Miss Impractical Pants (47 page)

Like an overheated thermometer, the color ran rapidly, starting from her toes, up the stem of her body, and nearly exploded out her ears.

Lucas, tugging off the underwear, struggled to avert his eyes.

“What are you doing?” she hissed vehemently, retrieving the towel and bunching it front of her naked body. “Get out!”

“I was concerned.” Lucas fought to contain his laugh.

“Well, be concerned outside!”

“What on earth were you doing?” A chuckle escaped him and she scowled, provoking a medley of unrestrained laughs.

“Get out!” she ordered again, marching carefully up to him and snatching her panties from his grasp. One-handed, she pushed him toward the door.

Not even trying to check his laughter, he didn’t budge. “What’s the big deal? It’s not like I haven’t seen you…well…like…well, naked before.”

“Not my
cooter
!” she exploded. “You’ve never seen my
down there
before!”

Clenching his eyes, he pressed his lips together until they began to turn white. She knew he was about to explode.

She pushed with all her aggravated might against his solid unmovable frame before punching his arm and
retreating
a couple of steps in defeat.

“Wait a second. I brought you something.” He wiped the tears from his eyes. “I thought you could use this.” He had crumpled in his hand a giant flannel nightshirt for her and the matching bottoms for
him. “Stanley says we can keep them,” he chortled, shaking the wrinkles out of the clothes.

They did a do-
si
-do around each other, Katie trying to protect the sanctity of her bare bottom as he pushed his way toward the shower.

“So what’s with the high-flying knickers?” he inquired jovially, stepping into the shower, pulling the curtain closed across him, and tossing his man-pris over the rod.

“I was trying to get them to dry. I didn’t want to put on reasty panties, so I washed them,” she sniffed, indignant.

The water discouraging further conversation, she fastened her bra and pulled Stanley’s tent of a nightshirt over her head. Bidding farewell to her favorite striped pajamas, she shoved them into the wastebasket and let herself be slightly mollified as she began patting her underwear dry with Lucas’s towel.

***

Katie padded timidly up the stairs behind Lucas and was surprised at the small group gathered in the large sitting room, sparse with ragged furniture. A worn-looking middle-aged woman had her short grey hair pulled into a tight ponytail as she labored over some kind of sewing project.

“This is my sister, Kata,” Stanley introduced with big gestures as he welcomed the couple. He spoke something to Kata in his native language. She raised her head and gave them a weary, if not curt, nod,
then
returned to her task.

“Of course you know Marko, my grandnephew.” The boy raced over and hugged them both around the waist, his short arms barely reaching across the combined breadth of their bodies.

Stanley escorted them across the room to meet a fragile, pale-faced girl of about twenty. She was lying under a bundle of blankets on an old, torn couch that was lopsided from a couple of missing feet. “This is my niece, Indira. She speaks only a little bit of English…her schooling has been cut short by her health.” His voice dropped as he continued, tainted by a note of impatience.
“And Janek, who you know.”

Janek could barely look at them.

“Please, please have a seat.” Stanley gestured to the floor. “I’m sorry, but we haven’t got much furniture,” he admitted with embarrassment. “I’m not the same Stanley you knew in America. Here I have nothing fancy, except this television.” His eyes beamed at the fifty-two-inch flat-screen. “It’s our one indulgence.” He smiled and winked tenderly at Indira, who was self-consciously adjusting the scarf around her bald head.

“The floor will do just fine,” Lucas assured.

The girl spoke something in a feeble whisper to Stanley, causing her pasty cheeks to burn red.

“
Indira
would like to know if you would allow her to comb your hair,” Stanley asked Katie.

“I would like that very much,” Katie responded, giving the young woman her warmest smile.

Indira
fussed over Katie’s hair with a reverence that made Katie’s heart ache. She untangled the ratty strands, making long gentle strokes with a comb, stretching the hair out to its fullest lengths. Braiding and unbraiding, twisting, knotting, and ponytailing, Indira was absorbed with an energy that obviously pleased her uncle Stanley. Lucas sat next to Katie, lightly running a tickle-rub combination with
the pads of his fingers over her bare leg, as Marko nestled into her lap. Janek lounged, favoring his injured shoulder in a broken
recliner,
Kata was intent on her sewing, and Stanley channel-surfed through the stations of his one remaining material possession.

From hostage to houseguest in just a short time, Katie felt the situation was a little too cozy after all she had experienced.

The unperturbed atmosphere only lasted a few minutes before Stanley’s channel surfing landed on the BBC news, causing everyone in the room to gawk, horror-struck, at the broadcast. Plastering the screen in high definition was a color photo of a haggard and bloody Lucas carrying a lifeless and bloody Katie from behind the hay bales in Stanley’s pasture.

