Found Wanting (15 page)

"All right," he said. "You know I've had detectives looking for them all along. Well, a couple weeks ago, I hired a new guy, and it paid off. He found them. But instead of telling me where they were, the son of a bitch hatched a plan to take me for an extra fifty grand. He kidnapped the kid and told me he'd kill him if I didn't pay the ransom. Of course, I paid. I wasn't about to take any chances with my son's life."

He was lying. She was sure of it. But damned if she could see the deception in his expression. Even with his back to her, he kept his game face firmly in place.

"We have to let Alaina know he's okay," she said.

He faced her, indignation artfully replacing his distress. "Why? We haven't heard from her in fourteen years. She hasn't once let us know a damn thing about my son, and she never bothered to tell him a fucking thing about me. Can you believe that?" He shook his head. "It's our turn now, Addy. She lost him, and now he's ours. Like he was supposed to be all along. Remember? That judge gave him to us, not to her."

She couldn't argue with him. Not without making him suspicious. Forcing herself to relax her shoulders, she said, "You're right." She turned her back as unexpected tears flooded her eyes. Her chest ached for her sister, for the father who'd been shot in his own home by her husband's thugs. Guilt mixed with the sorrow. Maybe if she hadn't been a blind idiot so long ago ...

Layton's fingers settled on her shoulders again, kneaded. "Don't cry, honey. It'll be okay. I know it's messed up right now, but we'll make a good home for him." He chuckled. "Did you see his holey jeans? That earring? What kind of mother was she to let him dress like that?"

Her heart seized up at his use of past tense. "Was?"

"Yes, was. You're his mother now, Addy. And I'm his dad. He's the luckiest kid on the planet."

Chapter 13

Alaina woke, knowing instantly where she was and why. What she didn't know was how long she had been asleep or what had awakened her. Had Mitch returned? She lay still and listened, hearing only the hum of the room's heater and the traffic of a busy street.

The clock beside the bed told her she'd slept for half an hour, yet it seemed hours had passed. Would Mitch come back tonight or wait until morning?

Sitting up, she gingerly rotated her shoulder as much as the cuffs allowed, trying to work some of the soreness out. It probably should have been iced and stabilized in some way to prevent further injury, but she didn't know how to accomplish that, especially while shackled to a bed.

Her stomach growled, and she realized that, having skipped lunch at work, she had not eaten since breakfast, some twelve hours before. No wonder her arms felt leaden.

She worked the cuffs anyway, alternately trying to slip the manacle over her hand, then checking each and every chain link for a weak one. When that didn't work, she inspected the contents of the drawer in the bedside table for the second time that night, hoping against hope she'd find a stray paperclip to try to pick the lock.

She was sitting there, propped against pillows and staring at the steel encircling her bruised wrist when the door slammed inward and a man she didn't recognize sauntered in.

He had a gun in his hand and a grin on his face.

* * *

Mitch sat in his car in the hotel parking lot, tapping the heel of his hand against the steering wheel. A paper bag of burgers and fries sat on the seat next to him. The greasy smell turned his stomach, even though it had been more than eight hours since his last meal. He wished like hell it were the next day and that his captive was on the PCware corporate jet, en route to the feds. His job would be done, just as Keller had said.

The good guy would win. Just as it should be.

Then why did it all feel so wrong?

He rubbed at his temples, where a headache was taking root. He considered calling Julia. He needed someone objective to talk to. But, he reminded himself, his partner wasn't objective. She had given Alaina the benefit of the doubt from the start, advising him against taking this job. Julia had warned him that it would become personal, and, dammit, she'd been right. He didn't think hearing her gloat would help, so he nixed the urge to call. Instead, he tried to sort it out, despite the ache in his head.

It bothered him that Keller had obviously had him followed. It bothered him more that Keller may have sent henchmen with guns to the Maxwell home to collect Jonah. Mitch kept seeing that bloodstain, evidence that an innocent man had been shot. His teenage son had been hurt, too. It didn't make sense. If the thugs had guns, why harm innocent people? Why didn't they just take what they came for -- Jonah -- and move on? Unless Grant Maxwell had indeed tried to protect Jonah and got shot in the process.

There certainly seemed to be no doubt in Alaina's mind that people who worked for Keller were responsible.

She's paranoid, Mitch told himself.

But he'd dealt with his share of paranoid people, and she didn't fit the bill. He'd also dealt with terrified people. That bill she fit. Which begged the question: Why, now that Jonah was on his way to his father, hadn't she bargained with Mitch to let her go? She'd done just the opposite, adamant that they go to D.C. right then, apparently giving no thought to the consequences to herself. She faced being imprisoned. Yet her only thought was her son.

Mitch remembered leaning over her after she'd been hit by the car. She hadn't just begged him to help her. She'd begged him to help her up, determined to get to Jonah, no matter the cost to her own health. That determination had carried her out of the hospital and to the Maxwells' when she'd been barely able to walk, had sustained her on her mad dash from the hotel to her home and to the airport, had compelled her to try more than once to overpower him, a man nearly twice her size and God knew how many times stronger.

