“A courier,” Raegan repeated as she stared at the older woman, disbelief swirling like a tornado in her gut. “You mean John Gilbert. We both know he didn’t take her by mistake.”
“Yes. Gilbert.” Kasdan’s lips turned down in disgust. “He was adept at moving inventory, but he was a liability when it came to his personal life.”
The woman was speaking about these children as if they were objects rather than living, breathing people. Sickness swirled along with the disgust inside Raegan.
“Unfortunately for you,” Kasdan went on, “Mr. Gilbert’s personal affairs were intertwined with your husband’s. By the time I learned what Gilbert had done, it was too late to correct the error. The repercussions would have been innumerable. Then I looked into your husband’s background, and, well, I knew the child was better off being relocated.”
“What do you mean better off?” Raegan snapped. “She’s not better off anywhere but with me.”
“Oh, but she is. You see, with her new family, there is never any threat of John Gilbert touching her ever again. You know how dangerous that man can be. Look at the bruises on your face, Ms. Devereaux. Is he the sort of man you’d allow near a young, vulnerable child? Imagine what he would have done to that poor girl had I not stepped in to save her.”
A new wave of understanding hit Raegan as she lifted her hand to the yellowing spots near her temple. “Did you hire him to make me back off these cases?”
Mrs. Kasdan pursed her lips. “A very unpredictable man indeed. I hear he was involved in a car accident last night.” She glanced down at her manicure. “Knowing him, he’ll likely survive. Pity, isn’t it? Your daughter is still not safe.”
The last of Raegan’s patience erupted in a fury that colored everything red. Her hand closed into a fist at her side as she stepped toward Miriam Kasdan. “Where is my daughter?”
“Careful, Ms. Devereaux. If you harm me in any way, you’ll never find your daughter. If, on the other hand, you agree to cooperate, I can take you to her.”
Raegan’s heart stuttered, drawing her up short. “What does ‘cooperate’ mean?”
“It means exactly what you think it means. You agree never to speak of what you know to anyone. In exchange for your silence, I’ll give you your daughter. All you have to do then is leave the country. I have powerful friends, Ms. Devereaux. We can give you new names, new identities. Say the word, and you can both have the same new start I’ve given dozens of children.”
“Disappear.” Raegan’s gaze skipped over the framed hearts on the walls. The woman wanted her to disappear just as those children had disappeared.
“Disappear with means. There’s a big difference. Come, now. If you love your daughter the way you say you do, you’d want her safe from the likes of John Gilbert, and we both know so long as Gilbert is alive, she will never truly be safe. His need for revenge is never-ending. He will use your daughter however he can to get that revenge.”
Raegan’s mind swam. Could this be real? Could this woman really take her to Emma? She looked back at Miriam Kasdan. “W-what about her father?”
“Mr. McClane? Isn’t he an alcoholic?”
“He’s been sober almost three years.”
“That’s not what my sources tell me.”
Raegan’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
“My sources informed me that he was seen just this morning entering a tavern on the west side. He stayed there for over an hour. What does one do in a tavern in the morning besides drink, Ms. Devereaux?”
Raegan’s heart cinched down hard. No, she wouldn’t believe that. She knew Alec had been upset last night when the FBI had dug up those remains, but he’d told her he didn’t want to drink. He’d told her he’d never spiral back to that dark place he’d been in before.
Except . . . he’d also told her that every day was a struggle and that he would always be an addict. And he hadn’t come home last night. Swallowing hard, she realized that he could have very well gone to that bar. He could have been drinking. He could be drunk right now.
Her pulse beat hard, picking up speed until it was a roar in her ears, but not because she was afraid of where he was or what he could be doing right this minute. It raced because she loved him, for better or worse. That’s what she’d said. That’s what she’d meant. She wasn’t going to walk away from him now or ever. And she wouldn’t let him push her away again either.
She met Miriam Kasdan’s emotionless stare with very focused eyes. “I don’t care.”
