Deciding that a walk would do her some good, she stepped out onto the porch and turned her face to the sun. The world smelled fresh, the recent downpour washing away all the ugliness of the last few days. She was sad that Samantha was gone, but seeing the world so clean and bright after an especially dreary week gave her hope.
She decided against the trail through the woods, unwilling to deal with any washed out or muddy trails that may have resulted from last night’s deluge. The trails usually fared well, but there was always that one trail that didn’t.
Walking along the sidewalk that meandered through the neighborhood unhurried, she knew where she was headed. But she didn’t care. She wanted to check on Samantha’s house and see for herself that her friend was really gone.
She moved through the neighborhood, waving at the neighbors who were outside enjoying the weather or walking their dogs. Within a few minutes, Mabel left the main thoroughfare and headed down the long, windy road that led out of the main neighborhood and to Samantha’s house.
Mabel closed her eyes as she walked, listening to the sound of the birds in the trees and letting the sunshine wash over her. She opened her eyes, following the last turn before Samantha’s house.
Mabel saw the front door and knew immediately that something was off. Samantha never used the front door, and she certainly wouldn’t leave it partially open unless she was right there. Samantha wasn’t the best at remembering to lock her doors, but she always kept them closed.
Mabel scanned the ground, noticing the footprints coming from the line of trees to her left. Grant! It had to be him. Had he been hiding in the tree line when Samantha left Mabel’s house? Mabel’s heart sank.
She looked around the side of the house, going into a panic when she saw that Samantha’s car wasn’t even there. What if she hadn’t gotten away from Grant? Where was she now?
Mabel pulled out her cellphone and dialed Samantha’s number. It went straight to voicemail. She hung up and tried Grants number, which went straight to voicemail as well.
“Please let her be okay,” Mabel said out loud, stepping around the multiple footprints in and around the gravel driveway and onto Samantha’s porch.
She pushed the front door in and called out into the house. Every light in the house was on, but her voice echoed back to her without anyone answering. Cautiously, she stepped into the foyer and into the living room.
Her eyes were drawn to the chaos beside the kitchen. Samantha’s purse and the contents of it were strewn about the floor as if there had been quite a struggle. Samantha’s laptop was in the kitchen, packed to leave, yet left behind.
She picked up Samantha’s phone, surprised to find it on airplane mode. She clicked the icon and the phone immediately started vibrating violently with hundreds upon hundreds of calls; all from Grant. She set it down on the counter, watching it for a moment before she walked over to the other forgotten items while the phone continued to buzz in the background.
She shook her head in disgust. No wonder Samantha had wanted to run. If that was on top of the voicemails that he left on her landline, it was a wonder that Samantha left on her own without a police escort.
Except she didn’t leave alone. Mabel wouldn’t have been surprised by Samantha leaving her phone behind, but the rest of it was out of place. Her laptop held her entire world. There was no way, no matter what was going on, that Samantha would leave behind her very livelihood. Plus, her wallet and driver’s license were on the floor, and the zippered pocket in her purse still held a sizable stack of cash in it.
No, none of this was right. Samantha was in trouble.
The phone finally stopped buzzing, signaling the end of the onslaught. Mabel went to where she’d set it down, looking at the final missed call count and shook her head angrily. The last call had been logged the night before, and marked over one hundred calls made to Samantha by Grant. And those were only the ones made after the phone was placed on silent. She didn’t have the heart to see how many were made prior to that. She was furious; with him and herself.
She should have known.
Below the missed calls was a single notification for a text message. Curious, Mabel touched the icon to load the message.
Are you free this weekend? the message asked simply.
The contact name on the text was TT.
“Wanna bet that stands for ‘Tiger Twins’?” Mabel said to the empty room.
She pulled up the contact, not sure what her next move would be. Could she just call them up, explain the situation and expect them to help? And how would they help? Mabel didn’t even know where Samantha was.
What in the world would she even tell them? That her brother had probably kidnapped Samantha and taken her who knows where? No. They would write her off as a stupid, worthless werelion like they had so many of Mabel’s kind. They wouldn’t help; they only thought about other weretigers.
Mabel stopped herself. Was any of that true? Everything she’d heard about weretigers - and specifically the Locke twins - came directly from Grant. What if nothing he’d said was true. It made sense, as much as she didn’t want to admit it. Grant wouldn’t want competition from men that made him look bad. She didn’t want it to be true, but she knew in her heart it was. Grant was evil – or at least unstable – and the twins were good guys.
Her head fought the truth, even as her heart accepted it.
Her hands were shaking when she pushed the call button and held the phone to her ear.
“Samantha, hi,” a man’s voice said, answering on the first ring. “I was starting to wonder if you dropped off the face of the earth.”
“Real smooth, Dylan,” a voice in the background said, laughing.
