by Elise Noble
“I have the evening off, and I hate to see you sad.”
Dinner. Malachi was meant to be picking me up from the salon, but I couldn’t turn down Jean-Luc. I sent a quick text saying I was safe and that I’d be back later, because I didn’t want another Blackwood search party out looking for me, then I took Jean-Luc’s arm as we headed three blocks over to a little Japanese restaurant that had just opened.
“Checking out the competition?” I asked, trying to smile.
“Call it professional curiosity. Gaston’s thinking of running a Japanese week at Rhodium. A friend of his is a chef in Tokyo, and they might do a kitchen swap.”
“Wouldn’t that be tricky? A temporary chef wouldn’t know where anything was.”
“He doesn’t speak much English either, but the publicity would be worth the logistical headaches. It’d be busy—would you want to work a few shifts?”
Go back to waitressing? No, thank you, not right now. I didn’t miss it. “The salon’s doing well at the moment.”
“C’est fantastique. Do you have a lot to catch up on?”
I shook my head. “The others shuffled things around and worked extra hours.”
“Good staff are hard to find.” He reached across the table and squeezed my hand. “We miss you at Rhodium.”
Once, that touch would have made me shiver, but tonight, I was numb to Jean-Luc’s charms. A warped reaction to the shock of being kidnapped? Or had spending too much time around Malachi ruined me?
I still hadn’t figured out the answer by the time our appetisers arrived. Pork gyoza for Jean-Luc—little fried dumplings—and tempura for me. Slightly soggy, Jean-Luc said, and I couldn’t imagine him making the same mistake. Still, I ate everything, grateful that my appetite had finally made a reappearance.
“So,” Jean-Luc said, leaning his elbows on the table after the waiter cleared our dishes away. “What happened? In Florida, I mean. Lisa wasn’t sure of the details. Do you know you made the news?”
Hear that flapping sound? That was my appetite flying out the door.
“I did?”
“The police put out an appeal for anyone that saw you or some van. Is that what you got kidnapped in?”
I managed to nod.
“Mon Dieu. I’ve never met anyone who genuinely got kidnapped before. At least, I don’t think so. Back when I was a teenager, I bussed tables at a restaurant in Paris, and the sous chef there swore he once got abducted by aliens.”
“It definitely wasn’t aliens who took me.”
“Did you know the guy well? I mean, did he ever look at you oddly?”
“I’d never met him before. Maybe we could talk about something else?”
“Je suis desolé. Of course. How was the wedding until that point?”
Not much better. I still had Erin’s claw marks decorating my back, red lines and scabby bits where she’d caught my skin with her nails. Lisa had redone mine today, fixing the broken one while I tried not to cry. For years, I’d plastered on a cheerful face, always the party girl, but every day, it got more difficult.
“The bride was friendly, and…and…the drinks table was well-stocked.”
“That reminds me, one of the reps brought in some excellent wine samples. I’ll bring a bottle over tomorrow for you to try. Imogen, I heard rumours the kidnapper was pretending to be a waiter—is that true?”
“I think he really did work for the catering company at one point.”
And so it went on. Jean-Luc’s curiosity was only natural, I guess, but I still couldn’t stomach my main course. Then Marelaine texted, and he gave me an apologetic smile.
“I’m afraid I’m being summoned. Perhaps we could take dessert with us?”
That actually sounded like a good idea. “Sure.”
“Sorry.”
“Honestly, it’s okay.”
I just wanted to get home before I cried. Talking about my ordeal had left me shaking inside. And as I jogged from Jean-Luc’s Peugeot into my building, I realised something. In all his questions—his whole interrogation, for want of a better word—he’d never once asked if I was okay.
That revelation made me choke as I scurried up the stairs. Don’t cry on the landing, Imogen. And why wouldn’t my key fit in the lock? I tried once, twice, three times, and it refused to go in.
A shadow moved across the peephole in the door. “Imogen?”
Wait. I didn’t have a freaking peephole.
