by Honey
“Or they could not find ya, and my sweet Nina could spend the rest of her life with Leo,” he offered with his hand on his chest. “I’ll be willin’ to take care of ya and protect ya forever. No American or the Jamaican police will find ya if ya just trust yer friend Leo to keep ya safe.”
Nina’s options were limited. There was no way she could survive in Jamaica on her own. And if she tried to make it to Mexico right now, she’d get caught. Leo had made good on all his promises so far. She had no reason not to trust him now. What other choice did she have anyway? If Leo was willing to protect her and provide for her, she would allow him to. But nothing in life came free. For everything worth having, there was a price. A chance at freedom and a fresh start weren’t cheap.
“Leo, you’re the only person I have in the world right now. If I reached out to my mother or my stepsister, it would cause them all kinds of problems. I can’t do that to them. My cousin Juan would help me, but Jay no doubt has already told the police all about him. So I’ll stay in Jamaica with you. But I ain’t stupid. You want something from me. What is it? Tell me,” she said, sliding over to sit closer to Leo on the bed.
Leo reached out and touched Nina’s face with care. Her eyes fluttered shut as she welcomed his gentleness. She had forgotten how it felt to be touched by the strong hands of a man. All her fear about the future and how it would play out disappeared when Leo rubbed her bottom lip with the pad of his thumb.
“Leo wants whatever Nina is willin’ to give him for now. In time, whatever should happen between a man and a woman will come.”
“I understand. Leo will take care of Nina, and Nina will take good care of Leo. ”
* * *
“I think she is hallucinating,” the nurse whispered to Chief Bess and Agent Wooten. “A very powerful pain medication is dripping through the IV. Plus, she has a morphine pump. The doctor is very concerned about her liver, though. She has an moderate case of cirrhosis, ya know? And she’s been complaining about her belly. I do believe she’s a heavy drinker. You may speak with her, but she seems to be babbling. Maybe you can make some sense of her words.”
The chief and the FBI agent left the nurses’ station and headed down the hall. They greeted the armed policeman outside Jay’s hospital room. When they entered, the female police officer inside stood from her chair and met them in the middle of the floor.
“How is she?” Agent Wooten asked.
“She’s been sleeping a lot. Sometimes she cries out in pain, screaming bloody murder. Earlier, she called out for someone named Zach and then Nina.”
“Zach is her brother,” Chief Bess told the officer. “He doesn’t wish to see her. I have no idea who the Nina person is.”
Agent Wooten shoved his hands in his pants pockets. “Ah, Senorita Nina Celeste Lopez is one of many in Ms. King’s chain of fools. We believe she and our ailing fugitive over there left Atlanta with Deputy Bethany Hardy. Together, they hid out on the outskirts of Miami, Florida. What happened after that is still a mystery. Deputy Hardy ended up blowing her brains out in their trailer-park hideaway. The trail on Ms. Lopez ends there too.”
“My officers have been questioning residents along the hillside. They’re mostly fishermen, and a few farmers and craftsmen. All the men said Ms. King came to Jamaica alone. She was the only person living in the abandoned house. None of them have seen this Nina Lopez. We confiscated clothes, shoes, and other personal items. Everything, it seems, belongs to Ms. King.” Chief Bess pulled something from the breast pocket of his uniform and handed it to Agent Wooten. “That is the Jamaican passport she used to travel here from your country. She looks nothing like the picture today, eh? And she used the name Belva Jane Dudley. Who is that?”
Agent Wooten shrugged. “Maybe Mr. King knows this person and will tell us who she is. Nothing about this case makes much sense to me so far. I wonder when and how Ms. King applied for a Jamaican passport from jail. Check out the date on it.” The agent angled the booklet so the chief could see it. “She was an inmate at the Fulton County jail when this was issued. It’s going to take a while for us to sort through this case. In all my fourteen years with the FBI, I don’t believe I’ve ever run across anyone quite like Ms. Jayla King.”
“Your fellow agents said the same thing to me this morning in my office.” The chief chuckled. “I can’t recall ever meeting anyone with such a deceitful and manipulative nature either. I think she’s a disturbed woman. I’m just grateful that Mrs. King is alive and well. It would’ve been most tragic had she been seriously injured or killed by her sister-in-law.”
