Chapter 13
The sidewalk’s rough surface bit into Dina’s cheek. She sucked in air, coughed and wheezed. Pain radiated across her body.
What happened? One second, Luke yelled for her to get down. The next, he rushed her, and knocked her to the ground.
Angry voices and scuffling noises surrounded her. She braced her hands on the cement, shoved back the ache shooting through her arms, and pushed against the hard surface.
Time slowed to a crawl. Everything happened at once. A knee pressed into her back and a hand slapped across her mouth.
“No!” She screamed, but a bitter taste of adhesive filled her mouth, preventing her lips from moving.
Heart pounding against her ribcage and adrenaline kicking up a notch, Dina flipped to her back, ready to knee, kick, and do whatever to get Luke off her.
A fist struck her face and a prick stabbed her in the neck before she could lay eyes on the perpetrator. Warm liquid shot through her veins. Her chest grew heavy, her eyelids felt weighted, and her muscles turned to wet noodles.
I can’t move.
Panic barreled through her system at her vulnerable, contorted state. Her body laid in the middle of the sidewalk for anyone to do what they wished.
A loud crack filled her ears and a form fell to the sidewalk.
The scream, fighting to release, couldn’t escape. Her adrenal glands flooding her, urging her hand, foot, anything to defend herself to move, but her limp body wouldn’t obey.
Another shot of warmth rushed through her veins. This time, she didn’t feel a prick. The sensation made her feel like she floated on a cloud.
The cloud jostled her body, engaging her brain and awareness seeped in.
Someone carried her. Emergency personnel?
Metal scraped against metal. Gasoline and rotten eggs drifted under her nose and her body flew through the air, bounced, and came to a rest on a solid surface.
Not the authorities.
Terror grabbed hold of her chest, sharpening the senses that worked and putting them on hyper alert. “Luke, put me down,” she demanded, yet her lips didn’t move nor did she speak the words.
Someone moved next to her, twisted her body until she lay on her side and rested her cheek on something like a pillow, yet rough.
An engine started. Gut-twisting alarm raced through her. Her mind spun so fast she thought her head would detach from her neck.
Cole…oh God…help me!
The vehicle jolted forward.
She had to get her churning emotions under control if she hoped to survive. On a deep breath, she forced her thoughts to relax, and focused on advice she read in the magazine at the police station while she and Monique waited for Vince. Concentrate on noises, smells, sights, count until the vehicle turns.
With the drug she’d been given taking away her abilities to see and move, she used the one sense that worked and listened: heavy breathing, wipers slapped the windshield, and country music played in the background.
“You awake?” a male voice asked with a strange accent.
Who is he?
A beat later, something pressed against her nose. A rotten gas smell made the one of the two senses that worked impaired. Her hearing grew distorted and faint.
****
A ta-du, ta-duh sound echoed, plunging Dina back into her mind. Her awareness returned. She still couldn’t move or open her eyelids, but she could hear again. The noise that woke her sounded again. Forcing herself to focus, she listened closely. What could possibly make the thumping sound followed by an echo beneath the tires?
A bridge?
Sheer terror washed over every inch of her body. Her troubles went from extremely bad to unbelievably horrifying.
The authorities had a short window of time to find a missing person before the odds of recovery waned. The abductor taking her out of the city made their work that much more difficult.
Sirens blared. She tossed the dismal thoughts aside, hoping the police noticed her slumped in the seat.
The truck slowed and jolted to a stop.
Excitement swirled through her and grit pumped through her veins. Still, the rush wasn’t enough to make her body react.
Whatever sealed her mouth shut was ripped off. A sharp sting as if pieces of flesh went with it, produced a scream, but nothing escaped.
A solid object touched her hip and slid behind her back. “Quiet,” a Creole dialect growled. Her mind caught up to her senses. He had a gun tucked between her and the seat.
No!
She needed to talk…move. Please let me!
Tapping, as if someone knocked on a window, broke through the country music suddenly playing on the radio. Her insides jump. Anticipation rose.
Scraping sounded…then cool air blasted across her skin.
“License and registration.”
