by Camy Tang
He turned the full force of those dark blue eyes on her, and she found it hard to breathe. She hadn’t been attracted to any man in so long...ever since Cruise. The name of her ex-boyfriend was like a bucket of cold water, and Liam turned back into just a man—a handsome one, but not one to be trusted.
“I’m sorry.” Liam’s voice was hoarse.
“For almost getting me shot or for ruining my morning?” she quipped. She needed to get some distance from what had just happened. And from the emotional intensity in Liam’s eyes.
“Those men must have followed me. While I was driving, I thought I might have been tailed, but I wasn’t sure.”
“They had four cars here. They might have used a four-car team to tail you, which would have been harder to notice.”
Unease crept into his eyes. “But what’s worse is that they followed me straight to you.”
TWO
He’d just put an innocent woman in danger.
No, it was even worse than that. He’d put two innocent women in danger.
The fact that Liam had practically delivered Elisabeth to those men on a silver platter filled him with guilt as police officers swarmed around the women’s shelter. Some of the residents were outside now, looking fearfully at the broken front door, while police officers ranged around the property, going in and out of the house through side doors.
An ambulance had pulled up front and the injured security guard, Bill, was being patched up from where his shoulder had been grazed. The older security guard was giving Bill an earful about his foolhardy actions.
Detective Carter of the Sonoma Police Department had just arrived. Liam had worked with the man several times over the past few months, contracted by the Sonoma police to track people down.
“Did you catch any of the men who drove away?” he asked Detective Carter as the officer approached.
He shook his head, his thinning red-gold hair glinting in the sunlight. “Officer Fong happened to be nearby when the security guards hit their direct signal to dispatch, but the four cars split up as soon as they left the driveway. Officer Fong followed one of them but lost the car.”
Elisabeth sighed. “I guess it was too much to hope that we got a couple of them for questioning.”
“You don’t know who they were?” Detective Carter asked.
She shook her head. “I think they were Filipino. The leader spoke in Tagalog to his men.”
“What exactly did they want?” Detective Carter asked.
“They demanded that we turn over one of my clients,” Elisabeth said.
“What client?”
“She told me her name was Joslyn Flores.”
“A few days ago, a woman who called herself Patricia hired me to find her sister, Joslyn Bautista,” Liam said. “She’d disappeared a few weeks ago, and her ‘sister’ was worried.”
“Nothing about it seemed unusual?” Detective Carter asked.
Liam grimaced. The detective had often praised Liam’s gut instincts, but they seemed to have failed him this time. “She seemed sincere. It was a little unusual when she paid the deposit in cash, but she said it was because she didn’t want her husband to know because he didn’t believe Joslyn was missing. I ran a cursory background check on her and she seemed to be who she said she was. The records showed that Patricia’s last name had been Bautista before she’d married Henry Santos, and her sister, Joslyn, lived with them in Los Angeles.”
“I know Joslyn didn’t have any sisters,” Elisabeth said. “When I was training her to go off grid, she had to be honest with me about any relatives she might run into. I saw her face. She wasn’t lying to me when she said she didn’t have siblings.”
“I should have dug deeper. A hacker could have created a credible background for Patricia,” Liam said. “Patricia said that Joslyn may have been traveling under a different last name. I followed a few leads that pointed to Ms. Aday.” Liam nodded to Elisabeth. “That’s why I came here today, to ask her if she’d helped Joslyn.”
“Did you tell Patricia you were coming here today?” Detective Carter asked.
“No. When I was driving here, I thought I might have been tailed but I couldn’t be sure. The men came in four cars, so they might have traded off tailing me.”
“Hiring a hacker and using a four-car tail?” Detective Carter frowned. “This isn’t some small operation. These guys are organized and have money.”
Liam told him about speaking to Elisabeth and being interrupted by the man at the front door who claimed he was with Liam. “The guard let slip that I was with Elisabeth. He mentioned her by name.” If only he’d been a second faster, he could have prevented that guard from saying anything.
Detective Carter looked sharply at them both. “So if he didn’t know who you’d come to see, he does now.”
Liam explained about the man shooting the door and rushing in, about Bill jumping him and Liam struggling with him. It had been a lot harder than he’d expected because his injured shoulder had flared up. He rubbed it, still feeling the ache.
Detective Carter noticed. “Your shoulder still okay?”
“It’s fine.”
The detective shook his head. “I want you to see the paramedic when we’re done here.”
“Detective—”
“Injuries like that are always bad.” The detective’s gray eyes on Liam were steely but concerned. “You don’t want to learn you’ve made things worse when you’re in the middle of chasing someone and you find you can’t pull yourself over a fence.”
Liam put his hands up in mock surrender. “Fine.”
“What injury?” Elisabeth asked.
“Shoulder wound. Afghanistan,” Liam said. It was bad enough his injury had worried his dad. Now even Detective Carter was interrupting taking their statements to worry about him. Liam couldn’t have that.
Elisabeth studied his face for a moment, and surprisingly she seemed to understand his reluctance to draw attention to his shoulder. She turned back to Detective Carter. “I tried to see the license plate but didn’t have a good enough angle.”
