“Fine,” she told him, rolling her eyes. “I’ll make that appointment with my ob-gyn. Now can you please get me to my office, or do I have to flag down a turtle to get me there?”
“No offense, but I don’t think you’d fit on the back of a turtle,” he told her, clearly doing his best to keep the smile off his face. “Besides,” he said as he slowed down and pulled over to the curb on the next block, “we’re here. And here’s Bigelow, right on time.” He brought his car right up to where the bodyguard was standing and waiting for her.
With a welcoming smile, Wallace leaned in and opened the passenger door for Marlowe.
“Good morning, Ms. Colton,” the bodyguard said brightly. He presented his elbow to her, waiting for her to take it.
Marlowe deliberately ignored his elbow as she swung out her legs and rose to her feet. “I can still get out of a car on my own, Wallace,” she informed the bodyguard stiffly.
“Never said you couldn’t, ma’am,” the bodyguard replied politely. He still watched her every move carefully—just in case.
Bowie leaned over inside the car toward the passenger side to get a better look at the bodyguard.
“I’d say you’ve got your work cut out for you, Bigelow. As you can see,” Bowie told the man on his payroll, “Ms. Colton left her sunny disposition at home this morning.”
Wallace flashed his employer a smile. “I’m sure everything will be fine, sir,” he said, glancing toward Marlowe.
“Just get me away from Mr. Personality here,” Marlowe said from between clenched teeth. “Before I say something he won’t appreciate.”
“As you wish, ma’am,” Wallace said, making certain that he was only half a step away from her at all times as he escorted Marlowe toward the building’s entrance. Reaching it, he held the door open for her.
Bowie remained where he was until he saw Marlowe walk into the building. Then he gunned his engine and pulled away.
Hearing the sound the car made as it left, Marlowe muttered under her breath, “I knew that sports car could go faster.”
“Yes, ma’am, it really can,” Wallace agreed, following her inside the building.
Chapter 20
Pausing, Marlowe rotated her shoulders and then rubbed the bridge of her nose.
Her head was killing her and her vision was getting really blurry, making the words on her computer screen look as if they were shimmering and moving about as they went in and out of focus.
Marlowe sighed as she looked at her watch. She had been working on this new proposal and telling herself “five more minutes” now for the last hour and a half. Every time she thought she was finally finished, something else would occur to her and she would have to stop and rework what she had written previously to make it jibe with what she had put down a few minutes ago.
She hated to admit it, but maybe she was pushing herself too hard.
It was getting to the point that things were beginning to spin around in her head. Even Wallace had grown completely quiet. He had adjourned to the outer office, leaving her alone. He’d done it undoubtedly in hopes that it might just help usher her along and get her to finally finish what was ultimately going to be a rough draft of the report she was going to be finalizing tomorrow.
The report that she was going to present to the state energy commission.
Marlowe bit her lower lip. This had to be just right, and at the moment, no matter how much she reworked it, she really didn’t feel that it was.
Marlowe sighed again.
Where had all this insecurity come from, she asked herself. Ever since she’d gotten pregnant, it was as if up was down, down was up and everything felt as if it was skidding sideways. Her confidence had always been her best asset, and now...
Now she needed to straighten up and fly right, Marlowe sternly told herself.
And that, she realized, was not going to happen until she took control of herself, went home and got a decent night’s sleep.
Her days of running on fumes were definitely over. She hated to admit this, even to herself, but this, perforce, was going to be a brand-new chapter in her life.
“Okay, Wallace,” she announced, raising her voice so that it would carry into the next room, otherwise known as her administrative assistant’s office. Wallace would avail himself of that area whenever Karen had gone home and he felt that she needed a little space to finish up whatever she was working on. “Your wish has come true. We’re going home.”
While her bodyguard wasn’t exactly the most talkative man in the world—there were times when he was downright quiet, almost eerily so—he did always answer her when she addressed him. Even if he wasn’t in the room, he would come back in and then answer her because he didn’t believe in shouting.
But Wallace wasn’t answering her now. He wasn’t making a sound.
Had he fallen asleep? No, that didn’t seem possible, she thought. The man ran on batteries.
“Wallace, did you hear me?” she asked, raising her voice a little louder. “I said I’m packing it in and you can take me home now.”
Still no answer.
Curious now, she pushed her chair away from her desk. Maybe Wallace had gone to the men’s room, although in all their time together, she couldn’t recall the bodyguard having availed himself of that facility even once. It had gotten to the point where she had begun to think of the man as a human camel.
“Wallace, are you there?” she asked, an uneasiness beginning to spread through her. Why wasn’t he answering? If he had suddenly started to feel sick, wouldn’t he have said something to her? He usually checked in with her if he was going to do anything out of the ordinary.
Marlowe was fairly certain that Wallace wouldn’t have just gone off to get a breath of fresh air. The man was the most self-contained person she had ever met. He didn’t eat or drink on the job, and she was beginning to think that Wallace was the closest thing to a self-propelled robot she had ever encountered.