Chapter Sixty-nine
“No, Jill, not tonight.” Zach folded his arms across his bare chest and rolled over onto his side, away from her. “We agreed to wait until tomorrow night, after the show. You’ve been through hell over the past forty-eight hours. You need to rest. And I don’t wanna hurt your arm, baby. Just let me hold you.” Zach reversed his position in the bed to face Jill again. He wrapped his arms around her waist, then pulled her body against his.
“But, Zachary, it’s been too long. I’m fine. You heard Dr. Johnson.” Jill kissed Zach’s lips hungrily and rubbed his chest like a woman on a mission of the sexual kind. “You forced me to eat that huge dinner, and I have all this energy now. I have missed you. Please, Zachary—”
“Go to sleep, Jill. Your pain medication should’ve kicked in by now anyway. Tomorrow is your big day. You’re a professional dancer. Show some restraint.”
Jill wanted Zach to make love to her. She’d been putting the moves on him. Her seduction had started over the seafood feast they ordered from room service, and had heated up in the shower. While Zach had made phone calls to their family and friends in the States to report that Jill was safe, she had fondled and massaged him all over. His body, especially that certain part of him she’d missed the most, had responded to her skillful touches. Zach wanted his wife, but he had resisted her. He didn’t want to put any unnecessary stress on her body after all she’d been through. The cut on her arm was his main concern. He didn’t want to risk injuring her arm more.
Zach forgot about Jill’s injury when she whispered his name and eased her hand inside his boxers. Before he had a chance to protest, she pressed her lips against his and snaked her tongue inside his open mouth. He was rock hard and ready.
“Stop that, Jill.” He moved back a few inches, interrupting her rhythmic strokes. “You’re not playing fair. Go to sleep and rest your body, so you’ll be able to give your best performance tomorrow night. You may not like it, but I’m trying to do what’s best for you.”
“First of all, I’m about to do my best performance tonight. Secondly, the last time you decided what was best for me, you were dead wrong. I’m more than capable of determining what is best for me,” Jill teased and caressed her husband’s sensitive spot again.
As much as Zach wanted to be in control, he was helpless. During his absence from Jill, his heart had definitely grown fonder, and so had every other part of his anatomy. So he stopped resisting the pleasure, relaxed, and took his seduction like a real man.
* * *
“Go! Go! Go! Go! Go!” Jill ordered her students, waving her hands in the direction of the stage. “Get back out there! Don’t you hear them begging for more? This is your chance to do the special routine we added last week. You remember it, eh?”
“Yes, ma’am,” all the girls answered.
“We know it very well, Madame Jillian. We will make you proud,” Wilma, the senior dancer, told her.
Jill hugged the young girl. “I’m sure you will. Shoo now. Your audience waits.”
The applause and cheers from the crowd swelled when the curtains opened. The thirteen female dancers appeared before the audience again, all dressed in flowing lavender dresses, for an encore performance. Jill threw her head back and covered her mouth to keep from screaming. The entire show had been an amazing success, every performance perfect, captivating the two thousand plus people in the audience. Jill stood
behind the curtain now, watching her students twirl and leap through the air. They all danced with the grace and precision of gazelles to Miriam Makeba’s “Pata Pata.” The audience was up on its feet, clapping and cheering. Jill couldn’t have been more proud.
At the end of the dance, the girls received a lengthy standing ovation. Jill came out onstage and introduced all her students, including the ones behind the curtains. She presented Madame Katherine to a thunderous round of applause and spoke very highly of her extraordinary legacy at Royal Rhythms. She acknowledged everyone responsible for making Magical Moments in Motion possible. Careful not to overlook anyone, Jill read from her long list of sponsors and production team members, including Gwendolyn Hayes. She’d done a superb job on the dancers’ costumes. Then through tears, Jill publicly thanked Chief Bess and all his officers for rescuing her. After an extensive standing ovation, she acknowledged her family and thanked them for their support, especially Zach and Zachary Junior.
By the time Roy’s van left the Alliance Performing Arts Center, Jill was too pooped to hold her head up. On the ride to the Blue Lagoon, she and Zachary Junior fell asleep, using Zach’s body as a pillow.
