Love's Protector: A Maverick's Shield Novel (32 page)

Pierce glanced behind Jason and his three body guards came rushing at them but they paused when Alex pointed the two guns he had hidden in his waist band in their direction. “We only want answers from him. If he cooperates he won’t have any trouble out of us,” Alex said to the guards.

The guards didn’t seem to be fazed at all by Alex’s weapons because they charged at he and Jason anyway but Pierce called them off. “Don’t worry guys, I’ll cooperate.” He looked at Jason again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Where’s who?”

Jason pulled back the hammer of his gun causing it to click. “I’m not in the mood Harrington. I will shoot your ass if you don’t tell me where they took her even if it means your boys will shoot
me
!” The look on Pierce’s face told him that he truly must have had no idea what they were talking about. “If you honestly didn’t know that Amour was just kidnapped out of this house you’d better convince me of that or you’re a dead man!”

Pierce gave a look of surprise that quickly turned to worry. He threw his hands up. “I didn’t know she was gone, I swear! I thought she was with you!”

Alex looked over his shoulder. “Do you have any idea where someone here could’ve taken her?”

When he didn’t respond, Jason placed the barrel directly on Pierce’s forehead. “Answer the fucking question!”

“I don’t know!” Pierce said frantically.

Jason lowered his eyes and shoved the family photograph he’d taken off the mantel in Pierce’s face. “I think you do!” Pierce looked confused so Jason pointed to something in particular in the photo. “I’m sure you’ve noticed it on her so don’t play games with me Harrington. I had a tracking device on her but the signal went out somewhere downtown so if you know anything about where she could possibly be located now is the time to tell me!” He gritted his teeth. “I’m gonna ask you one more time, where is she?”

When Pierce closed his eyes and shook his head, Jason knew it had dawned on him exactly what was going on. “Oh god, please tell me this isn’t happening.” He looked up at Jason. “I own a meat packing plant on Industrial Street, it’s a long shot but I have a feeling they may have taken her there.”

“Where is it?” Pierce just stood there in shock remaining silent. Jason pressed his gun harder to his forehead. “Tell me where it is now!”

“Alright, I’ll show you. Just please take the gun off of me.”

“Not a chance. Now let’s go!”

* * *

Caroline looked at Amour with eyes filled with so much hate she could almost taste it. Pierce must have been a horrible father to her; either that or she was certifiable. God she hoped Jason would find the means to locate her.

Caroline leaned in closer to her and whispered in her ear. “I’m going to enjoy watching you die just like I did your mother”

Squeezing a little more fluid out of the syringe, she grabbed Amour’s arm and pointed the needle it its direction. Amour’s heart as well as her head started to pound even more than before. She had to distract her. Maybe if said something… “Angela wants to get rid of you! That’s why she’s making you do this!”

Caroline chuckled and then looked over her shoulder at Angela. “Do you hear this Aunt Angie?”

“She’s full of shit! Just kill her already!” Angela exclaimed.

Amour held her hand in front of her face causing the chain rattle. “No I’m not! She told Jason and me that all she wanted was your father. Did you even know that she’s sleeping with him?”

Caroline stood and faced Angela. “Is that true Aunt Angie?”

“Yes, but what difference does
that
make sweetheart? All that means is that when this is all over, I will be your mother. Wouldn’t you want that?” Caroline said nothing. “Caroline honey, finish the job.”

Caroline clearly had mental problems. What else could possibly be the cause of her sometimes child-like naiveté? Pierce and Beatrice must have
really
done a horrible job raising her. “Wait! Before you go through with this think about what you’re doing Caroline. You’re about to kill your own sister so that
she
can have what she wants. What about what
you
want? Do you really want to spend the next twenty years in jail for Angela? I very much doubt that she would do the same for you.”

Angela turned Caroline in her direction. “Stop listening to her stupid! Now do what I’ve told you to do!”

She looked down at the floor. “Stupid?”