As the anchor read the news of Lucas and Katie’s abduction, an eerie chill delivered the disquieting realization that they had been stalked—and probably still were being watched, even at that very moment.

How else could that photo be explained?

“We have a bit of good news!” Lord Waverly announced to the weary group. Lottie, Lady Waverly, and Mrs. Albright put down their bridge game and joined the circle of men who’d gathered on various sofas and chairs to pass the anxious time by napping—or trying to.

“Someone has issued the photo to the press!” He snatched up the remote and turned on the television. The family grimaced as he kept clicking the remote and the photo flashed on half a dozen different channels.

“We hope the abductors have made a fatal error,” Lord Waverly continued. “As far we’re aware, other than the rebels themselves, we’re the only ones with access to that photo. Every news station from here to the United States is being questioned for their source. Also, the forensics team was able to trace the envelopes and paper delivered to us by the terrorists back to a small paper mill outside London.”
 

“But Denny, how can the paper mill be helpful?” Lady Waverly spoke everyone’s confusion.

His face beamed with the excitement of progress. “The mill specializes in selling products to university and college bookstores in the greater London area. We now suspect the person who sent these letters is living as a student in London.”

“With all due respect, it still seems as though we’re searching for a needle in a haystack,” Sidney proclaimed.

“Perhaps.”
Lord Waverly was undaunted. “But we’ve had people searching for that needle round the clock. A list has been compiled of Bosnian students registered within the greater London
area. This—” he said, slicing an official-looking envelope through the air as though he were a knight wielding a powerful sword, “is a profile of the man from the hotel reception, Mensur. It has been nearly three months since he’s been seen in London.” Opening the envelope, he drew out the one-page profile on Mensur and laid it on the table.

“This is all they have?” Lady Waverly asked after skimming the two-paragraph summary on Mensur’s life.

“Not quite everything. I believe the profile states that he lost both his parents in the Bosnian war and that he has no known family. The investigation has turned up the possible existence of a half brother, which Mensur failed to mention on his university registration.”

The crowd halted their breath in unison, praying this would be the key piece of information in finding Lucas and Katie.

“If that is the case,” Lord Waverly continued, “then it is probable the half brother could be acting as the accomplice keeping us and the media informed, and could lead us straight to Mensur.”

“Even if it’s not the brother, whoever sent those letters would still be able to give us that information,” Andrew noted speculatively.

“So how do we find this person?” Mrs. Albright asked, growing a little taller as if preparing to knock on every door in London herself.

“DNA evidence has been gathered from the seals on the envelopes and tests are being run as we speak.” Lord Waverly relished for a long moment in the glory of being the giver of optimism before delivering his next piece of information. “But it will take several days at best to receive the test results, and then we must hope that the either the U.K. or the American DNA database can come up with a match.”

The buoy of optimism sprung a leak, hissing out a tangible frustration that weighted the room.

“Wait a minute, everybody,” Charles interjected. “This could be good news. If the terrorists are responsible for getting the information to the media, that means they are desperate to gain attention for their cause. As long as Lucas and Katie don’t do anything foolish, their lives are probably not in any immediate danger. It’s obvious Mensur—or whoever this man turns out to be—he and the others have been waiting for the perfect opportunity to carry this out. They’ll not want to end it too soon. That might allow time for the DNA results.”

There was only one possible flaw in Charles’s logic, which no one dared speak. As far as they knew, Katie—even Lucas—might already be dead.

“It’s more hope than we had five minutes ago.” Lottie gave the crowd a feeble smile and started toward the kitchen. “I’ll make us something nice for tea. Thank you, Lord Waverly—we are truly grateful for all you’re doing.”

“Wait! I have another bit of good news that I was saving for last.” Lord Waverly’s eyes sparked with renewed excitement.

“Secretary of State Harriett Clayton will be here to hold a press conference in front of the hotel.” Rewarded by the complete turn of Lottie’s countenance and the astonished expressions of his other listeners, he held up his arm to look at his watch. “If she’s running on time, she should be here at the house in just shy of two hours.”

“Here?
Here,
here?” Lottie pointed to the ground beneath her.

Lord Waverly nodded. “She’d like to have a quick assembly with the family before going in front of the cameras.”

Simultaneously, each woman self-consciously began patting at her hair, face, and outfit.

“For the love of Donald Trump’s hairpiece!”
Lottie exclaimed. “We’ve not much time to prepare! I’ve got to find something fabulous to wear!”

Everyone in the room turned to stare at her.

“Something that will also convey ‘grieving, doting mother,’” she assured them.

***

“We are not safe here,” Stanley announced after calling Lucas, Katie, and Janek downstairs for a private conference. “Janek, how many others are involved in this plot?”

Janek
shrugged his shoulders, wincing at the pain the motion caused. “I don’t know. I got known two other mans more in Croatia and maybe someone in London.”