by JB Lynn
“That tacky Tara woman, with the bad makeup and manners, pulled him out of the water.”
“She did?” Alyssa remembered seeing Tara running behind Pete, but at a different angle. At the time she hadn’t understood it, but now she did. “She ran downstream.”
“Yes. That’s what she said. She may be slightly more clever than I originally gave her credit for.”
“She saved Mr. Burberry.”
“You all did your part to save him,” Mildred corrected. “And I’m so very pleased you’re all okay.”
Alyssa let out a shaky sigh of relief as a few tears ran down her face.
“Do you want me to get a nurse for you, dear?” Mildred offered, her face pinched with concern.
“I’m okay,” Alyssa said. “We’re all okay.”
“She should rest,” Jane said from the doorway of the room.
Alyssa looked toward her friend who was giving Mildred a polite, but firm smile.
“Of course,” Mildred acquiesced graciously. “I’m glad you’re doing well, Ms. Montgomery.”
Alyssa smiled, trying to figure out what nugget of information was niggling at the back of her brain, trying to get into the open.
“Tom will drive you back to your hotel,” Jane told the older woman, ushering her out of the room.
When Mildred was gone, Jane moved to Alyssa’s bedside. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore.”
“The doctors say it’s a miracle you weren’t hurt worse.”
“Why is she going to a hotel?”
Jane bit her bottom lip and glanced at the now empty doorway. “It’s nothing.”
“You’re a lousy liar, Jane.”
Her friend sighed. “Her house burnt down last night. Arson.”
Remembering the man in the cartoon mouse mask and his assertion that the money hadn’t been the objective, she asked, “What has the catnapper said?”
Jane grinned. “Pete said you keep calling them that.” She leaned closer before asking, “So how long have you two been a thing? Since the wedding?”
“We’re not a thing,” Alyssa denied hotly.
Jane tilted her head. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Maybe you should tell Pete that because he’s acting like a man in love.”
“He is?”
Jane nodded, a knowing smile spreading across her face like a sunrise. “I’m guessing he’s not the only one.”
Alyssa looked away, unsure of how to answer the question. “We barely know each other.”
“I knew the moment I met Tom. Remember that? You were spying on my date at The Pudding Place.”
Alyssa snapped her gaze back to her friend. “I wasn’t spying. You’d let that crazy psychic matchmaker set you up. I was watching your back.” What she didn’t say aloud was, sitting in the dessert shop, she’d seen how fast Jane had fallen for Tom.
“Armani was right about us,” Jane said gently. “Maybe she’s right about you and Pete too.”
Hope and fear warred within Alyssa, making her feel slightly sick to her stomach, or perhaps it was just the water she’d drunk.
“Maybe?” Jane prompted.
“Maybe.”
Chapter 27
Armed with his computer and a burning desire for justice, it didn’t take Pete long to figure out who would benefit from an insurance payout. Mildred and Lester Michelman.
Pete did some more digging, The house belonged solely to Mildred.
Strange.
A quick and slightly illegal scan of their bank records showed that Mildred was the wealthier of the couple. Far wealthier. While Lester had his income from his law firm and some minor investments, most of which had taken major losses recently, Mildred’s income stream, more like a river that never ran dry, was derived exclusively from the stock she owned in Burr & Berry. She also had a lot more than $120,000 in liquid assets, so why hadn’t the catnappers demanded more money for Mr. Burberry’s safe return? They could have replaced the statue and made a tidy profit for themselves.
His phone rang. He glanced at the number. It was local, but unfamiliar. “Hello?’
“It’s me.”
Just the sound of Alyssa’s voice sent his heart and other parts of his anatomy into overdrive. “Good morning,” he said, trying his best to sound smooth. “How are you feeling?”
“Hi.”
Fear, cold and unforgiving, sliced through him. Had she suffered some sort of brain injury after all? “Hi,” he replied carefully, thinking she was starting the conversation over.