“I only saw a partial as they got away,” Liam said. “Three-T-something.”
Detective Carter noted it down in his notebook.
She explained the rest of what happened. Liam winced again when she mentioned how the man had told his boss that she was talking to Liam.
Detective Carter’s expression was alert. “They only got your last name?”
“But I’m on the shelter website. Full name, photograph and my professional contact info. The men only needed to use a smartphone to check the website to find me.”
“And you have no idea who they were and why they wanted Joslyn?” Detective Carter asked.
“Four cars seems excessive for an angry ex-boyfriend who wants her back,” Liam said.
“She never mentioned anything about her ex,” Elisabeth said. “She was scared and penniless. Luckily she didn’t need medical attention when she arrived. She left as soon as she could.”
“That seems unusual,” the detective said.
“It is. Most women are relieved to find somewhere safe. They’re not yet thinking about the future. Joslyn was grateful to the shelter, but she was still anxious to move on. She took off early one morning and no one saw her leave.”
“Ms. Aday, you’re in danger if they think you know where Joslyn is,” Detective Carter said.
“They don’t know for sure that she’s not at the shelter,” Elisabeth pointed out.
“I don’t know how long that’ll keep them from trying to find you,” Liam said. He saw the shiver that passed over her.
“I’ll post an officer here to make sure the shelter’s safe from any other attacks,” the detective said. “But I’m afraid we’re stretched pretty thin. Unless you’re directly threatened, I don’t believe I can get authorization for a protective detail on either of you.”
Elisabeth said, “Don’t worry, I can take care of myself,” at the same time that Liam said, “
I’ll be fine.”
“I know you’re both pretty competent, but just be careful.” He nodded to them and went to talk to one of the other officers nearby.
“You need some type of protection,” Liam blurted out. “Let me help you. It’s my fault they’re after you now. I led them here.”
She blinked in surprise, and he thought he saw a hint of warmth in her hazel eyes at his concern for her. But then she lifted her chin. “I’m a licensed private investigator with advanced tactical and defensive handgun training. I think I’ll be okay.”
He was impressed. Still... “No one can be completely safe on their own. Personally, I know I wouldn’t stand a chance against eight men. The two of us could help each other out.”
Again, she blinked at him. Now she looked wary. “Help each other to do what?”
“Figure out who those men are, and why they want Joslyn so badly.” Liam looked deep into her eyes, wanting her to understand how sincere he was. “Let me help you.”
* * *
Those dark blue eyes were almost hypnotic.
Elisabeth couldn’t look away from Liam. Finally, she had to close her eyes and turn her head away.
He wanted to protect her. It had been so long, she’d forgotten what it was like to rely on someone else, to not have to always stand on her own two feet.
But trusting someone wasn’t who she was anymore. She’d had to learn that lesson the hard way—she wasn’t about to open herself up to that again.
Still, she had to admit she was touched by the deferential way he spoke to her, as if he really respected her abilities and wasn’t just placating her. Most of the men she encountered—the ones who had betrayed her and the abusers who came to the shelter in search of their victims—were condescending in the way they treated women. It surprised her to find one who wasn’t.
And really, who was she kidding? What chance did she have against eight armed men? She might be stubborn, but she wasn’t stupid.
She kept her expression cool, calculating. “What did you have in mind? I’m not much into someone shadowing my every step.”
He smiled and it transformed him, softened his wide jaw, making his eyes gleam. “I promise I’m house-trained.”
“Good, because I just got a new apartment here in Sonoma.” A muscle in her neck spasmed. She hadn’t meant to share that. There was something about Liam, some aura of safety he emitted that enveloped her, too, and made her let down her guard. She couldn’t afford to do that.
Liam looked at the people milling around, and with a gentle hand on her elbow, guided her down the long driveway.
“For starters, let’s see if we can reconstruct what happened with Joslyn. How did she find the shelter?”
“I have a few contacts in Los Angeles, some churches and shelters. They refer women to this shelter if they have an especially vindictive or persistent abuser.”
“You have no idea where Joslyn might have gone from here?”
Elisabeth chewed her lip. Was Liam truly trustworthy? But she trusted Detective Carter—she’d seen him handle some of the men who had found their victims at the shelter, and the other volunteers had always spoken highly of him. From his manner with Liam, Detective Carter obviously had respect for him. “I’m not sure,” Elisabeth said slowly, “but when I was coaching her, I mentioned Oregon once as an option, and she seemed interested.”
“Oregon’s a big state.”
“I also taught her how to hide, and it might not be safe for us to even try to find her. I don’t want to lead these men straight to her. If it comes down to it, I won’t risk Joslyn’s safety. I’d rather work on this end and try to find out who they are and why they’re after her.”
“Joslyn didn’t say anything about who she was running from?”
“No.” Elisabeth thought back to her short few days with Joslyn. “She had been badly beaten about a week before. She had bruises fading from her arms and shoulders, a cut on her face, a broken rib—I think she’d been kicked—and a broken hand. Her injuries had all been bandaged up by some clinic or emergency room.”
Liam’s expression had become grave and hard as she listed Joslyn’s injuries. “Her ex-boyfriend did that to her?”
