Eyes Only (11 page)

Five minutes later, Jack yelled, “Coming through. And Abner is here!” He saw it all in a nanosecond: Isabelle sat up straighter, and the girls all focused on her as Alexis nudged her slightly, probably as a reminder to do whatever they had told her to do. If he saw it all, then dumb-ass Abner should have seen it, too.

Jack sucked in a deep breath just as Abner said, “Lookin' good, Izz,” as his long legs carried him across the room and up the two steps to the dais like he belonged. Jack wanted to hug him. Especially when he saw the stunned looks of surprise on all the women's faces. Evidently, Abner saw the same looks, because he was grinning from ear to ear.

“Score one for the Gipper,” Jack muttered under his breath. He turned to see his wife glaring at him. Ooh, this wasn't over. Somehow, someway, those women were going to make him pay for this one up for the man that he'd just pulled off.

Sensing the tension in the room, Myra took control of the meeting, which hadn't really been a meeting thus far, but a gabfest. “Time to get back to work here, boys and girls. Let's review your assignments and get this show on the road. When we step onto that plane for Spyder Island, I want us all on the same page. Who wants to go first?”

Dennis raised his hand. “I should. I think. If Annie's last interview will be the lead story in tomorrow's paper, then we need to get it started right now. Espinosa is going to be taking pictures.” He looked at Annie and demanded, “Where's your tiara?”

“At home, in my jewelry box. I suppose you're going to tell me we need to go there so I can gussy up.”

Dennis nodded as Espinosa gathered up his gear.

“Okay, that's working for everyone. Next!” Myra said.

Alexis raised her hand. “I'm trying to get my red bag of tricks filled. Charles . . . um . . . used to do that. It's going to take me the rest of the day to get up to snuff. There's no way I'm going to Spyder Island without my bag.” To make her point, she whipped out a list that was as long as her arm. “I don't even know if I'm going to be able to get everything I need by overnight delivery. And before any of you ask, no, you can't help me. This is something I have to do myself.”

“Duly noted, dear,” Myra said generously as she recalled how many times Alexis had saved the day with her red bag of tricks.

Nikki raised her hand. “I'm on Jellicoe. Jack is with me on this. I have a few avenues I want to explore, and Jack can help because he was there at the end.”

Maggie went next. “I, along with Ted, am on Gretchen Spyder. Something has been nagging at me, but I can't put my finger on it. We're going to try to get a fix on her from the day she dropped out of the womb. There has to be someone, somewhere, who can help us out here. When it comes right down to it, we really don't know anything about her except for her college years.”

“All right, dear. That works. Kathryn?”

“I'm on the wife and mother with Yoko. She wasn't hatched from an egg. Somewhere there is a record of where she came from. We need Abner to point us in the right direction.”

Myra nodded.

All eyes turned to Isabelle. In a firm but steady voice, Isabelle said loud enough for Abner to hear, “I thought maybe I could help Abner, if he wants some extra help.”

“Sure,” Abner bellowed from the dais, where he was busy clicking away at one of the computers.

“And they lived happily ever after,” Jack muttered under his breath.

“Guess I'm odd man out,” Harry said.

“Oh, no, dear. I am assigning you to Avery Snowden. If he gives you any trouble, you have my permission to . . . um . . . take him out,” Myra said.

Harry grinned his special evil grin. He loved to torment Avery Snowden, and here he was, actually being given permission to take his sorry ass out. He could do that blindfolded with his hands tied behind his back. Oh, life was looking better and better.

“What are you going to do, Myra?” Nikki asked.

“I am going to get in touch with Mr. Sparrow. Then I am going to call Mr. Snowden to arrange a phone call with the Domingos. My intuition is telling me that the wife knows something about Gretchen Spyder. I'm not saying she deliberately withheld anything, but I think she might know something and not even realize she knows it, because she didn't think it was important at the time. One woman to another, one mother to another mother, might bring us some bit of news. It's just a thought but worth playing out at the moment.

