by JL Simpson
She kept looking. Ah-ha. Rugby. Solomon played rugby. She clicked on the link and scanned the first page of writing all about the local club’s illustrious history and its influx of new players. A click on the Continue icon brought up the last of the article, along with a photo of the club’s members with their names underneath. Fuck. She’d found him. Fuckity fuck.
Her heart pounded. Ronan Dunlop. That name was too much of a coincidence. Dunlop had to be his father’s surname, and Solomon had known it all along. He could be related to Paul and had never said a word. What were the chances he’d not only ended up in the same regiment as Paul but became best mates with him?
Daisy went back to the government website and ordered his birth certificate. Maybe Solomon had looked into this father’s background and the surname was a coincidence. If he really had no desire to be associated with his father, and knew he wasn’t related to Paul, then keeping the information to himself was reasonable enough.
She checked the time. It was after two and still no sign of the man returning. Should she call Paul and tell him what she’d found out? No, she’d wait to get the birth certificate. Once she knew the truth she’d know what to do with it. For now the only thing she could do was to go to bed so she’d be fresh when he finally dragged his sorry arse home.
* * * *
Solomon sat with his back against the door and listened. Silence. He counted off seconds in his head. Toby had been liberated over an hour ago. Maybe they planned to leave him alone in the room to starve to death. No one came down into the bowels of the school. He didn’t even have anything of any use to aid his escape or signal his whereabouts.
His watch was missing, along with his wallet and phone. He was left in the clothes he stood in and nothing else. Even the keys to the Aston Martin were gone. If he was on the outside and Daisy had gone missing with the Aston he would know he had an edge. He prayed the thugs had decided to take his car as well as his liberty. The alarm on the tracking device would have been activated after it was driven 100 meters if the thief didn’t have his credit card-sized driver deactivation device. Even though the young Maroni had his current mobile phone, it wouldn’t have given them any clue that the car was designed to track its whereabouts when it was stolen. The text message requesting he confirm the car wasn’t stolen would have gone to the old phone, which he hoped to God was in the hands of a person who’d alert the authorities that his car was missing.
A sound in the corridor had him turning his head to listen closer. Footsteps. Definitely footsteps. He took up a position next to the door. Tensed, ready for anything, his weight balanced evenly on the balls of his feet. Given an opportunity he was prepared to take it.
The grating of metal on metal heralded the arrival of company. He took a deep breath and focused his attention on the leading edge of the timber as the heavy door swung open with a low creak. Light speared a shaft across the stone floor of the small room. Fists balled tight, he bided his time. Toby was pushed inside. The man stumbled and grabbed at Solomon for support. He shoved him aside. A loud curse filled the air as the lord no doubt made contact with a hard surface. The door started to close, and Solomon pounced and dragged it open, drawing the man who held the handle into the room with it.
Solomon slammed his fist down on the man’s arm sending the gun he was holding clattering across the room. A knee to the groin had the man doubled over, and Solomon smirked with satisfaction as he recognized Jason. Solomon wrapped an arm around the smaller man’s throat. He had this. The cool feel of metal against his temple brought him up short.
“Let him go.”
Solomon turned his head and glared at Toby. What the feck. “You’ve not got the balls to pull the trigger.”
“Try me.” The gun pressed harder, and Solomon let Jason go. He sagged over like a sack of potatoes gasping for air. Toby waved the gun at Solomon. “Back off.”
Solomon sauntered across the room, never once taking his eyes off the precious lord who had just fucked up their best chance of escape. Jason grabbed the gun and glared from one man to the other. “Good choice, Zut. Just remember what’s at stake, and no one has to die.” He grinned. “Yet.”
The door closed with a sickening thud. Solomon waited a beat before grabbing Zut by the throat and slamming him into the wall. “What the feck are you doing?”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Daisy had hardly slept. She might as well have sat up all night. Solomon hadn’t shown up, and Paul still hadn’t called to say he’d arrived in Cheshire. She switched on the bedside light. Her phone showed it was a little after six. No point in lying around any longer. In fact there was no reason for anyone to be a sluggard. Solomon was supposed to be working, not screwing. He’d said he’d be back for breakfast, and her stomach was ready to eat. She struggled into a sitting position, leaned back against the pillows, and punched the button on her phone to speed-dial Solomon’s new number. His phone rang and rang. When she thought he was never going to respond and she’d be put through to his voice mail, the call was picked up.
A deep male voice sounded in her ear. “Hello, who is this?”
Her heart raced. She’d recognize that voice anywhere. She’d heard it on the office intercom often enough. Clive Lewis. She hung up and stared at the phone. A check of the call log confirmed she’d called Solomon. Why the hell did Clive have Solomon’s phone? If some breathy female had answered she wouldn’t have been surprised, but Clive was definitely not Solomon’s type.
Daisy clambered off the bed and dragged her clothes on as quickly as she could. Her hair was a riot of curls. She should have done something with it after her shower the night before. The best she could do now was to tie it up in a ponytail. She needed to find out what had happened to Solomon. If there was a reasonable explanation for Clive having his phone she couldn’t imagine what it was.