* * *
“Yeah, she sends me a message every day via Chief Bess, talking about please come visit her. I don’t know why. Ain’t nobody thinking about Jay.”
“You’re not a little curious about what she wants to say?” Dex asked as he held the phone to his ear.
“Nope.” Zach checked his watch. “Jill has her last interview with Chief Bess and the FBI in an hour. After that, we’re heading to Kingston to have dinner with our family and to say good-bye to them. Our flight back to the ATL leaves tomorrow morning, at ten. Make sure your ass is at the airport to pick us up by one.”
“Negro, please. I’m always on time. Just make sure you bring me a big bottle of that strong Jamaican rum.”
“I will. And I gotta buy a few bags of Blue Mountain coffee for Aunt Jackie. She reminded me again when we spoke this morning. My dad and Patricia want some too. I picked up a bunch of T-shirts for Nahima, Wallace Junior, and Abriah. What should I buy Ramona?”
“A coffee mug or one of those spoons with Jamaica inscribed on it should do. She collects that kind of stuff.”
Zach looked across the room at Jill when he heard her open the front door. She pursed her lips and placed her hand on her hip. Zachary Junior was straddling the other one.
“I gotta go, man. Roy is probably downstairs, waiting on us. It’s funny how he’s a driver for the Island Paradise Resort, but whenever Jill and I come to town, he makes himself available to us. Anyway, I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon.”
* * *
Agents Wooten, Brooks, and Paretti were all seated in Chief Bess’s office when he opened the door to welcome Zach and Jill inside. Roy was left in the lobby to babysit Zachary Junior.
“Mrs. King,” Agent Wooten began, “Ms. King confessed to kidnapping you and holding you for thirty-six hours against your will, but she claimed she didn’t act alone. According to her, a woman named Nina Lopez helped her. We know Ms. Lopez left Atlanta with Ms. King. They ended up in Miami together. Another woman was with them, but she’s dead. We have nothing to support Ms. King’s claim that Ms. Lopez traveled with her to Jamaica, but that doesn’t mean much in a case like this. Was there a woman with Ms. King, and did she help her kidnap you?”
The agent wanted the truth, but Jill wasn’t so sure he needed it. What good would it serve? Falling in love with Jay was the only thing Nina had done wrong. That wasn’t a crime. It was a terrible mistake. In Jill’s opinion, Nina, like her and Venus, had been one of Jay’s victims. She’d been used. Whatever part Nina had played in Jay’s escape from jail and her flight to Jamaica had nothing to do with the kidnapping. However, it would be hard to convince the FBI and Chief Bess of that. If they knew Nina was in Jamaica, she would be arrested and shipped back to the States with Jay. Jill didn’t want that to happen. Nina had not harmed her, and she didn’t want to harm her either.
She addressed Agent Wooten. “I’ve never met Nina Lopez. Like I told you before, Jay forced me from the dance studio with a gun. She made me put on a big straw hat and sunglasses. We caught a cab that drove us to a fruit stand at the bottom of the hillside. Jay led me up the hill to the house with that gun still pointed at me. Once we got inside, she taped my mouth shut and belted me to a chair like a prisoner. I was inside that house for a day and a half, only allowed to go outside to relieve myself, with a gun held to my back. I saw no one the entire time except Jay.”
Agent Paretti, the only female agent, jotted some notes on a pad. Then she spoke to Zach. “Mr. King, your sister traveled here on a Jamaican passport. The face in the picture is definitely hers, but it appears she’s wearing a disguise. The name on the passport took us aback. Do you have any idea who Belva Jane Dudley is?”
“That was my mother. Actually, that was her name before she married my father. Belva Jane Dudley King has been dead almost thirty years now. I can’t believe Jay disrespected our mother’s memory by using her name in her mess.”
“No one is off-limits when Ms. King is involved,” Chief Bess told the group. “A woman in Runaway Bay named Charlotte Gregory has been arrested for aiding and abetting her. She, too, was one of your sister’s lovers. Ms. Gregory allegedly arranged for Ms. King to hide out in the house up in the hills, among other things. If everything your sister has told us is true, Ms. Gregory could serve many years in prison.”
