Candy Crush (31 page)

Brandon shook his head.

“That’s weird.”

“Yeah, we thought so too.” Brandon glanced
at his watch. “I haven’t talked to her all day. And about
forty-five minutes ago, Butter was standing in front of my office
having a fit. When I opened the door, she took off down the street,
to the back door of the candy store. Gabriella’s car was there and
her purse was on the ground.”

“She swears it was Hector last night?”

“She was scared out of her mind. I was half
afraid she’d try to sneak out and run away in the middle of the
night.” More than half-afraid. He’d kept his arms wrapped around
her in a vise-like grip for the rest of the night and had barely
slept at all, for fear that she would slip out of his grasp and out
of his life.

“Shit. We have to move, fast. Hector
probably has her, and his goal is going to be to get her to Miguel
as quickly as possible. Let’s go to the police first, see if Gabby
made it there.”

Brandon pulled the keys to his truck out of
his pocket. “I’ll drive.”

***

An hour later, Brandon’s frustration level
was so high, he had an almost desperate need to hit something.
Daniel Franks was number one on his hit list, although Miguel and
Hector Martinez ranked high up there, too.

Brandon hated Daniel for what he did to his
sister, and now that hatred burned even deeper. He was a completely
incompetent police officer. Brandon hoped they took his badge after
this debacle.

He’d been in such a hurry to go on his
vacation that he hadn’t bothered to file last night’s report
correctly, nor to turn in Hector. Brandon’s vision glazed for a
moment and all he could see was red, as the realization that he
could lose Gabriella pressed down on his very soul. And it was
Daniel’s fault. If he had done his job correctly last night, Hector
would be in jail and Gabriella would be home – at
his
home –
safe and sound right now.

“Hey, you okay, man?” Emmett’s concerned
voice cut through the haze of anger.

Brandon blinked and turned to look at him.
He hadn’t really paid attention to how much Emmett looked like
Gabriella until that moment, and seeing it now caused his throat to
close up.

Her look-alike brother gave Brandon’s
shoulder a squeeze. “Hang in there, man. We’ll find her. We have
to.”

The irony that Emmett seemed to have decided
that Brandon was worthy of his sister after all did not escape him.
Now that he may never see her again. Emmett squeezed tighter and
Brandon forced himself to focus on Emmett – and to focus on coming
up with a plan.

“Let’s go to Daniel Franks’ apartment,”
Brandon said. “Maybe he hasn’t yet left for his vacation. I want to
know why he fucked up that arrest last night.”

“Good idea,” Emmett said.

Neither man spoke out loud what they were
both thinking:
it’s the only lead we have at this point
. The
police promised they would do everything they could to try to find
Gabriella, but really, what could they do? Brandon felt like the
only thing they were doing was feeding information to the Dallas
PD. And the Dallas PD was two thousand miles away.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Gabriella struggled to focus, to pull her
mind out of the darkness. Her head felt like an army of hammers
were relentlessly beating away at her skull. She wanted to close
her eyes and sink back into the oblivion, where no pain could
reach. But fear kept her awake. Fear of Miguel.

She tried to shift her body and realized she
was bound. She was sitting upright, in a chair of some sort. She
wiggled her fingers. Her hands were bound behind her back, and her
body was bound to the chair. Even her legs were strapped to the
chair.

She finally slit her eyes open and waited
until her vision stopped swimming. She widened her eyes and glanced
around, discovered she was in a small kitchen, tied to a chair near
a small wooden table. She could see a patio door and a small living
area beyond it. She was pretty sure she was in an apartment, but it
wasn’t the one above her candy store. She focused on the man
standing in front of her and let out an involuntary gasp.

“Daniel?”

Daniel Franks grimaced. “Surprised,
Gabriella? You shouldn’t be. I’ve been warning you to get out of
town and abandon that damn candy store for weeks.” He paused and
shook his head. The look on his face was grim.

“It never would have come to this if you’d
listened. And now you’re getting a double whammy.”

“A what?” Gabriella forced herself to focus
on the man standing in front of her. Her brain still felt fuzzy.
She was having a difficult time putting together coherent
thoughts.

