The Elusive Jillian Wilson (Siren Publishing Allure)

by Lynn Ray Lewis

  She put her face close to his and told him to wake up. He was out, and she couldn’t get him to even grunt. She scooted closer to his body and used her bent arm to pull his head onto her raised knee across her lap. His head flopped to the side, putting his lips at the nipple of her right breast. His whiskers scraped the welts from the crop, and she moaned in pain. She didn’t want to think that the contact gave her pleasure. All she had to do would be to lean in slightly if his mouth opened and she would probably orgasm right then and there. How fucked up can you get, girl?

  She ended up hugging his torso to hers and rocked as she cried, begging him to wake up and get them out of there before they died in this horrible place. “Vince, you need to wake up now. We need you to get us out of here. Please, please wake up.”

  Vince heard a woman pleading with him. He opened his mouth and noticed the tender nipple on his bottom lip and the rocking motion of their bodies. He licked her nipple before latching onto it and sucking strongly, working the bud with his tongue as her body stiffened. Becoming aware of his surroundings when he opened his eyes and realized that Jillian had somehow escaped from her bonds. He could not see her face clearly but imagined this was a new situation for her. Hell, it was a new situation for him, too. It was not every day that a deranged woman tried to kill him and frame him for the death of another human being.

  Jillian couldn’t believe he was awake and sucking on her breast. For one minute she considered letting him continue to pleasure her like this but knew that when he realized who he was with and where they were she would be mortified. She dropped her knee that was propping him to her body, and his suction pulled on her nipple as he fell back onto her now lying leg. She yelped and he opened his eyes.

  “Please, can we try to get out of here? They set the shed on fire. I can smell smoke, and it is getting stronger. I can’t lift you, and I don’t know what to do. Mr. Oliver, we need to move. We have to find a way out of here or we are going to die. I am not ready to die. Dammit, get your ass up and help us. Your family has caused me too many nightmares, and I am not going to let that bitch win.

  “I didn’t do a thing but try to get a job, and here I am kidnapped and trussed up like a curing deer. Then she beat me. I was so scared that man was going to rape me. Get up.”

  The rambling account of miseries continued, and she was just talking to relieve the stress and fear. And you’re just lying here while the building is burning overhead when you should get them out of this cellar to somewhere safe.

  He forced himself to slowly move his body to a sitting position and grunted as he stood.

  His hand reached down to find her hand and encountered naked female flesh. “Take my hand and we will get out of here. I know where we are, and it’s a good thing Brenda is stupid and her newest boyfriend is too lazy to explore beyond his feet.” He left his hand touching her as she raised her hand to his. “Okay, there is a stairway under that wooden wall, and it leads directly to the outside of the house. I hope they are already gone, but just in case I want you to wait while I go out and look around.”

  From the way she latched her hands on his arms, he knew she would not be left behind. “By the way I am Vince Oliver, and I presume you are the elusive Jillian Wilson?”

  She was surprised that he knew who she was. “Y–yes, I am Jillian Wilson.” She wanted to say more but couldn’t find the words now that he assured her that he would get them out of this death trap. If he thought she was staying put while he escaped, he had another thing coming. Her hands tightened their grip on his hand and wrist.

  Vince tried to loosen her grip on his wrist when they came to the top of the steps. Her nails dug in. “Look, I need both hands to get this door opened. As far as I know, this door could be rusted shut, and I need to put my weight behind it. Let go. I will be right here.” He felt her fingers dig in again and then release her hold only to grab the waistband of his slacks. It would do.

  Vince pulled the inside latch and pushed down at the same time. The sound of rusty metal trying to move was loud in the small space. He stepped back to kick it loose and then remembered that his shoes were missing, so he hammered his shoulder against the door, hoping to loosen the rust apart enough to open the door. Jillian let go of his slacks, but he paid little attention while he attempted to use his thick shoulders to force the door open.