“You’re not stupid Caroline!” Amore exclaimed. “You just need help that’s all.”

Angela grabbed Caroline by the arms. “If you don’t kill her then I’m going to do it myself! I should’ve known not to trust you again. You’ve already ruined my first plan all those years ago and now you’re about to ruin this one!”

The sound of the door opening startled them all. “And exactly what plan is that Angela?”

It was Pierce. Amour was surprised as well as very relieved to see Jason and Alex follow him in the door. She didn’t know how they managed to find her and she didn’t care, she was just glad they did. “Jason!”

“Are you okay baby?”

“Yes!”

Alex pointed his gun at Angela. “Drop it!” She did as she was told but he kept his gun on her.

Caroline ran to her father. “Daddy I’m sorry. I was just doing what Aunt Angie told me. Please don’t be mad at me.”

“I’ll deal with you later Caroline, right now I want to know what the hell is going on in here and why my daughter is chained to fucking wall!” He turned to Angela. “What the hell have you done now?”

“What you wanted me to do honey.”

He pointed to Amour. “
This
is not what I wanted you to do!”

“But I have to get rid of her. She knows too much, they all do!
I couldn’t let them expose you baby!” She clenched Pierce’s arm. “I even got rid of that bitch cop that was helping them out!”

Pierce’s expression turned sinister.
“You worthless piece of trash! I should’ve called it quits with you years ago!”

Angela smiled. “But you couldn’t because you love me.”

“No, I didn’t because you were still of some use to me. I figured if I made you co-owner of the lounge, you would keep your mouth shut and I would have control over you.”

Angela’s smile faded and her face became expressionless. “What are you talking about honey? With Beatrice in prison, you can finally divorce her and we can get married.”

She touched her hand on his face but he slapped it away. “Do you really think I would ever marry you Angela? You’re nothing but a skank and you’re nothing compared to Carly!”

Jason pushed Caroline over by Pierce and Angela. “Okay the three of you are gonna tell me exactly what the hell is going on here!” He gestured for Alex stand by his side and then the two of them pointed their guns in their direction. “Start talking.”

“I had nothing to do with this at all. This woman is crazy as you can see!” Pierce exclaimed.

“You lying bastard! How could you do this to me?” She turned to Jason. “He’s been lying to all of you. This was all
his
idea from the start!”

Pierce became so enraged that he back handed Angela hard across the face. “This is your fault you
cunt! All you had to do was hire the hit man to kill Ted and convince Beatrice to go to Carly’s house that day so she could be seen there! We could’ve framed her ass and everything would’ve been fine but instead, you had to go and screw everything up!”

Amour looked up in surprise. “You wanted to kill my father? Why?”

“Because he wanted that slut all to himself, that’s why,” Angela said.

Pierce got directly in her face. “She wasn’t a slut!”

“Yes she was and I’m glad she’s dead! Caroline obviously thought she was as well because she’s the one that killed her!”

“No I didn’t daddy!” Caroline yelled. Amour guessed that she’d just lied because he father was supposed to be unaware of that fact.

Pierce looked up at her. “There’s no need to lie to me sweetheart. I know truth now.” When Caroline’s eyes widened, he held her hand. “They found the bracelet that I had given you next to Carly’s body that day. It must’ve fallen off of your wrist. I had no I idea that you were involved in any of this until I noticed that Amour was wearing it when she came to my office. When she told me how she’d gotten it, I knew it was yours and that you’d been there that day. I hadn’t planned on any of this getting out but when Jason saw you wearing it in our family photo he figured it out so I had no choice but to admit to knowing about it.”

Caroline started to cry uncontrollably. “Angela told me to!”She grabbed her father’s arm. “She said that Carly was going to take you away from me and you were going to send me to that awful hospital with all those crazy people again.” She looked down at her feet. “I didn’t want Amour to take my place.”

Amour looked down at the bracelet on her wrist. “This is…Caroline’s?”