“Well, I do.” The older woman’s jaw tightened, and for the first time since she’d admitted to her horrendous crimes, Raegan saw a glimmer of anger. “I’ve thoroughly vetted each family. No parents addicted to any kind of vices will ever be approved for relocation. You might turn a blind eye to the reality that your ex-husband is a stinking drunk, but I won’t. If you want this new start with your daughter, Ms. Devereaux, you’ll have to take it without him. Choose now.”
Raegan’s mind skipped with what-ifs. But before the first even registered, she found her answer in the other woman’s steely gaze.
There was no choice. Miriam Kasdan was never going to take Raegan to Emma. She was going to con Raegan into leaving this mansion with her, and then she was going to get rid of Raegan, probably the same way she’d gotten rid of Conner Murray.
Instinct curled in her belly. An instinct that made her abandon any plan of running and told her she was dead if she tried to leave this room. An instinct that also told her the answer to her daughter’s whereabouts could be found here. In Miriam Kasdan’s personal office where the woman flaunted her trophies of children stolen and sold.
“Okay.”
The older woman lifted her perfectly threaded brows.
Raegan nodded. “I’ll go with you. I need my Emma. That’s all that matters.”
“More than your husband?”
“Yes. More than . . . Alec,” she lied. “If he was in a bar today, I’ve already lost him. I can’t lose Emma again.”
Miriam Kasdan studied Raegan speculatively, then slowly nodded. “Wise choice. Follow me. My associate is waiting to take you to your daughter.”
Raegan waited until the woman’s back was turned, then she reached for the lamp from the edge of the desk and jerked the cord from the wall.
“What on ear—”
Miriam Kasdan only made it halfway back around before Raegan slammed the base of the lamp into the side of her head. The older woman’s body sailed sideways, hit the doorjamb, and slumped to the ground.
Raegan’s head came up, and she stilled, listening for the secretary or anyone who’d heard what she’d just done. When only silence met her ears, she set the broken lamp down, stepped over Kasdan’s limp legs, and grasped the woman by the arms to pull her all the way into the room.
Her hands shook as she dropped the motionless woman on the floor behind the desk, stepped over her once more to pull the office door closed, and locked it. No guilt consumed her as she checked Kasdan’s pulse. Death was too simple for this woman. Raegan wanted her to suffer. In prison for the rest of her life, surrounded by all the same unsavory people she believed didn’t deserve a child. Finding the woman’s pulse slow but steady, she rose and scanned the office for a phone but couldn’t see one.
Damn. Hers was in her car. She didn’t have time to look for a phone. She only had minutes before someone came looking for the bitch.
She yanked drawers in the desk open one by one, knowing there had to be files somewhere. All she found was computer cords, pens, cardstock, and a small key.
Shoving the last drawer closed, she looked around again. Fear grabbed hold of her throat and squeezed. There were no file cabinets in the room. There was no computer. Only the desk, sitting area, the fireplace, and a row of shelves. No place even to store files.
Her stomach twisted as she zeroed in on the shelves. Moving quickly across the room, she scanned titles. Most of the books were paperbacks. Romance novels. Mysteries. Not classic leather
tomes like the ones she’d seen in the library. These, obviously, were Miriam Kasdan’s personal books. Lifting her hand, Raegan pulled a stack from the shelf and flipped through each one.
Just normal, publisher-produced paperbacks. No notes crammed inside, no photos, nothing.
Dropping them on the floor, she reached for another stack. And another. In a matter of minutes she had the entire shelving unit stripped of books. Stepping back, her hands shaking from defeat, she stared at the empty bookcase. And realized . . .
The section of shelving three rows up on the right looked different from the others.
She jerked forward and narrowed her gaze on the wood one shade darker than the rest of the unit. Lifting her hand, she ran her fingers over the back until they passed over a keyhole. One you’d never find unless you knew it was there because it was camouflaged to look like the rest of the wood.
Keys . . .
She whipped back to the desk, jerked the top drawer open, and grasped the key she’d found earlier. Pulse thundering, she rushed back to the shelf, slipped the key into the hole, and turned.
