The Perfect Couple (23 page)

Mrs. Hargraves gave the inside wall a thump to show her approval of Tiffany's obedience and moved on, but the bedridden Mrs. Floyd continued to watch Tiffany with interest. "There's nothing like being happily married,"

she said.

Tiffany shoved her cell phone in her pocket and smiled. "No."

"You're madly in love?"

"I'd rather die than live without Colin."

A faroff look entered the old lady's rheumy eyes. "I felt the same way about my Richard, God rest his soul."

The difference was that Tiffany meant it literally. And, because of Zoe, she was facing the worst threat of her life. She should never have taken 150

Sam. Colin wouldn't have gotten so swept away by their neighbor if she hadn't tried to cover up for one mistake with another.

Despite Mrs. Floyd's complaint that it had been over a week since they'd played pinochle, Tiffany excused herself and returned to the vending machine, where she bought two candy bars and ate them both.

When she arrived to meet him at the hospital, Zoe wore an attractive sleeveless blouse with a pair of jeans that accentuated her long limbs and slender figure. But she wasn't wearing her engagement ring. That wasn't a detail Jonathan wanted to notice, but the tan lines on her finger as she opened her car door told him its removal was as rare as it was recent. Why was it gone today?

As he finished his call putting off yet another client, he noticed several plastic garbage bags, all stuffed to capacity and stacked to the ceiling in her backseat. If they contained trash, it was an odd thing to put in a Lexus.

And if they didn't..."Everything okay?" he asked as she got out.

"Fine." With a nervous smile, she closed the door. "What's going on?"

She eyed the entrance under the covered drop-off area as if eager to draw his attention away from her vehicle. "Please tell me no one's seriously hurt.

Especially Sam."

She knew he would've told her if Sam was here, so he wasn't in a hurry to explain. Not when her clothing and personal possessions were piled in her car as if she'd hauled them out of Lucassi's house in a hurry.

"Someone's definitely hurt," he said. "But it's not Sam."

"Then why are we here?" Assuming an air of total absorption, she moved past him as though she expected him to follow, but he didn't budge.

Maybe he hadn't been able to find the leads he needed to figure out where Sam was. But it wasn't hard to guess what was going on with Zoe. In her passenger seat, he could see the sundress she'd worn yesterday draped over the bag he'd hefted around on their trip to L.A. There was also a blanket and pillow shoved down in the foot space.

"You moved out last night?"

When she turned, a pained expression rumpled her brow, but she shrugged. "As luck would have it, Anton and I aren't perfect for each other, after all."

He hoped to hell he hadn't caused the breakup with that little stunt he'd pulled in the hotel. "I could've told you that. But I'm still surprised by the sudden reversal."

"You could've told me that we weren't right for each other?"

It was his turn to shrug. "I don't like him."

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"Apparently everyone could see we were a mismatch but me," she grumbled.

Just yesterday, he'd wanted to kiss her, touch her. And he'd made it a point to show her that, whether she'd initially realized it or not, she wanted him, too. Now she was toting her belongings around as if she had nowhere to go.

Shit..."What happened?" he asked.

She studied him for a second, then apparently decided to be honest with him. "It had nothing to do with you, so don't stand there looking so guilty."

Nothing to do with him? That was hopeful. He was supposed to be helping her, not making her life more complicated. "Thanks for letting me off the hook, but I could use an explanation."

"There's not a lot to say. People change. Needs change. This came in a...moment of clarity."

His phone rang again, but he ignored it. It had been ringing all morning. His clients were going nuts, but none of them had more pressing business than finding Zoe's child. "Are you sure it's the type of decision you should be making now?"

"It was mutual, so not my decision alone. And I don't think there's any question as to whether it's the right one." Her gaze followed an SUV that turned in at the entrance and crept down a row of cars, searching for an open space. "The timing could've been better, of course," she added ruefully. "But the situation with Sam...It's brought out the worst in both of us, made us recognize that we're not very happy together."