Dina’s eagerness grew at the sound of authority in a masculine voice.
“Don’t have any.” The man beside her gritted out.
“Help!” she silently cried and shifted her eyes back and forth, hoping the officer saw.
“Hands in the air.” The fierceness in the officer’s voice didn’t leave room for debate. “Sir, I need you to step out of the truck.”
He saw me!
“That’s not possible,” the Creole said in a tone deadly calm.
Yes, it is. Get the hell out!
The hard object, resting against her back, disappeared.
Dread filled her stomach, bile formed that she couldn’t warn the officer
A single gunshot blasted. A heartrending male grunt followed.
Her heart jumped into her throat, stopped working, and made her lungs join it. Who shot who?
“Don’t tell me what to do,” the Creole voice growled out, punctuating each syllable in warning.
Anguish joined her utter terror, churning the bile in her stomach. He shot the police officer!
A winding noise sounded, and the cool air disappeared with the jerking of the vehicle.
“We’re alone again.” His hand slid down her arm, her hip, and over her waist before pinching the side of her breast.
The agony of the unknown became too much to breath, sending phantom sensations of ants covering her skin.
For a long stretch of time, she listened for sounds, signals, anything to indicate where she was being taken but couldn’t hear any more than the hum of the truck’s motor and the music playing on the radio.
Her body swayed with the vehicle’s quick sharp right turn followed by another.
“Ah, I hope you wake up soon.” He rested his hand on her butt and squeezed. “I have lots of buyers who will pay handsomely for the likes of you. I need you alert.”
The truck jerked, forcing her body forward. He spread his hand against her stomach and shoved her back against the seat. “I gave you a heavier dose than I meant. Still, I have a good idea you can hear me, so listen up.”
Dina had no choice but to pay attention.
“The last girl wasn’t pretty like you, but she beat you in liveliness. Her spunkiness got her killed.” He moved his hand from her stomach. The motor died along with the music. “She deserved what happened.”
Terror drowned Dina’s nerve endings in ice. Tears burned the backs of her eyes.
“That little filly gave me no choice but to thrust the needle into her until the syringe emptied. If you want to live, don’t try anything. Mark my words.” He heaved an upset sigh. “I wonder if they’ve found her body yet.”
****
The welcoming Daniel and Beatrice gave Cole when he arrived at their house unannounced was better than he expected. Both of them smiled and regarded him with more respect than when he spoke to them at Techno Park.
“Have a seat,” Daniel said, motioning to the couch facing a loveseat.
“Let me get some coffee.” Beatrice strolled off into the kitchen without waiting for a reply.
Cole dropped onto the couch, crossing an ankle over his knee. The uncomfortableness of being in their home returned. The oversized home resembled its owners, pretentious. He never understood why people believed money made them a better person. Hell, he had tons and didn’t think like that. People were people. From his conversation with Shelly’s best friend, he learned Shelly’s parents encouraged if not pushed her to marry him when she obviously wasn’t in love. But he had been in love. At least at the time he believed so. Maybe his feelings for her weren’t the deep, heart-wrenching sensations he experienced with Dina, but love just the same.
“Cole, my boy,” Daniel said, pulling him out of his thoughts.
Beatrice returned, carrying a tray of mugs. “Here you go.” Beatrice handed him a mug. “The way you like it.”
Taking the first sip, sugar exploded in his mouth. Not black like he drank it. He rubbed his lips together. “Thank you.”
“So what brings you here today?” Daniel asked as Beatrice sat next to him on the floral loveseat. Spots covered the material. The two of them looked like kids in a candy store, waiting for their parents to fork out the money.
“I want to discuss the certificate.”
“You’ve come to your senses,” Beatrice said, deadpan, no expression to let him know her thoughts.
He eyed the woman who’d driven him up the wall for years. “Another word and I leave.”
“Keep quiet,” Daniel said, squeezing his wife’s knee.
“Smart.” Cole didn’t like being an ass, but he was done with their bullshit. Even though, he hadn’t been aware of his late wife and her parents’ arrangement, he decided to take responsibility, but he had conditions. “First, the fact you came to my place of business without warning and accused me of stealing was an insult.”
