Armored Attraction

by Janie Crouch

“I need to contact Omega,” he told her. “Unless you have someone else in mind, someone you know can be trusted, we should probably bring an outside doctor in to talk to Karine.”

  She nodded. “That’s probably better. I do have lots of contacts at the hospital. I’m there quite a bit with my work. But all of them would probably believe the police over something a teenager says.”

  “Okay. I’ll get rolling on that. Omega has contacts all over the country, not just in Colorado Springs where headquarters is located. They should have someone here in a few hours.”

  “Good.”

  “Also, tell me where you found Karine. I can look at tide patterns, which will give us at least a general direction and possible distance she came from. We need to ask her how long she thinks she was swimming.”

  He walked over to a long drawer attached to a buffet in the dining room and pulled out large tidal maps of the area. Almost everyone who lived here year-round had a set. They were needed for just about any fishing or watersport activity.

  He rolled out the one for their area. “Where did you find Karine?”

  Vanessa stared at the map for longer than Liam expected. Was she confused? She’d always been so good with maps.

  “We’re here,” he said, pointing to a spot on the map where his grandmother’s house would be, not far from the Sound.

  Then he noticed the blush that had stolen over her entire face.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Nothing.” But her face was burning. “I was here when I found Karine.” She pointed to a place on the map.

  Oh.

  Liam knew exactly where that was. Undoubtedly, by her flush, Vanessa knew exactly where that was, too.

  A very secluded section of the Roanoke Sound where rarely anyone went. Its difficulty to access and mediocre views and beach made it not worth the effort by most. Sand dunes blocked it from the rest of the Sound.

  It was their special place. The place where they’d gone when they’d wanted to get away from everything and everyone else.

  They had made love there dozens of times. He could still remember the feel of the sun, of the sand, of the sweetness of Vanessa’s body as if it had happened five minutes ago.

  It was where Liam had asked her to marry him.

  He didn’t question why she’d been walking there yesterday and she didn’t offer the information. Whatever reason she had been, he was glad; otherwise Karine might’ve been in a lot more trouble right now.

  “Okay.” He nodded. “You found her here at about 6:30 p.m., right?” He looked over at her for confirmation.

  “Yes. Maybe a little closer to seven, but not much.”

  “We need to ask Karine how long she was swimming.”

  A soft voice answered from the doorway, “It felt like very long time.”

  Vanessa rushed over to the girl. “Hey, honey, how are you doing? Done sleeping?”

  Karine looked down, embarrassed. “I am hungry again.”

  “That’s fine. Let’s get you some more food.” She put her arm around the girl and led her to the kitchen. Liam followed them.

  “How long do you think you swam, Karine? Do you have any idea how much time?” he asked as Vanessa began to make them all a sandwich.

  “I do not know exact time,” Karine said softly. “I swam until I could not move my arms anymore. Then I just used my legs. I was very cold.”

  Hours, then. But then again, Karine was not very big and hadn’t had decent calorie intake in days or maybe weeks. So she might have become exhausted after just a few minutes.

  Karine sat at the table and pulled her legs up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. She was wearing the Outer Banks sweatshirt and sweatpants he’d bought at the grocery store. She rested her head on her knees and looked out across the room.

  “We all were in same room that was in bottom of ship. Every morning and every evening, one of the three mans come. They bring food and water. Let us use bathroom and walk around. Sometimes choose a girl and drag her out.” She wrapped her arms more tightly around her knees. “He said they would enjoy us for the week we were there.”

  Liam caught sight of Vanessa behind Karine. She had stopped what she was doing, listening, tears rolling down her cheeks. He didn’t blame her. Anger burned like acid in his gut for what Karine had gone through, what the others were still going through.

  “Karine, how many days had you been on the boat? Do you know?”

  “That boat? Divi.” She held up two fingers. “Two days. Before that, we were on other big ship for many, many days.”

  Karine’s only having been on the little boat here in the Roanoke Sound for two days was good news. If the men planned to keep them for a week before selling the girls to whatever buyers they had lined up, that meant they still had five more days before the girls were forever out of their reach.

  Unless the men decided to cut their losses and just kill the girls outright since Karine escaped. Liam prayed they would be too greedy to do that. Especially until they knew for sure someone was on to them.

  “When man left yesterday morning, he did not close my...” She put her finger and thumb around her wrists in demonstration. “How you say?”

  “Handcuff,” Vanessa and Liam said in unison.

  “Yes. He did not close my handcuff. I waited until he was gone, then showed the other girls. They agreed I should try to get help. They gave me all the day’s food to eat.” Now Karine began to cry. “I broke the door and got out.”

  “Could you see the land from the boat?” Since the boat was in the Sound, she could’ve been anywhere from half a mile—Liam didn’t think the perps would dare keep a boat with kidnapped girls closer than half a mile in—to about four miles at the widest part of the Sound if the boat was being kept in the very center.

  Honestly, Liam didn’t think Karine would’ve made it that far. She would’ve drowned.

  “Yes.” Karine nodded. “I could see some land far away and some land closer. I swam toward the close one.”