“I gave you plenty of warnings. Hell, I
thought finding Mr. Partridge’s body would be enough. I don’t know
why you are so hard-headed.”

“What does Mr. Partridge have to do with
this?”

“It was
me
, Gabriella. I’ve been
trying to scare you away from the candy store. I’ve tried
everything. I even tracked down Chareese and convinced her to come
back into town for the weekend, hoping she would lure Brandon away
from you. I’m not an idiot. I figured out he was the reason you
wouldn’t leave. But now it doesn’t matter. I’m finally going to get
the store.”

“How? Why?” Gabriella asked, afraid her fate
would be the same as Mr. Partridge’s. All over a stupid candy
store. Why was Daniel Franks so obsessed with the candy store?

“All I wanted was for you to decide to get
rid of that damn candy store. I just needed you to dump it, cheap,
so that I could buy it from you. If you would have just given up,
it wouldn’t have come to this.”

“To what?” Was he really going to kill her?
Over the candy store? This made no sense.

“I understand you had quite the life back in
Dallas.” He said the words softly, and watched the fear blossom
across her face.

She gasped. “No.” Anything but that.
Anything
. “I’ll sell it to you. I’ll
give
it to you,”
she blurted. Just please, no…

Daniel glanced at his watch. “Too late,
Gabriella. You had your chance.”

“
Please
…” She couldn’t leave Brandon.
She couldn’t.

“Why are you so upset? Hector Martinez said
his brother would be thrilled to learn that his errant fiancé was
tucked away right here in our quaint little town. So thrilled, in
fact, that he promised to sign over ownership of the candy store,
if I kept you secured until he arrived.”

“It’s not his to sign over,” Gabriella
argued.

“Oh, but it will be. Just as soon as you two
are married.”

“
No
.”

“Afraid so, Gabriella. I’ll give your
regrets to Brandon, of course.”

Gabriella’s eyes filled with tears at the
mention of Brandon’s name. Dear God, she would never see him again.
The thought was almost more than she could bear. It was worse than
the thought of dying.

“Why are you doing this, Daniel?”

“Oh, I’m getting something out of it.
Something I’ve been searching for, for seven years.”

“How could I possibly be connected to
something you’ve been searching for that long? I’ve only known you
two weeks.”

Daniel’s face twisted with pent up anger.
“My ex wife took everything.
Everything
. I’m in debt up to
my eyeballs and she still takes half my paycheck for child support.
Hell, I can’t even afford to see my kids because I can barely
afford to feed myself, let alone two additional mouths. I can’t get
ahead. She took it all,” he repeated.

Gabriella recalled Brandon mentioning that
Daniel had been married to one of his cousins, and that they had
both been unfaithful. She imagined Daniel must feel cheated because
of the Sarantos’ obvious influence in this town.

But that wasn’t reason enough to kidnap
Gabriella and hand her over to Miguel. At least, not in Gabriella’s
mind.

“I need a windfall,” Daniel continued.
“Somewhere in that candy store is a giant pile of cash, and I want
it. It will solve all my problems. I can give my ex a lump sum and
get the hell out of this hell hole.”

Gabriella glared at him. “Is the money
rightfully yours?” Was he related to the family who once owned the
candy store, and hid that pile of cash in the cellar?

“If I find it first, it is. That family’s
long gone. Hell, half of them never believed the money existed in
the first place. But I know it does.”

“How?”

Daniel gave her an impatient look and
glanced at his watch again. “My dad told me about it. He was
friendly with the kooky old man who hid it. Guy was afraid of
banks, so every dime he ever made, he kept, and stored it in his
own way. That candy store was just one of all of the businesses
that family owned. They were the first fucking Sarantos,” he spat,
a sour look on his face. Clearly, Daniel had jealousy issues.

“If I tell you where the money is, will you
let me go?”

Daniel stiffened. “What?”

“I know where it is. I’ve seen it.”

A myriad of emotions rushed across his face,
as he waged an internal battle. Finally, he shook his head and gave
her a disgusted look. “You’re lying. No other candy store owner in
the last seven years found that money, and some of them actually
believed it existed. You probably don’t even believe it’s there.
And you’ve only been here for two weeks.”

