The Firefighter's Cinderella

by Dominique Burton

  “I care about everyone.”

  “Liar!” Daphne yelled. “Where were you when the Mexican Mafia got into a fight on my street?”

  “I don’t know. You’re going to have to tell me.” Tasha kept her voice level.

  “I’ll tell you where you were. You were living in your house on Nob Hill while my brother got caught in the crossfire coming home from a friend’s house. He was only sixteen!”

  “I’m so sorry, Daph.”

  Daphne brought the knife up to Tasha’s cheek. C.J. froze. He wanted to protect Tasha, but this wasn’t the time to push a crazy woman.

  “You don’t have the right to be sorry!” Daphne backed up and started to bellow in pain. She grabbed her sides, but her eyes never left the two of them. “I was fifteen and heard the gunfire, but then my mom started screaming and I knew something terrible had happened.

  “After the cars drove by the neighbor’s house, we saw our mom run out to our front yard. They’d emptied multiple rounds of gunfire into the house next door. My brother had cut across their yard at exactly the wrong time.”

  Her face was a picture of agony. “Mom was screaming, ‘It’s not fair, it’s not fair!’ The next week I joined the white supremacists in our town and made their mission my own. I knew I could never get my brother back, but at least I could fight back.” Her blue eyes rested on Tasha and she smiled evilly.

  “So here we are. I was gonna try to kidnap you and take you to Sturgis, South Dakota, where the annual biker convention is every year. At the time we thought we would hold you for ransom in the Black Hills. A girl like you would bring in a lot of money for our group. But you were out of town, not available for kidnapping, so I had to try a new ploy.”

  Tasha gulped. “Are you the one who sent the threatening letters to my father?” Her mind was reeling. Because of the letters sent to her dad’s office, telling him to close down her law firm, he’d hired secret service agents to protect her. The fact that he had tried his hardest to protect her from people like Daphne made her love him even more.

  Daphne started to clap. “The valedictorian is finally putting the pieces together now?” She cocked her head and sighed. “Yes. The fools would never think to look at your silly little paralegal, a girl who’d become your best, best buddy!”

  The woman standing before Tasha was utterly insane. How had Tasha been so duped? Had she been so desperate for friendship she’d allowed a lunatic into her life?

  “It infuriated me no end that you didn’t die in your house fire. Let me tell you, the girl who jerry-rigged your condo paid the price.”

  Tasha stifled her appalled reaction.

  “Where is she?”

  “Out to sea somewhere. Probably a shark ate her remains. I don’t want to talk about her anymore.”

  Daphne was a cold-blooded killer. Tasha’s determination only increased. Somehow she had to get out of here without C.J. being harmed. “All right. What do you want to talk about?”

  “I don’t want to talk. I want you to come with us now.”

  “Fine, but C.J. stays here, safe. I’ll transfer as much money as you two want into Swiss bank accounts. If you let him live, you and your group will be wealthier than you could ever imagine.”

  C.J. sat up straighter and began to move his gun.

  “You’d transfer all your savings into an account just to let him live?” Daphne demanded.

  “Yes, but you have to let him live.”

  “Tasha, I’m not letting you go anywhere!” C.J. declared.

  “Hey, sexy, you’re not in charge.” Daphne walked over and held her knife to his jugular. “Dale? Get my back.” Dale moved closer. There was no way C.J. could do anything.

  Tasha needed C.J. to stay calm until she got out the door. She had a GPS. The authorities could find her. They had to.

  “Get moving, Tasha.”

  “It’s going to be a bit difficult. I have a broken foot,” she said angrily.

  “And you think I care? I see crutches by the bed. Use ’em.”

  Tasha eyed her crutches and began to scoot over to them.

  Daphne stared at C.J. “I should just kill you now. It would make things so much easier. If it wasn’t for you, Tasha would be dead and her little pro bono law firm to help IAs would be shut down. But no, Mr. Fireman had to come and save the day.”

  Tasha looked at the man she loved and knew she had to do something. “But everything works out for a reason, Daph. Now you’ll be richer than you ever dreamed. You can have all my money and travel the world in luxury.”

