Dane, Book 3
A Foster Family Saga
Avery Phillips
Copyright © 2015 Avery Phillips
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CHAPTER 1
Choppy waves slapped the hull of the Walk on Water, a storm cropping up out of nowhere. It was the last thing we, the remaining passengers on the yacht, needed. Bruise-colored clouds bunched on the horizon with menacing threat and the wind picked up, tearing at the stained and tattered shirt that clung to my abused frame. I stood on the main deck of the yacht, struggling to breathe. My heartbeat throbbed in my chest, a train rumbling. Pulse sprinting; perspiration beaded above my sharp upper lip. I didn’t know what to do next. I was all out of options, and for a man used to remaining in complete control, I felt dangerously out of my element.
At my feet, Darien Griess’ blood pooled on the wooden deck, and his chest laboriously rose and fell with shallow breaths. I had been sure the man was dead, but the faint signs of life were testament to the evil bastard’s tenacity to survive, and that was what finally spurred me into action. Balling my hands into fists, I turned away from my mother, who was crumpled like a broken woman above Darien’s body. I didn’t want to see Sissy. There was Hanna against the backdrop of the darkening sea.
The unexpected storm did nothing to dim her radiance. Face glowing, illuminated by flashes of lightning, she clutched the railing of the yacht as her brilliant red hair whipped around her, flag-like, violently combed by fingers of wind. Her eyebrows were slashes of red connected above her nose, fear evident in the trembling of her pale pink lips and colorless complexion. She’d had the opportunity to leave with the speedboat that had zipped off moments before, but she had stayed! I was furious with her for disobeying me, but equally awed by how she cared for me. Now it was up to me to get her off the godforsaken yacht alive.
“Stay with Mom,” I ordered.
I needed to get help. I flew up the stairs to the control room and found the radio, shaking hands fumbling with the knobs and dials as I struggled to find a clear channel. I shouted into the communicator, tried to make contact with the Coast Guard. Hope buoyed me as the connection was made and information was relayed that they were coming. I was able to give them a rough estimate of our location and impressed upon them the need to hurry, because the odds were stacked against us. There was just no way I could handle the yacht in the midst of a storm, even if I would’ve been able to figure it out under better circumstances.
I turned my attention to getting things stabilized until they arrived, and that meant providing first aid to a man who would not have hesitated to kill me. Leaden feet stomped back down the stairs, and I forced myself to move faster. The first-aid kit was in the bedroom, as much as I didn’t want to move him for fear of doing more harm than good. Griess had to be removed from the deck and out of the elements. I marched toward the room that had housed me like a caged animal, held hostage by parents who saw me as collateral.
I was bitter. I had a right to be. My own mother and stepfather, I thought, with ironic laughter rumbling in my chest. I got halfway across the deck and wanted to turn back and curse them both. To hell with delivering them to safety! But Hanna materialized at my side, her hand on my forearm bringing me back to sanity. Fat raindrops splashed from the sky, and she tenderly rubbed the water from my face to clear my eyes.
“How can I help?” she asked.
“Hanna,” I breathed. My palms reverently slid over her cheeks, and I pulled her mouth to mine, swallowing up her soft sigh. Everything else could wait. She melted into my arms at the heated sweeps of my tongue, and her hands slipped to the back of my neck. Her damp clothes warmed, bodies pressed together like pages of a book. If ever I needed anything, it paled in comparison to how much I needed her at that moment.
But a strangled cry ripped us apart. “Sissy!” I growled. Hanna and I spun around as my mother, eyes wild, rose from atop Darien’s prostrate form and dashed across deck like a madwoman, reaching for the gun that had been forgotten in the chaos. Thunder rolled across the angry grey sky in the wake of white lightning. I saw the look on my mother’s face.
“Mom, no!” I shouted.
In horror, I watched her fingers close around the weapon, and with strength and speed I had no idea I possessed, I flew across the distance and grabbed her wrist. We wrestled over the slick, sea-spray-soaked deck for the gun. Somehow she forced the steel to her own head, and I squeezed her wrist with all my might before her fumbling forefinger could press the trigger. “I won’t let you do this!” I yelled. A pain-filled yowl erupted from Sissy’s mouth as my hand on her pressure points weakened her grip, and the gun fell uselessly from her hand. Hanna slid forward and caught it before it hit the deck.
Raindrops blinded me, but through the haze I could see Sissy’s despair-ravaged face, all hope lost, and she turned in my arms with bony fingers clinging to my drenched, bloodstained shirt. Her shoulders shuddered uncontrollably, hard sobs shaking her. I whispered soothing words in her ear, not even sure what I was saying—anything to get it through her skull that no matter what happened between us, no matter what she did, I loved her too much to let her go.
The yacht lurched as a giant wave carried the bow up toward the stormy sky and then dropped us into a deep trough. Darien’s wounded body slid helplessly across the deck. I pushed Sissy into Hanna’s arms and shouted above the sound of the storm, “Get to the bedroom! Get there!” The women ran with no need for further coaxing. The sloshing sea would take any man wary enough to challenge it.
