vnNeSsa1 (20 page)

Two men are passing by Tink and heading my way. Alarms go off in my head because of the way they’re staring. Suddenly, they’re right next to me, one on either side.

“Ms. Van Clief, please come with us,” the shorter one says politely. At first, it’s the name that jolts me. Then it hits me that with freedom seconds away, my time has finally run out.

Chapter 27

They’ve found me. It’s over. The closeness of the timing makes me want to howl with frustration.

The men don’t touch me, but they’re close enough to suggest they’ll block me if I try to escape. Tink comes running over.

“Savannah?” There’s fear in her voice. “What’s this about?”

“Tink, take everything and go,” I say, hoping she understands I mean for her to take the money.

Tink
goes absolutely hysterical. She starts sobbing and yelling, creating a scene. Although most of it is incoherent, I can make out the part about me being the only person she has left in the world and if they’re going to take me they’re going to goddamn well take her, too. The men are looking over their shoulders at the person at the desk who’s on the phone. They look at each other, seem to make a decision, and hustle us out the door.

A limousine waits outside, its back door open. We’re directed inside. I grab for my carry
-on. Tink keeps her bag, too. The men crawl in behind, sitting by potential escape routes. The interior of the limo is dark, but the form of one woman is obvious. She leans over to take a closer look at me. She has very thick glasses on, but behind her lenses are arresting, gray eyes.

“Ah, just so,” she says, smacking her lips in the most peculiar way.

The limo pulls out from the curb. We’re about a block away when I hear sirens screaming nearby. Twisting around in my seat, I see red lights flashing in front of the apartment building just before we turn the corner. Incredibly fast response time.

“Where are you taking us?”

“Why, home, of course,” the woman says, whipping out a flask, taking a long slug.

Tink scoots over along the limo bench and takes my hand. It eases my fear of going into the huge unknown of “home.” But I have to protect Tink. She can’t go there with me.

“I don’t remember anything,” I tell the woman. Her expression doesn’t change. Maybe her eyes narrow a little.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I have—amnesia.” There. I said it. I’ve never actually called it what it is before. Tink squeezes my hand. I don’t look at her, but I can imagine the surprise on her face.

“I see,” the woman says.
She looks at me for a long time and then stares off into space. She looks at me again and her lips go in and out. It seems like ages before she talks again. “Well. A bad man is convinced you have something he wants. My advice is to lie to him and tell him you don’t have it.” She leans back and drinks out of her flask. Then she licks at this mole thing on her face.

“Can’t you let us go?” I touch her arm, pleading. She looks at me with her big eyes, distorted by the lenses. They have regret in them.

“No. My reputation is at stake. I have a perfect tracking record.” She tosses the flask in a corner. Then she reaches across the limo, grabs a bottle and starts drinking straight from it.

“How did you find me?”

“A guy who goes by ‘Wolfman’ gave up Liam and two men close to him. One of those two guys knew where Liam was. We are…persuasive.” There’s massive amounts of gross mole-licking and lip-pushing. “You’ve been a challenge to find. Excellent fun. I respect you.”

I worry that Victor was the guy who was “persuaded.” Also, that the mole-licking woman respects me is nice and all, but what good is it if she won’t release me?

There’s silence for a bit. The woman keeps chugging. Then she pulls a cell phone out of a bag and takes a picture of me. She messes with the touch screen and waits with the phone at her ear.

“Yes, it’s hard to believe after all this time. No, Howard, I won’t be coming all the way to the house.” The woman listens for a second. “Obviously, now that you have no more need for me, you would kill me. Like you almost let me die at the restaurant.” She listens some more. “I have my computer here and I want to see the
rest of the funds transferred to the account number I gave you or no girl. Thank you, Howard.” She hangs up. And then I think she smiles. But I can’t be sure.

There’s so much I want to ask this woman, but before I know it
, we’ve arrived at the airport. There’s fear deep in my belly. Before getting out, I turn to plead with her once more, but she cuts me off with a shake of her head.

“Take this,” she says, rooting around in her bag, coming up with a silver, gleaming object. She presses a button on its side and a vicious-looking knife glides out. “Put it in your suitcase with the other thing you’re hiding there and check it in. It will be easier to get it through airport security. It’s the best I can do.”

I accept the knife without a word. How did she know I was hiding something in my carry-on? I’m getting out of the limo and all I can do is look at her boots. She’s delivering me into the hands of the person who’s been hunting me for months and I can’t stop staring at her stupid black boots.

