Jake's Return

by Liana Laverentz

  "I don't know where they went,” the woman was saying, “but they turned up that way, right past Feeney's.” She squinted at Jake. “Aren't you that guy's got everyone all het up? People can't decide whether you're a hero or ... well, never mind. All I know is my husband thinks you're the best mechanic in three states. Said you did an amazing job on our old Mercury. He usually works on it himself, you know, but between working three jobs just to make ends meet, he couldn't find the time."

  Jake remembered the car. It had been ready to fall apart. He'd been in a foul mood that day, looking for a reason to dodge customers. He'd spent the whole afternoon working the Mercury over, doing everything short of an overhaul. He hadn't billed the man for more than Feeney's original estimate to replace the carburetor, planning to pay for the difference in parts himself. But when he'd put the money on the counter, Feeney had told him to forget it. It wasn't anything Feeney himself hadn't done a few hundred times in the course of forty years.

  Two weeks later, Feeney had offered to sell Jake the station. To keep him in town.

  And now Jake's daughter was missing. Because he'd stayed this long. And Jake had a damned good idea of who had her.

  "Let's go.” He took Rebecca by the elbow and turned her toward the car. “Thank you, ma'am. If you'll excuse us..."

  "I hope you find your little girl,” she called after them. “Got five kids of my own, and I know how I'd feel if one of them went missing."

  Jake waved an acknowledgement and hustled Rebecca back to the car. “What do you think?” he asked, as soon as they were back in the car.

  "It doesn't sound like anything Katie would do, but it's the only lead we have."

  "Who do you know in Glenhill who drives a new dark luxury car?"

  "More than half the people in Glenhill drive dark luxury cars, Jake."

  "Yeah, but who do you know? As in who in Glenhill would know Katie, or have any reason to stop if they saw her walking alone on the road?"

  Rebecca looked at him, shaking her head. “Jake, Avery wouldn't—what possible reason could he have for taking Katie?"

  Jake looked over his shoulder and shifted into reverse. “That's what we're going to find out. You said she never liked him, Becca. It's time to find out why."

  As he sped toward Glenhill, Rebecca put her hand on his thigh. “Jake, wait. Let's call home first. Maybe she's come back."

  Jake's every instinct screamed at him to get to Dillenger's, fast. He'd never bought Dillenger's story about buying toys for children at the shelter and hadn't seen a single one of those toys surface since. A couple of discreet fishing expeditions with FX had netted him a big zero as well.

  But Rebecca was right. A quick phone call might save them a lot of trouble. Because if Dillenger did have Katie, Jake was going to have to hurt him, and badly.

  "All right,” he said, tires squealing as he pulled a U-turn in the middle of the road. “You can call from Feeney's."

  Two minutes later, waiting impatiently while Rebecca made the call, Jake saw her shoulders slump and braced himself even before she hung up the phone. “Not a word,” she said, her voice cracking as she looked up at him with big, fearful eyes. “From anyone, anywhere."

  "Then buckle your seatbelt, baby."

  Chapter Nineteen

  "I'd like to go home now,” Katie said from her seat at the far end of Avery Dillenger's dining room table.

  "You would? I'm afraid that's not possible yet."

  "What do you mean?"

  Avery set aside his dessert spoon and leaned forward, giving the girl his full attention. “I mean, my dear Kathleen, it's not time for you to go home yet."

  "My name's Katie."

  "Kathleen's your given name, and I prefer to call you that."

  She looked at him for a long moment, apparently having nothing to say to that. Good. He was getting tired of her questions. He preferred his guests to be quiet and compliant.

  "I'm leaving,” she announced suddenly, and stood.

  He met her determined gaze across the length of the table, and fixed her with the look of promised retribution that had worked so well with so many others. “I don't think so, Kathleen."

  She bolted.

  "Kathleen!” Avery shot to his feet in annoyance as she ran out of the room, but refused to upset his digestive system by lowering himself to chasing after her. He smiled to himself. She could hide all she wanted. No one else was in the house, and there was no way out unless he deactivated the security system.

