Executive Protection

by Jennifer Morey

  And that had Thad tensing all over again. He sat forward, his forearms on his thighs. “Why?”

  “It’s too dangerous. Sophie was kidnapped to send you a warning and it’s one you should heed, at least for now, at least until my inside man can gather some meaningful intel. We need to know what we’re dealing with. Who is involved? Did someone pay the shooter or is the shooter working alone? These questions need answers.”

  It seemed to Lucy that there was more than the shooter involved. Cam’s background matched the shooter’s. Jaden was a suspicious character, and now Thad thought Chief Thomas knew more than he let on. Were they all linked somehow? Lucy didn’t see how. Why would Chief Thomas help assassinate Kate, a presidential candidate?

  “Let me do some checking,” Kate pleaded with Thad. “Go to Carova Beach for a few days. I’ll let you know what I find when you get back.”

  “No. I’m not leaving you here.”

  “I’m surrounded by security. I want you to go away for a while, and I need someone I trust to get the house ready for my visit. I’ll be fine here.”

  “I can’t leave you alone until the gunman is caught. What if something happens and I’m not here?”

  “Thad, you’re not the only one who can protect me. Sam is here, and I have plenty of Secret Service agents.”

  One of whom Thad didn’t trust. Lucy could tell he would not leave his mother unprotected and he felt he would do the best job of it. Part of her was relieved, since Kate had suggested she go with him. Another part wondered if a few days in Carova weren’t exactly what he needed to let his guard down with her.

  “Ask your friend Darcy to stay here while you’re gone,” Kate suggested. “You trust him, don’t you?”

  Lucy saw how that made an impact on Thad’s resolve.

  “Take Lucy and Sophie with you.” Kate pushed and wouldn’t let up until Thad agreed. That both excited Lucy and made her nervous. “You’ll keep them safe that way. Cam won’t be able to harass her and no one will be able to hurt Sophie. She’ll be able to play on the beach and see new things. It will get her mind off what she’s been through.”

  After contemplating his mother for endless seconds, Thad turned to Lucy in silent petition.

  “She has a good point,” Lucy had to concede. They would all be safe in the Carova beach house, and if Darcy stayed here at the estate, Thad wouldn’t have to worry about his mother.

  “It’s just for a few days.” A tiny smile pushed at Kate’s mouth.

  “All right,” Thad relented. “We’ll leave on Friday.”

  Lucy would have plenty of time to get Sophie’s things and pack.

  “It’s Sophie’s birthday this weekend,” Lucy verbalized her realization. “I’ll go shopping for the monster dolls.”

  “I’ll arrange for a dollhouse to be delivered to the beach house,” Kate said.

  Lucy looked at Thad the same time Kate did.

  He met each one and then said, “I’ll get her a bicycle. There are adult bikes already there.”

  This had the feel of a real family vacation. Lucy couldn’t tame her smile.

  “I can’t wait to hear all about it when you get back,” Kate said.

  Now brooding, Thad stood. “I’ll call Darcy in the morning.”

  He strode from the room.

  Kate waited until he was out of earshot. “You just might be the best thing to walk into his life.”

  “I wouldn’t bet on it.”

  * * *

  Thad headed for a storage room where Security kept their records, beset by the prospect of spending a long weekend at the Carova beach house. His mother was right. He should let her try to get information, and Lucy and Sophie would be safe if he took them away for a while. Not knowing who paid Layne to kidnap Sophie bothered him.

  The house was dark and quiet at this hour. The agents were at their posts for the night and none would come near the file room. He’d copied one of the keys so he could monitor the video recordings without anyone knowing. Unlocking the door, he entered the ten-by-eleven room lined with shelves and a few file cabinets. The shelves were half-full of file boxes and in the center was a rectangular table with a computer. Sitting on the stool there, he logged in as he had every night since catching Jaden in the dark living room. Navigating to the daily video files, he scanned through them.