“Harley
-Davidson Ladies Dipstick Steel Toe Riding Boot,” the woman says proudly, surprising me. “Get yourself out of this mess and I’ll send you a pair.”

All I can do is stare at her. This kidnapping is taking on a surreal quality.

She turns away abruptly and speaks in undertones to the two men. If they’re worried about us escaping, we won’t try anything yet. Tink and I will be wanted by police in New York for bludgeoning a man. Unless he dies. Then we’ll be wanted for murder. We need to get out of the state quickly. This flight to wherever will give me time to think.

The tracker woman pauses and looks back over her shoulder before she climbs into the limo. She fixes me with her intelligent eyes and opens her mouth to say something. But instead she clamps her lips together, turns her back, and slams the car door behind her damn black boots.

We’re on the plane in no time. Luck is with our kidnappers. A plane with extra seats is departing for Chicago and we make it through security with no problems. Chicago. It means nothing to me. I’m beginning to doubt my memory will ever come back.

Chapter 28

Once on the plane, everything crashes in on me. The places Liam punched me feel sore and damaged. My throat is crushed and my voice still doesn’t sound right. The old, familiar feelings of panic are threatening to overwhelm me. Taking deep breaths and holding Tink’s hand are the only things keeping me anchored to my seat. We were so close to escaping. Forcing myself to think through options somehow calms me. By the time the plane touches down at O’Hare
Airport in Chicago, I have a plan and a back-up plan.

But when we arrive, escape is impossible. We collect my suitcase in baggage claim. The shorter, polite man clears his throat.

“Ms. Van Clief, I’ll be keeping your friend near the airport while my associate takes you to your destination to make sure you don’t try to leave us. If you give him no problems, she’ll be fine. Understand?”

My eyes close in surrender. At least Tink will be safe from this Howard creature. I dig the knife out of my suitcase and tuck it in my bra. Then I roll the case over to Tink and curl her fingers around the handle.

“I promise you,” I say, looking straight into her eyes, “I will be back for you.” I leave her with tears streaming down her face and follow the taller man to the cab queue.

We seem to be in the cab forever
, with me getting more and more terrified. I remember all too clearly how the woman said Howard would kill her if she came to his house. If I don’t give him whatever he thinks I have, it sounds as if he will kill me.

We go through a gritty part of Chicago and then turn on a street that runs along the lake. The houses get nicer the farther along the lake we go. My memory stays blank.

We turn in to the open gates of a mansion. The tall kidnapper tells the cab driver to wait and ushers me into the front door, keeping a firm grip on me the entire way. But I won’t run because of Tink.

I’m trying to get my shaking under control. It’s not to my benefit for this Howard man to see how scared I am. Our footstep
s echo through the home’s empty rooms as the kidnapper leads me up a sweeping staircase to a door at the end of a long hall. The kidnapper knocks at the door.

“Bring the girl in and leave,” a deep voice commands. The kidnapper does as instructed and I find myself alone, facing a man sitting behind a desk at the far end of a darkened room.

“At last,” he says, petting some long-assed sword on his desk.

“What do you want?” I say, my croaky voice helping me sound indignant.

“Come over here, my dear. Let me look at you. I haven’t seen you in a while. You’ve changed. You look so…mature.” I move closer and he looks me over. I want to get a better look at him, too, but his face is still in shadows.

“What do you want?”

“You know what I want.”

No
, I don’t!

“I don’t have it,” I say, remembering the tracking woman’s advice.

The man opens his desk drawer and pulls out a heavy-looking, black object. It’s a gun. He handles it carefully, as if it’s some cherished pet. He sets it gently on the desk near his hand with the barrel pointed at me.

“
But you know where it is.”

“No, I don’t.”

“A little persuasion and this gun say you do.”

No idea what to say next to buy time. Knife versus gun. Out of options.

Then my ears hear a voice behind me—the one voice in the world that can make me joyful or crush me with a single word. Time slows down. My reality tilts. It’s impossible. How did he find me?

“FBI. Both hands on the desk
where I can see them, Harrington.”

Unable to resist
—I have to see if this is real—I whip around. There stands Victor, feet planted, expression deadly. He’s got a gun aimed at the man behind the desk. All his attention is focused there. When I turn back around, I’m horrified to see that Howard has his gun pointed at my head.

“A conundrum,” Howard says. “Can you shoot me before I shoot the girl?”

“Go ahead and shoot her,” Victor says. “She means nothing to me.”

Howard sits there in the shadows without moving.