Angela laughed. “Yes it is. That “C” stands for Caroline honey, not
Carly.” She looked at Pierce. “And if it weren’t for me, your precious daughter would be in prison.”

Pierce back handed Angela again, this time so hard that she nearly fell to the floor.
“You stupid bitch! If it weren’t for you, I would still have Carly and Ted would be six feet under! And now I’m finding out that not only did you have Carly killed, you convince my daughter to do it?” He slapped her again, this time even harder than the two times before. “Are you out of you fucking mind?”

Amour frowned. “Why would you want my father dead? He’s never done anything to any of you!”

Pierce never took his eyes off of Angela. “He took Carly away from me, that’s what he did. If this bitch would’ve just stuck to the plan he would be dead, Carly would be alive and in my bed, my old hag prude of a wife would be behind bars, I wouldn’t have lost my daughter and my life would be perfect!”

So the plan was to kill her father and set Beatrice up for it? Amour could feel the tears start to form in her eyes. She tried to push them back but failed miserably. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She didn’t know how much more of this she could take.

Alex shook his head. “Okay I’m a little confused, if the original plan was to kill Ted, then why was Carly the one that ended up dead?”

Pierce shot Angela a mean look.
“Because this bitch was too stupid to follow simple instructions! Carly was supposed to be the one to take Amour to the park that day but I guess Ted decided to take her instead. She was supposed to postpone our plan until the next day but she decided to defy me.” He gritted his teeth. “I should’ve killed you years ago!”

Angela wiped some of the blood off her nose. “I hate you, you son of a bitch! Carly would’ve hurt you; she had to go because I need you! I can’t believe you’re saying all of this after everything I’ve done for you!”

“You haven’t done anything for me but give me damn good blow job you whore! Do you have any idea what covering this whole thing up for all these years has cost me?” He frowned. “Do you bitch? I’m still paying off Westfield and Riley thousands of dollars to keep their damn mouths shut about fabricating their police report as well as staging Carly’s death to look like a robbery!”

“A robbery?”
Jason asked. “I thought she was supposed to have had a heart attack.”

“She was, at least that was the original plan but when the M.E. said that she had heart failure I no longer needed to use that. I assumed that I was just lucky.”

“What I don’t understand is if you loved Carly so much, then why didn’t you still set Beatrice up for her murder somehow? Why did you let her go free?”

“Believe me, I wanted to but Beatrice being connected to Carly’s death would’ve brought too much suspicion to my family because she was my campaign manager at the time and constantly being seen with me in public. Ted however would’ve been easily forgotten. I had no idea Caroline had anything to do with her death until now but my wife being charged would have caused an investigation and would have most likely led back to our affair and our child.” He looked at Amour. “I couldn’t have that.”

“Oh that’s right.” Jason said. “You had a
reputation
to uphold.”

“Hey, politics was my life. I knew that I would miss Carly dearly but her death wasn’t worth me losing everything I’ve worked for. I thought all these years that Carly’s killer was the person that Angela was supposed to hire. If I’d known she’d involved my daughter in this I would’ve gotten rid of her back then. Instead, I bribed her to keep her mouth shut about all of this and all my infidelities by making her co-owner of the Eleganti Lounge.”

“You own the Eleganti?” Jason asked.

“I sure do, and all of the prostitutes that worked out of there. Angela’s the one that kept the books and she also knew about my, need to indulge in a working girl or two.” Pierce shrugged. “I had to keep her quiet somehow.”

More tears ran down Amour’s face as she heard her mother’s worth being reduced to nothing. She didn’t think that she could hate three people more than she hated them now. Part of her, perhaps a huge part just wished that Jason and Alex would blow all three of their brains out. She looked up at Pierce in disgust. “But…When Jason questioned one of the men that were after me he told him that Beatrice had hired him to do it. If she had nothing to do with any of this, why would he accuse her?”