by Nancy Adams
About a quarter mile back, I saw two cars sitting in different spots alongside the road. I knew that had to be John and Jim, but I didn't dare stop. I kept going as slowly as I thought I could, trying to stay close to the action.
John texted me: car approaching from side road
I typed: OK
A moment later, he sent: bag retrieved, following. Going away from you.
I prayed with all my might that whatever bug they had on this car would only pick up sound, not location, and then I turned it around. The moon was up and bright, so I cut my lights and drove as fast as I could back the way I'd just come. Within a couple of minutes, I saw a car ahead of me, also with its lights off, but there was another further ahead that had them on. That, I was sure, would be whoever retrieved the money.
We followed quietly for about ten miles, and then the car with lights pulled off into a place with only a few houses. The car ahead of me slowed and came to a stop, and I stopped behind it. As I did, I saw another car ahead of that one, also with lights off.
I rolled the window down as quietly as I could, and got out, leaving the engine running. I walked up to the car ahead and found Jim there, just as John came to us from the other car.
John spoke softly. “Okay, they're in one of those houses, and I'm hoping Katelynn is there, as well. Let's move as carefully as we can, and try to figure out which one they're in, then surround it.” He passed me a Colt .45, and I saw that Jim had a pistol in his own hand. We moved out quietly, and got off the road into the brush as we got close to the houses.
There was only one that had a faint light showing through one window, and we agreed silently that this was the one. John went toward the front of the house, Jim took the side with the window showing the light, and I went to the back. There was an old garage there, and the big door was open. The car sitting inside was Katelynn's.
I moved into the garage, and as my eyes adjusted to the gloom, I saw a door in the far wall. I went to it and tried it gently. It was not locked, and I turned the knob so slowly that it made no sound at all, then prayed as I pushed it open a half inch.
I could hear voices in another room, so I pushed it open just far enough to let me slip in, then shut it just as quietly, thanking God that it didn't seem to have any squeaks. I moved toward the doorway into the room where the faint light glowed, and could hear the voices better.
“...we'll be there in three hours. You're sure you've got everything ready? I want to be on that plane before morning, and out of this country as soon as possible.”
The man was talking on a phone, which was putting out the light. I barely peeked around the door frame, and saw him with his back turned to me. I also saw Katelynn, sitting taped to a chair, and Donna Bennet, standing over by a wall. She seemed to be looking out a window, but it wasn't the one Jim was near.
I took a deep breath, stepped into the room and yelled, “FREEZE!” at the top of my lungs. Donna spun around first, and I saw that she was holding a gun in her hand that she instantly pointed my way, but before she could pull the trigger, two shots rang out from outside, and she fell to one side.
The man was almost as quick, but he didn't have a gun. Instead, he turned and threw the phone at my face, making me flinch, and before I could get my aim again, he had kicked it out of my hand. He threw a punch at my midsection that almost took my breath, but I had been trained by Marines; I rolled through it and swung at his jaw, connecting once, twice, but then he got me with a roundhouse kick to my side, and I staggered. He kicked at me again, but I caught his foot, and managed to flip him onto his back, then threw myself on top of him.
I barely registered Katelynn screaming, or John and Jim rushing in, because I was beating the man on the floor with both fists, one after the other. He tried to block me, but I was in pure combat mode, and I brushed his attempts away as I pounded his face again and again. He finally went limp under me, and I felt hands pulling me off of him; it was Jim, and he was telling me to come down, back off, don't stoop to their level…
I finally came to my senses, and turned to find John cutting Katelynn free. She was unhurt, and I went to her and pulled her into my arms, as John went to check on Donna. He felt for a pulse, then looked up at me and shook his head.
Katelynn began to sob, and I held her. John called 911, and the sheriff of the county dispatched an ambulance and three cars, who all got there about fifteen minutes later.
The coroner was called out, as well, for Donna, and they took her body. The sheriff himself was there, and took Jerry Patterson into custody. The shots that killed Donna were fired by John, who was licensed, so other than having to testify at the inquest, there was little trouble involved. After the paramedics checked the rest of us out, we were allowed to leave, and I drove Katelynn home in her own car.
Over the next few days, it came out that Jerry Patterson had once tried to scam our company for some money, with another bogus lawsuit, and he’d become involved with Donna when she confided in him about my visit to confront her about the thefts. The whole idea for accusing me of sexual harassment had been his, and he had gotten a friend of his to make the photos, using him as a body double, and taking secret pictures of me to get my face. Some new computer programs were employed to blend them, and the results were almost perfect.
Our lab was able to prove they had been faked, but it was not easy, they said, and a good lawyer (like Jim Burke) might have been able to convince a jury that our explanation was just too high tech to believe. In hindsight, it was good that the case never went to court, though I would have risked it anyway, to prove to Katelynn that I would never do such a thing.