  Thirty minutes later, he finished. Nothing of significance had occurred. Closing the file, he opened the live feed and checked all the cameras. He almost closed the one monitoring the side entrance next to the kitchen when he saw Jaden appear and unlock the door. Looking around him, he left as quickly as he’d come.

  After making a file of the portion of video showing Jaden unlocking the door, Thad saved it to a jump drive he always brought with him on his surveillance rounds. Shutting the program down, he left the file storage room. He went to the bathroom down the hall and waited. Sure enough, Jaden stepped into view and entered the storage room. He didn’t see Thad hidden in the darkness.

  A few minutes later, Jaden left the room. Thad returned to the storage room and confirmed Jaden had deleted the recording of him unlocking the door and tampering with the security system.

  First going to the side door to relock it, Thad then headed for the guesthouse. There, he went inside without knocking. No one was up at this hour. He found the agent in charge and woke him. The man had slept here most nights since the shooting.

  Todd Matheson was never surprised when he was awakened at all hours of the night. But he was surprised to be awakened by Thad.

  “There’s something you need to see.” Thad handed the man his laptop case when he sat up on the bed.

  “Give me a second.” Todd dressed in jeans and a long-sleeved Henley and then booted his laptop.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “You’ll see.”

  Todd let Thad put the jump drive in the computer and navigate to the video file. The agent in charge watched Jaden unlock the side door with an increasingly tightening mouth. When the file finished playing, he cursed.

  “He also disabled the security system for that section of the house.” Thad saved a copy of the file to Todd’s desktop and then removed the jump drive. “He’s trying to allow someone access.” The gunman, most likely. Had the same person paid Layne to kidnap Sophie? Was he also paying Jaden?

  After a moment, Todd said, “We’ll keep this between you and me for now.”

  Jaden was finished as a Secret Service agent. Todd wouldn’t reveal how he’d discovered Jaden’s betrayal. Thad wasn’t supposed to be involved in the investigation, but Todd had been briefed on Sophie’s kidnapping, the way Cam was stalking Lucy and the fact that Thad had seen Jaden go to Cam’s home. That would help Thad catch his mother’s shooter and anyone working with him.

  * * *

  Leaving the guesthouse, Thad walked down to the gatehouse and found it unmanned. A chill ran down his spine. It had been manned when he’d checked in the file storage room. He pressed a button on the gatehouse console that set off the internal alarm system. The agents in the guesthouse would be alerted, as well as his mother in her bedroom. Anyone else in the house wouldn’t know an alarm had been set off.

  Thad ran toward the house. Through the side entrance, he held his gun up and moved stealthily into the living room. Nothing moved. He raced up the stairs, hearing agents behind him. Sophie was still asleep in her room. Lucy’s was empty.

  Kate appeared in the hallway as agents swarmed her. His mother was all right. Lucy was missing.

  Sam emerged from his room, still fully dressed and looking as though he’d gone out for the night and had just gotten home. “What’s going on?”

  “Lucy’s missing.” Thad turned to search the rest of the house.

  “I’ll help you.” Sam told him which sections of the house an
d grounds he’d search and that he’d meet him on the side driveway.

  When no sign of Lucy presented itself in his search, Thad ran to the file storage room. There, he took another look at the files surveying the driveway and gatehouse. The footage repeated after one minute. The cameras watching the gatehouse had been disabled, so no live feed had been recorded. While Thad was talking to Todd, Jaden had driven away, secure with the knowledge that he wouldn’t be seen. He must have done something with the guard on duty.

  But why unlock the side door? He could have abducted Lucy and gone through the gate. He didn’t need the door unlocked. Thad didn’t have time to figure that out. He had to find Lucy and he had to find her fast.

  Jaden had to have taken her. Thad had seen Jaden at Cam’s house. Had Jaden taken her there? Again, the unlocked side entrance didn’t jive. Was any of this related to Sophie’s kidnapping? Maybe it was all linked somehow and Thad just hadn’t put the pieces together.