A click sounded in the silent room, but Raegan’s pulse pounding as loud as a marching band was all she could hear. The false backing popped open. She shoved it aside and stared at a stack of files in the hidden safe.
Her fingers shook as she yanked them out and scanned the file tabs. No names, just numbers. She flipped open the top file. “William” was printed at the top of the first page.
She set the folder on a shelf, reached for another. Multiple first names. No last names. “Jacob.” “Linda.” “Sally.” She stopped when she came across the name “David.” She shuffled through folders until she found the name “Mary.”
Billy Willig, David Ramirez, and Mary Coleman. The three missing children whose parents she and Alec had interviewed this past week.
Breathing faster, she flipped through files frantically until she located the one she’d been hoping for.
“Emma.”
Her lungs constricted. She tore open the folder and stared down at the background information typed neatly on the white sheet.
Her name. Alec’s. Their addresses. Names of each of their parents and siblings. Under Raegan’s father’s name, the words “Wealthy but not a threat. Estranged from daughter” were typed neatly as if it were part of her description.
Raegan’s heart thundered as she flipped page after page outlining Gilbert’s connection to Alec and Alec’s stint in rehab, what the McClanes each did for a living, and how their association with Alec might cause trouble. The last page was headed by the word “Relocation.”
She jerked the page out, dropped the file on top of the others, and frantically scanned the words. Emma’s name wasn’t listed anywhere on the page, but another name was.
“Emily Waldorf.”
There was also an address. An Oregon address in a wealthy area outside the city of Sherwood.
Sherwood . . . Conner Murray had been killed when his car had gone over an embankment on a windy road near Sherwood.
Voices echoed beyond the doors in the library, jolting Raegan’s attention from the page. The door on the far side of the room rattled.
“Mrs. Kasdan?”
Fear spread like ice through Raegan’s veins. Shoving the paper into her coat pocket, she looked around for an escape. There was no door. Only windows. All probably connected to a central alarm.
The doors shook harder, and the voices outside doubled and grew louder.
Raegan’s gaze shot back to the windows. She had only one way out, and she was taking it.
Alec pounded his fist on the door of Miriam Kasdan’s mansion for the third time, frustration curling like fire in his gut because they were being ignored.
“Raegan’s car’s not here, man,” Hunt said beside him, glancing over the immaculate lawn. “Maybe she stopped somewhere before her appointment. Or maybe she’s already been here and left.”
The already-been-here-and-left part was what worried Alec. “She’d answer her phone if that were the case.” Turning, he skipped over the steps and headed down the drive.
“Where are you going?”
“Around back. To see if someone left a door open.”
“That’s breaking and entering.”
“Only if someone catches me.”
Hunt muttered curses as he hustled to catch up. They followed a paved road around the side of the house. A long carpet of green lawn spread out from the house down the hillside. To the right, a raised verandah was framed by a concrete balustrade, and to the left, three cars were parked behind a large detached six-vehicle garage—a shiny silver Rolls-Royce convertible, a sleek black Jaguar, and a twenty-year-old blue van with a dented front end.
“Shit,” Alec muttered quietly, eyeing the van. “Didn’t you say cops found blue paint on Murray’s vehicle at the accident scene?”
“Yeah, I did.” The side door on the garage opened, and Hunt pressed a hand against Alec’s arm, shoving him back into the rhododendron bushes. “Someone’s coming.”
Two burly-looking men exited the garage. One held a cell phone to his ear. It was hard to hear over the distance, but Alec was sure the guy said, “Yeah. We’re on it. I’ll call when it’s done.”
They watched as the two men climbed into the van. The engine revved. Seconds later they swept past Alec and Hunt in the bushes and turned down the long, curved lane toward the road.
Alec glanced toward his friend. “When it’s done?”
Unease drifted over Hunt’s usually congenial features. He pulled the .45 he carried at the small of his back from its holster. “I don’t like the sound of that.”
