Jake took one of the napkins and pulled a pen out of his pocket. Natalie kept looking at him while he wrote something.
“This is my number … Keep it handy with you,” he said while passing the napkin to her.
“I don’t understand … Is there something that you want to tell me?”
Jake got up and walked towards the stairs to the dock. Natalie followed him.
“I have lost everyone I have loved … I don’t want to lose you,” he said and turned towards her.
Natalie hugged him. Teardrops rolled down her cheeks. “I … I am not going anywhere.”
Jake took her face in his palms. “I hope so and pray for it every moment.”
Natalie started to sob and that made Jake realize that he should have kept it to himself. He took her to the dining table and pulled his chair nearer to hers.
“You know, you are the best cook I’ve met … in the last two days,” he said and put a spoonful of rice in her mouth. Natalie smiled back, almost spilling the food.
There was nothing spoken after that. They kept feeding each other while gazing into each other’s eyes till the moon reached its summit.
Jake’s sleep was broken by the screech of tires on the gravel. He tried, but was not able to open his eyes. There was some commotion at the other end, but he was too wobbly to understand.
“Natalie …” The words barely came out of his mouth. He was sweating profusely. He tried to look around. His vision was blurred, but he could see that he was in his house. He did not remember how and when he came there.
Suddenly, there was the sound of the engine of a vehicle, the solitude of the night making it more pronounced. Slowly, the sound started to fade as the vehicle left. Jake tried, but was not able to get up. After a few moments of struggle, he gave up and closed his eyes.
“Open the door,” a female voice came from outside. There were few more knocks, but none could wake Jake.
Suddenly, the knocks stopped, but not for long. This time it started coming from the window of his bedroom. With great difficulty, he opened his eyes and looked out the window. It was Kiara.
“Wake up!” she shouted.
As he tried to get out of the bed and stand, he felt as if all the energy had been sapped away from his body. He could not stand for long and fell down on the floor. Kiara took a stone from nearby and broke a glass pane. She opened the window and climbed in immediately.
Jake was conscious, but incapacitated. She helped him get on the bed.
“Are you all right?” she asked worriedly.
“I … I knew you will come to stop me from proposing to her, but not so early.” Jake smiled feebly.
“I’m not going to spare you for that, but right now you need to get some water in your system. You’re dehydrated,” she said and rushed to the kitchen.
Jake had sweat so much that he felt cramps all over his body. His head was heavy and he didn’t remember anything about the night.
Kiara gave him some water and then some coffee. There was nothing in the kitchen to eat. Fortunately, she was carrying a few muffins. Jake ate them with difficulty, but felt much better post that.
“What happened here?” she asked while wiping sweat off his face.
“We need to check on Natalie … I guess she is in some trouble.” Jake got up immediately.
“What?” Kiara said, not believing where he got the energy all of the sudden. But Jake was not going to answer. He remembered the midnight commotion at her house. He rushed towards the door.
“Where are we going?” she asked while trying to catch up with him.
“To find out what happened in the night,” he said and turned towards Kiara, “though I’m sure we are too late.”
He almost fell twice, but did not stop till he reached the porch of Natalie’s cabin. Once inside, he looked at the door. It was slightly opened and that made his heart sink a little. As he approached the door, he heard someone speaking on the phone. Kiara stood outside the porch and kept looking at him.
As he was about to reach out for the door, he stumbled one more time. As he raised his trembling hands to push the door, it was opened from the other side.
A middle-aged lady came out.
“What do you want?” she asked angrily.
It took a moment for Jake to act normal. “Where is Natalie?”
The woman looked at him with surprise. “I am Natalie.”
Jake gasped as if his calculations had come right. “Of course you are.” His words were full of despair and defeat loomed large on his face. He looked at Kiara who was shaking her head while trying to understand what was happening.
“This must be your cabin?” he asked, knowing the answer beforehand.
The woman nodded her head. “What do you want?”
“Just one last thing,” he requested.
“What is it?” the woman said dryly.
“Were you out of the town the last few days?”
“Yes, for the last three days. I came back this morning,” she said with surprise. “How do you know that?”
“I am really sorry, ma’am,” Jake said. “I stay opposite to you. I was looking for someone else. Got the names mixed up. I thought she came back today.”
With that, he walked out. The woman was more agitated than before. She did not like the way Jake noticed when she was gone and when she came back.
“I don’t know you. But I don’t want to see you on my property again or else I will report to the authorities!” she shouted from behind.
“Won’t trouble you again,” Jake said over his shoulder and kept walking.
“I can’t believe someone took Jake Carter for a ride,” Kiara mocked him as they walked back. “You always said that you don’t have any weakness.”
Jake was not in a mood for this. There were lots of other things bothering him. He did not answer and kept walking.
“How can you be so gullible?” Kiara kept asking relentlessly.
“It’s called trust,” Jake almost shouted.
“Trust, my foot,” she said angrily. “She almost killed you. How could you not see this coming?”