“Do any of you have any questions? No. All right, then, let's get to work. We have less than forty-eight hours till we leave for Spyder Island. And don't forget, Stephen Wolansky, the baby daddy, will be arriving shortly. Let's get to it, boys and girls.”

Chapter 10

T
he young woman in the wheelchair turned her head when she heard her name being called. She knew she should smile or at least make the effort to smile, but that was precisely the problem. It took effort—a great deal of effort. Why couldn't everyone just leave her alone? She'd come out here to the garden to be by herself so she could read the book in her lap. She'd been reading the same book for over a year now, and if pressed, she couldn't give the name of the book or the author's name if her life depended on it. Once upon a time she had loved to read, had always had her nose in a book. Because . . . by reading she could escape into a make-believe world. Anything, anything at all, was better than the real world in which she lived, then as well as now.

“Good morning, Mother,” Gretchen Spyder mumbled. “Do you want something?” How cold that sounded. Like she cared.

“Yes, I do want something, Gretchen. I want my daughter.”

“You sure have a funny way of showing up and asking for strange things. Unless you are blind, I am right in front of your eyes. Did
he
send you out here? Of course he did. Such a stupid question. You never have a thought, an action of your own, just
his.
You're like a puppet on a string that he jerks when it suits
him.
I wish you'd stop pretending, Mother. I wouldn't put it past you to be wired for sound. Or maybe the bushes and flowers are wired so
he
can hear our conversation. Meaning, of course, that you are merely doing what
he
told you to do. After all, you never do anything else.”

Felicia Spyder's eyes narrowed slightly as she stared at her beautiful daughter. “You're talking nonsense, Gretchen. Your father didn't send me out here to talk to you. I came out here because I thought we should talk.”

“Nonsense? Don't you mean bullshit, Mother? Stop referring to your husband as my father. He's a sperm donor. He's never been a father to me, just like you've never been a mother to me. Ooh, did that little barb hit home, Mommie Dearest?”

“I hate it when you talk like that, Gretchen. There's no need to be vulgar. You were raised better than that.”

“Cut the crap, Mother. I'm not buying into that garbage any more now than I did when I was growing up in this hellacious place. You want to talk! Okay, let's talk. Get me the hell off this frigging island and back to Miami, where I can get that operation that will allow me to walk again. Can you do that for me, for your daughter, who you profess to love and adore? Or won't you do it, because you fear that monster you married the way I fear him? Which is it, Mother?”

“Gretchen . . .”

“Don't you ‘Gretchen' me, you worthless piece of crud. And I sure as hell don't want to hear the story again about how that monster pulled you out of the gutter when you were just a wee lass of thirteen and saved your life back in Russia. I'd rather hear about Goldilocks and the Three Bears, or Rumpelstiltskin, if you are going to tell fairy tales. Why won't you admit you're nothing but his slave, his whore? Surely you know about all those women who come here in the middle of the night to service him. He's a pig. He's the ugliest man in the world on the outside, and even uglier on the inside. All the money in the world can't change that. He's still a pig.”

Gretchen laughed then, an unholy sound that reverberated around the garden, when she saw her mother look around fearfully to see if anyone had heard her outburst.

In the blink of an eye, Gretchen pressed the controls on her wheelchair and swung it around till she was facing her mother. As always, she was stunned at her mother's beauty, at her fashion sense, at how impeccably made up she always was. And she smelled like the very garden she was sitting in.

“Tell you what, Mommie Dearest. Go to that pig and ask him if you and I can go on a mother-daughter trip. Pick a place. Or let the pig pick a place. What do you think the son of a bitch will say?”

“Gretchen . . .”

“Go back to the house, Mother. Isn't it time for you to change your clothes? You do that three times a day because that's one of his rules. Just like he tells you what to eat and when to eat it. All those designer clothes, all those jewels wasted on the servants and
him.
Oh, and
his
goon squad. I've seen them ogling you.
He
gets a perverse sense of pleasure out of that. Then again, maybe you like it. Someone appreciating your fashion sense, your beauty.”

Felicia got up from the spindly little outdoor chair she had been sitting on. She looked down at the wrinkles in her linen dress. That would never do. Gretchen was right; she needed to change her clothes before Angus saw the wrinkles.