The morning after it all happened, I was at Katelynn's home with her and her family. Mrs. Burke wasn't ready to forgive me or Jim, yet, for keeping her in the dark about the kidnapping, and wasn't talking much, but every time she looked at me and Katelynn, I saw a hint of a smile, I knew she'd come around, and I thought I knew a way to help her along.
When we were all sitting at their dining room table that day for lunch, I suddenly stood up and turned to Katelynn, who was sitting beside me, then dropped to one knee and reached out for her hand. She looked at me and her eyes got wide, but she didn't say a word.
I looked into her eyes and said, “Katelynn, I have just spent a few terrifying days thinking I'd lost you forever, and then another day thinking I might lose you all over again. I can't imagine ever living my life without you in it, and I want you to be in it in a very special way.”
I reached into a pocket and withdrew the ring I'd bought a couple weeks before, still in the box, and opened it. I held it out for her to see.
“Katelynn Burke,” I said, “will you marry me?”
She sat there with her eyes still wide for a long moment, and I began to worry she'd say no, but then she said, “If I'm gong to be your wife, then I think I want to be the wife who stays at home and makes sure her husband is happy and well taken care of, but there's this problem, you see. My parents raised me to never, ever be a quitter, so I don't know how I can do that, not with my job and all.” She stopped, and just looked at me, and I think my confusion showed in my face, because all of them started to grin at me. I tried to think my way through what she'd said, because I'd been all set for her to just yell, “YES!” and throw her arms around me, but that wasn't what had happened.
I thought it through again, and suddenly I smiled and looked her in the eyes again. “Katelynn,” I said, “you're fired!”
And then she threw her arms around my neck and shouted, “Yes! Yes, I'll marry you!”
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I'm the happiest man alive!
BOOK IV
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Katelynn
Chapter One
Rock and Roll
* * * * *
The last twenty four hours had been some of the worst in my entire life. I had been kidnapped by people who were trying to extort money from Nate, the man I loved, as a last ditch attempt to get him to pay up after he had called their bluffs on a blackmail scheme. They had made no attempt to hide their identities from me, so I was fairly sure they were planning to kill me once he paid, and I was terrified.
The trouble was, they hadn’t considered the kind of man they were dealing with, and he had decided to take matters into his own hands and come to rescue me. He, my father and a private investigator that worked for him managed to watch the kidnappers as they collected the two million dollar ransom and track them back to the house where they were holding me.
Nate came in one way, and took on the man, but the woman—who until a few days before had been my friend, or so I'd believed—tried to shoot him, and was shot herself by the detective. She died, and Nate beat the man half to death before he was pulled off him by my Dad and the detective. I was safe, but the thought that the woman had died for this was very upsetting, especially since she had three kids who would now be without a mother.
I had always been one who believed that we are each responsible for our own actions, though, and this only made that clearer than ever. The trouble with that is that our choices affect everyone around us, and now those kids would be the ones to suffer for their mother's choices. It wasn't fair, but then, life rarely is.
Nate asked me what was bothering me so badly about it, and I told him how I felt, that it wasn't the kids' fault their mom was a criminal. He agreed, and a few days later he arranged for them to be placed into a foster program for high risk kids. He paid for it all, because the program didn't have enough funding for them, and I was proud of him.
Maybe I should back up a bit. My name is Katelynn Burke, and I'm twenty-two years old. A few months ago I graduated from college with a degree in Political Science that no longer interested me, so I went job hunting and landed one as the manager trainee of a new variety store that was just opening in town, and the man who came to train me was Nathanael Simmons, the son of the man who'd founded the company. He and I sort of hit it off, and before we really knew what was happening, we were in love.
Then, Nate had to go back to California because his father had a heart attack, and suddenly he was the new CEO if the whole company. His dad retired, putting Nate in charge of everything and even assigning over to him all of the stock he would inherit someday anyway. Nate was suddenly a billionaire, but to me, he was still just the man I loved. As soon as he could, he came back to North Platte, Nebraska to finish training me himself.
That's when things went crazy. He'd found out, while he was in California, that one of my employees was stealing money and trying to make it look like I was doing it, so he confronted her and demanded to know why. She told him it was because she needed money for her daughter's medical issues, so he decided not to fire or prosecute her, and even gave her the money she needed from his own pocket, but he also promised not to tell me any of this. A few days later, while he was back in California taking care of corporate business, that woman came to me and told me that Nate had been forcing her to have sex with him, and even showed me pictures that seemed to prove it.
Like a fool, I allowed myself to believe what my heart knew was not true, and I actually turned against Nate. I helped that woman, Donna Bennet, to file a sexual harassment suit against him, and when he refused to settle out of court, she and her partner concocted the plan to kidnap me and hold me for ransom. They knew he loved me and would pay; what they didn't expect was that he would come after them. Donna was killed, and Jerry, her accomplice, will be spending the rest of his life in prison with no chance of ever seeing parole.
That was what led to the events of the evening before, and got me back into my beloved's arms. It was a terrible few days, but at least they were over.