“I did,” Jake replied tersely.
“What?” she said, not understanding what Jake meant.
He gestured towards the door. “Let’s discuss this inside.”
Kiara nodded and followed him inside.
“So, tell me what happened yesterday,” she asked while dragging a chair.
“The last I remember, I was having dinner with Natalie … the girl I told you about whom—”
“You were going to propose to today,” Kiara finished his line.
“Yes … and then …” He got up immediately, remembering something.
Kiara kept looking at him till he disappeared inside the bedroom.
He came out holding a small box. He tossed it to her while walking across the room. She looked at him and then at the box.
“Open it.”
“Ooh … It’s the engagement ring,” she said. “You want me to keep it now.”
Jake stopped and raised an eyebrow. He gestured towards the ring. She opened the box and took it in her hand. Suddenly, her expression changed and a hint of smile covered her lips.
“Is it …?” she said with surprise.
“I’m not sure, but it looks like that.”
Kiara got up and walked to her bag. She took out a magnifying glass and kept the ring under it.
“You still carry this?” Jake asked, remembering how much that magnifying glass had irritated him over the years. Wherever Kiara was, the magnifying glass was also there like an extension of her arm.
She put her index finger on her lips and gestured Jake to step away from the window.
Her face lit up at what she saw. The pearl had a fine-grained, scaly, and maze-like feel to it.
“This is a natural pearl and looks quite old,” she exclaimed.
“Now look at the bottom of the hoop,” Jake said while folding his arms.
Kiara turned the ring ups
ide down immediately. “Wow!”
“Yes, wow!” Jake said, pointing at the symbol. “This is a Victorian-era ring. Maybe a royal ring.”
“I must admire your taste in jewelry, Jake,” Kiara said. “But isn’t it too much, proposing to your girlfriend with an illegal piece of jewelry?”
“Shut up, Kiara,” Jake said. “Don’t pretend as if you don’t know from where I got it.”
“When did you suspect she was up to something?” she asked while scratching the pearl.
“When I saw those fake paintings. It’s okay to make imitation jewelry, but those paintings … anyone could be fooled by that. I was still thinking about that when I came across this ring. And, then I understood their game plan completely.”
“What game plan?”
“They actually carry all these antiques from one place to another and the imitation jewelry business is just a façade. They hide the original ones among the fake ones. No one is going to check all the thousand pieces. There is very little chance that the original ring comes out in the sample. And besides, there are very few people who will be able to make a difference between the original and the fake.”
“Are the fake ones so good?”
“Yep,” Jake said and pulled another ring out of the drawer.
Kiara looked at it. “Wow!”
“Doesn’t it look like real?”
“It does. No one can make out the real from the fake the first time,” she said with astonishment. “Anything else?”
“Well, I don’t think they put much effort in the fake business, otherwise they will become popular. I mean, the imitation work is really good. They sell through small corner-side shops. No one can suspect them.”
“Just like the one where you found that package?” Kiara said thoughtfully.
“Yes, and I found this fake one in one such shop here,” Jake said.
“We should check it out then?” Kiara said immediately. “Maybe we’ll get some lead.”
“I don’t think so. Just like Natalie, they must have replaced the kid from the shop,” Jake said ruefully.
“Still,” Kiara insisted.
“OK. We’ll do that. Let me get some energy first,” Jake said while sipping water.
“Anyhow, we have one of their pieces. We can trace who manufactured it,” Kiara said while looking at the fake ring.
“Won’t be of any use. They create these by themselves and as I said, they don’t sell these. They are there to just transport original ones from one place to another and a few ones are given to the shops that keep the real ones hidden under these. Once the bidding is over, they will give the original ones to the buyer and remove all the fake ones from those shops to be used for future transport. Same goes for the paintings.”
“Wow! That’s some planning,” Kiara said and paused. “What about the girl?”
“What about her?” Jake asked with raised eyebrows. He didn’t like where the conversation was headed.
“You really liked her,” she said with a smile.
“I like all girls except you,” he said and returned the smile.
“You are an ass, you know,” she said and threw a pillow at him.
“Whenever I am about to forget, you remind me that,” Jake said and looked at Kiara, who kept staring at him.
“Okay … When I met her, I saw the wedding ring mark on her finger. It was very pronounced. I thought she was married to some rich guy and wanted a fling. Remember, she made the first move. After knowing more about her, I found that she was a businesswoman and pretty good at it. So, I thought she was a recent divorcee. I asked her, but she avoided the discussion. I saw a guy meeting her twice. He abused her, giving me an inclination that after all she was not the boss. A look of that guy gave away the chances of this being a legitimate business. It’s then I started looking for some clue and found the ring.”
“But, she poisoned you. You knew all of this; still, you went out to dinner with her?”
Jake did not know what to say. He indeed had taken the risk. He did not know why, but something inside him made him do that.
“I don’t have an answer. Maybe I trusted her more than she deserved,” he said in a frail voice.
“So, you can fall in love, after all,” Kiara said seriously.