There were tears in her eyes when she bent over to peck her daughter on the cheek. She whispered in her ear. “If there were a way to get us both off this island, I would snatch it. It's all I think about, dream about. I'm not giving up, and I don't want you to give up, either. I think I might have a plan. When you feel like it, go online and read about the person who is coming to the island any day now. Let your imagination run wild.”

Gretchen soaked up the words like a sponge. It was a game the two of them played, each playing her part to the hilt, with the exception of the whispered words at the end of each meeting.

Gretchen continued in her playacting role. She pressed the controls on the wheelchair and spun around so fast, she almost knocked her mother over. She laughed. “Sorry, Mummy. I don't need to hear you tell me how much you love me, and I sure as hell don't need you to tell me to honor and respect that pig who sired me. Go on. Run back and change your clothes and report in to that sperm-donor pig. Now that you've managed to ruin what looked to be a promising day, I think I'll go play on the computer to while away my hours until it's time for my leg therapy.”

Felicia Spyder dabbed at her eyes with a lace-edged hankie that probably cost more than the cook's weekly salary. She ran as fast as her Louboutins could carry her back to the mansion where she lived. She immediately corrected the thought. Where she
existed.

She hadn't lied to her daughter. She did have a plan. It wasn't exactly a plan, but something close to a plan. If she could just make it work, all her prayers for herself and her daughter would be answered.

A man literally stepped out of the bushes, startling Felicia. “Are you all right, ma'am? Is something wrong?”

Felicia looked up at the man whom she thought of as the warden of Spyder Island. She supposed he was an attractive man and would appeal to certain women, with his hard-muscled body, his high and tight snow-white hair, and his bronzed skin. He carried a gun in a shoulder holster and made no effort to hide it. She knew for a fact he also wore a gun strapped to his ankle. All the guards carried guns and rifles. He gave her the creeps the way he watched her. He was her husband's number one man. If she so much as burped, the man would inform her husband. She didn't know whom she hated more, the man standing next to her or her husband. She knew she had to keep playing the game, because this man had eyes that saw everything.

“I'm fine. Thank you, Mr. Jellicoe. No matter how many times I see my daughter in that wheelchair, it still upsets me. Now, if you'll excuse me.”

Hank Jellicoe stepped aside, his demeanor respectful. His eyes told a different story. “I understand that, ma'am.”

Almost immediately, the watch on his wrist buzzed. He was being summoned by the man himself. Jellicoe clenched his teeth as he walked down the path that would take him to the annex at the rear of the vast property, where Angus Spyder had a suite of offices. He hated Angus Spyder, but he was indebted to him, and if nothing else, he did have his own code of ethics and was loyal. To a point. And Spyder paid him so well, he was a millionaire a hundred times over.

Trouble was brewing. He could sense it, smell it. The big question now was, was Angus Spyder picking up on his apprehension?

Hank Jellicoe took a deep breath, held it, then let it out with a loud
swoosh
of sound. He knocked on the stout mahogany door, which even a rocket launcher couldn't penetrate, and waited. He'd learned early on never to take liberties where his employer was concerned. You knocked. If there was no answer, you walked away. Under no circumstances did you
ever
open a door unless you were invited to open it.

As always when he was in the man's presence, he felt intimidated. The only man in the entire universe who could actually intimidate him, and the man knew it and played on it. One of the wealthiest men in the world and also the ugliest. He was a short man and was shaped like a barrel. God had not been kind when he fashioned his face. It was flat like a shovel. His hair was thick like a bush, kinky yet greasy at the same time. His colorless eyes were deeply set over a forehead that looked like a shelf. His nose was red-veined and bulbous, and his lips were large and blubbery. His teeth were pointy like a dog's. One ear was oversize; the other undersized. A scary-looking individual, to Jellicoe's way of thinking. No way could he comprehend the fact that Felicia had married him, then produced beautiful Gretchen. Both were trophies to Angus Spyder, and he loved nothing more than to show them off.