  Vince was about to admit defeat. Then he felt Jillian slap him on the back hard. “What the…” She shoved something heavy handle-first at him. When he grabbed a hold on it and hefted the thing, he wanted to kiss her. “Okay baby, good job, now stand back.” Vince aimed the sledge hammer where he thought the handle on the door was using both arms to swing the ten pounds of steel. Four muscle-stunning slams of the hammer to steel later, the door popped open.

  His hands were numb, but he saw the moon and pulled Jillian out into the open air behind him. The house was dark, and the only sound was the hissing and crackling of the burning shed. The rough ground and spiked dry grass crunched under his feet. He felt Jillian falter a few times, but he wanted to get to a telephone as soon as possible.

  Chapter 8

  Vince used patio chair leg to bust a window out of the back door. While Jillian was busily working on the patio slider, he was feeling for the lock on the door, encountering a key-lock deadbolt inside and cursing in frustration.

  “Hey, he-man, you wanna stand there and practice your nasty words or do you want to come over here and help me?” Jillian was pulling up on the door, trying to get it to come out of the track. “I could use some of those muscles over here when you have the time.”

  Vince went to where the little woman was working at the door and saw what she was trying to do. He had his doubts but pushed her little hands away and grabbed the door handle and the middle of the slider and picked up on it. Well, I’ll be damned. The door cleared the metal track on the bottom, and he horsed the door slowly out of the way, ending up bending the thin latch when it refused to release from the frame.

  Vince waved his hand for her to enter the house before him. “After you.” She scuttled through the doorway and into the dark house. He watched the way her breasts swayed as she moved. The wide white hips that he could see in the moonlight tagged his interest, and he immediately chastised himself for his wicked thoughts. He knew that when she remembered that she was naked there were going to be problems.

  Jillian sat in the first chair she stumbled over. She finally got a good look at Vincent Oliver. His eyes were light blue and went well with the thick light-brown hair falling over his forehead. The man was a powerhouse if you went by musculature. His suit fit perfectly over wide, thick shoulders. He must be well over six foot tall. Now that she saw him upright, that estimate was amended to six and a half feet tall. The man was huge all over from what she saw. His angular face reminded her of pictures of Vikings that graced so many romance novels.

  Vince grabbed the receiver to the house phone and punched in Haney’s number. He let the phone ring until the answering message came on for him to leave a message. “Call me ASAP. It is important. Call the farm number.” He immediately called Haney’s number again, and Haney finally answered his damn phone.

  “What the fuck, Vince? It’s two in the damn morning. Don’t you ever just sleep? You know close your eyes and dream of whatever makes you happy?”

  Vince could give a shit what time it was. Brenda and her loverboy were probably getting their sticky little fingers on whatever they could find, and Vince wanted them stopped before they left the country. “I want you to get someone over here now. And before you ask, I don’t care what kind of shit storm this causes. Brenda tried to kill me and Jillian. Which, by the way, your investigators are worthless fucks, and they are fired. The crazy bitch tried to set us both up and me especially for kidnapping and causing the woman’s death.”

  Vince looked over to Jillian. She was hugging herself and shaking, and he could see that she was trying to make an effort to keep it together but failing fast. She was no pansy, t
hat was for sure, but strong people had to break down once in a while. Even he knew that.

  “Haney, bring a doctor and the cops. Tell them to stop Brenda and her companion. All I know is his name is Dillon, tall guy, probably six two, midthirties. She said they were going to Cabo when they left us under a burning building.”

  * * * *

  The police had left and the fire department was making certain there were no burning embers before they packed up and moved out. Brenda and Dillon were arrested in Vince’s apartment with a small bag containing keys to the Jaguar and several gold watches that were collector’s pieces. They also had Jillian’s wallet and the gold chain that she always wore around her neck.

  Haney listed off the attempted loot, and Vince told him quietly to wait until tomorrow to finish up with his report.