The door swung open, and I clutched at my chest as Malachi tucked the gun back into his waistband.
“How did you get home?” he asked. “I said I’d pick you up.”
“You nearly gave me a heart attack!”
“Sorry.” At least he had the good grace to look contrite. “How did you get home?” he asked again.
“Jean-Luc brought me.”
Malachi stepped forward and peered along the hallway. “Where is he?”
“Downstairs. He didn’t come in.”
“Asshole,” Malachi muttered under his breath. “Are you okay? You don’t look okay.”
Now the tears came. I couldn’t hold them back any longer. Crying in front of Malachi was perhaps the worst part of my entire week. During my rescue, it had been sort of understandable—I mean, I was allowed to be emotional at that point—but now?
“I-I-I’m fine.”
He wrapped his arms around me, and it turned out that as well as being a superhero stuffed into the body of a fitness model, Malachi gave really good hugs. I fell a little bit more in love with him at that point—stupid, pointless love, but love nonetheless. At least, until I wiped my tears away and realised he’d turned my living room into a building site.
“Why is there a door on my couch?”
Hadn’t I just walked through the front door? I turned to check, and sure enough…two doors.
“I installed a new one.”
“Why?”
“Because your old one was shit. Flimsy as hell. This one’s steel-reinforced with a bump-proof five-point locking system.”
“I don’t understand any of what you just said.”
“It’s more difficult to break through.”
“My landlord…”
“Should’ve fitted a better door.”
“What if I lose my key?”
“I’ll leave a spare at Blackwood. Just call the control room, and someone’ll bring it over.”
He made it all sound so simple. “But…but I can’t afford a new door right now.”
Not when Svetlana had left and I needed to hunt for yet another new roommate.
“Nothing for you to pay. Since you’re on the fourth floor and you don’t have a balcony, window bars aren’t a strict necessity but an alarm is. My go-to guy isn’t around until next Thursday, though.”
“An alarm? You don’t have to do all this.”
He gave me a sweet but sheepish smile. “I just want you to be safe.”
“I think I need wine.”
I wriggled out of his arms because otherwise I might have been tempted to do something totally dumb like kiss him. Stef had left an emergency bottle of rosé in the fridge, and tonight definitely qualified. But when I yanked the fridge door open, the wine was hidden away behind a ton of food I didn’t recall buying. Kale? Carrots? Lean ground beef? No, that definitely wasn’t mine. I was more of a TV dinners kind of a girl.
“What’s all this stuff?”
“I thought I’d cook, but…” He nodded towards my doggy bag, which was literally shaped like a dog. Some sort of small terrier, if I wasn't mistaken. “It looks as though you’ve already eaten.”
Malachi had planned to make us dinner? My ovaries clambered up my throat and slapped me for not getting home earlier.
“I’m so sorry, I…”
“It’ll keep till tomorrow. I’ll clear up here, then we can go to bed. I had one of those delivered too—hope you don’t mind.”
Mind? I was tempted to climb into it with him. “That’s okay. Thank you.”
&
nbsp; He leaned past me and rummaged around in the fridge. “Here’s that wine. Pour me a glass too, would you?”
I should have bought an extra bottle.
CHAPTER 20 - MALACHI
WHAT WAS THAT awful noise? Mal woke to the sound of muffled country music shaking the ceiling above his head. Fuck, it was six a.m. Where was his gun?
He stumbled out of the bedroom in his boxers and almost ran into a sleepy-eyed Imogen. She hadn’t gotten dressed either, and Mal’s cock twitched at the sight of her in a scrap of pale pink silk that barely covered any part of her.
“You’re not going out like that.”
“What? Of course I’m not going out like this. I’m going to make coffee.”
“You’re not planning to complain about the noise?”
“The music? No, it’s pointless. The guy upstairs plays it every morning at the same time, Friday through Tuesday, and he refuses to turn it down. Wednesday and Thursday seem to be his days off, and he likes to sleep in. On those days, we get a reprieve until noon. The landlord doesn’t care.”
