Pinky Promises (The Promises #1)

by Ciara Shayee

  As Riley said—no news, in this instance, probably meant good news.

  Bypassing the hotel entirely, Riley had John take them straight to the medical centre where the child had been left. Nobody said a word until they got there, but as they walked up the steps, Reagan paused, bending to white-knuckle his knees.

  “Hold on, I need…I need a second.”

  Riley nodded sympathetically as Laker moved to rest a hand on Reagan’s shoulder. “Ray, you okay?”

  Reagan huffed, the sound full of a myriad of emotions. “I don’t know, son. This is all so…”

  “Crazy?” Laker supplied with a wry half-smile.

  With a nod, Reagan stood shakily, hands clenched at his sides. “A few days ago I didn’t know if I’d ever get to see my daughter again, and today I could be a hundred metres from her. And to top it all off I’ve just been told I’ve got a…a granddaughter.”

  Clearly choked up, and struggling to pull himself together, the men were still standing outside a few minutes later when a woman with long blonde hair and a friendly smile walked through the doors.

  “Hello, are you Mr. Lawrence?”

  Peter shook his head, nodding towards Riley as he stepped forward, palm outstretched.

  “That’d be me. You must be Mandy.” He turned to point to Reagan, Peter, and Laker, naming them as he went. “Reagan’s the grandfather mentioned in the note.”

  Mandy smiled in greeting, her expression turning soft and sad. “Your assistant told me you’d be coming. I didn’t expect you to be able to get here so quickly.”

  “We were already on our way,” Riley admitted, edging towards the doors to the building. “Shall we get inside? Reagan, are you ready?”

  What a question.

  Was he ready?

  Reagan wasn’t sure, but he steeled himself as best he could, looking to Peter and Laker to draw some much-needed encouragement from their faces before nodding jerkily.

  “Of course, come on through. Did you have a good flight?”

  As Riley and Mandy exchanged pleasantries, Reagan, Peter, and Laker trailed behind them, each lost in their own thoughts.

  Peter was worried for his friend, and for the sad-looking child he’d seen in the single photo Riley showed them.

  Reagan was petrified of what he was about to see, of who he was about to see. He’d been the proudest man alive when Carl-Roman and Chase were born. This child, his first granddaughter, was five years old and he’d only just discovered she existed.

  Laker’s thoughts had wandered to a place his older friends were vehemently refusing to think of. If Indie had a child, that meant she’d had sex. They already knew, thanks to reports of visible injuries Riley’s agents had reported, that Garrett had hurt Indie. Would it be such a big stretch to assume he might have committed the ultimate crime against a woman? To assume that this child, who so clearly belonged to Indie, also belonged to the man who’d torn apart the two families she’d been born into?

  Laker couldn’t bear to think of the girl he remembered being hurt in any way, so he shoved those thoughts from his mind just as Mandy paused outside a clinic room door. She looked between Riley and the other three men.

  “I don’t know how you want to do this. We need a DNA sample from you, Reagan, just to test against the sample we already have from Marley. She’s very scared, and so far she hasn’t spoken to anybody. It says in the note she had with her that she doesn’t speak but we don’t know if that’s at all, ever or just in scary situations, which obviously this is for her.”

  “I’m going to need that note, please. How many people have touched it?” Riley asked sternly.

  “Just me and Marley. I put it in a sterile bag when I realised what was going on. I’ll fetch it for you.”

  Riley grinned, pleased. “Thank you.”

  “Okay, are we ready? You ready to meet your granddaughter, Reagan?”

  Reagan made a funny noise in the back of his throat, but he managed a short dip of his head, so Mandy pushed the door open.

  The girl was sitting in the corner of the room by the solitary window. There was a chair right beside her but she was sitting cross-legged on the floor, stretching her neck up to be able to peer out of the window. In her lap she held a tattered stuffed bunny, her fingers kneading it, mindlessly caressing up and down its ears.

  All eyes swivelled to Reagan as he took a step further into the room.

