Undeniably Yours (32 page)

He couldn't find it.
Couldn't find it
.

Sheer panic suffocated him.

Meg!
Her name ripped from deep within.

Where are you?

F
or almost the entire drive, Stephen said nothing to Meg. And she said even less to him.

The man she'd once loved and been married to, the one who'd crushed her so brutally with his lies and his theft, the one who'd been gone all these years, the one who'd fathered Jayden and walked out on Amber had come back. And he'd done
this
to her.

He was at the same time chillingly familiar and a total stranger.

Meg sat in the seat next to him, her muscles taut with fear, her mind laboring to comprehend that he'd restrained her and put her in his car. As far as she could tell, they'd almost arrived at their destination. He'd taken her deep into the country, into remote land where no one could possibly find her.

He must want money. She knew very well it was the only commodity Stephen cared about or understood. What could he be planning? To ransom her? To coerce her into giving him money? How? Through physical violence? The threat of rape?

Oh, heaven. Dread wrapped around her and squeezed, as real as the physical ties binding her hands and feet. Her teeth kept trying to chatter, so she bit down hard to keep her jaw steady.

Bo's face came to mind. The Bo she'd thought she'd known would have helped her. Her Bo would have fought for her. She ached for the man she'd believed him to be, for his strength and protection.

He's not coming. Not coming, Meg
.

She saw other faces. Sadie Jo, Lynn, Mr. Son, Amber, Jayden. How would they learn about this? What would they think, feel?

Fear started to overtake her as surely as Stephen had inside the parking garage. She was going to lose it—

God
, she prayed, concentrating hard,
fill me with your Spirit. I'm terrified, and I need you
.

A tiny warmth, as small as the fire at the end of a match, kindled to life inside of her. She waited, praying. The warmth grew, spreading through her trunk and limbs. Her body relaxed incrementally as she gave herself over. In response, His peace flowed into the empty shell of her weakness and frailty.

He wasn't just near her. Or watching over her. She felt certain that He was
within
her.
The one who is in you,
she'd once memorized,
is greater than the one who is in the world
.

Her human fear remained. But she believed God's power inside of her to be stronger.

I trust you, God
. She'd said those words to Him hundreds of times over the past years, but they'd never been more true. All those times had been stairsteps. So that now, in this grave situation, she found that she could and did trust Him, with all of it.

Her life.

Her death.

“You look good, Meg. Better than you did when you were younger. Daddy's money must agree with you.” Stephen glanced at her, then returned his attention forward. The light from the dashboard illuminated his neck and the underside of his chin.
“Of course, your daddy's money would agree with anyone, wouldn't it?”

His voice affected her like an insect crawling along the surface of her skin. She bit the inside of her cheek against a wave of revulsion.

“You want to tell me why you've been searching for me?” he asked.

“Searching for you?”

“A few weeks back someone infiltrated my computer. I followed the trail backward, and what do you know? It brought me to Whispering Creek.”

He was talking about Amber's search for him, Meg realized. The one that Amber and Brimm had conducted. Stephen had discovered their investigation, somehow traced its origins to Whispering Creek, and assumed she was behind it.

“Meg? Why have you been looking for me?”

She kept her lips firmly sealed. The car bumped over uneven, hard-packed earth spiked with stones. Above, the clouds had cleared, taking the rain with them and giving her a glimpse of the stars.

“When I left you five years ago,” Stephen said, “you let me go without a fight. But things have changed, haven't they?”

She didn't answer.

“Haven't they?” he repeated, louder and with an edge of menace.

“Yes.”

“Now you can afford to hire hackers to find me and attorneys to advise you. Were you planning to let the police know where I was living? You interested in seeing me arrested, Meg?”

She couldn't reply because she refused to breathe a word about Amber or Jayden to him.

“You sought me out, Meg, and here I am. What do you say we skip over the police and the attorneys and settle this ourselves? Just you and me.”

