Love Inspired Suspense June 2015 #1 (55 page)

“What are the terms?” she asked, formulating an idea.

“The terms?”

It was Nate. She'd recognize that word on his lips any day. “Yes, Nate.”

The next second her blindfold was ripped off. “The terms are that you're going to give me what I want. Then you're going to die.”

Gretchen gulped, then answered, “I'm not giving you anything. Do you really think you'll get away with kidnapping and murder?”

“If you're not around to tell.” Nate reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a pocketknife, the blade snapping out as he opened it. “I was hoping I wouldn't have to explain things, but since I have to, we'll do this the hard way.” He reached for the ropes behind her and sawed through them with a couple quick jerks.

Only when he yanked her to a sitting position she found her hands were still tied behind her. He'd only released her from the ropes that bound her to the boat's deck. To do what? Throw her overboard like this? She shuffled away from Nate but came up against the port-side wall.

“You see, Gretchen, there on your little island you don't have a clear picture of the dirty world Colm and I come from. Where one does whatever he has to, to come out on top. It's not enough just to survive. People have to know you're in charge.”

Nate swung her around by the arm. She felt like a rag doll in his rough grasp. He yanked her arms back, causing her to cry out in pain. “Even if that means someone gets hurt. Especially someone who gets in the way.”

A searing pain emanated from her right pinky finger. Gretchen turned around. “You're hurting me!” she cried out. “What are you doing?”

“Giving you a taste of our world. And making sure you know I'll do whatever I have to, to get what I want.”

“By cutting off my fingers?”

“The pinky will go first.”

Pain exploded further from her finger and she cried out again.

“I gave you ample time to get out of my way, but you never left. I set up hazard after hazard so you would realize you shouldn't be on the set. Not even the shock worked! How was I supposed to carry out my job with you around?”

“Your job? I never stood in the way of filming. You reminded me constantly that I signed terms that stated I couldn't.”

“Not the filming!” he burst out but quickly calmed. “The painting. It was going to be my biggest fence yet. When I saw it above the fireplace at the restaurant during the interview, I knew it was something special. And now you're going to give me what I want, just like your note said.”

“You won't get away with this. The FBI is onto you.”

Nate laughed. “They're not onto me. They're onto Colm. You see, I watched you leave the notes for the others. You didn't see me, but I saw you. Worked to my advantage. I told your ex where he could find you and to take out the fed in the woods, as well. Yeah, I already knew about him. That's why I knew this would be my last heist. Take the painting and never look back. And Colm would be the one to pay for it.”

“I don't understand. How is Colm involved? He would never break the law.”

Nate laughed. “Shows what you know. When I met him he was breaking the law. It was only because Troy bribed the cop that he got off. My friend was fired that day. Colm won that round. But I couldn't have him forgetting what he was, believing that just because he cracked jokes in front of my camera he was something special.”

“That's what this is about? You wanted to make sure Colm knew he didn't succeed on his own?”

“He got a free ride because Troy saw dollar signs when he watched him fight. But now I've made sure he's going where he should have gone in the first place—to jail. I made sure all roads lead to him. And it was Gil Griffin who helped me.”

“His stepfather?”

“Right after Colm joined the crew, Griffin called for Colm, but I answered the phone that day. He had a connection who was looking for art. He thought since Colm was now hanging with the swanky Hollywood types, he might come across some unique works that would bring a pretty penny. He then proceeded to lay on the subliminal threats that Colm's mother could really use his help and he better deliver.

“I told the man that Colm was a Goody Two-shoes now and a real praying man. We shared a laugh over that, then we talked about how a cameraman is really the person he should talk to about this venture. After all, no one notices the cameraman, but I notice everyone and everything, right down to the paintings on the walls.

“I sent Gil pictures of what I found, and he told me which ones to grab. A great opportunity had finally come my way to put Colm in the jailhouse and put me in the rich house.”

“So, you've made it look like Colm is the one stealing the art while you send them to Griffin.”

“A tortured soul Colm is over the abuse of his ma. He would do anything to help her.”

“You're sick.”

He pressed the knife deeper into her finger, but Gretchen held her breath to hold in a whimper. “But I'm about to be very rich. Unless I don't show up with the painting. So where is it?”

“Don't you care that an old man fled his homeland with nothing but that painting? Do you even want to know why Griffin wants it? Have you thought how you're nothing but a puppet for someone else to control? You're only playing on someone's strings. You've been hoodwinked, Nate. Tell me, how much did Griffin promise you? Ten grand? A hundred grand? A
million
?”

His knife-wielding hand lessened its grip at her last figure. She knew she had her answer. She let out a laugh, having no reason to hold back now. This could be her last night alive.

“That's it, huh? A cool million.” She turned to try to look him in the face. “It's a van Gogh, Nate.

