He looked Desmond right in the eye when he spoke.
“She’s not allowed to kill her. Not yet.”
Desmond tried to avoid the knockout hit but the man in the suit was too fast. The world turned black before he even landed on the floor.
* * *
DESMOND STARED UP at the ceiling and saw white shiplap.
His house.
Living room.
Pain.
It weighed down his body, his head, while at the same time burning him.
Fragments of memories remained scattered around him, even when the yelling started.
“Desmond?”
Caleb’s face, full of worry, and his gun both came into view. He ran to Desmond and crouched in front of him.
“God, that’s so much blood,” he said, touching a spot on Desmond’s head that made him suck in a breath. “What happened?”
The question was magnetized. It brought those scattered fragments of memories together and formed one terrifying reality.
Desmond pushed up, stumbled to the side as his head spun at the movement, but kept moving forward.
“Maria and the man in the suit came for Jenna,” he hurried. “He knocked me out.”
Desmond hated the words.
Hated them almost as much as he hated the man who had done it.
“Riley? Jenna?” he yelled around the hatred flowing through him. He took the stairs two at a time. Caleb was on his heels and had his hand on his back.
No one answered his call. But that didn’t stop Desmond from yelling out. He continued to do it all the way into the guest bedroom. Even at the sight of an empty room, he still called out for them.
For her.
“Desmond!”
A woman’s voice floated from somewhere else in the house.
“My room,” he realized, turning.
Together they rushed into the bedroom and were met with a weird sight.
“Was your dresser in front of the closet before?” Caleb asked after flipping the light on. The dresser had always stood next to the door, not in front of it.
Desmond shook his head.
“No, it wasn’t.”
Someone started banging against the closet door it was covering. Wordlessly Caleb pushed it out of the way. The second the door was clear, Desmond flung it open.
A sea of wild red curls encased a tear-stained face. Dark eyes rimmed with water looked back at him. The fun shirt with fries on the front contrasted with her look of anguish.
“Oh, Desmond,” she said, voice breaking. “She made me.”
Movement at the back of the closet showed a scared Hartley. He hurried up to them and grabbed his mom’s hand.
Desmond turned to his brother and hated what he said more than anything else in the world.
“They took Riley.”
Chapter Seventeen
Hours went by.
Hours.
Desmond absolutely felt them.
So had every Nash alive. Not only had Maria and the man in the suit taken Riley, they’d done so from their home. No one had seen them come onto the ranch and no one had seen them leave. Not even Caleb who had jumped in his truck and hightailed it over after Riley had called.
Riley.
Desmond knew it was useless to try to move his thoughts away from how worried he was. How angry he felt. How helpless he’d become since.
She heard them talking and said we needed to hide, Jenna had tearfully explained. Then she—she said if it was Ryan that we—we needed to change because he knew about that stupid fries shirt. I told her no but then she pointed to Hartley and I—I did it. I switched clothes. She’d held Hartley tight to her chest and barely was able to keep from all out sobbing. Then—Then she told me to be quiet for Hartley and—and she pushed me and shut the door. I couldn’t open it. Then I heard you.
Desmond didn’t know Jenna as well as he knew her sister but he had put his arms around her and Hartley, hoping to help her somehow.
We’re going to get her back, he had promised. We’re going to get her back.
Now, hours later, Desmond was at the sheriff’s department, waiting for their only lead to pan out. Judging by Caleb’s expression after he came out of the interrogation room, panning out wasn’t happening.
“Davies is barking for a lawyer again,” he greeted.
“A lawyer? You mean the same one who took Riley?” Desmond put his hands on his hips. “Please, then, by all means let him get her out here.”
They both knew that wasn’t going to happen.
Maria Wendell had disappeared completely. Last Desmond heard no one even knew where she had been for at least two weeks.
Ryan Alcaster included.
Declan was in Kilwin talking to him and his lawyer. So far that had yielded zero results.
Which left them with Evan Davies. He’d been staying in a hotel outside of Kilwin. Declan had pulled some strings and gotten him sent to the department.
A lot of good that was doing them now.
“I don’t think he’s lying about not knowing about what happened tonight,” Caleb said after a moment. “He seemed genuinely surprised.”
“But he does know something and he’s too much of a coward to say anything.”
Caleb nodded in agreement.
“From what we know of him he seems to only have a backbone in the corporate world. Out here, in real life, he looks like he’s afraid of his own shadow. Or Ryan Alcaster’s or the man in the suit’s. Whoever is pulling the strings because you know it’s not him.”
Desmond grunted his displeasure.
“I’ve met men like him before. I vowed Second Wind would never employ anyone like that.” Desmond ran a hand along his chin. There was already stubble there. He paused as a thought occurred to him. He lowered his voice. “I’ve met men like him before. I know how he thinks.”
Caleb’s eyebrow rose in question. It fell just as fast as he figured out the answer.
“You want to talk to him,” he spelled out.