  Daphne continued to stare at C.J. “The only reason you’re breathing is because your precious Tasha is buying your life. Don’t forget that!”

  C.J’s eyes looked cold as steel. “I won’t.”

  “Get moving.” Daphne grabbed Tasha by the arm, making her fall to the floor. Excruciating pain radiated up her leg and throughout her body. But there was no way she was going to let Daphne know how much it hurt.

  As she backed away, Tasha grabbed the boot lying on the floor to put on her good foot. With all the strength she had, she reached for her crutches and began to pull herself up.

  “You really are a loser, aren’t you, Tasha. Look at you. So pathetic. All you have is money. I made you into what you are now. The look, the makeup, the hair and the clothes. Where would you be without me?”

  Tasha knew she had to play along. “I’d be nothing without you.”

  “Now that’s what I wanna hear.”

  Pain caused Tasha to break out in a cold sweat.

  Daphne grabbed a gun from Dale’s vest and pointed it directly at C.J.’s head. “Dale, she’s obviously crippled. That will come into use later, but for now you’ll need to carry her out. We’ll get back in the plane with her.”

  C.J. called out, “How can you take off in weather like this?”

  “Captain, think! We have a float plane. We’re going to float to our camp till the weather clears.”

  Dale moved closer to Tasha. She was afraid she was going to collapse. For C.J.’s sake she needed to hold on.

  When Dale picked her up and threw her over his shoulder, the odor of cigarettes and alcohol was so repugnant she nearly gagged. When he adjusted her body, he made sure he hit her cast against the frame of the door. Tasha was sure he’d broken her foot again. The pain almost made her pass out.

  “She’ll need a coat in this weather or she’ll die!” C.J. shouted.

  Daphne backed out of the room with the gun. “We don’t need her alive long. Or for that matter, alive in the best of conditions. She just needs the ability to use her mind and fingers to transfer funds.” Daphne paused. “We could also use her for ransom. Either way, let the games begin,” she said with a menacing grin.

  Tasha sought C.J.’s eyes one last time. She pointed to her watch and he nodded. She could see him mouth, “I’ll find you.” Dale took her out into the freezing rain. The last thing she saw was Daphne slamming the door shut.

  C.J. WAS CONSUMED WITH rage.

  He’d let down the woman he loved. She’d gone like a lamb to the slaughter, all for him. He didn’t deserve it. She needed him and what was he doing?

  Satellite phone.

  C.J. charged through the cabin to get it. He had to let somebody know what had just happened.

  C.J. punched in number after number, but all he got was static. “Damn weather!”

  There was only one thing to do. He had to go and rescue her before the plane took off. Daphne said they’d camped somewhere around the lake. He’d find it.

  He tried the phone again, but now wasn’t getting any signal at all. What a fool he’d been to think he could hide her in the mountains of Alaska!

  When he found the camp, the first thing he’d need to do was immobilize the plane before they knew he was even there. He’d worked with Jake a few times on his Cessna when there’d been a mechanical problem. Jake knew that C.J. was a master at rebuilding motors. C.J. loved working on the engines at the station and had had to fix
his Mustang more times than he liked to admit.

  His plan now was to disable the plane’s engine, then move on to the next step. Which was to position himself high, then pick off the bastards quickly before they knew where the shots were coming from.

  Being a firefighter, he preferred saving lives to taking them. He’d always been happy to let the police do the shooting at a crime scene. Tonight his respect for them doubled.

  C.J. layered his clothes to go out in the cold. He had to block out his fear for Tasha; it wouldn’t do her any good right now. He dug into his bag, grabbed his bowie knife and strapped it to his upper thigh.

  That was when he spotted Tasha’s pills on the table. He nearly lost it when he realized the horrific pain she must be in. He put them in his pocket. Finding his rain gear, he pulled it on fast, then reached for his favorite hunting rifle, a .300 Winchester Magnum that he had used all his life. As an extra precaution, he packed some .416 Rigby Magnum cartridges owned by one of Jake’s friends. Jake had left an arsenal here.

