Discovered (12 page)

“What?” Jay asked.

“It’s nothing,”
Layla replied, shaking her head. “I’m just surprised to hear you say that since
we’re supposed to be taking things slowly.”

“But it’s the
truth, regardless,” he answered.

“I guess…I guess I
feel the same way,” she stammered.

“You guess?” he
said with a small chuckle.

“I
do
feel
the same way,” she stated, surrendering to the moment.

“Layla…” Jay said
breathlessly, then bent down and kissed her again.

As if to dampen the
magical mood, Joey came running over to them at that instant.  “Do you want to
get out of here?” he asked. “I’m hungry, and the music is too loud.”

“What did you have
in mind?” Jay questioned.

“Maybe we could go
grab a burger in the ale house next to Target,” he suggested. “Hang out
somewhere quiet, just the four of us.”

Jay looked at Layla
and raised his eyebrows. “It’s your birthday,” he said, leaving the decision up
to her.

“Sounds good,” she
replied.
‘One more kiss like that and I’m done for,’
she thought,
grateful for the distraction.

Frank held the door
to the limo open for them as they climbed in. 

Jay sat next to
Layla, took her hand in his and held on firmly as they drove down the road to
the ale house.

Fifteen minutes
later, they were seated at a table, looking over the menu. “What time is it?”
Layla asked, trying to decide if a guacamole burger would be appropriate at that
time of the night.

“It’s five minutes
to ten,” Jay said, looking at the front of his cell phone. “Why do you ask?”

“I was going to
order a guacamole burger, but I can only imagine the calorie intake so close to
bed.”

“With a figure as
lovely as yours, I don’t think you need to worry about that,” Jay replied,
winking at her.

 “So, Julie…” Joey
said, shifting nervously in his seat.

Julie widened her
eyes at him.

“I was thinking
that maybe we could get together again, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“You’re risking the
wrath of Ben,” Jay said quietly, causing Layla to laugh, “opening a can of
worms…playing with fire…poking the bear…”

Joey rolled his
eyes. “Yeah, I get it!”

“When?” Julie
blurted out, obviously having no idea what Jay meant.

“Maybe tomorrow
night,” Joey answered wistfully. “Maybe the four of us could hang out again at
Jay’s or something.”

“Sure,” Jay butted
in, nodding, “although, we’d have to include Issy and Ben since there staying
at my house also.”

 “Great,” Julie replied.
“Issy seems really nice.”

“She is,” Layla
assured her.

They spent the
following hour eating burgers and just enjoying each other’s company. But as
the clock approached eleven thirty, Layla supposed she should get home before James’
started to worry. And besides, she was eager for him to present her with her
new car.

They walked out of
the restaurant and made their way to the limo that was parked at the far end of
the parking lot.

When they were
about twenty feet from their ride home, Julie turned to Layla. “My feet are
killing—” Her sentence was cut short by the loud screech of a black van turning
sideways abruptly next to them.

They stopped short
and glared at the dark vehicle.

Three masked men
jumped from the back of the van with guns drawn while the driver kept the van
running.

Layla screamed, her
heart thundering in her chest, feeling dizzy from the jolt of adrenaline. She staggered
backward slightly.

Without missing a
beat, Jay pulled a gun from the inside pocket of his jacket and held it up facing
the three strangers. “Don’t even think about it,” he warned the masked men.

Watching the scene
as if in slow motion, Layla noticed that Joey and Frank the driver quickly
approached Jay, standing on either side of him, both of them holding guns.

“We don’t want any
trouble here,” Jay said with a loud warning in his voice. “As you can see, it’s
three against three. Those odds don’t bode well for any of us.”

“There are a lot of
people looking for you,” one of the masked men said.

“I suggest you get
on your way and forget you saw me,” Jay insisted. He cocked his head slightly
to the right. “Layla, Julie, get in the limo now!” he ordered.

“Layla…” another of
the masked men said, turning his head in her direction.