“Also, get out of it immediately,” Jake replied immediately.
“We will see,” she said. “What is the plan now?”
“I’m thinking whether they knew I was coming here or is it just a coincidence,” he said while staring at the opposite wall.
Kiara thought for a moment. “It looks like a setup to me. She was here only one day before you came. She was the one who approached you first. And she knew you would fall for that.”
Jake looked at her with anger and chewed his words. “Go on.”
“I mean, she knows your history,” she said, again riling him up.
“Or maybe most single men fall for beautiful single women,” he retorted.
“OK … let’s set it aside for the time being. Where was I? Right … she befriends you and then poisons you,” she said and thought for a second. “Yeah, I am sure this was preplanned.”
“But why would they plan such a thing for a small-time agent?” Jake asked further.
“Maybe the said small-time agent has got something against them?” Kiara replied.
“But I don’t have anything against them.”
“Then it has to be a coincidence gone against you,” she said while walking across the room.
“Can you be any more discreet?” Jake asked.
“Let me explain. You lay your hands on one of their sellers in New York. You get a suspension. They become happy at your ouster plus the catch, losing his mental balance. They were happily back to their business. The next day, they come to know that you’re bound for Lake Sivan, which coincidentally is their other hub. They combine the two and become sure that you have a lead and are behind them. No one has ever reached them, but you know both the hubs. That’s when they plan to eliminate you and they use a beautiful—”
She was cut off by Jake. “I know my mistake. Don’t repeat it every other minute.”
“OK … I’m sorry. But it’s funny,” she said and then held her hands in apology.
“If that was the plan, why did she spend so much time with me? She could have poisoned me the first time she gave me that sandwich,” Jake argued.
“Valid point. Maybe she’s not the killer type. She was forced to do that,” she replied.
“Or maybe, there were people in the lake that time. She could not have gone unnoticed. So, the plan was to befriend me first. If people see me with her so many times, they won’t suspect anything. And when finally she poisoned me, they would have thought of me being drunk. Then she dropped me off at my cabin and after some time, left the town.”
“Well, I agree with the first part. She could not have poisoned you in daylight, but I don’t agree with the rest of your interpretation,” she said thoughtfully.
“So what is your explanation?”
“Well, by coincidence you landed up in one of the shops selling the imitation jewelry and the kid saw you scratching one of the pearls. He must be a local kid and it would not have taken him much time to find that you’re from outside. He thought of you as a potential buyer and made a mistake. He gave you her number. Now she was alarmed. She had to do something. So she tried to clear her name by showing you her business instead of hiding it. She earned your trust back. Whatever doubts you had were gone and that made it easier for her to strike you again. She poisoned you with your consent.”
Jake’s face turned pale. “She fooled me so easily.”
“Don’t be hard on yourself. It can happen to anyone. The more important thing is that a mere coincidence has led you onto something. You could unearth something big.”
“I don’t know. Right now I can’t even get out of the bed,” he said in frustration.
“You will. It will wear off in time,” she tried to assure h
im.
“How long will you be here?”
“I have to leave in the evening. Carlson has ordered me to report to him first thing in the morning,” she said ruefully. “Why don’t you come with me? Stay with me till you recover.”
“I’m thinking about doing something else,” Jake said and tried to get up. He tried to walk, but fell down on the bed.
“Are you all right?” Kiara said and came to him. He gestured her to stay back. He took support from the bed and got up.
“It will get better once my blood circulation becomes normal,” he said and tried to walk again. After a minute or so, he was able to walk without support.
“You feeling better?” she inquired.
“A bit low on energy, but much better than before,” he said with a faint smile. “As I was saying, I want to pursue this further.”
“I have to admire your spirit. What’s on your mind?” Kiara said with a smile.
“We don’t have anything against them. Heck, we don’t even know who they are. But, they think I’m behind them. We need to keep that façade going on. This will make them come out of their hole and make some mistake. That’s when we strike,” he said with excitement.
“You know these people are not ordinary thugs. They almost killed you one time already. You can’t take all of them single-handedly.”
“Who said I’m alone?” He gave a teasing smile.
“No, no, no,” Kiara said, waving her arms.
“Come on. Don’t be a spoilsport. You don’t have to do anything. Nothing at all. Just observe and see if something is going on in New York,” he said calmly.
“They will find out everything about me after this visit.”
“That’ what I want. I want them to follow us. That is the only way for us to find out who they are,” Jake impressed upon.
“But I’m not going to take any risks,” she said while accepting Jake’s plan reluctantly. “And you’re going to take all the responsibility if this goes wrong.”
“Absolutely,” Jake said and started moving his fingers across his hair. “Now we have to just figure out from where to start.”
“Well, you keep thinking. I’ll cook something for us,” Kiara said and got up.
“What? Since when did you start to cook,” Jake said with astonishment.
Mystery: Double Cross - The Davenport Mysteries (Suspense novel series of adventure mystery books and Crime mystery thrillers) Page 4