Dammit, he respected her for that. She wasn't giving up, even when she didn't stand a Popsicle's chance in Florida. He wished he'd had her fortitude when Shirley had taken their son and moved out of the state. But he'd been too busy being angry at the world for dealing him a pair of twos when he desperately needed a full house. Maybe if he'd fought harder ... hell, at all ... ah, what was the use? It was done. He'd folded and walked away a sore loser years ago, and now another man was raising his son. There wasn't a damn thing he could do about it now.

Grabbing the bag of fast food, Mitch got out of the car. He lectured himself as he walked through the parking lot to the room: Do the job, collect the check, move on. So simple it was absurd. From here on in, it was the easiest money ever.

He slipped the key card into its slot, heard the latch slide open --

"Gun!"

"Bitch!"

Mitch, dropping back against the outside wall, heard the sharp crack of flesh against flesh. The fast-food bag fell to the floor as he seized his gun from the holster under his arm. He strained to hear over the blood roaring in his ears. Silence.

"Alaina?"

"Get in here or the bitch buys it. I'm not shitting you, man."

The voice was male and low, coming from somewhere in the middle of the room. Mitch imagined the guy crouching between the two double beds, using the one closest to the door as a shield. His gut lurched as he recalled that that was the bed he'd handcuffed Alaina to. Not only was she helpless in there, unable to defend herself because he'd shackled her, but she also was between him and the intruder, making it impossible for Mitch to get off a clean shot without the risk of hitting her.

"All right," Mitch said, slipping his gun into the waistband at the small of his back. "All right. I'm not armed."

"Yeah, right. Toss your piece in here before you wander in, tough guy."

Well, it had been worth a shot, Mitch thought, as he pitched his gun through the open door.

"The piece strapped to your ankle, too. Make it quick."

Swearing under his breath, Mitch slid the smaller handgun out of its sheath and chucked it into the room.

"Good. Now, keep your hands up," the guy said. "And no fast moves. I'm pointing my gun right at her face. Anything stupid from you, and she's a freak show."

Mitch eased around the door, hands raised, keeping his gaze steady on the intruder.

The man was huge, easily six inches taller than him and probably a hundred pounds heavier. His bulk was clad entirely in black. Even his eyes looked black. His square head was shaved, his neck as thick as a football player's. He held the gun on Alaina with authority, his free hand bracing the forearm of his gun hand, his feet set wide. A professional.

"Close the door."

Mitch kicked it shut, keeping his gaze above Alaina's head. But he heard her uneven breathing, sensed fear in her stillness.

The hit man relaxed a little. "That's better."

"Who're you looking for?" Mitch asked.

"Who does it look like?"

"I'd hate for you to make a mistake."

The guy chuckled. "Do I look like the kind of guy who makes mistakes?"

Mitch tried another angle. "Who do you work for?"

"I hate to cut you off, buddy, but small talk ain't my --"

The pillow hit the thug square in the face. Mitch leaped across the bed, slamming into the man's middle and landing on top of him on the other bed. The hit man shoved him away, taking a swing at him and missing. Mitch rolled off the end of the bed, grabbed the heavy wooden desk chair and swung it up like a golf club, catching the guy under the chin.

The man's head snapped back, and for a moment, he seemed unaffected. Then he toppled over backward, unconscious.

"Nice shot," Alaina said.

Bending over, Mitch braced his hands on his knees to catch his breath. He'd thought they were both dead. "What the hell was that?" he demanded. "The pillow defense? It was stupid."

"Maybe you hadn't noticed, but he was going to shoot us. Somebody had to do something."

He looked at her finally, angry that she hadn't just let him handle it. "I don't suppose you noticed that he's bigger than I am. He could have snapped me in two --" He broke off, narrowing his eyes. "What the hell?"

She blinked, raising a hand to her face at the same time that he moved closer. As he remembered the sharp report of flesh on flesh, it registered that the dark smear across her jaw was blood. He caught her wrist before she could touch it, his fury drowning in a flood of guilt. "Don't," he said under his breath.

Without another word, he went into the bathroom and wet a towel. She'd paid for the warning she'd shouted before he could walk, unsuspecting, into the room and a loaded gun. She could have just let him come, let the beefcake kill him, then try to strike a deal with the bad guy. But she had warned him, the man who had cuffed her to a bed, the one who'd terrorized her. The one who worked for her mortal enemy.

And what had he done? He'd just stood there waiting for the goon to make the next move. If Alaina hadn't taken matters into her own hands, they'd both probably be dead by now.

As he wrung out the towel, he avoided looking at himself in the mirror.

Returning to the bed, where she watched him with puzzled eyes, he sat beside her and gently wiped away the blood, relieved to see only a shallow cut along her jaw line. Glancing at the unconscious brute, he noted the onyx ring on his left ring finger. The bastard had backhanded her. Mitch fought the urge to pummel the guy.