I hurriedly grasped Darien beneath his arms, eliciting a weak groan from him, and muscles strained as I dragged the heavy man to the safety of the bedroom. I couldn’t hide, however. Someone had to be on the lookout for the Coast Guard.
I ran up to the control room and did my best to keep the yacht from being tossed around helplessly like a toy sailboat in the cauldron of agitated waves.
#
“I’m not leaving him!” Hanna’s voice was shrill with shock, and I knew her fear was rooted in how close we had coming to never getting off that yacht alive, but we were safe now. An FBI agent with a crew cut tried to lead her away, but she broke free of his grasp and flew back into my arms. My chest rumbled with a surprised chuckle. “Hey, now,” I whispered, shushing her whimpers. She pushed her face against my chest, small and vulnerable in my arms. She didn’t even care about the blood staining my tattered shirt. I clutched her, inhaling deeply. “Hanna, it’s okay,” I mumbled into her hair. “We’re safe. Go with the officer.”
To help me out, Agent Brent stepped closer and spoke slowly to get through to he
r. “We just want to ask you some questions about your ordeal. We need a clear picture of what happened so we can build a case. Okay?”
She nodded, but she didn’t move. She pressed her ear to my ribcage, listening to the sound of my heartbeat. I let her listen, showed her we had survived, until at length her fingers finally loosened from clenching the collar of my shirt, and I gently eased her lithe body away. With her golden hazel eyes wide, she nodded again and finally stepped back, reluctantly following the officer, and they disappeared up the corridor to another interrogation room. I sighed, sharing a look with Agent Brent.
“Girlfriend?” he asked, grinning.
I shrugged. What could I say? “Let’s speed things along,” I replied, gesturing in a circle with my hand. “It’s vitally important I get in touch with my executive assistant, and your men confiscated my cell phone. I’ll need access to a telephone.”
“Sure thing, Mr. Foster. Right this way,” he said, clearing his throat and getting serious.
His nametag read Harold Brent, and he was a few inches shorter than me, but he had a self-assured air that made me happy he’d be one of the men handling the investigation. As soon as we had made landfall, the FBI agents had taken control of the situation, relieving the Coast Guard. It had been a relief to see them. The lead on the case, an Agent Jake Clementine, had informed me Darien Griess was already under their scrutiny. I knew the case Brent was referring to had to do with more than just our kidnapping.
As he opened the dark grey door that led into the room where he’d be interviewing me, he looked over his shoulder with light grey eyes and an apologetic smile. “My goal is to get you and your lady friend on your way as fast as possible, but there’s a lot I need to get from you so the file won’t have any gaps. Have a seat.”
I took a seat in the blue plastic chair he indicated and put my arms on the top of the table. The table was utilitarian, metal and wood painted the same bland shade of charcoal as the door. The surface was scarred and stained with a lifetime of condensation rings. I could picture criminals sitting in the same chair as me, picking at the table with nervous energy, but I wasn’t nervous—just ready to leave. The walls were white cinderblocks and the floor glossy linoleum. A mirror I was sure was double-sided covered one wall. I idly wondered if anyone was behind the glass.
Brent dropped a stack of beige files, each one packed to the bursting point, on top of the table in front of me. Papers slid out, including a document with Sissy’s photograph stapled in a corner. I inhaled deeply and exhaled resolutely. I knew some of what I was about to tell him would directly implicate my mother, and I felt an unexplainable tension in my shoulders at the knowledge. After all that had occurred, she was still my mother.
“Need some coffee? Soda before we get started?”
“Let’s just get this over with. The sooner I can give you the details, the sooner I can get to work forgetting about it,” I said lightly.
He chuckled. “Try not to forget anything. We’ll have Darien and Cecily Griess in a courtroom soon enough, and your testimony will be invaluable. Let’s put them away for good.” He pulled out a notebook and pencil, the tape recorder already in the center of the table. A camera was positioned nearby, and I looked around, surveying the tiny space where criminals and witnesses alike gave their sides of things. I wondered how many souls had been condemned in this place.
Jaw clenched, I waited for the questions to start. Most of them were easy—who I was in relation to the suspects, my purpose for being on the yacht. When it got to the part where I explained that I had gone to Louisiana in search of my mother, the observant agent sat back in his chair with his pencil to his temple, watching me closely.
“So, in all the years you were estranged from your mother, you didn’t try to contact her. Yet, out of the blue, you just randomly picked up the search? Help me understand that.”
I tilted my head to the side, studying him. “It wasn’t out of the blue. I received a phone call from Sissy—well, my assistant took the call, but it sparked renewed interest in finding her. When she sent a letter with her address, I decided to follow the lead and give getting her away from Darien one last attempt.”
“You knew about Darien’s cons,” he said.