“I care. Want me to have a word with him?”
“He’s scary. Besides, it means I don’t have to remember to set the alarm.”
Nobody was as scary as Emmy before coffee. A rowdy neighbour would be a walk in the park. Mal retreated to the spare bedroom to pull on a pair of pants then flashed a grin at Imogen.
“Make the coffee, babe. I’ll be back in five.”
Her mouth opened. Closed. Opened again, and he could tell she was ready to argue, so he quickly slipped out of the door. What kind of asshole deafened his neighbours on five mornings out of seven? Mal was about to find out.
Or was he?
It wasn’t difficult to identify the source of the noise—the door was vibrating. But over the din, Mal heard the faint sound of running water and somebody singing along. The asshole was in the shower?
Mal had his wallet in his pants pocket, and he extracted the set of lock picks that sat behind his bank cards. A minute later, the door swung open, and sure enough, steam rolled out of the bathroom door. Mal could just about make out the flabby figure wedged into the shower cubicle, tugging at his privates. A wanker in more ways than one, as Emmy would say.
The stereo, complete with a pair of giant speakers, sat on a low table next to the bedroom window, right above where Imogen slept on the floor below. Mal opened the window, checked there was nobody walking below, and tossed the offending items out. Problem solved. He’d left before the asshole even got out of the bathroom.
Downstairs, Imogen was pacing the living room, and she still hadn’t gotten dressed.
“There, problem solved.”
“What did you do? You didn’t hurt him, did you?”
Mal shook his head and steered her through to the bedroom. When he opened the window and motioned to the mess of scattered electronics below, the small crowd that had gathered looked up and applauded.
“That. Let me know if he gets another one.”
“Didn’t he try to stop you?”
“He was busy in the bathroom.”
“Busy? Like, pooping?”
“Nah, babe. Busy.”
She stared at him for a beat then burst out laughing. Proper belly laughs, holding her stomach, and fuck was that good to see.
“Ohmigosh! He was jerking off to Earl Thomas Conley?”
“You know who that is?”
“Sure I do. I’m from… Never mind.”
She clammed up, suddenly serious again.
“From where, babe?”
A hesitation. Why didn’t she want to talk about her origins?
“From Portsmouth, Ohio.” When she finally spoke, it came out as a whisper. “At least, I was born there, same as Earl Thomas Conley. My family moved to Cleveland when I was six.”
“Your family…” Ah, dammit, Mal was gonna go to hell for this. “When I first told Stefanie you were missing, she mentioned a problem with your brother. She thought he might have taken you.”
The effect was instantaneous. Imogen turned white, stiffened, and backed away. When she realised the wall was behind her, and she had nowhere to go, she sucked in a mouthful of air. And another. Then another.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit.”
“Just don’t talk about my brother, o-o-okay?”
Was this a panic attack? Was Imogen having a panic attack? Mal slid an arm around her waist and guided her over to the sofa.
“Okay. But whatever he did to you… Right now, I’m tempted to pay him a visit, and I don’t mean just to throw his stereo out the window.”
“Y-y-you won’t find him. The police couldn’t find him.”
The cops were involved? In Cleveland? If Mal bumped this up the priority list, Mack could dig up everything there was to know if she had a name to go on… What was Imogen’s surname? Blair? Yes, Blair. He’d seen it on her mail yesterday.
“If you want me to find him, I’ll find him.”
She stared at the wall for a long while, glassy-eyed. Did she need a doctor? Mal got up to turn off the heat when the kettle started whistling, and she still hadn’t moved when he got back. He squeezed her hand, and she clung on in a vice-like grip.
Finally, she spoke in a deathly whisper. “It’s better to move on. I’ve moved on.”
“No, you haven’t. Not if he still terrifies you this way.”
“I’m getting better. Ten years… It’s halfway now.”
“Halfway? What’s halfway?”
Mal had to lean closer to hear her reply.
“The statute of limitations.”