“It’s in the cellar,” she blurted, hoping
against hope that Daniel would believe her and free her before
Miguel arrived. “There’s a cellar underneath the storeroom. It’s a
hidden door. It was underneath that pile of overstock. No one ever
got around to throwing it all away, so no one knew it was
there.”

Daniel stared at her, remaining stock still
for the count of ten. Then he snarled, “I’ve been scaring people
out of that place for seven years and there’s a goddamned cellar no
one told me about? Son of a bitch.”

“Please let me go. Please. Take the money, I
don’t care. You can have the candy store too. I’ll sign it over to
you, free and clear. Please just let me go. I don’t want to go back
to Dallas.
Please
.”

She was begging and she didn’t care. She
didn’t care if she sounded weak and pitiful, if that’s what it took
to get Daniel to let her go. She didn’t want to go back to Dallas
and marry Miguel, but even more than that, she didn’t want to leave
Brandon. The thought made her throat close and she choked on a
sob.

Another flash of emotion raced across
Daniel’s face, guilt or possibly even sympathy. But it was gone so
fast, it may not have even happened. He set his jaw and shook his
head. “Sorry, Gabriella. No can do. I made a deal with your fiancé,
through his brother. And I’m pretty sure people don’t renege on
him. He’s coming to take you home, and then he’s going to sign over
that candy store so that I can get on with my life.

“Don’t worry. You’ll get over Brandon
eventually. That family is damn unforgettable, but if you work at
it, the feelings go away. At least you won’t have to see him every
single freaking day.”

Gabriella knew he was talking about his own
experience, about having to face Courtney and Laney every day.

“Why didn’t you claim Laney, Daniel?”
Gabriella asked, a new bid to try to convince the man that they
were on friendly terms and therefore he should let her go.

Daniel glanced at his watch again, fidgeted
and sighed. He did not appear surprised that she knew about his
relationship to Laney. “I couldn’t. I didn’t have a goddamned dime
to my name. I couldn’t even afford the kids I already had. And she
was only eighteen. Christ, I was nearly twenty years older than
her. Do you know what the people of this town would have done to
me? It was bad enough I divorced a Sarantos. If I would have gotten
an eighteen year old Sarantos pregnant, they would have ridden me
out of town on a rail.”

“No, they wouldn’t have. They would have
accepted it, because you stepped up and took responsibility. Like a
man. Instead, you hid behind your badge and pretended it never
happened. Courtney had to go through a humiliating teen pregnancy
alone, and Laney has to grow up without a father. You’re such a
loser.”

Okay, apparently she had issues with trying
to befriend people she did not respect or trust.

Daniel backhanded her across the face.
Gabriella’s head whipped to the side and she saw black dots dance
in front of her eyes. She touched her tongue to the inside of her
cheek and tasted blood. She gagged and Daniel jumped back, lest she
throw up. Gabriella gasped for breath and finally stopped
gagging.

A few seconds later, there was a sharp rap
on the patio door, and then it slid open. Three men stepped inside.
The last one closed the door behind him. Gabriella looked up and
waited for her vision to focus again. When she could finally see,
she shrank back against the chair to which she was tied.

Miguel stood directly in front of her,
looking down at her with a disapproving look on his face. She was
struck by how much he didn’t look like Brandon after all. His dark
hair was blue black, and he had pulled it back into a ponytail. His
skin was a shade lighter than she recalled, although it was still
mocha dark. His eyes were almost black, and they looked dangerous.
It wasn’t the girl’s fantasy kind of dangerous, like Brandon’s blue
eyes promised.

“Hello,
mi queirda.
” Miguel spoke so
softly, Gabriella almost couldn’t hear him. His eyes swept over
her, traveling down to her feet and back up again. “This is a
different look for you, Gabriella. You’ve changed significantly in
such a short time.”

He put his hand on her chin and lifted her
face, twisting it from side to side. Gabriella flinched. He gently
released her and turned to Daniel. “She looks as if someone has
been using her as a punching bag.”

Daniel swallowed convulsively and took an
involuntary step backwards. “She, uh, fell when I was trying to
subdue her. And I think she may have gotten banged up a little when
I put her in the trunk of my car.” He swallowed again and could not
quite meet Miguel’s eyes.