  Hurrying to the side driveway, he found Sam waiting there. He shook his head at the same time Thad did. They had both found nothing in their searches.

  “I have an idea,” Thad said, heading for his Charger.

  When Sam got in the passenger side, Thad explained about seeing Jaden at Cam’s house and the side entrance door.

  “He could have been trying to throw you off,” Sam said.

  That could be possible, if Jaden knew Thad was onto him and knew he’d been watching. Thad had a feeling it was more than that, but he considered the possibility.

  “He may have known I’d go talk to the agent in charge,” he said. But Jaden wouldn’t have predicted Thad would wait near the file storage room. He wouldn’t know Thad had made a copy of the recording.

  “There’s one way to find out,” Sam said.

  Catch Jaden.

  As he drove, Thad recalled that Sam hadn’t gone to bed yet. “Where’d you go tonight?”

  “Mike and I went to Ted’s Steakhouse for dinner and then ended up getting coffee. We talked awhile.”

  All night. They must have talked about their captivity. Thad didn’t press him for more details. If Sam was opening up about what happened to him and Mike, it could only do him good.

  His cell phone began to ring.

  “Thad. It’s Mike Harris.”

  Mike Harris? He exchanged a look with Sam and put his phone on speaker. “Mike, I have Sam with me. Where are you?”

  “Right now I’m parked in front of a house.” He told them the address. “After I dropped Sam off, I saw a security agent put Lucy into his car and drive through the gate.”

  “Did the security agent see you?” Thad asked.

  “No. I was parked a good distance away on the driveway. At first I wasn’t sure what he was carrying. By the time I realized it was a woman, and it was Lucy, Sam had already gone into the house. I thought about going in to get him, but the agent drove through the gate. I decided to follow. I don’t think he saw me.”

  Mike wasn’t close to the investigation. He didn’t know that Thad and Lucy had seen Jaden in the living room or that the window had been left unlocked and the security system tampered with.

  “The agent dropped her off here,” Mike continued, “and some other man carried her inside.”

  Cam. Just as Thad had suspected. Jaden had kidnapped Lucy...for Cam.

  “We’re two minutes from you. Call the police.” Thad pushed his Charger to its limit.

  * * *

  Lucy woke to an aching head. When she went to investigate, she discovered her hands were tied. Next, she discovered her feet were tied and she was lying on a bed. Craning her neck, she struggled to see through the darkness. Was the room windowless?

  A light came on and she saw Cam straighten from a lamp on a nightstand. She shut her eyes and pretended to still be unconscious. The last thing she remembered was going up the stairs to bed. Kate had already gone to hers.

  Opening her eyes a slit, she saw that Cam had gone toward the door. He must have just put her on the bed and thought he had to wait for her to wake up.

  When he left, Lucy twisted her wrists. The rope tying her was too tight. Her hands were numb. Sitting up on the bed, she reached with her bound hands and frantically tugged at the knot tying her feet. She had it loosened when Cam appeared in the doorway.

  “Ah. You’re awake.” He approached.

  Unable to finish untying the knotted rope around her feet before he reached the bed, Lucy lay back and kicked him against his chest. Catching him off guard, he stumbled backward and fell.

  Lucy struggled against the rope around her feet. It loosened some more. She kicked free and scrambled off the bed as Cam got to his feet with a curse.

  It was hard to run with her hands bound in front of her. She made it through the bedroom door and down a narrow hallway. It was so dark in here. There was a light on in the living room. The house was a ranch with a large, open great room that had a high, gabled ceiling. As she raced for the front door, she noticed all the windows were boarded up.

  Reaching the door, she was horrified to discover it lacked a door handle and the dead bolt could only be opened with a key.

  Turning, she leaned against the door and used her teeth to loosen the rope around her wrists. Cam appeared in the great room, walking slowly. His confidence told her all too well how much danger she was in. He was certain she couldn’t get out. Not without a key and not without a fight.