“That’s not what we did,” Beatrice said, her voice laced with defensiveness.
Daniel’s hand squeezed tighter. “Do I need duct tape?”
She pressed her lips together.
“Second, you accused me and made the years you’ve known me mean nothing. After Shelly passed, you didn’t want to visit. I honored your wishes, believing my presence was too hard. Now, I see each of you in a different light.”
Neither said a word, just stared at him wide eyed.
He drew out an envelope, containing the cashier’s check, from his pocket. They needed to agree to his terms first. “Know your facts before you accuse someone and question their integrity. I’m giving you this back because my wife didn’t hold up her end of the deal. She did, however, use the money to help out a friend who had a sick child.”
Beatrice swallowed and darted her gaze to the floor while Daniel’s mouth dropped open.
“I see one of you knew.”
Daniel removed his hand from his wife’s knee and the pulse in his neck ticked as he glared at his wife.
Now for the conditions that would seal the deal if they agreed and get him out of there. “If you accept the check our ties are dissolved. You will not come to me asking for money again.”
“Son, don’t do this,” Daniel begged, leaning his elbows on his knees. “We can still have a relationship.”
“You put the wheels in motion, I’m ending it.” Daniel was a pawn in his wife’s manipulation, and for that he felt bad, but Daniel went along without questioning. “Do you accept?”
Beatrice nodded and Cole turned his gaze back to Daniel.
“I don’t have a choice.” He pointed to the ceiling. “The roof needs replacing. I’ve lost my stock. No savings to speak of.”
“When you bought this house, I advised against it. It’s a McMansion, cheaply made.”
“I should have listened.”
Cole tossed the envelope on the table and stood. “If you had called me instead of taking the underhanded route when you needed help, I would have done anything for you two.”
“Because you were married to our daughter?” Beatrice nibbled on her lower lip.
“Because I was your son-in-law,” Cole barked. The ridiculousness of her words grated his nerves. “Goodbye.” He crossed to the door and exited without looking back. The sooner he put the past behind him, the better.
One situation down, one more to go to rid his life of the obstacles blocking his way to move forward with his future.
He slid behind the wheel and drove toward Shelly’s best friend’s house. The events at his former in-laws replayed over and over again in his mind. None of it made sense, the money, the betrayal, nothing, but one thing was clear, he was done with them and their oddities.
The drive passed quickly, and before he knew it, he turned into Marilyn’s driveway.
Snatching the folder of medical bills from the passenger seat, he approached her pulling weeds in a small flower bed off to the side of the house.
She immediately rose and removed her garden gloves. As if she didn’t want to make eye contact, she diverted her gaze to her clothes, brushing off the brown spots on the knees of her jeans and swiping at invisible dirt on her shirt. “Cole.” She smoothed her hair, and finally locked gazes with his. The pain in her eyes still hit him deep in the chest. He understood her pain, maybe not to the extent of her loss, but still, losing a child no matter the age never leaves. “I didn’t expect you.”
“I brought by your medical bills.”
“Oh.” She clasped the folder; a questioning expression crossed her face.
“I had my accountant go through them. He found some discrepancies and resolved them. I paid the balance.”
Her eyes widened. “You paid for all of them?”
He nodded. “In the envelope, there’s a little something to help you get back on your feet. Marilyn…” How could he express his sympathy for her losing her son? “I’m sorry.”
Tears streaked her face. “How Shelly could possibly do what she did, I’ll never understand.”
Him either.
She flung herself against him, held tight, and cried. “I miss them both.”
One day, when he wasn’t numb from the information he’d recently learned, maybe he could remember the good times he and Shelly shared and feel something. Right now, he couldn’t see how that was possible. He eased away. “Take care.”
“You, too.”
Cole climbed back in the car and headed to Dina’s apartment, more than ready to start the rest of his life.
****
A door closed. Cole jerked awake. He rubbed his eyes and scanned the room. Ruffled curtains covered the windows. A Van Gogh painting hung on the wall. A mirror of some sort, surrounded by light bulbs, sat on a dresser at the far end.