“Oh really? Where’s your back-up?” He waits a beat. “No, I think you’re a one-man rescue mission. The kind that never succeeds.” Howard slowly pushes back in his seat. Victor inches toward me at the same time.

“They’re on their way,” Victor says. He isn’t looking at me. His face is hard, unreadable. I’m
edging toward Victor when Howard’s voice snaps out like a whip.

“Take one more step and I’ll shoot you,
Vannessa.” I feel a wave of nausea, but battle it back with anger. Not now!

“He won’t shoot me, Victor,” I say
. “He needs something from me.”

“My dear, deluded girl, I’ll shoot you in an instant to save myself.”

Of course I believe him. Arrogance drips off this man like sweat. He apparently has decided to end this impasse because he suddenly stands from his desk chair, gun still trained on my head. When he does, the light falls on his face and I can see it clearly.

I see his eyes.

vnNeSsa1 and this hideous man.

At the point of death, your life is supposed to flash before your eyes. That’s how my memory comes back to me. In this instant, I see it all. And what I see makes me double over like I’ve been hit in the stomach again. Only, it’s far worse than anything Liam did to me.

“Bonita, what is it?”

I don’t even have to look at Victor’s face to know beyond all doubt that he loves me. It’s in his voice. The knowledge is bittersweet. It’s as though he’s being sucked away from me through some black hole in outer space.

Because gaining my memory back means losing the love of my life forever.

Chapter 29

I step directly between the two men, blocking Victor’s shot. The most important thing now is that Victor is not hurt.

“Bonita, what are you doing?” Victor says behind me, his voice vibrating with agitation. Ignoring him, I’m advancing carefully toward the now very familiar man behind the desk.

“Let’s go, Howard,” I say. It’s funny how so much hate can be packed into three words. Howard’s watching me warily, his gun still pointed at my head.

“My pleasure, Vannessa.”

“No, no! Stop, Bonita!” Victor is beginning to understand I’m sacrificing myself. He thinks I don’t deserve it. But I do.

“Take me instead,” Victor says. I thought it impossible to love him more. “I’m more valuable to you. Let her go.” Definitely more valuable. A good guy. And me? Not a good guy, after all.

“I don’t need you,” Howard says, disdainfully. “Whatever you think you’ve got on me, there’s no hard evidence. I do need the girl. So good bye, FBI man.”

I’m a foot away from Howard by now. He grabs my arm, placing me directly in front of him as a shield. I find myself facing Victor for the first time. I see him take in the bruises around my neck and the torn dress. His eyes close briefly. When they open, I see pain and anger and something else. He blames himself.

“It’s not your fault,” I say.

He just shakes his head.

“Victor, Tink is at O’Hare
Airport somewhere. Find her. My family attorney will see that she’s taken care of.”

“Bonita, I
—”

“As much as your obvious mutual attraction is fascinating, we do need to go,” Howard says, pulling me backward, making me stumble. I stumble again when he opens a door in the rear of his study and jerks me over the threshold of the doorway into a garden. He runs flat out for a gate on the far side
, dragging me behind. There’s a sound of a shot being fired behind us. It smashes into the wood of the fencing far to our right. Victor’s not taking any chances on me getting hurt.

We run along a wall. Howard stops by a door and fires a volley of shots to keep Victor back. He opens the door and pulls me back into the house. We run through a labyrinth of corridors
, ending up in an enormous garage full of cars. Howard pushes me into the driver’s side of a Bugatti Veyron and gets into the passenger’s seat.

“Drive,” he commands, inserting the key. He hits the garage door opener on my visor as I start the car. Moments later, we launch out of the garage. Victor has anticipated Howard’s move. He’s shooting at the tires as soon as we’ve cleared the garage doors. I’m moving too quickly and he misses. I get a glimpse of him as we fly by. His face is wild.

“Get to Lake Shore Drive and head south,” Howard says, leveling the gun at my body rather than my head. Lake Shore Drive. No problem. I know exactly where that is. The car is a joy to drive. A dream come true for me. I almost laugh at the irony.

“I’m out of time,
Vannessa.” His voice is sharp now, all phony politeness gone. “Where is the evidence?”

“You raped my mother.” I can feel his surprise.

“She told you?” He gives a small laugh. “We were kids, college students. I had a hard time stopping myself.”

There’s that feeling again
, as if something in my head is going to blow apart. The car’s cruising faster, screaming around the sprinkling of traffic around us. I push it until I feel it moving out of my control. It’s really too much car for me to handle. Howard mashes the floorboard with his foot.