  He was staring, transfixed. His gaze swept over the mane of chocolate curls adorning the child’s head, a frown twisting his brows when he saw her skinny arms and legs. They weren’t scarily thin, but she didn’t appear to have an ounce of baby fat on her like Carl-Roman did. For a five-year-old, she looked much older, her profile not rounded like her cousin’s. She was dressed in a dark grey tracksuit, tiny feet encased in a pair of black trainers. She was miniature, like a little doll. Reagan had never seen a child her age so small. Her year-older cousin Carl-Roman would dwarf her.

  The air in the room seemed too thin as Mandy called out to Marley in a soft voice. The child’s head turned as if in slow motion.

  The first thing they all noticed immediately were her eyes. Big, guileless sea-coloured eyes.

  Reagan’s eyes.

  And as she peered between Mandy and the four strangers, shrinking back slightly, she passed over Reagan before her gaze snapped back to him. She squinted, leaning forward a little. It was obvious she recognised the similarities in her features and his. She began to stare, and just as it looked as though she was going to stand, possibly to come closer, she was shocked back onto her butt and scooted back into the corner as far as possible from the crowd in the doorway.

  None of the men were quick enough to catch Reagan as the events of the day became too much, the air in his lungs escaping in a rush as his eyes rolled to the back of his head and he collapsed in a heap on the tiled floor.

  ~ oOo ~

  “I feel like a bloody idiot.”

  “Don’t, Ray, it’s not your fault. You’ve been through a lot these past couple of days, it’s no surprise,” Peter assured his upset friend.

  Reagan harrumphed, his eyes softening as he raised the cigarette in his hand to his lips. He hadn’t smoked in years, but shortly after they’d left the medical centre an ago, he’d asked Riley if he could get an agent to grab him some cigarettes. He’d spent the past half hour on the balcony of the hotel room Riley had arranged, chain-smoking.

  Inside, he could see Marley and Laker. The little girl, his granddaughter, was sitting on the floor with her stuffed bunny and a sandwich the agent had picked up when he went for the cigarettes. She hadn’t touched the food at all. Instead, she’d just alternated between staring out of the balcony doors and sneaking peeks at Laker, who’d sat himself on the loveseat and allowed himself to get engrossed with watching the FBI tech guru get himself set up in the corner. So far, nobody had been able to get a word out of Marley, so they were beginning to suspect the note had meant she didn’t talk at all.

  Remembering the note, the picture, Reagan felt his anger rising back to the surface. Once he’d come to, embarrassed and annoyed with himself for frightening Marley, Reagan had been allowed to read the note Marley had been given when Indie and Grace dropped her off. It had made him irate.

  Dear whoever finds this note,

  This is Marley. She’s five years old. I’m writing this note and I’m Indie Ashby, Marley’s mum, and I was kidnapped with my friend Grace Davies when we were eight years old by a man called Garrett Smith. Marley’s biological father is dead. He worked on the ranch where Garrett has kept me and Grace for the past twelve years. We managed to escape but Garrett is still looking for us and Marley isn’t safe, so please do me this favour and contact my dad, Reagan Ashby, in Eastbourne, England, or Grace’s dad Peter Davies—also from Eastbourne. She’ll be safe with them. I don’t know if the police are still or were ever looking for us, but if they were they’ll be able to help you find my dad.

  I’m trusting you with my baby, so pleas
e make sure she’s safe. Thank you.

  Indie Ashby

  Reagan’s eyes welled up, picturing the way his daughter’s name had been written shakily and blurred by a handful of spots of moisture at the bottom of the photo.

  She’d been crying.

  And was it any wonder? She was a mother—it was still crazy to think of his baby having a baby herself—and she was going through the same thing he was, though in her case it was voluntary because she wanted her baby safe and protected.

  She’d managed to fit that entire passage on the back of a six-by-four photograph by writing very small and with the words squashed together, but there was still so much he wanted to know. About Marley, about the girl’s father. He wanted to know how he’d died—he wanted to know that it was painful, because that’s exactly what he deserved for daring to touch Reagan’s baby girl.

  Nobody had been able to hide the facts from their faces as realisation had dawned. There was no doubt Marley was Indie’s. She looked exactly like her, hair colour aside. And they knew she was five years old.