That morning, though, was one of the most wonderful times of my life—because while we were all sitting in my parents' living room, Nate suddenly shocked me! He reached into a pocket and came out with a ring, got down on one knee and asked me to be his wife, and I said,”Yes!”
Mom and Dad were ecstatic for me, and they hugged Nate and called him Son, and then Nate took out his phone and called his own parents to tell them, and the next thing I knew, we were all getting ready to fly to San Francisco to meet them!
Not before morning, though, and Nate wanted me all to himself for the afternoon and evening. I was more than happy to agree, and we both went upstairs to change.
Since all of the excitement had happened late the night before, Dad had insisted on putting Nate into our guest room, rather than having him go and get a hotel, so his room was right across the hall from mine. We kissed once as we turned to go into our respective rooms, and Nate whispered into my ear, “Baby, I was so scared last night! If anything had happened to you...”
“Shh,” I said. “How could anything happen to me, when I've got you to love me and protect me?” We kissed again, and he finally let me go long enough to get into some jeans and a shirt. He actually took longer than I did, and I was waiting for him in the hall when he stepped out. He took my hand as we walked back down.
The Cadillac that he'd been renting since he'd originally come to North Platte was still parked behind the store, where I'd left it when I got angry with him, so we took my car and went out to the lake for an afternoon alone. We spread a blanket out on the ground beside the water and leaned into each other.
I decided it was time to talk about what had happened.
“Nate,” I began, “I need to tell you how sorry I am for ever believing Donna. I don't know what came over me, I was just so floored by those...”
He shushed me in the best possible way, with a kiss. “Hush about that,” he said afterward. “I saw those pictures, and for a split second I wondered if I had actually done it, and blocked it out somehow. I certainly don't blame you for wondering about it.”
I shook my head. “I should have known better, Nate. I was in love with you, and I had felt your love for me; I should have clung to that, instead of letting her lies make me turn on you! There's no excuse for what I did, and I just want you to know I'm sorry, and that I pray you can forgive me.”
He touched my hair and pushed it behind my ear. “Katelynn, I don't need to forgive you for anything. You didn't set out to hurt me; you were as much a victim of their schemes as I was. We were hurt together, and we got through it together, and that's all that matters, Babe.”
I leaned back against him as we watched the water. A fish jumped, right in front of us, and it was so big that we actually got splashed a bit. We both laughed at that.
“See?” he said. “Even Nemo, there, knows you're being silly. Everything's right with the world, now, Baby, because we've got each other, and I'm convinced that that is what God intended when he brought us together. Aren't you?”
I nodded, my head rubbing against his strong shoulder as I did so. “I do, I most certainly do!” I said. “Nate, there is nothing in the world that could make me happier than I am right now, knowing that you love me, and that you want us together as much as I do!”
“So, let's talk about the whole 'being together' part for a minute, shall we?”
I sat up and turned to face him. “Sure. What about?”
Nate looked at me for a moment, then smiled his most beautiful smile. “Well, I am the CEO of the company, now, you know. Are you going to be comfortable living in San Francisco?”
Other than going to college in Chicago, I had never actually lived in a big city, and Chicago isn't one to make you yearn for it, I can tell you that. The biggest city in my personal experience other than that was Omaha. Still, I'd heard a lot about San Francisco all my life, and it sounded like it might be a wonderful place to live.
“I
think I can manage. It might take me a little time to get used to it, but I won't let it scare me off, if that's what you're asking.” I added that with a smile.
“Well, we don't actually live in the city, itself. My Dad bought a beautiful estate when we moved there, and it has four houses on it. My folks live in the biggest one, but the other three are all over ten thousand square feet, each, and beautiful. We've used them as guest houses for some of my folks' wealthy friends from time to time, but mostly they're only sitting there. We can choose whichever one you like, and I'll buy it out. No matter which one you pick, it's going to need your touch to make it our home, and the staff will help you redecorate however you want.”
“Staff?” I asked.
He nodded his head at me, smiling. “Baby, a house that big isn't one that you play housewife in; it takes a butler, a few maids and some cooks and helpers to run something that big. It's like living in a country club! Our yard will be almost as big as this town, so there will be a groundskeeping crew, and a couple of gardeners. Is that going to be a problem?”
I stared at him. “A problem? You mean the part where I have someone else to clean the house, do all the cooking and take care of the yard? Let me see, I need to think about this, of course it's not a problem!”
He laughed and grabbed me in a hug, then we were kissing again. When we broke, I pushed him back so we could talk some more.
“What about you? Are you going to be content with a country girl for a wife?”
“Oh, yes,” he said. “In fact, I can't wait until we choose a house, because I'm dying to see how the staff reacts. Some of the people my parents hired have actually worked for royalty and celebrities; I doubt any of them have ever heard the word 'ain't' in their lives! You're going to be a whole new experience for them, and they'll probably make you think you're in a foreign country, at first. Don't let them push you around—what am I saying, they'll be falling all over themselves to please you! Just make sure they don't forget that you’re the boss!”