A small one-story clapboard house came into view.

Stephen parked, then extinguished the engine and the lights. They sat in the sudden silence while he waited, listening and watching. Both the sound of crickets and a sense of their isolation pressed in on Meg.

“You can scream all you like out here,” he said.

“I don't think it would help.”

“No,” he agreed. “It wouldn't.”

He came around the car and released her seat belt, then cut the tie that bound her ankles. After hauling her out of the car, he pushed her in front of him to the house.

Her hands were still cuffed behind her back. Even so, before he got her into that house, she knew she needed to attempt escape. She gathered her reserves, then bolted as fast as she could. His grip slipped away and she ran—

His hand latched on to her forearm, heaving her to a stop.

She turned to fight him, kicking at his shin, his knee.

The force of his palm slapping her face jerked her head to the side and sent her body spinning. Meg staggered and went down hard on her knees. She pulled in air, ears ringing, cheek throbbing, as she tried to recover from the stunning pain of the blow.

She should get up. Maybe she could still get away. She should—

He pulled her to her feet. His relaxed facade had stripped away, and only the harsh lines of his anger remained. “You're going to do this my way. It can go easy for you, or it can go hard.” His fingers bit into her arms, and he shook her. “But you
are
going to do this my way. You try a stunt like that again, and I'll cut you.” He dragged her toward the house.

She resisted, throwing herself in the opposite direction, but he used his greater weight and muscle to pull her past the wooden porch posts and rail, and through the doorway.

He forced her to the fireplace and switched on a camping lamp that sat on the mantel. Its light revealed an abandoned room, empty except for two folding chairs and a card table that held a laptop, a gun, and a knife.

He shoved her into one of the chairs, lowered himself into the remaining chair, and booted up the laptop. “You made a mistake when you decided to come after me,” he said. “I'd have left you alone. Live and let live, right? But since you didn't see it that way, you've cost me a lot of time and effort. I'm going to let you pay me back for your mistake, and then we'll call it even.”

Meg's attention riveted on the weapons.

“I'm familiar with your finances,” he continued. “I know there are at least two accounts you can access right here with your online banking.” His hands moved over his keyboard with ease. He'd always been skilled with computers, but by the looks of it he'd graduated to the level of a hacker. . . .

Meg's breath seeped from her lungs as understanding dawned. “You,” she whispered. “You're the hacker. You're the one who's been investigating my financial information.”

He ignored her and continued to work.

“You did it on Bo's computer. You set him up. You must've . . . Did you break into his house? Do it while he was at work?”

He didn't answer and didn't need to. She could see that she'd gotten it right. Using Bo's computer to check into her accounts had allowed him to kill two birds with one stone. He'd gained information about her money and simultaneously swung suspicion in Bo's direction.

She'd fallen for it. She'd ripped Bo out of her life, and in doing
so she'd lost her closest ally. Her love. Her protector. The man who'd been as good as—better than—a bodyguard. Which had, in turn, given Stephen an opportunity to grab her.

Bo hadn't betrayed her. It had been Stephen.

Not Bo. Not Bo.

Tears sheened her vision. Bo
had
loved her. Just like he'd told her. He'd asked her to trust him and she'd . . . oh my goodness . . . she'd said those horrible things to him. Fired him.

Regret and shame pierced straight through her. She'd had no faith in him.

“We're going to move four million dollars into an account I've set up. It's ready and waiting.” Stephen angled the laptop to face her. Her bank's Web site filled the screen. “What's your code?”

She met his gaze. “I'm not giving you any money.”

“Yes you are.”

Her determination intensified. She was
not
going to hand over four million dollars to Stephen McIntyre, a man who'd left a trail of destruction everywhere he went. “No.”

“You used to be so accommodating.”

“Not anymore.”

“That so?” He picked up the knife and tested the blade with his thumb. “If we were still married, I'd have access to every bit of your money, by rights. In comparison, four million dollars is just a drop in the bucket—and you know it.”

