Cain (13 page)

Cain and Damon had been about to sign
the contract when the police had called him. All he could get from
them was that his car had been in an accident and that one man was
dead. His heart had skipped several beats before Damon had taken
the phone from him and motioned for Devin to pay the check. They
were in the car and on their way before Cain realized it. Devin
drove while Damon shouted things into his phone.

Cain stood and when he knew that his
legs weren’t going to collapse, he stepped to the bed and pulled
Jazzie into his arms. He had to hold them, keep them to him. He
looked around the room, but before he could ask, Jazzie
spoke.

“
She’s not here. Julie,
she’s not here. I don’t know what happened to her, but one minute
she was directing everyone to take care of us, then she was gone.
I’ve looked everywhere for her and just so you know, Cait Grant
isn’t happy about her leaving either.”

“
Cain, I’m going to have
to stitch Quinn up. You want to step out or stick around? I think I
remember how to do it.”

Cain nodded at him. “I’ll stay. I can’t
leave them just yet.”

Cain knew that if anyone would
understand him, it would be Damon. The Grant brothers were the
closest family he’d ever seen and their wives blended into the
family as though they had been meant to be there. He loved them as
much as he did his own sisters. Cait came around the corner just as
Damon was starting to close up the wound on his sister’s
head.

“
Cain? Do you know where
we might find Julie? I need to ask her a few questions. Some
things...something has come up.”

Cain didn’t like the way she’d said
that, as if something he really didn’t want to know had been
discovered. He didn’t want to leave his family, but Cait was
nodding toward the other side of the curtain and he felt that he
really didn’t have a choice in the matter.

The room Cait had led him to was
already occupied with Devin. He didn’t look any happier than he
felt, but Cain didn’t say anything.

“
I need to tell you
something, but it can’t go any further than this room. Cain, how
much do you know about Julie?”

Cain looked up at Cait. “Know? Nothing
really. She’s homeless and lives around or near the Howard Building
on Broad Street. She’s been staying at the cottage on the
property.” He put his forehead on the table. He nearly told them
that he was in love with her, but didn’t. Couldn’t for some
reason.

No one said anything for a long time
and Cain looked up. Cait had taken one of the chairs and was
looking at Devin. Neither of them was speaking, but plenty was
being said. He knew whatever they knew, he wasn’t going to
like.

“
She’s married, isn’t she?
Some big, beefy asshole is looking for her and found her to...oh,
Christ, he was killed, wasn’t he? Today, Quinn killed her
husband.”

“
You do have a vivid
imagination, don’t you? No, she’s not married. And her name isn’t
Julie.” Cait slid a file toward him. “The other two men at the
scene today had this on one of them. They’ve both been arrested.
Take a look.”

It was a few pictures of his sisters
and Julie. They had been taken recently because he could just make
out the bruise on Julie’s cheek. They had been taken just inside
the gates at his house. Cait reached over and flipped them over. On
the back were notes and names. On the back of the pictures of his
sisters were “not this one,” but on Julie’s it said, “I want her
alive. The others, you can do whatever you want.”

Cain closed the file and looked up at
Devin. “Are my sisters in trouble? Should I contact the others and
let them know? I don’t know how to reach Sin, but I can
try.”

Cait pulled out another file. “No. This
isn’t about them, but about the woman calling herself Julie. You’re
sisters just happened to be with her when those men struck. Cain,
Julie’s name is Alyssa Marie Howard. Does that name ring a bell
with you?”

Cain started to shake his head when he
stopped and glanced over at Cait. “The Howard Building. She stays
near there. That’s where I’ve found her twice now. Is she related
to them?”

Cait looked at Devin again and this
time, Devin spoke. He pulled the file Cait had put on the desk
closer to him and opened it. He pushed a photo in front of him.
“This is Alyssa right before she disappeared nine years ago. She
had just buried her father, Nathan Howard, two weeks before. They
were having dinner in the Four Seasons, she and her mother Shannon
Howard, Alyssa’s two brothers, Nathan and Robert, and Nathan
senior’s younger brother Samuel. We don’t know what happened that
night, but Alyssa got sick and had went to the ladies room and
never returned. She was seventeen.”

The girl was Julie, or Alyssa, he
thought. The photo showed a much younger and more carefree girl
than the one he knew. Her smile was radiant and went to her eyes
that sparkled with what looked like mischief and mirth. The man
standing next to her had to be her father. There could be no doubt
about that. And he looked at her with such love that Cain could
almost feel it. He pushed them back at Devin.

“
So? She’s a runaway, so
what? I don’t understand what that has to do with what happened to
my sisters.” Cain could hear the hardness in his voice. He didn’t
care. She was a runaway and whatever had happened to his sisters
today was her fault.

“
I don’t think she’s a
runaway. I don’t know why, but I believe that she is—”

Cain stood up, cutting Devin off. “I
have to see to my sisters. If you find this girl.” Cain looked down
at the picture of Julie/ Alyssa. “Tell her I said thanks for
nothing. She nearly got my family killed today because she couldn’t
tell anyone who she was.” He left the little room and went to find
where Quinn and Jazzie were. He was angry and wasn’t really sure
why, or for that matter, at who. He found the room that Quinn was
in and made sure that Jazzie was with her before he stepped into
the hall to make a call.

“
Mrs. Webb, I don’t
suppose that Julie is there, is she?”

“
No, sir. She’s gone
already. She left you a note and a bag, though. She said if you
called that I was to read it to you. Would you like for me
to?”

Did he? Not really. He was just glad
she was gone. He told her that he would read it when he got
home.

“
All right, sir. She also
told me to tell you something else. She said she was sorry about
your sisters.”