“I want to find Riley, and if Davies won’t talk to law enforcement, maybe he’ll talk to a CEO.”
* * *
CALEB SHUT THE DOOR behind him. He was going to keep watch because he was a good brother, but mostly, because he knew Riley meant something different to Desmond.
Even without saying anything, it was simply understood.
And they were running out of time to save her.
Now they were breaking the rules and Desmond wasn’t going to leave that room until he got the answers he wanted.
“I don’t know anything,” Davies said, sitting up straight. “And I’m not going to talk to any of you until I have a lawyer in front of me.”
Desmond knew two things going into the interrogation room. For one, he knew he looked like a good ol’ country boy. Jeans, flannel, boots and his Stetson. He knew those jeans were worn, the flannel was rumpled, his boots had dried mud on them and his cowboy hat sometimes gave outsiders the impression that, for some reason, he wasn’t as smart as them.
What he also knew, and what Davies was about to find out, was that Desmond wasn’t leaving that room until he had a way to find Riley.
So, he removed his cowboy hat, set it down on the metal table between them and took the seat his brother had been sitting in minutes before.
Davies eyed him with defiance.
That defiance wasn’t going to fly with Desmond.
“I’m going to go ahead and stop you right there,” Desmond began, threading his hands together on the tabletop. He made sure to keep his voice even. “I’m not law enforcement, never have been. Which means, legally, I don’t have to provide you with anything. Least of all a lawyer. So singing that I-want-a-lawyer song isn’t going to make me do anything other than get really annoyed.”
“If
you’re not law enforcement you’re not supposed to be in here,” Davies tried. There was more bite in his voice than Desmond liked. He waved his hand to dismiss the thought.
“Listen, I get it—you want to be alone right now and I respect that. I surely wouldn’t want to be in here either.” Desmond motioned to the room around them. “These walls? Once you’re inside them they mean something different to everyone you meet.” He leaned back a touch in his chair, careful to keep his body language light and easy. “Some will think it’s exciting you were in here, some even sexy, but others? They’ll think you did something wrong. Something bad. Worst of all? Two times in less than forty-eight hours makes you look guilty as sin.”
“I didn’t do anything,” Davies said, voice raised.
Desmond shrugged.
“Exactly. You didn’t do anything. When you were asked what you knew about Ryan Alcaster’s, Maria Wendell’s and the man in the suit’s involvement in the attack and abduction of your ex-wife, you didn’t say or do anything.” Desmond cocked his head to the side and pointed at the man opposite him. “And that is what everyone is going to know at the end of this.”
Davies was unable to hide his flinch. Desmond guessed the man already had gone over that thought in his head.
And he hadn’t liked it.
Desmond leaned forward. He knew he could break the man and he was ready to bring it home.
“Do you know that my dad was a detective?” he started. “A really good one too. When my siblings and I were younger we were so intrigued about all aspects of his job. But, for me, I was mostly curious about how he was able to make these people who had found themselves in such unflattering positions talk. How he could, as a highly respected and well-known law-enforcement person, get these hardened criminals to tell him what he needed to know. So, one day I asked him.”
Desmond readjusted his casual lean so that he was sitting up tall.
“What he told me really stuck with me. He said, You know, Des, every person on this green earth wants to talk, to tell their story. It’s in our nature. And, just like everyone wants to talk, everyone has at least the one person they want to talk to. The only challenge is becoming that one person.” He once again motioned to the room around them. “And this is where he did it. Day in and day out, case after case, he became someone the other person needed before they said a word.”
Desmond thumbed back to the door that led to the hallway.
“My brothers, that detective and the sheriff, they took my father’s job and the lessons that went along with it and became the law themselves. But me? When I realized I could help people just by talking? Well, I turned that lesson into a smile.” To put emphasis on his point he brought up the corners of his lips with ease. “I became known as the charming one because I figured out the secret. From investors, volunteers and potential donors to boardroom meetings and legal teams to my mother’s book club, they all wanted the same thing those hardened criminals and wrongly accused wanted. To talk. All I had to do was become a good listener.”
Desmond dropped his sweet act. He leaned in again, his elbows on the table.
“So I could sit here as long as they’re allowed to hold you and go through the motions all in the hope you’d finally tell yours.” He jabbed one of his index fingers down on the tabletop. Davies was staring at him, unable to look away.
Good.
“Or you can finally do the right thing and just tell me what you know. If you ever loved Riley at all, you owe her that.”
A silence settled between them. Davies didn’t blink. The heat kicked on somewhere else in the building. Shoes scuffed against tile floor nearby.
Then, all at once, Evan Davies let out a sigh of defeat, his entire body dragging down. There was a hunch to his shoulders when he finally spoke.
“I honest to God don’t know where she is and I don’t know how Maria Wendell or the man in the suit are involved. I also don’t know if Ryan Alcaster is really behind any of it...”
“But?”
Davies let out another long, disheartened breath.