She glared at him.

“A reasonable bargain.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Let me put it to you this way, Meg. You're going to do something for me. You're going to transfer money. And afterward, I'm going to do something for you. I'm going to let you walk out of here alive.”

“What guarantee do I have of that?” As soon as she transferred the money, he'd have no reason left to keep her alive.

“None. But then again, I don't think you're in a position to ask for guarantees right now.”

“I'm the one that knows the code.”

“I'm the one that has the knife.”

“Use it, then.”

“You doubt that I will?” Moving slowly, he placed a hand on her shoulder, then pressed her back against her chair. He trailed the knife's tip across her forehead, into her hair, along the length of one of the long strands.

Meg held still, her throat tight, her heart knocking.

“Where would you like me to cut you?” he asked. “Your face?”

She shook her head.

“No? You don't want me to cut you?”

“No,” she rasped.

“In that case, I have an idea.” He pulled back a few inches. “Maybe I can use my knife on your friend Amber instead? Or on her little boy . . . my little boy. What's his name again?”

All the blood rushed from Meg's head. Her brave intentions spiraled. Stephen knew about Amber and Jayden. Which meant that he . . . he'd trumped her. Because she'd give him every penny she had before she'd allow him to hurt them.

“You were difficult to get ahold of. But either one of them would be a piece of cake. As I said, Meg. Easy way or hard way.”

Just then a faint
creak
sounded from the rear of the house.

Both Stephen and Meg jerked their heads in the direction of the sound. It had been subtle, the kind of noise an old house might make all on its own, or the kind of noise a floorboard might make when someone stepped on it.

“Help!” she cried. “We're in the front room. Help, please!”

Answering footsteps pounded toward them down the hallway.

Someone was here! “He has a knife!”

Stephen snatched her in front of him, lifting his knife's blade to her throat.

Bo rounded the corner into the room. He stood framed in the rectangular opening, a gun in his hands and murder in his eyes. His eyes connected with hers for a fragment of a second before his attention and the muzzle of his gun moved to Stephen.

A sob born of gratitude and the joy of seeing him broke from Meg's throat. Bo. Here. She might not make it out of this alive, but at least he'd come, and she wasn't alone. She'd been given one more chance to see his face.

“Lower the knife,” Bo ordered.

Meg could hear Stephen's fast, agitated breathing near her ear. “How did you find us?”

“I followed you.”

“Are there more with you?”

“Not yet, but there will be.” Bo made a downward motion with his chin. “Now lower the weapon, and I'll let you leave before they arrive.”

Stephen held silent, probably listening for any reinforcements already on site.

“Be smart.” Every line of Bo revealed his steely fury. “You haven't done anything unforgivable yet, but hurting her would be unforgivable. Release her and go now, while you still have the chance.”

Stephen relaxed his grip on her slightly. Meg stepped to the side to see if she could get herself free, but instantly, he wrenched her back in front of him. The motion caused his knife to nick the skin of her neck.

“No!” Bo yelled, extending one hand.

Stephen paused, then adjusted his hold of her. “You don't like to see her hurt?”

Bo set his chin, but he'd paled. She winced inwardly, knowing Bo could see her bloodied knees, the swelling on one side of her face, and now the hot blood trickling down her neck.

“I only scratched her,” Stephen said. “But trust me, I can do far worse.” He began to move closer to the table and his handgun, using her as his shield.

Bo's aim followed Stephen. “You hurt her, and I'll kill you. Let her go.”

“She's staying right here.”

Bo stepped toward them.

“Stop!” Stephen's voice rose.

Bo stopped.

Stephen grabbed his gun and leveled it at Bo's chest.

“No,” Meg breathed.

“Put your gun down,” Stephen commanded.

Bo didn't so much as flinch.

“Put it down.”

“No.”

“Put it down, or I'll cut her throat. I swear I will!”