  He sat back down and resumed his meal. As he ate his chocolate mousse, he ruminated over his plans for the evening. This time, he'd make sure Donovan took the fall. He smiled at his own cleverness. The bastard's knife would come in handy after all.

  Having finished his dessert and coffee in peace, he rose, and, whistling, went to his security room, where he spotted the girl on one of the dozen monitors there. Stupid thing, she hadn't even made it out of the living room. She could have at least made things interesting for him by finding herself a closet to slip into. He didn't have monitors in the closets. Or in his special room downstairs. A camera, yes, but security monitors, no.

  He smiled in anticipation as she rose from her hiding place behind the couch, listened for any sound of him, then began to make her way across the room, no doubt aiming for the front door.

  By the time she got there, he was there to meet her.

  "I'm afraid leaving is simply not an option right now, Kathleen. I still have plans for you."

  She bolted again, but this time he was ready for her. He swept her back against him with one arm while he used the other to try to subdue her. “That's enough of this nonsense, Kathleen. Do you hear me?"

  "No!” She increased her puny struggles, kicking and hitting like the ill-bred creature that she was.

  "Stop that, you little brat,” he snarled as she connected with his kneecap. “Or I'll—"

  The doorbell rang.

  Avery cursed succinctly. “Help! Help!” the girl screamed, before he could get a hand over her mouth. Still kicking and squirming, she bit his hand, then let out another earsplitting scream. Swearing sharply, Avery spun her around and slapped her. The idiot girl stopped screaming, but stumbled into a table holding a Ming vase filled with fresh cut flowers. As flowers and vase crashed to the marble-tiled floor, someone banged loudly on the door.

  "Come on.” He grabbed the girl's arm with the intention of locking her in his soundproof media room while he dealt with whatever imbecile was still banging on his door, and dragged her into the main hall. Behind him, the front door crashed open. The girl screamed again, this time even louder than before.

  "Quiet, you stupid brat,” Avery snarled, shaking her viciously. What the hell was happening to his evening?

  "Let her go, Dillenger, or I'll kill you."

  He stilled as he recognized the lethal note in Donovan's voice. Slowly, he turned and released the girl, who ran past Donovan and into her mother's waiting arms. The murderous look Rebecca sent him over the girl's head rivaled Donovan's.

  Avery smiled. All might not be lost after all. “Well, well, well. What have we here?"

  Rebecca ignored him, focusing on Katie. “Did he hurt you, baby? Did he hurt you?” she asked, furiously skimming her gaze over her terrified daughter for any outward sign of injury. The fresh bruise blossoming on Katie's face made Rebecca want to kill Avery Dillenger herself, but seeing to Katie came first.

  Katie sniffed as tears streamed down her swelling face. “I was trying to leave, Mama, and he wouldn't let me."

  "You sorry bastard,” she heard Jake growl low in his throat. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn't beat the shit out of you right here and now."

  "Jake. We've got Katie. Let's just leave."

  "How long has she been here?” Jake demanded.

  Dillenger shrugged. “An hour or so, two, at most."

  "He wanted me to spend the night here, Mama. He wasn't going to let me leave."

  Jake cursed again. Rebecca
fixed her gaze, rife with anger and suspicion, on the most prominent citizen in Warner. “What's going on here, Avery?"

  "Nothing devious, my dear,” he returned with a patronizing smile that had Rebecca itching to slap his smarmy face. “I simply offered your daughter safe harbor for the night. When I picked her up, she didn't want to go home."

  Rebecca looked down at her daughter, having a hard time believing Katie had wanted to avoid going home badly enough to get into a car with Avery Dillenger. “Katie, is this true?"

  "Well, at first I didn't want to go home. But then it got late and I started missing you."

  She bent to meet Katie at eye level and smoothed her daughter's hair. “Why didn't you want to come home, sweetheart?"

  "I don't think that's important right now,” Jake interrupted coldly. “What's important is why Dillenger here thought he could get away with bringing Katie here without your knowledge or consent, then keep her here against her will."

  "You're deranged if you think I'll answer to you. On any subject."

  "Then you can save your answers for the police,” Rebecca said.