She ran through ideas as she brushed her teeth, grabbed her jacket and bag, and then ran downstairs. The fire had burned out, and there was a chill in the air, giving the house a strangely empty feel. Should she call the cops? And tell them what? Solomon went out and didn’t come home and a well-respected lawyer with an interest in a local homeless charity answered his phone. That sounded stupid even to her. What she needed was proof he was really missing and to get that she needed to get out there and start looking. First problem, she had no wheels. Solomon had the Aston Martin and the four-wheel drive was safely tucked up in his garage. If she wanted to take it she needed keys, and they were last seen on the bunch Solomon had in his hand when he left the night before.
He had to have a spare set somewhere, but where? Daisy prowled the house, opening and closing drawers and hunting through cupboards. No keys, although Solomon had an interesting stash of DVD’s in his bedside cupboard. She returned to the kitchen and tried to think like Solomon. Where would he keep something important? The study. Had to be. It was the only place she hadn’t checked.
The sound of the key in the front door gave her a start. She dived through the kitchen door and came to a stop. A short, plump, middle-aged woman with gray hair that surrounded her face like a halo of wire-wool closed the front door and smiled at her.
“You must be Daisy. Solomon said you were staying.”
“He did?”
“Yes. I’m Mrs. Brown.”
“Sorry. He never mentioned you.”
“No reason he should.”
Daisy watched the woman take off her coat and hang it on a peg. She seemed very comfortable in Solomon’s home so she was unlikely to be a threat. Besides she seemed to have got through security without a hitch. “Are you a relative of his?”
She laughed. “No, poppet. I’m his cleaning lady.”
Daisy smiled. Of course. The git said he had a cleaning lady. In fact, it was a wonder he didn’t have a butler and chauffeur as well. “Do you have a key to his study?”
“I’ve got a key to everything.”
Daisy could kiss her. “Awesome. I need to use the four-wheel drive, but he forgo
t to give me the spare key. I’ve hunted the house top to bottom and can’t find it.”
“Do you want me to call him and ask where it is?”
Daisy shook her head. “No. I tried. He’s not answering. He had a date last night, and I guess he’s not in the mood to talk right now.”
The cleaner chuckled. “He’s quite the heartbreaker. If I was twenty years younger I’d take him for a trot around the paddock.”
“Really? I can’t see the attraction myself.”
Mrs. Brown’s chubby face wrinkled when she smiled. “Solomon talks about you a lot. He seems to be very fond of you.”
“He’s too in love with himself to care about anyone else, and I am sure most of his comments about me are peppered with rude words. Solomon only puts up with me because I’m married to his best mate.”
“Ah, that would be Paul. He seems very fond of him too.”
“Keys?”
“Righto. I guess he won’t mind. You do work together after all, so I guess you have no secrets from each other.”
Secrets. He had dozens, which could explain why he kept the room locked up tight. Once the door was open she assured Mrs. Brown she was fine to look for the car keys by herself. The cleaner headed upstairs to start stripping the beds, and Daisy closed the study door behind her.
She crossed to the desk and opened the drawers. She emptied each of them in turn and then shoved everything back inside as best she could. The third drawer held the missing car keys and a metal box. She slipped the box onto the desk top and opened it. Bingo. Solomon’s gun lay inside, along with a box of bullets. She pulled it out and dropped the magazine into the palm of her hand the way Paul had shown her when he had a pistol. Tut-tut. Keeping a loaded gun in an unlocked drawer was a definite no-no. Mind you, even owning the gun was illegal in the UK. Taking it with her was probably a bad idea, but then most of the things she did were bad ideas. She shoved the magazine back in place, dropped the gun into her bag, and put the box back.
Now she had the keys she should leave everything else alone. Solomon liked his privacy. However, there might be something else that would help her. No harm in taking a quick look. She opened the last drawer and pulled out a thick folder. After checking to make sure Mrs. Brown was still busy elsewhere she flicked it open. Shit. It was full of photos of Paul. Dozens of them going right back to when Paul was in basic training, along with a copy of Paul’s birth certificate and their marriage certificate. What the hell was Solomon doing? Lisa said he had an obsession with a man but Paul? She’d obviously jumped to the conclusion the interest was something sexual.
Daisy hunted through all the photos until she found one of Solomon and Paul together. There was a definite resemblance. Daisy had a feeling the reason for Solomon’s collection of memorabilia had nothing to do with sexual attraction, but with something that would have a far more traumatic effect on Paul if he found out. Solomon could well be his older half-brother. She couldn’t imagine Paul’s dad having an affair, but she only knew him as a staid middle-aged man. He could have been wild in his younger days.
Solomon had obviously had a difficult childhood growing up with only his mother to care for him. No matter who his dad was, the man should have stepped up and taken responsibility. However that didn’t explain why Solomon would seek out Paul and never tell him? Did he have some horrible plan to harm Paul in some way, to punish his parents? Sins of the father, and all that. Was that what was behind the bullet in the arse Paul took for him? The whole story about the girl and the enraged father had played to Daisy’s romantic inclinations, but it could be so much bullshit. He might have planned the whole thing to make Paul suffer.