“But I do know the motive, if he is.”
“And that is?” Desmond was on the edge of his seat. The door opened. Caleb came in and shut it behind him.
Apparently he had been in the viewing room.
Davies looked between them, but thankfully, didn’t have to be talked into continuing to say what he was about to say.
He was just as defeated as he answered.
“Ryan didn’t actually get all his money and success by building from the ground up. When he joined Macklin Tech he already was living off his father’s money. Sam Alcaster inherited a fortune from his uncle when he realized he himself wouldn’t have kids. Sam was extremely proud that he could pass that wealth, plus the money he’d added to it over the course of his life, to his son. That had always been the plan.” Davies looked uncomfortable. He shifted in his seat. “A few weeks after the divorce, Ryan showed up in the Atlanta office visibly upset. Maria was in-house and saw it too. We were his friends so we followed him into a conference room to see what was wrong. He shut the door and locked it. I should have known right then that he was trouble.”
“You should have known it after you found out he was beating his wife.”
Desmond didn’t mean for the jab to slip out—not that he regretted it, they just didn’t have the time for it—and Davies flinched.
“What was wrong with him?” Caleb interjected, keeping the new information moving.
“Apparently his father had done some digging into the divorce,” Davies continued. “He didn’t understand why Jenna was given full custody and cut every part of her life with Ryan off.”
“Let me guess,” Desmond jumped in. “He found out what his son had been doing.”
Davies nodded.
“He had hired a private investigator. One who found records, video and pictures of when Jenna was hospitalized. He put it together after that and then he changed his will.”
Money. It was about money.
Desmond should have known.
“Ryan isn’t getting a penny?”
Davies shook his head.
“Sam is leaving every cent of his fortune to Hartley... Which can only be accessed and used by Hartley’s legal guardian if he receives it before the age of twenty-two.”
For a moment no one spoke.
Desmond shared a look with his brother. Neither liked what they had just heard.
“So Ryan wants custody of Hartley to secure his original inheritance,” Caleb said.
“But the only reason Jenna didn’t expose Ryan in the first place was because she’d been given full custody of Hartley without a fight,” Desmond recapped. “There’s no way she would have been quiet if he’d tried to get full custody again. She’d out him and everything he’d done.”
A sickening thought blossomed in Desmond’s head. He saw it reflected in Davies’s expression.
“Unless something happened to Jenna,” he realized. “Brett Calder, the Fixer. Geordi and Maria. He’s not getting his hands dirty, he’s dirtying everyone else’s.”
“He never said he was going to do anything but he very clearly realized the only way to get his inheritance was through Hartley,” Davies said. “I assumed he was spending so much time with Maria because she was helping him, I don’t know, build a case or something. But then I heard about a news story of famous small-town triplets saving a twin just outside of Kilwin. When I saw that it was Riley and that Jenna was also in town, I worried Ryan had come up with a more malicious plan.”
Desmond was getting hot.
Angry.
“Why didn’t you warn her then? Why not warn law enforcement? Why were you at the construction site instead?”
“Because of me,” Davies said, confusing both Nashes. He blew out a frustrated breath and explained. “I didn’t say anyt
hing to anyone about Ryan beating his wife. I sacrificed my marriage to keep that secret, all because I believed my job was that important.” Davies looked to Desmond. “You said it yourself in so many words—being charming can be a tool but it can also be a weapon. Do you know how many friends Ryan has? How many ‘me’s he’s mentored and helped through the years? He’s not a man you take on head-to-head. You have to catch him in the act. So I tried to.” Another long sigh. He was so hunched over by now that Desmond had to angle his gaze down. “I said I found a way to get him what he wanted and asked him to meet me at a place where we could make that happen. I chose the construction site because of how much the media around here seems to love you Nashes. I figured the response time would be quicker and the coverage greater if anything went south with me trying to record his confession without him realizing it. But when I got there I was met by the man in the suit. He said he had been sent there to talk to me. He never specifically said Ryan, but, well, I guess that’s the only person who knew I was going there.”
“Then Marty showed up.”
Davies shook his head with vigor, sitting up a little taller than before.
“I never saw Marty. He must have been on the third floor already. I swear,” he hurried. “When I heard you downstairs I panicked and ran.”
“And the next day Maria Wendell was your lawyer,” Caleb said, disgust clear in his tone.
“You have to understand, Maria has been a friend for the last several months. Calling her didn’t seem that crazy at the time.” He shook his head. “I didn’t know she was involved in Ryan’s plans.”
Desmond rubbed his chin again. In the late hours of the night Riley had done the same motion and laughed.
The memory made him feel warm and hollowed out at the same time.
He fixed Davies with a stare he hoped hurt.
“You know Ryan, better than anyone we’ve talked to,” he said. “And now you’re going to tell us everything.”
Desmond didn’t ask if he understood.
Because, not understanding wasn’t an option.
Desmond had to find her.
Identical Threat Page 15