Dina’s bedroom.
He looked down at his body and—
“Put some clothes on, man. Isn’t this taking your obsession with Dina to the extreme?” a male shouted.
“What the fu—”
Cole jerked the blanket over him and pressed his palms into his eyelids before glaring. “Why are you here?”
“The name is Vince, and I live here.”
Not what he imagined to hear. Cole sat up. “What?”
Vince laughed and leaned against the doorjamb, way too relaxed. “Yep.”
Anger mixed with frustration took hold, an emotion he didn’t have a right to have, at seeing the man who had worn boxer shorts comfortably in Dina’s presence. “Again, why are you here?”
“I’m housesitting for Dina while she’s out of town.” Vince’s mischievous tone didn’t sound regretful.
He rubbed his palms into his eyes. “What?”
“You keep saying that.” Vince gleamed, looking mighty pleased with himself. “She left this morning.”
This was bullshit. Why would she leave without telling him? Then he remembered the phone call before falling to sleep. “No, she didn’t. She called.”
“Huh?” The fire in Vince’s expression dissipated. “I didn’t realize you’re in the know. Damn, there goes my fun.”
Cole had to hand it to the guy. Vince had him going for a while. “Prick,” Cole snapped and swung his legs over the side of the bed.
“Whoa.” Vince held up his hands, blocking his view from Cole’s body. “For the record, it’s not impressive,” he said and ducked out of the room.
“Fucker.” Cole rose and felt his muscles straining. Tension continued to rip between his shoulder blades. When Dina left this morning, a knot had formed, rolled back and forth, packing more tissue into the knot as if creating a ball for a snowman.
After telling Teile his plans, throwing out the peanut products in his apartment, and taking care of the matters with his former in-laws and Marilyn, he’d returned to Dina’s with a bottle of wine. He’d stripped, stretched out in her bed, and must have fallen asleep listening to the TV.
He read the digital clock next to the bottle. One.
Over an hour had passed since she’d called from the coffeehouse. He snatched his pants from the chair and dug out his cell. No messages.
He called her. When she didn’t answer, he texted: “Dina, where are you?”
A cotton T-shirt on, he searched for Vince, and found him barefoot in front of the stove. “So you’re living here?”
“I already told you I am.” Vince poured a can of tomatoes into a pot.
The man was too comfortable. “What’s your angle?”
Vince tossed jalapeños into the mix. “That’s between Dina and me. If she wants to tell you, fine.”
Dina had told him he was a childhood friend.
“And before you give me your opinion, I don’t give a shit what you think. But know this. I will break your neck if you upset her. She’s been hurt enough.”
The anger in Vince’s voice, his protectiveness over Dina, gave Cole pause. They had history, not romance, or Vince would have punched him. “I respect that.”
Vince flinched. “You do? You’re not gonna give me shit?”
Everyone could use another champion. “Nope.”
The redness in Vince’s face subsided. “Okay.”
“Smells good. Chili?”
“Yep, my specialty. There’s beer in the fridge.”
Cole opted for water. “How long does buying coffee take?” A rhetorical question but he wanted Vince’s take.
Vince sipped the chili off a spoon. “Come again?”
“Dina called from a coffeehouse about an hour ago. There was so much background noise I didn’t catch a name.”
“Or phone number?”
Cole slid a hand across his forehead. For being above average intelligence, he sure wasn’t smart sometimes. “No, I didn’t. Somehow, I hit a button and deleted the call history.” A fact, he wished he didn’t have to admit.
Vince tensed. “Have you listened to the news?”
He hadn’t. All his free time was spent finalizing The Fold, and thinking about Dina.
“Women have been kidnapped.” Vince hurried into the family room, plopped down on the couch, and snatched Dina’s laptop off the coffee table. Within seconds, he bypassed the login screen. The browser page popped up.
Cole stood to the side, eyeing him. “What are you doing?”
“I’m checking the locations of coffeehouses between here and her dad’s. There’s one on Lexington she likes in particular. I can’t remember the address.”
“And you know this how?”