Spyder favored colorful island wear, Bermuda shorts and flowered button-down shirts. Jellicoe knew for a fact that the man had a closetful of one-of-a-kind Armani and Hugo Boss suits, which he hauled out for special occasions.

“What do you have for me, Hank?”

“Nothing, sir. They were the way they always are. Your wife trying to be nice and your daughter rejecting her pleasantries. All they did was snap and snarl at one another. They acted the same way yesterday and the day before yesterday. Nothing has changed in their relationship.”

Spyder nodded, his beady little eyes taking the measure of the man standing in front of him. Whatever he saw satisfied him. He moved on. “Did you read the papers online this morning?”

“I did, sir, and I guess it wasn't a rumor, after all. Countess de Silva will be arriving any day now. With her entourage.”

“Were you able to place the listening devices in her home?”

“Of course. In every room and the garages, too. Also the pool house. Nothing has been overlooked.”

“All right then,” Spyder said, waving his short, stubby arm, which meant Jellicoe was dismissed. “Oh, one more thing, Mr. Jellicoe. My patience is wearing thin in regards to my grandchildren. You promised results. To date, there have been none. People simply do not disappear into thin air, especially people like the Domingos, dragging along two children. When can I expect some results?”

“Mr. Spyder, we have our best people on it. The family has gone to ground. It is that simple. What that means is they had to have had help from somewhere. The only thing that comes to mind is that a government agency has them under protection. How that happened, if it happened, I can't explain. We are working night and day on it. Sooner or later, we'll catch a break. We always do. Mistakes happen even with the best-laid plans.”

“That isn't good enough, Mr. Jellicoe. I want those children. They belong to me. They carry my bloodline. Do I make myself clear?”

“As crystal, Mr. Spyder.” The head of security turned on his heel with an offhand wave of his own and left the office. Outside, out of view of the man himself, Jellicoe's shoulders sagged. Christ, how he hated the man behind the door. If there was a way to gut the man from his throat to his groin, he'd do it in a heartbeat.

As always, when he left the man's presence, he had these thoughts, and the memories came rushing back. When he'd gotten away from the vigilantes, he'd headed straight here, believing that Angus Spyder would keep him safe. And he had. But he'd had to give up something for the promise of safety. The something that earned Spyder billions of dollars. And he'd just handed it over like it was nothing. But Spyder had hired him to keep the island secure, and he had upheld his end of the bargain. And because of that crazy-ass inbred loyalty, he'd accepted the man's offer. The way he looked at it at the time, his life was worth more to him than what he had been forced to give up. Loyalty to an insane man. How crazy was that? “Pretty damn crazy,” he muttered to himself as he squared his shoulders and marched off.

Jellicoe made his rounds, spoke with several of his top people. Satisfied that all was well, he headed home to make himself some lunch. He needed to think and think hard. Trouble was brewing. He'd honed his gut instincts till they were razor-sharp, and his gut was screaming loudly to tread softly but carry a big stick.

Inside the mansion where he lived, Jellicoe headed straight to what he called his monitoring room. He checked to see what Gretchen was doing. As always, playing on the computer. The mother was changing her earrings and spraying herself with perfume. A daily ritual that her husband demanded. All these years of doing the same thing over and over again had made her movements robotic. He wished he knew the real story behind the married couple. And there was a story. Sooner or later . . .

Jellicoe headed for the kitchen, where he made himself a ham sandwich on rye bread, which he washed down with two ice-cold bottles of beer. One of his rules, a rule that he broke every single day, was no drinking on duty. Well, for Christ's sake, he was on duty twenty-four hours a day, so the rule simply did not apply to him.

The laptop computer on the kitchen table beckoned to him. None of Spyder's lapdogs could even come close to figuring out how this particular computer worked, nor would they ever figure it out. On the surface it looked just like any other laptop. But there were layers upon layers of firewalls, installed by some of the most brilliant minds in the world. It held his life, the key to his life, the key to his future. Right out in plain sight on his kitchen table, which was cluttered with reports, food wrappers, crumbs, and an ashtray full of cigarette butts. He let loose with a bitter laugh. His future. What a laugh that was. Unless . . .