“That’ll get you
popped between the eyes, Buddy,” Jay warned. “Get on your way, gentlemen. I
don’t think you want to find out the hard way which of us is the quicker shot.”

Layla was frozen to
the spot, paralyzed by fear. A shaking and whimpering Julie finally managed to
pull her into the limo. Layla crouched down on the floor of the car while Julie
bravely looked out the side window.

Layla wanted to ask
Julie what was happening outside, but couldn’t find the voice to do so.

After what seemed
like an eternity, Frank slid into the driver’s seat and put the keys in the
ignition, starting the car, while Jay and Joey climbed into the back.

Jay sat next to
Layla and gathered her into his arms, hugging her tightly. “Are you alright?”
he asked, breathing into her hair.

“What happened?”
she whimpered.

“They left,” Jay
replied.

“What the hell was
that about?” she asked with a shaky voice. She pulled away from Jay and looked
over to see Joey with his hand on Julie’s shoulder, his head bent over hers,
making sure she was okay. “Attempted robbery?” Joey guessed, looking over at
Layla. “Expensive car, expensive clothes…they probably assumed we had a lot of
cash on us.”

“But one of them
said that there were a lot of people looking for you,” she said, turning her
gaze on Jay in a questioning manner.

Jay shrugged. “I
have no idea what that meant, and I wasn’t about to ask them for an
explanation.”

“But…but…” Layla
stuttered. “Why are you and Joey carrying guns?”

“They’re licensed,”
Jay replied almost too casually. “Perfectly legal.”

“Yes, but why are
you carrying them?” she pushed, perplexed by his answer.

Jay looked at her
as though she was the one not making sense. “Because we can…because, like I
said, they’re licensed and legal.”

Layla was too
shaken from fear to form an opinion on that answer. But despite the fear, she
felt relieved that Jay had not been seriously injured or worse, she also felt
sick to her stomach from the severe rush of panic and prayed that her burger
would stay put.

Jay kept his arms
firmly around her all the way to Julie’s house.

“Are you sure
you’re okay?” Joey asked as Julie exited the car with Frank’s help.

“I’m…I’m fine,” she
muttered. “I’ll be fine.” She hurried into her house without looking back.

“Layla, if you’d
rather not go home alone, you can stay in my spare room,” Jay said, stroking
her hair as they rode to her house.

“I have to go
home,” she stated firmly. “James is expecting me. I haven’t seen him today, and
he’ll be wondering where I am.”

Jay ran his fingers
through his hair. “I’m so sorry this had to happen on your birthday.”

“At least I’ll
never forget it,” she said, trying to giggle through her nerves.

Her hands shook as
she tried to open the front door, still traumatized from the encounter. She
turned and waved quickly at the limo before walking inside and locking the door
behind her. “James,” she called out, but there was no answer. There was no
sound of the TV, or any kind of life coming from the house. It was evident that
James hadn’t returned yet.

Layla walked to the
stairs en route to her bedroom, flicking on every light that she passed, unable
to get a handle on her nerves.

She walked into her
bedroom, kicked off the shoes and slid out of her dress and into a pair of
sweats and an oversized T-shirt. She unfastened the string of beads that Jay
had given her, then lifted her necklace off the dresser and tied it around her
neck.

She was just making
her way to the bathroom to wash off the make-up when her cell phone rang.
Assuming it was James, Julie or Jay, she placed it to her ear without looking
at the name on front. “Yeah,” she said into it.

“Layla Sparks,” an
unrecognizable male voice said over the line.

“Who is this?” she
asked suspiciously.

“That’s not
important,” the unknown man replied. “I have something that you might want.
Something you might even be interested in trading your boyfriend for.”

A shiver ran up
Layla’s spine as she remembered the three masked men, and without knowing how,
she knew that whoever was on the phone had something to do with them. She felt
as though all the air was sucked out of the room as she started trembling
uncontrollably again.

“I don’t have a
boyfriend,” she muttered into the phone.