"And the fact that we shared a hotel room didn't set him off--"

"It didn't even come up." She rubbed her palms on her jeans. "Please, don't worry about San Diego. I owe you an apology for putting you in such an awkward situation to begin with. I should've gotten my own room."

She was establishing some emotional distance, and he told himself he should be relieved. He had no business getting involved with her. But logic rarely curbed desire, and it didn't now. "I didn't mind sharing."

"I know." She cleared her throat. "Shall we go in?"

Not yet. He had more to say. "Nothing happened when we were together, Zoe. You said I didn't have anything to do with it, but if this breakup is your own guilty reaction to wanting me, you didn't act on--"

"It's not guilt. I have a history of picking the wrong guys, okay?" She motioned in a careless manner. "And this is yet another example. Breakups don't hurt that much anymore."

This was the first woman he'd wanted to make love with since 152

Sheridan, and she'd just told him she was too jaded to care. It was a warning sign--one he planned to take seriously. "Skye told me Anton's different from your usual, uh, love interests."

"He is. Which is why I forced it. But I found that a loveless relationship isn't much of an improvement over the kind I've had in the past.

Without love, there isn't enough depth to survive a major challenge."

"So you're okay with leaving him."

She hiked her purse up. "I won't find any peace until I have my daughter back, but...I'll survive the breakup. I've had plenty of practice in that area."

He lowered his voice. "Why didn't you call me?"

"Because you would've offered to put me up."

"Didn't you need a place to stay?" he asked with a glance at her car.

"That's too much to ask of you."

He gave her a skeptical frown.

"And...I would've agreed," she finished.

"What's wrong with one friend helping another?"

"You're not my friend. You're my private investigator." Her attention shifted to the person who'd just parked the SUV, but he wasn't close enough to overhear. "And we would've wound up sleeping together."

He wished he could deny that he'd take advantage of her presence in his house, but if she looked at him the way she'd looked at him in that hotel lobby, he wasn't sure he'd be able to resist. She'd been with Anton for months, yet she was as lonely as any woman he'd ever met, and she didn't even know it. He wanted to satisfy her hunger--along with his own--but his track record wasn't any better than hers.

He started toward the entrance, and she fell in step with him. "No comment?" she prompted.

"Who knows what we would've done," he said.

The man in the SUV was obviously in a hurry. Wearing a silly grin and carrying a bouquet of flowers, he cut in front of them as if he hadn't even seen them. They stopped abruptly to avoid a collision. "New father,"

Zoe murmured.

Too intent to be distracted, Jonathan ignored the stranger. "So where'd you stay last night?"

"Near the airport."

His phone rang again. He glanced at the number on the caller ID, saw it was Robbie Babcock, the bail bondsman he'd been assisting in tracking down a skip, and silenced it. He'd return the call later.

"You're not going to take that?" she said.

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He didn't answer her question. "Do you have a room for tonight?"

"Not yet. But I'll get one."

He decided to let her do exactly that. She had too many scars. And so did he.

They stepped on the sensor that made the automatic doors whoosh open. "Now tell me why we're here," she said.

"I read an article in the paper this morning that made the hair stand up on the back of my neck."

She faltered, then took two quick steps to catch up with him. "What was the story?"

He was a little concerned about how she'd react to this news, but he couldn't shield her. And by marching to Franky Bates's door, she'd already proven that she was tougher than he might have thought. "There was a fourteen-year-old boy found wandering in the woods near Placerville. He was abducted more than two months ago."

She stopped. "He's alive? I bet his parents are so relieved!"

He nodded. "But he was naked and badly beaten."

Her eyes were riveted on his. "What makes you think he has any connection to Sam?"

"There's not a lot," he admitted. "He turned up the day she went missing. That could easily be a coincidence, but it stood out to me. And because he's a similar age, and this type of thing is so unusual here in Sac, I called Skye's husband."

"He's a detective with the Sacramento police, right?"

"Right. He was nice enough to place a few calls to the sheriff's department and get us some more information."

"You don't think the same man took Sam."

"Not necessarily. Like I said, it's a long shot but...worth investigating." And they didn't have anything else.