“You agreed to steal it for a million dollars, when Griffin will sell it for a hundred million. It's probably worth a lot more.” She leaned in close to him. “You feel those puppet strings strangling you yet? How about using your knife to cut those instead? You may think you're winning this fight, but the truth is no bully will ever allow such a thing. I know this for a fact.”

Nate was quiet for a few moments. Gretchen's lungs began to expand as she realized she may have convinced Nate that Gil was using him.

“Take me back, Nate. Let this go and break your connection with Griffin before you end up paying for his crimes. You can do it.”

A second later, Nate yanked hard again on her hand and pressed his knife back into her wound. Gretchen bit down but the pain was too strong and she moaned. Tears filled her eyes.

“‘You can do it,'” he mimicked in a singsong voice. “What do I look like? Some cameraman from a children's television show?” He pulled her back. “No. This is how it's gonna go down. You're going to tell me where the painting is. I know you know. I saw the old man bring it into your house the first day we arrived. I was heading out to take pics on the ledge, and I saw him carry a brown package that could only be the painting. Things would have gone easier for him if he had only left it on the wall of the restaurant. But when I paid him a visit, he wouldn't tell me where he stashed it...so I decked him. I turned that house upside down looking for it. You must have put it somewhere else. That's all I can figure. But where?”

“What do you plan to do with it if I tell you?”

“I'll fence the art myself and take all the money. And then I'll find Colm's father and make sure he pays for swindling me. I'll make sure Colm goes down for that, too. That won't be hard. Nobody will believe he isn't guilty.”

A surge of anger rolled through Gretchen. Nate was right. Colm's past would deem him guilty even if he was nowhere near Ireland.

Nate shook her. “What are you waiting for? Tell me where it is!”

Gretchen stole a glance in the direction of the shore. That was when she saw the flames.

“Fire!” she shouted. “Nate, take me back. My house is on fire. I have to save it!”

“You should be thinking about saving your life, not a heap of kindling.”

Billows of smoke took her dreams up with them. She had to get back to shore. A burst of energy shot Gretchen to her feet and out of Nate's grasp. He stood in response and she bent at the waist to plow headfirst into his stomach. But her head met the heel of his hand first.

The blow came so hard and fast that Gretchen's body could only follow the spin of her head as it whipped her to the right. Without the ability to brace herself with her arms, she fell flat to the deck in a painful smack.

Her whole body ached with the impact, her lungs expelled in a whoosh. As hard as she tried, she couldn't get them to refill. Then Nate was upon her again.

His blade cut into another finger, but the pain from her fall took precedence. “Tell me where the painting is or I'll cut it off!” he shouted. “Every thirty seconds you'll lose another one.”

Gretchen tried to look toward the shore. Her life was going up in flames. Her dreams of independence were over...unless she told him the painting was in the house.

As air slowly seeped back in, her reasoning became clear again. If she told Nate, he would take her back to get it before it perished in the fire. He wouldn't let
his
dream go up in smoke.

But could she let hers?

SIXTEEN

G
retchen knew what she had to do.

She closed her eyes and let her dreams burn away.

Billy had said he was going to torch the evidence of his brutality. He had just neglected to say he would torch it along with her house. She wasn't surprised at his actions. They fit well with his identity. But she was surprised that her decision to release her dreams didn't leave her feeling like a weakened victim.

The ability to turn her face filled her with power.

“Twenty-five!” Nate's voice rang through her head like a bell from a boxing ring.

Not weak, but meek. Strength under control. A winner knew there would be sacrifices. Painful ones at that. But when it was all over, she would rise from the ashes. For now, she had a fight to engage in.

“Untie me, and I'll take you to the painting. It's treacherous out here with all the submerged rocks. I'll need to navigate carefully.”

“Do I look like an idiot? I'm not untying you.”

“Do you want your painting or don't you? Besides, what am I going to do, jump into the deep, black ocean? No one would ever find me. I'd never be heard from again.”

“That's the plan,” Nate said snidely. “But fine, I'll let you drive us in.” He wrenched her to her feet and cut the ropes, then threw her toward the helm. “One wrong move and I'll cut you.”

“Wouldn't think about it,” she replied with her head held high. She ignored the painful sores and sticky blood on her wrists and fingers. “Besides, that's your MO, right?” Gretchen took the wheel and moved the throttle to put the boat in motion. “Stage a few mishaps for the camera, keep the light off you? You really had me going, though, when you filmed Billy hitting me. I never dreamed it was for profit. You staged that to let me think you were on my side. I think I'm starting to see what you mean about coming out on top. You'll use whatever means you can to get there.”

Gretchen saw the lit lighthouse dead ahead, got her bearings and brought the boat in line with it. The lighthouse's beacon warned seafarers to stay away from the dangerous rocks that surrounded the island, but tonight its light pulled her forward and drew her eyes up.