She giggled, a soft, girly sound he’d never heard from her before. He wondered if there was permanent brain damage.
“I feel high. They’ve got me on some heavy-duty drugs.”
He was so relieved he almost dropped the phone. “So I guess you’re not in much pain?”
“Not. At. All.”
He smiled, liking this unfiltered side of her. “Glad to hear it.”
“That’s why I was calling. You know what I wasn’t glad to hear?”
“What?” he asked indulgently.
“Mousehead called me by my name.”
Guessing that she was referring to the man who’d worn the mouse mask, he asked, “When?”
“Right before he tried to kill me. He called me Montgomery,” she complained pitifully.
“That is your name,” he teased, even though it alarmed him that her attacker had known it.
“I didn’t like the way it sounded when he said it,” she pouted.
Pete chuckled. “I understand.”
She sighed heavily, the sound roaring in his ear. “Jane wants me to give her the phone.”
“Why don’t you do that, sweetheart?”
“I like that. Say it again.”
“Sweetheart,” he said softly.
“Sweetheart,” she repeated. “I like hearing that.”
Warmth blossomed in his chest, chasing away a lot of the anxieties that had settled there.
“I like hearing it too,” Jane’s voice teased through the phone.
“Don’t tell me. Tell Tom.”
“We’re bringing her home with us,” Jane told him.
“Good.”
“Unless you want us to bring her to your place?”
For a moment he imagined Alyssa in his bed, her blond hair splayed out on his pillow, her blue eyes staring at him, and he almost agreed. Then he remembered she’d almost been killed and he needed to find out who was responsible.
“No. Take her to your place.” Realizing his tone had been unnecessarily sharp, he added, “Please.”
“No problem,” Jane replied easily, but he heard a slight hesitation in her voice.
“What?”
She didn’t play coy and pretend she didn’t know what he was asking. Her directness was one of the things he liked best about his sister-in-law.
“Are you okay, Pete? You seem… different.”
“I’m fine,” he assured. “Maybe a little overtired. Take care of my girl for me.”
“I’d tell her you said that, but she’s already fallen back to sleep,” Jane informed him with a smile in her voice.
There was a series of quick knocks on his door.
“I’ve got to go,” he told Jane. “Someone’s at the door.”
“Talk to you soon.”
“Bye.” Disconnecting the call, he tossed his phone on the desk.
The knocking started up again.
“Keep your pants on,” he shouted, hurrying to open the door. Yanking it open with a grunt, he asked, “What’s so—?”
Then he saw the duck mask, felt a zap of pain, and the world went dark.
Chapter 28
Alyssa felt hungover when she finally woke up in a room filled with chintz. She hated chintz. It gave her a headache.
Or maybe the headache was a side effect from the medication she’d taken. Besides the headache, her throat was raw, and a low-grade pain thrummed through her entire body.
She
sat up slowly, waiting for the room to stop spinning before she placed her feet on the floor. She stood up carefully, testing both her balance and the viability of her limbs. She didn’t feel like herself, but she didn’t fall to the floor either, which she took as a win.
She shuffled across the room, each step awakening a new ache. She steadied herself on the dresser and examined her reflection in the mirror that hung over it. A bandage covered a spot near her hairline. She knew without examining it that it protected stitches.
Her left cheekbone was bruised, a scrape that looked a lot like a soul patch darkened her chin.
She pulled down the collar of the man’s oversized T-shirt she wore and examined her right shoulder. It caused her most the pain. The shoulder wasn’t even bruised, which meant the injury was internal.
Hearing footsteps approach, she tugged the tee back up and then tugged the bottom down, trying to maintain some semblance of modesty.
“Just me.” Jane walked in. “I brought you some tea with honey. Drink it and get dressed. I’ll be back in five minutes with someone to help you down the stairs.”
Alyssa swayed unsteadily as an unnamed panic clawed at her throat. “What’s wrong?”