“It’s not Samantha. Are you the Locke twins?”
It was suddenly quiet on the other end of the line.
“Who is this?” Dylan said, all the boisterous joy gone out of his voice.
“It doesn’t matter now. Samantha is in trouble. I don’t know what to do or even where to look.”
“Then how do you know she’s in trouble?” Dylan asked. “And why won’t you say who you are?”
“I’m afraid if I tell you that you won’t believe me. You probably don’t know me, but I’m sure you’ve run into my brother Grant before.”
“Grant Daniels?” he replied, his voice sounding more like a hiss.
“Yes.”
“Does he have her?”
“I think so, but I don’t know for sure.”
“Where are you right now?”
“I’m at Samantha’s house.”
“Stay where you are. We’ll be there in less than an hour.”
“Please hurry,” she said, but the line had already disconnected in her ear.
***
They arrived as promised about forty-five minutes later. They parked a few yards from the door, both twins getting down on their haunches to inspect the footprints and tire marks in the muddy, wet gravel.
Mabel waited on the front porch for them, watching them inspect the scene. They were talking quietly to each other so all Mabel could hear was the low sound of their voices with no recognizable words.
They stood almost as one, walking towards her in sync as only identical twins can do.
“How long were you here before you called us?” one of the twins asked.
“Ten, maybe fifteen minutes. The phone was disabled so it took a while for all the missed calls from my brother to come through.”
“How many were there?” the same twin asked.
“Over one hundred,” she admitted, wishing she could hide her head in shame.
But that wasn’t going to accomplish anything, and she wasn’t about to hide her part in this.
The first twin scowled at her, and Mabel wanted to melt into the floorboards and disappear. The second twin stood just a few feet behind the first. He smiled at her, an expression meant to comfort that came off as pity.
“We should go inside,” the second twin said. “We need to kn
ow everything that happened from the beginning and you’ll probably want to be sitting down for that.”
“That’s sounds good,” she said, turning and going straight for the couch without waiting to see if they followed.
“So,” Dylan said, sitting across from her, “start at the beginning and don’t leave anything out, no matter how unimportant it seems.”
Mabel did as he asked, going all the way back to the day that she first met Samantha and ending with the moment she discovered the house in the condition it was, right then. The twins listened in silence, both men hanging on her every word without interrupting. When she finally finished, she felt exhausted.
“Did Grant say anything that might give us a clue as to where he took her?”
“No, and I don’t know where he moved to in the city after I moved here. I’m sorry I-”
She sat more upright suddenly, eyes wide.
“Wait. He said something about buying property and being close by.”
“How close?”
“I don’t know, but it was a large property. Really large, and I think he said something about it being a few combined properties but I don’t remember for sure.”
“That’s alright,” Jacob said, “I think I can get something from that information. How recent was the purchase?”
“He was looking at the property the day you two were here. He just bought it yesterday, or maybe the day before.”
“I’m going to make a phone call,” Jacob said. “Keep talking to Dylan. You might have more information that you don’t realize is important.”
He left the room quickly, already dialing a number and waiting for the call to connect. Mabel heard a door close down the hall and looked at Dylan.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know my brother was unstable when I introduced them. He’d changed so much since our parents died, I thought I’d finally gotten my old brother back.”
“You’re not responsible for what he does.”
“Then why do I feel responsible?”
“Because you’re a good person.”
Mabel looked at him, surprised to see that he was being sincere.
“How can you think that after what happened to Samantha? She could be in danger, and it’s all my fault?”
“Actually, I don’t think it is. I think your brother used you to get to Samantha.”
“How?”
“Well, let’s start with how you ended up in Barnes Point?”
“I was stressed out, and city life was just too rough for me. I love to touch the earth and feel the sun on my face. I felt so stifled in the city, with all the crowds and the noise. So Grant bought me this house and I moved here.”
“How did you find this house?”
“Grant bought it for me. He surprised me one day and I moved out the next week. It was the best decision I ever made.”
“And how long after you moved here did Samantha move here?”
“She was already here.”
“For how long?”
“A few weeks, maybe?”
“And how much warning did Grant give you before he moved you out here?”
“A couple days. One day I was telling him how much I hated the city and he was giving me grief about it, then the next day, he was taking me somewhere where I could be comfortable and live in peace.”
“You don’t think that’s an odd coincidence?”
“Not really, I guess.”
“You said you were reading one of Samantha’s books when she walked by the first day you met her. Where did you get that book from?”
“Grant. My box of books that I had packed somehow got lost-”
“And let me guess – Grant just happened to have a book of Samantha’s in his car to give you?”
“Yes. That’s exactly what happened. I still don’t see what you’re getting at.”
“Think about it. Didn’t Samantha say she had a stalker before and they never found out who it was?”
“Yes.”