Way up.

“We'll be going to the top tonight. Of that.” She pointed to the lighthouse.

“That's where you hid it?” The beacon flashed on Nate's face as it circled around. His look of delight nearly made her forfeit the fight right then and there. The light gleamed on his expression for only a few seconds, but it was enough for her to know that if she took him up there, she would most likely come down a faster, more direct route than the way they ascended.

Especially when he realized the painting wasn't there.

Gretchen dared not turn to see her house. She might lose her focus and cave in at the sight. She needed to hold off revealing her final play until she knew for sure he could never get his hands on the painting. And she would know this only when she had lost it all.

Gretchen slowed the boat and let it drift to the large rock the lighthouse stood on about five hundred yards from land. The boat banged against the stone, and she dropped anchor. The next second, Nate had her by the strap of her painter's overalls. He pulled with a roughness that had her scraping her hands along the barnacles stuck to the rocks as she tried to keep on her feet.

Nate led her to the door, but it was locked. “How do you get in?”

She knew, having lived here her whole life, that a key was hidden. As a teenager she'd learned the not-so-secret hiding place on a late-night excursion.

“It's in the lantern hanging beside the door.”

The door scraped open on rusty hinges, and the beacon from above shed some light down the spiral staircase on them.

“Ladies first.” Nate gave her a shove onto the first step.

Gretchen righted herself. “Who said chivalry was dead?”

“Funny, you don't come across as a woman who wants a man to hold the door for her. I was just obliging your claim to independence. Now get moving.”

As she took the first step alone, her independence felt more like isolation out here on this rock far from the townspeople's help. From Colm. “Right about now I would take that knight in shining armor,” she mumbled.

“Then you shouldn't have picked a street urchin. They don't get to be knights. Keep walking.”

Nate's slander cut her as deeply as if he'd attacked her personally, as if...?

As if she and Colm were one?

But that wasn't possible. How could she be independent
and
with someone?

As Gretchen led the way up the narrow metal stairs, each step she took brought a sharp ache to her heart at the idea of never seeing her Irishman again.

Her
Irishman. Listen to her. She chastised herself for taking such liberties, even in thought.

And yet she knew she always would think of him as hers. Colm had given her so much of himself. He'd infiltrated her life even when she promised never to allow it again.

How had he done it?

With his smiles and selflessness.

Gretchen reached the top landing and entered a circular room enclosed in glass. Outside the glass was a narrow walkway with a short railing. She knew that all Nate had to do was scoop her up and give her a toss.

But not before she dealt the final blow.

One look out the window and she could see the flames shooting up into the sky from behind the pine trees. Her house was engulfed and it was time to hit Nate right where it would hurt him the most.

“There's nothing up here but a bunch of tools,” Nate growled. “Is this some sort of trick? Did you think I wouldn't throw you over?”

Gretchen kept her gaze locked on where her house was situated on the cliff behind the trees. “No trick,” she said. “Just taking your advice to make sure no one else comes out on top.” She turned to look straight at him.

“Including you. You see, we both lose tonight. I've lost my house and my future. And you, well, you've lost the painting. It's in my attic. Or I should say, was.” She nodded to the flames.

Gretchen half expected him to retaliate as Billy would: a right-handed slap across her face. She kept her head held high.

“It can't be. I tore that place apart, right down to the studs. You're lying.”

“Lying would be cheating, and that wouldn't be fair, would it? No, Nate. If I have to lose tonight, so do you.”

“Not if I can help it. Move it.”

Gretchen started at his grasp and violent pull toward the stairs. “Where?”

“To the house. You're going in to get it. And if you're too late, you'll burn with it.”

* * *

Colm coughed as he crawled along the floor of the servants' quarters. He had called out to Gretchen so many times he was hoarse. Flames roared around him as he made his way through, dodging shoots of fire and mounting heat. His eyebrows had to be scorched off by now. Thankfully, one of the islanders thought to drape a wet blanket over him before he ran inside. It shielded him while he searched for Gretchen...and Nate.

In a crawl through the first floor, darting around bursts of flame from the basement, Colm realized they weren't in here. If he could he would have breathed a sigh of relief, but he needed to look everywhere first. Would the fire have spread to the main house? Or had the islanders been able to contain it?

Smoke billowed around him so thickly he could only feel his way through the apartment. Colm knew the layout like the back of his hand, having pored over the blueprints for nearly a month. He reached the back staircase that would take him to the second-floor bedroom and to the main part of the house.

The entrance to the stairwell was open at the bottom, but the top was closed off by a door. Once the fire reached that doorway, there would be no stopping the beast.

The Morning Glory would never open for business.

Colm hesitated before opening the door. Even with the blanket, he felt as if he were burning inside and out. Sweat poured off him, giving the smoke something to stick to. He was sure he looked as blackened as the house. The sight would kill her, he knew: her whole future charred away.