  Before the police and firemen had arrived, he had gone into his room and brought out a thick bathrobe for Jillian to cover her nakedness with.

  She was mortified that she hadn’t thought about dressing in something, but she had been so out of it for a few minutes clothing had no priority for her. All she could do was shiver and rock herself back and forth until the doctor saw her and gave her a shot to calm her down long enough to examine her.

  When the doctor had finished his examination and left a tube of antibiotic cream with her, the police wanted pictures of the welts on her body and had a policewoman take her into the bathroom to take the pictures. Once that was done, Jillian locked the door behind the female officer and stepped into the shower stall to scrub the dirt and grime from her body. She hated to put the robe back on, but there was nothing else to change into, and Jillian did not want to go out of the room in a towel.

  The shot the doctor had given her was only a mild sedative, so it didn’t make her sleepy, but her body was weary and Jillian was hungry, so she made her way quietly into the kitchen to find something to eat. The refrigerator was empty, and the only food she could find were canned vegetables, so she went back to her chair and sat waiting for someone to stop talking long enough for her to ask for something to eat.

  Haney gave them a ride to Vince’s condo and promised to bring Bea over in the morning if he could find her before she took off with Dustin for the day. If not Bea, then he would contact Jillian’s friend Kelly to come and stay with her until they could sort out what to do. Just before he left them, Haney played a hunch by telling Jillian, “Oh, by the way, your little buddy Eli misses you and has named his new truck after the magic green minivan.”

  At the mention of Eli, Jillian smiled. “I hope they didn’t have any problem finding his mommy. He is such a sweet little man. If I was his mother, I would have been going crazy looking for him. I’m sorry about his father though. He was dead. I knew it when I saw his eyes staring at nothing, but I didn’t tell Eli.”

  When Haney gently explained the circumstances of Eli’s presence at the hotel that day Jillian stared at him with her mouth open. “His parents have been looking for you, too. They want to thank you and give you a reward for rescuing him. It will probably be a substantial amount so you will at least be able to afford to buy a new vehicle and some clothing. I will call Ben and tell him that Eli’s pretty blonde lady with the magic green minivan is here with us and that you would like to talk to Eli again.”

  When Jillian nodded Haney said good-night then walked out into the afternoon sun. Damn, here I said good-night, and it is two in the afternoon. He laughed at his time warp, but since he hadn’t been to bed until midnight last night and then Vince called him just after two a.m., he was running on little or no sleep. The only really good thing about this was that he got to go pick up Beatrice. Dustin could ride shotgun. First a few hours of sleep, then seeing Beatrice again.

  Jillian waited for Vince to take his shower before she brought up the subject of food. Her stomach was growling, and she was about to tear into a can of whatever he might have in the cupboard. If she had her purse she would call for a pizza or Chinese takeout, anything to relieve the gnawing ache in the pit of her stomach.

  When Vince walked into the living room, Jillian looked her fill of the yummy man. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt that showed his powerful arms and chest. Damn, girl, look at that. When he looked at her and smiled, she forgot about her empty stomach for a few seconds until it growled again, reminding her that it was over forty-eight hours since she had eaten.

  “From the sounds of our stomachs, I think it was a good thing I called in an order for pizza to be delivered. I hope you like pepperoni and sausage with mushroom and extra cheese. There is beer in the fridge, and we can eat as soon as he gets here with the food.”

  The doorbell rang, and Vince grabbed his wallet off the table to pay for the pizza. Jillian went to the kitchen and came back with a cold beer and a can of soda for herself.

  He set the pie on the coffee table and went to get the plates and forks. He didn’t often use a plate for pizza but just in case his sloppy habit of eating the slices off of the cardboard offended her then he was ready to act civilized.

  Neither of them said anything until half of the food was gone, and Vince went to get another beer. He opened the conversation by telling her it was a good thing he had taken this week off for a vacation. “At least I don’t have to run into the office tomorrow. We need to get you situated and decide what to do with you.”