  Indie was just twenty-one a month ago, which meant they couldn’t deny the uncomfortable truth.

  She could only have been sixteen at the oldest when she’d given birth to Marley.

  So, yes, Reagan would love to get hold of the miscreant who’d touched his daughter. He’d never been a violent man; this entire ordeal was changing that.

  “Why do you think they did it?” Reagan asked suddenly.

  Peter pulled his gaze from the distance to look at him. “Did what? Left Marley at the hospital?”

  Reagan nodded grimly.

  “I don’t know. I guess…well, they wanted her to be safe and they obviously didn’t think she’d be safe if she stayed with them. I don’t know why they didn’t just stay with her, though, and come back to us with her. That part I can’t make head nor tail of.”

  Reagan couldn’t either. He couldn’t understand why Indie and Grace had chosen to stay hidden when they could finally have been found. They could have been protected, too. They would have been safe. But they’d chosen to stay lost and it didn’t make sense. Not to their fathers, nor to Laker, or Riley.

  “They must have their reasons, I suppose.”

  The men slipped into silence once more, both staring out over the landscape below. They were on the top floor of a fairly shitty hotel, but Riley had explained the reason for staying somewhere nondescript was because it would be easier to hide. Nobody would be looking for the FBI in a dingy hotel, if anybody were looking at all.

  A few minutes later, Reagan cast another look inside, unable to keep his eyes away from Marley for longer than a handful of minutes at a time. He just couldn’t believe his own sight.

  The view that greeted him this time made him grin despite himself.

  Marley had obviously grown curious enough of Laker and Ben—the FBI tech guy—to leave her spot on the carpet. She’d edged closer to them in the corner, Laker having had joined Ben to see what he was up to. The bunny she hadn’t once let go of was still firmly in her clutches, but was now hanging at her side as she slinked nearer to the two men. She had to stretch a little to see them better, and the sight was an adorable one as she rose onto tiptoes to watch what the men were up to.

  Reagan saw the moment Laker noticed her. He didn’t acknowledge her, not really, but he did smile to himself and adjust his stance so she could see more. As the next few minutes passed, Reagan watched her creep around the end table until she was just scant feet from Laker. Through the thin patio doors, he listened to what was being said, motioning for Peter to do the same.

  “Are you okay, Little Sweet?” Laker murmured when she was just a foot or two away.

  Marley’s eyes flashed to him, her steps faltering. She hadn’t realised she’d been caught.

  Remembering too late that she didn’t speak, he crouched a little so they were closer to eye-level, smiling gently. “Do you want to come and watch us? It’s okay, Little Sweet, nobody here will hurt you.”

  Marley seemed to consider this for a moment. Reagan held his breath. She hadn’t willingly gone to anyone yet. Mandy had told them that when she’d tried to pick her up, the little girl had struggled so much she’d been afraid of dropping her, so she’d had to point out the way to the clinic room where she’d been waiting. When it had come time to leave the medical centre, Marley had walked of her own accord to the waiting black car at the back of the building, and walked into the hotel the same way—protected by a square of men around her as she went.

  With a proud smile tinged with a small amount of jealousy, Reagan watched as Marley visibly steeled herself and made her decision. She held out her skinny arms, the bunny still dangling from one tiny hand, allowing Laker to pick her up and hold her at his hip. She settled there with a look of trepidation on her face, and held herself away from his body as he pointed out all the various pieces of equipment Ben had already laid out. She seemed pleased to be included, though the morose look on her face didn’t dissipate. Not wanting to miss out on the chance to see Marley livening up, Reagan stubbed out his cigarette and tossed it into the rubbish bin beside the plastic chair his legs had moulded to, wandering inside with a squeak of the patio doors behind him.

  As soon as she spotted him, Marley’s face changed. She shrunk into herself and tucked her body into the curve of Laker’s chest until her face was buried in his neck, though she was still peering out through the curtain of her hair. Reagan’s stomach fell. He’d scared her, that much was clear.