But she wouldn't have a future at all if he didn't find her soon.

“Gretchen!” He listened intently for any human sound.

Colm pulled himself up the stairs as he watched the flames nip at his feet. He covered his eyes where the blazing orange heat scalded him and raced to get away from it. At the top of the stairs, he burst through the door and fell flat on his face. He kicked immediately to slam the door behind him, but not before flames shot out and ignited the throw rug in a loud whoosh. Colm jumped to his feet and backed away just as the flames sped toward him and the new curtains beside him disintegrated in a flash.

Colm looked at the door across the room. As soon as he opened it, the fire would retreat through it. But going back the way he came wasn't an option. He ran forward, through the door before the fire found the next flammable item.

Him.

Colm slammed the door behind him. He removed the wet blanket and draped it at the base of the door. Hopefully, the saturated towel would hold back the smoke and flames for a little longer.

The air around him cleared, and he took the reprieve from ingesting toxic smoke, still wondering how the islanders were faring. Had they put any of the fire out?

“Goldie, finding you alive is my only concern.” He raced around the balcony, not touching the restored railing. It, too, would be gone soon, overtaken by the blaze that destroyed everything in its path.

Colm pushed open every door to find beautifully decorated rooms, but no people. He rushed to the attic door and pulled it wide.

Darkness loomed and he nearly wept when he reached the rooms and found them empty. If not here, then where was she?

Nate would have wanted the painting, Colm reasoned, and he raced for the trap door. If the painting was still there, then they hadn't come here. Thankfully, he still wore his barely used hammer. Tonight it would be used well. He lifted the door and dropped to his knees.

“It's still here.” Dread filled Colm as he looked out through the window above him as though it would show him where they were. Had Gretchen led Nate to an unknown place to trick him?

If that was the case, Colm might never find her in time.

* * *

“Get down,” Nate growled when they came in view of her burning house. He pushed Gretchen's shoulder down hard, and she fell to her elbows and knees.

The sight before her kept her there.

Hundreds of people were wrestling with the flames, make that hundreds of
islanders
. They were working together to put out the fire!

But why?

She watched people spraying hoses from the fire trucks' tanks. Many passed buckets in an assembled line, then passed them back to be refilled.

She wished she could call out from where Nate had her hidden in the darkness, but no one would hear her over the roar of the fire or their shouts. Maybe if she broke out of the clearing and away from Nate, she could find refuge in the masses, but before she could plan her next step, Nate dragged her back into the woods.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“Around to the front. I said you were going to burn. I didn't say I was.”

She noticed the flames were contained to the rear of the house. “All because of the islanders,” she said aloud, her mind still reeling at the thought of them helping her when they had been against the B&B from the beginning.

Nate gave her a shove. “Move. I want that painting before it goes up in flames.”

Gretchen stayed behind the tree line but took in the scene with question after question. Questions that she would never know the answers to because as she skirted her property, she knew she walked to her death. Once Nate had the painting, it would be all over for her unless she came up with another tactic to free herself.

They reached the front of the property. “It's all clear,” Nate growled. “We're going right through the front door, and I don't want a word out of you. Got it?”

Gretchen nodded, but just in case, Nate covered her mouth with his foul, beefy hand. All she could hope was that someone would see them.

Her hope was in vain.

They walked right up the steps and through the door without notice. As soon as they were inside, Nate flashed his knife to point the way up and shoved her forward.

“I'm not dying in this fire tonight, so you better make it quick,” he instructed. “This part of the house is already filling up with smoke.”

At the second floor Gretchen noticed where the smoke poured from under the door that led to the servants' quarters. The fire had to be right behind it.

A cry escaped her lips, but she bit it back and turned her gaze from the sight. There was no use saving the house if she didn't save herself. And she had to keep Len's painting out of Nate's hands. She couldn't let him run off with it tonight, never to be heard from again.

Gretchen had to wonder if Len would rather the artwork burned in the fire than got stolen by crooked dealers. After all he went through to save it from the hands of tyrants, would it be better to eliminate its existence forever?

Gretchen passed by her bedroom and through the smoke noticed the door was open. In fact, all the doors were, she saw as she scanned the upstairs balcony. That was when she noticed the railing was completed. Colm had restored it along with her home, bringing the structure back from abandonment. For so long the house had lain lonely and vacant with no hope of anything more in its future. The longer people ignored it, the more disgrace befell it. Until she recognized how it felt, being so much like it.

Then Colm came along and restored it with his talented hands. What a gentle, loving touch could do! The house blossomed around her and a sense of freedom shone from floor to ceiling. Its state of permanent vacancy was lifted. All because of Colm. But not because he wanted anything from it. He gave freely with no strings attached.