  C.J. slung them across his shoulders, feeling their cases hit his back. Now he was ready to go and get her back—or die trying. Kidnap victims were rarely found alive after twenty-four hours. How many mothers had he had to console? Too many.

  Now it was his turn to face firsthand the hell others went through. He loved Tasha too much to let her be taken away from him. He’d just stepped out the door when suddenly he was shoved back by a group of men dressed in black, all yelling. One said, “We’re too late! How long ago did they take her?”

  C.J. didn’t know if he was in a dream or hallucinating. He took a menacing step forward. “I’m armed and dangerous. Don’t touch me.”

  Jake was there and his voice broke through C.J.’s fear-induced state. “Chris, we’ve been trying to call you for the last five hours, but the storm prevented all communication. The moment Cole thought he could fly us out here he did. We nearly died landing in this weather.”

  C.J. looked at his brother and then at Cole in panic. “They have her. Daphne, her paralegal, is the killer. She and at least one man took her by a pontoon plane to a campsite somewhere on the lake.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Maybe five to ten minutes ago.”

  One of the other men stepped forward. “Chief Powell, we’re going to take it from here. We’ll be following the GPS signal on her watch, and we’ll bring her back. If you need us you can reach us on the two-way radio.” In the next instant they were off like dogs on the attack.

  “Where do they think they’re going?” C.J. cried to his brother.

  “Those men are a specially trained unit of the FBI,” Jake said in a matter-of-fact tone. “They contacted me five hours ago to warn you to hide in the woods until help came. By then the storm had hit and all communication was down.”

  “How did they know what was going on?”

  Before he answered, Jake and Cole forcibly led C.J. back into the cabin and made him sit down at the table. They sat across from him. “A call came in to police from the San Francisco D.A. informing them that her assistant, Anthony Reynolds, was found dead in a cleaning closet. The FBI jumped all over it. Reynolds, it seems, snuck Daphne in at around twenty-three hundred hours the same day you two flew out of San Francisco.”

  C.J. nodded. “She told us she killed him. I’m just amazed the FBI figured it out so fast.”

  “They looked at surveillance videos and saw her go into the office with Anthony, then only Daphne came out. They immediately began to run a background check on her. By the time they contacted me, the storm had come and it was too late to tell you.”

  Jake looked as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. He went on, “Tasha’s dad is frantic. He thought he could trust the D.A., of all people.”

  “Daphne is a terrifying woman,” Jake said.

  “Tell me something I don’t know. What does the profile say?” C.J. asked.

  “Once the D.A. starting to delve into her background, Tasha’s father was sickened that the two of them had been duped by the ditsy woman who’d become such a special friend. If Tasha had done a thorough background check, there’s no way Daphne would’ve gotten hired. But she played on Tasha’s feelings and desire of freedom for IAs.”

  Cole jumped in. “So even her dad didn’t check Daphne out?”

  Jake shook his head. “He thought Tasha had done a proper background check. Daphne used her mom’s social security number, name and profession to get hired.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me!” C.J. was furious.

  “Her legal name is Jessica Daphne Grant, a high school dropout. Once the FBI got a photo of her, a list of criminal activities came up.”

  “I’ve never seen anyone look as shocked as Tasha.” C.J. shifted his weight, trying to alleviate the pain from his burns.

  “When they searched the film from Tasha’s office building, they found Daphne tampering with the fire sprinklers the morning of the bombing. She was the last person seen coming out of Tasha’s office.”

  “How exactly did the FBI track her here?”

  “Since the D.A. had access to the information about the FBI’s secret plans for your disappearance, they believe Daphne had it, too,” Cole replied. “They were able to track her and two men catching a flight up to Ketchikan yesterday.”

  “In case they came,” Jake added, “we flew in a special force of FBI agents. I’m sorry we couldn’t get here faster.”

  “Don’t you dare be sorry.” C.J.’s eyes had turned stone cold. “Daphne conned everyone. Now she’s going to pay.”