“
Where’s the evidence?”
he demands, jamming the gun into my side.

“I don’t know!” I scream back at him. “If I knew I would tell you! What do I care? You think you’re so damn smart. You’re an idiot. My dad said he had something important to tell me that evening at dinner
after we went rafting
. Your timing sucks. And then in the raft…” I’m sobbing, choking out the words, driving suicidal down the road.

The man beside me whips his head around.

“What happened in the raft?”

He gets nothing more from me. I’m fighting to get myself and the car under control when Howard breaks into laughter.

“Oh, that’s rich, that’s beautiful,” he says, as though delighted by some hysterical joke. “Now I get your self-sacrifice back at the house and that pathetic guide lying about hitting your dad with the oar. Did you have a fight with Daddy, Vannessa? You did my dirty work for me, didn’t you?” He keeps laughing his fool head off.

For
get this shit. The Bugatti is said to have 1000 horsepower with 6000 rpm, topping out at over 250 mph. Let’s see if that’s true. I deliberately push it to 220 mph, where I know hydraulics will lower the car, and the wings and spoiler will deploy.

“Slow down,
Vannessa, or I’ll shoot you. We’ll die keeping this speed up. We’ll die if I shoot you. At least with the latter option, I’ll have the satisfaction of putting a bullet in your brain.”

Over the sound of the car’s powerful engine and my own crying, I can hear the unmistakable whipping noise of a chopper flying low. A light from the sky washes over our car.

“Would you shoot your own daughter?”

The chopper, the car, my crying, all sounds recede as though muffled by cotton. As I slow down, I risk a glance at Howard’s face. Shocked doesn’t begin to describe it.

“Look at my eyes, you conceited, self-absorbed ass. I have your exact eyes. You raped my mother in college. She got pregnant. My dad fell in love with her and married her.” The car responds to my direction. I’m much better with cars than with horses. The speedometer reads sixty mph.

To Howard’s credit, he recovers quickly.

“Marvelous,” he breathes, staring. “You
are
more like me than the other offspring I had a year after you must have been born.
You’re
beautiful. Crafty—”

“Shut up! Never forget you are just a sperm donor. You are not my real father. My real father raised me. He changed my diapers, fed me, held my head when I threw up, listened to my fears, held me when I cried…” And I can’t go on because I’m crying too hard.

“Thank you for that reminder, Vannessa,” Howard says, coldly. “It helps with this next part. Because, you see, the plan is for you to be my decoy.”

Gun still in hand, he reaches over and
I see he means to take the wheel and crash us into the center divider so he can get away. All reason leaves me. One hand grabs for the knife in my bra and thumbs the release button as though I’d been knifing people all my life. In a red rage, I stab blindly at Howard’s hands and arms. He jams the wheel far to the left in response. My foot pounds on the accelerator instead of the brakes. This mistake sends us through the center divider and into oncoming traffic. The headlights blind me and I’m sure we’re going to die. I hear a girl scream and realize it’s me.

In seconds
, we’re across the lanes of traffic, heading for a low wall with the lake on the other side.

“The answer to your question is: yes,” Howard shouts. I hear a gunshot and he rolls out the door.

The car crashes across the top of the wall and takes flight. The airbag explodes in my face just as pain explodes in my body and I realize Howard shot me.

It seems to take forever to hit the water. My life does not flash before my eyes.
Instead, the image of Victor’s face appears vividly in front of me.

I feel the car’s impact on the water. It’s a crushing blow. Everything
disappears.

Pain everywhere. I can’t open my eyes. Too bright. Something on my face. Get it off. Sirens. So loud. Try to get up. Lead weight on my chest.

“She’s waking up!” It’s Victor’s voice. “Bonita, my love, you’re going to be OK. You’re on the way to the hospital. It’s all right.” His hands pet my hair. His lips kiss my hand.

It’s OK. If I’m going to die, let it be here, with him gripping my hand. Tears squeeze out of my eyes and fall in my ears.

“She’s in pain! Get her something
—
now
!”

My eyes try to open against the glare. I have to see him one more time. Ah, there. He looks like an angel. Eyes on fire. But he looks cold and wet. Ouch! Oh no, no sleep. Not now. I want to look at him. One last time.

“It will be better now, my love,” he says, kissing my forehead.

He speaks to me in Spanish. It sounds like a lullaby. For the longest time
, I try to keep my eyes on him. Then I just listen to his beautiful voice and float away.