Jane put a pile of clothes, which had been on a chair in a corner of the room, onto the bed. “I went to your place and got some of your things.”
“Jane?” Alyssa’s voice crackled with worry.
“Drink and dress,” Jane ordered firmly, but she made a point of not making eye contact. “We’ll be back for you.” She left the room closing the door behind her.
Shaking from the effort, Alyssa forced her noncompliant body into an evergreen velour track suit she’d bought for herself the Christmas before. It was the softest thing she owned and she was grateful Jane had chosen it as the soft fabric scratched against her sensitive skin. Perching on the edge of the bed, sipping the tea, enjoying the sweetness and the way it soothed her throat, she slipped her feet into a pair of sneakers, but didn’t risk attempting to bend over to tie them.
There was a soft knock at the door.
“Come in,” she called, hating the betraying tremor in her voice.
Roscoe stepped inside.
They stared at one another for a long moment, cataloging each other’s visible injuries. Alyssa wasn’t as worried about the purpling bruise covering half his forehead as she was about the tightness around his eyes and mouth. Something was definitely wrong.
Roscoe broke the silence. “You ready?”
“You didn’t bring me anything to eat?” she teased, trying to bring a degree of normalcy to the moment.
The corners of his mouth lifted into a semblance of a smile. “I baked you a tart. It’s downstairs.”
“Then let’s go.” She stood too quickly and a wave of dizziness almost knocked her off her feet. Her butt hit the bed again, hard.
“Give me that.” Roscoe plucked the empty cup from her fingers.
If she hadn’t already finished the tea, she would have spilled it everywhere.
Setting the cup aside, he held out both his hands. “Let’s try this again. I won’t let you fall.”
Placing her hands in his, she stood more slowly this time and the room didn’t spin. “I’m okay.”
“Okay enough to walk down a flight of stairs?”
Her stomach clenched painfully at the memory of falling down the last set of steps.
“I didn’t think so,” Roscoe murmured. In one fluid motion, he bent and swept her up in his arms.
“What are you doing?” She resisted the urge to kick her feet and pummel his chest like a damsel in distress about to be tied to train tracks.
“I’ve got enough to worry about.” He walked out the bedroom door and carried her down a flight of stairs like she weighed no more than a sack of flour. “I don’t want to have you end up being hurt worse.”
Reaching the main floor of Jane and Tom’s house, he carefully put her back on her feet, but didn’t let go of her elbow as though he were afraid she’d pitch over.
“They’re in the dining room,” he murmured softly. “If it gets to be too much in there for you, give me a signal and I’ll whisk you away.”
“Whisk me? Is that a cooking pun?”
“Cute,” he smirked.
Afraid of whatever awaited her in the other room she asked. “What kind of signal?”
Roscoe furrowed his brow. “Maybe a code word instead?”
“Duplicitous,” she declared. “If I use duplicitous in a sentence, it means I want out.”
“You got it.”
Side by side they walked toward the dining room.
“Keep breathing,” Roscoe coached on a whisper.
Despite his advice, she held her breath as she stepped into the room. She recognized most of the people present, Tom and Jane, Gerald, Mauricio from the gym, and a dusty-skinned, green-eyed man she’d been introduced to at Tom and Jane’s wedding whose name began with a “J.” Familiar faces, but the one she most wanted to see wasn’t there.
“Why don’t you have a seat?” Jane suggested kindly, patting the chair beside her.
Alyssa didn’t move. She couldn’t breathe. Something was very, very wrong.
“Is she going to pass out?” the J man asked.
“Shut up, Jackson,” Tom warned.
Roscoe gently shoved her in the direction of the seat Jane had indicated.
She exhaled as she sat down and blurted out breathlessly. “What happened?”
Jane took her hand. “Pete’s missing.”
“Missing?” She would have jumped back up, but Roscoe, anticipating her reaction, stood behind her, pinning her shoulders so she couldn’t stand.
“You need to stay calm,” he whispered in her ear.