  Dillenger's laugh was short and harsh. “I don't think so. The job of the police is to protect people like me from people like you. Not the other way around. You're not calling the police. Either of you. Rebecca because she's already in enough trouble with the town council and you, Donovan, because deep down you don't care about anyone but yourself. As soon as your parole is over, you're out of here. History. Calling the police would only make waves you can't afford to make.

  "No, I should be calling the police, myself. Trespassing, breaking and entering, terroristic threats. I've got it all on tape.” He nodded toward a hidden security camera. “What do you think your parole officer would say if I showed it to him?"

  "Jake, I think it's time we left,” Rebecca said, her arm still firmly around Katie.

  "In a minute. Why don't you take Katie out to the car?"

  "Jake..."

  "I won't be long. Trust me."

  Rebecca hesitated so long, Jake was sure she was going to refuse. To his relief, she nodded once. “Be careful,” she said, before she turned away and ushered Katie out the mahogany door he'd kicked open when they'd heard their daughter's scream.

  "What is it?” Dillenger snapped behind him.

  Jake turned to face his nemesis. “Don't fuck with me, Dillenger. Stay the hell out of my life, and that includes Rebecca and Katie. If I hear you've bothered either of them again, I'll take care of you myself."

  "Are you threatening me?"

  "Take it however you want."

  Dillenger's eyes glittered darkly, and he moved forward, practically daring Jake to take him down right then and there. “You'd go back to prison for them, wouldn't you?"

  "In a heartbeat."

  "Why? Did you enjoy being locked up that much?"

  Jake knew Dillenger was messing with him again, baiting him, but Jake was thinking about the cameras. If there was any way he could turn the tables on the bastard ... “You're sick, Dillenger. Really sick. Stay away from the children in this town, or you're going to find out first hand what living in a cell feels like."

  "Oh, so now you think it's me preying on the little darlings?"

  "Sutter knows, doesn't he? Is that why you tried to kill him and frame me for it?"

  At that, Dillenger almost smiled. “I'm afraid I couldn't pass up the opportunity.” His expression hardened. “Nor will I when it comes around again."

  "Where's my knife?"

  "That's for me to know and you to find out. When I'm ready to let you find out."

  Jake let it go. He'd done all he could for now. He turned and was about to cross the threshold when Dillenger spoke in an icy voice behind him. “If you think you're going to walk away with everything that belongs to me, you've grossly underestimated me."

  Slowly, Jake turned around, fully expecting to find a gun pointed at him. When he didn't, he couldn't stop an annoyed, “What the hell are you talking about now?"

  "Don't tell me you don't know she's planning to give you everything."

  Jake just looked at him. What was the man talking about?

  "Your grandmother. My great aunt. She's willed it all to you."

  "Jesus, Dillenger, now I know you're a paranoid son of a bitch. My grandmother's not planning to give me anything different from what she's given me the past thirty years. Nothing."

  "She gave you a house."

  "That was my mother's house. Mickey kept it from me."

  "And Amanda Dillenger bought it when she found out Princess Eileen was pregnant with her precious love child."

  "Yeah, right."

  "It's the truth. Your grandmother bought that house for you."

  "Let it go, Dillenger. I'm nothing to your family and we all know it."

  "That's where you're wrong. They all wanted you, Donovan. Desperately. Your mother, your father, your rich as sin grandparents. Don't tell me they didn't try to come and get you after your idiot of a mother killed herself. I know all about it. How your drunkard father tossed Conrad Dillenger out on his ear the night of Eileen's funeral, saying no way in hell was he going to turn his son over to some sick pervert to raise."

  "What are you saying, Avery? How do you know this?"

  Jake looked over his shoulder to see Rebecca had returned. She'd probably seen him start to leave, then turn around as if a gun were trained on him. A part of him wanted to kiss her for coming back, another wanted to shake her for taking such a risk with her life. For him. “Where's Katie?"

  "She's fine. Curled up in a blanket and listening to the radio.” Her attention returned to Dillenger. “Now what's this about the night of Jake's mother's funeral?"

  "Drop it, Rebecca. It's old news,” Jake warned.