  She finished loosening the rope and tossed it aside. “I told you this would happen,” Cam said.

  That he’d lock her in a room? This was more than a room. He’d turned his entire house into a prison...for her.

  Could she fight him off before he had his way with her? She’d try to reason with him first.

  “What kind of end do you think this is going to come to?” she asked with serenity she did not feel on the inside.

  His head cocked to one side as he neared. He came to a stop in front of her.

  “That depends on you.” He reached out and brushed her hair away from her face. It was all she could do not to swat his hands away. “On how well you behave.”

  She felt as if she were about to vomit.

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Well...” He folded one arm in front of him and propped his elbow on his forearm, putting his chin in his fingers as though thinking deeply, albeit full of mockery. Before she could block him, he swung his hand out and smacked her alongside her face. The blow sent her stumbling off balance and she fell. On her hip, she stared up at him.

  “To start with, you can stop untying yourself and trying to run away. I’ll untie you when I want to untie you.”

  Anger swirled and sparked inside her. No man had ever hit her. She would not do as he ordered. He was sick in the head and she’d fight him to her last breath. Even as she rebelled, his craziness gave her a dose of reality. Could she fight him? He was a big man and stronger than her.

  Getting to her feet, she glanced around the room. There was a standing lamp, some books on a bookshelf, and an electronic picture frame. Her options were minimal. As Cam walked toward her, she went to the standing lamp. Picking it up, she swung. Cam blocked it by grabbing the pole, but the base clipped him on his face. She pulled the lamp but he held firm. Letting that go, she went to the bookshelf and started hurling books at him. He knocked a couple away but she got him with two others. His face grew stormier as he marched toward her.

  If she didn’t get away now, he was going to seriously hurt her. Unable to control her panic, she ran around the couch. In the kitchen, she opened drawers until she found the knives. She almost had her hand around the handle of one when Cam grabbed her hair and yanked her backward. She sailed across the kitchen and banged into the table, the corner of it digging painfully into her side. She fell into one of the chairs, toppling it
over as she crashed to the floor.

  Crawling away, she scrambled to her feet, pushing the table askew to block Cam’s advancing steps. She had to hurt him before he hurt her. Or killed her...

  * * *

  When Thad and Sam arrived at Cam’s house, they spotted Mike standing outside his car. He’d parked in front of the neighboring house. Thad parked behind him. Mike hadn’t gone to the house. Probably smart, since help was on the way. But Thad wasn’t waiting for the police. He alighted from the car and ran with his gun drawn toward the house. Seeing there was no handle on the front door, and the windows were boarded up, a sick feeling roiled his stomach.

  Sam tapped his arm. Thad looked to where he indicated. The garage. Maybe there was a side door. Sam wasn’t armed and neither was Mike.

  “You two stay behind me,” Thad said, and led them around the side of the house. There was a side door in the back, and Sam and Mike kicked it until it broke off the frame.

  Thad rushed in. Like the front door, the inner garage door didn’t have a knob, but someone inserted a key and began to unlock it from the inside. Cam had heard them kicking down the door.

  Sam and Mike scattered to either side of the door and Thad stood between them. The door opened and Thad aimed his gun as Cam peeked his head to look into the garage. Seeing Thad, he ducked out of sight and tried to slam the door closed. Thad shoved his foot in the doorway, blocking the attempt. His black combat boots protected his feet. As a cop, he always wore good shoes. At times like these, it paid off.

  Pushing the door open, he hurried inside, swinging his gun in each direction. Cam wasn’t in the kitchen.

  He heard sirens as he emerged into the living room and saw Cam holding Lucy with a knife at her throat. Other than that and the frightened look in her eyes, she appeared to be all right. She was fully clothed. There was a cut on her face and a faint bruise was forming but Cam hadn’t had enough time to do what he’d planned.

  “Drop that gun or she dies.”

  “In two seconds you’re going to be surrounded by law enforcement,” Thad said.