  Jillian wanted to stab him with the fork in her hand. “I am too tired for this conversation. Let me tell you this, mister, I was enjoying a very peaceful life before I had the stupid idea of trying to get a contract from Oliver International. I was minding my own business when I heard your nephew and his cougar girlfriend arguing. The next thing I know bullets are flying and the dumbass refused to shut his mouth. He just kept taunting that crazy bitch until she shot him upside his ignorant head.

  “Then I am driving and stop to stretch my legs and use the bathroom and your lunatic sister or whatever the crazy is to you has me Tazed and kidnapped. Then they subjected me to their version of sex education at least five times on the way back to Georgia. Do you know that they are so screwed up in the head that they purposefully drove off the highway and had sex on the hood of the car? In a cemetery no less.

  “Then there is the little matter of that big doofuss torching my van. I realize that you don’t have any idea what that did to me, but I am going to tell you. Everything I owned was in that van, everything. I was going to St. Louis to get an apartment and find a job there. Now I don’t even have my van anymore.”

  Vince could see that the last of her composure was rapidly depleting. He started to get up and planned to show her a bedroom where she could get some much needed sleep when she began crying. First he could see her hazel eyes swimming then overflowing, and it was as if a dam had burst. She hung her head over her arms on the table and cried as if her heart was broken.

  He pulled her up and cuddled her while the storm of tears soaked his shirt and her fists kept clenching and unclenching on his chest. They stood there for a few minutes, and then Vince bent down, putting one arm under her knees and the other stayed across her shoulders while he carried her to the bedroom, laying her down then shucking his jeans and sliding in beside her. He pulled her back onto his thick chest and kissed the top of her head while rubbing up and down her back, making soft, crooning reassurances to her.

  They feel asleep in each other’s arms, and Vince woke up around midnight to the sound of a woman softly crying. The muffled sounds were coming from the living room so he pulled his jeans on and went to find Jillian. He found her at the kitchen table with one hand wrapped around a coffee mug and a wad of tissue pressed against her mouth and nose.

  Vince walked into the kitchen with a quiet “good morning” as he passed her to pull a mug down and fill it with the fragrant brew. He added a splash of creamer and sat at the table across from Jillian. She wiped her eyes and took several deep breaths before he tried to talk to her.

  “Jillian, I know that you have lost everything you own. I am aware
that you have no place to go, and that my family has been the source of your misery. But I also have to say, you are probably the strongest woman I have ever met. I am going to tell you some family history and trust that you will keep it to yourself.”

  He told her about the loss of his mother and then skipped the two years in between to the time his father remarried Brenda’s mother. He shook his head and poured them each more coffee while he talked about the family bust-up with his father, and the fact that he was guilty of allowing Brenda and Vinny to run around throwing his money away on dubious pursuits, and indulging them with his checking account rather than having to deal with them.

  She sat through his story with her mouth open when he got to the part about her involvement that fateful day in his office. She had no idea that she was being searched for. Or even that the police wanted to talk to her about that day.

  “So here we are, both of us still alive and alone. You have lost your possessions because of Brenda. I lost my father and probably a few million dollars. The money is gone. I am not going to worry about that. Brenda went off the rails, and the million she was supposed to get will not be transferred. She will be going to prison, and that firebug boyfriend of hers will, too. If I find out that Vinny was involved in any way, that little bastard will be sitting in jail rotting for as long as I can push for it.

  “Now, since it is my family that caused all your misery and I can afford to replace most of your possessions, I plan to do it. I can even give you some money to live on for awhile until you decide what to do with your life or where you want to be. You are safe here with me until the business with the police is over, and you will probably need to testify at the trials.”

  Jillian didn’t know what to say. The man had everything worked out in his mind and thought she was just going to fall in line. Strange, but she didn’t remember signing slave papers giving her ownership and brains over to him. So she told him. “First, I didn’t know any of this until those nut jobs grabbed me.