  "Not to me,” she countered sharply. “You never told me your grandparents tried to take you from Mickey."

  "They only tried once. It wasn't worth mentioning."

  She glared at him. “Wasn't worth mentioning, when it was probably one of the most pivotal moments of your life?"

  "What are you talking about?"

  "If you'd gone home with your grandparents that night, Donovan, like you were supposed to,” Dillenger sneered, “my life would have turned out entirely different.” His eyes filled with undiluted hatred and bored into Jake. “Because then Conrad Dillenger would have had you to play with instead of me. You have no idea how much I hate you for that, cousin. Because every time I tried to fight back, every time I tried to get away from the sick bastard, he'd laugh and say, ‘Forget it, boy, I'm going to give it all to your cousin Jake if you don't do what I say.'

  "I couldn't let that happen. It was mine.” His face twisted into a dark mask of bitterness. “Mine. I earned it."

  "Avery?” Rebecca interrupted gently. “Are you saying Conrad Dillenger molested you?"

  "Every chance he got,” Dillenger spat. “From the time I was eight until the rotten sonofabitch died when I was sixteen."

  "Why ... why didn't you tell anyone?"

  "Who was I going to tell? My mother, whose only concern was her social calendar? My father, who was married to his law firm? Neither of them wanted to be bothered with me. They wouldn't have believed me, anyway.” His gaze, still burning with hatred, flashed back to Jake. “And now she wants to give it all to him."

  "Who wants to give all of what to whom, Avery?"

  But Dillenger had apparently gone somewhere else in his mind, leaving the two confused and slightly shell-shocked people who stood in his cold foyer behind. “Week after week I've had to listen to her Sunday dinner prattle about how unfair life has been to her poor, neglected grandson, how she's hired private investigator after private investigator to prove he's innocent, how she plans to make amends for all the trouble he's had when she dies, how she doesn't blame him for not wanting to have anything to do with her. For not answering her letters."

  Rebecca looked at Jake in confusion.

  "My grandmother,” Jake
said quietly. “She wrote a few times while I was in prison. I didn't answer her."

  "And you haven't been to see her since you've returned,” Rebecca said, just as quietly.

  "Because you know how desperately she wants to see you, don't you, Donovan?” Dillenger sneered. “You're just holding out for the big prize."

  "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "The hell you don't! She's leaving it all to you, you worthless bastard. The whole damned estate."

  "You're not making sense, Dillenger,” Jake snapped. “Come on, Rebecca, let's go. The man's delusional.” He stopped and turned back to Dillenger, pointed a finger. “My warning stands. You come near my girls again and I'll—"

  "You delude yourself, Donovan. Rebecca and Katie aren't yours."

  "Wrong again, Dillenger. Katie's mine, through and through. Come within fifty yards of her again and I will personally cut off your balls and feed them to you."

  "Rebecca, can you honestly say you prefer this crass convict to me?"

  "You're despicable, Avery."

  "You didn't think so when we were dating. I took you out over my mother's stringent objections, you know. ‘Breeding will tell,’ she always said. I loved to taunt her with the idea of marrying you before she died. Chloe Reed's daughter. It would have humiliated her to the bone. Which was nothing less than she deserved, the self-centered bitch.” He refocused on Rebecca. “But you slipped through my fingers, didn't you, and now you're bent on repeating your own family history.” His expression hardened. “I hope what he does to you in bed is worth it, because I'm going to make sure—"

  Without a sound, Jake lunged.

  "Jake!” He felt Rebecca pull at him from behind, but it was too late. He'd made his move, and Dillenger was on his ass on the floor, screaming bloody murder as bright red blood gushed from his nose onto his fancy Italian suit and white marble tiles.

  "Speak to her again, Dillenger, and I'll kill you. Come on, Rebecca, let's go."

  Chapter Twenty

  They returned to the car to find Katie feeling needy and eager to leave. Jake didn't blame her. When she asked Rebecca to sit with her in the back seat, Jake's fury increased a hundredfold. The bastard had shattered his daughter's sense of safety. It took everything he had not to go back and finish what he'd started.