Growing a little concerned now, she called out, “Wallace, where are you?” as she walked out into Karen’s office.
Still there was no answer.
The outer office was fairly dark, and she didn’t see him.
Not at first.
And then, staring into the darkness, Marlowe realized that she could make out a form.
Her knees went weak.
Wallace was over in the corner, lying on the floor, partially hidden behind Karen’s desk. Rushing over to him, she saw that there was a bloody crease across his temple. Stunned as well as worried, Marlowe fell to her knees beside the man, feeling for a pulse.
At first, she couldn’t find one. Forcing herself to calm down, she tried again and finally detected a faint beat. Wallace was alive.
She almost cried.
“Oh God, Wallace, you gave me such a scare,” she told him, addressing the unconscious man as if he could hear her. She had no idea what had happened to the bodyguard. All she could think was that he had to have tripped on something and wound up hitting his head on the corner of the desk when he went down.
But whether that did or didn’t happen didn’t matter right now. There was a far more immediate problem to be handled.
“We’ve got to get you to the hospital,” she told Wallace as she took her cell phone out of her pocket.
But before she could even hit the number nine, a voice came out of the darkness and said, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
Startled, her heart pounding almost wildly, she got up quickly and turned around toward the voice. She saw an average, nondescript man stepping out of the shadows and coming toward her.
As he came into the light, she realized that the man was holding a gun.
It was pointed right at her.
For the last several days now, she had had this strange, uneasy feeling that she was being watched. A feeling she could
n’t shake, even though no one had shot at her or Bowie in over a week. With effort, she had managed to convince herself that the only one watching her was Wallace and that she was being paranoid.
But now she saw that she’d been wrong.
There was something definitely wrong with this man, she thought, but she couldn’t let fear get the better of her. Wallace needed medical attention, and she was the only one who could get it for him.
“He needs an ambulance,” she insisted, beginning to dial her cell phone.
“He doesn’t need anything,” the stalker told her darkly. When she continued to dial, he barked, “Put the phone down. Now!”
Afraid he would harm Wallace further, Marlowe did as the stalker told her, never taking her eyes away from the man.
“What did you do to him?” Marlowe demanded, doing her best to use an authoritative tone.
“What did you do to him,” the stalker parroted, mimicking her voice and making it sound high-pitched and singsong. “It’s always someone else who has your attention, isn’t it?” he snapped. “Never me. Well, now I have your attention, don’t I?” he asked, mocking her. His eyes narrowed, resembling small laser beams. “Now you have to pay attention to me, don’t you?” he asked—and then he swung the gun toward Wallace, aiming it at the man’s head. “Because you know I can snuff your friend out. Just. Like. That. Right?” he taunted.
“Don’t!” she cried before she could get hold of herself. “Please don’t. You have my attention, my complete attention. I swear it,” Marlowe told the man with feeling. “Just don’t shoot him.”
The man sneered as he looked at her contemptuously. “You don’t even know who I am, do you?” he demanded. He looked familiar, but only in a vague sort of way. For the life of her, Marlowe couldn’t recall where she had seen him before, or even if she had seen him before or was only imagining it. But she sensed that if she said that to this man, it could send him over the edge or have some other dire consequences. She wasn’t ready for either Wallace or her to pay that price.
So she lied.
“Of course I do,” Marlowe told him in her warmest, friendliest voice.
For just a split second, she could see that her ruse was working and he believed her. But then his expression transformed into an ugly mask of pure hatred and, his face turning red, he shouted, “Liar! You don’t remember me. I’ve been in love with you for over two years now but you never even gave me the time of day. Never even knew I was alive,” he shouted, his face growing even redder.
“That’s not true,” Marlowe insisted, even as she racked her brain trying to remember seeing him somewhere. Desperate, she came up with an idea. “Of course I knew you were alive. But you know how it is, how my father is,” she told him. “If I let my father know about you, about how I felt about you, he would have made your life a living hell.” She lowered her voice, as if confiding information to her stalker. “He doesn’t want me paying attention to anything—or anyone—except for the oil company.”
Though it sickened her, she drew closer to the man, playing up to him. “I pretended not to notice you so that you could go on working here.” She was making it up as she went along, praying that she had guessed right with this wild stab in the dark she was making.
The man’s pale, gray face lit up, really pleased. She had guessed right, she thought triumphantly. The stalker did work here in some capacity.
But where?
Marlowe thought back, remembering that uneasy, really creepy feeling that would come over her unexpectedly. He had to work somewhere in the company where he could see her with a fair amount of regularity. Maybe even daily.
Whom did she have daily contact with but didn’t notice?
She tried to think, but it was almost as if her brain was suddenly paralyzed. Frozen.
Nothing came to her.
His smile faded as the truth came to him. “You don’t remember me,” he shouted. “You only have eyes for that Robertson man. Ever since I saw you two at that conference...”