“Don’t lie to me,
Layla,” the man responded. “You would do yourself a favor by playing nice with
me. I know where you live, and I know you’re alone…”

Overcome with
panic, her phone fumbled from her hand, and as she bent over to pick it up, she
accidentally hit the off-button, breaking the connection.

She raced
downstairs; her only thought was to get out of the house and into the company
of others quickly. She opened one of the kitchen drawers where she, her mom and
James kept various keys, and fumbled around for the keys to James’ car.

They weren’t there.

She stood paralyzed
to the spot.

Her phone rang
again.

She picked it up
and placed it to her ear, almost incapacitated from fear.

“Don’t hang up on
me again, Layla,” the voice said over the line. “And don’t even think of going
to the police. I promise you, pretty girl, you would live to regret that.”

Layla moaned into
the phone, unable to answer.

“That’s a good
girl,” the man said. “Now listen—”

Not really knowing
why, Layla disconnected the call, this time on purpose.

She quickly tapped
on Jay’s name, not knowing what else to do. She prayed silently that he’d pick
up.

“Hey, Layla,” Jay
said casually.

Instead of
answering him, she began to whimper uncontrollably.

“Layla?” Jay
questioned.

“Um, hum,” she
mumbled.

“What happened?” he
asked.

“Someone…a man just
called me. He…he knew my number,” she managed to stutter out.

“Okay, Layla, I
need you to calm down,” Jay insisted with overwhelming concern. “I need you to
tell me who called you.”

“Some man…I don’t
know for sure, but I think he was one of those men from before.”

“What did he say?”

“He said he knows
where I live, and he knows I’m alone. God, Jay, I don’t know what to do. He
told me if I called the police I would regret it.”

“Okay, listen to
me. I’m on my way over. I’ll be right there,” he promised. She heard muffled
sounds as if he had his hand over the mouthpiece of his phone. The only word
she heard clearly was
‘now’
. “Layla, are you still there?” he asked.

“Yes,” she
whispered as though someone would hear her if she spoke at normal volume.

“Okay, just stay on
the phone with me until I get there,” he stated. “I’m less than ten minutes
away.”

“Alright,” she
replied. She could tell by the background noise that he was in motion, then she
heard car doors slamming.

“I’m in the car,
Layla,” he said. “Just stay on the phone. I need you to check the doors to make
sure they’re locked. Can you do that for me?”

“Yes,” she
answered, rushing to the front door and pulling on the handle. “The front door
is locked.”

“Okay, go check the
back and the side doors.”

She did as she was
told, oddly comforted that he was on the line, as though she was not so alone
and vulnerable.

“All the doors are
locked,” she reported.

“And the windows?”
he questioned.

“Yes…yes, we always
keep the windows locked.”

“Good, that’s
good,” he said down the line. “I’m almost there.”

“Hurry,” she
muttered.

“Okay, just talk to
me,” he added.

“About what?”

“Tell me all about
your new car,” he said in a calming voice. “Tell me what it looks like.”

She stood by the
front door in case she needed to make a quick exit and told him all the details
she could remember. It seemed like eons had passed until she finally heard a
car coming up her street.

“Layla, I’m almost
at your house,” he said.

“I can hear the
car.”

She breathed a sigh
of relief when she saw the Range Rover pull into her driveway through the
window.

Fumbling with the
lock, she thanked heaven that Jay was finally there.

Jay stood on the
top step with Issy, both of them holding small automatic guns straight up in
both hands, eyes skirting in all directions. Ben stood at the bottom of the
steps, holding a gun in the same fashion, head moving from right to left,
looking for any sign of danger. Joey stood by the Range Rover, same style gun
in his hand, same stance.

“Let’s go,” Jay
said without lowering his weapon.

Layla walked down
the steps with Jay and Issy on either side. When they past Ben, he took up the rear
so that she was almost completely surrounded.

Joey nodded over to
them then jumped into the driver’s seat of the car and started the engine.

Jay opened the back
door for Layla. She climbed in and scooted over to make room for Issy, who
followed behind her. Jay got in on Layla’s other side as Ben lowered his gun
and jumped into the front passenger seat next to Joey.