  And he knew he’d messed up when reading the note Indie left. Despair had gotten the best of him and he’d hit the table with a balled-up fist just as Mandy ushered Marley into the room after a trip to the toilet. She’d squealed in fright and hadn’t come anywhere close to him since.

  “She’s okay, Ray, she’s just overwhelmed, I think. This is all a bit much for her,” Laker murmured, his lips curling into a grin when Marley reached up to stroke his beard; she seemed to find it comforting.

  “Well, she’s okay with you,” Reagan waved a desolate hand towards her, cuddled into him. It should be him soothing her. He was her grandfather. Her Pawpaw, if she chose to use the same name as Carl-Roman. That’s if she did speak. Obviously, it wouldn’t matter what he was referred to if she continued being mute.

  “I think I can explain that,” Ben interjected. He’d been quiet up until then, just observing. When all eyes swivelled to him, he grinned toothily. “I think it freaks her out to see the similarities between you and her mom. Your eyes and hair, possibly some of your facial expressions. Laker doesn’t look anything like her, and there’s no pressure with him. Kids are mega intuitive, you know, so she probably realises it’s different with you.”

  The three men considered Ben’s words.

  They couldn’t deny that of all of them, Marley had reacted the strongest to Reagan. She’d been a curious mix of frightened and inquisitive when she first saw him, and if he hadn’t inadvertently frightened her by fainting, who knew what she’d have done when she’d tried to move closer back in that clinic.

  “So, you think I should stop trying to push it and let her come to me?” Reagan surmised, eyes darting backward and forward between Marley resting her head in Laker’s neck, and Ben.

  The FBI agent gave him a nod-shrug combo. “I don’t know what to suggest, Sir, but that’d be the way I’d go. She’s clearly curious about you, but for whatever reason she’s latched onto Laker here. I’d say let her explore what she’s comfortable with. She’ll come to you, in her own time.”

  “Okay,” Reagan sighed. “Okay.”

  Nobody mentioned it, but the dejection in his tone was as clear as a bell.

  ~ oOo ~

  Everybody made themselves as comfortable as possible at the hotel to wait out the search. Reagan, Peter, and Laker had originally asked to help, so Riley explained in explicit detail how reckless it would have been for them do to so, especially considering one very important fact. Well, two.

 
One; Smith was still on the loose somewhere.

  And two; every time Laker left the room, Marley would search frantically for him until he returned.

  Clearly, they both meant nobody was keen for the men to leave the hotel, and so they didn’t.

  To distract themselves, Reagan and Peter called home to speak to Archie, Heidi, Pippa, and Peter’s parents, while Laker worked hard to buoy the spirits of his friends as well as help Marley adjust to her new surroundings.

  By the time night fell, jet lag and the exhaustion of a long day had caught up to the two older men, dragging them into a sleep haunted by the girls’ faces hovering just out of reach.

  While they fidgeted restlessly in their beds, Laker sat on the sofa in the small living area, the tap of Ben’s fingers against the laptop keys a comforting beat in the otherwise quiet room.

  Marley was sitting on the floor over by the patio doors. Her bunny was tucked under one arm, her face resting in her cupped hands as she leaned on them, elbows propped on her crossed knees. The position didn’t look very comfortable, but by then she’d been sitting that way for almost forty minutes, so it couldn’t have been too bad. She was silent, as usual, but Laker suspected she was getting tired as she’d stopped her incessant fiddling with the bunny’s ears. Instead, she stared out into the night, her head lolling to one side just a touch.

  “Marley, are you sleepy?” he called when the small digital clock on the end table pinged to say it was ten p.m. He didn’t spend a whole lot of time around children, but he didn’t think ten o’clock was a particularly normal time for a five-year-old to still be up.

  Marley turned her head a little, peering at him from the corner of her eye. To say she was comfortable around Laker wasn’t completely true, but she didn’t seem to be as wary as she was around Riley, Reagan, or Peter. Laker classed it as a win, purely because it meant the little girl could at least find comfort somewhere in this strange, messed-up situation. He couldn’t comprehend how scared she must be. All these strange faces and unfamiliar places.