Zach and Jill answered a few more questions before they left Chief Bess’s office. On their way down the hall, hand in hand, Zach leaned in to whisper in Jill’s ear.
“You told me you saw Nina in that shack the day Jay kidnapped you. You’re a liar, young lady.”
“I am not a liar. I told a little white lie. Nina didn’t help Jay do anything at all to me. Why should I have helped Jay do something to her?”
Chapter Seventy
Nina studied her hair closely in the mirror. It was different. The new short length and the dark color had totally changed her appearance. She hadn’t meant to steal Jill’s hairstyle, but she’d needed something drastically new. And going from long auburn curls to a short black Afro was quite drastic. Nina adjusted the straps on the pastel pink sundress Leo had bought her, and smiled. With her thirty-pound weight loss, she almost didn’t recognize her own reflection in the mirror. That was a good thing, because Nina Celeste Lopez no longer existed.
To Leo and Mamie, she would forever be Nina, but to every other person on the island, she would be known as Marta Fox. It was the name Juan had chosen for her when he’d arranged for her Mexican passport. In the picture she was rocking a long curly black wig. That had been her cousin’s idea too. She had confided in him about her plans to leave the United States with Jay and had asked for his advice. The one thing Juan had insisted on was that Nina allow him to get her a Mexican passport, instead of her asking one of her coworkers to hook her up with one issued from the States. Otherwise, she would’ve been tracked down by now and would be awaiting extradition back to the States.
Nina’s gaze locked with Leo’s in the mirror. He was sitting on the bed behind her, watching her examine her brand-new makeover. “So what do you think?”
“It makes no difference what Leo is thinkin’, my dear. The important thing is what you are thinkin’. Leo likes whatever Nina likes.”
Nina took a seat next to Leo on the bed. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without you. Thank you for everything, Leo.” She placed a soft kiss on his cheek.
“We must be goin’ now. Leo moved everything from the old house and put it all in the new one. It’s time to leave the hillside. Nina deserves better.”
Never in a million years would Nina have guessed she’d be living anywhere else besides Atlanta, East Los Angeles, or Mexico City. But falling in love with the wrong woman had cost her dearly. She couldn’t contact her mother or any other relatives out of fear that the FBI was searching for her. Leo was the o
nly person in her life. And because of him, she had a chance to make a fresh start. It wasn’t a perfect situation, but Nina was hell bent on making it work.
“Let’s go home,” Leo said, standing to his feet. “The cab should be here now.”
“Yeah, let’s go home.”
* * *
“Hello?”
Jay paused before she spoke. The mere sound of her aunt’s voice stirred her emotions. “Aunt Jackie, it’s me, Jay.”
“How are you, baby?” She placed her Bible, purse, and choir robe on the kitchen table and took a seat.
“Well, I’m living in a bootleg Jamaican jail cell, with only three of the fingers God gave me on my right hand. I’m still on crutches, and the doctor said my limp is gonna be a permanent one. I guess I’m doing pretty damn great. What do you think?”
“I’m just grateful you’re alive.”
“The doctors here have released me. I’ll be returning to Atlanta sometime tomorrow. Can you believe the FBI sent three agents over here to escort me back? You’d think I was a fucking sociopath, like Jeffrey Dahmer or Charles Manson.” Jay laughed, but it wasn’t genuine. There was no humor in her situation. She had hit rock bottom. Her life was pathetic, and she had no one to blame but herself.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’ve done some awful things, Jay. I’m not judging you, but you have some repenting to do. Zach and Jill hooking up behind your back was wrong. They’ve both confessed to that. But your plan to make them pay for it was worse than anything I could’ve imagined. I love you with all my heart, but I can’t condone anything you did. All I can do is pray for you.”
Jay had expected a spiritual reprimand from Aunt Jackie. Anything else would’ve been insincere. This was Jackie Dudley Brown. The woman was a saint. Jay had never heard her curse or swear. Everyone in the family said she was a virgin on her wedding night. Jay could testify that no man had ever spent the night at their house when she was a child. Uncle Julius was the only man she knew who had hit it. And that was only after they’d gotten married. Yes, Aunt Jackie was a special woman with a kind heart. Otherwise, she wouldn’t give Jay the time of day.