Knowing he was right, she took a shaky breath, trying to quell the cold panic rising within her. “What happened?”
“He was abducted,” Tom said quietly.
The lack of emotion in his voice frightened her even more. She felt like her world was falling apart and she’d only known Pete a few days. How devastated must his brother feel?
“Three men in cartoon animal masks dragged him from his home,” Tom continued.
Risking a glance at him, she saw he was staring down at his hands while he spoke. Her heart broke a little more. “Are you sure?”
“It was captured on a neighbor’s security camera,” Jane told her.
An uncomfortable hush fell over the room.
“We’re breaking into two groups,” Gerald explained. “Some of us are going to look for Pete and some will try to figure out who’s behind what’s going on with the Michelmans.”
“Divide and conquer,” the one called Jackson, who hadn’t stopped fidgeting since she’d entered the room, interjected.
“Mildred?” Alyssa asked. “If she safe?”
“We have people watching her.” There was no mistaking the animosity in Tom’s voice. She wondered if it was directed at Mildred or whoever was protecting her.
Jane stroked her husband’s arm.
“We need to know which team you want to be on.” Gerald watched her closely, waiting for her response.
Alyssa closed her eyes for a moment, trying to make her decision from a logical, not emotional place. While she desperately wanted to be with the group focused on rescuing Pete, she thought that, considering her injuries, she’d do better working with the other team. “I’ll stick with the Michelman side.”
Gerald nodded his approval.
“Okay, let’s go.” Jackson jumped to his feet, unable to contain his nervous energy.
Behind her, Roscoe backed away.
Tom stood too and Jane followed suit, wrapping her husband in a tight hug. Over her shoulder, Tom exchanged a look she couldn’t decipher with Mauricio, who hadn’t uttered a word. Mauricio nodded.
“Wait!” Alyssa called out before anyone could leave the room. “There’s one more person we should probably ask for help.”
The crowd looked to her expectantl
y.
She shrugged helplessly, before suggesting, in a tone that sounded a lot like an apology. “Armani.”
Chapter 29
If Pete ever saw Armani Vasquez again, he would wring her neck. At least that’s what he told himself. Before he’d fallen under her crazy spell, he’d led a safe, predictable life.
Now he was threatening people who skulked around their family’s backyard, participating in ransom exchanges, and trying to keep the woman he loved from getting shot. Not to mention the fact he’d been dumb enough to let himself get kidnapped.
He once again twisted his wrists, testing the bonds that attached him to the chair he found himself tied to. Still tight.
It was too dark to see where he was being held captive. All he knew was that it was cold and damp and smelled like sweet dirt.
“Hello?” he called out.
He got no answer, his kidnappers having left him to rot in whatever terrible hole they’d dumped him in.
A vise-like fear crushed his chest, making it hard to breathe, not because he was worried about what might happen to him, but because the same thing might be happening to Alyssa somewhere. The idea of her being alone and afraid caused terror to course through him.
Save her.
He yanked harder, but the knots binding his wrists didn’t budge.
A shroud of hopelessness settled over him. He couldn’t save her. He couldn’t even save himself.
Sitting at the dining room table, drinking more tea and picking at a slice of Roscoe’s apple tart, Alyssa listened carefully to Gerald as he explained what he’d discussed with Pete about Mildred’s statue being a fake.
“So maybe Pete figured out who the beneficiary of the insurance policy is,” Jane guessed.
She was the only one who’d stayed with Alyssa and Gerald to work their end of the puzzle. Everyone else, even Roscoe, was out trying to get Pete back. Alyssa wasn’t sure whether that was the way it had been planned, or if she’d scared someone off by suggesting they consult Armani.
“Maybe,” Jane agreed. “If we had that information too we might—”
The doorbell rang interrupting her.
“I’ll get it.” Jane leapt up and rushed away.
“You really think knowing the beneficiary might help Pete?” Gerald asked.