“What if Grant was the stalker? Both times?”
“He wouldn’t do that.”
“Are you sure? You don’t sound all that sure. Did you think he would ever kidnap Samantha?”
“No.”
Dylan sat quietly, letting Mabel mull it over. When she finally buried her face in her hands and hung her head in shame, he moved to sit beside her and put his arm around her.
“Sometimes, the things that should be obvious to us we’re completely blinded to. It happens to us all.”
His gentle words were her undoing. Mabel choked on a sob, pain bubbling up to the surface unchecked. Dylan held her close, letting her crumble to pieces in his arms and murmuring soft words of encouragement into her ear.
“It’s going to be alright. We’re going to find her and we’re going to save her.”
“You can’t promise that.”
“You’re right, we can’t. But there are two of us and just one of him. Whatever he’s got planned we’ll be better prepared.”
“There are three of us, not just two.”
“No. You’re not going in there,” Jacob said from behind her. “There’s no way we’re going to have two women to rescue.”
“I’m a werelion, too. I can handle myself.”
“You can handle yourself in most situations. I’m not going to expect you to be able to handle this. Crazy or not, Grant is still your brother. We have to go it alone and you need to wait here where it’s safe.”
Jacob turned to Dylan.
“I think we’ve found it. It sounds like the perfect place.”
“Where is it?” Dylan asked.
“North, through the woods. Less than five miles away.”
“What?” Mabel said in disbelief. “He’s practically right around the corner.”
“He is,” Jacob confirmed. “It’s the perfect hiding place.”
CHAPTER 12
Samantha awoke the next morning, mouth so dry that her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth and an odd flavor was left even after she’d brushed her teeth twice. She had a splitting headache, and at some point in the night, her wound had bled again, and blood had stuck to her bangs and covered most of her face when she woke up.
Samantha listened to the locked bedroom door, looking for signs of Grant’s whereabouts. Maybe he had gone out to get supplies? Samantha could only hope that was true.
She took the time to wash her face and forehead in the water, gently dabbing away at the stickiness and revealing the gash beneath the mess.
The outer edges of the wound were an angry red and quite swollen. She needed to clean the wound out and she needed antibiotics to fight off the infection. She probably could have used a stitch or two, but she would survive the ordeal and it probably wouldn’t scar too bad.
She shook her head back and forth slightly, holding onto the rim of the sink just in case. When she stopped moving, she was pleased to see that the excessive, earth shattering dizziness from the night before was all but gone.
Although she’d been terrified to let herself sleep, both because Grant was in the house and because she was afraid she would never wake up, the sleep had been good for her. She felt much stronger than the day before, and this time, if the opportunity presented itself, she was sure that she would be able to get to the woods and hide.
And where was Grant? She hadn’t seen or heard him yet, but she was a little afraid to hope that he was gone. What if he was outside the door, waiting for her to make her move and prove that he couldn’t trust her? Then she would be screwed. As long as Grant thought she was, he was clueless, she had the upper hand.
Her stomach growled and she looked at the clock. It was still late morning, but it had been nearly twenty-four hours since her last meal. She was starving and she needed to eat. If she was weak from hunger and got dehydrated, she would not make it far at all.
She was about to knock on the door and call out for Grant when she heard heavy footfalls at the end of the hall. Even though she was prepared to
see him, the sound of him coming towards the door unseen was almost her undoing. She tamped down her fear, stepping quietly into the bathroom and pretending to still be fussing with the gash on her head.
He didn’t want her to know that she was aware that he’d locked the door. Maybe, if he thought that she’d stayed in the room without realizing it was locked, he would let his guard down even more.
She heard him unlock the door and step into the room quietly.
“I’m in here,” she said pleasantly before he could call out to her.
Her stomach was in knots as she focused on her wound, trying her best to be nonchalant about the entire thing. Part of Grant’s delusion was that Samantha was just as interested in him as he was in her. If she burst that bubble now, it might very well get her killed. He needed to think that he was the hero in all this.
“Your head looks awful,” he said, a twinge of guilt in his voice.
“It looks better than it did when I woke up. There was dried blood everywhere and my hair was stuck in the wound. I think it needs stitches.”
“It doesn’t,” he said, shutting down the conversation before she got a chance to broach the subject of medical attention again.
“You’re probably right,” she said, smiling sweetly. “You’re always right. I’m glad I have you to take care of me.”
She felt sick as the words tumbled out of her mouth, but what was worse was his expression. The wide, pride smile said that those were the very words he’d been longing to hear for so long. He wanted to be her hero. He just didn’t understand that being a hero had to come organically. As long as Grant was willing to force the event, he would never be anyone’s hero; least of all Samantha’s.
“I’ll take care of you until the day I die,” he said.
Her Tiger Twins Page 12