Alec didn’t like it either. Worry curled through his chest as they moved around the back of the house and up onto the raised patio. Broken glass lay shattered across the decorative concrete.
Alec’s heart jumped into his throat, and he rushed to the broken window and peered inside what looked to be an office. The gap in the window was large enough for a person to climb through. Tucking his hand into the sleeve of his coat, he broke a large piece of glass aside to make the gap bigger, then climbed through the opening and stared at the dozens of file folders and paperbacks scattered across the floor.
Hunt was breathless when he reached Alec. “Okay, now we’re really breaking and entering.”
Alec knelt for the closest folder and opened it. Names and addresses, birthdates, and work histories. He flipped pages, unsure what he was seeing. He came across what looked like a contract, and behind it, a receipt of sale.
“What is that?” Hunt asked.
“I don’t know.” Alec kept flipping pages. The second-to-last page looked like a return receipt, but he couldn’t tell for what. His fingers stilled on the last page. No name was listed, just a date. And below that a stamp that read “Deceased.”
“Holy shit,” Hunt muttered. “Is that what I think it is?”
“I—I don’t know.” Sickness churned in Alec’s stomach as he knelt and lifted another folder. Flipping to the back he found another date, followed by a name and address.
“It’s in here,” a woman’s voice echoed from beyond a door slightly ajar across the room. Alec and Hunt both looked up. The door pushed open just as Hunt raised his gun. “We have to get this cleaned up before someo—”
The elderly woman with salt-and-pepper hair wild around her bruised face and a wrinkled suit jolted when she spotted them. “Oh my goodness.” She pressed a hand to her heart. “Who are you? How did you get in here? Ms. Hennessy, call the police. We’ve been burgled.”
The blonde just behind the older woman stepped back with wide eyes. Hunt shifted the gun her way and muttered, “Uh-uh. Stay right here.”
The blonde froze.
Fear filled the older woman’s slate-gray eyes, but the emotion was quickly masked by a wave of rage that made her whole face red. Almost as red as the blood trickling down her temple. “You can’t just waltz into my home. Do you have any idea who I am? The police
are already on their way.”
Alec’s blood pumped hot as he stepped over the paperbacks and lifted the folder in his hand. “Good. I’m sure they’ll be more than interested in this, Mrs. Kasdan. Where is my daughter?”
Every inch of color drained from Miriam Kasdan’s face as she glanced from the file in his hand up to his eyes. “Y-your daughter?”
“And my wife. I know she was here this morning.”
Kasdan glanced toward the gun Hunt held, pointed right at her. “I—I don’t know what you’re—”
The phone in Alec’s pocket buzzed. He whipped it out, a burst of relief rushing through him when he saw Raegan’s name on the screen. “Raegs, where are you?”
“Alec, listen to me.” Her voice was distant, as if she were talking into a speaker. “It’s Miriam Kasdan. The charity socialite. She’s the one behind the whole thing. She took those kids and—”
“I know. I’m standing in her office right now. Raegan, where are you?”
“I’m going to get Emma before they move her. She’s in Sherwood, Alec. 49273 Ridgeview Lan—” Her voice cut off with a muffled scream.
“Raegan?” Fear clamped hard around Alec’s throat. “Raegan?” he asked again when she didn’t answer. “Raegan!”
The line went dead.
“What happened?” Hunt asked, gun still trained on the two women.
Wide-eyed, Alec looked up at his friend, remembering the two thugs they’d spotted jumping into that blue van and tearing off down the drive.
“I have to go.” Urgency spurred him back toward the broken window. “I have to get to Raegan before it’s too late.”
“Go.” Hunt pulled a cell from his pocket and dialed with one hand. “I’ve got this.” He lifted the phone to his ear. “Yeah, I need to speak with Special Agent Jack Bickam immediately.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Raegan swerved on the two-lane road that wound up through the hills above Sherwood. The blue van had come out of nowhere and slammed into her from behind, the force of the hit shooting her forward and sending the cell phone in her hand flying across the car.