  “Of course you did.” Vanessa put a sandwich on the table in front of her. “Smart.”

  “Where was the sun when you got in the water? Straight overhead? Were you swimming toward it?”

  Karine took a bite of her sandwich and thought as she chewed. “At first sun was straight, but then behind me.” She shrugged.

  “Good, that’s good,” Liam said. That meant she had been swimming east in the mid to late afternoon.

  “Once I was on land I was too tired to walk. I slept for long time before I got up. Walked little more then lay down again. Miss Vanessa find me.”

  She would’ve been swimming with the tide, thank God. That undoubtedly was a factor in Karine’s making it to shore. Based on his knowledge of the area and the map, Liam could make an educated guess that the boat was in a certain two-mile radius on the Roanoke Sound. He took a pencil, wrote an X where Vanessa had found Karine and a circle where he thought it most likely the boat had been moored.

  Unfortunately, there would probably be hundreds of boats in that same two-mile radius. Not to mention, the perps had probably already moved the boat. That was the main reason boats were so often used for human trafficking. Because they could be easily moved.

  Vanessa put a plate with a sandwich next to him on the table. She looked over his shoulder at the map nodding.

  “Now what do we do?” she asked.

  “Now I make that call I was talking about earlier, getting the professional help needed.”

  “Good.” Vanessa nodded, touching Karine gently on the shoulder. “That shouldn’t wait.”

  “Then, if you think it’s okay—” he turned to Karine to include her in the conversation, too “—and if it’s all right with you, Karine, I think we should take a boat out to this area on the map—” he point
ed with his finger “—to see if we can find anything.”

  “Do you think it’s likely?” Vanessa asked.

  “Honestly, no. But I do know that the longer we wait, the more endangered those girls become. They are bound to move the boat soon if they haven’t already.”

  “Yes.” Karine was already standing. “Yes, Miss Vanessa. Please, let’s look. We must try.”

  Liam could see Vanessa was torn. It was dangerous, he knew. Any number of people would be looking for both her and Karine.

  “Is it worth the risk?” Vanessa asked softly. “I just can’t stand the thought of anything happening to Karine.”

  Honestly, it probably wasn’t worth the risk. The chances of them finding the girls were slim. But they were better than their chances of finding them from here in the house.

  “I’m not going to let anything happen to you two. You can bet on that.”

  Chapter Eight

  The search for the girls all that afternoon and the next day proved fruitless. Liam had rented a boat and taken them all around the area they’d determined on the map as the most likely place Karine had been held. But they hadn’t found anything useful. Most likely the boat had already been moved. Vanessa’s frustration mounted.

  Liam was infinitely patient when working with Karine. He showed her different boat sizes so she could have a reference to better describe the one she’d been held in. He pointed out landmarks she might have seen in the distance while swimming that might have been familiar. He never got frustrated with her no matter what she could or couldn’t remember.

  Even though his focus had been torn—looking for boats that could be holding the kidnapped girls and also for anyone who might be trying to find Vanessa and Karine—he was never short with Karine when she asked any questions or had any sort of language barrier that needed clarification. It was easy to see that Karine was becoming more comfortable with Liam.

  Liam would make a great father.

  Maybe he was already a father. The thought cut something deep inside Vanessa. Eight years was a long time. He could’ve been married before. Have a whole gaggle of kids.

  “What? Are you okay?” Liam was looking at her. Reaching out one arm from where he was steering the boat. “Are you sick?”

  “Have you ever been married? Do you have any kids?” The questions were out of her mouth before she could stop them.

  He tilted his head to the side. “How do you know I’m not married now?”

  “You never would’ve kissed me at the hotel if you were.” Vanessa had never even questioned that. Liam would be true to the woman he married.

  “No, never married. No kids.” He grinned in that way that was so uniquely Liam and winked at her. “Although many of my colleagues would argue that I am a kid.”

  She couldn’t help smiling back. “I don’t doubt it.”

  He nodded and then turned his face back to watch the water in front of them, answering a question Karine had.

  Although the search hadn’t led to any positive results, the doctor Omega Sector had sent, Dr. Jennifer Giandomenico, both a medical doctor and psychiatrist, had been wonderful. She had been waiting when they’d returned from searching the Sound yesterday afternoon. She had examined Karine and documented all possible physical evidence in case it was needed later. Then she had talked with the girl for hours.

  Vanessa wasn’t sure exactly what the doctor had said to the girl, or what Karine had said to the doctor, but Karine had looked better, calmer, after their conversation.

  Omega Sector had also sent profiler Andrea Gordon to help out in any way she was needed: profiling, surveillance, hanging out with Karine.

  Vanessa had wanted to dislike the agent—the young, gorgeous, leggy blonde agent—on sight. Was this the type of colleague Liam worked with all the time at Omega?

  But the woman had been nothing short of immaculately professional with both her and Liam. No flirting, no touches with him or anything that could be considered unprofessional. As a matter of fact, Vanessa would have thought Andrea was downright cold if it wasn’t for how she treated Karine. Andrea might be all business with her and Liam, but with Karine she was friendly and kind. Something in Andrea identified with Karine, Vanessa could see.