Either Solomon told Paul the truth or she would. Once she had Solomon’s birth certificate showing his father’s name she’d confront the git and sort the whole mess out. Knowledge was power. Once Paul knew who Solomon really was he couldn’t do anything to hurt him.
The loud boppy sound of her phone’s ringtone, made Daisy jump. She shoved everything but the picture of Paul and Solomon back in the drawer with one hand as she pulled her phone from her bag with the other. Caller ID flashed the caller’s name, and her heart rate lifted. She needed to keep her tone light.
“Paul. Did you make it all right?”
“I did. Sherman’s still sleeping, and I might get my head down for a couple of hours before we head into Manchester.”
“Good idea.”
“Did Solomon show up?”
“No, not yet. I guess he got lucky like you said.”
“So, what are you going to do with yourself?”
She shrugged and blew out a breath. “Wait around, I guess.”
“Good idea. Stay safe.”
“I will. Now go and sleep.”
“Love you, beautiful.”
“Love you too.”
She hung up, shoved the phone and photo in her bag, grabbed the car keys off the desk, and headed out the front door.
* * * *
Once she’d mastered how to activate the front gate with the remote hanging on the key ring, the drive to Bournemouth had been uneventful. Her idea to start looking where Solomon was last supposed to be had been truly inspired. Okay, maybe it had been inspired by a voracious appetite for bad detective shows on TV, but it had been her only idea.
There had been no sign of his car in the hotel’s car park, but she’d struck lucky when she headed inside. The receptionist from the night before was on duty and remembered seeing Solomon leave. He’d been accompanied by two other men who were holding him up. They explained he’d over indulged. Bullshit. There were some holes in her knowledge of Solomon, but one thing she did know for sure was that he was a professional and getting drunk when he was working would be completely out of character.
Back in the SUV she pondered her next move. The hotel refused to give her any details of the function’s organizers. If she called the charity or Clive she might tip them off that she was on to whatever they were doing. So far she had nothing that would interest the police. Solomon had never found out if Maureen had set them up when she asked them to search for Zut, but she might be the only option left. Her number was in Solomon’s old phone. If he hadn’t had a chance to check out the car park there was a possibility it was still there. She fired the engine to life and set off, weaving in and out of the rush-hour traffic.
The big vehicle was difficult to maneuver, and she cursed as she scraped the front corner on a bollard at the entrance to the multistory. She wound down the window and collected her ticket before negotiating the tight turns and steep ramps. The car park was filling up, and she sighed with relief when she finally had the SUV neatly parked between a pillar and a small hatchback. She was on the fifth floor, and the explosion had been on the fourth. The only evidence she’d seen as she passed the scene was some soot on the roof. If the police were investigating they had obviously found all they needed, and it was back to business as usual.
Daisy opened the door, climbed out, and locked the SUV, before heading to the stairwell. The stench hadn’t improved any since she had been there with Solomon. She jogged down the stairs, pleased that she’d chosen to wear jeans and relatively flat boots. If the bad guys came after her she would be able to run; her footwear would be no impediment to her escape—her fitness was another matter altogether.
Once she was on the fourth floor she took a moment to orient herself, and then strode with a sense of purpose. Her heart raced. If the phone wasn’t there, she had no plan B. Even if it was, someone could have driven over it, or it could have been smashed when Solomon dove for cover.
They’d been behind an SUV parked next to the third pillar on the left. The phone could have gone in any direction. She squatted and tipped her head to look beneath the vehicles parked in the vicinity. Something caught her eye and she waddled along the row and up the side of a dark blue sedan. She dropped to her hands and knees and took a closer look.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Solomon sat with his back against
the wall and pretended to doze. Toby paced around and around the room. Other than mumbling that they’d be rescued, he’d been less than forthcoming. Solomon wasn’t giving up, though. He figured they’d brought Toby back about three hours ago.
He opened his eyes and shifted position. “Who did you have to call?”
Toby glanced at him and shook his head. “No one.”
“Maureen asked me to try and find you. She’s a brave girl.”
“Leave her out of it.”
“Do you think she’ll stop looking for you? Do you even know how much she loves your sorry, uptight, upper-crust arse? She has absolutely no idea who you really are, and yet she’s prepared to risk everything to get you back. Most women wouldn’t give a toss about a man who claimed to be homeless and had a history like the bullshit you and your government puppet masters made up to hide your real identity.”
Toby stopped pacing and stared at him. “I was homeless, and I did have a drug problem.”
“But you’re not denying someone’s pulling your strings. So, who did you call?”
“Maureen. Told her I was fine and doing some work with Jason on my debut album. I thanked her for her help and wished her a happy life.”
“She believed you?”
He shrugged. “Jason just signed on as my manager so I could be in the studio.”
“She’d never buy you dumping her. She told me about the baby and the proposal. Does Jason know?”
Toby shook his head. “No. He suspects I’m the one who got her pregnant, but either way he doesn’t care as long as I’m out of the picture.”
“Did you mean it when you told her you wanted to get married? Because if you didn’t I might feel compelled to punch your teeth down your throat.”
