wasn’t sure why, either, since no one from the company has tried to contact her since the explosion.”
“The explosion that cost Larengetics more than three million dollars. Riordan was not happy about that. So while Heaven has remained on payroll, Opaline has not,” Ryan said as he reached for his fork, cut himself another piece of pie, and stuffed it into his mouth.
“And that’s why she showed up wanting to take Heaven back to Boston,” Parker added. “The investigator in Boston said Heaven was no longer a suspect in the explosion. They had another lead.”
“Right,” Ryan said, brushing crumbs off his hands then flipping through the papers in his folder. “Johnny Tuscaverdi, or rather one of his men.”
“Wait, I know that name,” Quinn said. “He’s some big-time loan shark from New York, right? I remember him because he’s the one they think killed Randy Davis, Nikki’s ex.”
All eyes rested on Quinn at that moment, then shifted slowly back to Ryan as he continued.
“Tuscaverdi works for a huge crime family out of New York. If he’s involved in the explosion, there’s a much bigger problem than just Heaven’s kidnapping,” Ryan said.
“No!” Preston said adamantly. “There’s nothing more important than getting Heaven back. Absolutely nothing.”
The room was quiet.
And that made the ringing phone all the louder.
Preston was standing closest to the stand that held the cordless phone, so he picked it up.
“Thank you for calling The Silver Spoon. How can I help you?” he asked out of habit since he’d been here for weeks now.
“You can help me by delivering three million dollars to the back of that church, the one down Route 33. There’s a Dumpster in the back. Put the money in black trash bags and leave it there. Once I get it, I’ll drop her off somewhere in this hillbilly town of yours. Five o’clock this afternoon. Not a minute after.”
Then the line went dead.
Preston stood there for a moment. He’d sat at the trial table with murderers and drug dealers only inches away from him. He’d walked into penitentiaries to visit with maximum-security prisoners and sat right across the table from them. And never, not in all the years that he’d practiced law, had he felt such stark, white-hot fear ripple through his body.
It wasn’t a feeling he relished.
“He wants money. Three million. The exact amount Larengetics lost because of the explosion,” he told everyone in the room.
“So Riordan had her kidnapped to get his money back?” Parker asked.
“Or her crazy-ass mother had her kidnapped so she could resume getting her paycheck?” was Quinn’s thought.
“Or,” Ryan suggested, rubbing a hand over his goatee, “Tuscaverdi was paid to set up the explosion at the behest of a rival pharmaceutical company with an Alzheimer’s drug of their own ready to hit the market, all the while framing Heaven for the job. After the success of the explosion, he caught wind of Riordan’s loss. Now he figures he can cash in a second time, and frame Riordan.”
“Son of a bitch!” Preston yelled.
“Calm down. We’ll get her back,” Ryan said, way too calmly for Preston’s way of thinking. “The minute Tuscaverdi’s name came up I was given carte blanche by my director to do whatever’s necessary to bring him in. I put agents at The Marina and inserted some around the town. Your sh
eriff did good by closing down the road in and out of town. It was hell getting in, so our kidnapper is still here. After hearing about Parker’s cell phone trace, I figured it couldn’t hurt to put one on Preston and Heaven’s phone as well as the business phone here, since it’s obvious that somebody already knew she was here.”
“So you traced that call? He wasn’t on it that long,” Parker said.
“It’s been recorded. We’ll at least get a phone number, and if it’s a cell phone—we’re almost positive it will be—we can get a location from the device’s GPS,” Ryan said.
“Wow, and I’ve been wasting all my time dating millionaires and princes. I should have been looking for an FBI agent all along,” Savannah said as she entered the room, a smile on her face directed solely at Ryan.
* * *
Savannah’s entrance—while she took full advantage of meeting Ryan—was actually to announce that the Montgomerys had arrived.
They weren’t invited but Preston stood to greet them anyway.
“Any news, son?” Mortimer Montgomery asked the moment he walked into the dining room.
“There’s been a ransom call,” Preston said, his gaze shifting from Mortimer to Opaline searching for the woman’s reaction.
She was dressed in a black skirt and a pale pink blouse. Preston immediately noted that the color did nothing for her sallow complexion and dark, assessing eyes. Her hair was pulled back tightly, so tightly her face looked pinched—perfectly made up, but pinched nonetheless. In her right hand was her purse, a big black patent-leather bag that looked more like a portfolio. In her left hand were black gloves, as if she expected to put them on to keep the germs at bay.
“I suspected there would be one. How much?” she asked in a drab tone.
“Mrs. Montgomery, I’m Agent Ryan DelRio from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Please know that the FBI will be using all of our resources to ensure that your daughter is returned safely.”
Ryan, dressed in black suit pants, a white shirt, and an ice-blue tie that he’d straightened only moments before Mrs. Montgomery’s entrance, stood to extend his hand.