“Because I know Dina.”
He and Vince might fight after all. “How well?”
“Don’t get your briefs in a wad. She’s a sister to me.” Vince’s fingers punched the keys. A city map blinked on the screen.
“Honey, I’m home.” The door clicked shut. Monique strolled in, pecked Vince on the lips, and her green eyes scrutinized Cole. “Hi, Twenty-ten.”
Twenty-ten?
“Where’s Di?” Monique asked before Cole could comment.
“Dina stopped for coffee on her way home from talking to her dad,” Vince said, his voice strained. “An hour ago.”
Monique’s intake of breath chilled Cole to the bone.
The knot between his shoulder blades made a beeline for his chest. “What am I missing?”
“The tech guru hasn’t watched the news?” Vince shot Cole a how-dare-you glare, then faced the computer screen. “This is the one.”
“Somebody tell me what the hell is going on.” Cole’s patience wore thin.
Vince grabbed a lightweight jacket from the chair, tossed it to Cole, and tugged another one from his bag. “I’ll explain on the way.”
Monique disappeared out the door.
Stove off, Cole followed Vince out of the apartment and met a jacket-clothed Monique at the elevator.
“I’m worried. I’ve had a bad feeling all day,” Monique said, stepping into the elevator before him and Vince.
Cole shoved his hands in his pockets and looked under his brow at Monique. She had a bad feeling? The vise grip on his chest shifted into his heart.
“We’ll never find a taxi.” Vince ran a hand through his hair. “Shit!”
“I’ll take care of it. My driver is on standby.” Silo alternated hours on Saturdays with another driver. He checked for messages from Dina, found none, and dialed Silo, hoping he was the driver still on call. On the first ring, Silo answered, and Cole explained the circumstances and destination to a more than willing helpful employee.
“Here’s the deal,” Vince said when Cole ended the call. “Women…blondes, in particular, have been taken and sold to a sex ring.”
A wrecking ball couldn’t have hit him over the head any harder. His muscles tightened to the firmness of bricks, hands fisted, and jaw clenched. His initial instincts were dead on.
“She knew about the kidnappings,” Monique said. “Why would she not listen?”
“You can’t stop Dina from doing what she wants. The divorce made her obstinate,” Vince said.
The elevator dinged and the doors opened. The gloomy skies darkened the lobby.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Dunbar, Ms. Stone,” the doorman said when they approached and turned toward Vince. “I’m sorry, I haven’t had the pleasure.”
“Vince Carrington. Nice to meet you.”
“You too, sir.”
“We need to hurry,” Cole said, spotting the waiting limo.
“Excuse me, Mr. Dunbar. I didn’t mean to detain you.” The door opened, wind gushed inside, blowing his hair and jostling his clothes, rain slammed into his face and body.
“Not a problem.” Cole lifted his coat collar and dashed the short distance to the limo.
Vince and Monique followed. The wind blew the door shut behind them.
Water pooled on the floor and seats from their drenched clothes. He stared at the turbulent weather, thinking what Vince had said about not being able to stop Dina. Despite her determination to see her dad, he should have insisted he accompanied her.
“I hope she’s okay,” Monique said.
“Dina’s fine.” Vince slid an arm around her and kissed the top of her head, the concern etched into Vince’s features belied his comment.
Rain slammed against the windshield. The wipers worked fast but the rain blocked their view. The defroster blew out hot air, but it wasn’t enough. Silo continuously used a cloth to wipe the moisture on the inside of the window.
“Can you see?” Vince asked, lifting his chin from Monique’s head.
“Not very well. I have my hazard lights on, but I’m afraid people can’t see us. Sir, should I pull over?”
Cole hated to, but there was no choice. “As soon as you can find a place to park, yes.” He’d run to Lexington.
“Look!” Monique yelled, pointing to a large piece of metal flying toward them.
The worsening storm ratcheted up Cole’s level of worry and concern for Dina.
“Oh, no, sir!” Silo shouted a second before the sound of a freight train encroached.
A dark gray funnel, stretching from the sky to the ground, whirled between the skyscrapers toward them.