“Oh, but I do, I do,” Marlowe told him with feeling, trying to convince him. “It’s just that you’re waving that gun around and you’re scaring me, so I’m having trouble thinking.”
Anger creased his forehead as he glared at her. “You’d like me to put the gun down, is that it?” he asked her.
Her eyes met his, and she did her best to stay calm. More than anything, she needed to get him to listen to her. “Yes, please.”
His eyes grew even colder. He raised the gun, aiming it at her. “You must think I’m really stupid,” he accused her with a sneer.
“No, no, I don’t think you’re stupid at all,” she denied adamantly. “I think you’re smart. You were just biding your time, that’s all. That was your plan all along.”
Marlowe kept talking, but she could see that she wasn’t getting through to this man. She was beginning to think that he was totally crazy. She could feel her heart starting to sink.
Her phone had already gone off once since her stalker had come on the scene, menacing her. And now it rang a second time.
Her stalker cocked his weapon, taking aim at the offending cell phone.
“Turn that damn thing off or I’ll turn it off for you with my gun!” he all but shrieked.
“All right,” she told him in a soothing voice as she reached for her phone, “I’ll turn it off.”
“Use your left hand!” he ordered sharply. This time the stalker shifted the gun so that it was pointed at Wallace. “Or so help me, I’ll finish him off right now,” he threatened.
The last of her hope withered and died within her. Marlowe drew in a shaky breath. She had no choice but to do as he said.
* * *
Damn it, Bowie thought, Marlowe wasn’t picking up, either. Now he knew something was wrong.
It had become his habit to check in once an hour with Wallace. But the bodyguard hadn’t picked up his cell phone in the last hour, even though he’d called Wallace a total of three times.
And then he’d called Marlowe, but she wasn’t picking up. He’d had his assistant check to see if there was a dropped signal, but all systems came back up and running.
Bowie tried again without success.
If the system was up, why weren’t Bigelow or Marlowe answering their cell phones?
He could feel a knot tightening in his already twisted stomach.
Something was very, very wrong.
Racing to his car, he drove over to Colton Oil headquarters at top speed the entire way, thinking that Marlowe would have enjoyed feeling the rush of cold air against her skin.
The sports car had barely come to a stop when Bowie leaped out, running all the way into the building. All he could do was pray he wasn’t too late.
The elevator wasn’t there. He didn’t have time to wait for it. Instead, he took the stairs, racing up the steps and taking them two at a time.
His lungs were burning by the time he reached Marlowe’s floor.
Running to her office, he nearly came to a stop right then and there when he saw Wallace on the floor, unconscious and bleeding.
Half a dozen scenarios played through his head, each one worse than the one that came before. “Bigelow, where is she?” he demanded.
For one awful moment, he was afraid the big man was dead. But then he heard the bodyguard emit a low moan. Relieved, he knew he couldn’t waste any precious time trying to make the man regain consciousness. He had the very sick, uneasy feeling that seconds counted and he might have already gotten there too late to be able to save Marlowe.
“Marlowe!” he shouted, scanning the area. “Where are you? Are you all right?”
There was no answer, only the sound of his own voice echoing back at him.
“Marlowe, say something! Anything!” he pleaded, fear all but closing his throat.
And then Bowie heard it.
It sounded like a muffled cry. Like someone, he realized, whose mouth was being covered to keep her from crying out.
Scrambling back up onto his feet again, he called, “Marlowe, I’m coming!” It was more of a promise than a declaration. “Just hang on—I’m coming!” he cried, racing toward the sound of the muffled cry.
Bowie ran into her office and saw someone at the far end of the room brandishing a gun and dragging Marlowe into the stairwell that was located at the very far end of the wide office.
Her private stairwell, he remembered. He wasn’t sure where it led, but he had the awful feeling that if the stalker was able to drag her inside, he could barricade himself and Marlowe in there. The very least that could happen was that the stalker might wind up harming her—and their unborn baby.
Bowie knew he couldn’t let the man succeed in getting in there with her.
Exerting practically superhuman effort, he all but flew through the room, cutting the distance between himself and Marlowe and the stalker at an incredible rate. With one giant surge of effort, he leaped up and then into the man, tackling him before the man could succeed in making off with Marlowe.
Marlowe tumbled backward, but the shock of the blow he’d sustained when Bowie crashed into him had the stalker dropping her hand.
Backing up, Marlowe watched Bowie battling her would-be kidnapper. Despite his slighter build, incensed with fury, her stalker was able to match Bowie swing for swing. Desperate to help, Marlowe looked around the immediate area, searching for something—anything—to use as a weapon so she could knock the other man out.
Feeling half-crazed, she saw the commemorative statue of an oil rig her father had given her. Grabbing it, she intended to swing it at the stalker the very first clear shot she got of the man.
But the stalker and Bowie kept switching positions as they grappled for the weapon.
And then suddenly, the gun went off.
Marlowe screamed, terrified. Her heart froze. Who had shot who?
Colton Baby Conspiracy (The Coltons 0f Mustang Valley Book 1) Page 18