  Vanessa had to go back to work today. She had called in sick the past two days, but any more than that would really be suspicious. She’d be wearing the same jeans and blouse she’d worn three days ago—she’d washed them yesterday—since she didn’t dare stop by her house to get new clothes. Fortunately the organization she worked for—a privately funded aid organization that helped families, women and children in need—encouraged casual dress. Many of the people Vanessa went out to see and help on a daily basis would not respond well to a suit.

  “Remember, be as vague as possible when answering any questions your colleagues ask,” Liam told her. “Cough a lot and tell them you’re still not feeling one hundred percent. That will usually keep people away.”

  Liam was going to drop her about three blocks from the hotel where they’d left her car. She was going to drive to work from there.

  “The police are still looking for their ‘fugitive,’ so don’t freak out if you’re pulled over,” Liam told her. “Just let them search your car then move on. Don’t ask questions.”

  “How long do you think they’ll keep doing that?”

  Liam shrugged. “It’s a smart move on the perp’s part, actually. Having a fugitive on the loose provides them with an opportunity to search cars—in the name of citizen safety—they’d otherwise need a warrant to search.”

  “I know a few cops. Why don’t I use my contacts at work to see if I can find out who provided the information about said fugitive? That would give us our bad guy, right?”

  Liam shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe it would just be someone who was following someone else’s orders.” He helped her slip on her button-down sweater. “Don’t do anything that will draw attention to yourself or the trafficking ring. Our greatest asset right now is making them think that Karine made it to shore, you helped her and she ran without telling anyone anything. If they think we know about them, it might make them move up their timetable or do something drastic.”

  “Okay.” Vanessa nodded. Drastic meant kill the girls. That was the last thing she wanted.

  “Andrea is going to rent a house on the other side of the island in her name. If somebody recognizes me, this place won’t be usable as a safe house any longer. Our past history is too well known.”

  She looked over to where Andrea and Karine were eating cereal and watching old sitcom reruns on television.

  “Yeah, Karine seems pretty comfortable with her. I think that will be good.” She watched as the two females looked at each other then laughed at something on the television. “How old is Andrea, anyway?”

  Liam cocked his head to the side. “I’m not sure. I never thought about it. She pretty much keeps to herself all the time at work. I guess I assumed she was in her late twenties.”

  Vanessa doubted the woman was over twenty-two or twenty-three, although she didn’t voice her opinion. Andrea tried hard—maybe a little too hard in Vanessa’s opinion—to be professional. But underneath, Andrea seemed to be much more relaxed and carefree. Maybe she just felt she needed to keep up a front around her coworkers. Vanessa didn’t care, because the woman seemed as drawn to Karine as Karine was to her. Kindred spirits.

  “Okay, I’m ready,” she said to Liam. “Bye, girls,” she called out to Andrea and Karine. They both waved but barely even looked at her. Vanessa rolled her eyes. At least she didn’t have to worry about Karine being upset she was leaving.

  Liam opened the door for her at his SUV. “After work, drive straight back to your house. Try to act as normal as possible. Text me and we’ll work out a plan. Andrea is going to get Karine a phone today, too, so she
can talk to you or text if she needs something.”

  That was good. Vanessa knew both Liam and Andrea were competent and cared about what happened to Karine. But Vanessa felt responsible for her. She wanted the girl to be able to easily get in touch with her if she needed something.

  “Great. Thank you.” Vanessa was nervous. Jittery.

  When they were almost to where Liam was going to drop her off, he reached over and grabbed her hand. It was lying on the leg she couldn’t quite keep from bouncing with nervous energy.

  He looked over at her. “You’re going to do fine. It’s just another day at the office.”

  “I’m not a great liar. I’ve always just voiced my opinions about everything, usually not caring what other people thought.” She shrugged and looked away. She was certain that was part of why he thought her so selfish and self-centered.

  He squeezed her hand. “Honesty is a trait to be admired, so don’t beat yourself up over it. Just don’t volunteer information and try to sidestep any questions.”

  Easier said than done.

  He stopped at the parking lot of a diner a few blocks from the hotel where her car was parked. He turned off the SUV and looked at her. “The key to a good lie is to keep it as close to the truth as you can. If anyone seems suspicious about how you’re behaving, take them into your confidence.”

  She shot him a blank look, frowning.

  He turned toward her and leaned a little closer. “Tell them, in truth, you weren’t really sick but called in because your old flame showed up in town and the two of you were naked in a hotel room before you even knew what happened.”

  * * *

  VANESSA WAS STILL thinking about Liam’s outrageous statement two hours later when she sat at her desk pretending she was catching up on paperwork. Not only the statement but the kiss that had come afterward.

  She was sure he’d probably meant it as a playful, go-get-’em, tiger-type kiss. Instead, within seconds they’d been all but crawling over each other. Continued proof there were some things time didn’t change. The heat between the two of them was one of those things.