  Jake tried to console his brother. “The agents will find them.”

  “You think they can find Tasha as fast as we can?” C.J. pushed himself to his feet.

  “We need to leave this to the professionals,” Cole said.

  Jake turned to him. “Damn it, Cole! We’re all professionals who’ve taken oaths.” He looked at C.J. “We’ll go with you, Chris. I know this lake pretty well and have a good idea where they might’ve camped. But there need to be some ground rules.”

  “Rules aren’t going to help Tasha, Jake. Daphne’s a madwoman and the man she’s with deliberately rebroke her foot as they walked out the door.”

  “That guy is mine,” Cole declared in any icy voice that surprised C.J.

  “And you leave Daphne for me!” C.J. snarled. “I’m going to make sure she’s locked up in some institution where she can never hurt anybody again.” He began to walk toward the door.

  Jake moved in front of his brother, barring the exit. “No, Jeremiah. You can ensure the plane never flies again—I know you’re good at that—and then you’ll have to take care of Tasha. She’s going to need you now more than ever. Let us take care of the others.”

  “They hurt her!”

  “Yes, and she’s going to need comfort.”

  C.J. looked at his brother, then at Cole, before he could see their logic.

  Jake got on his two-way radio. “Roger, roger, Bravo Company. Over?”

  “Ten-four, Tango Company. Over.”

  “Have you found rendezvous point? Over?”

  “We’ve lost the signal but are heading in direction. Over.”

  “Bravo Company, we’re coming and will let you know when we’re close to rendezvous point. Over.”

  “Tango Company, that is a no-go. Over.”

  “Tongass and Checats Lake are in my jurisdiction as Tango Company. Over and out.” Jake shut off the radio.

  Cole looked at Jake. “Can you do that?”

  “I just did.”

  “Let’s go,” C.J. urged.

  The three headed out the door.

  TASHA WATCHED AS HUGE drops of rain came at her from all directions in the cold, green forest. She could feel the temperature dropping, but she would fight to live through this.

  All she cared about was the terrible pain in her foot, and staying awake. She focused on the ache, channeling it to her mind as a way to keep from falling asleep. She’d been tied
to a tree for an hour or maybe more? The rain had soaked her completely. Now the cold was going to freeze her solid.

  Tasha could hear Daphne laughing with the men in the tent hidden in the forest. They were planning how to kill her once they got the ransom money. Tasha had to believe the GPS would work once the clouds blew over. She felt her eyes beginning to close and banged her cast against the tree to let the pain keep her awake.

  The ache was excruciating, but at least she wasn’t dead. There was no way she was going to die. She had too much to live for—a life with C.J. and a family who loved her.

  Daphne came striding out of the tent with a satellite phone again. “I know it’s still raining, but I don’t want you to get too comfortable out here. Let’s see if the phone is working.” She grabbed Tasha’s fingers to check how icy they were. “Lucky for you, you can talk. Now let’s get the dial tone back so we can phone your bank.”

  Tasha fed her a slew of numbers.

  Daphne waited and waited, but to no avail. She couldn’t get a signal. She put her hand on Tasha’s cheek. “I’m beginning to think that killing you might be better. Think of the pain it’ll spare you. There are always other heiresses to kidnap and ransom.” With that she turned and laughed all the way back to tent.

  Tasha started to cry, and her tears froze before they hit the ground.

  THE THREE MEN FOUND the camp a half hour later. “Where’s the SWAT team?” C.J. asked.

  Jake put his arm around his brother. “They’re using the GPS locater.”

  The three of them edged closer and took in the parameters of the situation. “They’ve got Tasha tied to a tree,” Jake whispered. “There are three kidnappers in the tent. Change in plan. Cole? You free Tasha. I’m going to get in the plane. Chris? You keep those three from getting near us.”

  “I want to get Tasha.”

  “No! Cole’s a doctor and she’s severely hurt. He’ll know how to get her down to the plane in the least painful way.”

  “I’m an EMT.”

  “And I’m a bush doctor,” Cole asserted. “I wouldn’t tell you how to fight fires.”