“She seemed afraid of him, but at the same time, I thought there was some anger behind all that fear, which is unusual.” She then remembered something. “She might have had ligature marks on her wrists. At least, they looked that way to me, and they were her freshest bruises.”
“He tied her?” His voice was muffled by his tight jaw.
Men’s anger used to make Elisabeth flinch. As she’d regained her self-esteem, she’d had to train herself to face it with calm confidence, remembering she was no longer that victim. But Liam’s anger, directed at the man who’d hurt Joslyn, made Elisabeth realize he was someone who wouldn’t stand for anyone lifting a finger to her. What would it be like to have someone who wanted to guard her and care for her? She hadn’t had anyone like that since she was sixteen, when her mother died.
“Some abusers do that, but it’s unusual,” she said.
“The way I see it, the only way you or I will ever be safe is to figure out what’s going on,” Liam said.
“It sounds better than just sitting around and waiting,” she admitted. “Let’s talk to some of the women at the shelter to see if anyone knows anything about Joslyn.”
Liam nodded, but as they walked back up the driveway toward the house, he said, “We’d better be discreet. Detective Carter might not appreciate us doing our own investigation when the police are on it already.”
“I’m a private investigator. This is my job.” They walked in silence for a few moments, then she said, “You’re pretty friendly with Detective Carter.”
“He’s known my family for a long time. When I started my skip-tracing business, he sent some work my way.”
“I do some freelance for the San Francisco FBI,” she found herself saying, and bit her lip to keep herself from blurting out more. What was it about Liam that made her so eager to overshare about her life? “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like I was bragging.”
His eyes twinkled at her. “An occasional dose of humility is good for a man’s character.”
She didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t often met men who could make fun of themselves this way.
At the back of the house, there was a fenced-in recreation area for the residents, and Elisabeth knew the key combination to open the gate. She nodded to Witton—one of the house security guards—who stood watching over the children on the play set. As soon as some of the women saw her, they came up to talk.
“Are you all right?” Kalea, a staff member at the house, grasped Elisabeth’s hand, but she also cast a curious look at Liam.
“I’m fine. This is Liam O’Neill. He’s a skip tracer and he works with Detective Carter.”
Several of the women visibly relaxed.
Elisabeth gave an abbreviated account of what had happened.
“Joslyn?” Kalea’s eyebrows rose. “But she left weeks ago.”
“Do those men still think she’s here?” Witton’s dark brows lowered over his deep-set eyes.
“Not sure,” Liam said. “Detective Carter is assigning some officers to watch over the house, though.”
“What do they want with her?” Kalea asked.
“We don’t know,” Elisabeth said.
Kalea looked thoughtful. “She didn’t say much when she was here.”
“She enjoyed playing with the children,” one of the women spoke up.
“Miss Joslyn was sick,” said Kayoi, a precocious little girl with large eyes and a narrow chin.
Her mother tried to hush her, but Elisabeth said, “No, I’d like to know what Kayoi saw.” She knelt in front of the girl. “What do you mean, she was sick?” From what Elisabeth could tell, Joslyn had been healthy, aside from her injuries.
“She was throwing up in the bathroom,” Kayoi said. “Early in the morning, before breakfast.”
&n
bsp; Joslyn could have been vomiting for a variety of reasons, but one zoomed to the top of Elisabeth’s list.
“I asked her if she wanted me to get Miss Kalea, but Miss Joslyn said she was only a little sick and didn’t need help.”
“Thank you, Kayoi. That’s helpful.” Elisabeth rose to her feet and caught Liam’s eye. From his expression, she figured he had made the same guess.
“Was she pregnant?” Kalea asked in a low voice.
“If she was, she didn’t tell me,” Elisabeth said.
Kalea leaned close to her. “Are you in danger from those men who are after her? Are you going to be all right?”
Elisabeth didn’t want to lie to her, but she didn’t want to worry her, either. However, Liam answered for her. “I’ll keep her safe. Don’t worry.”
His words should have annoyed her—after all, she was able to take care of herself. But his tone was earnest rather than arrogant, and if she was honest with herself, it was good to know someone had her back.
Not that she’d let herself rely on that. No, he might sound trustworthy now, but she’d seen too many broken promises to start trusting someone now just because they seemed earnest. He wanted to protect her? Fine. But she wouldn’t stop protecting herself.
Kalea squeezed Elisabeth’s hand. “We’ll be praying for you, okay?”
Elisabeth’s answering smile was stiff. She loved volunteering at Wings shelter, but the faith of the owners and the staff occasionally made her uncomfortable. She didn’t feel any affinity to a God who had failed her at some key points in her life.
She spoke to a few of the other women there, giving reassurances and answering questions, but she learned nothing new about Joslyn. She had just left a group of women when she saw Tiffany sitting alone on a bench, soaking in the sun. Tiffany didn’t obviously signal to Elisabeth, but she held her gaze and tilted her head slightly. Her expression was anxious.
Elisabeth casually walked over and sat beside her. “How are you feeling?”
Tiffany rubbed a hand over her distended stomach. “Tired. The baby’s been kicking a lot lately.”
“So you heard that the men were looking for Joslyn?”