If halfway was ten years, then what had a twenty-year statute of limitations in Ohio? Legal talk got bandied around the office all the time, and Mal racked his brain. Fuck. Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck. Tell him he was wrong.
“Imogen, did your brother rape you?”
This morning’s tears were worse than last night’s, and all Mal could do was hug her as she wept the pain out. And there was a lot of pain. Mal had his answer, even if it was one he didn’t want to hear.
“He can’t get to you now; I promise.”
“At first when I w-w-was in the back of the van, I thought it was Kyle driving, then Morton spoke, and I realised it wasn’t, and I was relieved. Is that crazy? I was relieved because I’d gotten kidnapped by a regular freak instead of my brother.”
Kyle. Kyle Blair. Mal filed the name away. “It’s not crazy at all. You were seventeen when he attacked you?”
“The last time, yes. Seventeen.”
Every word out of her mouth made things worse. “The last time? He did it more than once?”
“The first time, he was fourteen, and I was eleven. And I thought it was freaking normal! He told me it was, and I didn’t know any better until I got older. Then it was too late. He wouldn’t stop.”
“Did you tell your parents?”
“My mom? Not then. She worshipped Kyle.”
“Your father?”
“He’s serving life in prison for armed robbery. Mom thinks he’s innocent too.”
“And you don’t?”
“No way. He was always violent, even before that.”
Mal squeezed Imogen tighter, and she squashed against his side, knees drawn up to her chest. Imogen was broken. The last week had destroyed her, and he didn’t know whether to keep probing or let her shut down. Emmy always said it helped her to talk about the shit she dealt with, that sharing allowed her to sleep at night, although she only confided in her husband. Mal decided to push on, gently.
“But you told the police?”
“I didn’t want to. But the d-d-doctor, she convinced me.”
“The doctor? What doctor? Did Kyle put you in the hospital?”
“Sort of.” Now she was back to the glassy-eyed stare. “He got me pregnant.”
Holy shit. “What happened to the baby?”
Imogen’s shoulders shook as if she wanted to cry but she’d
run out of tears. Mal felt like a shit for ever starting this conversation. Why hadn’t he just bought a pair of earplugs?
“I told Kyle what he’d done. I guess I thought maybe he’d leave me alone for a while, but he punched me in the stomach instead. By the time I got to the doctor’s, I was already miscarrying. And the doctor said I should tell the police, that there was evidence now.”
The foetus. DNA. Kyle Blair was a dead man. It took all Mal’s willpower to keep his ass on the sofa rather than driving straight to Blackwood HQ and raiding the weapons locker. One bullet to the brain was all it would take.
“The police brought charges?”
“They came to interview me, but Mom told them I was a troublemaker. Always seeking attention, those were her words. The police officers were real kind, and they said they’d bring Kyle in, but Mom warned him they were coming so he kept clear of the house. That was when he threatened to kill me. One day on the way home from school, he forced me into an empty building and held a knife against my throat. Said if I went ahead and pressed charges, he’d cut clean through to my spine. I can still hear him now, whispering with his breath on my ear.”
“You’re safe here. Nobody’s coming through that door.”
“I’ll never be safe. He hates me, and he never lets go of a grudge.”
“Why? Did you press charges?”
“I tried to, but the police still couldn’t find him. By that time, I’d left home. It was summer, and I found a job picking apples on a farm outside the city. The farmer and his wife were real sweet, and they let me sleep in an old trailer behind the barn, but I hadn’t gone far enough. Kyle found me there. I didn’t sleep so well, and I heard him at the door one night, trying to get in.”
No wonder she was jumpy about doors. “You’re sure it was him?”
“Yes. I climbed out the window, and when he got into my bedroom and turned the light on, I saw him. That was the night I travelled to Richmond. Just rode the bus without even knowing where I was going, and this was where I ended up.”
“But you’ve done well for yourself. Didn’t you go to university?”
Mal may have asked Oliver a few questions about Imogen after he first met her. Nothing that would arouse too many suspicions, but he’d gotten curious. Except now she buried her head in her hands.