“
Thanks, Mrs. Webb. I
appreciate that. But it’s a little too late for that.” He assured
her that Miss Quinn and Miss Jazzie were all right.

“
You think Miss Julie will
get some help for her injuries, Dr. Waite? She was bleeding pretty
badly when she left here. I tried to tend to them, but she wouldn’t
see it.”

“
I’m sure she’ll be fine,
Mrs. Webb.” He didn’t want to think about her being hurt. He didn’t
want to think about her at all. “She seems to be able to get
whatever she needs.”

Cain walked back into Quinn’s room
after hanging up and sat in the chair. Quinn was sleeping and
Jazzie was curled up next to her on the bed asleep as well. He
didn’t want to wake them so he left the lights off and turned off
his phone.

~~~

Alyssa moved along the building looking
for the cubby hole. She had checked on it so much the first year
that she was sure she’d never forget where it was. When she finally
found it, she nearly cried in relief. Pulling out the loose brick
and reaching inside, she pulled out the plastic bag. It was dried
and brittle with age and covered in dirt and dust. She sat down on
the ground and pulled it to her chest.

She sobbed for what she had allowed to
happen to Quinn and Jazzie. Neither of them had had anything to do
with what had happened all those years ago. And especially nothing
to do with the man that had been killed today. Standing up, she
made her way back to the hospital to give Molly Rodney’s
things.

Alyssa could no longer hide from who
she was. Now that the police were involved, she knew it would be
only a matter of time before someone recognized her. Cait Grant was
too smart for her to let this go. And if anyone would figure it
out, it would be Cait.

Looking over at the Howard Building,
Alyssa saw someone she never thought she’d see again. Thomas
Miller, her father’s secretary. Before she could think twice about
it, she was on her way toward him. He looked up at her when she
said his name.

“
Hello, my dear. I see
you’ve finally come home. If you would be so kind, I would take you
somewhere where we can talk. I have a nice private place in
mind.”

Alyssa simply got into the limo that
had pulled to a soft stop beside them. Thomas opened the door
before the driver could get out and handed her in, taking the small
bag from her as he did. Once she was inside, he handed it back to
her and sat across from her.

“
You knew where I was,
didn’t you? All this time...Rodney, he told you.”

“
Yes, Mr. Kincaid and I
have been watching over you for some time now. He contacted me just
a few days after your picture came out in the papers. He said that
you’d been drugged and that he wasn’t sure it was safe for you to
be found. I agreed.” Thomas reached over, took out a first aid kit,
and slid onto the seat next to her. “He reported to me weekly
unless you needed something. I didn’t like it at first, but when
things around the office started to change, I decided that he was
correct in keeping you away.”

Alyssa put her hand on Thomas’ and
looked at him. “You know that it’s only a matter of time now, don’t
you? In a few days it will hit the paper that…why hasn’t it ever…?”
She looked at him sharply. “Why you sly old devil. You’re the
reason that I’ve never been declared dead. What have you been up
to?”

Thomas had the good grace to blush. “We
took your picture at times when you slept or when you were not
aware. It was a challenge at times to set them up. We needed to
have them think you were elsewhere. Miss, I believe you will need a
physician. I will take you to my home and we will see about getting
you mended. You will need your strength, I believe, in dealing with
the goings on.”

Alyssa thought that was an
understatement and leaned back in the limo as it started out. She
hoped that Jazzie and Quinn were all right and hoped that Cain
would forgive her someday.

Before she knew it, Alyssa was across
town and in a big brownstone. Her father’s family doctor was on his
way to the house and she was being pampered for the first time in
almost a decade. And for all that, she had never been so depressed
in all her life.

The house was one that Thomas had lived
in since he’d started working for Howard Incorporated. And it had
changed little over the years. There was a pool out back now that
Alyssa had seen on her way in, and the staff was different. Mrs.
Chanel had passed on, Thomas had told her, and he missed her
dearly.

An hour after Doctor Trout arrived,
Alyssa was sitting on the king-sized bed waiting for him to tell
her his findings. He had poked and prodded her, tisking the entire
time. She remembered him from when he would come to see her dad. He
was old even then and was positively ancient now.

He still had those eyebrows that looked
as if they had a life of their own. She remembered thinking as a
child that if he could get them moving fast enough, he would be
able to fly. While his brows still defied anything she’d ever seen,
he was grayer than she remembered and much older-looking

“
You’re in very good shape
for a dead woman. A little under nourished, and beat the hell up,
but otherwise all right. Mind me asking where you been for the past
nine years?”

“
Yes, I do. What do you
mean ‘dead woman?’” Dr. Trout had been making notes on a pad of
paper, as Thomas had asked him to not put this in any record until
he let him know.

“
Well, what was it,
Thomas, about four years ago? Your mother claimed she had proof you
were dead. Then about a year ago, she even had this ‘doctor’”—Dr.
Trout made the quotation signs with his fingers—“say he had
discovered your dead body in an abandoned cave in the northern part
of Ireland.”

Alyssa fought the smile. “And where is
my body now? I’m sure that it’s still not in this cave, is
it?”

“
Funny thing that. You
just up and disappeared when the coroner arrived. Now I know why.”
Dr. Trout sat in the big chair and looked at her. “The gash on your
head looks to have been stitched by someone who knew what they were
doing, same with the wound on your belly. The bruises around your
neck are as recent as today and will only get worse over the next
few days. I would really like to think that Nathan Howard’s
daughter is not doing anything stupid.”

Alyssa glanced at Thomas, who stood and
left the room. “Yes, I’ve been stupid. Stupid about a lot of
things, but not anymore. There are some…I need to ask you
something. It’s personal.”

“
All right. If this has
anything to do with your mother, then I agree. Whatever you want to
do to her, I will back you one hundred percent. Nothing is too evil
for her.”