"So what did you learn?"

He nearly cursed when his phone went off again. Robbie Babcock wasn't giving up easily. He wanted to get paid for hauling in a man who'd jumped bail for armed robbery. But this time Jonathan turned off his phone.

He couldn't leave it that way for long--it was his conduit to the world--but he needed a few uninterrupted minutes. "The poor kid was in shock and babbling incoherently when they found him," he told her. "They couldn't get him to focus long enough to answer a single question, but every word he spoke seemed to revolve around the same theme."

She brought a hand to her chest. "What?"

"Someone he called 'Master' treating him like a dog and making him 154

wear a collar that choked him."

The color drained from her face. "Where's he from?"

"His family lives in Antelope, only he wasn't taken from the house.

He went missing while on his way home from school."

She shook her head. "Antelope's not far from where I live, but I don't see the connection to Sam. As you said, the fact that he was found the day she went missing might mean nothing. And--"

Jonathan raised a hand. "I'm not done. The deputy who rode in the ambulance with him kept asking for a name. 'Who did this to you?' He was afraid the boy would die and the case would go unsolved. And knowing there was a cruel son of a bitch out there who needed to be caught, he kept pushing."

"Did he get a name?"

"No. Just more babble--until he asked where he could find this

'Master.'"

Zoe's eyes grew round. "And then?"

"The boy assumed a deep voice and spoke his only complete sentence:

'Not just any bastard can live in this part of Rocklin.'"

Toby Simpson, the boy Jonathan had told Zoe about, was lying unconscious in intensive care with his parents by his side. After Jonathan had explained why they'd come and received permission, Zoe stepped in for a brief moment, took one look at his bruised and battered body, and all the tubes hooking him up to various machines, and felt her heart break.

Live, she prayed. Fight back. Help us beat the monster who put you here.

Tears slipped down her cheeks, but only a few. She was becoming accustomed to the nightmare. The hurt was quickly being replaced by a white-hot anger that transformed itself into raw determination. She would never give up, she promised herself. If the man who'd done this had also taken Sam, she'd spend every dime she could scrape together, every moment of the rest of her life. She'd search until she finally found him--and made him pay.

Mr. and Mrs. Lyle Simpson, the boys' parents, stood silent while Zoe gazed down at their son, then they followed her into the hall.

Zoe felt guilty for disturbing them in their grief. They'd been through so much. The last thing they needed was to have strangers show up at the hospital and bombard them with questions. But she also believed they all had to pull together to put an end to the suffering, to reclaim their children and protect others. She had no idea if her daughter had been taken by the 155

same man, but the fact that both children were connected to an affluent part of Rocklin made it likely. This kind of crime wasn't common, and Rocklin wasn't that big.

"Was he conscious when you got to the hospital?" Jonathan asked the boy's parents.

"For a few minutes." It was a pasty, tired and shell-shocked Mrs.

Simpson who answered. The weariness even showed in her voice.

Jonathan slid his hands into his pockets. "Did he say anything that might help determine who did this to him? A name, a characteristic?"

"No." This time Mr. Simpson, a stocky, balding man who was several inches shorter than his wife, provided the answer. "We tried to ask him, but he clung to my hand and--" He choked up and couldn't finish, so Mrs.

Simpson filled in.

"Started to cry." She blinked repeatedly, fighting her own tears. "And then he slipped into a coma."

A muscle flexed in Jonathan's cheek, and Zoe knew he was having the same reaction she was. He wanted to put a stop to the man, whoever he was, responsible for inflicting such senseless pain.

"What do the doctors say?" Zoe asked.

Mrs. Simpson exchanged a worried glance with her husband. "They're not making any promises."

Jonathan had given Mrs. Simpson his business card when they first arrived. "If something changes, will you contact us? Please?" he asked.

The woman wiped her eyes and nodded. "I've got your number in my purse."

"I'm sorry we had to intrude at a time like this," Zoe whispered and began to move away, but Mrs. Simpson caught her arm.