“I knew Darien was a deceitful person. In all actuality, I hadn’t seen or heard from either of them in years. I had a hunch. Men like Darien are always up to something, but I couldn’t tell you what exactly he was doing down south, because I didn’t know. I went to retrieve Sissy due to the fact that Darien was an abusive son of a bitch.”
He looked down at his notepad and scribbled something away from my eyes. He grunted. I told him about making it to Louisiana and finding out about the missing money from the theological school.
“Why didn’t you contact the police with your suspicions?”
“My primary concern was getting to my mother. Forgive me if I operated under the assumption that calling the law on a person who was already under investigation would be redundant. After all, I had speculations, not evidence. What exactly are you asking me, here?”
He smiled, lip curling up to the right as his eyes connected with mine. “Mr. Foster, we’re just making conversation.”
“I think I’d prefer if we put the conversation on hold until I have my lawyers present.”
He held his hands up. “Your call. In my experience, people with nothing to hide have no problem talking to guys like me.”
I decided to keep my mouth shut. It suddenly occurred to me from his line of questioning that some of my actions leading up to being kidnapped could be construed as helping them evade police. As the only other person, besides the landlord from the apartment complex where Sissy and Griess had been staying, who knew where the yacht where they were laying low was located, maybe I should’ve called the police instead of going in alone.
I watched the man leave, feeling antsy. Had I unwittingly done something that could make me culpable of obstructing justice? I stared at the ancient tape recorder, still reeling from where he hadn’t turned it off. Schooling my face not to register my rattled nerves, I glanced at the camera. Somewhere Hanna was suffering the same heavy-handed investigation technique. I didn’t have to worry about her. She didn’t have anything to tell that would put her in danger.
As far as I knew, her only involvement was in removing money from our accounts and flying to Texas to hand it off. She was an unfortunate victim in Darien Griess’ scheme to pay off a Mexican drug cartel. I, on the other hand, might be in deeper shit.
After about thirty minutes of stewing in my own thoughts, Agent Brent walked back into the room looking unfazed. “Please contact your attorneys. Arrangements have been made for you and your friend to hang out in a local hotel—bureau hospitality at its finest.” He grinned and looked me over. “Probably won’t be what you’re used to, though. Anyhow, we’d love it if you folks stay in town for a while. I was hoping we’d get you out of here sooner. Course, your insistence to play hardball leaves us no choice. You can leave after we get the information we need.”
The smile on his face didn’t reach his eyes. He gestured to the door where another officer stepped in with Hanna on his heel. She looked relieved to see me.
“You two hang tight in here while we get a phone freed up for you to call your representative, Mr. Foster.”
He walked over to the tape recorder and hit the stop button, then removed the tape. He walked over to the camera and did the same, looking over his shoulder at me. Hanna stepped into the room and took the seat across from me he had vacated. I smiled and waved casually as the men left the room, well aware the place was probably tapped.
“How was it?” Hanna asked.
I held up a single finger. She stared at my hand and back to my eyes. I shook my head subtly. “We’ll be staying at a hotel on the FBI’s dime tonight. They still have some questions they want to ask,” I said.
Her eyes registered alarm. “I thought we were going home.”
“In time,” I
replied. She nodded her understanding, her pale lips thinning with acceptance. Another agent entered the room and beckoned for me to follow him. I placed a call to Gervais and had him contact my lawyer, a very close friend for my college years named Kent. After that, we were driven to a Holiday Inn. I looked up at the plain face of the building with a wry twist of my lips.
“Home sweet home for a few days,” the driver of the FBI-issue black sedan said with a laugh.
I climbed out of the back seat and reached back for Hanna. We’d make the best of it.
CHAPTER 2
“Maybe we should upgrade our room,” I murmured.
Hanna stepped in behind me and looked around. There were two full-sized beds blanketed by the ugliest burgundy comforters I had ever seen, outdated and floral-printed. I frowned as I stared closer at a questionable stain on the dark brown carpet. There was an armoire that doubled as a television cabinet and a writing desk with a faux-leather swivel chair that looked like the newest thing in the room.
“No,” she said. “We won’t be here long, right? All I need is a bath and a bed, and you’ll make me the happiest woman in the world.”
I laughed out loud, closing the hotel room door behind me. “A low-maintenance chick. I like it,” I teased.
She hit me with a look that begged for clarification of my statement, but I wasn’t quite ready to tackle the complicated question of our relationship, or lack thereof.
I moved into the bathroom and turned on a light. As the shower sprayed like summer rain in the background, I moved into the main part of the hotel room and used the phone to contact my credit card’s concierge. By the time we were both bathed and hiding our naked bodies beneath the covers of each of the beds, a knock at the door signaled that my delivery was being dropped off. I opened the door after a pause to let the courier leave, as I had left instructions by phone for him to do, and pulled the box inside.
Dane - Book 3: A Foster Family Saga Page 1
